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sundrop-writes · 29 days

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Careful - Chapter Four

(Dad)Spencer Reid x (Mom)Fem!Reader

Chapter Four: Last Hope

It’s just a spark but it’s enough to keep me going.

Summary:

The entire axis of your world is shifting.

Spencer is not the man you left alone all those years ago, and you don't know how to react to him being such a perfect, caring father. You also don't know how to react to the potential that you could be killed by someone who has already gutted five other women.

Luckily, Spencer is there to protect you. Another thing you don't fully know how to react to - but somehow, you just go with it.

Dad!Spencer Reid x Mom!Fem!Reader. Exes to Lovers. (Slight) Fluff and Angst.

Word Count: 8,800

Criminal Minds Masterlist | AO3 Link | Series Masterlist

Detailed warnings and author's notes below.

Warnings: Again, basic warnings for a Criminal Minds episode - mentions of murder/killing, the reader character is the next target of a serial killer; mentions of the reader wearing a sexy Halloween costume (during a flashback); mentions of gender roles - the reader doesn’t raise Sebastian with strict gender roles (and Spencer appreciates this); mentions of the reader giving birth (not graphic descriptions); some emotional tension between Spencer and the reader; angst because Spencer is upset about missing out on so much of Sebastian’s life; passing mention of abortion; the reader is threatened (in a graphic way) and called whore in a derogatory manner by the UnSub; Spencer is also threatened in a very graphic way by the UnSub; specific threats of stabbing and rape (toward the reader); passing mention of poop (because come on, this is a little kid, and kids talk about their poop a lot); I believe that’s it for this chapter.

A/N: So, this chapter starts off with a flashback rather than ending with one, because flashbacks are important to how information is revealed to the audience, and I think it works here. Idk what else to say about this chapter - I think it's a nice transition into the climax. I hope you guys enjoy it!!

...

Halloween. It was always a time when Spencer thrived the most - and he thrived even more when spending it with you.

It was your second Halloween together as a couple, and Spencer loved that you enjoyed celebrating the holiday just as much as he did. You loved dressing up, you loved all of the spooky lore behind Halloween. And of course, you loved listening to all of the real life facts he had to tell you about Halloween’s history, and things like vampires, werewolves, zombies, and all of the Halloween traditions and how they evolved over time.

You didn’t think before that learning about the origins of Halloween could make it even more fun, but Spencer somehow made it into the most exciting educational documentary of your life.

This year, you had invited him to a house party that one of your work friends was hosting. It would be some light drinking, finger food, dancing to cheesy Halloween songs, and most likely sitting around and talking while roasting marshmallows around your friend’s backyard fire pit. It wouldn’t be anything big, but you expected it to be a really fun night.

You showed up to Spencer’s place wearing a straight off the rack, generic ‘sexy witch’ costume. It consisted of a very wide brimmed pointy hat, dark make-up, and a tight corset drawing attention to your curves, as well as a short tulle skirt, flared sleeves, and black fishnets and black boots to top off the look. He found you irresistible and almost wanted to stay at home. But he was looking forward to the party; he was excited to meet your friends and he knew that the occasion meant a lot to you.

He told you that he was planning on going as a young Ernest Hemmingway, and as much as you adored it, because it was a very Spencer thing to do - you knew that it was very unlikely that anybody else at the party would be able to identify his costume on sight, and that would probably disappoint him. He would be standing proudly, asking people to guess who he was, and they would come up blank because they weren’t in the same mindset as him.

So you advised him of this, and encouraged him to steer his costume in a different direction. (And Spencer - trusting any advice you gave, simply let you lead him.)

You took the late 1800s style clothing he had picked out for the occasion, and some of the makeup you had brought in your bag for potential touch-ups - and you convinced him to let you dress him up as a sexy vampire who had been turned in the late 1800s.

You did his makeup - with some dark eyeliner, that he winced at the entire time, some dark eyeshadow, and some red lipstick smudged around his mouth to appear as though it were blood he had just siphoned from his latest victim. And the entire time you worked, he came up with an elaborate name and backstory for his vampire character. You delighted in listening to him tell you all about Frederic Henry - named after a Hemmingway character. A man who was shot in the military and assumed dead, but who was saved in the trenches of World War I by a vampire’s bite, and then lived on.

You encouraged him to wear his shirt unbuttoned quite a bit, creating a deep V down to his chest that he wouldn’t have worn any other time. Thinking about his story, you even used the eyeliner to create the scar of a bullet wound on his chest, slightly hidden by his shirt - something to hint at Frederic’s tragic past.

(Both you and Spencer got way too into it, but you were having fun.)

You were running a bit late by the time you left Spencer’s apartment, but it was a casual house party, and you knew that nobody was going to call you out for being ‘late’.

You parked a few blocks away, not wanting to drive through the neighborhood with so many kids out and about on foot. It was still early in the evening, and many kids were still out, knocking on doors, getting their candy.

“They’re so cute, aren’t they?” You remarked as the two of you walked down the sidewalk, hand in hand with Spencer as you made your way toward the party among a sea of Trick or Treaters.

“Kids in costumes? Or just kids in general?” Spencer replied with a chuckle, trying to clarify what you had said.

(There was a hopeful edge in his voice, a daring longing in his eyes as he looked at the parents helping their children from house to house. Something deep inside of him that hoped the two of you could have your place here a few years from now.)

“Kids in general are cute.” You shrugged. “But kids in their little costumes are so much cuter.”

Spencer’s insides fluttered - seeing you light up with joy just talking about children, knowing that it might be in your future. Knowing that it might be a part of his future with you.

“If we had a baby, would you wanna dress him up for Halloween?” Spencer asked.

You wanted to fixate on the ‘if’ - to tell him that you thought it was something more certain in your future, with the way things were going. That you thought he would make an amazing father. That you wanted it to be a ‘when’.

Instead, you chose a different part of his statement to pick at.

“You sound awfully certain that our kid would be a boy.” You chuckled. “Please don’t tell me you’re one of those guys who would be disappointed by having a girl.”

That would be a dealbreaker for you. As amazing as Spencer was - he had to be just as good of a father to a daughter as he would be to a son in order to stay in the picture.

“Goodness, no.” Spencer replied, shaking his head.

He held back. He didn’t tell you that he had spent far too much time - hours on the plane rides back home, nights when he couldn’t sleep - thinking about his future with you. He imagined three kids. An oldest boy, and two girls, about a year or two apart each. A golden retriever, a house - he had even picked out which district he wanted to live in based on schools in the area and lowest crime rates.

He knew it was stupid, but he had already been squirreling away money for a downpayment on that house. When you were ready, he wanted to be able to give you everything you could ever ask for. He had way too much time to fantasize, and he didn’t want to admit that to you now.

“Just - it slipped out.” He chuckled. “I would be thrilled if we had a little girl. But - I pictured us having a boy.”

In his mind’s eye, his daughter was so much like you. And if that came to pass, then he would be the luckiest man on earth.

“You did?” You grinned at him, a distinct light in your eye.

Spencer found his chest untightening as he breathed in relief.

“Well, if he’s half as cute as you,” You said, moving a hand over to pinch one of his cheeks, which made him smile and let out a huff, half forming into a laugh. “Then I definitely wanna dress him up in a Halloween costume. Especially while he’s still little and cute and can’t argue about what I wanna dress him up as. Before he starts talking and wants to be that fuzzy guy from Star Wars.”

“You mean Chewbacca?” Spencer asked, wondering which one you were talking about.

“Yeah!” You said. “The big ugly one. The little teddy bear guys are cute, but the big one is kind of creepy.”

“We had an all-day Star Wars marathon, and you didn’t tell me that you thought Chewbacca was creepy?” Spencer chuckled, his mind now distancing from the subject of the two of you having kids.

“Yeah, because you were there to protect me!” You replied, your voice still filled with lightness and laughter. “And I didn’t even really realize it until after. I had this weird nightmare-”

“You had nightmares about Chewbacca?”

“One nightmare! It was only one!”

The subject of children was forgotten, then.

Your laughter echoed off into the night, and you didn’t think much of the conversation.

Spencer remarked on it as a precious memory - as a sign that his savings account was an insurance policy for his future, not a fool’s errand. After the break-up, he thought about it over and over - he wondered where he had gone so wrong, how he had lost you. If you had felt so secure in your future together - how had he lost you?

…

Spencer wasn’t sure how it was possible, but he was growing more and more love for Sebastian with each passing moment.

After he got off the phone with Derek, he went back into the house to be mobbed by Sebastian. Having the boy run into his arms with so much excitement - it made him feel more heroic than anything he had done with the BAU for the past years of his life. So often, when he carted off a killer to jail or when he saw a victim returned to the arms of their family, he couldn’t feel the relief or the calm that JJ or Gideon spoke of. He just felt so empty.

But having Sebastian hug him tight and ramble in his ear with excitement about all his plans for their afternoon - it made his chest swell with a grand importance that he had only gotten a taste of when he was with you. When he was making you happy. It felt like a moment that his whole life was leading up to.

You asked Spencer if it was okay for you to go back to your office and get some work done while he occupied Sebastian, and he could think of nothing he wanted more - except maybe for you to join him, and to spend some true quality time with him and his son. But he hoped that would come later. And this in itself was progress - you trusting him to play with Sebastian, to spend time alone with him while you got your work done.

Sebastian showed Spencer every single one of his toy dinosaurs, and they played with those for quite a while. They also had a tea party with some large bears and dolls present - and Spencer was delighted by the fact that you didn’t buy him gender specific toys. Knowing that this opened up different areas of play and imagination, and allowed for his development to be nurtured by gentleness and caring that young boys didn’t often get in a society so rigid about gender roles.

Spencer really couldn’t imagine a better boy. You had raised such a beautiful, smart son. Someone who was polite, so caring, and gentle.

Spencer was practically swollen with love, overwhelmed at getting to spend time with his son.

His heart felt as though it might burst out of his chest and he knew that he looked fitful, actively holding back overwhelmed tears while Sebastian poured the imaginary tea for each member sitting around the small plastic table and they clinked their tiny plastic cups together in a toast.

Then, Sebastian wanted to show Spencer a favorite movie of his. He rushed downstairs to put it on the TV, and as he was picking it out among the DVDs, he became distracted by something at the top of the shelf beside the TV.

“My Halloween basket!” Sebastian said, pointing to an orange basket at the top of the shelf - one that did appear as though it was for Halloween, with a jack-o-lantern’s face painted on the front of it.

“Mommy says treats are for after dinner. But… can we have one now?” The boy looked hopefully toward Spencer, knowing that he would be able to reach the basket and bring it down toward him.

Spencer didn’t want to undermine your rules. You had done so well raising Sebastian this far, so you were clearly doing everything right.

He crouched down to the boy’s level.

“We should go ask your Mommy if it’s okay to have one.” He told Sebastian, who nodded, and then ran off toward your office with that thunderous urgency in his steps.

He heard a distant ‘Mommy!’ - and a bang that could have been Sebastian’s version of a knock or him downright smacking the office door until it opened. But then he heard your voice murmuring and what must have been a frustrated sigh.

Spencer felt slightly bad that he had sent Sebastian to interrupt your work, especially over something so small. But he didn’t want to lose progress with you and have you reaming him out for giving your son sugar without your permission.

You soon came into the room and went straight for the candy bucket, lifting it off the shelf and bringing it down to Sebastian’s level so that he could choose one.

“I know it seems cruel. But I didn’t want him eating it all on Halloween and puking, so he’s allowed to have one a day, usually as a treat after dinner.” You explained, clearly wanted to lay out your reasoning for Spencer.

“No, no, it’s not cruel.” Spencer replied quickly. “It’s a good idea. Regulating his intake of sugar while not completely restricting it as something sacred or off-limits. It’s a good call.”

Sebastian picked out a small packet of M&Ms, and then you went to lift the bucket away, and he spoke up.

“Can I pick one for my friend Spencer, too?” He asked.

“Yeah, go ahead.” You nodded, and then you added on: “Spencer’s favorite is Snickers.”

Of course, Spencer was floored that you remembered this.

Sebastian picked out a mini Snickers and then excitedly thrust it in Spencer’s direction.

“Aw, thanks buddy!” Spencer said, eagerly taking it with a grin, even reaching out to give him a high five while he smiled up at Spencer in return.

(He was too busy looking at Sebastian with those stars in his eyes to notice the way you were watching the pair - watching all of your dreams unfold before you with an odd mixture of bitterness and affection swelling up inside of you.)

Sebastian moved on to picking out the movie and you went to walk out of the room again, seemingly to get back to work, but Spencer stopped you. Something else was on his mind.

“Y/N.” He called your name gently, and you turned back to him, your arms crossed stiffly.

He was just glad that you didn’t seem so angry at him using your name this time.

“Do - do you have any pictures of Sebastian in his Halloween costume?” He asked meekly, afraid that you would stamp out this request with more anger and defensiveness.

“Why?” You gaped, seeming very confused that he would even ask this.

“I - I just wanted to see.” Spencer replied.

‘Because I missed out on so much of him.’ He hesitated to say. ‘I know it’s impossible, but I want those years back.’

The deep sadness lingering in Spencer’s eyes caused your stomach to clench.

He had really changed. This wasn’t the same man who had been standing in the apartment that night. This wasn’t the same person who had been so callous and stubborn - the same person that you felt you needed to protect your unborn child from.

Maybe this was the man you had fallen in love with, somehow rescued from the clutches of that person you didn’t know who had mocked you while wearing Spencer’s face.

“Gimme a minute.” You told him. And then you leaned in close before you whispered something else. “And you should let him see you eat the Snickers, otherwise he’s gonna be insulted.”

Spencer smiled at this.

Sebastian waved him over then, and he asked which DVD Spencer would rather watch. Spencer ate the Snickers and thanked Sebastian for sharing his treats once again while the boy went through a very detailed explanation of the plot of the films so Spencer would have an informed choice. And then Spencer picked, and Sebastian moved to put the movie into the DVD player.

This was when you came back with a thick envelope filled with pictures and handed them over to Spencer.

“I had these printed a while ago.” You explained. “I was planning on making a scrapbook for my mom, for mother’s day. It’s… basically every important moment in Sebastian’s life.”

“That’s my baby picture!” Sebastian said excitedly, looking over at the pictures in Spencer’s lap. “That’s when I was a baby, after I was born. I was one day old. Mommy said that everyone used to be one day old at some point, but that just sounds weird!”

Spencer’s throat clenched up with tears, and this clashed with the laughter he experienced from Sebastian’s comments.

But as he looked through the pictures, he had a much harder time holding back his tears.

Seeing all of the pictures, all of those moments - it slowly broke him.

The first picture was one of Sebastian wrapped in a very clinical swaddling blanket when he was still so new and wrinkly, only hours after his birth. Spencer could imagine how small Sebastian would have been in his arms. The tiny little newborn sounds he would have made. Spencer wished that he could have held your hand through the birth, that he could have been there with both of you in the hospital during those first few days of his life.

Then, a picture of you holding Sebastian in his nursery when you had brought him home from the hospital - a photo that was most likely taken by your mom. You had such a big, bright smile on your face. You looked so perfect with him in your arms. You were such a good mother.

There were pictures of him when he was more alert - his big, curious eyes looking at the world for the first time; what appeared to be his first picnic out at the park when he was laying on his back on a soft blanket, taking in the world for the first time. Spencer could imagine how sweet his baby laughter would be - what it would have been like blowing raspberries on his soft belly and kissing you under the warm sun.

He continued flipping through the photos - another one of what must have been his first Halloween. He was dressed up as a chubby round Jack-o-Lantern with his little fist in his mouth, drooling around it while your mother held him for the picture.

And then - pictures of him walking experimentally while you held him by both of his hands; him sitting in front of a Christmas tree, opening an exciting Christmas toy that made him beam with a big smile.

Pictures of important memories all throughout his life, all the way up until recently. This past Halloween, he had dressed up as Luke Skywalker.

He liked Star Wars.

“Um, can I use your bathroom?” Spencer choked out.

He knew that he was crying very blatantly now.

His chest was caving in as all of it truly hit him - how much of his son’s life he had missed. He didn’t wait for you to direct him because he knew that he had passed the bathroom coming down the hall. He abandoned the photos in the middle of the coffee table, haste to escape.

Sebastian looked at him with sad eyes as he stormed out of the room.

“Why is my friend Spencer sad?” He asked in a small voice, looking up at you. “He doesn’t like my pictures?”

“No, honey, your pictures are beautiful.” You assured him, kneeling down by the table and gathering up the pictures. “It’s complicated…” You let out a huff, not knowing how to explain it to him. Not even knowing where to start. “It’s grown-up stuff, okay? Just - just watch your movie.”

You stacked the photos back into the envelope, and you hoped that Sebastian wouldn’t follow you as you raced down the hall toward Spencer. You weren’t surprised to find the bathroom door closed.

“Spence,” You called out his name as you knocked gently on the bathroom door.

That gutted him even more. Spence.

Another harsh reminder of the life he had lost.

“I’m sorry.” He called back, his voice audibly drenched in tears.

