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clouditae · 3 years

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Unexpected Confession

Word: 5.7k

You gathered up the courage to confess your feelings, but it seems everyone in school knows about it before you could even find him

“You’re really going to do it?” your friend asks, looking at you through the bathroom mirror in shock as you wash your hands. “You’re actually going to confess to one of the most popular students in this school?”

“Don’t scare me. I’ve already told myself six times today that I was going to confess.” You turn off the faucet, grabbing a paper towel from the dispenser. “Even if he rejects me and I can never look at him again,” you mumble.

“Y/N,” Aleah begins, blocking your exit from the bathroom with her arms spread out to her sides, “you’re about to confess to Jungkook, the basketball and baseball playing hottie. You understand his ex will not be happy to hear about this since she’s protective of everything.”

You frown. “He’s in basketball?”

Aleah sighs, rolling her eyes as well. “Yes he’s in basketball! How do you not know? You go to his baseball games,” she claims.

“I have NOSB, so I’m usually at the club preparing for the competition,” you disclose, pushing one of her arms down to get past her and out the door.

She groans, “You are such a—are you sure you want to do this?”

“It’s now or never,” you whisper. Your friend can only sigh in response, patting your back as the two of you part ways. “See you at lunch,” you call out to her, walking down the hall towards your chemistry class.

You have a test today, but you didn’t study as much as you would have liked since the club leader decided to give you “homework” to do and study for a small competition Friday. You’re stressed to the point where you’re beginning to think gray hairs are appearing. You almost cried when you thought you saw one. Turns out it was the light playing tricks on your eyes.

Entering class you take your seat, setting your bag down and pulling out a pencil. The second the last bell rings, you watch as the instructor passes the test out. You take in a deep breath. There’s nothing else you can do but try your best.

When the test reaches your desk, you immediately begin, surprised that after you finish, you know a lot of it. Some educated guesses seem like they’re the correct answer, but you’ll have to wait and see after it's graded and passed back on Monday. For the remainder of the class you listen to the instructor go over the next lesson on ionic bonding. You listen in silence, jotting down notes as the instructor works on the white board to explain in more detail about her explanation.

“Does anyone know if a cation gains protons to form a positive charge or does it lose electrons?” your instructor asks, a strand of her hair falling from her bun as she pushes it back, eyes scanning the room for raised hands. Looking through your notes, you raise your hand. “Y/N,” she says, giving a nod for you to answer.

“The protons in the nucleus do not change during normal chemical reactions. Only the outer electrons move. Positive charges form when electrons are lost,” you tell her, looking up from your notes to see if you’re right.

“That is correct,” she tells you, smiling as she continues class. So, for the rest of class, you take detailed notes and do a surprisingly good job at distracting yourself from your practiced speech you’re going to tell Jungkook after school.

Jungkook. The popular one in school. Your neighbor since your first year here when you moved to this town for your dad’s job. A few words are exchanged whenever the two of you see one another at home, and a lot of accidental gazes when you two would look out your bedroom window. You just happen to pick the bedroom right across from his.

Jungkook plays sports, is smart in class, has a girlfriend for two years—until they broke up over the summer before school started, and lots of friends. Whenever he walks down the hall, at least half the students say something to him, and he always talks to them like they’re his best friend. You wish you had the guts to try and be his friend, but you’re always afraid.

What if his personality is all a show and he’s a mean person? Well what a great way to figure out by confessing your feelings for him.

You almost bang your head against your desk until you remember where you are. To your luck the bell rings to let you know that class is over and lunch has begun. Packing your belongings, you head out of the class and enter the busy hall. Aleah will be waiting at the usual table, but before you can meet her, you need to put your chemistry textbook away and swap it out for your math book. Turning down a different hall, you notice several people looking at you; some are whispering to one another.

You try your best to ignore them as you reach your locker and put in the combination before exchanging books. Why would they be looking at you and possibly be gossiping? You’re not well known in this school, so why would you be on their minds? Maybe you're overthinking it.

Entering the cafeteria, you stand in line to get your food. You focus your attention on the display of food in front of you, debating on what to ask for when you reach the people standing behind the counter. After getting your food and heading towards the usual table Aleah sits at, you notice her expression.

An expression you don’t like.

“Y/N,” she whispers, as you take a seat across from her. “Everyone knows.”

You frown in confusion. “Know what?”

