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danghyuk · 3 years

Text

BTS having a tall but timid boyfriend

A/N: Request by: @awkfanboy, this is really long (like 2,6k words oof) and I’m sorry it took ages to finish.

Namjoon:

Namjoon is the tallest member in BTS, and though he’s not used to be the smaller person for once, it’s not a bad thing at all. It’s not before one of his fellow members points it out, that Namjoon starts to notice the slight difference in your heights.

With the slight teasing about how Namjoon isn’t the tallest anymore, especially from the youngest, the older members like Seokjin also starts to hint about and assume your bedroom situation.

Though Namjoon never comments on it. He’s mature about the teasing and he knows to keep your private matters to himself. In fact, he often refrains himself from smiling due to the rest of the members being so clueless and assuming that your height defines who’s the more dominant. The two of you are not your average heteronormative couple, starting with the both of you not being straight, so why do the same social expectations apply to you in every aspect?

They just continue with the teasing, taking it for granted since Namjoon never says or does anything against their claims. He wants the members to see for themselves rather than correcting them for judging a book by its cover. Because he also assumed that you would take the lead when it came to sex, and Namjoon doesn’t want to appear as a hypocrite.

So, when he finally introduces you to his fellow band members, he refrains himself from laughing as their expressions one by one changes into pure surprise. None of them can tear their eyes away from the two of you, and being shy, you naturally hide your face into Namjoon’s neck, to which he just smiles and pulls you closer. There’s not really a distinct height difference between the two of you, but it’s still surprising to see your taller and longer frame sitting on Namjoon’s lap.

Seokjin:

No one, not even Namjoon believes that you – Seokjin’s tall and intimidating boyfriend, are as shy and cute as he describes you as. “What do I have to do, huh? Drag my small baby to meet all of you hyper kids at the same time?” “Hyung, I’m sure [Name] is a lot of things, but small is not one of them…”

It takes a lot, and I mean a lot, of persuasion (and diversity of bribery) from Jin’s side to make you finally accept the fact that you were going to meet them all at once. A pep talk, murmurs of sweet nothings and loving kisses is a big part of it (and it never fails to make you blush, which Seokjin takes great pleasure in – that sadistic bastard).

Seokjin reassures the rest of his bandmates that he under no circumstances was trying to hide you, but then again no one believes that you’re as shy as he makes you out to be. On the other hand, he resonates with you that he wants the most important people in his life to meet.

On the big day, neither of you can tell who’s the most nervous judging by both of your clammy hands (Seokjin simply refuses to let go of your hand). He steers you right away towards the couch when you’re done taking off your outerwear because he knows for a fact that you’re not going to be left alone for the entire evening. The couch is therefor the perfect limbo, he can press himself into your taller and warmer frame at the same time as the members can join you.

Meeting them isn’t as chaotic as you thought it would be, and the members (especially the younger ones) are perplexed, which quickly turns to giddiness. They do not pry much (thanks to Jin’s warning looks and Yoongi’s sharp elbow into Jeongguk’s stomach), but their curious eyes bulge every time your cheeks flush due to Seokjin’s flirty antics, and whenever your hand unconsciously searches for Seokjin’s calming touch. By the end of the day, your boyfriend is wearing a permanent smirk and your ears have never felt warmer due to Seokjin ‘accidentally showing off the long scratch marks on his back.

Yoongi:

Yoongi can be blunt when he wants to, not to mention honest, but there are some aspects of his private life he values too much. One of those being you, of course. The other members know he has a boyfriend of some sort; however, they are rather bad at getting any type of information out of him. Jimin and Seokjin are the nosiest, being two different menaces – one nagging and one too curious for his own good.

From what they have gathered, they know that you are younger than Yoongi and that’s about it. Despite Yoongi rarely opening up when it comes to the boyfriend topic, he does sometimes slip up. Like that one time you changed his lock screen to the two of you and he forgot to change it back.

Despite his fellow band members constantly begging him to introduce you to them, Yoongi declines every time with no room for any argument. What his members don’t know is his reasons for not wanting to introduce you to them just yet. Even after being together for almost four months, you’re still extremely shy and nervous around large groups of people, especially nosy ones. BTS is exactly that and because they’re considered as his second family, he just knows you will be way more nervous meeting them and to give them a good impression of yourself.

When they do meet you, it is just by accident and poor miscalculations. Yoongi had texted you earlier to come over and with a clear signal that the dorm was empty except him. However, it is not your boyfriend who opens the door for you when you arrive. Jimin, who wasn’t expecting anyone, mirrors your shocked expression as you both stare at each other for a while. He figures out who you are immediately seeing as Yoongi was everything but subtle when he pulled you after him in a hurried manner towards his room, and he doesn’t waste a single second to text everyone about his discovery.

When the rest of the members arrive back home, they are met with a pretty funny and slightly pathetic sight. You, a 190cm tall male, trying your best to hide behind your much smaller boyfriend. Your much taller form next to the smallest idols in BTS is a sight to take in. Just like Jimin, all of them are shocked by your height, but also how you behave around Yoongi. With looks as sharp as knives from Yoongi, no one dares to look at the two of you too long nor ask the question at the tip of everyone’s tongue. This lasts until Yoongi, by accident again, manages to tug your sweater down and expose your hickey covered throat.

Hoseok:

When Hoseok starts to date you, everybody knows it. Before they have even met you, BTS knows what your favourite colour is, how you look when you sleep and how many plants you have. He can’t particularly help it since you’re his favourite topic and honestly, everyone is rather amazed at him not having exposed your relationship. The weird thing, which Yoongi pinpoints every time you are brought up in a conversation, is that they have yet to meet you.

Being constantly reminded by the other’s and not having a good answer as to why they haven’t met you, makes them slightly annoyed. You are already a huge part of Hoseok’s life and it’s not hard to see how much you affect him in every aspect. A single text from you can make his entire day and he wears the same dreamy smile whenever he returns from a date with you.

There’s nothing else Hoseok wants to do other than introduce you to them, but he respects your comfort zone and takes your feelings into consideration. If you don’t feel ready meeting them, then he’ll wait for you 100%. You’re his adorable boyfriend after all, even with your taller and bigger build, he adores how easy he can make you flush and writhe underneath him.

“Yah! When are you going to introduce your boyfriend to us?” “Soon, I hope. He’s just… really shy.” Whenever Hoseok uses that specific word to describe you, the others have a hard time believing him due to his other stories about you. Luckily, they do not have to wait long before you agree to meet them all.

The first introduction goes like dream, except for the many times you hit your head in the door frames. They are all in awe of your height, whether they voice it out loud or not (like Taehyung asking you if he could get a piggyback ride). Some of them feel slightly guilty for not believing the rapper earlier, though those feelings are quickly brushed away by their curiosity. How come someone so tall has a personality resembling that of a fragile flower? Another thing they learn, to their surprise, is Hoseok’s new favourite hobby – teasing you until you’re hiding in his embrace.

Jimin:

The first thing Jimin had noticed when he saw you was your undeniable height, but it wasn’t what drew him towards you. He can’t deny that you look absolutely stunning, with your long legs wrapped in skinny jeans or slacks that make your figure seem as if you’re sculpted by the gods, but he simply can’t enough of your flushed cheeks and you averting your eyes whenever the two of you lock eyes for more than five seconds.

He simply thrives on how completely different you are compared to your looks. Even though he is the smallest in BTS and is relentlessly teased for it, he has absolutely no problem standing at the tip of his toes just to whisper something dirty in your ear, kiss your nape or just tug you down by your collar to meet your lips in a deep kiss.

Because of Jimin’s never-ending PDA, you’ve gotten quite used to being showered in affection and more used to ignore prying looks, though you can’t stop yourself from blushing whenever he decides he wants to kiss you. And you just know he does it on purpose, that’s a no-brainer because your boyfriend will always, without a doubt, burst out in a cute high-pitched giggle every single time he manages to make you hide behind your own hands.

Jimin is pretty quick to introduce you to his friends and the first thing they immediately point out are your ridiculous differences in height as if you weren’t aware of it yourselves. Your boyfriend is used to comments like that, but you aren’t and causes you to step behind Jimin- using him as a shield. You’re practically digging your own grave by trying to hide behind your boyfriend, BTS are ruthless and they tease you even more after laughing at your attempt at hiding.

BTS thinks it’s cute how the two of you compliment yet contrast each other in your relationship. With your tall build and shy nature, it’s easy to imagine your personality as cold and stoic, so, until now you’ve done nothing but turning the other member’s expectations upside down. They still can’t phantom the image of you turning towards Jimin for permission someone asks you to do something or join them.

Taehyung:

Like Namjoon, he isn’t really aware of height until he has a hard time kissing you, messing with your hair or jumping at your back for you to carry him. He also tends to forget how tall you actually are because he is a rather spontaneous and impulsive person. It doesn’t bother him even if he has to ask you to bend down time after time, Taehyung just huffs in fake annoyance and simply tugs your head downwards.

Due to your own awkward and timid personality, you feel bad whenever he has to ask you to bend down. Taehyung thinks you’re being ridiculous when you tell him and shows you just how hot he thinks your taller frame really is. That certain event made Taehyung realise in which direction your relationship was establishing and unfolding, and he realised how little he cared whether you took control or not.

The discovery makes him more aware of your sheepish habits and your reserved way of accepting his affections. From how your neck would turn darker whenever he does something you really like or display your relationship – to how you would try to make yourself smaller next to him in the public (he always scolds you for doing so because he’s worried about your posture).

The two of you have spun your own net of habits around you and your relationship, which you often are unaware of, but when you meet his bandmates, they’re a little thrown off at how you and Taehyung’s dynamics work. You are completely used to your boyfriend making the decisions and don’t think much of it until the rest of BTS, especially Jimin and Hoseok, catch on to who’s really in charge.

Suddenly you find yourself in the middle of a sexual innuendos and joke battle, and your face feeling as if it’s on fire does anything but defuse the situation. Even after getting Taehyung to save you and sitting in his lap, it’s Seokjin and Jeongguk’s turn to laugh seeing as you’re trapping your smaller boyfriend between you and the couch. Having the build like an intimidating basketball player doesn’t help your case when a little kiss makes into a stuttering and flustered mess.

Jeongguk:

Your height is something Jeongguk was jealous of originally before you got together and before he knew that your ‘tall, mysterious and handsome’ appearance is you being too reserved for socialising in large groups of people. Now he just relishes and finds pride in being able to push you down on your couch, bed, floor, whatever to start a heavy makeout session, knowing you love it as much as he does.

He loves to show you off to everyone, everywhere. “Look at my boyfriend, isn’t he gorgeous?” “He’s legit a tree, Jeongguk, but sure.” Having him constantly spewing out compliments and bragging left and right, doesn’t help your shy persona at all and makes you pull out of social interactions more often than not.

Thus, portraying yourself as unapproachable and standoffish to others. BTS has a hard time warming up to you since the first few introductions were brief and pretty awkward for both parts. Even though they’re all impressed by your height, it just adds to your ‘tough guy’ image. Jeongguk doesn’t give up however and tries harder to include you in the group activities.

Whenever you try to excuse yourself or go somewhere quieter, your boyfriend hurries to pull you back in even if he has to haul your tall ass over his shoulder. It’s quite the sight to see the youngest member dragging his way taller boyfriend after him as if he has no worries. Your flushed expression makes them ponder a bit before they all realise the same. Seokjin even apologies for not being the most welcoming, they just found you slightly intimidating, and of course, that makes you even more flustered as you accept their apology.

After the big revelation, Jeongguk’s friends watch your interactions with your boyfriend wide-eyed, disappointed in themselves for not having noticed your constant flustered expressions, how you seem to lean on Jeongguk and the fact that it’s the youngest BTS member who initiates all physical contact like kissing you and placing his hands on your thighs. The two of you fit together like a puzzle even if some stereotypical roles are reversed.

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bondsmagii · 3 years

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same person who asked about spelunking (sorry i binge your blog every now and then and keep finding things i wanna hear about this time!) But you mentioned one of your most terrifying experiences involved dolls, I'd love to hear about it if youre comfortable :>?

oh it's fine, don't worry! I can always appreciate a good old fashioned bit of curiosity. I suppose it's only fair that with all the creepy experiences I take from other people, I finally give a statement of my own. buckle up, though, because this one is a long one.

So, this all happened in 2011-2012, and it began in Belfast, Ireland. A friend of mine, Caoimhe, had started studying at Queen’s University, and she had moved in to student accommodation in the student district nearby. I was studying in Scotland at the time, but thankfully the summer and winter holidays provided me with three months off each, so I would frequently return back to Ireland and catch up with the people who’d stayed there. Caoimhe’s place, being situated in the city and in a university district, was obviously the place to hang out and party, but before I even arrived Caoimhe warned me that the place was… odd. Now, as anyone who’s ever met me knows, I absolutely love creepy stuff and I have a tendency to bring it out in places and in people; naturally I asked for details, but Caoimhe said she wanted to see what I thought when I got there. Considering I was going to be there that evening, I was able to have a modicum of patience.

I get there in the late afternoon. It’s summer and everything is still bright and lively, and the street looks normal. Parking is only on one side of the street; on the other side is a row of buildings, three floors high. Most of them are split into houses, but there are a few businesses there, too – a nursery school, a hairdresser’s, that kind of thing. I get out of the car and go and knock on Caoimhe’s door, which is between two businesses. She opens the door, and immediately tells me she cannot wait to hear what I think of the place. I have no idea what to expect, because Caoimhe was always the sceptical one and it takes a lot to get her even remotely excited about anything spooky, but I realised what she meant within about five minutes of being in the house.

It was the weirdest layout of any house I have ever seen.

Upon entering, I was in a small porch area. Going through the interior door brought me to the bottom of a set of stairs; to the right was a short hallway, containing a bedroom and, at the end of it, a spacious kitchen. Going up the stairs, I came to a small bathroom on the half-landing; turning and ascending the second flight brought me to a small landing area and, directly opposite, a colossal living room. Turning up yet another flight of stairs and there was a larger bathroom on the half-landing, practically industrial – like a large school changing room. There were about eight showers all lined up in cubicles, toilets lined up in other cubicles, and a row of old, almost Victorian-looking sinks. There was no door to the bathroom, either. Just an open archway leading to tiles that looked as though they should be on a factory floor in the early twentieth century. After this, there was another flight of stairs and then a small landing, this time with nothing ahead of it but, to my left, a long hallway. I mean, a long hallway. The longest hallway I’ve ever seen in any residential building, ever, in my life. It went on, and on, and on. From beginning to end, at a normal walking pace, it took about two minutes to walk. There were other doors, but they were few and far between. Only three people lived on that floor, and the hallway just stretched endlessly on. Caoimhe, of course, lived in the absolute furthest room from the stairs. We walked, passing the occasional door, under dim, flickering lightbulbs high up in the ceiling. We had long since walked past the original house we had entered. We were probably almost entirely down the street by this point. There were no windows at all.

Finally, we get to Caoimhe’s room. It’s practically at the end of the hall; in front of us is a dead end, and a fire escape that cannot exist. All of the buildings on this street are terraced, which means that joining on to this wall should be the next building. There were no alleyways separating any of the buildings at street level – they were all side by side, sharing a wall. I asked Caoimhe about it and she just shrugged, and then pointed to the wall opposite her door. There was another door there, cheaply made, not a fire door like the doors to the bedrooms. It also didn’t fit properly, leaving a small gap and a cool breeze drifting out from between the wood and the frame. I, of course, stuck my eye to the gap and peered in. I could make out nothing aside from swirling dust and the faint outline of the first few steps of another set of stairs. Upon my asking, Caoimhe told me she didn’t know where it went to, and that she and some of the others had tried to prise the door open but given up when it wouldn’t budge. They had even asked the university’s residential services about it, but were told that it didn’t belong to them as tenants and it was best to leave it alone.

As I mentioned before – Caoimhe is not really interested in messing around with this kind of stuff. Practically minded, she spent her time dealing in the tangible, and as a nursing student she had precious little free time. What free time she did have she enjoyed spending drinking, and annoying me by doing lines of cocaine off my books. I love her dearly, but you have to understand that mysteries like this do not interest her at all, but they drive me mad. From the moment I saw that door, I suppose my fate was sealed. In the old refrain of many sorry souls before me, I had to know.

The first few nights I was there was admittedly spent partying and catching up, and nothing out of the ordinary happened. I split my time between staying with Caoimhe and staying with an ex-boyfriend of mine, Brian, who lived about half a mile away in another part of the university district. I was at his place when I got a call from Caoimhe at about two in the morning, telling me that some weird shit was going down and I had to come see. I, of course, ran over there as quickly as possible, to find the house in uproar. Aside from one girl on the ground floor, everyone else lived in the Endless Hallway – all three of them – and they were all out of their rooms and standing in a strange section of the hall about two thirds up. Here, two rooms were located, the doors to which were set back in a little alcove. Opposite this alcove was another fire door that had to lead to nowhere, that I admittedly had not noticed before. I stared at it, confused, and then I was temporarily comforted when Gemma, once of Caoimhe’s housemates, asked me if I hadn’t noticed it before, either. I absolutely had not, and the general consensus was that nobody had noticed this fire escape. It was very difficult to miss, too – it was silver, with the green sign for a fire escape on it, but strangely there was no way to open it from this side. It was just a smooth door – no handle, no push bar, nothing. Being a fire escape door, it should have had a push bar and swung open into the stairwell or hallway beyond, to prevent it from being blocked from opening by a crowd of people trying to escape, but there was nothing. It was like looking at a fire escape door from the outside. Everyone agreed that it could not have been there before; Gemma and Ashley, the girl in the room next to her, were absolutely adamant they would have noticed it, considering it was right opposite their doors; Caoimhe admitted that she probably wouldn’t have noticed it because she wasn’t in the habit of noticing every door she walked by, but she did admit that the colour would have made it hard to miss. I, of course, amin the habit of looking out for such details, precisely for reasons like this, so I had definitely not noticed the door before.

I asked how they had noticed, and Gemma said that she had heard running footsteps in the hallway going back and forth for some time, and as she’d been trying to sleep she had opened her door to tell whoever it was to knock it off. She had found the hallway dark, and the door opposite hers. She had understandably been freaked out by this and banged on Ashley’s door, and the commotion had drawn Caoimhe into the mix whereupon she had said she knew a guy who absolutely had to see this shit and called me. She was correct, and I duly stayed the rest of the night to see if anything else happened. Nothing did, and aside from the extra door that had materialised in the hallway, things were calm for another week.

When it all kicked off again, I was staying over after another heavy night partying. Caoimhe and I were passed out in her room when we were both woken up by an incredibly loud crash. Before we could work out what had happened, lights went on in the hallway outside and we heard Gemma start screaming, and I mean reallyscreaming. Caoimhe and I jumped up and ran out into the hall, sprinting the distance between Caoimhe’s door and the alcove, and there we found Gemma hiding behind her own door and the fire door opposite wide open. It had been flung open so wide that it had crashed against and dented the wall it was on. Ashley was looking at it, dumfounded; Gemma could barely watch. Caoimhe was also not being much help, so – bound by insatiable curiosity and an extreme lack of self-preservation that for me is so often co-morbid with said curiosity – I went forward to investigate. I noticed that the door seemed old, like it had perhaps been rusted in place; beyond it there was nothing but darkness, and cold air moved out of the passage with enough speed that I felt a strong breeze. I had my phone, so I turned it on to use it as a light, seeing that beyond the door was a short landing and then a set of stairs. I went to the wooden railing at the top and shone the phone down, seeing that the stairs appeared to keep going in a half-flight, small landing, half-flight pattern. The stairs were all wooden, and in bad condition. With the girls still nervously watching, I descended the first flight and then turned to look at the next one. It smelled stale now, and slightly damp; I put the brightness of my screen up and saw, arranged neatly at the end of each step, there was an item of children’s belongings – a toy, or a teddy bear. They were all arranged very precisely, one on each stair, all the way down as far as I could see. Where the light gave out, the darkness was so black it seemed to have a solid weight. I decided I was not going down there without a proper light, and as I didn’t yet have one, I retreated back up the stairs. We closed the door over, but it would no longer fit in its frame; a chair was dutifully carried all the way up from the distant kitchen and put in front of it.

I quickly discovered something even odder about that staircase. Probably to the surprise of nobody, it shouldn’t exist. The floors directly below us should have been a hairdresser’s; there was no space for a stairwell and no way to exit on the ground floor. I went outside and checked both the front and the back of the building, and no doors opened anywhere near where the stairs should have come out. There was just no possible way for it to fit, and no point to it being there. It was a dead end in dead space.

Now we get to the truly terrifying part. For several weeks the place seemed to be fine, just the kind of regular haunting I was used to but that the others understandably found concerning. Cold spots, weird noises, strange atmospheres, feelings of being watched… that kind of thing. It made me increasingly uneasy in one particular spot of the house, though. There was one other mystery door that led to a mystery staircase, and that was the strange, out-of-place door opposite Caoimhe’s room. I figured that there was a chance that that door shouldn’t be there, either – like the fire escape, it was a different kind of door to the others, and also like the fire escape, it didn’t quite fit into its frame. I tried multiple times to get in to the staircase beyond, but the door would absolutely not shift and every time I tried, I would soon have to retreat because of an overwhelming sense of sadness and dread. I’ve always been highly sensitive to the paranormal, and anyone who has spent any amount of time with me has seen some inexplicable stuff go down; something I’m known for is knowing things I shouldn’t be able to know. I either just know them – they just arrive in my head full-formed and I know that it’s the truth – or they come to me in dreams. These dreams stand out from the other dreams because they’re incredibly realistic, and even in the dream I know that they’re something else entirely. I’m either myself in the dream, moving around and discovering things on my own, or I’m watching as somebody else does it, silently observing and, unusually for my dreams, with no amount of lucidity at all. I suppose, with all my banging around trying to get up those stairs, I must have finally tapped in to whatever it was that would allow me to know what was beyond it, because shortly afterwards I experienced the worst instance of this of my life.

By this point, I was back at university. I hadn’t thought too much about it all in any detail because classes had started again and I was still exhausted from driving all my stuff back over, getting the ferry, unpacking… moving every three months was a bit of a drag. Despite this, when the dream started, I immediately knew where I was. The building felt different, and all the lights were dimmed to the point they were barely worth being on, but I knew I was back in Caoimhe’s flat and I also knew that it was years before anybody moved in. I stood there and watched as a woman walked towards me down the long, endless hallway. She was young, probably in her mid-twenties, and her hair was a mess. Her face was blotchy and her eyes red; she was still crying as she walked past me. I knew that she was moving out, that this was the final walk-through; suddenly I was the person who was moving in, and I was being handed the keys, and the estate agent was saying that the place was mine and that the agreement still stood: I was allowed to do anything with the place and the price would stay low, so long as I obeyed the wishes of the previous owners and kept the top floor as it was and in good order. I agreed and then I was alone in the hallway.

I immediately walked to the end of the hallway, past the room that was Caoimhe’s when I had known the place, and to the door opposite. The wood looked newer now, and when I pushed it, it swung open noiselessly and without resistance. I walked up a neat set of wooden stairs and the light was warm, sunset-orange. I emerged from the staircase and found myself in a lovely attic room, the sun setting through a large dormer window opposite. The room was a beautifully decorated nursery, with a small bed under the window and a dresser, a toy box, a rug on the ground littered with toys. I looked around, touching the small hairbrush on the dresser, seeing the little blonde hairs entwined in it; on the nightstand next to the bed was a picture of the crying woman I had seen earlier, happy now, holding a smiling little girl of about two or three months in her arms. I stared at this picture for a long time, feeling a growing sense of sadness that deepened into dread. I felt paralysed, unable to turn and leave even as the dread grew and I wanted to more than anything; instead of running, a sudden urge to sleep came over me. I staggered to the small bed, curled up to fit, and immediately passed out.

When I woke, I was on my back and the room was dark. There was enough moonlight that I could see the glint of the picture frame beside me. Immediately I was gripped by terror – I was aware, even then, that I do not sleep in my dreams. I can do a lot of things that most people can’t – I die in my dreams, I read and write in my dreams, I see my reflection in mirrors in my dreams – but I do not sleep. I decided to sit up and see if any of my usual tricks for waking myself would work, but before I could move I felt something shifting in the bed beside me. It was solid and firm and cold; it pressed itself against me with plastic smoothness and then shifted, part of it bending. Out of the corner of my eye I saw something sitting up in the bed beside me. I told myself not to look at it, but of course I did. Sitting next to me in bed was a baby, but at the same time it was a doll. It had the plastic look to it, the strange texture of the hair, the glassy eyes – but at the same time its face moved, its limbs moved, and around the eyes and mouth there was a slight discrepancy, like the whole thing was a plastic mask forced into the flesh of the face. I stared at it, mute, too stunned to do anything, and then the baby doll opened its mouth, revealing sharp, pin-like teeth, far too many of them – and it began to cry.

I have never heard a sound like it and I never wish to again. It was a cry so piercing it was painful; it was a sound meant to terrify. It rose the same dread in me as I imagine people felt when they woke to hear air raid sirens in the dead of night; the distant thud of falling bombs. It was all I could hear and it was all I became. It inspired a blind terror in me that I have rarely known; I wasn’t human as I launched myself from that bed. I was a prey animal in flight, I was running for my life. I jumped from the bed and before I could hit the ground I awoke, miles away, in my dorm room in Scotland – but something was on the bed beside me. I sat up, turned, and the doll was there. It looked at me, grinned, and opened its mouth. Then it started screaming again.