Your throat tightened up.

This began to shift your entire axis. The man you had left standing alone that night - you thought he was a man who would have never cared about your son. Someone who would have asked you to get an abortion or distanced himself from the pregnancy as much as possible.

But this man - this felt like the Spencer you knew, the one you fell in love with.

He cared so much.

This was someone who could fit into your life, someone who could help raise your son.

And tugging right at your heart, something you wanted to deny - this was a man you wanted to be your husband, as well as the father of your child.

“Spencer, please-”

Spencer opened the door then, and upon instinct, you drew back, wrapping your arms tightly around yourself. Unconsciously, you were protecting yourself.

“I’m sorry.” He apologized again. “Did I scare him? I didn’t mean to.” He asked, looking behind your shoulder as if waiting for Sebastian to appear.

There it was again - prioritizing your son above all else. Worry for him.

Something you wouldn’t have expected. Something that forced you to shift your whole perspective.

“He’s fine.” You told him. “He - he probably just wants you to watch the movie with him.” You said, entirely honest, motioning toward the living room - where the sound of Sebastian’s cartoon movie could be heard playing from the television.

“I’ll be out in a minute.” Spencer noted, reaching for some toilet paper to wipe his eyes with.

You squeezed your hands tighter around your arms, resisting the urge to reach out and touch him. You wanted to wipe those tears away yourself. Spencer’s keen eye went right to this movement, and you felt so caught.

“I should go start dinner.” You said, eager for an excuse to escape the situation.

You whisked down the hall before Spencer could say anything else, and before his mind could linger too much on it - on you - his phone rang again.

It was a number he didn’t recognize, but he had to guess that it was one of the phones from the local police station - someone from the team calling with an update about the case.

“Reid here.” He answered, deeply hoping that he didn’t sound too tearful over the phone.

“Do you like pretending, Doctor Reid?”

That certainly wasn’t a voice he recognized.

“Excuse me?” Spencer squeaked back, having no clue what this meant.

“Do you like playing house, Doctor Reid?”

The person on the other end posed a slightly different question. The voice was sharp and certain, completely devoid of genuine emotion. It caused a chill down Spencer’s spine, and he knew, somehow-

The UnSub had gotten a hold of his phone number, and felt the need to taunt him by getting in contact with him.

“Unlike you, I’m not playing.” Spencer growled in return, already having the profile in his pocket. “I don’t need to play house to fulfill some God complex. I fully intend to spend the rest of my life being there for my son, raising him. And as long as I am here, in this house, no harm will come to my son or the woman who raised him.”

“Hmm…” The man seemed entirely bored with Spencer’s words. “The woman who raised him. Such a funny way to talk about that whore you supposedly once loved. But she did such a good job raising the boy, didn’t she? Seems like she didn’t even need you in the picture, did she? Such a sweet little thing… anybody could just waltz right into that house, slit her throat and take him. He’s smart enough to do well on his own now.”

Spencer knew that it was a tactic intended to get to him, and he shouldn’t have let it emotionally affect him as much as it did - but fuck, it got to him.

“Don’t talk about her that way.” He growled into the phone. “Don’t talk about them, that way, I swear to god, I’ll-”

“You’ll do what, Doctor Reid?” The man cut him off, clearly mocking him. Clearly in disbelief that Spencer could ever truly be violent in response to his family being threatened.

Spencer choked on a breath, trying to compose himself.

“Now, now. Simmer now.” The man cooed, still mocking, entirely condescending. “And don’t you worry, Doctor. Every whore gets her time to be an angel. I’m sure that she’s going to look so beautiful when she’s moaning and writhing in pain while my knife plunges into her guts. Don’t worry, Daddy - I’ll treat her as gently as I can.”

Spencer sucked in a breath, preparing to yell at the man, but then - the line went dead with a sharp ‘click’. Spencer pulled back his phone and looked at the display - he memorized the number so that he could give it to Garcia later, and then, he called JJ.

“Reid, hey.”

She sounded worried.

Any rage pumping through him that the unknown man had triggered in him melted away, and he immediately wondered why JJ had taken on that sad, sullen tone.

Before he could ask, she spoke up again.

“We… were just wondering if we should call you.”

“What’s wrong?” He asked.

“The UnSub knows you’re in the house.” She announced, ripping the band-aid off all at once.

Spencer wondered again how this was possible. But he figured that it was better to exchange information and let the questions naturally arise than to ask the questions himself.

“Yeah, he just called me.” He told JJ. “Clearly with the intention to antagonize me.”

“Wait, hold on.” JJ sighed. In the police station, she walked into the conference room where the team was working and put her phone on speaker for the room before she spoke to Spencer again. “Tell them what you just told me.”

“Someone who I can only assume was the UnSub just called me.” Spencer explained. “It was very clear that he was trying to antagonize me. He - he seemed jealous that I’m here - that I’m trying to take his place as father in the household before he could get here.”

“What makes you say that?” Hotch asked.

“He claimed that I was ‘playing pretend’. He called me Daddy. He mocked my love for Y/N, and taunted me with the idea of him… potentially killing her.” Spencer found those last words particularly difficult to speak, but he knew that the team needed all the information at hand.

“Let me guess, he called you from a blocked number?” Prentiss wondered aloud.

“No, actually.” Spencer replied. “Do you have a pen? I can give you the number and you can have Garcia run it.”

“Fire away.” Prentiss replied.

“503-202-1052.” Spencer told her.

“I’ll call Garcia now.” She said - on the other end, getting up from the table to call Garcia on her cell.

“JJ said you guys have something too?” Spencer asked, still wondering what JJ had meant.

“The scumbag sent us a letter.” Morgan answered. “The envelope was full of pictures. A bunch of pictures of your girl and the kid from weeks back - them at the park, at restaurants, at the grocery store. He’s way farther ahead in his timeline than we thought he was.”

“Yeah, and there’s… something else.” Rossi sighed. “He also included pictures of you and JJ standing on the porch when you arrived at the house. And one of you coming back to the house later, by yourself. In one of them… he crossed your eyes out with a red marker. It’s clear that he sees you as competition. A clear threat to his fantasy.”

“But - how does he know that I’m Sebastian’s real father?” Spencer wondered aloud.

“Perhaps he only sees you as competition because you’re another male encroaching on his territory. Because you’ve spent prolonged time at the house, seemingly to protect her and the child.” Hotch theorized.

“No…” Spencer said, putting the pieces together in his. “On the call, he said: ‘Such a funny way to talk about that whore you supposedly once loved.’” Spencer repeated it perfectly from memory, feeling a pang in his chest at calling you a ‘whore’, even if it wasn’t his own wording. “It was like he knew that me and Y/N dated before and broke up. Like he knows that Sebastian is a result of our previous relationship.”

“That is… strange.” Rossi remarked. “Do you think that Y/N might have mentioned your relationship to a friend, or a neighbor? Maybe… she might have confided in somebody?”

“It’s possible.” Spencer sighed. “But since she’s moved here, she’s surrounded herself with women. A female babysitter, fellow moms as her friend group.” It was something he had noticed in the more recent photos of Sebastian. “Our UnSub is a man - I don’t see her divulging those types of things to him, even if she didn’t know he was a potential threat.”

“Well either way, he knows. And he’s pissed off.” Morgan sighed. “I mean, the wording of this letter… it makes sense why he seems so hostile toward Reid. It’s not just anger toward a random man who’s encroaching on his territory - it’s a personal rage towards someone he feels could actually ruin his chances with Y/N if he’s built up this fantasy of having her in his mind over these weeks.”

Morgan picked up the letter and read some lines from it. “‘I will stab him in the spine, paralyzing him and forcing him to watch as I rape that whore - I will take her as my own while he pleads for mercy. I will show him what happens when weak men abandon their obligations. If Daddy wants to play, I’ll play too.’”

“Is that really what he thinks?” Spencer huffed, unable to hold back his emotions. “That I abandoned my obligations? Does he really think that-?”

“Reid.” Hotch said firmly, cutting off Spencer’s ranting. “Stay calm. What we really need to ask ourselves now is: how does he know so much about you? How does he know so much about your past that even we didn’t know?”

He added this on - seemingly taking offense to the fact that most of the team didn’t know that Spencer had a serious girlfriend in the past. A relationship that had resulted in a child.

Just then, Emily came back into the room.

“Garcia said the phone number goes to a public library on the other side of town.” She announced.

“Morgan, you and Prentiss go to the library - see if anyone there saw the UnSub or if they have any potential security footage of him.” Hotch ordered.

“Reid, see if you can convince Y/N to come into protective custody.” Hotch added on, turning his attention to the man on the phone. “With the UnSub being further along in his timeline than we thought, and seemingly being provoked by your presence, we really need to protect her and her child. Stress that fact to her. We need to keep a close eye on her until we can find a viable suspect.”

“Yes, of course.” Spencer replied, before ending the call.

Spencer splashed some cold water on his face, truly trying to pull himself together before he exited the bathroom.

It truly hit him, then.

This day wasn’t about some soft, sappy reunion with you and his son. This day was about the fact that you had been targeted by a dangerous, deranged killer. And he needed to do everything in his power to protect you from that horrible man.

A fresh, vicious wave of determination went through him - if he had to tear out the man’s throat with his teeth, then he would. He wasn’t going to let even the tiniest amount of harm come to you or his boy. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever.

He put on a smile, not wanting to potentially scare Sebastian with a frown or his trembling fear over what might happen. He tried his hardest to push all of it out of his mind for now as he walked down the hallway and back into the living room - where a musical cartoonish number was in full swing on the TV.

“You were in the bathroom for a long time!” Sebastian commented brightly. “Did you have to go poop?”

Spencer let out a laugh at this. This almost instantly lifted his mood - the fact that such a young kid didn’t have the sense of embarrassment or social constructs in order to know that it wasn’t really routine to ask someone what they had been doing in the bathroom. He easily found humor in Sebastian’s bluntness.

“Seb, what did we say about asking people about their poop?” You called out from the kitchen, clearly having heard the conversation.

(So this was a habit of his?)

“Sorry!” Sebastian called back. Sebastian then turned back to Spencer. “Your poop is only your business. Unless you have to tell the doctor about your poops.” He assured Spencer, clearly repeating something that his mother had told him.

Spencer nodded. “It’s all good, bud.” He said, smiling at Sebastian. “I’m gonna go talk to your mom, okay?”

“Are you gonna watch the movie with me?” Sebastian asked.

“I promise, I’ll watch whatever you want to later.” Spencer replied.

He made it a promise because he wanted to hold himself to it - he wanted to spend lots of days watching films with his son. And playing games, and teaching him things. He promised himself that there would be lots of time to do these things with Sebastian in the future because nobody would interrupt that for him.

But for now, he had to convince you to agree to protective custody so that the three of you could have the safety and security of a future together.

Sebastian seemed content with this answer and turned back to the TV, and Spencer ventured into the kitchen, where you were preparing dinner.

“Hey, Spence.” You greeted him gently. “I’m assuming that you’re staying for dinner? It’s nothing fancy, just some pasta with cream sauce, and chicken and broccoli.” You explained, gesturing around to the many items you had surrounding you - a pot of boiling water, and cutting boards with different vegetables, and one sequestered off in the corner with cut-up chicken pieces waiting to be put in a frying pan that was still heating up.

“Sounds good.” He easily agreed. “After dinner, we need to pack a bag for Sebastian, and you need to get some stuff together so that we can get you guys into protective custody.” He said, posing it more like a gentle suggestion than a question that you could say no to.

He truly hoped that he wouldn’t have to go into the graphic details as to why you needed the protection - why it was more urgent now. He hoped that he wouldn’t have to resort to telling you about the man who had threatened to go poking around in your insides with a knife while making him watch.

Not surprisingly, you completely ignored what Spencer said.

“Unless you prefer Turtle Mac n Cheese?” You said, instantly deflecting away from the topic, holding up a box of mac n cheese that had some cartoonish characters on it. They were green and looked vaguely like anthropomorphic turtles. Spencer guessed that this was what you were making for Sebastian’s dinner - most likely along with having him eat some broccoli, because you seemed determined for him to at least somewhat eat healthy. “I think that cartoon shapes really give it that extra gourmet flare.”

“Stop that.” Spencer demanded gently, taking the box out of your hands and placing it somewhere else on the counter. You frowned at him. “Stop acting like what’s happening isn’t a big deal. If you’re doing this because you’re frightened-”

“I’m not frightened.” You said, cutting him off. “I just don’t think that the FBI needs to be wasting resources on me when there’s people out there who are actually in danger. Or people who have dead loved ones who need answers.”

“Exactly.” Spencer pressed. He lowered his voice before he spoke his next words, though he knew it was unlikely that Sebastian would hear him over the movie playing on the TV.

“The man who sent you those flowers has already killed five other women.” He stressed, pointing behind you, toward the vase with the white carnations in it. He was surprised that you hadn’t thrown the flowers away after what he and JJ had told you. “Five women’s families are waiting for answers about who killed them. And you could be helping us-”

“I can’t help you, though.” You shrugged. “There are no men in my life. There’s nobody Spencer. There hasn’t been since I broke up with you.” You snapped, giving him a harsh glare - as though you resented him for ruining you, tainting your heart and leaving you broken.

The realization shattered him a bit more. All this time, he had been worried that you had moved on, that you were living a better life without him. But you had been just as lonely as he was - aside from the company of a small child that reminded you more and more of Spencer every single day.

Spencer took a breath, trying to focus.

“Just come into protection.” He pressed. “The FBI will take you to a safehouse, and-”

“A safehouse?” You scoffed. “How is that any safer than the house we’re currently standing in? Does it have bulletproof windows and a steel reinforced door? Or - or is it just a regular house with regular windows, and regular walls, and a regular door? Just like my house?” You chuckled sarcastically, moving to grab the cutting board with the chicken, shoving it into the now heated pan with the back of your knife.

Spencer’s nerves were grated on by your sarcasm.

“Dammit, Y/N!” He shouted, much louder than he intended to. “Can’t you see that I’m just trying to protect you?”

“Yeah, and where the hell was that attitude four years ago when I begged you to-” You swiftly cut yourself off, the words dying off in your throat, not wanting to rip open old wounds.

You tossed the items back onto the counter with a crash, only causing more tension in the air. You took in a sharp breath - suddenly, standing in front of the stove, you felt too hot.

You reached for the edge of your hoodie without thinking, and peeled it up over your head. You were wearing a thin camisole underneath, but surprisingly, your black bra being so visible through the thin white fabric wasn’t the thing that caught Spencer’s eyes as more and more of you was revealed.

There it was.

The four-pointed star necklace that he had given to you on your birthday was sitting in the middle of your chest, right where it belonged, glaring at Spencer, taunting him.

It became apparent to him in seconds that you had been wearing it all day. You had answered the door earlier that day wearing that pale blue hoodie, having no clue that Spencer would be on the other side. You had no reason to impress him, quite angered that he was even there in the first place, actually. So you had been wearing it under your hoodie since before then - since the beginning of the day, likely.

You had been holding it close to your chest as something precious - hiding it under your clothes as a secret, just for yourself.

If there was a single shred of doubt in Spencer’s mind that he had loved you more, that he had missed you more since the break-up, it was gone now. You hadn’t dated other men, and you had silently carried that symbol of him, as if unconsciously beaconing him back to you.

When you finally got the fabric off your head, you instantly noticed him gaped-jawed and staring at your chest. You wouldn’t have called him a pervert, because before you even glanced down to confirm that you had the necklace on - you knew. A terrible guilt struck through your gut, like you had been caught stealing something, and you froze up on the spot.

You and Spencer locked eyes for a moment, and his hands quivered with the terrible need to reach out and touch you - though in that moment, standing just across the kitchen from you, he felt a thousand miles away. He had a terrible need to hold you, yet he had never felt more distant from you. He had never felt more prohibited from touching you since the moment you had first grabbed his hand on that very first date.

How long had you wanted him back and said nothing? How many days had you woken up thinking about him, knowingly raised his son alone, and made no effort to contact him?

“I - I have to go change my clothes.” You said, your voice so utterly small. “Can you watch the stove?”

You didn’t wait for a reply before you turned and whisked off again, clearly too eager to escape the tension.

Spencer busied himself with watching over the food - stirring here and there, and starting the cartoon turtle mac and cheese based on its boxed instructions - trying desperately not to think about what all this meant.

When you came back, you were wearing a simple, light tee shirt. And it was easy to see that you had taken off the necklace and put it away somewhere.

…

Having Spencer there for dinner felt like role-playing as a family.

With Sebastian in his usual seat behind the dinosaur placemat, sitting between the two of you - it felt like something out of a strange, distant dream. He kept looking to Spencer for encouragement when he ate his broccoli and didn’t spill his juice, and Spencer stared at you across the table, having that constant fond look in his eye whenever he turned back to Sebastian or talked to him in that sweet, soothing voice.

Spencer also watched you, and tried to make it seem subtle. You noticed his eyes drifting over to your plate, ensuring that you were eating, as he had done many times before. You wanted to make another snarky comment about him pretending to care, but you kept your mouth shut.

It felt so shallow, and plastic, with the supposed threat hanging over your head; knowing that the only reason Spencer was there in the first place was because he believed that you were in danger.

Yet, it felt like something you had been doing all your life. It felt like just another night. Like Spencer had come home from work to this a thousand times; like you would get up and do the dishes and kiss him and then bring him to your bed for the night. It felt like that’s how things should be.

You really weren’t sure if you loved it or hated it.

You were nearly finished with your food and Spencer’s dinner was half-done, food getting cold on his plate while he encouraged Sebastian to finish up - when there was a knock on the door.

You expected it to be JJ again, pressing you about the protective custody thing. You let out a harsh sigh when Sebastian quickly wormed out of his chair and raced toward the door - eager to answer it himself.

“Seb!” You called after him. “What have I told you about answering the door when Mommy isn’t there?”

You raced after him and uncomfortably grabbed him up with a gut full of food, Spencer trailing behind you awkwardly.

“You’re here now!” Sebastian argued, laughter in his voice.

“Here, go with your-”

You abruptly cut yourself off, stopping yourself from saying ‘go with your dad’.

“Go back to the table with Spencer.” You told him, turning him around and directing him toward the man. You couldn’t bear to look him in the eyes, knowing that he could predict exactly what that verbal near-slip was. “I will answer the door.”

“Come on, bud.” Spencer encouraged him. “If you finish up all your dinner, we can have a treat later,”

He hated to promise something you hadn’t permissed, but he knew that you needed the distraction right now.

You unlocked the door and opened it, fully expecting JJ to be standing there patiently (likely having heard that entire exchange from behind the door). You were surprised when nobody was there, and instead, your eyes drifted downwards to a large brown envelope sitting on the step.

It didn’t seem to have any kind of shipping label on it - just your first name written on the front in bright red ink. It made you startlingly curious, at the same time, caused a tight knot to form in your gut. You picked it up, bringing it inside before you closed the door and locked it again.

You brought it back to the kitchen and placed it on the kitchen island, and of course, this caught Spencer’s attention where he could see you from his place at the table.

“Y/N, what is that?” He asked, unable to mask the frantic worry popping up in his voice.

“I don’t know.” You said, feeling slightly haunted by it yourself.

You moved to open the envelope, and before Spencer could stop you, something echoing in the back of his mind - chirps about potential poison or even a bomb - you had ripped it open and spilled the contents onto the counter.

Your insides quaked when you saw what it was.

Spencer rushed over to look at the items with you, and naturally, this drew Sebastian’s attention as well.

“What is it, Mommy?” He asked, marching over and trying to get a peek over the edge of the counter, but not yet tall enough to see - which you were thankful for.

“Did you finish all your dinner?” You asked, leaning over to look at him.

“I did!” He said proudly, nodding.

“Okay, then, why don’t you go into the pantry and pick a cookie?” You said, hoping that your sudden flood of worry and fear didn’t quake through your voice as you forced a smile for him.

“Okay!” He cheered brightly.

He ran off to the large cupboard beside the kitchen table, eager to pick between the varieties of cookies that you had there.

(Again, he was smart - but easily distracted. That you were thankful for.)

“Y/N-” Spencer gasped when he saw the items that had come out of the envelope.

“I don’t wanna hear it.” You said, your voice now quivering with tears you found yourself unable to hold back. “I don’t wanna hear about how you were right.”

You stared down at the items in horror.

It was several photos of you; very voyeuristic shots of you going about your daily life. Several of them including Sebastian when you had been doing perfectly innocent things - going shopping, playing at the park. Even pictures of the two of you playing in your own backyard. A view of you getting dressed through your bedroom window.

One of the photos - a photo of nothing more than the front door to your home - had a message scribbled across it in bright red marker.

‘Daddy misses you. Be home soon. xoxo’

“That’s not what I was going to say.” Spencer sighed.

He saw how horribly you were shaking - he saw the tears brimming your eyes. This time, he truly couldn’t help himself. He stepped around the counter, and upon instinct, he swept you into a tight hug.

Unconsciously, he caged you away from any potential danger with his arms around your shoulders - holding you like he would have when you had a nightmare or when you shied away from men you considered ‘creepy’ on the subway. Your arms wrapped tightly around his waist, your fingers digging into his back for comfort, clinging to him like you would have clung to a life raft at sea.

You broke into sobs, the sound muffled by his chest, and Spencer’s own heart stung - knowing that the true depth of the danger had finally hit you.

“It’s okay.” He told you. “It’s gonna be okay.”

He rubbed a flat palm across your back, hoping to comfort you in some way, even though he knew that the terror of the whole situation was mounting - and it was a horrible thing to face.

“Spencer-” You sobbed out, unsure what you even wanted to say.

“I’m going to make sure it’s okay.” He said firmly. “You know I won’t let anyone hurt you, right?”

It wasn’t even a question in your mind. The two of you had your problems back in the day, but you knew that Spencer would never let any harm come to you.

You clung tighter to him, savoring the moments while Sebastian was still distracted - likely sneaking more than the singular cookie you had allotted him to have, not that you cared in the slightest right now.

If there was anything else on your mind aside from the potentially crippling fear as the realization truly hit you, any room past the fact that you had been stalked and secretly surveilled by a murderer for weeks now; then you might have considered the fact that when you had woken up this morning, you never would have never thought that Spencer Reid, of all people, would be such a comforting touch to you.

Oh, how things change.

…

Spencer was hesitant to let you go from the hug.

But he had to call the team, because this was an important break in the case. And he had to see what kinds of arrangements they could make for you - if they could find a safehouse for you on such short notice, or if he would be taking you to the field office or the police station.

You cleaned the cookie crumbs off Sebastian and took him to the living room, trying to maintain some sense of calm while you turned on a random cartoon show on cable. He got out a puzzle and you helped him with it while Spencer stepped into the other room and dialed Morgan’s number.

“Hey, Reid.” Morgan greeted him. “How’s married life treating you?”

“Not funny.” Spencer replied, his voice short and frustrated. “The UnSub just delivered another package here. More photos. And a message. ‘Be home soon’. It’s pretty clear that he’s planning on making his move soon.”

“Woah.” Morgan replied. “Well, if Y/N didn’t want protective custody before, then I’m assuming that scared her into complying.”

“Yeah.” Reid agreed. “Where should I bring her?”

“Hold on.”

There were some voices clustered on the other end, and then, the next person to speak on the phone was Hotch.

“Reid… you’re not going to like what I have to say.”

“What is it?” Spencer prodded.

“Morgan and Prentiss got nothing at the library. So far, the only thing we’ve got on this UnSub is the fact that Y/N is likely his next victim, and he doesn’t seem eager to break pattern just because you’re in the house.”

Spencer didn’t like where this was going.

“You’re not insisting-?” He asked, and Hotch filled in the blank for him.

“Our only chance to catch him could be… catching him in the act. We could tie him to the other crimes if we catch him breaking into the house-”

“The house that my son is currently in.” Spencer huffed.

“We could bring the boy into protective custody. And leave Y/N there. We know that he never hurts the children, that’s not part of his MO.” Hotch offered meekly.

“But he gets some kind of catharsis from playing house.” Spencer replied. “If we move Sebastian, that might cause him to break pattern, and he could just move onto another victim.”

Then, something else occurred to Spencer.

“Also, we don’t know how he’s surveilling us.” He added on. “If he sees where we’re moving Sebastian, he might go after him.”

He considered that another woman - someone completely unsuspecting, someone unprepared, someone innocent with no way to defend herself - would be killed if Spencer made the wrong choice. It could be more than one woman if the UnSub got away and simply continued his patterns uninterrupted.

This was more controlled. The UnSub seemed determined to confront Spencer.

Spencer felt that was a confrontation he could win.

“We can have unmarked cars posted on every block. And the minute he breaches the house, you call it in. He won’t get anywhere near them.”

Spencer hated that it was their only choice.

“Okay.”

...

Keep reading here: Chapter Five - Brick By Boring Brick

#sundrop writes #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds #criminal minds fic #spencer reid x reader #dad!spencer reid #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid x you

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holybibly · 1 month

Note

hmmm shy recently presented omega has a crush on older omega hwa......... but it's too embarrassed to confess because she thinks alphaxomega are meant to be but wants so so bad to mix slick with hwa

૮꒰ ྀི >⸝⸝⸝< ྀི꒱ა

Oh baby, I love this so much.

Our gorgeous Omega Seonghwa, lovingly caring for the little innocent Omega who doesn't even know that Hwa is just waiting to wrap her up in his silky sheets.

NSFW link highlighted in text

It was easy to fall in love with Seonghwa - it was too easy. He was soft, gentle, radiant and so beautiful that just the sight of his face was enough to bring tears to your eyes. Park Seonghwa was perfect.

Park Seonghwa was the perfect Omega.

In a society where all relationships are based on the second gender, Omega couples didn't stand a chance, your parents used to tell you.

"One day, you will find an Alpha who is worthy of you."

When you presented yourself as an Omega on your 21st birthday, your mother told you. But you didn't want an Alpha. You wanted Seonghwa.

You loved him so much that you went to work at the kindergarten where Seonghwa was teaching.

He had the scent of strawberries and champagne, a perfect match for your delicate scent of whipped cream and white chocolate. Everything inside you knew that you were made for Seonghwa, but the gendered framework your parents put you in prevented you from even hinting at how you felt.

And even if you did, you were sure that Seonghwa would reject you; why would he want a shy little Omega when he had so many beautiful Alphas all around him? Of course, Seonghwa was dating; he often went out, and the next day he shyly hid countless purple hickeys on his thin, long neck. You always wanted to be the one who would leave them on his neck.

He didn't often tell you about his one-night stands, even though you were friends. Or Seonghwa was friends with you while you drooled over him and embarrassedly flowed for him. It was terribly awkward and embarrassing for you to admit it, but your panties were always wet because of his presence. As if your desire for him was not already obvious, your body clearly showed its willingness to give in to him and allow Seonghwa to claim you as his own. Allow another Omega to be your mate.

It was almost a year of unrequited longing for Seonghwa until one day you met Yunho. He was a tall, charming Alpha with a face that made you want to get married.

Yunho was a great distraction from your slightly painful love for Seonghwa, and you were happy about it, or so it seemed. While your relationship with Yunho was on the rise, your friendship with Seonghwa was on the decline. He was pulling away from you, becoming quieter and more withdrawn. His beautiful, sparkling eyes became distant and dull when he looked at you, and his juicy and delicious strawberry smell became sour in your presence.

You searched desperately for the reason for such a drastic change, but you were never able to understand what exactly was your fault until one night.

You and Yunho were already at the stage in your relationship where sex was almost a vital part of it. And although the Alpha was a true gentleman and did not insist on anything, you were no fool and understood perfectly well that if you spent the coming heat separately, your relationship would come to an end.

You didn't even know who to talk to about it because you had never had sexual experience with an Alpha before. That was until your eyes fell on Seonghwa. So you plucked up the courage and went up to the older Omega.

"Hwa, I'd like to have a word with you in private, if that's ok?" Already feeling the mucus leaking from your hole and staining your underwear, you shifted awkwardly from foot to foot. As always, your body gave an automatic greeting to Seonghwa.

His lips parted, and his tongue flicked out a little to lick the plump pink flesh before he swallowed loudly and gave you a reply.

"Are you able to come over to my house today?"

"Yeah, sure." You gave a sweet nod. "Thanks a lot, Seonghwa."

It was hot, wet, and sweet, and yes, sweet, because Seonghwa tasted exactly the same way—morbidly sweet. How you ended up here—in the silky bed of Omega Park Seonghwa, with his long tongue between your legs—you have no idea.

As agreed, you came to see him in the evening, nervous and overwhelmed, hoping to talk about the coming heat and how to spend it with Yunho, but it didn't go as planned.

"Seonghwa..." You moaned loudly as Seonghwa's tongue carefully licked your pussy and you arched back on the bed. Your slime poured out of you like a waterfall. It mixed with Seonghwa's and filled the room with the incredibly decadent scent of strawberries and cream, with the finest hint of white chocolate and sparkling champagne.

"You're so perfect, Princess. Perfect for me, no Alpha could ever have you; you were made just for me," he said. With each letter spoken, his plump, soft lips touched your pussy, his hot breath flowing around the sensitive folds, stimulating you further.

All this made your head spin. You couldn't believe that Seonghwa, who you had been in love with for so long, was fucking you in his bed right now.

The excitement becomes unbearable and you can feel the knot in your stomach burning.

Seonghwa smiles as he notices the way your hips unconsciously arch to meet his tongue and lips. His own excitement grows every time your legs try to close around his head and a trembling moan escapes your throat.

He has been dreaming about you for so long, imagining this moment a thousand times, going mad thinking about tasting you and making you his. Seonghwa had always wanted you, and after he had smelled the creamy slime of you for the first time, his desire had become almost painful. He had planned everything, had thought of your whole life in advance and was just about to ask you for a date when Yunho appeared and all of his plans were shattered like glass.

The handsome Alpha was like a bone in his throat. He tried to distance himself from you, to let you go your own way with a sweet Alpha who would love you and respect you. But every night when he fell asleep, Seonghwa imagined him kissing you, worshipping your body with his lips and tongue. He imagined him tasting you, mixing your mucus and his on your tongues while you moaned into each other's mouths. Seonghwa wanted you and now that he had you, he wasn't going to let you go. He is making you his.

As Seonghwa's lips wrap around your clit, sucking lightly, you unconsciously spread your legs wider for him. You arch your back sharply as the older Omega worships your beautiful swollen cunt with her magnificent mouth. He kisses it hungrily and lets out a moan of his own as he feels the slickness of your dripping into his mouth.

The whimpers, moans, sighs, and Seonghwa's loud slurping sounds of shameless cunt eating bounce off the walls of the elder Omega's exquisite bedroom as you writhe and tremble under his ministrations.

His big, shining eyes never leave your sweet, flushed face, but as soon as you take your eyes off him, the stimulation immediately stops.

"Have a look at me, my love. Look at how I am enjoying you; I love you so much." Seonghwa's voice sounds almost desperate in your mind, which is clouded by lust. You nod and quickly look back to meet the eyes of the gorgeous Omega.

His long, deft tongue touches your plump clit as he sucks sweetly on it. It sends shivers down your spine. Tiny beads of sweat roll down your heated skin, and you feel like you're suffocating. Your cum stains Seonghwa's face and silk sheets, older Omega's own oozing from his pretty pink hole. Seonghwa has been fucked many times in his life, but it was always his dream to fuck you, and for some reason he was sure it would be a million times better than the knot of some worthless Alpha.

Your hips jerk forward, and Seonghwa's face literally buries itself in your sweet pussy. He doesn't mind at all and eats you up with even more devotion and passion. As you get closer and closer to coming, you find it harder and harder to keep your eyes open.

You close your eyes for just a second, but it is enough for Seonghwa to stop and ruin the orgasm you are about to experience. The line between pain and pleasure is so blurred that it may not exist at all. The fire burns beneath your soft skin and pulls a frustrated moan out of your throat.

The excitement is running through your veins, making you tremble in Seonghwa's arms, and your pussy is clenching around nothing. You struggle to catch your breath, still shaking from the intensity of the experience. The only thing that occupies your hazy mind is the burning sensation between your legs. You have never been touched before; you have never allowed anyone to caress your body; no one before Seonghwa, and these sensations are literally destroying you from the inside out.

As Seonghwa runs his finger around your small, shrinking hole, you let out a high-pitched whimper. You feel the tip of the Omega's finger caress your silky walls as it penetrates you, and you squirm in an attempt to get more of the necessary stimulation from one finger.

The two fingers that are already inside you are gently curling, stretching, and spreading until your mucus soaks the whole of Seonghwa's hand and runs down his forearm, making you so wet that he can slide a third long finger into you without any resistance. Then Seonghwa jerks his hand back sharply and watches as your whole body trembles from the intense stimulation and as your pretty little mouth opens in a soft cry of pleasure.

He can't wait for your lips to wrap around the flowing head of his cock and press against his own wet hole so that you can get a taste of his slickness.

Seonghwa slides his long fingers in again, enjoying your delicious squeal before he stops moving. You let out a whimper; the sound was soft and pitiful.

"Seonghwa, please..." You arch on Seonghwa's fingers, buried deep in your pussy, jerking your hips in treacherous desire.

The older Omega leans closer to you, kissing and licking the soft pink folds of your cunt, greedily gulping down every drop of your slick like a drunk.

His lips wrap around your swollen clit once more and pull it into his beautiful, hot mouth. It is at this moment that the words seem to leave you completely, your voice dissolving into incoherent cries and moans.

Your knuckles turn white as you grip the damp silk sheets beneath you, now soaked in a mixture of your own and Seonghwa's mucus. Your eyes are glazed over, but you can't take your eyes off the stunning Omega between your legs, his lips enveloping your pussy.

Eventually you can't hold out any longer, your orgasm growing stronger by the second.

"I'm so close, Seonghwa, oh my God..."