I want to say that’s the moment I woke up for real, but I was awake. That thing was beside me in bed, still screaming, and I was awake enough to panic, to roll out of bed, to stand up, to stare in frozen horror for several seconds, and then to reach out blindly until I managed to turn the lamp on. The room filled with light and still the doll remained, for three or four seconds, still crying that horrible sound, and then it faded. The sound faded with it, gradually, until I could only see an outline on the air, and then it was gone. I did not sleep for the rest of that night. For the rest of the semester, I only slept in the daylight.

I never returned to Caoimhe’s house. I have my answers, which is something, but I do not exaggerate when I say that the cost was far more than I anticipated I would have to pay, and that something of that experience has forever stuck with me. Even now, a decade later, I go to bed every night with the fear that I might wake up in that hallway again, the door at the end of it – and the knowledge that I will go to it, step into the sunset-orange of the space beyond, and go back up those stairs.

#[slumps onto desk] statement... ends #seriously that made me feel some kind of way holy shit i need a cup of tea and a lie down #anyway enjoy one of the most fucked up paranormal experiences of my life i guess #my creepy shit #creeptastic #statements #long post #anon #asks

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geminil0vr · 3 years

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𝙬𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙖 𝙬𝙖𝙨𝙩𝙚 !

the masterlist -> part two

summary ✰ your relationship with your boyfriend, ben, has been a little (a lot) rocky from the start. back from a session of him not even trying to help you finish, you run into pansy in your dorm room, and it's safe to say she has some suspicions.

tags ✰ @partr1dge <3

wc ✰ 1.7k

content ✰ fake moaning, toxic relationship, a little smut, sexual themes galore, cumming (not just yet for our dear reader), (constant) mentions of shitty sex experiences, lying, endless cursing, reader is h word, getting dressed, mentions of homework (this one should be classified as a warning), snooping/stealing

a/n ✰ this is pretty much just a short intro, some backstory and all that !! i hope you like it. and be careful, past the read more it pretty much goes directly into some smut/sexual themes. okay, happy reading :))

with a few final thrusts, your boyfriend comes inside you, quickly pulling out and rolling next to you on the bed. you laid there, as usual, fake moaning, pushing back onto him. and he went quick, not doing anything to make you feel good, and pulling out before you've even come (though, when the only thing he does is piston in and out of you like a personal fleshlight, that's unlikely to happen). this is how all your sex happens, usually.

ben turns to smile at you, cupping your cheek in the palm of his hand. "did you cum?"

ha, did you fuck. he's not even done foreplay. "yeah! like, twice. didn't you notice?"

you've found that the only way to entertain yourself is by making even more outlandish statements each time you fuck. well, he fucks you. well — no, it isn't really fucking. he actually has the nerve to ask why you make him use lubrication every time... perhaps it's because he refuses to eat you out, or even play with your clit for more than fifteen seconds, or finger you to prepare you. in the early days, he tried, and you repeatedly went to tell him what you liked. and, not enjoying being told what to do, he did it how he wanted, and now consistently leaves you in a confused state of 'how can i be so horny when he did the bare minimum?'. ben calls it domination. you call it ignorance.

another way you've found to entertain yourself, is by making sex a performance. see, when you first started off, you were a virgin, and although well-educated on sex and the things you might like, you didn't feel inclined to fake anything. now, you've been with ben for around six months, but in your first one he put up this façade of a romantic, so you had gone and fallen (tripped, stumbled, collapsed, grazed your fucking knee) for him. you'd fallen for roses, and dates, and... well, that was it. your standards were pretty low back then — christ, you were sixteen! and when you two finally did anything, two months into the relationship (despite his relentless begging), the glass window was shattered.

ben is selfish. once you sucked his dick, and let him fuck you (the definition of fuck is still on thin ice, really), the romance came around less often. you thought it was just a typical couple thing. you mean, your past relationships lasted about a month or two. you thought this was the average.

until your friends, well, they got boyfriends and girlfriends, and now they're always grinning, and they have little spats that are easily resolved with communication, and they're in love. and the way they speak about sex, merlin, it's like a fantasy out of some erotica book. 'he did this', 'she did that', 'it felt so good', 'it's like they know exactly what i want'. so when your friends turned to you about your sex life, you put all your walls up, and you told them some phoney story about how he's your best lay (... your one lay) and how he's so bloody good at taking care of you.

you still feel bad for lying to them. but it's been four months, now. you don't want to go back, not that they would be mad at you, but you're almost embarrassed about how long you've stayed. you know they'll make you break up with him, considering what an arse he is in and out of the bedroom, and you're scared to get into drama, and you're scared he'll be upset, and you're scared that a little part of you still clings onto your old, false perception of him, so you stay. you know it isn't healthy. but you stay.

and you make sex the greatest show of your life, you arch your back, you moan, you gasp, you refrain from telling him that when he cups your breast it feels like nothing, you curl your toes, you remain submissive. in bed, you're a porn star of a very vanilla, one-man show. and you give yourself a five-star fucking rating. of course, you only started this when you realised he would never listen to you. ben just reckons he's got really good in bed all of a sudden.

"you alright?" ben is already in his trousers, buttoning up his school shirt. you're still in only your bra on the bed. 'course, no aftercare.

"yeah, sorry, dazed off." hurrying to get dressed, you kiss him on the cheek (he doesn't like kissing on the lips once he's come in your mouth) and rush to your dorm, tie hanging underneath your collar. class is in forty minutes. when you two started, you were five minutes into a free hour.

the slytherin common room is moderately empty, most people being in class already or making use of their free hour, and when you drag your shoes all the way to your dorm room, you definitely don't expect to see pansy parkinson flipping through a magazine on top of her emerald duvet.

see, you've known pansy since first year. she isn't much involved in the slytherin girl group, but she gets along quite well with everyone, sometimes participating in sleepovers if she feels like it, and always cracking clever and bitter jokes. pansy's a nice girl, though relatively bitchy with the gryffindors, and you quite like her, and she quite likes you. it's a mutual agreement, you say 'hello' in the mornings, and she'll ask you for a quill from time to time, and you'll hand it to her, and when you two are drunk out of your minds you do challenges to see who can drink the most, in your dorm room, as all your other friends giggle and watch on. it's a good, solid, friendship, albeit not super close.

and just as you would feel with any friend, your dishevelled appearance (undone tie, messy hair from your 'performance', untucked shirt) immediately embarrasses you as you stand in the doorway.

"oh. hi, pansy." you give a tight smile, shutting the door behind you and going to do your tie, before giving up because, well, you're shite at doing ties, and tossing it on your bed. "what're you still doing here?"

she's not stopped eyeing you since you came in. "gee, lovely to see you too, y/n. and, couldn't be bothered to socialise. draco's being a dick." she looks over your appearance critically, raising a sharp brow. "had fun? good lay?"

"y—es. 'course." you swallow, diverting your attention to your school bag, attempting to disguise the fact that you certainly did not have fun. nor a good lay; couldn't be more the opposite, actually. well, you were lying down?

she pauses, clenching her jaw before tossing the magazine to the side and narrowing her eyes, one leg crossed over the other, arms crossed over her chest. head tilted. lips parted. "you okay, there?"

taking a deep breath, you kick your shoes off and turn around with a gentle smile, passing a comb through your hair. "yeah, why?"

"just, you look more like you've been dragged through a bush than been fucked." her face is completely blank, and your cheeks grow hot from her crude vocabulary, but nonetheless you chuckle. looking down, you notice that one of your thigh high socks is rolled to your mid-calf. thank god the hallways from the ravenclaw tower to the dungeons, and your common room, were pretty much empty when you walked through.

you roll it back up and begin tucking in your shirt. referencing to your sock, you grin. "stylistic change. and yeah. ben, well, he's quite the animal in bed." more like a tortoise. not because of speed, but have you seen how they mate?

"hmm." she hums, tucking a strand of short black hair behind her ear, and nodding before picking back up her drama magazine to look over different pages as you quietly put your clean clothes away. a comfortable silence settles in the room while you take the time to get out your homework, sitting on your bed and correcting a few of your grammar mistakes. it's a long while before pansy speaks again, not looking up from the pages. "gilderoy lockhart still hasn't got back his memory."

"awful shame," you smirk, finishing up your work and putting it away before bounding over to her four-poster bed. sitting down, you fold one leg under the other that remains firmly planted on the carpet. your eyes gloss over the painfully colourful magazine with wizard celebrities plastered all over it, "tell me, why do you read such trashy things?"

"found it in daphne's drawer." she shrugs, rifling through some more pages.

"you went through daphne's drawer?"

"was bored. 's not really interesting in there." pansy deadpans, "doesn't even have any sex toys." then she grins cheekily, pearly whites on display. you suck at your teeth and shake your head in amusement, chuckling and getting up.

"dickhead. put it back before she notices!" you exclaim.

"alright, then." she rolls her eyes playfully, and bounces up, smoothing out her short, school skirt and slipping the magazine back into daphne greengrass' bedside table.

with only ten minutes to get to your transfiguration class, you start to clean up your appearance, leaving just the top button of your shirt undone and attempting to do your tie. pansy slips on her high-top converse (mcgonagall will have her head for that), doing the laces and glancing over at you every few seconds as your fingers fumble with your dark green tie. how many years at hogwarts, and you still can't do it right? you squint in the mirror hung up on the wall, once more wrapping the thicker part of the tie around the thinner part, tucking it under, making a loop, tucking the — wait, how did it go again?

"here, let me do it, since you're so bloody incapable." pansy storms over, exasperated from watching you fail, grabbing you by your shoulders to twist you around and taking matters into her own hands. she does it expertly, because of course, she's a pureblood, and purebloods just have to be bloody good at everything. tightening it up just a little, she folds down your collar and smooths her fingers over your shirt, before coming up behind you and getting up on her tiptoes to wrap her arms around your shoulders and make sure the tie is well situated. you hold in a breath as her fingers brush against your neck — really, that dumbarse boyfriend of yours leaving you high and dry makes everything get you worked up.

finally, pansy works some of her fingers through your hair, smoothing out the messy strands framing your face and placing her hands firmly on your shoulders. "perfect." and she's gone, grabbing her bag and swinging out the room before you can even utter a 'thank you'.

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chaoticneutralwriter · 4 years

Text

Fifth Act: Diligence

Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him - James 1:12

guardian demon!jimin x reader

genre: fluff, romance, supernatural, angst, slow-burn, slice of life, comedy

word count: 12.9k (CHONKY BOIII)

related works: see Masterlist under guardian demon!jimin au

Continuation of Fourth Act: Kindness

A/N: when i said it was long, it’s LONG long. WHEW! The second longest chapter in the series so far?? djfksgh Sorry to keep you waiting for so long ;w; I can’t thank you enough for your patience and unwavering love and interest for this series in spite of it! So here we go, FIFTH ACT YALL HHHH I hope you’ll enjoy!!

@cherryjiminiee @kokobaekkie @breathebangtan @itsadoozie @thatshylatina @chiminieboi @azulamakesmeblank @sectumsemptae @awkwardwookie @aduky @poisonseashell @shortannoyingginger @caramelmac-chiato @sana-b @jiminstinct @beautifulparisiangirl @taelieninvader @ggukjitaejin @xakemi-chiix @vantaenims @atulipandarose @moments-of-melancholy

You don’t want to admit it.

It’s so cliche.

But you’re not gonna burst out singing Meg’s song from Hercules because you’ve passed that stage at least.

What your problem is is that confessing your feelings has proven to be way easier said than done on a multitude of different levels.

Confessing to someone is already a nerve-wracking thing to begin with — you’re basically laying your heart out to a person hoping that they won’t end up completely crushing it — but furthermore, you don’t even know how to go about doing this. For the past days or so since you’ve resolved yourself to Jaehee that you were going to take that leap of faith, your only means of contact with Jimin has been through texting which was both a blessing and a curse.

You’re not gonna lie and say that you didn’t need to do some psyching up first, some mental pep talk through the assurance that you could still hold a decent conversation with him without getting sweaty palms. Of course, when you did manage to pull enough courage to direct the conversation to that topic (and okay maybe a glass of wine helped too), you were strategically swerved.

If there was one thing you wanted to do when you confessed, it was to do it in person. You feel like this is too big of a deal to do through text even if it would’ve helped you with organizing what you wanted to say better. You wanted to be open with yourself and to Jimin and being face to face was the only sure way to get your sincerity across.

So whenever you ask him if there was any chance he could meet up in person, whether it be at a cafe or even just late at night in your room, he would always excuse himself saying that he couldn’t. The reason always being that he was ‘busy’ or had matters he needed to attend to (his words, not yours). You understood at first, though the times when they happened it had put a damper on your confidence, but it soon became too redundant and you grew agitated, even more so because any attempts at a compromise didn’t work either; Jimin never gives a straight enough answer for it.

But then the chats became sparser, never lasting more than a few short exchanges until they just stop altogether.

And when the texts aren’t being returned, your calls are met in the same manner; your only reply is the sound of the dial tone.

Soon your suspicions morphs into anxieties, and though you attempt to reign in your imagination, the longer you don’t hear from him, the more they become rampant. Your mind begins to dredge up memories of things you’d rather forget, playing them out as if to show you how eerily similar this all is, taunting you, reminding you that the last time this had happened your guardian demon had come back on the brink of death.

You swallow, trying to quell the suffocating feeling that comes up but there’s a pressure on your chest that has your breathing shortened. You’re wringing your hands unconsciously, a small attempt at coping with how on edge you’ve become though it proves to not be as effective as you would have liked. How you found that out was because anything and everything irritated you and it showed.

You hate how it seems like you can’t go for a minute without wanting to snap at the next person who so much as look at you — a really bad thing because you work in an industry that requires you to maintain your cool in literally any situation, even the most absurd ones.

And it’s like today was ‘let’s irritate the hell out of Y/N L/N’ and you didn’t get the memo because the clowns are out in full force.

“Well I don’t want to call the help line, that’s gonna take too long.”

Deep breaths, you tell yourself, deep breaths.

“They’re actually pretty fast with finding your transaction history; the only time it would take a while is if you called during the weekend because their time of operation is shortened.” You explain for what felt like the millionth time.

Yet still, the man in front of you continues to scowl as if this is entire thing was your fault.

“But I’m already here, I don’t want to have to go home and come back because that’s a waste of gas.”

“Sir,” You start again, “I can’t refund this item for you at full price if you don’t have the receipt. As I said, I can still put it on a store credit but I will have to deduct thirty percent because I don’t know if you got this on sale or if you used a coupon — that’s just store policy. Or,” The word comes out firmly, “You can find the exact same item and just do a straight exchange for the better of the two.”

He pauses, as if to think it over and you were foolish enough to think that maybe he finally sees reason, but then he opens his mouth.

“But I want my full refund.”

Holy shit if it were not for the laws of this land….

“Then you’re gonna have to call the help line or go find the exact same item and exchange them.”

You’re done, you’re absolutely done and you swear if this man doesn’t walk away doing any of your suggestions right now, you can’t promise that no ones about to get smacked in the face with your scanner. Thankfully, as if the universe has heard you, he begrudgingly takes the box of outdoor fairy lights (you really want to pull your hair out here) and heads off down an aisle. You actually breathe out a sigh of relief, but there goes what little of your patience you have left.

Now you can only pray that the rest of your shift goes by as quickly and as smoothly as possible.

Obviously that was too much to ask for.

You cash out around five people more before a woman approaches your register, holding a box with a picture of a white Instax Mini Polaroid camera on the front. You’re not sure if it’s your gut instincts or because you’re already so annoyed that immediately, you have a bad feeling about this. Regardless however, you muster all the mental strength you possess to suppress the feeling. Lips pulled taut into a wide smile, you greet the customer with an overcompensating amount of friendliness.

“Hello, how are you?”

“Yeah, I want to change the colour of this polaroid camera.”

You force the smile to remain on your face, “Sure no problem! Which colour would you like instead?”

“The pink one.”

You turn around to scan the rows of polaroid boxes hanging on the pegs behind you, picking out of the three colours available for the pink one the woman wanted. Placing it on the counter beside you, you ask nicely, “Can I see the receipt for the camera that you have and the camera as well please?”

She slides the box over to you and you see the receipt poking out of the slit. You take it out, opening the box to check the camera inside and make sure that everything that came with it was still there. Once you confirm that it is, you close it back up and unfold the receipt to match the barcode number on the box to the one that’s printed. Looking over to the pink coloured one, you confirm that the the item code for the white and pink cameras are different which comes as no surprise for you; in order to do this exchange, you would have to return and repurchase so the inventory count would be correct for the store.

A rather simple and painless concept.

“Why can’t I just take this one and give you this one?” The lady questions, annoyance colouring every one of her words as she gestures between the two cameras.

“I know they’re the same camera but since they’re different colours, they have two unique item numbers that differentiate them from each other to help with our inventory. It would only work if they were the exact same camera.”

“But they are!”

“They’re different in colours.”

“You know I’ve shopped here for a long time and I have never had to do this before.” She scowls at you and you refrain from rolling your eyes because clearly she doesn’t shop here enough to know.

“We’e always had this policy ma’am.” You instead answer plainly, the artificial civility in your demeanour already dissipating. When it’s clear that you weren’t going to budge and give in to her intimidation, she rolls her eyes and pulls out her card to insert into the pin pad. The computer system lets out a beep in error, letting you know that the card she used was not the one she purchased the camera with.

“Is that a debit or a credit card?” You ask despite already knowing.

“It’s a debit.”

 “It has to be on the same card you used to pay for the camera.”

“Why can’t I just use any card?” You can already pick up the growing inflection in her voice; it’s a little louder and more aggressive but at this point you’re at your wits end too.

“For security purposes.” You choose to state simply, tired of explaining when you know it won’t work.

“Well, I don’t have that card on me because I thought this was going to be a simple exchange.” She says accusatorially, like of course all of this is your fault and you’re the one who’s being difficult. You try to take a deep breath in discreetly, jaw clenched until you feel it beginning to ache before you reply back to her.

“I can put it on a store credit and you can just use that amount to pay for the camera again.”

Your answer makes her huff, crossing her arms as she says, “Fine.”

Your finger practically punches in the appropriate operating system for the return method, reaching in a side drawer behind your counter to pull out a black card meant for store credits. There’s a slight tremble in your hand from the sheer effort of holding yourself back, feeling like a coiled snake ready to lash out at the littlest prod that you try to keep hidden by speeding up the process, which almost makes you slam the drawer close with more force than necessary.

You confirm the amount and swipe the card through the machine in one quick motion, carelessly dropping the card onto the counter in front of you as you wait for the printout copy of the transaction to come out.

“You didn’t have to throw the card like that.” The woman’s voice snap, piercing through your tunnel vision, so hyper-focused on just getting the task done that for a good minute you actually don’t know what she’s talking about.

“I didn’t throw the card.” You reply evenly.

“Yes, you did. Just now.” She challenges, gesturing to the card and pinning you with a sharp glare.

“It dropped out of my hand.”

“No, you threw it.”

“I didn’t throw the card, it dropped out of my hand.” You reiterate, biting out the words that at this point, there’s no way she wouldn’t notice your own growing disdain. To your surprise, she doesn’t continue to try and fight you on this (though the crossed look on her face remains) so you take it as a sign to proceed on to completing this transaction.

You think you’re in the clear; after swiping the card through, you hand over her new receipt and the camera she wanted but before you can even think about gritting out a very forced ‘have a nice day’, the woman cuts you off with a terse, “I’m speaking to your management about this. What is your name?”

The shock of her words make you freeze in place, your jaw nearly dropping from speechlessness. She can’t be serious right now….

But as the woman continues to wait, clearly impatient yet stubborn enough to wait for your answer, you realize that yes, she really is threatening to take down your name and report you to management over this petty squabble. Your heart is practically beating in your throat now and you feel your face heating up at how angry you’re getting, so much that for a split second the rash thought of outright refusing her came into mind. You wanted so badly to go through with it, loathed the idea of letting her think she had won when it’s her who was wrong in the first place. However, rationality wins over in the end; as sweet as the instant gratification would be, you think it’s not worth losing your job over.

Also, you just want her gone.

So you find yourself swallowing your pride and begrudgingly, you give her your name. To add insult to injury, she asks for a pen to write it down onto her receipt before she finally turns to walk off.

Great, fantastic, just what you needed; being written up because this stupid, entitled bitch decided to mouth off on you for something you have no control over.

You hate how your heart is still pounding, still trembling from your barely restrained emotions that has your nails digging into your palms. With a shaky exhale in an attempt to shake it off, you radio over to your manager that you would like to take your break now.

Thankfully, you’re given the go ahead and you had never made for the break room faster in your life, brisk pace allowing for no chances of getting stopped by any more annoying customers. Once the door shuts behind you do you finally slump back against it, temples throbbing as you take in deep shuddering breaths.

It takes a feel minutes before you feel calm enough, the overwhelming fire simmering down to a calm you can control.

You may have had to swallow your pride in telling a Karen your name and risk being written up, but you’ll be damned if you let it break you down.

The groan comes out unabashedly when you unceremoniously fling yourself across your bed, finally home after what felt like a ten hour shift. You lay there, eyes shut like you’re trying to trick your body that you’re in the state of sleep just so you can obtain some semblance of energy back — it doesn’t work.

Instinctively, your hand reaches to dig into your sling bag to fish out your phone, muscle memory dictating your actions as your thumb slides your lock pattern open and they’re tapping on the messenger icon before you can even think to stop yourself. The window opens with Jimin’s message thread staring right in your face, mocking in the way it has not changed status at all, frozen in its own time.

You don’t know how many times you’ve seen this screen at this point but it still never fails to stir back up all the negative thoughts and emotions that has been plaguing you so vividly as if it was your first time experiencing it. Your teeth are tugging at your lips again, reading and rereading your own sent messages that have gone unanswered, all asking the same thing;

Are you okay?

Where are you?

The details to the questions are no longer of your concerns because each scenario you conjure in your head was worse than the last that they threaten to drive you mad. You don’t think you can bear the weight on your heart much longer as more and more days pass in living this torturous limbo of not knowing.

All you wanted was just an answer, anything that would let you know that he was out there, alive and well.

That alone was enough for you.

You tear your gaze away from the offending sight, tossing your phone carelessly onto your bed somewhere. You sit back up just in time to hear the front door unlock and open, signalling for Jaehee’s arrival home.

You exit your room to greet her, wanting to take your mind off of things if only for a short while.

“Hey, where’d you run off to all day?” You ask, helping Jaehee with a couple of grocery bags but a quick peek lets you see that there are some that contains other curious things like….is that a plant?

“Hey! Oh, just here and there. Stocked up on some more food stuff but then got really distracted because look at these!”

Jaehee excitedly sets down a reusable bag on the table before reaching inside to pull out its content, which turns out to be a good sized leafy plant sitting in a cute little white ceramic pot. The leaves are wide and arrow-like in shape, marbled beautifully in vibrant greens and yellows — the lightest colour starting from the centre and transitioning much darker — that makes them appear as if they have been painted on. At a quick glance, you would’ve actually believed that the plant is fake if it wasn’t for the specks of dark soil spilling out from the base when Jaehee accidentally tipped it too much while placing it down.

“They’re called Chinese Evergreens. Aren’t they pretty?” Your roommate beams, twisting the plant this way and that. “Now that I got some time to myself, I thought why not finally fulfill my wish in living my life out as a plant mom.”

A loud snort leaves you as you gingerly place the bag of food on the kitchen counter, turning around to see that Jaehee has pulled out yet another leafy looking plant, only the leaves of this one were long and banana shaped, a solid dark, olive green colour and parted slightly at the centre into an almost fan-like shape with seven leaves equal to each side.

“I got this one because I remember growing up, my parents had one, only theirs was way bigger.” Jaehee comments, holding up the plant comfortably in her hands. “I never knew what it was called until the gardener helping me told me it was a Kaffir Lily.”

You blink, a little skeptical at the name because it certainly didn’t resemble the lilies you pictured in your head.

“Lily? So does that mean it’ll flower?”

“Apparently? I was surprised too because I don’t think I’ve ever seen my parents’ plant flower but the gardener say its sporadic and sometimes first blooms don’t happen until two or three years later.” Jaehee regards the plant with a pensive pout and a tilt of her head but then shrugs and happily says, “But judging from the pictures though, they look pretty!”

You hum, choosing to nod along with what Jaehee says before turning back to sort out the food she’s bought. Seeing Jaehee so lively like this makes you glad for her. Ever since quitting her job, it’s like a weight has been lifted and Jaehee isn’t shy about taking full advantage of all the time she has now to do the more simpler things she’s missed out on — like cultivating plants apparently.

Whatever the hobby is, it’s nice to know that at least one of you is thriving.

Over dinner you express as much, which you get a boisterous laugh in response and actually feel sorry when Jaehee asks the same of you but all you can do is tell her that things have been the complete opposite on your end.

Aside from the god awful day at work you had (one which had Jaehee physically reeling and not knowing what to do with herself for a good five minutes; that was pretty funny), you had also told her of your predicament with Jimin. She’s frowning by the time you get out that you haven’t heard from him for days now.

“Every time I ask him to meet up in person, he’s always brushed me off or changes the subject, like he’s avoiding it.” You sigh out heavily, can’t keep how troubled you are from it out of your voice. “Now I don’t even hear from him at all and it’s making me anxious.”