"Come on, darling, cum... please cum for me; I want to see your face when you cum on another Omega's fingers and mouth." Seonghwa answers you before he starts swirling his tongue around your sensitive clit again.

His simple permission is enough to make you come in an obedient manner. The orgasm spreads visibly through your body; your moans mix with Seonghwa's; you feel the vibrations on your pussy; your mucus flows uncontrollably out of your hole; and Hwa swallows it as if he's dying of thirst. His fingers continue to stroke your tender walls from the inside.

Your whole body is shaking so much that it's hard to tell when exactly you've come again, splashing out streams of mucus out of you and making the bed underneath you wet. Seonghwa feels his own hole tighten as you orgasm, his cock twitching painfully against his flat stomach. You two are an absolute mess—a wet and slippery tangle of bodies in love. He doesn't care how disgusting you look now; everything is covered in mucus and saliva. Now you belong to him, and he will never, ever let you go. Even if he has to put up a real fight, Seonghwa will fight to the death for you.

You were created for him and only for him, and the fact that nature did not make him an Alpha is not a sign that he will ever sacrifice his love.

You had the impression that your soul was on its way out of your body. You squirmed in Seonghwa's arms, searching for something to keep you grounded in reality. Your trembling hand wrapped itself around the hand of the older Omega that was between your legs. Seonghwa continues to caress you, curling his fingers around you and hitting that delicious spot inside you again and again.

Your toes are curling up, you are choking on your own moans, and tears are flowing freely down your flushed cheeks as the stimulation becomes so overwhelming that you are struggling to stay conscious.

And then another orgasm hits you, sending you over the edge and tearing a loud moan of Seonghwa's name out of your throat.

With a last soft kiss on your clit, Seonghwa pulls away and you suddenly go limp, like a puppet that has been cut from its strings, and you fall limply onto the mattress, your breathing becoming short and rapid. Seonghwa smiles at you tenderly and wipes the mucus from his chin with the palm of his hand before licking it off of his hand.

"I am so in love with you, starlight." He whispers and gives you a tender kiss on the cheek, enjoying the salty tears he can feel on his lips.

After a while, you finally come down from your high and bury your face in Seonghwa's shoulder, breathing heavily as you do so. The older Omega lets out a soft sigh and kisses your forehead, holding you close to him.

"My love for you is more than words can express." There is no point in hiding it any longer, you are crazy in love and as it turns out, the feeling is mutual. You feel a sense of peace and contentment in this embrace, in the warmth of your closeness. You feel that you belong to each other at last.

"I am more in love with you than life itself, my princess." Seonghwa whispers back to you, his voice heavy with emotion and filled with sincerity and warmth.

As you embrace each other, the world around you seems to disappear, leaving only the warmth of your love between you.

#sugar weekend #ateez smut #kpop smut #atz smut #ateez hard hours #ateez unholy hours #smut #seonghwa x reader #seonghwa smut #park seonghwa smut #ateez scenarios #ateez au #ateez x reader

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witchthewriter · 10 months

Photo

𝐁𝐞𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐁𝐚𝐫𝐛𝐢𝐞'𝐬 𝐠𝐢𝐫𝐥𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐞

⤷ female, ambiguous race, and any size reader. Requests are open, thank you for reading!

a/n: I know NOTHING about the movie or it’s plot, other than I want to marry Margot and her portrayal of Barbie is bringing so much nostalgia

Warnings: nothing, because in ... Barbie world there’s no hatred, no homophobia, no gender norms etc. It’s perfect...

ᴹᵃˢᵗᵉʳˡᶤˢᵗ

ENFP

Gryffindor

Chaotic Good

Taurus Sun, Aquarius Moon, Leo Rising

𝑺𝑭𝑾🌿

・First and foremost Barbie is a very independent woman

・She doesn’t need a partner, which makes your relationship all the more special

・She’s chosen you because she genuinely loves you, rather than doing it because ... she has to

・And it was a big shock to many when they found out that Barbie had chosen a woman to be her partner

・But she wouldn’t hear anything against it: she loved you and that was the end of it

・Your relationship seems pretty perfect. Because it is.

・Life with her is perfect

・All the annoyances of normal daily life don’t occur during life with her

・Even if you don’t live in Barblie World, she still has this magical energy that brightens everywhere she goes

・She isn’t someone who has many flaws; physically, mentally or emotionally

・Maybe she does act before thinking though, and that can cause a bit of trouble

・And she’s very specific with both her outfits and yours

・Her wardrobe is endless

・A lot of pastels, as well as endless pinks

・She always makes sure your hair and nails are done (you usually have something matching with your nails...and outfits...)

・Always gives you compliments throughout the day; “god you look radiant honey!” “you’re glowing!” “I can’t believe we’re in love!”

・Being around the other Barbie’s and always having light-hearted conversations (dark thoughts don’t bother you here)

・There are mermaids in the ocean, fairies in the trees, princesses in castles and magic around every corner

・Her nicknames for you are “honey,” “sweetheart,” “my love,” and “bunny.”

・Barbie’s love language is ... all of them. She loves ‘buying’ you gifts (there is no money currency), she loves spending time with you; exploring, dancing, adventuring.

・She always wants to hold your hand or have your arm linked in hers. Her words of affirmation are almost constant. With acts of service, she likes to clean and redecorate for you (even if you don’t need her to).

𝑹𝒆𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒑 𝑻𝒓𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒔

Overthinking This x Not Thinking At All

Acts Then Thinks x Thinks Before They Act

Chaotic Dumbass Duo

𝑹𝒐𝒎𝒂𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒄 𝑷𝒍𝒐𝒕 𝑻𝒓𝒐𝒑𝒆

Forever In Their Honeymoon Stage

𝑻𝒉𝒆𝒎𝒆 𝑺𝒐𝒏𝒈:

Romantic Flight by John Powell

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gatheringbones · 1 year

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[“I told my mother I thought I might be trans in a lengthy and overly apologetic email, which she didn’t quite know how to respond to. From her perspective, my transition had popped up out of nowhere, with no prior warning signs. She was convinced I had been brainwashed into transitioning, and agreed to meet my counsellor for a joint meeting with me, primarily to meet the person she felt had brainwashed her child into transitioning.

My mother describes her first meeting with me presenting as Laura as very difficult for her, due in no small part to her inability to see me as anything but her very traditionally masculine son in a dress. For a while she knew but did not talk to my father, which she found very difficult. She told me years later that she went through a period of mourning, feeling like her child had died, and that she was left with a stranger she did not know. It put a lot of strain on her, and on our relationship as parent and child.

Why the assumption I was brainwashed? Because of autism infantilisation.

Before we talk more about my journey coming out as transgender, we have to rewind a little bit to something else that went on at around the same point in my life: my diagnosis of Asperger’s. By the time my mother attended that appointment and met me as Laura for the first time, I had already been diagnosed with Asperger’s, which was part of the reason she was so worried about me. She was not aware of any statistical link between autism and gender dysphoria, and in her eyes I was a vulnerable young person with an autism spectrum condition who was being manipulated into transition because I was easily swayed, or lacking in ability to assess my feelings on the matter properly for myself. This is depressingly common: an adult’s assumption that having an autism spectrum condition means you’re incapable of proper self-understanding, or that you’re susceptible to being manipulated into believing things about yourself that you did not previously. You’re not trusted as being of sound mind to make choices about your own life, out of fear you’ve been manipulated.

Speaking to my mother years later, now she has somewhat settled down and got used to me going by Laura and female pronouns, she told me that her biggest fear, and the primary reason she agreed to attend that first joint session together, was that, as a youth with Asperger’s, my therapist was influencing me into believing that I was trans. She feared it was some kind of brainwashing that my gullible mind could not resist the allure of, rather than believing my own account of what I was experiencing.

I also faced this same issue with doctors when trying to access medical support through the NHS. I would have general practitioners, mental health doctors and gender specialists alike raise an eyebrow when I acknowledged my Asperger’s diagnosis, and then proceed to take plenty of extra time asking me lengthy questions about how my autism symptoms manifested, to ensure I was of sound enough mind to make permanent choices about my body. Apart from the obvious infantilisation of people with conditions like Asperger’s on display there, I always just explained it as being like the decision to get a tattoo. I am an adult, over the age of 18, who has been deemed sober and mentally sound, and as such I have every right to permanently inject colours into my skin that may never go away. Why should I not be trusted to take slow-acting meds that are somewhat easier to reverse? Still, the fact I had to fight to be believed that I was mentally sound enough to make that choice says a lot about misunderstandings about autism spectrum conditions, but highlights that to assert that transition is unique in the permanent nature of its change to the body is completely inaccurate.”]

laura kate dale, from uncomfortable labels: my life as a gay autistic trans woman

#laura kate dale #lesbian literature #trans literature #currently reading #gender stuff

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minnaci · 5 months

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SHIEDA KAYN | nsfw abc's — headcanons

contents: gender-neutral!reader, reader is implied to be kayn's partner, mentions of heavy/intense kinks, kayn is a lil slut (affectionate), some soft!kayn for the soul, top-leaning switch kayn, penetrative sex (reader receiving)

written with both heartsteel & canon kayn in mind! lemme slut out our collective boyfriend <3 nsfw alphabet hc prompts taken from @/the-coldest-goodbye. as always, thanks for reading! comments + rbs + asks always appreciated :3 stream paranoia!

a (aftercare) — what are they like after sex?

kayn is surprisingly considerate— he's pretty good about matching his aftercare to whatever activity you've done. for a long night of hard sex, you might get a bath and cuddles. for a vanilla quickie, he might toss a snack at you, pull you into his lap, and rest his chin on your shoulder while he makes sure you eat it.

b (body part) — favorite body part of theirs? their partners?

kayn has a not-so-secret thing for your hips. it doesn't matter how big or small, how curvy or flat, just as long as he can get his hands on them and squeeze. on himself... well, he's worked hard for his abs. it'd be a shame if he didn't appreciate them fully! (in the rare, soft moments, he'll tell you he likes his hands. he likes the way they fit with yours)

c (cum) — what's up with the cum situation?

kayn loves using his own cum as lube. it's thick and creamy and sticky, and something about the way it drips from your skin makes his head spin. he also makes adjustments to his diet to make sure he tastes good because he's freaky like that (read: he absolutely licks his own cum off his fingers after he jerks off, and he relishes in the taste)

d (dirty secret) — what's their dirty little secret?

sometimes, when he's feeling particularly wretched, kayn will ask rhaast to take over his body and jerk him off. the combination of giving up control and rhaast's taunting, filthy praises makes him cum harder than anything he could do to himself.

e (experience) — how experienced are they?

kayn knows how sex works, but more importantly, he's well-versed in pleasure. he's perfectly capable of figuring out just what makes you tick (and what makes your brain melt out of your leaking hole). it's just a matter of how nice he's feeling.

f (favorite position) — what's their favorite position?

kayn absolutely loves doggy. there's just something about the way he can manhandle you, and mount you, hands spanning over your hips, pulling you back onto his cock, that makes him hopelessly aroused. the only downside is that he can't see your pretty face when you cum on his cock, but he's generally okay with that. after all, there's always next round.

g (goofy) — are they more serious? more humorous?

kayn tends to be a force of nature when it comes to fucking you. the only time he really laughs during sex is in disbelief of how good you feel, nice and warm and wet around his cock, or if he's being mean, he'll laugh at how needy and desperate you are. if you catch him in a good mood, though, he'll grin and engage in a bit of teasing banter while he does his best to make you lose your train of thought.

h (hair) — how well-groomed are they? do the carpets match the drapes?

kayn doesn't really shave, but he doesn't really need to— he's naturally got a bit less hair down there. he occasionally does a little trim, just to keep everything looking neat and enticing, including the tempting patch of hair that trails down his tummy. as for the color... the carpet matches the drapes, though he won't dye his pubes to match if he dyes his hair. he learned that lesson a while ago.

i (intimacy) — how romantic are they? how sensual?

it really depends. he has the capacity for romance— it's one of those fantasies that he keeps in a secret back corner of his mind, only to be pulled out when he's feeling at his weakest. he likes linking his fingers with yours. he loves kissing you while you cum. and if you specifically ask for something sweet and slow, he'll oblige (though not without making a little fuss about how he's big, bad, dark and powerful first)

j (jerk off) — masturbation headcanon

kayn is a huge supporter of jerking off. he proudly fails no nut november on november 1st every year. but it's not really his fault— his balls just feel so full and heavy if he doesn't cum at least once or twice a day. and it's no joke, either— the ache between his legs often becomes overwhelming, sending him stumbling to his bed to curl a rough palm around his length. even rhaast lets out a soft sigh of relief once the familiar pleasure starts to coil in kayn's gut. if you're not around to help him through it, what else can he do but fuck his fist?

k (kink) — what's a kink they have?

kayn's got a corruption kink a mile wide. he loves watching his partners go from put-together, well-adjusted members of society to needy, slutty little puddles of arousal. the higher they fly, the farther they have to fall, and kayn loves tugging you down just a little further into the depths of degeneracy.

l (location) — what's their favorite place to get it on?

he's not picky, but if you let him choose, kayn has nothing wrong with fucking in a bed— yours or his, it doesn't matter. of course, he's had his fair share of public sex, and he can't deny he loves the thrill of almost getting caught, but his possessive streak balks at the idea of someone else getting to hear all of your pretty little sounds. he likes to keep you to himself, desperate and debauched in his bed.

m (motivation) — what turns them on?

a slight breeze could turn him on. really. it's almost a little pathetic how easily he can get going, but what turns him on the easiest is you. it's the littlest things, really. the sliver of skin between your shirt and your pants when you reach up and stretch, the soft curl of your smile when he's done something sweet that surprised you— there are so many small things you do that drive him insane. and he's determined to make you accept the consequences.

n (no) — what turns them off?

kayn will try (almost) anything once, but he's not a huge fan of ageplay. he'll let you call him daddy, sure, but he's not a caretaker at heart.

o (oral) — giver or receiver? skill level?

kayn won't lie— he prefers receiving head over giving it. there's just something so gutwrenching about having a pretty little thing between his thighs, lips spread wide around his cock, glancing up at him with pleading, desperate eyes. but that's not to say he never gives head. just because he prefers to receive doesn't mean he doesn't enjoy giving head. in fact, he loves to return the favor. what he lacks in technique he makes up for in pure, filthy passion. he doesn't fuck you with his tongue as much as he makes out with your dripping hole.

p (pace) — fast and rough? slow and sensual? other?

kayn's got a penchant for those deep, overwhelming thrusts— the kind that make you feel like his cock is drilling straight up into your throat. most nights, he'll come in hard and fast, fucking you stupid with single-minded devotion. but on the rare occasion where he's patient enough to take his time with you, watch out. he'll take you apart slowly, methodically, until you're nothing more than a warm, pliant hole, begging for more.

q (quickie) — opinions on quickies?

kayn loves a good quickie, especially when he's got his heartrate up and pumping. he makes sure to make it good for you, too— in fact, he doesn't tell you, but he's got a mental tally of just how fast and how often he can make you cum (hint: it's very fast and very often). the one downside is that kayn is a little shit, so he sometimes makes a mess of you and, after helping you calm down with a quick cuddle and a few sweet, lazy kisses, he'll cackle and leave you to clean up the mess of cum he's left dripping between your thighs. it doesn't happen very often, though— most of the time, he'll kiss it all off your skin. can't have any going to waste, after all.

r (risk) — do they like to experiment? do they take risks?

again, kayn will try (almost) anything once. in the world of kinks, fetishes, and pleasure, there's very little he hasn't (or won't) try. as for risk... what's life without a little adrenaline rush every once in a while? he loves a good thrill, and the high is even better when he's balls-deep inside of you, letting the cocktail of hormones and pleasure overwhelm him as his cock paints your walls with spurt after spurt of thick, creamy seed

s (stamina) — how many rounds? how long do they last?

kayn's stamina is the stuff of legends. a league of legends, even (lol). his self-control is extremely impressive, and his love for overstimulation makes him the perfect candidate for marathon sex. he can go for hours, and his refractory period is surprisingly short. on the off chance that you manage to tire him out, rhaast is always waiting in the wings, burning with the desire to take you for himself.

t (toys) — sex toy headcanon

if you ask kayn, he'd say he isn't super into toys (he's lying). he has a solid collection of them. it's mostly fleshlights, back from the days before he met you, but he also has a more discretely hidden collection of anal toys, vibrators, and massagers that his prostate is intimately and lovingly familiar with. once he meets you, he'll expand his collection to include a few nice, thick dildos— perfect for filling any empty holes that he can't take with his cock.

u (unfair) — how much do they like to tease?

kayn's ability to tease is directly correlated with how pent up he is. when he's planned a scene with you or is coming in calm, he loves to tease. he likes getting a little condescending, letting his voice take on a smug, patronizing lilt while he turns you into a dripping puddle of need, denial, and aching desire. but when he's amped up and high on adrenaline, he needs you on his cock and he needs you immediately. there's no tease— only a feral, growling beast of a man, desperate to ravage you until you're as depraved as he is.

v (volume) — how loud are they? what sounds do they make?

kayn has absolutely no self-consciousness when it comes to being loud, and he is loud. he sounds good and he knows it— he's seen your pupils dilate when he lets a particularly obscene moan slip from his throat— and he's happy to let you hear exactly what you're doing to him. his sounds range from soft, needy moans to deep, animalistic growls. on rare occasion, when he lets you ride him, you can even draw a few trembling little whimpers from his lips as he bucks his hips up, searching for more, hotter, deeper.

w (wildcard) — random hc!

sometimes, kayn's control slips when he orgasms, and rhaast peeks through. luckily for everyone, rhaast is surprisingly weak to the pleasures of the mortal flesh. one rhaast is finished having his way with you, it's pretty easy for kayn to take control again, leaving rhaast's consciousness to soak in the afterglow.

x (x-ray) — what's going on under their clothes?

kayn's not obscenely big, though he might claim otherwise. he's actually pretty average when he's hard— around 5.5 inches (14cm), but he's veiny and thick. his cock is unfairly pretty, especially when his slit drools out pearly little drops of pre-cum. when it's inside of you, it feels so heavy and hot and good that it's more than enough to keep you coming back for more. his balls are always full and always heavy, and if he lets you edge him a few times, his head goes from a deep, dusty pink to a pretty purple.

y (yearning) — how's their sex drive?

his sex drive is insane. if he's not working himself up, then rhaast is behind the scenes, whispering filthy demands in kayn's subconscious. if he were any less disciplined, he'd waste his days away, jerking himself off until you were available for him to play with. as it is, he still cums at least twice a day— once in the morning before he gets out of bed, and once at night before he goes to sleep. otherwise, his poor cock throbs with the lack of attention, and his balls get all swollen and achy, and he can't focus or relax until he's emptied himself into his fist, or, if you're around, into a warm, willing hole.

z (zzz) — how quickly do they fall asleep after?

it takes kayn a while to come down from his post-coital high. even after he's done with aftercare (both for himself and for you) and you're both sated and comfortable, he sometimes finds it hard to calm down completely. he likes to burn off that extra energy by pulling you into a slow, sensual make out session, which usually ends up with you mouthing sleepily at his neck while you both drift off to sleep.

#kayn smut #kayn x reader #shieda kayn smut #shieda kayn x reader #heartsteel kayn smut #heartsteel kayn x reader #league of legends smut #league of legends x reader #heartsteel smut #heartsteel x reader #writemin!#+kayn

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lunarmoves · 9 months

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beauty and the beasts

summary: you should've expected they were up to something when they picked you as a volunteer for one of their theatre shows. you just... didn't expect all of this.

pairing: DCA sun/moon/eclipse x reader

mentions: gender neutral reader, non-sexual intimacy, pining, fluff, true love's kiss<3, takes place when the dca used to work in the theatre, so includes ruin eclipse & their characterization, more eclipse-focused than anything tbh, eclipse uses they/them while sun & moon use he/him, they are all the same animatronic, lowercase fic

word count: 3.2k

ao3 link

this was not how you'd expected your day to go.

the theatre had been scheduled for an afternoon show according to the email you'd received from management. you were the only one on shift at the moment, so you were required to go and supervise. you didn't mind, not really. all of the jesters' stories were perfect for the kids, with just enough adventure, magic tricks, and morals to satisfy everyone. you liked watching them perform—weaving tales from that robotic mind of theirs. they never did the same story twice, not precisely, anyways. it was entertaining. and hey, getting to spend time in a dimly-lit auditorium beat having to walk around the plex any day.

ten minutes before showtime, you made your way over to the theatre and entered through the main double doors. families were already starting to trickle in, sitting on the plush seats that surrounded a curtained stage as they chattered excitedly. you smiled and offered polite nods to those you made eye contact with as you walked over to the stage to take your position next to it. you leaned against the wall and crossed your arms, gaze surveilling both the lower level and the balcony of the auditorium. looked like it was going to be a full house.

from your position, you could see the edge of the red curtain closest to you shift a tad before a glowing, white eye peeked out from behind it. you watched as it seemed to take stock of the room's capacity, the sunrays you could see spinning left and right in little motions. then the eye turned to look right at you.

you offered them a smile and a wave. they jerked back a little in a way that made your smile falter only slightly. then, their eye upturned in delight—sunrays spinning once around their faceplate—before they disappeared once more behind the curtain.

they'd been acting a bit weird lately, you pondered to yourself as you waited for the show to start. at least, weirder than usual. you'd caught them numerous times staring off into the distance—sometimes at you—or mumbling lowly to themselves. you figured maybe they were just thinking about more stories to perform. but when you'd approach them about it, they'd jump and their voice would start glitching out slightly before they'd run off to their little room.

they didn't always act like that, of course. it just happened enough times that you were starting to wonder if they were okay. did they need a check up in parts 'n services or something? maybe you'd bring it up next time you chatted with them.

as soon as the clock hit three p.m., the curtains rustled a little before a tall figure stepped out from the middle part. a hush settled over the theater at its sudden presence, the lights dimming slightly so that everyone's attention could focus on it.

"hello friends and welcome to the faztheatre!" eclipse spoke out, hands politely clasped in front of them as a spotlight beamed down on their body. you were always in awe at how easily they could command the attention of a room. their rays did a little wave-like motion around their faceplate, shifting the night cap they had on slightly. "before the show begins, please make sure to silence your cellular devices. flash photography is not permitted in the theatre. in the case of an emergency, exits are located in the back and to the sides of the stage. we hope you enjoy this fazbear-approved performance!"

and with that, they stepped back behind the curtain. a gentle murmur started up in the audience as music played from the speakers overhead. the lights dimmed further and you got yourself comfortable as the curtains parted so the first story could begin.

whoever designed eclipse had certainly done a good job helping to balance the three A.I.s they had in them. you always found amazement in how easily they were able to switch from eclipse, to sun, to moon. it was seamless—smooth. almost natural. you ended up zoning out slightly as you watched them perform, having watched this particular story so many times beforehand already. you mostly liked watching the motions they made, observing every click, twitch, and spin of their joints and head adornments.

ten minutes later, you were roused from your daydreaming when clapping erupted around the theatre. you blinked and glanced at the stage to see eclipse doing a little bow. done already? that was fast. well, the stories were rather short. each show was about half an hour long, after all. kids could only sit still for finite amounts of time. you clapped along for a bit, then quietened when you noticed eclipse straighten back up.

"for our next story," they said as they rocked back and forth on their heels, "we will need a volunteer!"

you tilted your head to the side slightly as a few hands waved up in the air, a chorus of 'me me me!' following in their wake. you don't think you'd ever supervised one of their performances where they asked for a volunteer from the audience. first time for everything, you supposed.

eclipse made a show out of tapping a finger against their chin, faceplate moving from one side of the theatre to the other until their bright gaze landed on you.

"you there! eager participant!" you blinked owlishly as a metal hand extended in your direction. their grin seemed to widen at your stupefied look. "come on up if you so insist!"

"wh—" you started, only to cut yourself off as your gaze darted around the audience. a sea of eyes stared at you, some expectant, some disappointed. sweat broke out on the back of your neck. "i don't—"

"come on, don't be shy!" eclipse bounced closer to the edge of the stage and reached a long hand over to grab at your arm. you swallowed thickly and found your legs moving to climb up the small set of stairs and onto the stage. the lights were so much brighter here, nearly blinding you and causing your eyes to squint slightly. large hands grasped at your shoulders, moving you along to the center of the stage. eclipse made a sound as though they were clearing their throat, then projected their voice out to the rest of the auditorium. "the show will resume in five minutes. please take this time to stretch, use the restroom, or purchase a drink and/or snack from one of our nearby stations!"

and with that, the curtains drew themselves back across the stage, hiding you and a seven-foot-something robot behind them. you were grateful for the reprieve from the lights, but the feeling did not last all too long.

"eclipse, dude, what the hell?" you wheezed as you stepped away from their hold and spun around to look up at them. a rasped 'language!' came from moon that you ignored as you gave them a look. a smile was still on their face. "you and i both know i didn't volunteer myself. what gives?"

"come on, it'll be fun!" they told you delightfully, rays spinning slightly. they swayed gently side to side to a tune you could not hear. you frowned. they were planning something, you knew it.

"i don't even know how to act," you grumbled, listening to the chatter of the audience from beyond the curtain. it left an uneasy feeling in your gut that made you feel slightly sweaty. you did your best to push it down.

"fret not, my dear! just follow along with us and you'll do wonderfully!" eclipse soothed you, hands reaching out to hold onto your upper arms. "you needn't even say a word, just allow us to guide you!" your frown only deepened before you let out a long sigh and allowed some of the tension to ease itself from your shoulders. something seemed to sparkle in their eyes at your relent.

you only had to last through a ten minute show for a bunch of children. you could do it. you didn't even need to speak. it shouldn't be too bad. "fine, but this is the only time i'm doing this, okay?" you wagged a finger up at them, then poked them right between their eyes that upturned at your action.

"amazing! now come—let's get you a costume."

five minutes went by quicker than you'd expected and soon you found yourself standing off to the side as eclipse stood in the center of the stage once more. you fixed the shiny headpiece they'd put on your head and took in a deep breath when music started playing through the speakers once more. the curtains withdrew and the audience quieted.

"once upon a time," eclipse began in a honey-coated voice—soft, gentle, dulce—as he narrated, "there lived a humble prince."

before your eyes, they shifted over to sun—who stood proudly on stage decorated with a fluffy cape and golden crown placed around the rays on his head. eclipse's voice continued on even as sun let out a hearty 'ho! ho ho!'. "the prince loved adventure. the thrill was something he chased after. sword in hand, he journeyed far and wide, looking for people he could help." sun brandished a wooden sword from somewhere behind him and bounced around the stage, pretending to fight invisible enemies.

"one day, the prince learned of a gentle noble who'd been kidnapped and locked far away in a castle for reasons unknown." that was your cue. you took in another deep breath and stepped into view on the stage, resisting the urge to squint your eyes in the light. "none had been able to save the noble, for a dangerous beast guarded them."

sun suddenly shifted over to moon, white eyes being replaced with red ones that lit up his face in an ominous glow. straight teeth slanted into ones sharp enough to rip you to shreds. the crown disappeared and was replaced by a familiar night cap. moon let out a low, raspy chuckle and swept up close to you, circling you slowly in a way that had goosebumps rising on your skin. he reached out a clawed hand and pulled you close to him so he could guide you across the stage in a strange, sweeping dance.

your gaze darted up to his face, allowing him to lead you along. moon's sharp grin seemed to widen at the slight confusion on your face. the close proximity made your heart skip a beat. you hoped he couldn't hear how fast it was racing.

moon suddenly let you go as eclipse continued with the tale, shifting over to sun in the process. you stepped away into the shadows of the curtains. "naturally, the prince believed this to be a worthy adventure. so he set off in search of the noble." sun marched about the stage, a determined look on his faceplate. "he found the beast in his travels. knowing he was close, the two fought against each other."

you watched as sun and moon took turns shifting into each other as they enacted a dramatic battle. it was interesting to look at, especially with you standing so close by. sun struck his sword out in front of him, then twirled around into the spot he'd slashed as he shifted into moon. "the prince won the battle. but as the beast lay dying on the floor"—moon made some choking sounds and collapsed onto the ground in a heap, clutching at his chassis where sun had presumably injured him—"he used his last breath to curse the prince."

moon made a clawed motion with his hand, then shifted up into sun who clutched at his rays and made a pained noise. he dropped his sword and cleverly kicked it to the side near the curtains. he seemed to fight with himself, rays jittering in and out of his head before he shifted into eclipse. they stared down confusedly at their sharp hands. "the prince turned into a beast. dazed and disoriented, he found himself stumbling towards the castle the noble was imprisoned in until he found them."

you emerged back into view as eclipse staggered over to you, reaching a clawed hand out. "the noble looked in horror at the prince, and as he managed to tell them that they were free—that he killed the beast—they only looked at him in sadness." you did your best to school your expressions into the ones eclipse was describing, but you weren't quite sure if you succeeded.

"the noble told the prince that they had been kidnapped and locked up because of their powerful magic. they had grown to believe it was dangerous and that they needed to keep away from society." eclipse took your hand in their own and squeezed it gently. you patted it sympathetically with your other one. "they refused to leave and with the prince now turned into a beast, he did not want to go either. so they stayed in that castle together—healing. grieving."

eclipse tugged you close and twirled you around in another dance, your hand still gripped in their own. they were being awfully touchy with you. you found yourself not minding all too much—not with how careful they were being. "the two grew close together over time. they danced around the feelings that had developed between them." eclipse dipped you swiftly and brought you back up so fast you wondered if it had happened at all. a rosiness dusted itself across your cheeks that you did your best to fan away. "but just when the prince thought to confess, disaster befell them."

eclipse ripped themselves away from you and shifted into moon again, crouched low to the floor. "a warrior had arrived at the castle, intending to free the noble once and for all without knowing their story. and upon seeing the prince-turned-beast, the warrior struck."

moon launched himself forward and made a slashing motion with one of his clawed hands. he spun around and switched over to eclipse, who clutched at their chassis and fell dramatically backwards onto the floor. "in the noble's grief at seeing the prince fall, they used their magic to end the warrior's life then stumbled over to the side of the prince."

you didn't know what to do about the whole 'using magic to end the warrior's life' bit, so you just fumbled your way over to eclipse's side and sank down onto your knees by their chest. their eyes were closed and they lay as still as possible. their voice continued on with the story. "the noble grieved over the prince's body." you sniffled and did your best to force yourself to cry, wiping your hand at your eyes. "and as the prince let out his last breath, the noble leaned down and gave him true love's kiss."

wait— what the fuck?

there was a moment where you froze, eyes widening slightly. eclipse's grin twitched from where they were laying on the floor, feigning death—or close to it, anyways. and as you processed the words they'd spoken, you shot them an incredulous look and felt your face burn with the heat of a thousand suns.

were they messing with you? they were just messing with you, right? you glanced up at the audience before you—so silent that you'd nearly forgotten you were on stage, performing. right. you were just acting. you swallowed heavily and—ignoring the way your heart thumped rapidly away in your chest—leaned down to press a light kiss to the metal of their smile. you added a weak "mwah" for effect.

eclipse's grin widened delightedly.

"the prince turned back to normal and came back to life," eclipse said as they shifted back into sun, who wasted no time in springing to his feet and grabbing onto you. he swept you up into a crushing hug that shocked a laugh from you and spun around, rays happily clicking in and out of his face. "and they all lived happily ever after. the end."

the audience burst into applause at the end of eclipse's story, the sound echoing in your ears. but all you could hear was the pounding of your heart—feel the breathlessness in your lungs. sun grinned happily up at you as the curtains drew together once again, swathing the both of you in shadow.

"you did great, dearest!" sun exclaimed once you were both out of view, spinning you around once more for good measure. you laughed and attempted to hold onto the headpiece you were still wearing to no avail. it slipped off your head and fell somewhere to the floor in a light clatter that you couldn't hear over the crowd of people leaving the theatre.

"that was surprisingly fun," you admitted, your hands holding onto sun's shoulders so you could keep your balance. "it's cool seeing you guys at work. you've really got a knack for storytelling." as sun preened with your compliment, you paused for a second and thought back to the ending. "well. you've got a few plot holes."

sun's grin twitched a little before he switched over to moon. it was a bit strange, especially with you still clutched in his hold. moon grinned sharply at you. "plot holes? do tell."

"well for one, the noble used their magic to kill the warrior when they were in the castle because they were afraid of how dangerous they were," you rambled, tapping moon on the arm so he could set you down. he did so after a short moment of hesitation. you fixed your clothes once you were solidly on the ground. "like, talk about trauma. no way they're gonna wanna leave the castle after that. they didn't really have any character development either in terms of accepting their magic."

moon tilted his head at you then said, in a dry voice, "it's a story for children. they won't remember it by tomorrow." he then switched over to eclipse, who clasped their hands together.

"we'll workshop it!" they chimed out, swaying side to side animatedly. "a tale of helping others, love, and embracing who you are!"

you gave them a smile. "i'm sure it'll be great after."

eclipse seemed to look at you then, almost in an expectant manner. their hands wrung together. "you know, maybe you should get a position as a theatre assistant! you'll do numbers on stage!"

at that, you laughed and waved a hand at them. "who, me? no thanks, i don't think acting's for me. you guys do fine on your own." something changed in their expression that you couldn't quite make out, but before you could ruminate on it further, you distracted yourself with looking at your phone. you didn't know why you were feeling so... odd. you brushed it off easily. "i need to get going. got a mess to clean in bonnie bowl. i'll catch you guys later."

with that, you spun around and waved at eclipse as you headed to the stage's stairs. you couldn't linger—if you did then you'd never leave. their arm spasmed a little before they lifted it up to wave back at you. "come back soon, friend!" they called out, watching as you disappeared past the thick, red curtains. they waited—as though hoping you'd return—but when you didn't, their body slumped.

their arm fell slightly before they reached their hand up to touch at the smooth metal of their grin thoughtfully. longingly.

eclipse sighed, the sound getting lost in a stage that was a bit too big for just a solo act.