A pause, and once again you’re wringing your fingers as you try to work out any sort of explanation for this. “You don’t think…You don’t think I scared him off do you?”

“No, no I don’t think that’s it.” Jaehee affirms, though the pinch in her brows doesn’t go away. “I mean it would suck if that’s all it takes because damn, I actually had a lot of faith in him but….I don’t know, it doesn’t seem right to me.”

Her words give you more comfort than you had expected, a relief you hadn’t known you needed and you’re all the more grateful for her to anchor you down. After wracking her head a bit more, Jaehee says carefully, “You mentioned how he was leaving soon, did he say anything about when he’s coming back or….?”

“No, he— he didn’t say. Just that it would be soon….” You swallow, feeling your chest clench suddenly. “I mean, he’s been gone before like this — twice actually — but he comes back, he always does…”

Even if it nearly kills him….

You trail off in your ramblings, trying hard not to reveal too much to Jaehee yet you feel like you’re making excuses for yourself because you don’t want to acknowledge the possibility that Jimin would up and leave without telling you. If not to your face then you’d hoped he would have at least the decency to leave you a note. Besides, shouldn’t there be some sort of formal undoing to your contract with him if he’s clear to be a free roaming demon again? It wouldn’t make sense if you’re still tied to each other in some way, or does the contract simply null itself? You refrain from letting out a groan, feeling the frustration and the oncoming headache draining what last bit of energy you have left. Instead, you drag your hands down your face and let out a heavy sigh.

“It only makes me worry because sometimes he’s reckless and does stupid things….”

“Wait, like what kind of ‘stupid things?’” Jaehee suddenly interjects, sitting up a little straighter and sounding a little more concerned. It has you floundering on how to put lightly that it’s in Jimin’s nature (and literally his job) to go out and find people to tempt them into depravity; would be fine and all had he been the only dangerous thing roaming the city but no doubt after that fateful night, there was something else more dangerous out there. Even though Jimin had told you it was one of those rare moments that he ended up so badly injured like that, you’d rather not take any chances or have him test his luck again.

“I don’t know like…things that might get him into unnecessary trouble.” God that does not make it sound any better. Panicked, you hastily add, “Nothing illegal of course! But like he…tends to wander and is a little too impulsive sometimes – do his own thing without thinking it through?” You cringe, bracing for Jaehee to give you shit for liking a guy who now sounds like a drug dealer or something. She gives you a rather perplexed look, a sort of lopsided quirk of her lips but eventually she seems to let it go, wordlessly trusting you and your sense of judgment.

“I’m just asking because….” Jaehee hesitates, then begins chewing on her bottom lip and her nervous tick starts to make you antsy.

“What?” 

“When I met up with him, on the day we talked about quitting my job at the cafe, he also brought up how he’ll be gone for a bit and told me to make sure it doesn’t worry you too much.” She lets out a short, wry chuckle. “Actually said something along the same lines but about you, or as he put lightly, ‘make sure she doesn’t go off and do something she might regret.’”

It takes a second for her words to process, so shocked at hearing about this new tidbit of information. You blink and can’t help the hard frown that takes over your face, “W-Wha— Wait hold on, he told you he was going to be gone for a while too? And he didn’t say where either?”

And what did he mean ‘go off and do something you might regret’??

Jaehee winces slightly at seeing the heightened distress she’s caused but she powers on, firmly believing that you deserve to know as much as you can in regards to someone you deeply cared about.

“Yeah, he only said that much to me so I’m still as lost as you are. But….” She swallows, “Before he left that day, he didn’t look so well…. Like, he might be coming down with something serious.”

Your shoulders tense, heart palpitating as your mind begins to race.

“I’m not saying this to freak you out because it’s just what I saw so you can take it with a grain of salt. I’m just letting you know in case it might shed some light on some things.” Jaehee placates, holding up a hand as if in an attempt to calm you. You try to get a word out, an acknowledgement or anything but your throat suddenly feels too dry and all of your thoughts are spinning with questions that have no answers.

Did he get hurt? If so, how? Or can demons actually become ill, but from what? Is this why he’s not answering your calls or texts? Because he was trying to hide whatever this is? For how long?

“Do you know any of his friends? Someone you can contact to try and get a hold of him for you?” Jaehee’s voice pulls you back out from those depths, only half registering her words.

“I— Uh…No, not real— “ You stop your jumbled stream of thoughts midway when one name does come to mind. “Yeah…. Yeah I know someone.”

You say that, but you hadn’t exactly thought of how you were going to find him, let alone ask him if he could find out where the hell Jimin has disappeared off to.

Hell, you're not even sure if Jungkook's around to help anymore. If you remember correctly, you swear the last time you’ve spoken to him was on that rooftop garden and that felt like ages ago; you haven’t heard so much as a peep from him since.

But you need to try something.

As aloof as he is, Jimin always lingers in some way, like a shadow that’s hidden out sight and after Jaehee’s talk, you're confident that he wouldn’t just leave without telling you first. Clearly, there's something else going on with him and he's not telling you. So it’s with that hope that you find yourself doing things you wouldn’t find yourself doing late into the night at almost two in the morning.

Like google searching how to summon specific demons.

It’s so stupid, you’re well aware. Before, you would be like anyone else when it comes to your opinions on the supernaturals and anything relating to the occult; a skeptic and a very niche hobby one partakes in. You wouldn’t have thought twice about it existing because there was little to no evidence on it (or if there were claims, it would consider to be a reach). Oh how the tables have turned and with this desperate times calls for desperate measures position you’ve found yourself in, now it’s like a whole new world full of possibilities, ripe for your picking.

Perhaps not something you should dive right into the deep end of but what other choices do you have? Besides, you never know if there might actually be something helpful or clues in…..Beginner’s Guide to the Dark Arts and Satanism.

.... Fucking hell, what are you doing?

It’s okay, you reassure yourself, as long as you don’t accidentally end up in the dark webs then you’re good.

You go through a number of different websites, all looking and sounding more like something you would find in a fantasy novel or just plain cult-y. Once or twice you come across ‘summoning rituals’, most of which involve your run of the mill staple requirements: lots of pentagrams, symbols, candles, a skull of an animal or a straight up animal sacrifice, and some fancy incantations that you’re not sure are even legit.

Of the times you do come across specified summoning rituals, they include all of the above in varying methods but one thing that had remained consistent, you noticed, was that you needed a name — a ‘true’ name as they had called it — of the demon you’re trying to summon, like Beelzebub or Lucifer.

It leaves you briefly wondering about your guardian demon’s name, the one he went by rather than the alias he uses. You never realized and the more you mulled over it, you begin to feel immensely guilty.

How must he have felt when you called him by another name that wasn’t his.

You go to sleep that night with a knot in your stomach.

Much of your nights is spent that way; scouring through internet searches hoping to find some sort of lead to go off of but honestly, there’s only so much sifting you can do before everything starts to sound like the ramblings of a fanatic. The only information you had found promising was about the summoning rituals, particularly the ones to summon a specific demon, given if you knew their true names….which is something you don’t possess, either for Jimin’s or Jungkook’s.

It’s a frustrating fact because it’s the last and most crucial thing you needed if you even want to attempt trying. You hate the idea that you’re so close to getting somewhere and it’s just this one thing standing in your way. At this point, you think you might have more luck trying to summon Lucifer himself and asking him where your guardian demon went.

…..

Huh.

Your fingers stop scrolling through your phone — another demonology article you’ve come across that didn’t really have much to do with finding a lost demon but intriguing enough to have you read — the thought pervading in your mind. It should concern you that it stays for as long as it did but the worse part is that the more you thought on it, the more it made sense.

If you can end up with a demon as your traditional guardian angel, then surely you have a chance at getting a hold of his boss, right?

Before you know it, you're flinging the covers off and booting up your laptop again in the quiet darkness of your room, half telling yourself that you won’t go through with this insane plan if you can’t find that one web page that seems the most credible to you. Much to your bemusement, you do, tucked away as a bookmark no less. It comically sticks out in contrast amongst the other more mundane things on the list; cooking recipes, nail art tutorials and then boom: witchcraft, demonology and understanding how you can attract different entities based on the energy you create through the elements.

Well, you think, looks like you’re about to find out whether Hell really is toll free after all.

If someone were to tell you months earlier that you would be spending a weekend shopping around for items to set up a demon summoning ritual you’ll be attempting yourself, you’d probably just let out one long, exasperated groan into oblivion before accepting the predicament, mumbling something along the lines of ‘he’s going to end up killing me first before anything else, and then what?’

Furthermore, you’re not just summoning any demon, you’re going to try to summon Lucifer, essentially the CEO of Hell and you’re about to pull a goddamn Karen — ‘corporate will hear from me!’ — on them because your guardian demon decided to go AWOL on you and you’ve had enough of being left in the dark. When they say you either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain, this wasn’t exactly what you had pictured for yourself.

Ah, truly the things you do for love.

Once you got over that rather ironic analogy (literally stared vacantly into space for a good ten minutes, not knowing whether to laugh or cry), you had searched up all the places within your city that would possibly have the things you were looking for. The site had suggested a variety of them, ranging from apothecaries to antique shops. It took you by surprise when you do actually find two or three of them, not expecting at all for these sort of niche shops to exist in what you had always pictured to be a mostly uptown urban neighbourhood — guess that goes to show how much you go out.

Your plan was to hit up these little shops, buy what you can find there and then whatever you’re missing you would order off from a suggested website. So that’s how you find yourself on a Saturday off, bright and early; a rare sight for all kinds of reasons as normally, you’d be dead to the world until at least after twelve in the afternoon but you had been so restless that even sleep didn’t hold you back.

You’re on a mission.

After painfully following your buggy google map directions, you stumble upon the first stop. It’s a little apothecary shop, tucked away down a small, narrow side street where much of the city’s history is still prevalent in its structures. You can only guess these buildings were built in the early 1900, or even 1800 — the brick-red edifice is well worn and have patches of dense ivy that seems to almost swallow the walls whole. It appears to be tightly packed, the few mom and pop shops that are open on the street level on either side have multiple windows and sometimes iron fenced balconies above them, which you can only guess are the living spaces for the owners. For the most part, it’s quiet, the only other person you’ve seen is a young man who was too engrossed in getting an interesting angle with his camera.

Craning your neck, you take in the the lacquered sign above which reads ’The Soul Apothecary’ in gold script against a dark forest green paint that colours the outer front of the shop. It’s chipped in some places, mainly along the border that surrounds the large panelled window that display numerous of things on a small wooden shelf; crystals that are big and small in varying colours, jars of dried herbs, small potted plants, and wind chimes made of both wood and silver hanging off to the side.

It’s all very quaint and it makes you think that perhaps on some other less tumultuous time in your life, you would actually visit this place again.

Once you had your fill in admiring the exterior, you finally make your way towards the front entrance, passing by the two potted evergreens and pushing the door open to which a little silver bell chimes, signalling your arrival. Immediately, you’re taken by the interior and the smell of burning incense. It’s rustic in nature, the furnishing mostly, if not in all dark wood with the same forest green accents and despite it being a relatively small shop, everything has been designed to effectively maximize the use of space; nothing appeared to be cramped or cluttered at all.

All the walls were occupied from top to bottom with shelves and drawers, packed full of jars containing who knows what with the occasional decorative pieces breaking in between — taxidermy butterflies in frames, diagrams drawn on parchment that has browned with age, and geodes. There’s a single, long wooden table that sits in the middle of the store that holds trays of trinkets that can be worn with a little chalk sign that has an explanation on the purpose of certain items (and a winky face drawn next to a ‘buy one get one free’ advertisement), mini figurines and mortars. Above you, you realize, were dried lavender and roses hanging from a bar secured into the ceiling, their scents still faintly lingering in the air whenever you pass under.

Finally, you come upon the front till and it’s perhaps by far the most eye-catching thing you’ve ever seen. Framed on either ends of the counter were two wooden pillars that taper towards the top to form a narrow pyramid where two wrought iron rods curve outwards, meeting in the middle. Hanging from them were brass scales, varying in lengths and sizes, some of the little weights left forgotten from previous use. It’s here that you also discover the source of the incense, the lotus shaped burner resting off to the side along a call bell.

You’re so caught up in taking everything in that you had failed to notice someone else has entered the room.

“I gather you enjoy my shop?”

The sudden appearance startles you, whipping your head up to come face to face with a chest before quickly shifting your gaze upwards and when you do, you do a double take. The owner of the voice — and as it turns out, the shop — was a shockingly handsome man, his hair a chestnut brown with the tresses sweeping naturally down over his forehead and looks soft to the touch. His face is oval in shape, set upon a strong jaw and brows but paired with warm features; eyes round, tall nose, and a prominent cupid’s bow upon plush lips (though you’re sure not as plush as Jimin’s), you think you can go as far as to say his face was near perfect— the golden ratio as they call it.

He’s dressed in a white tunic shirt, loose and flowing over broad shoulders and simple black trousers, his only other accessories were the long silk scarf draped around his neck, it’s gold intricate floral designs standing out against the black colour and a single dangling silver earring with a nail point at the end of the chain, the shape reminding you of a fang as it twinkles with the slightest tilt of his head.

For a moment, your mouth and brain fail to work coherently, leaving you to gape stupidly like a fish. To be quite honest, you were half expecting a much older gentleman or lady to be the mysterious owner of the shop, a long ingrained stereotype from all the fairy tales you’ve been told as a child but standing in front of you is a man you think no older than twenty-eight. Furthermore….. why does he look so familiar?

You can’t quite place it, like your mind is just on the cusp of figuring out where you’ve seen him before, but then you’re back to drawing a blank once your eyes focus on his features. It’s almost as if you’re being forced to relive a deja vu over and over again. You give up eventually, tired of this mental battle that’s only aggravating you. Besides, you have more pressing matters at hand. Like functioning as a normal human being.

“I— Uh, y-yeah! It’s— It’s a nice place. So...” You gesture your hands uselessly, not really knowing yourself what you mean by it either so you smile back, exhaling a nervous laugh. He lets out a hearty chuckle in response, a hand over his chest as he throws his head back slightly and letting you see his Adam’s apple bob.

“Ah, hearing how speechless you are about my shop is all the compliment I need.” He peers down at you again, soft smile never leaving his face, “Though that can only mean you’ve never visited before?”

You shake your head sheepishly, confirming his assumptions. “No I haven’t, so you’re right about this being my first time.”

He withdraws to his full heigh with a thoughtful hum, nodding his head and clasping his hand behind his back. “I had a feeling since I remember all of my customer’s faces. I guess I should introduce myself then.” With a flourishing bow, he says, “You can call me Sung Jin or Joel, whichever you prefer.”

You nod, smiling widely as you introduce yourself as well. “Y/N.”

“Y/N….” Sung Jin repeats, committing it to memory. His expression dims briefly, a complete one-eighty from his otherwise cheerful demeanour but as quick as it came, it vanished, replaced by his usual benevolent smile again. It has you thinking that maybe you had imagined it. “What can I help you with today?”

Seeing as there were no other customers aside from yourself, Sung Jin sticks by your side, helping you find most of the items you have written down on a list. He’s charming, quite amicable as he enthusiastically tells you about the different plants and minerals you were looking for in great detail, their medicinal properties (or lack thereof) and other trivia facts you hadn’t bothered to look into.

You enjoy it, fascinated by what you’re learning yet you can’t help feeling the irony of it all because what you’re using these things for is far from healing purposes. And evidently, Sung Jin seems to catch on when the items start to become more and more dubious in nature, but in spite of it, he does little to deter you from buying them.

“So….. Atropa Belladonna….” He starts off casually, one dark brow raised and when you give him a puzzled look back, he adds, pointing his chin at the vial of dull purple, bell-shaped flowers and shiny black berries in your little basket. “Commonly known as deadly nightshade — not something people buy often, let alone ask in my shop.”

“O-Oh….” You nervously fidget, eyes darting from the little jar of poison to the jar in your hand (‘chamomile’ the label reads, a subconscious choice that you’d rather not look too much into). “Uh... I just thought...you know, it looked pretty interesting...?” You sound as convincing as a soggy loaf of bread, the grimace on your face not helping at all.

Sung Jin stares at you, eyes boring so intensely into your soul that you felt the need to lean back slightly. It goes on for a long minute until he lets out a loud gasp and he leans in, stage whispering conspiratorially, “You're not trying to summon a ghost or a demon are you?”

“N-NO!” It comes out louder than you had intended, spluttering and choking on air as you say defensively, “I'm not – !! Who would – why would anyone wanna do that?!” The jar still in your hand nearly goes flying from all the frantic waving you're doing. At your strong reaction, the tall brunette bursts out into a guffaw, slapping the tops of his thigh delightedly, laughter pitching and squeaking as if you'd just told him the funniest joke he's ever heard.

“I'm just kidding! Oh man, the look on your face was priceless!”

Again, you're hit with the dizzying sensation of deja vu, so fast that you're left in a daze until you're knocked back by Sung Jin who playfully smacks you on the shoulder.

Geez, is the incense that strong in here? You don't know what's gotten into you.

Once he finally calms, Sung Jin lets out a satisfied sigh, placing his hands on his hips as he regards you again. “Well! If that's all that you're looking for today, I'll be happy to cash you out whenever you're ready.”

“A-Ah...yeah....” You reply weakly, still trying to recover from the cold sweat that he made you break out into. Once you get your bearings again, you shuffle on over to the register counter and by the time Sung Jin bags the last of your things, you'd spent just a little over a hundred dollars. Your wallet is crying but you tell yourself it's all on Jimin's tab that he's wracking up with you.

“Thanks for everything today, Sung Jin. It was really nice meeting you and finding your shop.” You say. The shop owner smiles at you, about to bid you farewell when he catches himself, eyes widening in realization.

“Ah! I almost forgot something!” He whirls around from leaning against the counter to rifle through the drawers behind him, muttering under his breath until he makes a noise that lets you know that he's found what he was looking for. Turning around, he presents to you a stone crystal of sorts, about the size of his palm. At first, you think it's some type of rose quartz, only much paler than what you're used to seeing but as the light catches it, it shimmers iridescently, the vibrant colours sparkling and bouncing against the wooden surface of the counter. “A gift for you.”

“Oh no, I can't possibly...”

“Consider it as a 'thank you' for spending over a hundred dollars.” Sung Jin cuts you off with a tut, gingerly sliding the crystal into the little black pouch and cinching the draw strings together before offering it to you, “Also, it doubles up as a protective charm.”

“Oh really?” You ask, mildly intrigued, tentatively taking the bag and placing it into one of the pockets in your large tote bag.

“Yeah, keeps away all those evil spirits and spooky, scary stuff.” He wiggles his fingers at you, making you snort. Without any more surprises, you gather the brown paper shopping bags in your hands and turn, ready to leave.

“Thanks again, Sung Jin. I hope I can visit sometimes near the future.”

He shoots you a beaming smile, one that makes his eyes crinkle and cheeks full, waving cutely at you. Right before your eyes, he's aged back ten years and the sight makes it all the more difficult not to return his smile.

“Of course, come back soon Y/N. I'll be expecting you.”

His parting words ring out the same time the bell above the door does, making you halt just outside of the shop. You turn to look back as if something is compelling you to do so. It's confusing because you don't have any attachments to this place, having only visited for the first time and yet, you have this strange feeling of not wanting to leave.

The connection is broken just as quickly however, with the shuttering of painted wood, the door closing with a forceful clatter, effectively cutting off the strong earthy smell that had seemed to permeate around you until now. You shake your head, taking a deep inhale of the fresh air in the late afternoon sun. It clears away whatever dreamy haze that remained and with a shrug, you head on home, intent to tackle the rest of your remaining tasks.

Obviously, they would call for a night with a full moon, right on 3AM – the start of the witching hour. That's usually the case with these things right? Aside from this one requirement, everything else had been exceptionally easy to obtain. Your trip to Sung Jin's shop had saved you a lot of time and trouble in finding the things you needed which left only a handful of items that needed to be acquired – most of which you found on Amazon (of all places, but you suppose you really can find anything and everything on Amazon). The only hiccup you had was Jaehee nearly discovering your, as you sardonically call, 'new secret hobby' (boy that would've been a fun conversation to try and weasel your way out of).

So thanks to Amazon Prime, you have your very own demon summoning starter kit ready to go by the time the next full moon appears. And lucky for you, it lands on the day you have a closing shift so after you're done working, you can head right off into doing this – you have your eyes set on a local park just outside of your neighbourhood as the perfect place for it!

Wow, you sound way too excited about trying to summon Lucifer with no prior experience.

But you attribute the morbid exhilaration you're feeling as nerves you would have when you're doing something out of your comfort zone, like skydiving – except this was by far the most unorthodox way of getting high off of an adrenaline rush ever. Either way, you're antsy during the days leading up to it and even more so throughout your shift; you could barely keep still. Once you punch out for the night, you bid a hasty farewell to your co-workers and jet off without a second to waste. You take the bus to your normal route but instead of walking down the street towards your home, you continue on forward for two blocks.

You cross the road, coming up on the park that was like a little island all on its own with a simple playground and a set of swings that has seen better days situated in the centre, bordered by a singular paved path that curved from one end of the park to the other. The three street lamps planted sparely about the area begin to come alive just as the last of the sunset's light fades over the horizon. It casts everything in an umber glow, occasionally flickering sporadically. It's a quiet night, the only sounds are the faint chirping of crickets and passing cars in the busier intersection at the end of the road. There was no other person that occupied the park as far as you can tell, only seeing one or two people out taking a nightly stroll. The weather is especially warm tonight; even with the sun down there is still a blanket of heat that remains in the air, making you think that maybe you might actually get an early summer at this rate.

Your skin feels slightly warm and dewy as you decide to take a seat on the lone bench, finally putting down your tote and the big brown paper shopping bag you've lugged to work and stuffed in your cubby locker. It contains all of the things you need to set up for the summoning ritual but seeing as it's only eleven-thirty, you pull out your headphones to listen to some music while you wait for the appropriate time.

The moon was bright tonight, so clear against the cloudless sky that it almost looks like it was hanging right above you. You fall into a tranquil peace staring at it, the first in what felt like ages that you just bask in it – might as well take advantage of this rare moment before who knows what kind of shit will hit the fan soon.

Unfortunately, it lasts for about a good hour and a half before your nerves rear its ugly head again, suddenly so acutely aware of the time slowly passing. You're no longer satisfied with gazing at the moon, already having given up on trying to see the stars if you stared hard enough (you've never had such luck with that around here anyways). So you try to occupy yourself in other ways, like taking a look around the playground (you foolishly decided to try your hand at going down the twisting red slide which nearly sends you crashing into the sand pit below; that slide should definitely not be that fast) and doing a couple of rounds on the swings (before it let out a loud and concerning creak).

Still, the itch persists, you want to get this over with much like ripping a bandage right off. But magic takes time and precision, there's no cutting corners here, or so you read.

You eventually settle to make your base in the small platform of the play set, anxiously checking and rechecking your bag to see that you have everything. After you painfully drain your phone battery to fifty percent and nearly falling asleep, the clock finally hits 3AM. Now, you're truly deep into the night where the world falls to a hush and knows no better of the deeds that are about to transpire. The perfect cover.

You get to work, climbing down the play set with your bags in tow. Through the tab on your phone, you walk through the steps in setting up the summoning circle, using simple white chalk to draw on the pavement. You sprinkle the area with a crushed mixture of herbs and roots you had bought from Sung Jin's shop in the cardinal directions as instructed and draw a salt ring in the middle, meant to contain and protect you from harm. Finally, you mark the five candles and the inside of your wrists with more symbols in black ink and then take out a safety pin.

This is the one part you hate.

Inhaling deeply, you press the point of the pin against the pad of your thumb, adding pressure until you flinch, feeling the skin pierce and bead of crimson rises from the wound.

“Why do they always gotta involve your blood or any kind of blood....” You mutter, annoyed as you swipe it against the body of each candle, just above the marked symbols. Sticking your thumb in your mouth, you lick away the remaining blood as you arrange the candles to sit at the different points on the summoning circle and with a match stick, you light them all up. When the last of the candle is lit, you flick away the match and get into position, scrolling all the way down on your phone until you reach the incantations.

“Alright, here we fucking go...”

With your palms facing up, you begin to recite the first lines. You try to keep your tone steady and clear, enunciating each word. The further along you go, the easier they flow out like you know them off by heart, shocking you. You don't know if you're just imagining things but it's like something comes over you, a chill that travels down your spine, reaching to your fingertips and makes every nerve endings stand on edge. The sound of your own voice seems so distant to you now, like it's not even yours anymore as you fall into a trance-like state. You fail to notice the breeze that begins to pick up, a static charge in the air as the lamps around you flicker violently and when you utter the name 'Lucifer Morningstar', the candles are blown out.

When you regain your focus, you're slightly out of breath, heart thundering against your chest and in your ears. You glance around your surroundings, cautious and half-expecting to come face-to-face with the devil himself but slowly you realize....

There was nothing.

A whole three-sixty spin confirms it; there wasn't a single thing amiss around you that you're actually left in disbelief. But it's quiet now, too quiet. The crickets have stopped chirping, the street lights have stopped flickering – even the faulty one you saw earlier. So you wait another few minutes for good measures, holding your breath and shoulders tense until a sharp ringing and intense vibration erupts from your hand, causing you to yell out in surprise. Fumbling, you crash onto your knees in an attempt to catch your phone, managing to cushion what would've surely been a screen shattering fall to a short, edge denting clatter. You can't help the pathetic whine that escapes your lips; from being startled, dropping your phone, the ache in your knees, and the fact that the ritual most likely didn't work.