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gothhabiba · 11 months

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I understand what people mean by prison abolition, but what does it mean in practice to abolish the family? I've never quite got it - who is raising children? How does it work? I'm asking in good faith, I've just always been a bit embarrassed to ask anyone

Like positions that are “anti-work” or against “gender,” the thing being objected to is more detailed and specific than the range of meanings that can reasonably or semi-reasonably be assigned to the word in question (“work,” “gender,” “family”)—which is why these propositions and programmes can have a bit of a PR problem. And, as with all terms that position themselves against something (e.g. "anti-psychiatry"), the term "family abolition" can be taken up by people with a range of different positions who disagree amongst themselves on some issues. In general, though, no one objects to "people living together or being emotionally close to each other" or "children not being left to roam about at random and get eaten by wolves" or anything.

Rather, anti-capitalist objections to "the family" tend to hinge on objections to:

parental rights, or "the special legal powers of parents to control major aspects of their children’s lives," which function as "quasi-property interests" more than anything that is in the best interest of children (link explicitly relates to U.S. law). Parents legally control where their children live, whether and where they go to school, what information they have access to, what level of freedom of mobility they have, what medical care they receive and don't receive, and what they may do with their own bodies, and are legally allowed to physically assault their children.

relatedly, the lack of legal autonomy that children possess (this is also often discussed under the banner of "children's rights" or objections to "adultism").

the positioning of "the family" as the only economic or social "safety net" in an economy and a society which provide no other one (creating an artificial "structural scarcity" of care). In a society which is otherwise dominated by "economic competition between atomized individuals," the family must be relied on—and yet, for some people (whose families cannot or will not provide living space or financial support in an emergency; whose families are abusive and physically or psychically dangerous to be around or rely on; who will not receive help or emotional support from a spouse or family unit without making serious concessions on the level of their personhood being basically respected; Black working-class people in whose communities the nuclear family unit has been deliberately prevented from forming by government intervention), the family cannot be relied on.

the way that the positioning of "the family" as the only safety net therefore constitutes economic coercion that works to keep people (especially women and LGBT, disabled and/or transracially adopted people) in abusive or exploitative situations, and that works to create incentives for working-class women (whose employment is generally less secure) to make themselves erotically desirable to men & disincentives for doing anything else.

the idea that housework, gestational labour & childbirth, and childcare are tasks "naturally" falling to the "mother" ("mother" as a "natural category"), such that the social, political, and economic nature of these tasks, and the economic and political discourses that mobilise the creation of our concept of "motherhood," are obscured.

Thus the objection is to "the family" as a unit of social reproduction under capitalism—as a legal, political entity that structures inheritance, taxes, health insurance, "race" and ethnicity, &c., and therefore works as a sort of interface between the capitalist state and the individual.

So the programme of "family abolition" involves, firstly, the control of the means of production on the part of the proletariat (this is a communist programme—the point isn't to remove the safety net of the family while keeping capitalism in place, but rather the idea is that without capitalism this ultimately abusive safety net ought not to be needed); and then the abolition of marriage as a legal institution; the abolition of parental rights; the putting in place of measures for the elderly and disabled to be cared for regardless of whether they have family alive who are both able and willing to care for them; the forming of social networks at will; and, depending on who you ask, the communal raising of children (which involves ceasing to privilege "parent" as a legal title automatically conferred upon biologically creating a child).

Obviously, toddlers who do not yet understand things about the world including "causation" and "mortality" will need on occasion to be restrained from running blithely into the jaws of wolves &c. The argument is just that coercion of this sort should be legitimately in the best interests of the child; not performed by two people who need answer for their actions, up to and including battery of their children, in no way other than saying that they "plausibly believe this to be necessary to control, train or educate their child"; and walked back in measure as the child gains the ability to assert their own desires.

Probably no one has a perfect solution 100% worked out—life is messy, and we don't know what the future will look like—but having a perfect solution 100% worked out should not be a prerequisite for noticing that the current situation is abusive and untenable.

#family abolition #nuclear family #family #capitalism #communism #questions #Anonymous

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therealdogsinmymind · 18 days

Text

✩ My Rival (All Mine) ✩

18+ MDNI

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

AO3 Link | Word Count: 2,394 | Chapters 1/1

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Synopsis: Sung Jinwoo pisses you off but maybe you've you've finally found a way to ruffle his feathers a little bit.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Pairing: Sung Jinwoo/Reader, Sung Jinwoo/You

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Tags: Reader POV, Gender Neutral Reader, Virgin Sung Jinwoo, Jealous Jinwoo, Rivals to Lovers, Bickering, Kissing, Neck Kissing, Tenderness, Light Angst, Miscommunication, Conflict Resolution, Happy Ending

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Picture from @oo0mika0oo ‘s icon edits

“You piss me off,” you say under your breath, fully intending for him to hear it. He always fucking does.

You don’t like Jinwoo, you never have. Not before you awakened as an S-Rank hunter and you saw him on TV and certainly not now that you know him personally. He’s got shitty vibes and an even worse personality. He’s closed off, and you can smell his fucking god complex from a mile away.

“Good to know,” Jinwoo says coolly, taking a sip of his water. You don’t know why he needs it, he hasn’t even broken a sweat, despite the fact that he’s been running circles around everyone in the training arena for hours. Just to show off, you suppose. He’s kicked almost everyone’s ass so far, sans for yours. You really don’t feel like going up against him though, you’d like your ass to remain un-kicked, thank you. There’s also some cards you’d rather keep close to your chest; but god you wish you could rub his face in the dirt just once.

As Jinwoo lingers against the wall next to you, head turned just barely so you’re in his line of sight, you grow increasingly agitated. Why the fuck did he come over here? Why is he looking at you? What’s his deal? He’s always doing this, he’ll follow you around just to piss you off. You swear he started going to the only coffee shop you like just to torment you with his extremely pretty, extremely punchable face. As your irritation reaches max cap you decide it’d be better to just take a deep breath and walk away, you don’t need to get into a pissing contest with this guy, you’re better than that. You’ll be taking your leave now.

You spring up, intent on heading for the door when Jinwoo calls after you, ”You don’t want a round?” Yeah, no.

You turn around briefly, still walking backwards towards the door. ”With you? No. I can think of better things to do with my time.” You take a little pleasure in the way Jinwoo looks slightly shocked at your rebuff. You turn around and pick up the pace, hoping to get the hell out of dodge.

Suddenly Jinwoo’s in front of you, blocking the door, having somehow appeared out of the shadows. ”Fuck!” You startle, you didn’t know he could do that, is there anything he can’t do?

“The better things, what are they?” Jinwoo asks, staring at you intently as if your face will reveal the answer.

”What?”

”What are the better things?” He repeats.

”I don’t know, dude? Get laid? Not that you would know anything about that.” It doesn’t even occur to you until his face twists, all sorts of emotions that you’ve never seen on him. They mar his usually such impassive features; he’s jealous. You said it as a joke, really more than anything wanting to call him a virgin, but this is too good. You have to hold in a laugh, it’s almost unthinkable, you have an antagonistic relationship with him at best. It intrigues you though, you wonder if you could push his buttons like this, he’s usually so unconcerned with others.

When Jinwoo doesn’t reply right away you take that as your cue, needling him, “Anyway- I do actually want to get fucked sometime today, so if you’ll excuse me…” You have no such plans but you wave your hand at him dismissively anyway, just to be a bitch.

His face stays twisted but he doesn’t otherwise react so you push harder. Leaning in close to him and speaking low so as to not be overheard, “Unless you want to see to that.” It’s just to throw him off his game, you just want to see him gape like a fish, or maybe sputter, curse you out, anything. You’ve thought about what Jinwoo might be like in bed before of course, who hasn’t, a simple curiosity if you will. That’s neither here nor there, you’re truly just aiming to rile him up at this point; surely any second now he’ll reel back and run away.

Instead Jinwoo grabs your wrist and pulls you out of the training arena. All that comes out of your mouth is a grunt, too worried about making a scene. Although maybe you should, where the hell is he taking you and why? He says nothing, simply dragging you down the hallway until he seems to sense an empty room where he promptly tosses you in; and for all your agility and grace you still land right on your ass. Great.

He shuts the door behind him just as you’re springing up, ready for a fight. That’s the only reason you can think he dragged you out here, to kick your ass away from prying eyes, the room is kind of small though, maybe he’s just that overconfident. You decide you won’t let him throw the first punch but it’s too late, Jinwoo’s fast, faster than you. You’ve barely had any real combat training as a new hunter and he’s the real deal. He’s in your space before you can even blink and you’re sure he’s about to beat you to a pulp. However no pain comes, there’s only a horrible sense of too-quick motion and then you’re seated firmly, feeling a bit dizzy. It takes you all but a moment to realize you’re sitting on Jinwoo’s lap, he seems to have scooped you up and sat down on a couch; you must be in someone’s office.

“I’ll be seeing to that now,” Jinwoo says in a low voice, giving a healthy pause before he moves at all, perhaps to let your brain catch up with his words.

It sure tries its best, running at a million miles a minute. You think about the fact that you hate Jinwoo, he’s fucking annoying, he’s stupid as shit. Your mind screams at you that he’s too powerful, it's dangerous, you shouldn’t get close. He’s too confident even if he can back it up, it’s kind of hot. You ignore that last part, you don’t who said that. However you also have eyes, he’s really fucking good looking and maybe if Jinwoo wants to fuck you so bad you can make him work for it a little.

You slip out of his arms and off of his lap. You don’t even dream of laughing at the poorly concealed heartbroken look on his face; it’s actually kind of sad to see. You click your tongue before sliding back onto his lap but this time straddling him.

“Come now, don’t make that face, I'm just getting comfortable,” you coo at him, stroking your thumb across Jinwoo’s cheek, it’s oddly tender for what the two of you have. He just looked so sad. He leans into it and it makes you want to be nice to him again, disgustingly enough. You lean in and give Jinwoo a soft kiss on the tip of his nose, deciding to kiss him more when he sigh softly, happily. You’ve never heard him make that noise, it’s entirely new to you, you wonder what kinds of other new sounds you can drag from him. More kisses, one on each of his cheeks, and again on the corners of his lips, missing the true mark purposefully. Jinwoo audibly swallows and his arms wrap loosely and hesitantly around your back. It appears all of his earlier confidence has sapped right out of him. You wonder if you were right on the money when you said he doesn’t know anything about getting laid.

You press a kiss to his jaw and linger there. “Jinwoo,” you whisper softly against his skin and he shudders. That’s cute, but you must stay focused, you have to ask, “Have you done this before?”

Jinwoo stiffens, “Define…’this’...”

“Fuck someone, baby.” He whines a little at the pet name and you make mental note of that. “Have you ever fucked someone before? Been with anyone? Made out? Kissed? What are we working with here?”

He clears his throat and turns his head away from you as his cheeks go red. You groan and drop your forehead onto his shoulder. You were just going to mess with him a little, kiss him a bit and leave him wanting more; but there’s no shot in hell you’re going to fuck up his first time. He deserves someone better than you for that, someone he actually likes. You have to ignore the way that thought stabs you in the heart so badly you can barely breathe.

“I’m sorry, baby,” you say, your forehead still resting against his shoulder, “We can’t do this.”

“Oh,” Jinwoo says, voice flat, devoid of any emotion, truly reminiscent of the closed-off man that you so often see. His hands fall away from your back and you wince at the way he shuts down.

“Hey,” you pour as much emotion into your voice as possible, “I promise it’s not you.” You tuck your head into Jinwoo’s neck and squeeze him tightly. You wonder if he can still breathe like this, you feel like you can’t despite nothing restricting you. “When you find someone you like you’ll be glad we didn’t do this.” He says nothing so you pull back to take a hesitant look at his face. Jinwoo looks angrier than you’ve ever personally seen him.

“Already did.”

He grabs you by the face with both hands and before you can figure out if you heard him right, Jinwoo crushes your lips together too hard and too fast. However once your lips are touching he hesitates for a second, unsure of what to do next. Well, apparently you heard him right, and his hasty kiss answers all of your follow up questions about what he said, go figure.

You can’t just leave him hanging, so you kiss him back like your life depends on it. All in all it’s a crappy kiss. Your teeth clack together painfully, he can’t seem to find a rhythm with you, and you bump noses incessantly too. Despite all this you can’t fucking stop kissing him; you don’t think you could even if the world was ending. Jinwoo pulls back after a bit, gasping, apparently no one ever taught him how to breathe.

You grab Jinwoo by his hair, “Breathe through your nose, dipshit.” Using your hold on his hair you pull him back into another kiss, delighting in his shocked moan. This kiss is slightly better, he seems to be learning quickly. Jinwoo wraps his arms around you again and grasps at the back of your shirt, you worry if he pulls any harder he might tear it. That could be hot though, an idea for later.

This time you pull back first and Jinwoo emits an uncharacteristically pathetic whine in response. “Shh.”

You press kisses up his jaw, before sucking a mark directly below his ear. You’ve never known anyone to leave a scratch on Jinwoo, maybe you’ll be the first. The thought fuels something new and feral in you. You begin covering his throat in as many marks as you possibly can, something delightful burning inside of you when you see each new bruise forming. You want him covered, you want everyone to know that this stupid man, this dangerous, closed off man is yours. Nobody else is allowed to see Jinwoo a mess like this, this is for your eyes only. That’s all you’ve ever really wanted, isn’t it?

“Jinwoo…” you whisper, your breath fanning across the spit-slick marks you’ve just made on his throat.

Jinwoo shudders beneath you, “Yeah?”

“We are not fucking in a stranger’s office.” Just on so many levels that is not happening.

He sags into the couch like a puppet that just had all of its strings cut. “I truly hate you sometimes…” he says with absolutely no malice, in fact it sounds kind of whiny and you have to hold in a giggle.

“Until about ten minutes ago, I was under the impression that you hated me all the time.”

Jinwoo scoffs and runs his hand up your side gently, “I don’t hate you ever, you’re just really annoying.”

You rub a thumb over one of his blossoming bruises, admiring your hard work. “Awww thanks, you’re also a real fuckin’ peach.”

“I do try.”

You roll your eyes, patting him on the head now that you know he won’t kill you for doing that, “Come on, you can fuck me in my bed later. I’m dying to know if I can fit your dick in my throat.” The last bit is tacked on with a pointed wiggle of your hips, just so you can feel Jinwoo’s cock straining against his pants. God, he’s such a virgin, it’s painfully cute. You absolutely would give him a quick hand job here just to help him out but it’s so much funnier not to.

Jinwoo’s hips twitch and he groans deeply, the sound reverberating in his chest, “Fuck you-”

“Happy to help!” Being a hindrance is your favorite activity, especially when it’s Jinwoo you’re hindering. You can’t believe you’ve finally found his weak spot.

“Yeah, I’m sure you are…”

“Aww, I’m sorry baby,” you say, voice thick with condescension, “I promise I’ll make it up to you later, just be patient.” You press a quick kiss to his lips before you slip off his lap. He sighs, folding over and dropping his head into his hands.

“You’re a nightmare…”

“Yeah but I think you might like that about me… Just a hunch.” You’re not actually sure if that’s true or not. You’re not sure of anything anymore. Really where the two of you stand now is a total mystery, but the soft laugh Jinwoo warms your chest, and that’s something isn’t it?

With a soft tone Jinwoo says, “Get out of here, menace.”

“Yeah, yeah… Hey- see you later?” Your words come out as a question, quiet and hopeful.

He sits up and looks at you, the corners of his lips quirked up. “See you later,” he says, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

Of course, you almost forgot, ever since you came here it’s been that way hasn’t it? Where you go he follows and vice versa, he’s your rival after all, what would you do without him?

#solo leveling #sung jinwoo x reader #jinwoo sung x reader #only i level up #solo leveling x reader #sung jin woo #sung jinwoo x you #jinwoo sung headcanons #jinwoo sung x you #jinwoo x reader #solo leveling fanfic #solo leveling headcanons #solo leveling jinwoo #Zephyrs Stories

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carmyboobear · 2 months

Text

ALEXITHYMIA CH 1: onions, weed, and pizza

Roommate AU: Carmy Berzatto x Reader (R18)

ao3 link ch 2 ch 3 ch 4

Summary: Carmy can’t put into words how he feels about his roommate. It’s only been a couple months, but here he is looking forward to going home and sharing a smoke with them. That’s all it is, though. There are no underlying feelings, none at all, even if everyone around him has something to say about it.

Or: Carmy is repressed as ever, but through the combined power of vulnerability, weed, and the horny, Carmy too can find love.

Tags: hurt/comfort, friends to lovers, mutual pining, slow burn, cursing, yearning, repression, SO MUCH REPRESSION, angst, mental illness, canon-typical imagery, unresolved tension, for now, virgin carmy, use of weed, alcohol, all that good stuff, carmy character study, eventual smut, gender neutral reader, nonbinary reader, up to you

A/N: HI I've never posted fic on tumblr before but i deeply love Carmy...please enjoy!!!

CHAPTER 1: onions, weed, and pizza

It always stays the same.