Shaking away the jitters, you blink, momentarily blinded by the light of your phone as it shows you the identity of the caller. You pick up after the third ring.

“Hello?”

“GIRL! WHERE ARE YOU!?” Jaehee's voice screeches through. You pull away, wincing and even from a distance, she speaks as if she's right beside you. “IT'S ALMOST FOUR IN THE MORNING AND IT'S BEEN TWO HOURS SINCE I GOT HOME! TWO HOURS!! AND NO TEXT OR CALL OR ANYTHING?! I THOUGHT YOU GOT KIDNAPPED!”

You sigh, guilt washing over you as you can hear how palpable her worry is. It'd completely slipped your mind to text her that you would be home late. You drag a hand down your face, feeling drained as your night's escapades start to catch up to you and answer Jaehee less she was going to pop a blood vessel.

“Y-Yeah sorry, sorry. I forgot I had to go somewhere and sort of lost track of time, also didn't help that I missed the last bus to get home so...”

“Do you need me to send an Uber? Where did you go? Are you far?”

“No, no it's okay Jaehee, I'll be home in a few minutes don't worry.” You reassure. You end the call after convincing Jaehee that you're absolutely fine and not being held at gunpoint. Looking down at the mess you've made, you can't help the small chortle as it dawns on you that this is definitely not something you should leave behind any evidence of – you don't think families or the elderly would appreciate finding out that there's been some occult funny business going on right outside their homes.

Whoops.

You gather the candles once the wax has dried, stuffing them back into the brown paper bag along with the little jars and vials you used. You sweep away the salt and remnants of the herbs as best you can, pushing them into the grass inconspicuously. For the ink staining your wrists, you wet your fingers with your tongue and rub until all that's left is a blotchy mess. Now all that remains was the chalk drawing of the summoning circle. At first you tried scuffing as much of it with the soles of your shoes but all that does was slightly smudge it, the markings still clear as day.

“Uhhh.....” You flounder, not knowing what to do with your hands before you give your bag a thorough rifle and triumphantly pull out an old water bottle still half full. This will do. You empty it over the drawing, making sure to try and get as much of it as you can. Thankfully, it dissolves without much resistance and you chuck the plastic bottle into the trash can. Sure there might be a few marks left over but it was hardly discernible and honestly, you can't be bothered with any more efforts. You're tired and you just want to go to sleep.

So you head on home without so much as another thought on your mind, oblivious to the ghostly white wisps of smoke trailing after you.

Jaehee was on you the moment you stepped through the door, already interrogating you and going as far as to ask if it had anything to do with trying to find Jimin. You should've figured she would assume that, knowing how troubled you were about his absence. At least because of that, she was somewhat more understanding but had made you promise you would let her know if you were going to be out past 2AM.

“I know how worried you are about him, but I don't want you going out and endangering yourself trying to find him like that. You shouldn't have to get hurt because of some bad decisions he chose to make.”

You really wished it was that simple.

So you placate her by saying that you had tried to meet with a friend of Jimin's only to be stood up at the last minute, completely not his fault. She let you go then, still miffed but otherwise glad that you're safe otherwise. You fall into a deep sleep that night the moment your head touches the pillow, exhausted.

It'd been the longest sleep you've ever had. You wake up groggy as all hell but with a new weight on your chest.

Your only lead in finding your guardian demon didn't work and the blow hits harder than you want to admit. It continues to follow you the days going forward, plaguing your mind with one question; where do you go from here?

Should you try other methods to summon a demon? Are there other methods? If so, then what? Try to find a local witch? It eats away at you and you swear you would've fallen into a manic obsession if it weren't for your friends. Like a saving grace, you get a text for an invitation to hang out on the preface that it's been a while and truthfully, it has. The last time you all had the time to gather together was before the BTS concert. At first you had wanted to decline, thinking you're not in the right state of mind to enjoy hanging out leisurely but you second guess yourself; maybe you do need a distraction, something to help clear your mind from this dark void that's taken over your life so that you can regroup and figure out what's your next best course of action.

The final push was Jaehee who practically forces you to go out at this golden opportunity, rightfully concerned about the haggard look you're starting to take on. So you pull yourself together, slap on some makeup to not look as dead on the outside as you feel on the inside, and take your ass out of the house.

It was no less a struggle, feeling as if you had to drag your feet every step of the way to the meeting spot you all agreed to. Doesn't help that the weather today was muggier than usual despite the sky being overcast, the sun constantly peeking in and out from behind the thick clouds that drift by. You don't remember it calling for rain today so you keep your fingers crossed, not liking the way some of the clouds appear darker than the others and you not bothering to bring an umbrella.

Thankfully when you reached the subway station, you're greeted by two of your friends who are already there, their cheerfulness lifting your spirits slightly.

“Y/N!!” Rosa squeals delightedly, coming to embrace you with a big hug. You let out a small 'oof' at her enthusiasm but bring your arms up to squeeze her back too.

“Hey, oh man it feels like forever since we've seen each other.” You part from Rosa to give your other friend a hug.

“Right? Oh my god...when was it? Like, before the concert?” Mei points out. “What's even sadder is that we always talked about meeting up and doing something but just...never did, for like weeks.”

Rosa laughs, “That's basically what being an adult is.”

You continue to chat idly, waiting for the rest of your other friends to show and when they do, you head on over to your favourite cafe as your first pit stop. You catch up with everyone and mainly talk about what you were all up to, which you can't exactly disclose in too much detail beyond 'working and sleeping'. It leaves much to be desired for an engaging conversation and you find yourself struggling for the first time with this disconnect, made more obvious when your friends mention any latest BTS content they've seen.

“You haven't seen this yet?!” Jess exclaims to you. She flashes you a high-definition picture no doubt taken by a fan site of Jimin on her phone, probably in the midst of their EU leg of the tour. He looks like a literal angel, dressed in all white with arms outstretched in a way that any second, you would think wings would appear, the glare of the spotlight illuminating behind him as he gazes out into the sea of purple twinkling lights. It's a breathtaking photo but right now, it's so bittersweet to be looking at him like this. Your heart clenches painfully in your chest, the emotions threatening to overwhelm you. It suddenly feels like you're living in a dream and the person you're trying to chase is nothing but a phantom, their face slowly fading from your memories and you're desperately trying to hold on.

You swallow, the tightness in your throat becoming uncomfortable as you force an apologetic smile on your face, straining. “I really didn't have time to catch up on anything lately.”

You follow your friends from one place to another afterwards, complacent in their decisions and growing more and more despondent in your responses. Whatever energy you had before to try and maintain a farce is long gone now and it doesn't go unnoticed by your group.

“Hey, you feeling okay?” Sonya asks gently, falling back to where you're hanging near the front of a cute stationary shop you all decided to randomly stop by. You go to open your mouth, ready to deny but then stop yourself, seeing no use in it. So all that comes out is a defeated sigh that has your shoulders slumping.

“Sorry, I don't know, I felt fine when I left home but I guess not...”

“Did you want to maybe get some water? I have Advil in my bag if you want. Or if you want we can walk you back home?” Sonya suggests helpfully. You give her a weak smile, declining with a wave of your hand.

“No, it's okay. Maybe if I rest a little....”

“You don't have to force yourself if you're not feeling it. If you feel like you wanna go home then we don't mind.”

You still feel guilty even though you know Sonya means everything that she says. The guilt only intensifies when the rest of your friends gather from browsing or buying something, immediately worried once they've caught on the rather serious air surrounding you and Sonya. In the end, you had decided maybe it was better to call it quits here, not wanting to trouble or ruin what was supposed to be a fun outing between friends because you're getting too much in your head. After apologizing for having to leave early and fight off their insistence on walking you back to the subway station, you part ways.

You've ended up in the deeper parts of the city, so it would take about six stops for you to get to the station nearest to your place. First though, you had a bit of a walk, either to get back to the station you exited from or the next stop over three blocks up the street, usually something you wouldn't mind if not for the looming dark clouds above you that had taken over the sky completely, plunging the world around you in a deep gloom. With no sun in sight, it makes the summer solstice 6PM look like it's winter's.

You go at a brisk pace, choosing to go back the way you came since you're more familiar with that route. The wind begins to pick up, a sure sign of the coming storm and you dread being caught out at this rate. Up ahead is a stoplight, the one where you're supposed to cross the street at but you're tempted to just cut across the road now, wanting to save time. The traffic here isn't busy with hardly any cars passing through so once you see that it's a red light on both sides, you make a run for it.

You're just about halfway to the other side when you feel the toe of your shoes catching on the asphalt and you're suddenly stumbling forward with your momentum. You're bracing for the fall but before you could let out a gasp, a strange sensation passes over you, like being suspended in midair. It goes by so quickly that you don't have the time to register the impact it makes because a split second later, a black sedan barrels past you, honking loudly as it goes and so closely you think it would've grazed your nose.

Body rigid, you're frozen from the shock, heart pounding loudly and with a mind now kicked into flight or fight mode, you sprint the rest of the way on shaky, clumsy limbs. You nearly collapse once you've reached the safety of the other side, taking deep breaths to calm yourself and the adrenaline running through you.

Either you should've looked both ways more carefully or that asshole just blew through a red light going a hundred kilometres on an eighty speed limit.

You're gonna go with the asshole because you swear the lights were red. You made sure of it.

Straightening yourself, you hoist your tote bag up your shoulders again and continue to make your way down the street. By then, it has begun drizzling, the droplets falling so erratically and lightly that they get carried by the wind. It makes it hard to avoid and only serves to further irritate you. It's a straight walk from here, you don't think you have to worry about nearly dying again so you keep your head down, one hand raised in an attempt to shield yourself from the spattering rain. You turn the corner at the end of the block, peering up to see the tall station street sign looming ahead and you've never been more relieved, powering on to reach it if only to escape the steadily increasing downpour.

So caught up in closing the last bit of distance, you're jerked out of your focus when there was a loud shout of alarm.

“HEY WATCH IT!”

Instinctively, your steps slow, body turning towards the noise in trying to find the owner of the voice. Your eyes whip to see a few people huddling under an overhang to a high-rise building you passed but what's more concerning is where their gaze is focused – widen in fear, their necks craning up, and some even rushing towards your direction, waving frantically to get your attention. It's when you follow their line of sight do you understand why.

Three stories high you spot the outlines of glass panels that line the edges of the balcony, only to your horror, many of them were teetering precariously off of their hinges with no hopes of hanging on because seconds later, their weight gives way and two of them begin to free fall.

Right above you.

You hear rather than see the first one crashing onto the pavement mere inches behind you, the sound much like that of rolling thunder that you can easily mistaken it as part of the stormy weather. You think you feel the pinpricks of glass shards spraying up to scratch your legs but all you can think is where was the second panel? You feel like you can't move your legs fast enough, so frazzled with your mind racing to barely process what is happening and eyes searching wildly but seeing nothing as if you've been blinded.

A chill runs through you then, an icy cold grip that holds you hostage and you wonder idly if this is how you're really going to die. A poor, unfortunate girl who met her demise because of some rotten luck and a freak accident.

And there it was again, that weightless feeling surrounding you, except now there's a distinct tugging as you feel yourself being pulled backwards. All at once, a flash of light goes off right in front of you, shimmering so brilliantly in an arc shape that it has you shutting your eyes, hands thrown up in protection and a gust of air whistles past your ears along with another resounding crash. It's so strong you momentarily feel the rain stop falling around you and you trip backwards, landing on your behind in a crumpled mess.

When you finally open your eyes, you're staring at a pile of frosted glass right where you had been standing, the glittering shards curving outward as if something had forced it away. You can't stop the tremors that shake through your body, breath coming out in short gasps.

What was that just now? There's no way that couldn't have hit you, you practically had a target marker right over your head for it.

Your head is spinning, barely hearing how a small crowd begins to gather around you, some approaching you while there are others who are on their phones, no doubt calling the fire department to report the incident. You're helped to your feet, are asked if you're injured and if you needed medical help, all of which you answer no thoughtlessly. You're more concerned with something else.

There's something else at work here; the first time you would've brushed it off as a trick of your mind but this time, it's just too coincidental. You swivel your head around, not even sure what you're looking for but you can't stop the traitorous surge in hope within you.

You nearly miss it.

Through the dispersing crowd you see two shadowy figures, concealed in the depths of an alley, so well hidden thanks to the darkness of the looming clouds and the still cascading rain. You stare with baited breath, watching the scene unfold as one of the figure grips the other in their hand, raising them until their feet dangled off the ground. They struggle uselessly and claw at the strong hold to no avail. Then, with an inhumane strength, they are slammed into the wall as if they were a rag doll. But to your shock, the crumpled body dissolves in a flurry of ashes and smoke, a few flickers of orange light seeping through before disappearing like dying embers on coal. You dare not take your eyes away, much less blink in fear of it being merely an illusion.

Yet the image before you doesn't fade, even though it seems like you're the only one who can see it. You watch the way the now lone figure struggles to remain upright, a hand reaching up to grasp at their head as if suddenly hit with a wave of nausea. It's then you realize they had been wearing a hood because the dark fabric falls away then, revealing to you a pale face you had not seen in so long.

“Jimin....” His name falls from your trembling lips in a mere whisper before you can stop yourself, breath caught in your throat and as if he had heard you, his gaze whips to your direction.

Your eyes lock on the familiar glow of crimson. Your heart lurches.

And then he takes off.

Panicked, you scramble to push past the few lingering bodies out of your way, feet kicking into a dead sprint, eyes never leaving his retreating back. You rush into the alley without a second thought, weaving and dodging the waste, dumpsters and other things that were lost and abandoned there. You're panting in your efforts to keep up, barely having time to call out to him but try as you might, you cannot hope to catch up to someone who's abilities far outweighs your own and after minutes of winding and sharp turns, you lose sight of him.

You come to a halt, lungs burning from exertion as your eyes dart this way and that but come up empty in what you're looking for. You curse loudly, distress taking over as you grab a fistful of your own hair. After the adrenaline begins to die down, you begin to take in your surroundings. So caught up in your pursuit of him, you failed to notice the unfamiliar streets you've ended up on. You don't know how far you've strayed, can't tell whether going up or down would be the best option in finding your way back but above all, you can't believe you let him slip from your grasp like that.

“Fuck....!” You hiss again, hands balling themselves into fists. The boiling anger makes you tremble more than the cold rain that begins to soak into you; anger at yourself for being so helpless, anger at Jimin for how distant he's become with no explanation. Were you not worth telling anything important to? The thought quells the anger to a hurt and the realization that your fears are more than likely to be true. Yet still, you don't want to confirm them, stubborn to deny it until you get answers – you needed proof. And the only way you're going to get that is to get to the bottom of it, no matter what. With nothing more to gain standing there, you reluctantly turn back to the way you came, mind frayed at the seams from all that has happened.

You don't make it two steps before someone grabs you and your screams are smothered by a hand.

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fandom-necromancer · 3 years

Text

A little distraction Part 3

This was prompted by @rufina72 as well as two anons and at least one AO3 user. I have to admit I lost track on AO3 because apparently people really enjoy this story line XD Hope you do to!

Fandom: Detroit become human | Ship: Reed900, Hannor/Hancon Part 1 link not available [Part2] [Part4] [Part5] [Read complete on AO3]

‘S-s-so Connor is your brooother?’ They were driving through Detroit’s streets covered by snow slush and salt. It would be a pain to get the hardened dirt from the road off his car later, Richard thought as quiet Christmas music accompanied their drive. ‘Yes. Older by roughly five years’, he answered. ‘We’re very close.’ ‘And he w-w-will be the only one there?’ Again, Richard nodded. ‘Yeah, him and his boyfriend. Guess I have to update that to husband soon, they plan to marry as soon as legislation has caught up with recognising androids as persons in every aspect.’ ‘No other f-f-family?’ Richard frowned, face falling instinctively, before he forced himself to cheer up.

‘Nah. Our father died in a car accident. I was three years old; I don’t remember much of him but photos. Connor knew him more and always said he was a nice guy. Our mother was always at work, too absorbed in her studies. It changed a bit when father died, but still she wasn’t home much. Connor basically was the one raising me, and he blames mom for not being there for me.’ ‘And y-y-you?’ ‘Nah’, he laughed. ‘It was normal for me; I didn’t know anything else. But we both agree that me and him, we are family and she doesn’t belong in that definition. And that we’ll do it better should we ever get kids.’ Gavin nodded slowly. ‘How’s he?’ ‘Caring?’, Richard began, having to think of the right words to express what he felt when thinking of his brother. ‘Overly protective. Overly friendly. It can be annoying at times. But he is honest too and understands boundaries. He never said anything when I had my silent phases, just came to my room and did whatever he did close to me keeping me company. He seems to always know what you need right now and I think that’s his most treasurable attribute.’ ‘Hooope he knows that with meee too, not just you. Wh-wh-what I told you, I won’t tell anyooone else.’

Nines risked a look to the side to Gavin, who had ducked his head in between his shoulders and fidgeted with a button on his shirt. ‘Hey.’ He stopped at a red light and was about to touch the android comfortingly, refraining from it last second as he remembered his reaction to that. ‘Hey, if it gets too much at any point, tell me. I don’t want you to be uncomfortable.’ Gavin quickly looked out of the window and nodded, obviously embarrassed.

They arrived at a small house draped in tasteful Christmas decoration. Not too much and in exactly the right colours to make it feel cosy, warm and welcoming. Gavin stepped out of the car watching the lights and trying not to think of how he had lifted up the kids so they could help putting them up in their old home. They were fond memories made all the more sour by his loss. He knew his LED was likely red again, alerting the strange human that had picked him up of his composure slipping, but if Richard noticed, he didn’t say anything, just walking ahead and smiling back at him as an invitation to follow him. Gavin swallowed and hastily walked through the snow to the freed path leading to the door. Nines was already standing there, hand hovering over the doorbell.

‘Richard!’ The door was almost ripped open by someone who looked exactly like the other human, maybe an inch smaller and a lot more expressive. ‘You came!’ ‘I promised, didn’t I?’ Connor hugged the other human and grinned from one ear to the other. ‘Yes of course, but still!’ Only then did he turn to Gavin, who was awkwardly standing half behind Richard and watched them. It was hard to blink away the warning popping up over and over again. Connor moving towards Richard. Threat. Warning. Richard returning his hug, the arm passing through Gavin’s personal space at that. Warning. Threat. Connor turning around. Threat. Run. Gavin didn’t know since when he was stuck in this analysis mode, but he was sick of flinching and glitching at any movement. ‘This must be your plus one?’, he asked Richard with a wink and held out a hand towards Gavin. ‘Hello, I’m Connor.’ Gavin couldn’t suppress taking a step back. ‘I-I-I’m Gaaavin’, he said, cursing his voice box for glitching now out of all times. Connor let his hand fall, but smiled at him, completely ignoring his stutter and hangers. ‘Hello Gavin, nice to meet you! Merry Christmas! Come in, you two! Hank’s getting out the food already!’

They followed Connor in and got rid of their shoes, before entering the living room. Connor instructed them to sit down and hurried into the kitchen to help Hank. When the larger android came to greet them, Gavin dared to relax a bit. He was deviant too, sending a friendly greeting ping to him. He looked gentle, trusting and didn’t have any marks on him. Hank put down plates for Connor and Richard, while Connor came back with two mugs of warmed Thirium for the androids as well as blue tinged cookies. ‘Can you eat?’, Hank asked him then. ‘You are an older model, right?’ Gavin nodded. ‘I am. B-b-but I caaan eat. I g-g-got the upgrade when Kathy- I got the upgrade.’ Hank lifted a brow at the errors and swallowed sentence, but otherwise didn’t mention it. ‘Then I hope they taste, Connor made them. He has no talent.’ ‘Excuse me?’, the human answered, elbowing Hank. Gavin expected damage, but it was a friendly gesture. ‘I can cook great.’ ‘Yeah’, Hank countered. ‘If you count heating up frozen pizza.’ ‘Hey, that’s all I can do, too, so I’ll side with Connor here’, Richard laughed. ‘What’s your verdict, Gavin?’

He looked into the other’s faces, still overwhelmed by it all. Instead of answering, he took one of the cookies and nibbled on the edge. He hadn’t really eaten much since he had gotten the upgrade and his tank didn’t allow for more than one meal anyways. It tasted… sweet. The texture was interestingly grainy and gave in to force easily. Not able to stand being stared at any longer, he just shrugged and said: ‘It tastes good?’ ‘See!’, Connor grinned. ‘Gavin likes it. I can’t be that bad then!’ ‘Or your recipe was good.’ ‘Or he did something wrong and accidentally saved otherwise horrible cookies.’ Connor crossed his arms. ‘Oh, shut up, Nines, try baking something you can’t even try because it’s literal poison for you!’ Richard laughed, and it eased the mood into simpler waters.

They continued talking for a while exchanging about what they had been up to lately. Gavin listened, but was content not to be involved at all, eating the cookies Connor had prepared. He actually liked them a lot and it was quite relaxing to just munch away on them. ‘And? How did you two get to know each other?’ He froze, sharing a look with Richard. ‘Errr…’ ‘Do you know that red light at the corner of that mattress store?’ Connor frowned, then nodded. ‘Yeah, you have to wait ages until you can drive on.’ ‘Somehow timing was perfect, and we saw each other every day when my shift ended.’ He looked over to Gavin and he nodded, thanking him inwardly to not tell them his whole life story. ‘Today I decided to talk to him.’ Connor looked over to Gavin disbelievingly. ‘My brother spoke to you first?’ Gavin huffed. ‘Y-Yes, he did. I-I-I lost my family because of the revolution. Had nowhere to go. He invited me to come with him.’ ‘So you really aren’t more than strangers’, Hank asked. ‘Kind of?’, Gavin shrugged. ‘But Richard seeeems like a nice g-g-guy and I don’t have m-m-much to lose.’ Connor swallowed. ‘I’m sorry to hear that’, he said. ‘You are welcome here any day if you need a place to stay.’ The android ducked his head, blushing. ‘Richard offered that already and I agreed to try it out.’ That shifted their attention towards the man completely.

‘Nines, are you ill? Initiating conversation, bringing someone for dinner and inviting them into your home?’ ‘Fuck off, Connor, seriously. Call it a Christmas miracle.’ Connor shook his head. ‘Would be one hell of one.’ Richard threw him a look and laughed. ‘Connor, just because it’s rare it doesn’t mean it never happens.’ ‘It was awkwaaard as hell too’, Gavin added carefully. ‘Have to admit I thought he was some sort of weirdo first.’ Connor smiled as Nines rested his hand on his arm. ‘Okay, that sounds more like my brother.’

‘Really? A weirdo?’, Richard asked Gavin. ‘I thought aaaaafter our last talk you appreciated h-h-honesty.’ ‘Yeah, okay, but you don’t just tell someone they are a weirdo.’ ‘It’s the truth.’ Richard sighed. ‘I don’t think you are oooone now th-th-th-though’, he added. ‘Thanks, at least there’s that then…’ Richard looked up at Connor. ‘What?’

The other human was grinning at them both and tried to hide it badly. ‘I’m happy, Nines. Really. I’m glad you both are here today. Come on, let’s watch a movie and then presents!’

The longer they spent at Connor’s house, the more at ease Gavin felt. No one asked him about his past or why he was malfunctioning all over. It surely was a question that burned in their minds, he could feel it, but they consciously didn’t question him. He was just being accepted as a part of their Christmas celebration as if he hadn’t just been picked up from some scrapyard and put into nice clothing. It felt like he… Like he had been here last year and the year before. Almost like… like he belonged. Like a family. He just had to reach out a hand and take the chance Richard had offered him and all of this would turn from pretend to reality. It was weird thinking about it, especially when every connection to the word family brought up memories of loss and grief about old happiness.

But was it wrong to want this again? To wish for another chance at building new memories? He looked at Richard from the corner of his eyes. The man was completely fixed on the TV in front of them, body relaxed and close to him but far away enough not to impose or cause stress. Gavin swallowed and looked over to Connor and Hank on the other couch under a blanket lying close, Hank holding the human and caressing his hair. He could have this again. This casual comfort, these caring touches, this feeling of safety and belonging. The home he had lost and tried to build for himself in that scrapyard could be his again, if he just allowed to let it happen.

He swallowed and pressed his eyes close to block out the warnings of threat, warning, run, danger. Then he scooted over slowly until he hit Richards warm ribcage. He felt the other shift around his frozen body, then an arm was draped around his shoulders carefully. ‘This too much?’, Nines whispered near inaudibly over the movie running and Gavin shook his head. No, he wanted this, he just had to get over his own barriers. A few minutes later, he tried opening his eyes again and was surprised his systems weren’t bombarding him with errors. Instead, his status box read safe and Richard’s body was marked as friend/ally. Gavin sighed deeply, dropping into the carefree touch completely.

When Richard dared to look down the next time, the android in his arm was smiling just the slightest and his LED was circling somewhere between blue and yellow – the calmest he had seen Gavin so far. By the end of the movie, Gavin wasn’t moving anymore, the LED pulsing slowly. Nines looked over at Hank questioningly and the android nodded. ‘He’s in stasis now.’ ‘Wow’ Richard said with raised brows, looking down on the sleeping android. Connor sat up and threw them their blanket. ‘You can stay the night if you want. Guess I have to call you Tens now’, he joked. Nines huffed and answered deadpan: ‘Do that and I’ll stop talking to you to go back to Nines.’

[>next part]

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padfootagain · 4 years

Text

Girl Crush (VI)

Chapter 6: Orange Blossoms For A Bride

And here we go again! New chapter!! 1000% of fluffy fluff!!! Here again, so much cuteness, so much cuteness…

I hope you like this chapter :) Let me know!

Word Count: 2609

You were beyond panicked by now.

Like… way, way beyond panicked.

You had 150 bouquets and compositions to prepare, on your own, for the next day. And the delivery for the flowers, instead of happening 48 hours before the wedding you were to decorate, had arrived 10 hours before.

But in these ten hours, you needed to make these bouquets, organize the rooms, give the bride her own bouquet, decorate the church, decorate the venue, decorate the tables, decorate everything.

It was the first job that Mary had entrusted you with from A to Z. It was your baby. And you couldn't fail. Because if you did, you would get fired. And there was no way in hell that you would lose this job, so by any means necessary, you had to pull through this mess and emerge victorious.

But if that wasn't already a catastrophe, your colleague Joshua, who was supposed to help you, had just called sick. Food poisoning. He was agonizing in his bathroom…

Wonderful.

There was no way you could do everything on your own…

There was only one option left: you needed to call for help.

Sandra wasn't available for the evening, being out of town because of another of Mary's projects, but she had agreed to work on her day off anyway to help you prepare the ceremony. You only needed to find help to make the bouquets during the night with you.

So, you called your two best friends to the rescue.

Jasmine mumbled something about you owing her a big favour for making her spend the night up when she had to work the next day, but she agreed without any convincing needed. You were lucky Harry was in town as well, and he didn't hesitate to drop whatever plans he had to head to Mary's flowers to come to your rescue.

When he passed the front door, Jasmine was just taking her coat off. He was slightly out of breath, and had clearly been running.

"Harry! Thank you for coming!"

"Normal," he mumbled under his breath, taking his jacket off as well, before greeting Jasmine. "So, what do we do?"

"We have to make bouquets. A lot of them," you answered. "I'm gonna show you how, and then you'll have to do it too, okay?"

"Okay," both of your friends nodded in unison.

"How many bouquets are we talking about?" Jasmine asked while she and Harry followed you to the back of the shop that was now filled with hundreds of flowers.

You took a deep breath, before announcing the news.

"150."

"WHAT?!"

This time is was Harry who was staring at you with wide eyes.

"150?!"

"We have 9 different types of bouquets to make, not counting the one for the bride, I'll make this one myself. And we have… 6 hours to do that, and then I'll have to start decorating the church."

Jasmine took a look at her phone, it was almost 23:30.

"So… none of us is sleeping tonight, huh?" she asked, but it wasn't really a question, or more of a rhetorical one, at least.

"You can leave whenever you want, I'll take the help you can give me though."

"Don't be ridiculous," Harry shook his head, nudging Jasmine in the arm and glaring at her for her remark. "Of course, you can count on us."

To that, Jasmine had nothing to answer but a roll of her eyes.

They sat with you around the large wooden table at the centre of the room, and you walked them through the first composition, leaving the first bouquet on display for them to copy it with ease.

"We'll all make the same ones, so… if you hesitate, ask me," you instructed, before reaching for more flowers to start a second one.

Harry could hear in the way your voice was shaking and how your eyes seemed unfocused, almost glassy, that you were sustaining an unhealthy level of stress. He spotted the empty box of biscuits, and wasn't surprise to find that you had been eating some of the stress out of your system.

And it made his heart ache to see you so scared and upset.

He had barely gathered the flowers he would need that you were already starting a third one. He noticed how your hands were shaking, how your entire frame was shivering under so much adrenaline.

He rested a soothing hand on yours, his long fingers wrapping around your own in a delicate hold to make you stop your rushed movements for an instant. You looked up at him with eyes full of questions.

"You are panicking," he explained with a voice deeper than usual, sweet and warm and that calmed you down in an instant just by the sound of it, he didn't even need to add meaning to his words. "You need to slow down. We're here, and we're going to help. But you have to calm down, or you'll make mistakes and that won't be any good either. Okay? Just… take a deep breath..."

You obeyed, and inhaled sharply.

"…And let it out."

Once again, you complied, letting the air leave your lungs.

"Again."

You took a few more deep breaths, feeling your heart-rate slowing down.

"Better?" he asked, leaning to catch your gaze with his.

You nodded, and indeed, under his palm, your hand had stopped shaking.

"It's going to be alright. We're going to do it, the way you planned it, and you're going to show Mary how amazingly talented you are. Okay?"

You nodded, ready to believe him.

"Okay."

"Good."

Harry sat down around the table again, and started his own bouquet.

He did stop after the fifth flower though and discreetly turned to Jasmine.

"Which one after the peony again?" he asked with a sheepish expression on his face, whispering because he was afraid his question would make your stress level skyrocket once more.

But it didn't. His question made you laugh actually, and you explained how to make the bouquet once more.

Harry was right, after all. You were with your friends and they were ready to help you. Everything would be alright.

Jasmine fell asleep on her chair around 3 am. It was almost five now, and outside the sky was still inky and lit up only by the moon. It was a starless night above L.A as clouds covered their light.

Harry had a hard time keeping his eyes open, but fought his fatigue for you. You still had some work to do, but it seemed that you would manage to complete all the bouquets that were due for the wedding.

You yawned for the fifth time in twenty minutes, and Harry got up to make some more coffee.

"You should sleep for a while," he told you. "You're going to need your strengths for the actual wedding too."

"I'm fine."

Harry couldn’t refrain a smile – a smile he barely noticed appearing on his lips – and shook his head a little. You were always so damn stubborn…

He handed you a cup of fresh coffee instead, and you thanked him with a bright smile, despite the dark circles forming under your eyes.

"Thanks. You can rest though, if you need to. You look exhausted."

"I'm fine," he imitated you with a cheeky smile, making you roll your eyes.

As you took the cup from him, you noticed the dozen or so of little cuts and scratches that ran all over his hands.

"What…?"

But he hurriedly took his hand away, as if he were a little boy caught red-handed stealing sweets.

"'s nothing. I'm just… not so used to handling thorns on roses, that's all."

You looked up at him with a sad expression, your eyes watering.

You were tired, you were stressed to the point of absolute fright, your body was now only working up on caffeine and adrenaline, and you were on the edge of breaking. And Harry knew it. Any little push in the wrong direction would make you fall for good.

He shook his head.

"I'm okay, it's just a few scratches, that's all."

"I think I'm really tired," you explained in a weak voice, drying your eyes on your sleeve.

"We should take a break," Harry whispered, not willing to wake up Jasmine who was snoring softly on the chair beside him.

"No, we need to finish this. I will finish this. You take a break. You should take care of your hands."

But instead of complying, he took the flowers away from you, and displayed his hands in front of you instead.

"Let's make a deal. You help me clean up this mess those bloody roses did, and we'll count that as taking a break. What do you say?"

You sighed, defeated.

"Alright, you win. Hang on, I think there's some first aid kit somewhere."

A couple of minutes later, and you had moved to the shop, settling around the counter so you could talk without disturbing Jasmine's sleep.

You started by washing his cuts with some disinfectant. He hissed a few times at the stinging sensation, and every time you apologized with a sheepish expression painted all over your features that he found absolutely adorable, and perhaps he hissed a bit more than necessary just to see that little wince of yours.

You didn't speak for a while, you were focused on your task, and also on an effort to slow down your heart as you held his hand in your palm, his rings cold against you but his skin soft and comforting.

It's only when you started to apply colourful plasters all over his hands that Harry heaved a sigh and started to speak again. His eyes were lost on the plants and flowers neatly organized across the large shop. And you knew every one of their names, and their meaning, and how to assemble them perfectly, and how to make them last longer, and how they smelt and how they felt under your fingertips, and how the petals sounded as they fell to the ground…

This shop was your life, in a way. These flowers that would bloom for only a few days were the centre of all your focus and love. You nurtured them, and arranged them in bouquets so they would bring people joy. He had seen you handle them so many times by now, he knew how delicate your hold was with them, how fond the smile on your lips was when you looked at them.

You deserved better than to stay up all night so that someone else's name would be praised for your hard work though.

"You still haven't told me how you're going to call it," he said out of the blue.

"Huh? Name what?" you asked him with a confused frown.

"Your flower shop. When you get it to open, your own shop, how are you going to call it?"

"Oh… Uhm… I don't know yet."

"Yes, you do," he replied with a crooked smile. "You just don't want to tell me. That's alright."

You shook your head.

"It's just… It's not going to happen any time soon anyway, so… no need to think about it too much."

"On the contrary! You should plan ahead! Besides, I'm sure you've already decided about everything. You just… won't tell me. And that's alright, it's your dream. If you feel like keeping it to yourself for now, then you should."

But the truth was, you didn't want to keep it to yourself, not anymore. Harry was here now, and it had changed everything in your life. Or well, not everything but… still… everything…

You didn't know how to explain that feeling, you just knew that you were a better person and a happier one too thanks to him.

And you wanted to share your dreams with him, you really did. An unspeakable part of you knew that it was because you wanted him to be by your side when it would come true.

"Yeah," you chuckled, shying away a little. "I guess I've planned a few things…"

You heaved a sigh, giving up.

"Sunflowers and peonies."

"Huh?"

"That's what I want to call my shop. Sunflowers and peonies."

You were avoiding his gaze, focusing on placing a plaster covered with tiny kittens on his thumb instead, but if you had looked up to look at him then, you would have found the most tender smile on his lips.

"What's the meaning behind it?" he asked in a soft, deep voice.

"Peonies are my favourite flowers, as you already know," you giggled a little, growing shyer again, but his smile only broadened. "And my mom's favourite flowers are sunflowers. So… it would be a little bit like having her with me all the time. Plus, they're happy and full of sun, perfect for California, don't you think?"

"It's a lovely name."

"Thank you."

"What else have you planned?"

"I… I want a pink door… but not like a Barbie kind of pink, a pastel one, light and happy. I want blue and lilac windows, and the walls white. I want a little table and a couple of chairs before the store to make it feel like a home. And I want flowers all over the place. And stalls of them outside. And I want the name of the shop written on a slate to rest on the white counter…"

You heaved a dreamy sigh, your eyes lost in the distance but your fingers still resting against Harry's large hand. You hadn't noticed that he was holding your hands in his now.

"It sounds lovely."

"Yeah… but… there's much to do before I can have that," you shook your head, the thought bringing your feet back to Earth.

"I could help."

You finally looked up at him, silently asking him what he meant.

"I mean… I could help with the money you need to get started…"

But you seemed angry and hurt at his proposal, and took your hands away from his.

"Don't say things like that," you replied.

"Why not? I have money, and I believe in you. Why not use it to give you a little push."

"I don't want your money."

"You almost say that as if it was dirty money…"

"That's not what I meant. But that's still a no."

"I just wanted to be useful," he replied a little too harshly, and you winced at his tone.

You heaved another sigh.

"I know, but I… I don't want your money. I don't… You're my best friend…"

"That's why I'm offering," he interrupted you, but you shook your head.

"I don’t care about the fact that you have money, or that you're famous, or any of those things. And I don't want to give anyone an argument to say that I do. I just… You're my best friend because of who you are, not because of your career. And I don't want to be in your debt. I don't want that side of you in our friendship. Do you understand?"

He gave you a small smile.

"Yeah… yeah, I think I understand."

"I'll get my own loan, and I'll get my shop, eventually. But I'll do it because I've worked hard for it, not because my best friend is rich. Maybe, in a few years, my answer might be different. But for now, I want to try to do it all on my own."

"I get it. I won't offer again."

"Thank you."

You exchanged a brighter smile again, until Harry would nod at his hand that still laid on the counter.

"You forgot a plaster on my pinky."

********************************************

Tag list: @ponycake27 @horsesreign @xinyourdreamsx @jbluevelvet@notkeppeki @daynigt-dreamer-stuff @fudgeflyss @stuckupstucky@snek-shit @suchatinyinfinity@i-padfootblack-things @buckybsarmy @heyohheyitsgabi@jigsawlover10 @emyyjemyy @addictedtofictionalcharacters @staringmoony@madamrogers @cronias13

#harry styles #harry styles x reader #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles fanfic #harry styles series #harry styles imagine #imagine #fanfiction #fanfic #writing #series

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stupendousaestheticfoodrascal · 3 years

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The Call of the Dark

“She’s beautiful, don't you think?”, said the stout man. His face was pale, but not the kind of paleness you see when someone is ill. It was the kind of pale a person obtains naturally, as though from birth. Despite his paleness, his face shone bright and somehow the very prominent freckles on his face became even more visible, there was a faint twinkle in his eyes, and if you didn't pay attention, even for a second, you would miss it. With the way he looked, you would guess he had just won the lottery. “I met her at this very coffee shop a few months ago and we really hit it off! I never thought I would find someone who was into a lot of the stuff I liked, well excluding you of course”.

He looked right at me, to make sure what he said hadn't made me upset. It didn't of course, but he didn't need to know that. “Oh how miserable I am, to find out my good friend Chase has found another, and now I will be left all on my own to deal with my sorrows”, I spoke, with just a hint of mischief in my voice. He certainly did not find it funny but I found it to be hilarious, to the point I burst out laughing, something I hadn’t done in a long time. Before I knew it, Chase had joined in on the laughter and whatever tension was present had cleared from the air. “It really is nice to see you again and I’m glad you’ve finally found your special someone”. A light pink dusted his cheeks at what I assumed to be my little comment. “Enough about me, I want to know what’s going on with you Mr. Mysterious”.

I had taken note of the newly designated nickname, although I knew the reasoning behind it. “I can’t say a lot really happened, my life isn't exactly thrilling”. I took a sip of my coffee, it was caramel macchiato, my favourite, her favourite. I shook my head to get rid of the thought and instead took in the familiar view of the shop. It was rather small, and not heavily decorated except for a few advertisement posters plastered on the wall, the top half of the wall was a deep brown colour (rather typical for a coffee shop) while the lower bottom of the walls were plain white.

There were five circular spruce wood tables each with two chairs at the centre of the shop while the corners were occupied by booth tables for anyone who might decide to have coffee with a large group of friends. On the opposite side of the shop was the counter, where people got their orders. The counter itself was coloured just like the wall, white and brown, except they chose to incorporate the colour white as the name of the shop ‘Latte Love’. I had always made it a point to mention it to everyone I knew that I never liked that name, there really was nothing to love about their latte’s. Even with all my complaints, I still managed to come to this coffee shop every morning at the same time, to order the same drink. I turned my head as I noticed something unfamiliar had caught my attention.

A looming shadow stood at the corner of the shop. I couldn’t quite make out it’s figure but it looked and felt like pure darkness, emphasis on felt. The figure began to step closer to me and the closer it came, the more I could feel it trying to consume me. I was called out of my state by a question from the man sitting in front of me. “Earth to Malcolm, I said do you plan on coming to the game tonight?”, he said while waving a hand in front of me. “Yeah sure”, I said, while not knowing what he was referring to. “Great! I think this is a great time for you to finally meet her!”. Her? The confusion was clear on my face, evident by the question he followed up with, “Oh no, don't tell me you forgot”, he said, disappointment clearly laced in his tone.

“No?” “I set you up to meet a lady friend of mine, we agreed that you guys would meet at the game this Saturday?” “WHAT?” “What do you mean ‘what’, you totally agreed to this?!” “I have no memory of anything of the sorts”, I huffed. “Well it doesn’t matter now because you HAVE to go. My friend already expects you to be there and I can't have her thinking ``I'm friends with a jerk” “Well I don’t care what your friend thinks” ''Come on, it’s just this time, maybe try out your luck? If you don't like her then you don’t have to see her again, what do you have to lose?” “Fine, I’ll go, but I'm not promising anything” “Great dude! Make sure to come at 2pm, not a moment later” “Yeah yeah”.

I woke up to an intense pounding in my head, stretching down towards the upper nape of my neck. It felt like a hammer had somehow found its way to my skull in the middle of the night and unleashed all its fury on my poor unsuspecting head. This pain was something I had become familiar with as of late. It happened again. I had the dream again. After having this happen to me for two months straight, it had become something I was used to. I just casually went about most of my days with a nausea inducing headache. Although this headache was particularly fearsome, I knew the reason why.

I had gone on a different route after my little meet up with Chase at the coffee shop. What I hadn't realised was that this new path was not new at all. It was very familiar but I couldn’t reason as to why I felt it was. It was of no importance now, I had to get ready for the game, for my date. It was going to be particularly difficult pretending I was excited to be there, especially with a splitting headache. I had already planned how I was going to break it off. I would tell her how great a time I had but say I wasn't looking for anything right now or something like that.

It didn’t really matter what I said as long as she understood that I wasn't interested. I stood up from my messy bright yellow twin bed. It was ironic really, that someone as miserable as me would own something that was often seen as a symbol of joy. I looked at myself in the mirror right across from my bed. I looked… awful. I had refrained from looking at myself in the mirror and now I remembered why. I was a tidy person by nature but in recent times I had neglected myself, and it was… evident. My thick, black, tightly curled hair was dreadfully matted from the lack of combing. I had also developed a bushy beard and a subtle mustache. My skin was ashy and my lips were cracked, it was getting colder, no surprise as winter was just around the corner.

I hadn’t been to the gym in months and whatever sign of being fit I had, was nowhere to be seen. In other words I had gained a considerable amount of weight. My eyes looked drained and tired and the bags under them looked more prominent than ever. I knew that if I was going to be meeting someone new, even if I wasn’t interested in keeping ties, that I had to look decent. I tidied myself up and got dressed. I chose to wear a plain blue shirt and some trousers. I didn’t feel the need to dress up since it was just a ball game. It was 1:30pm and I needed to be on my way. The sooner I got there the sooner I could hopefully leave. I got into my very run down red Toyota and made my way to the game. Thoughts were swirling in my head, memories were resurfacing, but I shoved them all down as I parked my car. I took a deep breath and made my way to the game.

I saw Chase, his girlfriend and someone else sitting next to him, the person I assumed to be his friend. She sat nervously, darting her eyes from one direction to another, until her eyes finally settled on me, I flinched as I realised we made eye contact. I waved nervously and she waved back, just as nervous. But what I couldn’t understand was why I was nervous. That didn’t matter, I had a plan and I had to stick to it. I walked up to the bleachers where the other baseball enthusiasts sat, making sure not to sit too close to the girl. I didn’t want to send the wrong message. “Hi, I’m Anne, nice to meet you”, she said. “It’s my first time going on a date in a long time, I’m kind of nervous”. “Interesting, so she’s more or less in the same situation as me”, I whispered. “Well, I’m Malcolm and it’s nice to meet you too”, I said with a slightly forced smile.

The announcer made note of the start of the game, if there was something I had observed from coming here it was that the girl, Anne, was a very big sport enthusiast and other than that she was… pretty. Although I had acknowledged I wanted there to be nothing between us, it would be silly to deny that fact. She was rather short compared to me, this I knew from whenever she would jolt up from her seat at a moment of intensity in the game. She was dark skinned, just like me and had long thick afro hair neatly bunched to the back allowing you to see her face. She was well built but more on the slim side. Her eyes were the most prominent part of her face, they were big and full of emotion, and the emotion right at that moment was excitement.

The team she was rooting for was on their way to victory with only a few minutes of the game left, they had the victory in the palm of their hands. One advantage of having a date at a baseball game with someone who is passionate about the sport is that you don't have to bother with talking to the other person, they just do their own thing and you do yours. She was so captivated by the game it was like she had forgotten she was actually here on a date with me, she would occasionally sneak in a few questions on what I thought of the game. I always gave a brief simple answer and she would go back to being completely engrossed in the game. I admitted it was nice not having to feel inclined to respond, or having to fill in the silence when no one was saying anything.

The game finally came to an end and people began leaving the stadium. I rehearsed my lines ready to tell her I wasn’t interested but to my surprise she turned to me and spoke right before I could get a word out. “Look, you're probably a great guy and I had a great time but I don’t think I’m really interested in you that way, no hard feelings?”. An unlikely turn of events, the girl I was supposed to let down easy was the one turning me down? It offered an easy way out but I would have preferred if I wasn’t on the receiving end of a ‘rejection’. “That’s fine, I actually feel the same way, I’m honestly glad you said that, I didn’t want to have to hurt your feelings or anything” “I’m glad we agree, I think it’s about time I leave, it was nice meeting you Malcolm” “You too”.

There it was again, that feeling of familiarity, like this exact thing or something familiar had happened to me. I could feel a wave of emotion re-surfacing from the depths of my being. I saw the dark figure again, standing next to the bleachers, this time just staring at me, as if to try and tell me something. And then I remembered.

Laughter. We were on our way back from a restaurant, it had gone great. I was going to propose, I wanted it to be private, just the two of us. We headed down an alleyway. Bang Bang. We heard it and tried to run. Bang Bang.

The sound was getting closer, I was terrified something horrible would happen and more so to her. We made it to the end of the alleyway but they cornered us, they said they couldn’t let us go. I tried to take them down but they threatened to shoot. And they did, but not me. They shot her instead, there was a lot of blood, I was mortified, police sirens were blaring, the shooter and his accomplice ran away. I tried to get help but no one was listening, they were too focused on the criminal. She died in my arms. It wasn’t fair. I could feel all the emotions of that day resurfacing, I had to leave as soon as possible. I couldn't be here. I rushed to my car and sped home. I rushed inside and rummaged around for my meds, I fumbled around for the container, I found it, although I had trouble opening it because I was trembling. I opened the cap and dumped the meds into my hand, I took them, more than I should have, I didn’t care. I just didn’t want to feel this anymore. And soon enough, the drugs started taking effect and I started to feel better, although I could still see the mysterious shadow at the corner of my room, it didn’t do anything, it didn’t even try to approach me, almost like it couldn’t. As long as it didn’t do anything I didn’t have a problem. It would either leave on its own or I would get used to it. I collapsed on my bed and let out a heavy sigh. The day didn’t go horribly but it wasn’t great either. I had almost had a meltdown in front of a lot of people, something I would much prefer to avoid. I needed to get rest, I had work in the morning and it would be better if I could actually function when I got there.

I could see the faint shimmer of the sun peeking through my window. It was morning and I hadn’t slept a wink. I couldn’t sleep, less because of the fact that I had overdosed on my meds and more because the mysterious shadow hadn’t left me since the day at the ball game. I got up and began to get ready for work. It was obvious I hadn’t slept, both visually and from the way I felt. I could hardly move and I looked half-dead. I just hoped my boss wouldn’t cause a fuss as I believed I could still get work done, but probably at a slower pace and a few mistakes here and there. As an accountant, mistakes aren’t exactly welcome and neither is wasting time but I'm sure I could survive a day of scolding from my boss.

“You’re fired!”. The door to the office slammed shut and I stood there, dumbfounded. I didn’t have a job anymore. According to my boss, I wasn’t working at company standard anymore and I had caused a lot of losses with my mistakes. I had figured he would be angry but I never expected to have gotten fired. Then it dawned on me, my mother. How was I going to pay for her meds if I didn’t have a job? It felt like my world was spiraling into some horrible dark abyss of despair. She was all I had left and the thought of losing her was too much for me to handle. Soon enough I wouldn’t be able to cover rent, and I would get kicked out, my mother would get horribly sick and it would all be over for me and her. I was panicking to say the least. I tried to regain my composure, at least until I was in the privacy of my home. I needed to find a job fast. I made my way back home and slumped on my bed. Ding. A message from my phone, my mum asking me to send money for this week's meds. I had to send her some money from my emergency funds, I really needed to get searching. I looked at the corner of my room and sure enough it was there, but it seemed to have gotten larger and more terrifying. Great, another thing I had to deal with, well not really, since it wasn’t exactly doing anything.

Weeks had gone by, I had tried everything but I couldn’t find another job. Mum was getting worse, she didn’t have her meds anymore and her illness was catching up to her. I knew she didn’t have much time so I tried to see her, but she didn’t want me anywhere near her. She didn’t want me to see her so sick and I’m sure she wouldn’t be thrilled to see me looking so unlively right now. All my friends were getting worried, I hadn’t spoken to anyone in weeks and they wanted to make sure I was okay. I couldn’t tell them the truth, they would fuss over it, or they wouldn’t understand and I couldn’t lie to them either, they didn’t deserve that. It was easier to just cut off all ties. Yes. The only company I had was the looming shadow. Over the past few weeks I had almost grown to like its presence. It was comforting in a way, just having it stand there and watch me, it never approached me, something I preferred, never asked me questions, never worried about me, just stared at me and I liked it that way. I had also stopped taking my medication as they had run out so maybe that was another contributing factor. I talked to the figure occasionally, it was the shadow that told me to stop talking to my friends, anytime it had something it wanted me to do, it wouldn’t stop repeating it until I did what it said, so as long as I listened it didn’t annoy me much. It had tried and succeeded to hurt me a few times but I never complained. I didn’t want it to leave so I never said anything that might cause it to depart from me. It would soon be just the two of us.