This is the thought that Carmy has when he wakes up, gasping for a chance to just catch his breath and keep it. It’s a kitchen knife twisting like a lock and key in his chest. It fits just right, as all awful and familiar things seem to do.

No matter how many times he wakes up, he’s never anywhere different. That drowning feeling suffocates him in his sleep and follows dutifully into his waking hours. He can’t remember when that haunting started, only that it’s always been with him.

He hates feeling like a drifter, like he’s lost (even though he is both of those things), so he picks a goal and runs after it like a monster. He’s an animal, hunting and working and bleeding until he fucking makes it work , because that’s who he is, and that’s who he’s always been. He can’t not make it work. Because if he can’t do it, then…then what was it all for?

What is he even for?

These are the thrilling thoughts that serve as the background music to the swirl of his cheap morning coffee, oils rotating in a slow circle. He thinks about getting a nicer brand next time he goes grocery shopping. But that would mean change. That would mean less money on the restaurant, too.

Yeah, so it tastes like shit, but it doesn’t matter. Even if it mattered once. Less and less matters to him these days.

Mornings in Chicago are not technically quiet by definition, but when compared to other times of day, they are. Especially when most of his day is spent in the kitchen wringing out his throat. It isn’t bad to have a quiet morning by normal means, but for him…

The quiet is dangerous.

It’s not silent, but it’s not enough. There’s distant beeping of impatient cars. The whirring sound of the old AC unit. He tries to listen to them, but his rampant thoughts nonetheless rise above them all, buzzing everywhere with nowhere to land.

A brief analysis of his thoughts reads as such:

Beef sandwiches eggs flour shipment Michael cigarettes smoking sore throat late shipment so tired not sleeping Michael Sugar Mom coffee tastes bad it’s too early my stomach hurts Michael fucking hates you Michael Michael Michael Michael Michael you piece of shit you fucking ki—

“Mornin’, Carmy.”

Until his roommate wakes up, that is.

When he moved back to Chicago, there was a fact, plain, simple, and unchanging. He wasn’t gonna make rent on his own, not with the restaurant. Not with everything. So maybe he didn’t need to deal with a new roommate, but it’s not like there was a choice. It seemed bearable, survivable enough.

He keeps waiting for the thing that’ll make him grit his teeth, make him regret not getting a place on his own, but it never comes. They’re easy to live with. It’s so easy, as a matter of fact, that it feels strange. The difficulty that he was so certainly expecting just isn’t there.

If anything, he looks forward to being at home. For someone who lives at work, that feeling is completely foreign.

They don’t steal his food (not that there’s much). Instead, they cook him food, leaving heated leftovers on the stove on late nights. In Carmy’s case, that’s most nights. They don’t bring over obnoxious company and keep him up with the noise. Rather, he basks in their company, and they make a ruckus between their laughter. Their presence doesn’t stifle him, it soothes him, just like the candle they leave lit in the kitchen for him when he comes home. They’re not just easy to live with, they’re good to live with, and that’s…

That’s been a hard adjustment, Carmy would say. It’s too much of a good thing that he’s not sure what to do with himself.

On those late nights, they’re usually fast asleep by the time he’s home. But as he sits and eats the leftovers they’ve kept for him, he wants to say something. Something about how a long time ago, there was once a Carmy who cooked for himself, who looked after himself, but that he’s not that Carmy anymore. That it doesn’t matter that he’s a five star chef and they’re just some guy in the kitchen, as they would put it, because he’s…

He’s grateful. Incredibly so.

And yet, the words will never come out. He feels the words tingling on his lips, but it feels scary. He can thank them as many times as he likes (which he does) but it will never capture what he’s really trying to say when he says thank you . There’s too many words, and it just can’t…it just can’t—

It always stays the same.

“You’re up early,” he says to them when they enter the room. It’s a rare sight to see them up at the early hours he frequents. He sees the morning drowsiness in their mussed hair and big t-shirt stained with hair dye. They yawn back at him, nose scrunching.

Cute , he thinks, and he stamps it down as soon as it flashes through his mind.

“Randomly woke up.” They fall into the empty seat next to him on the couch, and they rub at the crust around their eyes. “About to head off to work?”

“Unfortunately, yeah,” he replies. There’s a certain sentiment that lies on the tip of his tongue, something about how he wishes he could have a slow morning with them instead. Of course, he can’t voice it. He can’t even come close.

“The plague of the working man,” they sigh. “Well, I got an idea that might cheer you up.”

“...And that would be?”

“Let me paint you a beautiful picture,” they start. They clear their throat and gesture widely with their hands. He notices their chipped nail polish, the writing callus on their middle finger. “Imagine this—you come home from work, tired. You need to relax —something you need to do more often,” they add with a pointed look. No comment. “And I have dinner ready. Some sort of soup, pasta maybe. I need to check the fridge.” They pause with a yawn. “And before we eat, we smoke a big, fat joint.”

He snorts as they finish, unable to hold back a laugh.

“That’s a nice picture,” he admits. He doesn’t remember when he started smiling. “Y’know, I was wondering when the joint was gonna pop in.”

“You fucking know me, man,” they reply, blooming with his interest, his smile. Not that he can perceive that. “So? Thoughts? Haven’t done that in a while, right?”

“Right, right,” he echoes faintly. His mind is already sorting through the pile of tasks on the schedule. “Well, I gotta go over this new recipe with Marcus, today,” he mutters, partially under his breath. “But before that, ingredient orders. And those invoices before the end of the day—and that, that toilet guy was supposed to come today…I think?”

“Dude, I do like, one task, and the day’s over for me,” they say sympathetically, and the look on their face is so serious that Carmy struggles to hide his smile. “You’re crazy.”

“I, I’ve seen you do tasks,” he argues.

“Name one,” they argue back.

“You did two loads of laundry and did the dishes all before lunch time once,” he says, the memory clear and instant. “And when I woke up, you were vacuuming the whole place.” The immediacy surprises him, and it seems to surprise them, too.

“Damn, I said name one , but I guess I’m just that good!” They laugh, a breathy, exasperated sort of thing. “Well, point taken. Anyway, it sounds like you’re not gonna be home early tonight.”

“It is a Friday,” he says, “but…”

“But.”

“Can’t make promises I can’t keep,” he sighs, and shame melts over him like butter on a stainless steel pain. This isn’t anything new.

“I know, I know,” they say, gracious as ever. “It’s okay. Such is the life of a business owner, yeah?” He searches for some thinly veiled shred of disappointment, frustration in their expression, but he doesn’t. No matter how many times he lets them down, the explosion he’s waiting for never comes. They remain patient, collected through it all.

Says more about him than them, he supposes.

“Yeah,” he mutters, “such is the life.”

“C’est la fucking vie,” they say, and he laughs with a shake of his head.

It can feel strange to laugh. He worries that the lightness in his chest will expand like a balloon, and he’ll float away. It’s uncontrollable, foreign. It should be scary, how his emotions lead him when he’s around them, not the other way around, but it’s not.

It’s not scary to loosen up around them, and that’s the scary part. There are no words to describe why. All he can see is that the fear exists, stubborn and persistent. That fear is what makes him snap out of it, makes him look at the clock. He holds back a sigh.

“Time to go,” he mutters, and they nod.

“And time for me to go back to bed.” They salute him. “Best of luck with your day, brave soldier. And just shoot me a text if you do end up coming back early, ok?”

“Yeah, sure. I’ll try. And, thanks. You, you too,” he gets out. He stands up, readjusting the waistband of his pants. “I’ll, uh, see you later.”

“See you,” they say through a yawn, waving at him from where they’re lying down. They’ve taken his spot, sprawled across the couch, tangled hair flayed out on the pillows.

Cute , he thinks again, and hearing the thought in his brain makes him wanna panic.

He doesn’t wanna panic, doesn’t wanna think about it at all, so he nods, shuts the door, and heads out to work with a cigarette hastily lit in his mouth.

By the time it’s Carmy’s lunch break, he swears his vocal cords must have snapped by how tight he was wringing them.

The soreness has never stopped him from lighting a cig, though. As he stands outside in the back, finally forced to go on his 30, he smokes rather than eating. There’s a sandwich in his pocket, one that was bearing the brunt of test ingredients. He can feel the aluminum wrapping at his fingertips.

Eventually, he does eat, though, because he sees the way his hands are shaking when he flicks his lighter. He doesn’t wanna shake when he uses a knife, so he eats. He tastes it, but he doesn’t really taste it.

In truth, he wasn’t even planning on taking his lunch break at all. Most days, he forgets about it. The kitchen’s always busy, there’s always something missing, there’s always something that hasn’t been prepped that’s ruining everything, the lights in the hallways keep flickering because they need to fixed, Fak’s supposed to fix them, but he can’t, because Richie’s still out getting the replacement bulbs, the pile of papers on his desk are bigger than he remembers, he doesn’t have enough fucking time—

But then he’s in the middle of chopping an onion, and the cutting board slips. The half-chopped onion and its sliced offspring scatter on the floor with the cutting board. The sound of its fall draws Sydney in like a whip.

“You okay? Need a bandaid?” Sydney’s already kneeling by him, helping him pick the onions off the floor.

“I, I’m fine, didn’t drop the knife,” he explains, and it feels like an ocean current is rushing by his ears. “Fucking, I just—such a stupid fucking—” He sucks in a breath and goes silent.

His entire body feels tight, wound like a spring. He can barely fucking breathe.

“Hey.” Carmy turns his intense stare from the onions to Sydney, and when he sees her searching expression, he remembers himself. “Maybe you should go take your lunch break.”

“No, I’m fine, really,” he repeats, and he feels like he’s heard this before. From someone else. He can’t remember. Who was it? “The onions—we’re behind on onions—”

“I can handle onions for 30 minutes,” she interrupts, decisive and firm. “Seriously.”

Carmy’s about to say something, but then he’s looking at the onion half in his hand. His hand is shaking.

“Okay,” he sighs after a beat. “Okay, yeah. Sorry. For fucking up.”

“It happens. We all have our moments.” She shrugs. When he keeps standing there, she makes this shoo-ing motion with her hand. “Go on. Take your 30!”

So here he is, taking his lunch break a whole hour later than he’s supposed to. Although it’s better than most days where he doesn’t take it at all.

She wouldn’t have had to tell you to take a break if you didn’t fuck it all up, he thinks to himself, eyebrows knitted together. When the last time I’ve fucked up something so fucking easy?

He thinks about his dream from last night. A familiar sight of red fire and flames up to the ceiling, crackling so loud it sounded like screaming. The only good part is that when he woke up, he wasn’t at the stove burning his place down. It hasn’t happened at this apartment yet. Carmy hopes it never happens.

Just get it together, he thinks. He aggressively taps the ash out onto the decrepit ash tray they have in the back. It’s full. You’re supposed to be at this shit. So just be good.

“Cousin.” Carmy snaps his head up, and Richie’s at the door, stepping out. His presence yanks him out of his inner whirlpool, a quickly descending spiral. “Gimme one.”

Wordlessly, Carmy hands him a cigarette. Richie plucks it out of his hand like a flower.

“You had a lighter, but no cigarette?” Carmy comments, squinting at Richie pulling a busted up red lighter from his jean pocket.

“Shut up,” Richie mutters, but there’s no heat behind it. “Got the wrong damn light bulbs,” he explains unprompted.

“Alright,” Carmy sighs. He has so little energy that the frustration bypasses him completely, diving instantly into deflated acceptance. “Just return ‘em.”

“Can’t,” Richie says, and when Carmy gives him a look, he elaborates, “no receipt.”

“ Dude .” Carmy opens his mouth, but then he shuts it again. It’s just not worth it. “Thanks anyway, cousin. We’ll get it done.”

“Don’t fuckin’ thank me, you asshole. I didn’t do shit.” Richie nudges him, but like before, it’s not an angry thing. “Also, toilet guy’s not comin’ today.”

“The fuck? Why ?”

“Canceled,” he replies simply.

“Fucking hell,” Carmy mutters under his breath. “Did he say when he could reschedule?”

“Not yet.”

“Great.”

“Yep.” Richie tilts his head up, blowing out a slow stream of gray cigarette smoke. “Might as well wait for Fak to get his ass back in town at this rate.”

“I guess.” Carmy sighs. He thinks about all the things he still needs to do. “I dropped this onion I was chopping, earlier,” he mentions out of nowhere.

“Okay.” Richie gives him a look. “And? You bitches chop those things up faster than I could cut one in half.”

“I dropped it on the floor,” Carmy tries again, but Richie’s expression remains unchanged. “I never do shit like that.”

“Well, cousin, you did.” Carmy feels something in him deflate. “What’s the big deal?”

“Nevermind,” he replies, because he’s a coward. “Just—just forget it.”

Silence. The spark of a lighter.

“I’m gonna leave early,” Richie says, like he can just do that. Which…he can, Carmy supposes. “If no one’s gonna show up, what’s the point?” He slaps Carmy’s back, and Carmy doesn’t watch him as he heads back inside.

Guess all I need to do later is get rid of those papers on the desk , Carmy thinks to himself, idly moving the shortening cigarette between his lips. Then that’ll be it, I guess.

He doesn’t remember the last time he’s gone home early. It’s hard to even imagine what he does on days like those. Sleeping, probably. There’s nothing much else for him to do, not with how tired he is—

Shoot me a text, okay?

He hears them in the back of his head all of a sudden, and he remembers.

Oh, he remembers, hands moving to take out his phone. Almost forgot.

“Sorry to bother you, chef.” Carmy’s not sure how he didn’t hear the door opening. Marcus’ head pops out, nose covered in flour. “Just wanted to let you know that we’re gonna need more flour for tomorrow.”

“Order’s not gonna come for a couple days. I thought we had an extra bag left,” Carmy tries, but the guilty look on Marcus’ face explains it all.

“Dropped it,” Marcus grimaces, and Carmy’s already fucking over it.

“We’re all fucking up today, chef,” Carmy replies, and the day goes on.

. . . . .

It’s a strange, delightful miracle, but he manages to get out of the restaurant before the sun sets.

Considering their collective track record, the fact everyone was able to leave early was cosmic intervention. It helps that the toilet guy didn’t come, in an unfortunate way, but still. Standing outside of the restaurant in the evening like this feels…weird.

It’s not that Carmy’s complaining about a nice thing, it’s just that he wasn’t prepared to have anything good today.

Shower, dinner, and weed, he thinks absentmindedly on the way home. He juggles the three around in his brain. Just the thought of it feels like relaxing. A little.

With company , his brain helpfully adds, and his stomach squirms.

Self control, he thinks. He needs more self-control. He can’t just keep thinking of them so indulgently. He’s not allowed to think of them that way, because it’s not fair to them. Even if no matter how many times he chastises himself, it never works. Even if they remain in his brain like sun-spots in his vision. Even if it’s not his fault that he just can’t help it.

The thing is, though, it always is. Even when it’s not his fault, it actually is. Always.

You dropped that fucking onion , his brain helpfully adds for no particular reason. Fucking loser.

Fuck off , he thinks back as he approaches his front door. Predictably, it does not stop.

Just as his fingers search for his keys in all of his pockets, he hears something that makes him pause, hands stopped on his waist. It’s music, distant and muffled. They’re probably listening to music in the kitchen. He stands, trying to place the song, but he doesn’t recognize it.

He does recognize the voice that’s singing over the music, though.

Oh, he realizes. That’s them.

The way their voice clumsily layers over the music shouldn’t make him pause like this. He shouldn’t be doing this, standing in the doorway and listening rather than opening the door. The keys are in his hand. This, this is a breach of privacy, he tells himself, feeling a little dizzy with distress, he just needs to just—

There’s an abrupt, loud clang, and he shoves the door open.

Concern is on the tip of his tongue, but it dies there. The source of the noise lays face-down on the floor—a pan sitting in what seems to be tomato sauce. The matter next to it is what makes the words evaporate from his lips, like they were never there at all.

They’re kneeled down next to the pan, paper towels in hand, but all they’re wearing is an apron.

His mind blanks. He thinks he stops breathing. He’s never seen so much of their skin at once. He needs to look away, he thinks, but his eyes keep traveling, traveling, and traveling. It just happens so quickly. He doesn’t mean to look, he doesn’t, but they’re right there and he can see right down their—

“No, I—I’m sorry! I didn’t know you were coming back early!” They exclaim, quickly crossing their arms over their chest, and that’s what makes him tear his eyes away.

“I—I thought I texted you,” he says quickly, hot face turned to the side, “on my lunch—...“ He stops there, the memory reconstructing itself.

He forgot.

“It’s fine, I just feel bad about dinner, and, uh—okay, I’m just gonna change real quick, and then I’ll clean this up,” they reply, words rushing out. In the corner of his vision, he sees their bare legs dart to their room.

It seems wrong to just stand here staring at the tomato sauce slowly expand outwards on the floor, so he cleans it up. A couple paper towels later, he’s gotten most of it, and they’ve returned with a change of clothes.