I woke up to the sound of my phone ringing, I didn’t think I would receive calls anymore after I had pretty much cut off connections with my friends. I looked at my phone and saw that it was an unknown number. I cut the call but they kept persisting, I reluctantly answered the call. “Who is this, and why are you bothering me” “Is this Malcom Forman?” “Yes, now what do you want?!” “I’m sorry to inform you that your mother passed away a few hours ago in her sleep” “Oh… thank you for calling me, goodbye”. I cried. Even though I knew it would happen eventually, I still cried, I couldn’t - no I wouldn’t believe it was possible. I had failed my mother, my friends, myself. I was worthless. Even through my tears I could still see the shadow, it didn’t even have a face but it almost looked as though it was… smiling? I certainly hadn’t said anything funny. I was so intrigued by it that I had stopped crying.

I stopped to look at the mysterious creature. Whatever smile was present had vanished. The creature came closer to me, but the air around it felt different. Every fibre of my being told me to run but I couldn’t. I didn’t want to run. I sat on my bed as it slowly approached me, until everything around me was enveloped in darkness. There was nothing else there, even the mysterious shadow creature was gone. If you think about it, it's rather poetic. My life just like everyone else's began in darkness and now it ends with darkness once again.

#my first official post straight from my brain #this is bad but I needed to put this somewhere #feel free to critisize #its also kind of long but that might just be me #i hope at least one person sees this

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tavi-hayes · 4 years

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side fic two ~ finally, a nice One

((I should probably be working on that foundation thing for the next challenge, but here is another side fic instead oops. let me introduce to you: nice and friendly tavi! thank you anna @hugo-stanton for the wonderful rp! if you decide to read this, then enjooooy! also please ignore any spelling or grammar errors...))

“Listen, I really don’t…”

Carla doesn’t let me finish my sentence, “we said you were going to help, the photographer is expecting you.” With that she hands me the dress I’m supposed to be wearing today. “You have no choice but to go.

Urgh. I really do not want to spend my day with some weird, old photographer who is just going to snap at me to do as he says. No thank you, I didn’t feel like being anyone’s puppet today. I’d rather spend the day in the library again, surrounded by law books I didn’t understand.

But unfortunately, I had learned that going against my maids was not a clever thing to do.

So, I sigh and reluctantly put the dress on.

Then I notice the shoes, oh hell no. I open my mouth to say anything, but Carla just gives me the angry eye. I quickly close my mouth again.

“The photographer is waiting for you in the gardens,” Carla says as she opens the door, “and you should hurry, you have 5 minutes.”

I let out a big sigh as I push myself to my feet.

Am I looking forward to this? No.

Am I going to go anyway? I don’t really have a choice. If I don’t voluntarily go, Carla will just drag me there. So, I’d rather keep my dignity intact and walk myself.

Am I going to complain every minute of the process? A 100% yes.

Walking down the stairs, in heels, and trying to hurry, is not a great combination.

But I manage to make it to the ground floor with falling, so that is worth something.

A staff member opens the door leading to the gardens. The sunlight is blindingly bright again today, not something I was getting used to.

In the gardens, Carla had said. Not a good description when the gardens are as big as 50 football fields together.

Where is that guy?

After walking around for at least 10 minutes, I finally spot someone in the distance.

That must be him then.

Wait.

Are my eyes deceiving me?

I was expecting some old, creepy, bald, wrinkled man. But the person waiting for me looks nothing like that at all.

At least I hope he is waiting for. Maybe there is an old, creepy, bald, wrinkled man here out somewhere.

Before I can do so much as stop staring, the other person looks up and smiles at me. “Octavia?”

I don’t know what surprises me more, the fact that he smiles at me or that he knows my name. Or maybe it’s both things.

“Uh yeah hi,” I get out as I continue walking over in his direction. As a way of greeting I wave, something I normally never do. I don’t know why I’m suddenly doing it now. “You must be the photography guy, right?”

He nods and smiles again. I can’t help but compare him to the prince. When was the last time he had smiled in my direction, deliberately or not? Well definitely not during that awful date. No I think the last time, and the only time, had been during that interview. And how many weeks ago was that?

The guy is holding out his hand, “I’m Hugo.”

Finally a normal person around here, someone who accepts a handshake. I take his hand and shake it, “hi nice to meet you.” I feel relieved I don’t have to curtsy, a skill I still hadn’t mastered.

“Thanks for doing this for me,” he says nodding towards the flowers.

“Oh yeah no problem,” I refrain from saying this photography thing hadn’t been my activity of choice, or that I wouldn’t even be here if it hadn’t been for my maids. Instead I look around the garden, perhaps I should spend less time inside the palace and more time exploring the grounds surrounding it. “This is such a beautiful spot,” I say before turning back to Hugo, “what exactly do you want me to do?”

“Yeah,” he says, nodding, “it’s great for photos.” His head turns into a different direction. “Do you like flowers?”

I try to follow his gaze, eventually landing on some pretty roses. A bee is flying straight towards them. “I do actually,” I say, nodding my head, “they can really make a garden come to life. And not just with their colours, but also because of the bees and butterflies and all the other insects.”

“Perfect, then let's start there.”

Oh. Oh. He meant like in photos. And I’m just blurting out my opinion. Tavi pay attention, will you?

I do notice Hugo’s head motioning me to follow. As I do just that, I decide to ask, “so are you like a professional photographer?”

He shakes his head now, “Gosh, I wish. But there really isn't a big demand for One photographers.”

I don’t understand his sentence, “one photographers?”

“Arin is my cousin.”

Oh. He meant One as in the caste, not the number. That makes sense.

What doesn’t make sense is the family tie between this guy and the prince. First, I didn’t recognize the prince’s ex-fiancée and now there is his cousin. I wonder if the other girls do know all this stuff.

“Shouldn't people like hire you for your skills instead of your caste?” I’m very aware of how messed up things are in this country. It happened all the time to my band. Now clubs would much rather book some D-lister Two, than Fives with more talent and who would perform for way less money. Life sucks. I just wasn’t aware the higher castes also suffered from this.

“Maybe one day Illéa will work like that, but for right now photography can only be a hobby,” Hugo turns back in my direction, “are you ready?”

I can’t help but comment on that first part, “I’m sorry, we can only hope for that day to come soon,” and I’m not just saying that for me, or for this One photographer. No this was a national problem, someone should do something about it. If only there was a prince who would just open his eyes to everything wrong here.

Remembering he also asked if I was ready, I quickly add, “yes, now what do you need me to do?”

“Move a little to the right?” as he is saying that he touches my shoulder, gently pushing me in that direction.

Hugo lifts his camera up and looks at it, “hmmm tilt your head up a little?”

I usually don’t do too well with orders, but for once I listen and do as I’m told, “like this?”

He smiles and nods, “perfect”. The prince appears in my memories again. If he was just a little bit like this guy, my stay at the palace would become a billion times easier.

I try to stay as still as possible, not wanting to move and ruin a picture. I also don’t know if I’m allowed to talk. Maybe that will only take Hugo’s attention away? So I decide to remain silent.

For a little while there are only the clicks of his camera, but then he asks, “so, which province are you from, Octavia?”

“Oh please call me Tavi,” I move slightly to get in a more comfortable position. My leg is starting to cramp from standing still. The feeling doesn’t go away immediately, so I move my leg a bit more until it all feels perfectly normal again. “I’m from Denbeigh.”

“Tavi... I like that,” he says before taking a couple steps to the side, telling me to look in the direction of his camera again.

Because it doesn’t sound as nice as Princess Octavia? Or Queen Octavia? The prince’s words echo in my head. No, I still hadn’t forgotten that statement. A shiver runs down my spine.

Pushing those ugly words away, I try to focus on the photographer again. As he is crouching down, he says, “Denbeigh's nice, do you miss it?”

“I don't necessarily miss the province, but I do miss my family and friends.” Every night when I’m in bed, alone with my thought, the feeling of longing crashes down on me. We do have a telephone chat often, but that’s just not the same. I miss being around them all. To make sure I don’t break down right this second, I try to direction of the conversation away from the missing part. “Question what am I supposed to with my arms?”

It’s an honest question. I have no clue what I’m doing here, just trying to roll with it.

I’m nothing like the other girls here, which is not a bad thing. But they all act so natural in front of the camera. They could all pass as models. I’m sure they would nail this photo thing too.

Hugo nods at me, “I'm sorry about that- but they should be able to come visit at some point I think,” then he drops his camera a little bit, his eyes peering at, the camera no longer in front of his face. “You can cross them if you like, putting your hands on your arms.”

I nod my head a little and follow his directions, crossing my arms in front of me. Something he said earlier caught my attention, “you mentioned Denbeigh being nice, have you visited it?”

“I've been to Winnipeg before, last summer actually. I did a trip through Illéa and stopped in each province.”

“That sounds so cool,” I wish I could say I had been on a trip just as interesting but coming here to the palace had been the first time I left my province. It’s quite sad actually, I haven’t seen anything in this country. “What did you think of Winnipeg? It's a wonderful city, right?”

His smile grows even bigger, “it’s beautiful.”

“I know right?” I chuckle a little bit, “though I might be biased.”

“You’re from Winnipeg?” he tilts his head to the side.

“Correct,” I say, nodding my head a little, “it’s my hometown.”

Living in Winnipeg has always been great. The city is simply gorgeous with its buildings and the river going right through it. Plus the nightlife was also pretty good, always something to do there. And if you don’t like the city life, it literally takes 15 minutes by car to be completely surrounded by Denbeigh’s nature.

“Oh, wow! You must love living there. I know I would.”

“I do love it yeah. You must go there in the winter, when there is snow everywhere and then when the sun rises in the morning,” pfft, “it's just gorgeous.”

The first sunrays of the day would illuminate the untouched snow. Saying it was gorgeous was a bit of an understatement. It was simply magical.

The weather also caused a lot of problems. Not to mention the need to clear to snow away in front of our house. But the glittering snow in the morning was worth all the troubles.

“Maybe you could show me around. It's always so much better with a local friend around.”

What is this? Am I making a friend?

Wow, well done Tavi.

“I will definitely keep you up on that,” I smile at Hugo, who is not taking pictures anymore I suddenly realize.

As he looks back at me again, he asks, “do you want to go over by the pond?”

It’s not like I’m the expert here, so I just nod my head and try to catch up with him as he starts walking away.

“So, how do you like the palace so far?”

“Uhm,” a sudden breeze of wind blows some curls in my face. Thank god I have splendid eyelid reflexes. The strand of hair bounces in front of my closed left eye before I push it back to where it came from. It also gave me some time to think of an appropriate answer to his question, “it is really big and there are a lot of rooms. I still get lost at times.”

“But sometimes you can find the best things when you think you're lost.” I notice Hugo’s fingers fidgeting with some thing on his camera. I have no clue what that thing is for or what he is even doing, but the act could my attention.

That sentence should be printed on a shirt, or better on one of those tote bags everyone seems to have. Could make some money with this. “That is such a wise thing to say, but I completely agree with you.” I nod my head a little. “Though it is also nice if you can actually get to your destination.” And reach it in time instead of arriving 30 minutes late…

Hugo smiles again, and I can’t help but notice how it just lights up his face. His voice goes a little softer, “and between you and me there's a lot of fun things to discover in the palace.”

“Maybe you can show me around,” I’m interrupted by a bee flying just in front of my face, but once it’s on its way again to the next flower filled with nectar, I quickly add, “if you ever have time for that of course.” Because obviously some people actually have important things to do.

“Yeah, maybe not today, but I'll be around over the next couple weeks.”

“Of course, also don't feel forced please,” I say before looking towards the pond we just reached. The sunlight is reflecting on the water, there are waterlilies in different colours, dragonflies resting on the leaves. “Oh this is pretty.” It looks like something out of a fairy tale.

“I'm serious, I'd love to, Tavi.” I look back just in time to see his smile. “Why don't you go sit on that rock over there and I can get a couple more shots.”

I turn my head to see which rock he’s talking about. It’s not hard to miss, given there’s only one big enough to sit on. The front half of it is still resting on the grassy ground, but the back side has a water border. Knowing myself and how clumsy I can sometimes be, I carefully walk towards it. I definitely don’t feel like taking a dive right now, despite it being another warm day.

Once I have positioned myself on the rock, and I’m sure I won’t fall into the water, I try to smooth the wrinkles in my dress. That action causes me to wobble a little, I quickly bring my hands down so I can support myself.

“You’re doing great,” Hugo tells me from behind his camera, “just relax. The rock won't bite.”

“Oh, it won't?” I chuckle softly, “that is good to know.”

It’s not going to bite you, you know? I had said to the prince examining a paintball mask. He had responded with an I know, which had only reminded me once again that it was not possible to be in a conversation with him.

Why is he in my head anyway? He does not have the right to be there.

I push the memories back to where they came from. Locked behind the wall, safe for any prying eyes.

Perhaps I should live more in the here and now, instead of in the memories of some awful events. Maybe that would be better for me.

I try to relax a little, exactly what Hugo said. Flipping my hair over my other shoulder I ask, “since when have you been into photography?”

Seeing people talk about the things they were passionate about always made me very happy. Just as it made me happy to talk about the things I love, music for example. And I had noticed the sparkle in Hugo’s eyes every time he said something about photography.

“Since I was a teenager at least,” he says, smiling fondly, “my aunt got me into it though, so really since forever.”

“Oh that is cute,” just like my own parents got me into music, it makes me smile a little. “How did you learn how to do it? With workshops? Or did you figure it out on your own?”

I’m very aware of the fact that photography looks way easier than it actually is. Taking pictures with my friends was already a struggle, especially when the lighting wasn’t ideal. And we took photos with our phones. But those real cameras had like a billion buttons. I don’t think I would ever understand what to do to take the perfect photo.

“Mostly on my own. My aunt showed me what she knew and from there I've learned from books and such,” he says as he moves himself to a different spot. I can here the click of pictures being taken. “What about you? What do you do back home?”

“That is impressive, really!” A breeze of wind blows another curl in my face. This time it bounces against my nose. I move my hand upwards and try to tuck the loose curl behind my ear, away from my face. Right then I hear more camera clicks. “Besides working in a music store, I’m also part of a band.”

“So, you're a musician? That's wonderful. I'm sure everyone back home must be missing you.” Hugo says as he puts his camera down.

That makes me snort a little, “I'm sure they're enjoying all the quietness now that they still can.” For I could be send home any minute and then they will have to deal with me and my music again. Before arriving here, I had expected to be send home in the first round of eliminations. But the unlikely thing happened and now I’m still here for whatever reason.

“Why? You don't seem too loud.”

“Our house is quite noisy,” I try to explain, “so if I’m practicing in my bedroom, you're able to enjoy it in like every other room.” And I’m pretty sure our neighbours can hear it too, even though they’ve never complained about it before.

I stretch my back a little. Sitting on a rock was not comfortable in the slightest, it would be nice if there was something to lean against. But what do I expect, it’s a rock.

When Hugo looks up at me, he’s smiling, “I don't think I could ever complain about that.”

“Wait until you're exposed to it all the time, you're going to long for some silence.” Earplugs seem to help.

Hugo has made his way over to me and is now holding out his camera to show me a photo. I lean slightly forward to get a better view. It’s the picture where I’m pushing some hair out of my face.

I know it’s me, but I don’t recognize myself.

Nothing like the person staring back at me in the reflection of the prince’s car. That girl had looked like a mess.

But this girl, here in that photo, she looks so carefree and happy. Alive.

“Oh wow, dude you're talented!” I can’t believe that’s me.

When I look up, Hugo is shaking his head, “that has nothing to do with me. It was all the model.”

“Oh shut up, I've never looked anything like that before.” I point to the photo, “Look you don't even see my double chin.”

That makes him laugh, “I'm a photographer- not a wizard. That's all you.”

“I won’t believe that,” I shake my head a little for emphasis, “you obviously are a wizard for taking such a photo. Can I see another one?”

He laughs a bit more, such a joyous sound, “sure.” He does something on his camera, and then shows me a photo taken by the roses. “See, that's not me, Tavi.”

“How?” I can’t stop staring at the photo, how is this even possible? “I will say it again, you are talented. Look at the sharpness of that photo, and the sunlight and the shadows.” The entire setting and angle really make my face stand out. In a good way.

“All I did was point and shoot. You did all the hard work.”

As I look back up again, away from the photo, I roll my eyes and say, “I bet you can even make a garbage bag look pretty,” before hopping down from the rock. I try to wipe any dust off it, without being too obvious.

“Maybe, but a garbage bag wouldn't make anywhere near as good of company as you.”

That makes me chuckle, what a compliment. “Thanks, I’m glad to hear you think my company is better than that of a garbage bag.”

“Significantly better,” he chuckles as well.

“You're great company too,” I say as my eyes follow a dragonfly flying buying. It’s searing through the air, just above the water surface of the pond. Eventually it lands on the leaf of a water plant, casually chilling in the sun. “Do you need any more photos?”

My gaze travels onwards to land on Hugo, who’s looking at his watch. “Maybe another day?”

“Okay cool,” I say, nodding my head. I should probably get out of the sun, I don’t want to get a sunburn. Plus I’m already feeling fairly hot. Going inside to a cooler room sounds like a great plan to me. “Are you also going back to the palace or are you staying here?”

“I actually need to get headed back. Let me walk you?”

“Yes sure,” I smile a little. My foot starts to wobble as I take a first step. The ground is very uneven here, with little rocks stuck in the ground everywhere. Why did my maids make me wear heels today? I should have insisted on wearing flats. At least they provided more balance on a bumpy ground.

I focus my attention on the floor, trying to place my feet in such a way that I won’t stumble and fall flat on my face.

Hugo must have noticed because he holds out his hand to me, “I’ve got you.”

I appreciate the gesture and gladly take his hand, whilst mumbling a thank you. “So what is your favourite thing to photograph? People?”

The rest of the way back to the palace we talk some more about photography and my band. He even says he’d love to hear some of our music.

It’s so nice to finally meet someone who is genuinely interested in what I have to say.

Once we reach the doors, I notice there are no staff members around this time. Being the independent woman that I am, I quickly open the door myself and hold it open.

I don’t need a man to open any doors for me, I’m perfectly capable of doing that myself.

Apparently it surprises Hugo because he lets out a surprised oh.

Once he is inside and I’m inside, I carefully close the door. It looks like the windows would break if the door is shut too harshly.

Hugo smiles at me, “I guess I'll see you around? We can take a stop in the music room when I give you your tour.”

“Sure,” I nod my head but only a little, trying to hide how much I’m actually looking forward to it. “It was nice to meet you,” I say with a smile. A smile, I now realize, that has appeared on my face many times since the moment I met the guy standing in front of me.

“It was nice to meet you too, Tavi,” he says as he takes a small step back, “thanks for letting me take photos you.”

“Of course, it was nothing.” With that we part ways.

As I’m going upstairs, back to my bedroom, I realize this photography thing had been so much more fun than I had expected beforehand. Maybe I should listen to my maids more often.

#selectionoc #side fic #fic

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kwantified · 4 years

Text

buttercup - jeon wonwoo

genre: angst word count: 1.7k synopsis: cold, early mornings - what a time to break up with someone. lowercase intended.

disclaimer! mild swearing and mentions of mature themes.

+ the concept of wonwoo and flowers is my fav aesthetic so here we are :)

it was early in may when our relationship bloomed. much like the flowers around his house did. it was colourful; an abundance of greens, pinks, whites, purples, and yellows painted the yard. it was when the weather wasn't too hot or too cold, nor was it too dry or too humid.

it was also when wonwoo started to have a hobby for gardening after seeing all those colours bloom at home. it was beautiful, and he wanted to make it stay even when the year said otherwise.

as spring transitioned into summer, and summer fell to autumn, the flowers decreased, and the weather turned cold. it was october.

still, he found one. he found one flower by the soil of his backdoor, still blooming as if it were the prettiest in an entire meadow of flowers. it was bright yellow, too, and it brought something new to him; something interesting.

it was like us. a product of plain luck and circumstance, we found each other like he found the buttercup. something that started without thought became the one thing that occupied our minds for every waking hour of the day.

ever since then, he used to call me buttercup. he said so while we were watching a movie, all snuggled up on his old couch, my head on his shoulder.

"you bring colour into my life," the man used to say, "and you're pretty cute, too."

"you're so cheesy, wonwoo," still, i liked it.

buttercup. buttercup. butter-cup. but-ter-cup.

suddenly, i'd forgotten all the other nicknames anybody had ever given me. to wonwoo, i was his buttercup. his flower on an autumn day, the splash of colour in a greyscale world.

even more, i wanted to keep being his buttercup. more and more, i'd look forward to our calls and dates. i could hear his love, and i loved how he loved me.

we were always abroad doing our own things, but he'd always be the first to call me when i arrived at home. his calm voice still rings in my ears to the time i'd exited the airport and he held me tight, laughter in the air.

i did the same, right?

i thought i painted his world. i thought i told him enough times how much i loved him. i thought i would always be one of the people that made him happy.

i was once all of those things. but perhaps our second january couldn't refrain himself from shoving the buttercup in the snow. and so, the buttercup turned cold.

"buttercup!" wonwoo's warm voice greeted me through the phone. i hadn't picked up for days. "it's been a while. how about my place, tonight? maybe we can watch something? i miss you."

"ah..."

i never wanted an "ah..." to come out. i thought i would answer like i usually would. then i'd go over to his place, watch something, and fall sleep in his arms, like we usually would.

"ah?" he asked. i contemplated for a while, almost hesitating to answer.

"okay, i'll be there at five?" i eventually answered.

as soon as the call ended, my smile quickly faded and my eyes felt the strange presence of my tears.

he welcomed me with open arms into his flat. it was still as small as i remembered it, with his kitchen, living room, and bedroom all stuffed in one medium-sized room. damn seoul and its living expenses.

we were quick to cuddle up with each other as his cheap heating made the want to cuddle a need. i missed this. his head was rested on my lap while we watched whatever was available, whether it be rom-com, horror, drama, or action.

initially, i only started coming to his place whenever i felt like i needed him. it was the typical "netflix and chill" kind of date, which was really just an excuse for something nobody wanted to say out loud.

now, i'm starting to see a difference between love and lust.

"baby, i'm going to go to the bathroom, yeah?" i tiptoed over to his bathroom and locked the door only to stare at how dark my eyebags had become.

i continued to stand in front of his bathroom mirror, walking in circles, lip trembling. when i opened the door, my eyes met his.

though i tried to give him a half-hearted smile, i think he already knew me well enough by then to know that i didn't mean it. but i didn't want to see the look on his face when he knew.

so, i walked all the way to the sofa, stood him up by the hand, and planted my lips on his.

i wanted to prove to myself that i still loved him.

the kiss was gentle at first, and slowly i found myself melting in the familiar comfort of his arms. i held on to his loose striped shirt - the same one that i used to wear as a dress in the summer - as he gladly took me in.

"i want you, buttercup," were the last words he said before we slipped under the covers.

if only the want could be replaced with love.

i woke up that night in wonwoo's arms. warm and familiar, yet i felt suffocated. i tried to shut my eyes back to how they should be and get rid of my stray thoughts, but to no avail. i shuffled around in my spot for a short while, not intending to wake him up.

eventually, i managed to crawl out of the bed, tiptoeing on the cold wooden floors, praying he wouldn't hear a thing while i got myself dressed. as i found my purse on his couch. i dug through it to make sure i had everything, and to my worries, i could not find my phone.

i searched around the place in an attempt to silently find my phone. the memories of last night were hazy in my mind, as i only remember the dreadful thoughts in my head.

"Y/N?"

fuck.

my body froze completely. i hesitated, and almost considered hiding, but i still managed a "wonwoo?". a frenzy of thoughts swarmed my head as i heard the creak of the floorboards telling me he's coming.

he wrapped his arms around my waist and buried his head on the nape of my neck.

"it's almost five am."

"i know," i whispered.

"come back to bed," he hummed lazily.

"maybe... later?"

he sighed, "baby, it's been so long."

"i think- i just-" i try to gather my words. he kept silent, listening.

"...feel like this isn't going anywhere."

i felt his eyes dart towards my jaw. his arms loosened.

"i feel like this has been happening for-"

"i know," he interrupted, louder, "a while."

"i'm so, so sorry," i feel the same kind of tears roll down my cheeks as when he had called me yesterday.

"no. me too," he whispered.

confused, i turn around to face him. i wrapped my arms around his neck, pulling us closer.

then i gathered my courage and swallowed my pride and spit out the words: "wonwoo, i think we just miss the idea of each other."

"yeah." he said softly, "yeah," he said again, almost inaudible, but i can just about make out what he said under his breath.

"it all comes back full circle, huh?"

"i guess. we started like this, so now we're ending like this."

"did you..." he trailed off.

"did you ever love me, though?"

i opened my mouth to say something, but the words vanished this time. i don't know if it's the messy hair or the deep voice or the fact that we're here, vulnerable and unclothed, the only warmth coming from each other's bodies in this small city flat.

or maybe it's because i knew i'd miss him too much when i went, and it hurt to already imagine the day his wedding invitation arrived at my doorstep.

regardless, it's because "i loved you, believe me," i said, almost sobbing, "god, you don't even know how much i-"

"me too, me too." he murmured into my ear - the same ear that's heard his sweet nothings and dirty secrets. at the same time, he kissed away my tears, and i held him even tighter than when he once broke in front of me.

then i let go. that's when i looked at him once more, and for once, i felt hatred.

i hated myself that it's been so long. i hated that i flinched too many times when he touched me. i hated that i wouldn't be his beloved buttercup anymore. i hated that this was happening, but i wouldn't have it any other way.

we haven't seen each other in days, and even before that, we felt something fade. i think we both knew it was bound to happen. after all, our relationship started in the midst of one night stands and drinking habits; love could only go so far.

we bloomed - and now it's time for us to rest.

"i wanted to say goodbye, one last time."

"i'm happy you did," he chuckled softly, "last night... was nice."

"yeah. it was." i replied as i put my coat back on. i had found my phone stuck between the sofa cushions, and i opened the door.

"will i see you around?" i turned around, nervous. wonwoo planted a soft kiss on my lips in answer, and i know it's the last.

"better invite me to your wedding - whenever it happens," he joked, taking the words right out of my mouth.

"i will! i'll send you a hundred buttercups along with the invitation."

"alright," he laughed, "goodbye, butte- Y/N."

"goodbye, wonwoo."

he closed the door, and i-

"Y/N!"

"yeah?" i looked back.

"be careful. it's still a little dark out there."

"thanks."

and then it was for good.

every now and then, i miss being his buttercup. now i'm just me. now i blend into his greyscale world; another falling leaf on an autumn afternoon.

maybe he'll tell the next person the same story, call them the same name.

maybe he'll finally find the one. maybe i should've been the one.

he kept his buttercup for two years, but he knew: you shouldn't keep buttercups too close to your skin; they might poison you.

#seventeen #svt imagines #wonwoo #jeon wonwoo #kpop imagines #kpop #buttercup #flowers #angst #breakup #kpop fanfiction #fanfic

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imaginewithmgk · 5 years

Text

you’re my friend and i care about you

prompt; “you’re my friend and i care about you.”

summary: y/n is having a really hard time sleeping because of her responsibilites. colson realises and comforts her so she can feel better. incorporates ideas from @overdramaticdepressedteen: "The reader is sick ( with the flu or sth else) and Colson is taking care of her and it's all soft and fluffy but Colson ends up being sick too”

word count: 1,577

warnings: none

Y/N’s P.O.V.

You couldn’t recall the last time you had properly slept, let alone simply relaxed, and this worried you. You couldn’t even remember the last time you had slept at all, it must have been at least 48 hours ago. Surely, monstrous dark circles had taken their place under your weak eyes. You were craving a break mentally and physically, your body ached with every movement but your job and schooling wouldn’t allow it. A break would only ensure failure. But you knew that you could get through this, that you were strong enough, you just needed something to remind you of that. That’s where Colson came in.

You got along with him, he was a good friend but nothing more. Both of your actions contributed to this, both living in a shell and blocking anyone from getting close. Feelings get in the way of everything. But even though it was rare, sometimes, just sometimes… he would let you in and you got a taste of the real Colson.

You sighed as you kicked off your uncomfortable work shoes and disgusting jacket that your employers deemed appropriate for your job, although it was the ugliest thing you had ever seen and you swear, drove customers away. Both found their own place in the corner, I’ll clean that up later, you thought but you secretly knew it wouldn’t happen until completely necessary. Your room was your safe space, the only place you could hide and calm down in.

Sleep became your number one priority as soon as you arrived home but one thing was stopping you from doing so, you needed to shower and quickly go over what you were currently learning. In order to stay up to date, an hour or two of examining a boring book was completely necessary. Considering today you seemed to have obtained little to no information at all, or at least ignored the stuff you actually needed to know.

You refrained from screaming when you spotted Colson making himself at home on your couch, scrolling on his phone. He was at your house a lot, you should not be surprised that he chose this night to come over. It started off with him always saying that his home is too crowded and he just wants to relax so you invited him over a few times, then you gave him a key, and now it’s as if your house is a safe haven for him. A secret little paradise. But you don’t mind. You would be lying if you said you didn’t enjoy his company.

He looked up from his vigorous reading, “You alright there?” He asked, adding a deep chuckle to the end. “Sorry,” You breath out and nod. Colson chuckles once more and points at a free spot next to him, “Sit.”

You found it funny that he made out like this wasn’t actually your house and he instead allowed you to remain in his presence. You would have reacted to this, had you not been as tired as you are.

“I can’t, sorry. I have to have a quick shower and then continue with my studies,” You paused. “What are you looking at on your phone that has you so focused?” “I was just got off facetime with Casie, now I’m scrolling through Instagram.” Oh, how you loved his relationship with Casie. “How is she?” “Sit and I might just tell you about her,” He said which made you roll your eyes. “Colson, I can’t. Believe me, I want to but I really can’t,” He smirked at this. “Give yourself a break. You seem stressed,” “Well, I am, genius!” You laughed. He was being generous, you didn’t look stressed, you looked dead. I suppose five minutes couldn’t hurt, you thought as you sighed and practically fell onto the comfy couch, right next to him. You leaned back, ready to fall asleep then and there but your conscience wouldn’t allow you. Instead, you sat up and crossed your legs so you were facing Colson. “You’re doing too much,” He mumbled as he put his phone down on the table to meet your sleepy eyes. “You have no idea,” But he did. Of course, he knew what you were going through. One thing you had learned about Colson was how perceptive he could be, he seemed to always know how you felt and how to find a solution, temporary or not. But that didn’t scare you, what scared you was that he was alright right and at this moment, he was right once more about you doing too much. You couldn’t handle anymore. Despite going through his own things and dealing with his own stresses, he was here now. Detaching himself from everything, you secretly knew he came over to not only relax but to look after you as well. He always tossed everything away when you needed him.

You broke through your own thoughts, focusing on his dirty blond hair and enchanting blue gaze. You said nothing until your mouth opened before your brain could catch up, keeping your eyes on his gorgeous locks. “I wonder what you would look like with a few braids in your hair,” Shit, apparently being tired was worse than being drunk. You can’t believe you just said that. Colson furrowed his eyebrows with utter dismay. “Sorry, stupid thought. I just really like your hair, I guess.” I’ve always wanted to brush it and play with it, but would he let you? You used to do it with your dolls and figurines when you were a child, it always calmed you down when you were upset.

Slowly, the young man shook his head, clearly amused. “You’re lucky I like you,” “Is that a yes?” You grinned. He hummed in an affirmative tone and rolled his eyes when you jumped like you were filled with energy, like you had been fully rested and mentally okay. You ran to grab your hairbrush from the bathroom. He must really treasure your friendship, trust you even. “When was the last time you slept, babe?” He asked when you returned, holding your hairbrush excitedly. You ushered him to turn around, which he did. And then you leaned back into a comfortable position, pulling him with you as he sighed in defeat. You had hardly ever experienced this side of him, maybe once or twice. He was always either closed off and icy or covering his feelings with humour. At this moment, he was open and possibly… vulnerable? I could get used to this, even if the reason for his current actions was him pitying your current state. “I’m not really sure,” You gave a faint smile and brushed your fingers through his hair. It was short on the sides and back as per usual but instead of being dyed and dead, it was healthy. It was his natural colour too. The curls he tried so hard to hide were fighting to show off their beauty. His hair was much softer than it looked, not greasy or dry. You brought the brush up to his head and began brushing lazily, the sound and feeling instantly calming you down. “I can’t believe I’m letting you do this,” You actually giggled this time. “But you’re my friend and I care about you. So I suppose it’s okay.”

You smiled and continued brushing through his hair, switching between the actual brush and your fingers. You snatched three strands of hair and braided it carefully. This continued until there were random braids all over his head. Surprisingly, you did quite a good job and it actually looked decent.

You were almost disappointed when you finished. Instead, you took out most of the braids except for one that you let hang at the front of his head. You sigh and began running just your fingers through his hair, gently massaging his scalp. He groaned, or moaned? You weren’t too sure. His eyes widened at the realisation, freezing in his moment of utter vulnerability. “Do you want me to continue?” You whispered. No answer. Eventually, he said something, “Please do.” You smiled at his response and his almost immediate relaxation into your touch. The silence was anything but awkward, it was pleasant and reassuring. You listened to his even breathing, something to fall asleep to. You flinched when you came back down to earth and noticed your tired eyes drooping every few seconds but you fought against slumber with everything in you. But he noticed. Reluctantly, he turned you both around so he was the one with his back against the couch, forcing you to remove your happy hands from his soft hair. “You need sleep,” He said strictly. You frantically shook your head. “I have so much to do, there’s no time.” “Don’t force me to make you, Y/N.” He shot back. It surprised you, startled you. How would he make me? You wondered. Your thoughts were interrupted by him reaching for a blanket at the end of the couch. “Lie down. Please.” He said gently. You were so tired so you did as he said. All feeling of resistance melted away as you leant against his chest. You smiled weakly, he really did like you. He really did care. You yawned as he draped your entire body in the warm blanket.

Within a minute, you were asleep. The last thing you felt was the tender touch of lips on your temple.

this is something different, i hope u enjoy it

i’m sorry it’s not exactly what the request wanted but i was feeling a bit stuck so i replaced being sick with being tired, let me know if you don’t like it and i’ll be happy to write a proper one for you :))

tagged: @mrsambroserollinsacklesmgk

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xiubaek-13 · 4 years

Text

The Masks of Destiny - Prologue

Pairing: None. Story is Monsta X + OC, but there is no romantic pairing.

Warnings: Not much in this prologue. Mentions of hell, inciting violence, questionable morals.

Word Count: 2,645

Genre: Fantasy, Dungeons and Dragons inspired world. Also, pirates.

Summary: Brought together in the town of Luskan, seven adventurers meet in the local tavern, The Cutlass, on the seventh night of the new moon as requested. They meet with Celaena, an infamous pirate captain who informs them of the concerning matters at hand. Unbeknownst to them, they have been watched since they arrived in the port. A mysterious traveller watches from the shadows, biding their time.

Prologue: Told from the perspective of the mysterious traveller.

***

In the depths of the Forgotten Realms your adventure begins. A candle illuminates an aged window on the bottom floor of The Cutlass tavern. It wouldn’t have been your first choice of venue but apparently your benefactor thought popular meant good. The place was falling apart, large chunks of rotting wood made you question the structural integrity of the place. And it smelled like booze, loose lips and vomit. Even the steady falling of rain outside couldn’t mask that smell. Gods you hated pirate towns.

You sat in the corner, out of the way and out of view of most of the patrons. With your cowl and hood covering most of your face you were able to sit back and observe, a task you were exceedingly good at. You were here to complete a mission. A mission that you felt was beneath you but you weren’t about to be the one to question Grazz’t, only an idiot would do that and think it was going to go well for them.

The demon lord was not to be trifled with. Many forgot that he was one of the few to rule over multiple realms in the Abyss, and had done so for centuries, unchallenged. Just because he didn’t appear like your typical demon did not mean that you should speak freely in his presence. He was always adorned in finery, everything about him was designed to draw you in, to make you susceptible to his charms. Rather, it was the opposite. You’d learned quickly to choose your words wisely with him. He was more skilled than any politician when it came to making deals and twisting words, hell he even manipulated other demons to keep himself amused. He enjoyed making you think that you’d bested him, gaining the upper hand in a deal only for him to lay all of his cards on the table at the last moment, showing you just how fucked you were.

This made some think that he wasn’t to be feared in combat. They were wrong. He won’t kill with brute force but he’ll turn you against your allies and force you to kill them before killing you himself. He was the ultimate tactician and manipulator and you were one of his best students.

Being one of his best was why you felt this task was beneath you. Your instructions were straight forward enough, follow the party, gain their trust, join them and sabotage their mission without them knowing. It was a mission that any acolyte could complete. There was something more at play here, there always was when Grazz’t delivered missions to you personally. The glint in his eye had hinted at it. Until you worked out what the ulterior motive was, you watched your marks.

This kind of mission should have gone to your sister Calaena, and would have if she’d been smart enough to serve Grazz’t. She didn’t have as much hatred for do gooders as you did. Your past experiences spoke for themselves and you learned from them. ‘Heroes’ were never to be trusted. Your sister and you had very different upbringings, you were always the perfect evil child while she was only ever half in on it. Her heart wasn’t as dark as yours and she was far more aloof. She would never serve a higher power, only herself. In some ways you envied her, especially when you were serving Lilith but once you had your exodus from the Underdark and found yourself in the servitude of Grazz’t you found a new purpose in life. A chaotic evil purpose. It pleased your dark and twisted little heart. Caleana had other ideas for herself once she escaped, commandeering a ship that she felt befit her and set sail. She was infamous as a master pirate thief. You never sought the infamy or recognition. All you strived for was the thrill of destroying those who thought they could make a difference. How naive they were. Dragons ruled this land for centuries for a reason.

***

Morons you think to yourself as you watch five adventurers make no effort to divert attention from their presence. There are two others in their group but at least the rogue and druid have the decency to avoid being the centre of attention. It was as though they were asking for the attention of everyone in the tavern, something that you would never do. You work in the shadows, unseen and unheard.

You turn your focus back to the troupe as you continue your assessment of each party member. At least this group was diverse. Sipping his ale and telling tales of the war is a tall and broad man, must be human. It didn’t matter where in the realm you were, there was always a fucking human. Why is it always a soldier? Do their armies not keep them loyal so the defect and set their own agenda? Almost every human you encounter has the same story, something about strength and purpose and a razed village, helping on a small scale or a sick relative. How boring. He should be easy to manipulate. Humans were prone to strong emotional reactions and illogical tactics.

The second being is a little surprising, if you were less skilled you would have picked him as the muscle of the group but the pouch of runes and herbs by his side and the Morningstar resting against his leg tell you he is a divine healer of sorts. This one requires a more in depth look, you recognise the slight shimmer around him as a glamour, one that is hiding more about him. You catch a glimpse of his ruby red eyes and wonder what he is. He seems quiet, gambling like he has no understanding of the game that he’s playing. Divine healers tend to serve a God and could usually sense evil. He was one you would clash with the most. You’d be wary of hiding your true nature from him lest he try to save you. The wide berth people were giving his back makes you think that his glamour is hiding either an object kept behind him, or wings. You kind of hoped that he was one of the sky people, for you had not encountered one of those yet. A feather from one of those wings would be worth more than its weight in gold.

Long blonde hair, a quiver full of arrows and a bow slung over his shoulder. You grimace at the pointed ears, recognising the wood elf quickly. Putting your kind’s history with the elves aside, this one was no doubt a ranger. They’re usually too perceptive for their own good but this one seems to be fully engrossed in dice games so at this stage you’re not concerned about him. He is different to the other elf rangers you’ve encountered in the past. They were all quiet, observing types, whereas this one is currently growling at the pirate who just beat him at their game. It’s almost animalistic but also childlike in its quality. It’s as though he was raised outside of an elven community. Something to delve into at a later date.

The last 4 additions are interesting to say the least. A changeling was always irritating, slipping their skin constantly, chameleons of personality. Why this one felt the need to also be a bard on top of that makes you unreasonably irritated, you just hope he doesn’t have a familiar too. He seems a little over the top and manic as he holds the attention of a crowd of pirates, weaving a fine tale about the rescue of a mystical wolf. He’s good, you’ll give him that. Further down the table the human chuckles and shakes his head at the bard’s epic tale. As good as he is, you can’t help but feel like there is something off about him, something you can’t quite put your finger on yet.

Tieflings are always a wild card, even more so when they have magical abilities. No matter how small, there is always a part of them that is demonic. They can never be wholly ‘good’ no matter how hard they try. Society would never believe that someone who looks they way a Tiefling does – horns, tail, elongated canines, solid eye colour and otherworldly skin tone – could be divine in nature. The one seated at the bar has rather small horns for his kind, his skin a very pale blue hue, and his eyes are solid gold. There is no point in using magic to hide his tail, and the pirates don’t seem to care. They are far more interested in the man himself, some speaking as though they have a history with him. It was rare to see a Tiefling so at ease with the people around it. You spot the scar on his throat, and catch a glimpse on similar markings on his wrists. Slave you think to yourself.

The autumnal Eladrin was more concerned with his surroundings than the people in them, staring off into the middle distance when a thought captures his attention. You feel similarly about him as you do the elf. Neither have a good history with your kind but spotting the druid makes one part of your travels here considerably clearer. It should be the middle of summer, it was until two nights ago, but when you had woken up the world was suddenly in the middle of autumn. At least you now understand what had happened. He held a quarterstaff and had odd runic shapes decorating his arms, usually common for a forest druid. As long as you refrained from harming nature when he was around he shouldn’t pose too much of a threat to you.

The one that you need to watch the most is the last member of this rag tag group. He is dressed similarly to you, all black with a hood and cowl, daggers visible because you know where to look for them. He is observant, eyes assessing the room, lingering over you for a moment before continuing to scan the crowd. There is no doubt in your mind of what his role is, like recognises like after all, but he has another agenda. A fellow rogue always makes things interesting. He’s sitting away from the rest of the group, half hidden by shadow as he watches the bar. If he’s any good he’s already assessed routes to the exits and identified the marks that are likely to cause their party harm. He’s probably found exits for all of them unlike you, who only has to look out for yourself.

He leans in towards the pirate captain who sits beside him and smirks, muttering something that makes the captains eyes widen so much that they almost threaten to fall out of his head. He slides a handful of coin to the rogue before hastily departing. The actions don’t mark him as a textbook thief or assassin to you, it seems like he deals more in information. The pale skin, black hair and black eyes let you know that he is a Shadar-Kai, a race not unlike your own, but cunning, sneaky and highly skilled. Under different circumstances you might get along with him but you would have to mislead and fool him if you were going to succeed in your mission.

And you had every intention of succeeding. Now that you’ve completed your initial assessment of your marks, you figure there is no better time than now to test them. It was one thing to observe how they act on a night off, but it was a whole different thing to observe them when presented with the opportunity to fight. Not a planned fight either, not something they could prepare for. You find that a decent bar brawl never fails to show you someone’s true colours.

Pirates are almost always ready to throw down, drunken pirates even more so. They’ll throw more than punches too, things have a tendency of escalating quickly when there’s pirates involved, a fact that you are more than happy with at this moment in time. You grin to yourself at how easy it will be to get this altercation underway. You murmur to the man at the table next to you that the large, dim witted pirate near the bar keeps giving him the stink eye and that you’d even heard him tell the barkeep that only impotent men were bald.

Leaving him to seethe and mutter about how he’ll make the big man regret his words you start to duck and weave through the crowd as you make your way towards the bar, stopping only to tap a large brute of a man on the arm. You draw your hood back, revealing your long white hair, pointed ears and dark skin – the tone changing depending on the light (right now it is a lovely shade of greyish purple) but it could range between obsidian to hues of blue and purple with greys in between. He turns angrily, ready to yell at whoever touched him but when he spots you he takes pause.

“You look like the strongest man here.” You smile sweetly up at the man, angling yourself towards him so that only he can hear what you say to him.

He puffs his chest and beams down at you. “Well little lady, yer lookin at the champion arm wrestler in these parts. So not only do I look the strongest, I is.” He flexes his arms for good measure and honestly, he does look like he has the strength of ten men, it’s why you chose him.

You let your features shift into confusion. “See I thought that you looked like a strong man but that guy over by the window, the bald one laughing with the two bandits, he said he’s the strongest in the realm.”

You barely finish your sentence before the man in front of you starts to seethe. “Oh does he?!” He exclaims, cracking his knuckles and doing a few minor stretches, all good signs that your plan is working.

Nodding you reply. “He does, I’ve heard him tell so many people but I don’t think I believe him. How could he be stronger than you?” You gesture at the man standing before you, pointing to his muscles and then wave dismissively at the unsuspecting man in the corner.

The man hands his ale to you. “Wouldya mind holding me drink for a sec little lady?” You don’t exactly get a chance to accept or deny his request before his drink is in your hands and he is marching off to the other end of the room. You set it down on the table nearest to you and continue to move through the crowd until you are at the other end of the tavern, at a table with the perfect view of the mayhem that is poised to unfold. You chose this seat for its view but also because it’s next to an open window should you need to make a quick getaway.

No words are spoken, you thought there might be a challenge or a threat but instead the big man simply punches the bald man in the face then throws him across the room. The sudden moment of violence is all the tavern needs before cacophony erupts. Pirates start yelling and fighting, furniture is smashed and thrown, and anything and everything is suddenly a weapon.

With their pleasant evening ruined, the party find themselves in the middle of a bar brawl in a pirate bar. How they manage themselves now is going to be very helpful for you. You smile to yourself as they exchange a few quick looks at each other, speak two words then disperse into the fray.

Everything is going to plan.

A/N: Let me know what you think so far. What do you want to know more about? What do you think will happen? I’m trying not to bombard you with lore but if you want to know more about certain aspect of the characters or the world, please ask me! I’m trying something different so hopefully you enjoy it.

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atinyidea · 5 years

Text

A Promise To The Sea | Ateez | To Sea | One

TO SEA – ONE

→ note! story one is told in the pov of Wooyoung’s sister with occasional pov shifts to one of the boys but! CHANGED TO THIRD PERSON

→ note 2! parents names in the story are all made up!

→ 3.8k words.

→ ml | prologue | next

Birds fly overhead in a cloudless blue sky. She had always liked birds, free to fly where they pleased when they pleased. She aspired to be as free as a bird, unshackled by tiresome duties as a human being. Jung Jiwoo sighed, propping her head on the palm of the arm leant in her balcony. Being a free bird was all her head could wish for however, her heart had a different desire. Shaking her head to rid herself of the thought of her missing brother she was reminded of something her father used to tell the two of them.

“Birds are the symbol of freedom, are they not? Everyone believes that they are.” Jung Woosung spoke loud and clear. His back faced his children as the three walked through the gardens. He didn’t turn to face them as he continued, pointing to a small bird that had landed on a nearby branch.

As a young girl, Jiwoo simply adored her father, she listened to his every word with nothing but praise and curiosity. Her brother, on the other hand, never seemed to truly listen to your father. Jung Wooyoung’s eyes never focused on his face when he spoke instead, they looked distant like the mere tone of their father’s voice was sending him into a slumber.

“But that simply isn’t true.”

“How can everyone be in the wrong father?” Jiwoo asked, confusion washing over her thoughts.

“Because, little one, not everyone understands the plight of a bird; their downfall.” Her father paused. He kept his arm raised, finger still pointing at the small bird. She had stopped walking now. Wooyoung had yet to speak.

In the next second, the bird’s chirping ceased to sound out, a small silver knife punctured its breast as it itself ceased to exist. The only sound in the garden now was the sharp intake of breath from the brother and the small cry that left the sisters lips. Your father then, and only then, turned to face his children.

“Birds are weak. They have no purpose but to fly around, be caged and get killed.”

Then he walked away, leaving Jiwoo to sink to her knees as tears streamed down her face. She was six years old when she witnessed her father kill an innocent bird for a metaphor. Wooyoung had picked her up and let her cry into his shoulder, still not saying a word.

Jiwoo was ten years old when she witnessed her father kill a man and she was eleven when she witnessed her father make her brother kill a man for the first time. Wooyoung was only fourteen.

Jiwoo was fifteen when she witnessed her father kill an innocent child in the name of justice. That was when Wooyoung finally spoke up and informed her of how wicked a man their father was. He disappeared a few days after that.

She could hear the excitement of the people down in the city her house overlooked but she couldn’t bring herself to share their sentiments. One says house, but it would be a rather big understatement to say the least, for Jiwoo lived in a castle. She could never be a free bird. Jiwoo was caged by her duties as a princess.

Today was her brother’s birthday. The city always celebrated a royal’s birthday — whether they were missing or not. She could never find it within herself to join the festivities. The day marked Wooyoung’s twenty-third birthday, adding another year to his age and another number to the years he had been missing.

Five years.

She was starting to give up hope that her brother was even still alive. He wouldn’t really leave her alone with their father, would he?

Jiwoo retreated from her balcony, gently closing the glass doors so she couldn’t hear the people anymore. She walked slowly across the room, bare feet almost tracing the marble tiles of the floor. Her fingers traced the silks and fabrics of her bed and the garments laying on it. Her handmaiden, Hayoung, had laid out a grand dress for her earlier in the day - the cream fabric quilted with golden patterns, the corset with golden laces. Gold had been Jiwoo’s favourite colour and now, she felt sick just looking at it. She looked down at herself, standing in the middle of her bedroom in nothing but a man’s button-down shirt, the white cloth covering all of her frame. She wiggled her toes when her eyes caught sight of them, and a small smile was brought to her lips. She looked over her shoulder at one of the open wardrobes, staring at the set of trousers one leather and the other linen.

She let her eyes flicker between the trousers in the wardrobe and the dress on her bed, once, twice, before she made up her mind. She wasn’t going to let her father dictate her life anymore.

Her fingers brushed over the linen and the leather. Her heart was beating out of her chest. It wouldn’t be the first time she had worn them, they were specially tailored for her when she started horseback riding but, fear still struck her heart at the thought of her father hearing she had skipped out in the celebration of her brother’s birthday. Not that the bastard actually cared for a more than a second.

Jiwoo’s next thought was strange. The idea of running away and never coming back. She had played around with it for almost four years, after the death of her mother. Could she really become an orphan? Her father would never welcome her back into the castle.

No. She couldn’t live like this anymore. She was going to become the bird she’d always aspired to be. Jiwoo fisted the leather trousers before slipping them over her legs, linen was easier to fold.

She grabbed a pair of leather boots, not bothering with the linen socks Hayoung often implored her to wear. The leather slipped over her feet and she plopped them down on a nearby chair to lace them up properly. The leather wasn’t the firmest, but it meant it was easier to run in them. She folded the tops of the shoes down, fastening them around her calf with brass buttons. They weren’t the fanciest of shoe, but she was sure they were fancy for the port she was headed for.