“Sorry,” Carmy starts right as they also go “I’m sorry”. He pauses, meeting their eyes. It’s a lot easier now that they’re wearing leggings and a t-shirt as opposed to, well, nothing. Not to say he doesn’t appreciate the leggings.

“Sorry you had to see me like that,” they sigh. “I don’t—I don’t usually walk around the place naked, I just—I didn’t think you’d be back—“

“I should’ve texted,” he interrupts. He struggles to not think about them walking around the living room naked. “I forgot. But it, it’s fine. You’re fine. Really. Sorry for not texting.”

“Okay. Cool.” They exhale, a tired noise. “And it’s okay. It happens.” They look at the floor and make a sound of surprise. “Did you clean this up?” The look they give him has far too much gratitude, and it feels like a searing hot iron.

“Yeah, uh.” His hands are moving like he’s trying to explain something, but no words crop up. “Felt weird not to.”

“Well.” They smile, grateful. “Thank you. That was gonna be dinner, but…” They trail off, looking at the floor with a sour expression. “I fucked up.”

“It’s just that sort of day today,” Carmy mutters.

“Shitty day for you, too?”

“Yeah. Lots of shit went wrong.” Especially me, he thinks, but he doesn’t say it. “You?”

“Gotcha.” They shrug. “As for me—yeah. Really not my best day. It was just, uh, some family shit. You know how it is.”

Carmy makes a sound of acknowledgement. “That sucks.” He doesn’t know much about their family other than that they’re fairly shitty. It’s the same the other way around, too.

“It’s whatever,” they say, even though it really isn’t, and he knows it. They look at the floor one more time before looking up at him. “Do you just wanna order pizza or something?”

“Yeah, I do,” Carmy replies, his words coming out much more despondent than expected.

They settle on some pepperoni pizza from a place down the street. It’s a tried and true method—they deliver, it’s cheap, it’s oily, it’s cheesy, it’s good. Just talking about it makes Carmy taste it on the tip of his tongue.

“You can go and shower if you want. I’ll get the door when pizza comes,” they offer. They’re standing at the sink, sleeves rolled up.

“Okay, thanks.” Carmy pauses then, gears turning. He’s vaguely worried his memory is going to shit. “Did—did I just say I was gonna shower?”

“Oh, no, you didn’t, you just always shower when you get home from work, right?” They say it like it’s the weather, like it’s familiar, and that’s when Carmy realizes because it is. After several months of living together, of course they’ve picked up on his habits. It doesn’t need to be a thing. There’s no reason for it to be a thing.

“I do,” Carmy replies faintly, and for some reason, that’s all he can say.

“Thought so.” They look at him for just a moment, but it makes him feel like his body’s gone transparent. “I notice these things, you know.”

“Yeah.” Carmy looks at them when they turn back to the dishes, back facing him. “You do.”

He tells himself he’s not gonna think any harder about any of it. He’s not gonna think about the singing, the apron, the way they just notice these things, but then he does.

He’s in the shower, and he thinks about everything.

The water pressure is pathetic, but the warmth still feels nice. Between that and the sound of the running shower, it’s usually enough to quiet his thoughts. This time, though, it doesn’t. To his credit, he does try to think about anything else.

He thinks about work, because he always does. He thinks about flour, about onions, about knives. He thinks about the shampoo lathered in his hair. He thinks about those lightbulbs they still need to get. He thinks about food. He thinks about them. He thinks about pizza. He thinks about the way they sing when no one’s around. He thinks about the way they know him.

He thinks about them, knees on the floor only in a—

He thinks of bashing his head into the tile wall until he explodes.

“Shut the fuck up,” he whispers to himself, rivulets of hot water trailing down his forehead and dripping off his lips. “Shut the fuck up.”

The soreness is still present in his body, but that never quite goes away. He does feel a bit better now that he doesn’t have sweaty, sticky skin, though. It gets even better when he puts on a clean white t-shirt and his favorite sweatpants. It’s a nice surprise from his past self who did his laundry for him.

This amount of niceness is okay. This is what he’s used to—a shower and comfortable clothes when he’s home from work. That’s enough.

He steps out into the kitchen with a damp towel on his head. He finds them sitting by their one shitty window that opens, pizza box in front of them and joint lit. It casts an orange glow to mix with the golden light from the window.

“Hey, pizza’s here!” They slap their hand on the greasy cardboard box. “Just got this joint started for us, too.”

“So you weren’t gonna smoke it all on your own?” He doesn’t mean to tease, but he does. He slips into the seat across them, arms resting on the table they placed by the window.

“I couldn’t smoke this whole thing even if I wanted to,” they protest. “Besides, joints are made for sharing. Here—now you get to take it. Isn’t that nice?” With their elbow propped up on the pizza box, they hold up the joint to him. The lit end of it sizzles a bright orange, emitting a thin trail of smoke up to the ceiling.

“That is very, very nice,” Carmy agrees, taking it carefully from their fingers. Their face spreads into that contagious grin of theirs, and he’s far from immune. Sometimes he smiles so much around them that his face hurts, rusty and unused.

Sure, he can blame that on the weed, but if he’s being honest with himself (a rare occasion), that’s a complete lie. Obviously the weed lessens the tension, the stress that winds him up tight. It’s not just the weed that gets him to relax, though.

It’s them. There’s something disarming about their presence, something that makes him loose-lipped around them. Even when he’s sober, he finds himself feeling comfortable. He’s not quite sure how that happened, or if that’s ever happened. He supposes that isn’t a bad thing. Just something he’s noticed.

He wonders if they’ve noticed.

“You like the new rolling papers?” They tuck their knees under their chin, propping their feet up on the chair.

“Hm.” Carmy lowers the joint from his mouth to give it a good look. He rotates it around in his fingers. “Strawberry?”

“Yeah, it’s strawberry,” they confirm, poorly hiding the excitement in their demeanor. Not that they were trying to. “Can you taste it?”

He pulls from the joint, the edges of the paper sizzling red with the weed. It’s an even burn this time. He rolls his tongue around in his mouth after he exhales a cloud of smoke.

“Still no,” he decides after a beat, and they sigh.

“I don’t know why I ever get my hopes up.”

“I do taste something else in this, though.” He takes another hit, stews on it. “Lavender?”

“Shoulda known you would’ve gotten it on your first tray. Yeah, it’s lavender. I found some lying around.”

“You made this one pretty nice,” he observes, eyes tracing the shape of the joint. “Between the lavender and the new papers, I mean.”

“Well, y’know.” The smile on their face is small and shy. “I don’t smoke joints often, so I wanted to make it nice, and I, uh…”

They’re paused for so long that Carmy interjects.

“And?”

“And I—want that joint,” they finally say, outstretching their hand. Carmy has a strong feeling that they weren’t originally going to say that, but he hands over the joint nonetheless.

“Strain?” He asks curiously. He can feel the body high creeping up his shoulders, fluid and light.

“The strain that gets you high,” they reply with a grin.

“Oh, thank god,” Carmy sighs in relief, and the way that makes them laugh… It makes his chest tight.

“To actually answer your question, though—I dunno.” He likes watching the smoke drift from the tip of the joint as they talk, thin gray wisps in the air. “I think it’s a hybrid? Not sure if it’s more one way or not, though…”

“As long as it’s not the weed that puts you to bed.”

“Um…well, if you smoke enough of it, it can.”

They sit together like this for a while, just sitting and taking turns with the joint. It’s an easy, fluid exchange, flowing between them like smoke. No matter how much they both try to blow it out the window, it always comes back in. The smell of weed is strong in the air, earthy and pungent.

Although he would never describe himself as a talkative person, sitting stoned across from them makes the words come out. Sometimes, he thinks he likes himself better when he’s high—his mind isn’t running circles around itself, and the soreness of his body just floats away. He feels more like a human than a poor imitation of one like he usually does.

This weed smells kinda good, he thinks, and when they laugh, nose scrunched up, he realizes he said that out loud.

“That’s literally what I’ve been saying,” they agree, a bright grin lingering on their face. “That’s how you know you’re a fuckin’ stoner!”

“Feels weird to call myself a stoner,” he muses. He plucks the joint from their outstretched hand. It definitely looks shorter from when they started a moment ago. “But I guess…”

“If you like the smell of weed, you’re too far gone,” they say with a grave expression. “It’s so fucking over for you.”

“Fuck,” he whispers, equally as serious, and then they’re both bursting out into laughter. He likes the sound of their laugh—it’s unabashed, fills up the space.

“Dude, I’m high,” they whisper after they both calm down, like it’s some sort of secret, and Carmy can’t stop himself from laughing all over again. “Oh my god. Are you high?”

“I—I think I might fucking be,” he gets out between laughs, and that sparks them straight into another cackle of laughter. He’s not supposed to be able to make others laugh, he doesn’t even make himself laugh—but then he’ll say something, and they’re lit up with laughter.

“We need to eat this pizza now, ” they yell, projecting over their combined noise. They flip the pizza box open, and it smacks Carmy right in the face.

“Oh,” he reacts mildly.

“Shit, I’m so sorry—”

“It’s fine, it’s not like you punched me in the face,” he reasons, but their guilty expression persists. “It didn’t hurt, it’s just cardboard.”

“I’m sorry, I’m high,” they sigh apologetically.

“I know,” he replies with a little smile. His eyes drift down to the pepperoni pizza sitting before them, glorious in its perverse amount of oil. “So, we’re gonna eat this, right?”

“Oh my god, yes we are,” they gasp, and the moment is forgotten.

When he tears off a pizza slice, the cheese stretches in thin, gooey strings. They grab the slice adjacent to it to snap the strings in half, but they’re both leaned back in their chairs, pizzas in hand, and the cheese is still connected.

“This doesn’t seem right,” Carmy mutters, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “We should’ve just cut it.”

“How could we have predicted this?” They pull their pizza further back, and the string still doesn’t break. “Wow. I’m honestly impressed. I don’t think it’s ever been this insane before.”

“I think we’d remember.” He’s not sure why he’s still talking and not just running his finger across the string to break it.

“I think we would, too.” They snort, shaking their head. “This—this is some spaghetti type shit.”

“What? Spaghetti?” He’s genuinely perplexed.

“I—I mean like—that fucking disney movie. With the dogs.” They pause for a moment, mouth silently moving. “Fucking—lady and the, the truck—”

“Uh.” He has to hold back a laugh. “...The lady and the tramp?”

“ Holyshittheladyandthetramp ,” they blurt out in a rush, and the cheese string finally snaps in half. “…Well, I guess it’s not exactly like the lady and the tramp, then.” They take a large bite of their pizza, and it reminds Carmy exactly how hungry he is.

“You mean lady and the truck,” he corrects, and he can’t stop himself from smiling. Especially not with how good this hot pizza is, delightfully salty and greasy in his mouth.

“Shut up, I was trying,” they grunt through a mouthful of food.

“How exactly is this like the lady and the tramp, again? Or, uh, not like it?”

“Well, it was just like it, but then the string broke.” Somehow, they’re already halfway through their slice. “Could’ve been a beautiful spaghetti moment.”

“Spaghetti moment,” he echoes under his breath, holding back a laugh. “Remind me how that scene goes?”

They go quiet for a moment. It’s like he can see the gears turning in his head. If he’s being honest, he already remembers how that scene goes, but…he wants to hear them say it. He needs to hear them say it.

“Uh, well, they’re…eating spaghetti. The titular lady and tramp.” Their eyes are fidgety, flickering back and forth between their pizza and the window. “And they’re sharing the plate, the two of them. They’re eating together, and, um…”

“...And?”

They meet his eyes, mouth hanging open, and then they close it.

“Um, I don’t remember, actually,” they say, shaking their head and blinking. He sees it for the blatant lie that it is, and yet. “Do, do you remember?”

As he stares back at them, unable to look away, he wonders. He wonders about what this really means. About if this really means anything at all, about if he’s going to find out if it does.

“I don’t remember,” he answers quietly, cowardly, and neither of them say anything else.

Out of the two of them, they’ve always been better with recovering from awkward moments, so they do. They start talking about something else, and the world keeps turning. But in the back of his head, Carmy remains in that moment, unwilling to let it go.

Why did you say that you didn’t remember? He wants to say. Why didn’t I say that I remembered how it went? Because I remember. They kiss—they fucking kiss. Is that what you wanted to hear? Is that what I wanted to hear?

But because he’s Carmy, he doesn’t say anything. He just eats.

He’s so hungry that the pizza disappears in minutes. It’s delicious, but he’s so high he’s not completely sure he can taste it. Somehow, it remains the best thing he’s ever eaten.

The rest of the night is a blur. He remembers getting onto the couch at some point. They both decide on a random movie he doesn’t catch the name of. They finish off the joint on the couch together, sinking into its cushions. It burns hot in his throat as it reaches the end.

And as it turns out, the weed he smoked is the one that puts him to bed.

“...Ca…Car…” Someone’s calling him. “...Carmy, c’mon. You’re gonna complain about your neck tomorrow if you keep sleeping here.”

“Mhm,” he replies helpfully. He turns his head into the cushion. His body feels like an abstract blob, perfectly molded into the couch cushions.

“Okay, you made a good point. But. ” They laugh quietly, under their breath. “Movie’s been over for like 20 minutes now.”

“Mhm,” he repeats, nearly inaudible. He doesn’t wanna get up. Whenever he falls asleep, it always feels like he’s never gotten an hour of sleep in his life. There’s nothing he needs to think about, worry about. He’s warm and comfortable, and he doesn’t feel like letting that go just yet.

Everything goes silent again for a moment, save for the cars on the road. He begins to drift away again, slipping back into his dreamless sleep.

But then there’s a hand on his shoulder, and it’s like a smoking brand on his skin. His eyes fly open and he jolts awake, jerking upright.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you,” they apologize, fretful. Between the dark of night and haze of sleep, they look pretty different. The blue light from the television is streaked across the blurry planes of their face.

“It’s fine,” he replies, drowsy. Speaking feels…heavy. Begrudgingly, he adjusts to sit up. “Didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

“Weed,” they say with a shrug.

“How, how long was I—?” He cuts himself off with a yawn, wide with condensation in the corners of his eyes.

“Only like, 30 minutes.” They yawn back. Typical infectious yawning. “End of the movie sucked anyway.”

“Oh.” Pause. “What was the ending?”

“Love interest died,” they state plainly. “He told her about how he felt, got rejected, and then she died in a car accident. Pretty tragic.”

“Huh.” Carmy makes a face. “That does suck.”

“Yeah, a bit.” They’re idly fiddling with the remote, scrolling through Netflix without reading anything. “I feel like the movie was trying to say something profound about the unpredictability of life or something, but the writing was shit.”

“I guess it’d be too perfect if they got together,” he muses.

“I guess,” they echo. They turn off the tv, and the room goes dark. The only light is from the yellow street lamp right outside their window, wonderful in its inconvenient placement. It illuminates the shape of the back and leaves their face in shadow. “I think I remember how that scene went,” they say suddenly.

“Oh.” Carmy’s heart feels stuck in his throat. “And how does it go?”

“Well, they’re—both eating spaghetti. Like I said.” They’re not facing him, leaving their face shrouded in shadow. He’s not sure if he’s imagining the shake in their voice or not. It’s beyond him why there would be any shakiness at all. “They somehow get the same noodle, so they, uh, kiss.”

“They kiss,” he repeats for some unknown reason.

“Yeah.” They let out a quick laugh, but it doesn’t sound like they actually find this funny. He wishes he could see the look on their face.

“I don’t think pasta works like that,” he hears himself murmur faintly. For some reason, he can’t help but think that was the wrong thing to say. But he’s already said it. Maybe it’s the same reason as to why his heart is beating so urgently.

“No, I, I don’t think so either,” they mumble. He refuses to place the way they’re feeling.

I can’t fucking do this.

The thought resounds like a gong, hit with a mallet right next to his ear.

“It’s late, I gotta head to bed.” It feels like someone else is speaking for him, moving his body for him. He can’t stop them. When he stands up, he avoids their face.

What the fuck are you doing?

Another thought resounds. He doesn’t respond.

“Right, I—didn’t even notice the time.” He pretends he doesn’t hear the strain in their voice. No, he didn’t word that right—there is no strain in their voice. “G’night.”

"Night,” he murmurs back.

This is enough, he tells himself as he falls into bed. His sheets are tangled. This is enough , he repeats, and it’s not because he’s scared, afraid, anxious, or any other stupid synonym. It’s because he believes it, needs to believe it.

He tells himself, this is enough , even though he wonders, what is supposed to be enough? He doesn’t listen. He stamps down the protests, the thoughts that are out of line. The high usually helps with that, but it’s worn off, now just leaving him in a weary, sleepy state of things.

This is enough, he thinks, and he falls asleep looking at their shrouded face behind his eyelids.

#carmy berzatto #the bear #carmen berzatto #carmen berzatto x reader #carmy berzatto x reader #the bear fx #jeremy allen white #lip gallagher #the bear fanfiction #hahaha i've been stewing on this fic since sept 2023 and now its here... i have like 2 more chapters written right now #they're around the same length #AH!!!! CARMEN BERZATTO!!!!#my writing #my fics #carmy #reader #alexithymia fic

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