She then grabbed the linen trousers and made a beeline across the room to where a bag made of firmer leather was hung over a door. A spare set of clothes was always needed. Jiwoo folded the trousers quietly, picking out two more shirts from the drawers to her left and packed them at the bottom of the bag. As she moved around the room her eyes caught sight of her dressing table, where jewels and pearls lay in strings. She grabbed the pearl necklaces and laid then in between a set of undergarments. They would be helpful in case of a money shortage. She was about to turn away when her hand brushed against another necklace. It was the royal family jewel. Her mother used to wear it every day and had gifted it to her in her will. She knew it was important to the throne.

Which is why she took it too.

She set the bag down on her bed, searching her thoughts for anything else she may need. In the calm silence, she finally tucked her shirt into the leather around her waist, securing a thin belt through the loops: it would help with carrying things on her waist. She grabbed a few books, laying them on top of the clothing before closing the bag and sliding it over her head to lay on the opposite shoulder.

She didn’t have a jacket, nor did she have a hat. Figuring she’d just buy them on the way, she picked up a medium sized sack of coins as well as an empty smaller sack and attached it them the belt on her hip. Now all she needed was to get to her horse, Jax, without being spotted.

✦❘༻༺❘✦

“Lady Jiwoo?” She heard a voice, freezing her in her stance as she was petting Jax. Turning slowly her eyes met the confused ones of the stable boy called Gunho. She wasn’t allowed to learn of the staff’s last names, courtesy of her father’s rules, but Gunho had once let it slip in conversation after Jiwoo had come home late in the night and decided it was better to head back to the castle in the morning than wake everyone up. Jeong Gunho was a good friend. She turned to him, a frown framing her features.

“I’ll be back before the celebrations, Gunho, I promise.” She pleaded, eyes flickering to the bag against her hip, conveniently hiding the sacks of coins.

“But you’ve got a bag packed?” His voice was light, one could hear the confusing lacing his soft tone. Jiwoo had never been a very good liar, but now she had to try.

“I’m just feeling restless right now, there’s nothing more than a couple of books and a few apples for Jax.” She smiled. It was small and broken and if Gunho noticed he refrained from commenting. So, she continued. “You know how father hates it when I leave the festivities early because I’m restless. I’ll be back soon. I promise-”

“Okay, Lady Jiwoo.” He cut off her ramblings. She nodded and gave him a stronger smile before mounting Jax. The horse had no saddle, she figured you would simply set him free once you reached Gilway Wharf. In her haste to leave, she hadn’t noticed that Gunho had now set his sights on the sacks in your hip.

“Gunho?” Jiwoo asked after a few seconds, looking down at him from her heightened stature.

“Yes, M’lady?” She almost frowned. She hated that he had to be polite and formal right now.

“Thank you for everything you’ve done for me.”

Then she left and, somehow, Gunho knew she wasn’t going to come back.

While the day was good today, during the past week it had rained. The grounds were wet and as Jax cantered through the lanes she could both hear and feel the up-splash of mud. Jiwoo let a smile grace her lips as she urged him to start a gallop, the wind brushing through her long dark hair, blowing it behind her in a wave-like shadow. She was doing it.

It didn’t take long to reach the port town of Gilway Wharf, but Jiwoo knew Jax would be tired after all the galloping. The two of them slowed down to a slow trot before she stopped next to a market stall.

“What can I get you for, young lass.” The man behind the stall smiled. It was a kind smile, she knew that was the intention anyway, but the squint of his eyes and scared face threw her off a little.

“A couple of apples, please,” Jiwoo answered, reaching down to grab the three coins he asked for in return. She hadn’t been to Gilway Wharf very many times at all, any smaller town for that matter, so when she handed over three coins the reaction it warranted from the man startled her. His eyes had grown wide and he practically fell over his own feet. Jiwoo smiled as kindly as she could before moving on, not completely understanding his reaction.

When they reached a more secluded part of the town she dismounted from Jax, holding an apple in the flat of her palm and letting him eat. Once he had finished both apples she smiled fondly at the white-grey-speckled stallion. She petted him gently, letting her fingers brush through his mane. She wanted to remember how he felt before she set him free.

The town was bustling, busier than she remembered from the last time she had been here. Then again, she was seven and only passing through with her mother to send your father off on a journey and today was the birthday of a prince.

Jiwoo made her way down the main street before she stopped as a leather coat caught her attention. She walked slowly towards the shop, entering through the open doorway, door missing.

“Hello?” She spoke out tentatively, sticking her head around partition walls within the run-down shop. She wandered around more when she wasn’t answered, coming to stop before the coat that caught her eye. The leather was dark, darker than her trousers but not quite black. It was long and showed off two deep pockets, one either side around half way down. The collar was thin, but she found it quite stylish. She lifted a hand to run your fingers over the silver buttons that lined the bust of the jacket. Around the waist was a fastening, a flap covering another pocket on the right side.

“See something you like, my dear?”

Jiwoo jumped, startled, dropping her hand to turn on her heel to confront the person who scared her. It was an older woman, curling grey hair framed her face which was free of scars. Her skin looked worn, but it was smooth despite the wrinkles that lined her eyes and lips.

Jiwoo silently nodded.

Since the two women were in such close proximity Jiwoo’s eyes caught sight of the change in her own: from curious to delighted.

“Oh! Lovely!” The old woman exclaimed. “This coat’s the one I take it?”

Jiwoo nodded once again.

“I made it myself- quite a- many years ago.” The woman’s words struggled to come out of her mouth coherently as she stumbled over them like she couldn’t make up her mind what she wanted to say. Or that she forgot what she was saying. “Made it for someone special- yes you are special- just for you.” She grabbed the jacket with one hand and Jiwoo’s wrist with the other, pulling her further into the shop. Jiwoo could no longer hear her mumbles. “A princess wants a coat- a princess will get a coat.”

Once at the back of the shop she stopped abruptly, almost shoving the garment into Jiwoo’s hands. “Put it on!” She cried with a grin, “put it on! Let us see if it’s just right.” So, Jiwoo put it on. She slipped the coat over her arms and was pleasantly surprised that it fit the length of her arms perfectly. She fastened it at the waist and smoothed out the fabric. It was perfect. She looked up at the woman with a perplexed expression.

“It fits perfect.”

“I know”

Jiwoo didn’t want to ask why her tone sounded like she had made it specifically for her instead of a tone of amazement that it simply fit exactly.

“How much money do you require for it?”

“How much do you think it’s worth?” She asked. There was a second of silence before she began cackling. “That matters not, a handful of coins from that sack on your hip shall do the trick. Enjoy it, My Lady.”

✦❘༻༺❘✦

A couple of hours later Jiwoo sat in a tavern. The table she sat at was more secluded than she intended but it was the closest one to the window, where she could see both the sea and the setting sun. Her jacket kept her warm every time the door was opened and the cool breezed wafted through the room. She had a tankard of what she assumed was Gilway’s finest alcohol, not that she had drunk much of it. The reason she came here was not to drink anyway.

Jiwoo had always been good at being quiet, to hear everything around her. She wanted to know which boats had just docked and which were about to leave. She wanted to know who would have a problem with a woman on board or if she would have to tie up your hair and pretend she was a man. She was about to put away her book – which she was only pretending to read – and leave when she overheard a conversation from a young man that just entered and the woman behind the bar. Jiwoo shifted her position, so she was facing them, head down and eyes still on the book she held as she flipped a page as if she had suddenly become uncomfortable and needed a small change.

“Getting ready to leave then?” The barmaid asked, preparing a drink for the man without being asked.

“Today, The Poseidon is all fixed and ready to depart again.” The man sounded like he was already drunk and loose-lipped. Or perhaps he just carefree. How Jiwoo craved she could be carefree.

“That was quick.”

“Indeed. Our carpenter is very quick.”

Jiwoo let her gaze raise to watch them then. The man was wearing a brimmed hat, hiding his face from her gaze but she could still make out the tuft of hair that escaped it. His hair was a light brown, or maybe a dusty blonde - Jiwoo couldn’t tell from this far away. She couldn’t tell if he even knew the barmaid - not that it mattered since he’d be leaving today.

“Couldn’t you stay a little longer?” The maid asked, pushing a glass towards him, resting her chest on her arms as she leant against the counter. That answered Jiwoo’s previous question - they must know each other to some extent.

“Sadly not.” He replied, taking a swig. “We have a journey to finish. My sister would skin me if we were late on our orders.” He spoke slowly like he was trying to convey a different message with the same words. Jiwoo’s attention was thoroughly grasped now, she had unconsciously lifted her head to face in their direction instead of just her eyes. His sister? A woman?

Before anything else could happen a drunken man slumped on the bar next to them lifted his head. His eyes widened and his voice was loud and slurred. “I recognise you!” He pointed, tried to point, a finger in the man’s face. “You’re that pirate! There’s a bounty on your head!” He had stood out of his chair, falling down once on his feet.

The man with the hat stood too, tilting his head to look at the drunk man yelling in his face. Now Jiwoo had a look at his face clearer, well what wasn’t still hidden under the brim of his hat. He was quite handsome with a small face and a defined jaw, hair around his neck that was longer than the rest.

“You might be mistaken, sir.” His tone was not kind, but it wasn’t particularly threatening. The tavern had become a hush of the same word. Pirate was all anyone could say. Jiwoo was shocked that she didn’t particularly care.

“I ain't! I’ve seen them eyes before! With my very own ones at that!” The man was wailing now. He grabbed the pistol from the gun strap around his gut and pointed it right at the man’s head. He didn’t flinch like one would expect most men to. Maybe one gets used to guns when you live on the seas as a pirate. He moved the gun at a surprising speed for a drunk man and moved the right sleeve of the man’s arm up with the barrel of the gun.

“You are a pirate!” He exclaimed. The man must be branded, Jiwoo thought.

As if everything wasn’t tense enough, another man burst through the door, panting and waving his arms around in a panic. “The princess is missing! The king has put out a kingdom-wide search!” He cried between breaths.

“What?!”

There was an uproar. Jiwoo didn’t think many people would care. She froze in your seat.

“First the Prince and now the Princess?” She heard someone shout. Without a word, she packed her book in her bag and stood to leave.

“What shall we look for?”

“Well, she’s got the long black hair they all had, don’t she?”

“Yes! and her horse is missing too! A white and grey stallion!”

“Well if we find the horse surely, she wouldn’t be too far.”

“I bet the King’s giving a reward too!”

Jiwoo left a single gold coin next to the practically full tankard of liquid and made a beeline for the door. She slipped out easily enough, but the streets were a different kind of mayhem. She paused in her steps for only a second before turning away and heading for the docks. She’d just slip on a random boat and plead ignorance if she was found.

Jiwoo hadn’t made it far before a hand wrapped around her upper arm, pulling her to a stop. She didn’t know what to do but all thoughts of fighting back disappeared when her gaze came to see the man named a pirate.

“You disappeared quite quickly there.”

She didn’t answer him. Her eyes scanned his face, determined to remember his face so she knew to avoid it if she ever came into contact with him again. “You were also quite quiet when everyone became concerned over their princess.”

It took everything in Jiwoo not to flinch at the word hissed from his lips. “Why should I be concerned? It’s not like I’m going to find her.”

His laugh was shallow. He looked over his shoulder for a second, but Jiwoo’s eyes followed them nonetheless. Two more men stood behind him, she recognised then slightly, from the tavern, but she didn’t know they were with the pirate. One had artificial green hair, the colour changing under the sunset and the shadow. The other, the taller, had what she assumed was naturally dark brown hair, a singular braid twisted with metal hoops hung on the side of his face. That one looked somewhat familiar although she was sure she had never met them in her entire life.

“I think I just did.”

Jiwoo couldn’t stop the gasp that left her lips as her eyes snapped back to the man that held her.

“Well, now I know I did.”

Again, like a chain of events that could only get more unfortunate, they were cut off by a loud shout and a gunshot. Or three. Jiwoo couldn’t tell because she was encompassed in a great amount of pain.

“I’ll kill you! You… You pirate!” It was the drunk man from before. He had finally had the thought to use his gun. Sadly, for Jiwoo, he was still pissed drunk and one of the bullets had lodged itself into her knee cap. Another in her shoulder. There was another gunshot, where it came from Jiwoo couldn’t determine. She was in shock. Her head pounding as blood flowed from both her shoulder and knee on her left side. She stumbled, vision blurring. She had never been shot before - she didn’t think she liked it.

“Captain. We have to go. Pick the girl up! Let’s get out of here!”

Jiwoo had no recollection of what happened next.

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felicismagic18873 · 4 years

Text

Beyond the Blaze(9)

Summary: 4 Years old, Alyssa Potter finds her life taking a magical turn as she steps into a world of cute green giants, talking robots and misunderstood aliens. All of it is almost enough to make her forget the probable destruction of her own world.

The night turned to day and soon Tony wasn't the only one awake and working in the tower (except the security that is). But unlike most people, Time wasn't worth more than a casual glance to Tony. What was time anyway but a man-made concept? He could work the same way during the darkest of nights as he did in the brightest of days, plus it wasn't even that obvious if it wasn't for Jarvis announcing the time every few hours, silently indicating that Tony should go to sleep.

Not yet, he still had work to do. Sleep wasn't worth stepping away from the newest model of his suit, this one with back up oxygen, and he needed something to allow him to summon the suit remotely. He was almost done with the structural design just an hour more and-

"Tony? Jarvis said you have Alyssa down here?" Bruce walked in rubbing his eye with the palm of his hand, his other hand holding his glasses." I know you want to spend time with her but this is not the way she needs her.." His slightly chiding tirade trailed off when he reached the point from where the sleeping child was clearly visible. "...sleep. Huh." He tilted his head looking at Alyssa.

Tony raised his eyebrow resting his chin on his hand, "You were saying?"

Bruce looked sheepish, he ruffled his hair, "I didn't see her and sorta-" He looked at a loss for words.

"Panicked?" Tony cut in helpfully. He eyed the fellow scientist knowingly, now he knew what Tony felt like when the kid pulled the disappearance act. Though this time, unknowingly, Tony was the person who lured her in not Loki.

"Yes," Bruce put on his glasses. Tony hid back a smile seeing the 'Zen Sloth' T-shirt Bruce was wearing, so he liked Tony's gift after all.

"How long has she been down here? I put her to bed myself." Bruce leaned against the desk which Alyssa had occupied last.

"Came in about 1-ish in the morning, dropped to sleep half an hour later. She was apparently 'worried' ." He made air quotes with his fingers while simultaneously rolling his eyes pretending he didn't care for the gesture. The kid was so...so kid-like and innocent that it was just ridiculous.

Ridiculously, feelings. It's just that, this sorta thing just didn't happen to Tony. He could count people who worried about his eating habits of all things on one hand and still have fingers left.

"Makes sense. She asked me about you our times before finally agreeing to go to sleep, which she obviously didn't" He shook his head staring at the sleeping kid with a fond but exasperated smile. Tony Hmm-ed in reply.

For a while, Tony worked and Bruce stayed silent.

"The structural design is complete sir. The newest model will have increased mobility of 12% with the revised adjustments. Oxygen supply should allow for flying on higher altitudes."

Some tension left Tony's shoulders as he realized he wouldn't have to worry about suffocation in the suit ever again.

If Tony had looked he would have seen Bruce's eyes moving from Alyssa to rest upon his slumped form with something akin to pity and understanding in his eyes. If Tony had looked he would have joked until the thought of his near-death experience left both his and Bruce's mind.

But Tony didn't see so none of that happened instead it was Bruce who distracted him with casual observation," She needs more pajamas. She has been sleeping in that one for days."

"Well, you're the one who wouldn't let me buy her all the stuff I wanted to.", Tony pointed out.

"Because, " Bruce stressed the word, "You wanted to buy a whole wardrobe for her. The last thing she needs-Tony she'd be overwhelmed plus we have no idea what's gonna happen once people find out about her. And they will." He added seeing Tony opening his mouth to interrupt.

Secrets had a way of spilling, especially the ones that you wanted to stay hidden. And if your secret was a three foot five inches tall kid, well then the chances were that it wouldn't even last a month. After all, they couldn't keep her inside forever.

"She does need pajamas though," He continued lightly, not wanting to touch that particular can of worms, ", and a few more sets of clothing." He once again stressed on 'few'.

Tony pointedly rolled his eyes, took out his stark phone from the pocket of his sweatpants and with quick taps placed the order, "Done, it'll arrive in an hour or two."

Bruce refrained from commenting on it not being that urgent of a task and went to get the kid. It couldn't be comfortable sleeping on the sofa.

He gently shook Alyssa's shoulder, "Time to get up, Alyssa. Let's go upstairs. Then you can sleep for a while longer. Okay?" Alyssa smacked her lips together a few times before licking them and absently nodded.

She peered at Bruce with half opened eyes as she slowly got up. She leaned against him with a jaw-breaking yawn. Bruce stood up and placed his hand on her back to guide her, Alyssa pretty much sleepwalked to the elevator with him, her steps unsteady and eyes almost closed.

Bruce looked over his shoulder at Tony, "Come up for breakfast, okay?"

"I'll be there for the delivery." Tony absently said, already back to work.

Bruce shook his head and walked into the elevator with Alyssa.

-----------------------

The package arrived exactly two hours later and true to his word Tony showed up soon after it did. Bruce was putting the dishes in the dishwasher while Alyssa was playing with the projections again, she'd slept for another hour before getting up for breakfast.

Bruce didn't stop her from gathering things for her own breakfast (Fruits and Milk, she couldn't stomach bacon or eggs first thing in the morning) but he made sure to keep an eye on her and he insisted on cutting the fruits making it clear that knives were dangerous and yes, he knew that she knew how to use them but that was not the point. She didn't need to do it when an adult was near and she definitely wasn't allowed to do it when one wasn't. She could eat the fruit that didn't need to be cut up if she was alone.

"Goo' Morning, Mista Ro-Tony." Alyssa grinned at him, her eyes squinting a little.

"Good Morning, Kid," Tony didn't mention that since he didn't get any sleep or coffee last night, it was more like 'dead exhausting morning' for him. "Did you see the stuff that came for you?" He inclined his head towards the package laying on the table in front of the couch (which he had replaced with the exact same one yesterday) He plopped on one of the chairs near the table.

Her eyes widened a bit, "That's for me?"

Tony nodded, contemplating whether or not he wanted to get up and sit on the couch instead, it was much more comfortable than the chair but it'll require getting up. He was still deep in thought when Bruce handed him a plate and he shockingly accepted it. It was only a second later when he was raising the grilled cheese sandwich to his mouth that he realized Bruce had handed him the place. And he hadn't felt the bone-deep discomfort that he usually did. Huh.

He took a deep gulp of the burning nectar of life that Bruce had placed near him and decided to put this thought away with all the things he needed to think about later (along with why he hated when Bruce reminded him of the kid's stay was temporary.)

"You can open it, Alyssa." Bruce gently guided the kid towards the package. Tony barely stopped a yawn from breaking through, his eyes watered a bit but he blinked it away rubbing a hand over his slightly stubbly jaw. He felt exhausted all the time now, maybe it was because he hadn't got a decent sleep for days. Since the inva-since that day really.

The kid who was looking for a green light apparently quickly began to open the package with Bruce helping her whenever she got a bit stuck and then-

"Is that Iron man pajamas?" Bruce sounded bewildered.

Tony grinned, "The hulk ones will arrive tomorrow, personalized ones take time."

The kid was staring at the red Iron man shirt in her hands with a slightly open mouth.

"Tony," Bruce was trying his best to hold back a smile holding up an iron man onesie but Tony could see right through it, "when I said clothing-"

"Can I wear this now please?" Alyssa finally spoke up, hugging the pajamas to her chest excitedly. Her smile was so wide, Tony wondered if it hurt her cheeks. But that was the best sorta smile, wasn't it?

"They're pajamas, Alyssa," Bruce said but Tony knew he didn't have the strength to say no to those happy smiles.

"Its still morning, can I? Please oh please." Alyssa was almost bouncing on her feet. Tony chuckled, she looked so pleased with her argument.

Bruce sighed, "Sure go ahead. It won't hurt anyone."

She circled the couch to run into the bathroom with the clothes, it seemed like she couldn't even wait to go to her room.

"Whipped," Tony sing-songed a few minutes after the kid was gone.

Bruce raised an eyebrow, "You're one to talk."

Tony opened his mouth to defend his reputation but a blur passed him by. Alyssa stood next to the box looking all shy and adorable. She then grinned and posed putting her hand on her waist, "I'm the Robot now."

Tony let out a laugh.

The top was a perfect hot red colour with the same design as the iron man chest plate (Almost same, but Tony could see the differences no one could) The arc reactor was shown as a small circle of white light (Blue, it was supposed to be blue!) But Alyssa looked so happy that Tony reigned in his comments.

"Quite the look, you've got there Sabrina," He winked at her, Bruce shook his head at their antics and opened a pack that he had ordered.

He signaled Alyssa to come near him and handed her a notebook. Alyssa tilted her hear with a curious expression, "This is a workbook," He explained, "Have you started school, Alyssa?"

"No, not yet." Alyssa shook her head. She was supposed to start this year actually.

"Okay, then. I want you to do a little every day so that you're not too far behind when you finally go to school. "

Tony made a face, there Bruce goes again. Implying how she'd have to leave soon.

"Okay. Can we watch Wall-e? "

"Well, "Bruce looked hesitant. " I have some reading to do, so how about you do some of your workbooks and then we can watch Wall-e."

Alyssa looked down at the notebook she was holding and nodded her head.

"See ya Mista' Tony", she said to Tony who looked half asleep.

"See ya kid,"

She then ran up the stairs to her room, probably to do her work.

"No running on the stairs, Alyssa!" Bruce called out after her but she was long gone.

Tony turned towards Bruce to go to say something about the workbook and how parent like he was acting but Bruce cut him off by raising a hand.

"Just don't Tony," He pinched the bridge of his nose, " You're sleep-deprived. Please go to sleep."

Tony stood up, "Fine," He huffed, "But I am doing it because I want to, not because you told me to Brucey Bear." He then turned away with a flourish and strode to the stairs to go to his room but it probably would have looked more impressive if he wasn't yawning and his eyes weren't red.

Bruce shook his head, leaning back in the chair he was sitting on.

-----------------------

Bruce looked up from his Stark pad due to a sound. He could feel the telling stiffness in his neck indicating that he must have been working for quite some time, it was easy to lose himself in work when he wasn't worried about being captured... He gently massaged his neck to ease away some of the tension. He looked towards the elevator to see who had come in since Tony was sleeping.

"Hello, Doctor Banner." Steve Rogers stepped into the penthouse. Bruce looked him over, taking in tension in his shoulders that wasn't there the last time Bruce had seen him.

"Captain," Bruce nodded towards him in greeting. "Hope you don't mind me saying this but you look run down."

Captain leaned against the couch, he cast a fleeting glance at the glass shelves in the kitchen which no longer housed a line of alcoholic drinks (Those were now hidden in a compartment below the counter easily accessible to Tony, not so accessible to a kid). Then he turned his eyes towards Bruce.

"Yeah, Its been a rough couple of days," He tiredly

Bruce placed his tablet on the table in front of him, "The assassin." He simply said.

Captain stilled, " Yeah," He finally answered. He looked a bit confused.

"Clint told me," Bruce answered the unspoken question.

"Of course. Right." Steve shook his head," I just wanted to let you and Stark know that we'll be going underground for some time. Me and Miss Romanov. " He crossed his arms in front of him.

Bruce remained silent. He didn't know what he could say. Did he wish him good luck or offer his help?

Steve kept staring at the box on the table like it held answers to all his dilemmas, "The assassin, " He finally spoke again, "He's good-too good." A pained expression showed on his face. "He-Well, he disappeared before we could do much but Nat thinks we may have a trail. We're going to follow it." The expression was gone the next second and Steve's face closed off again.

There was a sound of footsteps, Bruce looked towards the stairs. Alyssa still in her Iron man Pajamas, was running down the stairs. She was hugging her workbook to her chest.

'No running on the stairs!" He almost said again but she stumbled to a stop at the bottom of the stairs on seeing Steve. Immediately the smile wiped away from her lips.

"Hello," Steve visibly softened his face and smiled in greeting.

Alyssa stared at him for a while then she turned to Bruce. "I am done with my workbook,"

She held out her book "Can I watch Wall-e now?"

"Sure thing, kid."

But Alyssa didn't move to sit on the couch to watch the movie. She turned her eyes towards Steve again who was confused to see that she was almost glaring at him. She narrowed her eyes, which would be cute if the other two members weren't so perplexed.

"I think I'll have some juice first." She strode off into the Kitchen.

Steve looked surprised and confused. Bruce shrugged, he had no idea why Alyssa was acting like that. He finally decided to say what he was dreading, "Do you need any help?" He mentally prayed that they didn't.

"No. No thank you." Steve held up his hands." Just letting you know, " He shrugged, focused on the conversation again, "Shadow work isn't really Stark's style and the last thing we need is the Hulk showing up when we are undercover, no offense. "

"None taken," Bruce almost let out a breath of relief. "Get in contact when you're done with the mission?"

"Sure thing." Steve let out a small smile and extended his hand, Bruce shook it. "See you soon, Doctor. "

"See you, Captain."

With that Steve stood up and walked towards the elevator again, the last thing Steve saw before the elevator door closed was bright green eyes glaring at him again.

#tonystark #Marvel #Harry potter #female!harrypotter #Irondad #Beyond the blaze #Fanfiction #tony stark has a heart

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