She looks at you with a sad expression. “People are talking about your crush on Jungkook and the confession you’re going to make after school.”

“What?” you ask in complete disbelief. “How do they know?”

No wonder people are looking at you and whispering to one another. Even now as you glance around the room you can see people looking at you and laughing with one another as they talk in low voices.

“Did you check to see if anyone was in the bathroom when you went in there?” she asks, resting her arms on the table. You can’t meet her eyes at the realization that you didn’t check. You were so nervous at telling Aleah your plan that you just forgot. “Y/N,” she says, tone comforting.

“I’m so stupid, Aleah,” you whimper, keeping your head down.

“You’re not stupid, Y/N. It was just a coincidence that someone was in that bathroom.”

“I heard you’re going to confess to Jungkook,” a voice interrupts. You look up to meet a pair of brown eyes. Golden brown hair, make-up packed on, and the school uniform—slightly unbuttoned and skirt higher than it needs to be. Naeun. Jungkook’s ex. “Well? Is it true?” she asks, tone demanding.

“That’s none of your business,” Aleah tells her, defending you before you can utter a word.

Naeun turns to look at Aleah. “Was I talking to you?” she bellows before turning back to you. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Y/N,” she begins, placing her palms on the table and leaning in close towards you, “Jungkook only needs a break from us because he needs to focus on basketball, and that doesn’t mean he’s available to anyone. Got it?” Looking you up and down with a look of disgust, she stalks off.

“Don’t listen to her, Y/N. She’s just a bitch who’s sad she’s no longer with Jungkook,” Aleah tells you, but you can already feel it. “Oh, Y/N, don’t cry.” She reaches across the table and takes your hand in hers. “I’m gonna beat her ass—” A sudden loud bang makes you both jump. You look to see your best friend staring behind you in shock. “Holy shit,” she whispers.

Turning around, you see two people on the floor throwing fists at one another. A crowd begins to gather, but Aleah seems to be quicker as she pulls you to your feet and drags you towards the fight. After she pushes her way through, you get a clear view of the two. You watch as Jungkook pins down the captain of the football team and punches him in the face. Bringing his fist back, Jungkook lands another hit before he is thrown off by the man beneath him.

“I can’t believe Jungkook is fighting Aaron. They’ve been friends for years,” Aleah mumbles in confusion. “What could have happened?”

You watch as Aaron gets a few hits in before he is pulled away by security. Another appears at Jungkook’s side, holding him back from lunging at his friend. “Everybody disperse,” a loud voice booms, making you jump again. The dean walks to the center of the crowd, eyes glaring at everyone. “If you are not back to your tables and eating lunch by the time I count to three I will start giving out detention. One!” That is all everyone needs before the group breaks up and runs back to their tables.

You follow Aleah back to yours. “Man, that was scary as hell,” she tells you, shaking her head as she sits back down.

“I’ve never heard of Jungkook fighting with anyone before. He’s always friendly with everyone.”

“Tell me about it.” Aleah takes a bite of her food. “At least we know he can fight. Did you see how bad Aaron looked? Jungkook was nowhere near that,” she laughs.

“Still he could get into a lot of trouble and he may get suspended from school,” you worry, glancing at the hall through the open doors where Jungkook was taken down.

Suddenly you feel a splash of some sort of liquid whip across your face. You shut your eyes, feeling the sting as a familiar voice speaks up, “This is all your fault.”

“What the fuck, Naeun?” you can hear Aleah speak.

You’re not listening to their argument as you rub yours eyes. You’re just grateful that she threw water and not something else that can hurt. “It’s her fault that Jungkook got into a fight. This bitch deserves more than what I gave her,” Naeun finishes.

Rubbing your eyes, you watch her walk back to her laughing table. You can hear Aleah talking to you, but you’re so pent-up in your anger you don’t listen to her as you grab your plate full of your mashed potatoes with gravy and storm towards her. No one stops you. No one does anything as you grab her by the shoulder, spin her around, and smash the paper plate on her face, some of the food flying from the impact.

Watching the plate slide off her face, the ringing in your ears has finally stopped and you stand in a room filled with shocked eyes and silence. Naeun wipes the food from her eyes and you realize you’ve never seen someone look as pissed off as she does. “You’re fucking dead,” she says, ready to lunge but stops short at the deans voice.

The two of you turn to see him standing at the doorway. “Y/N, my office. Naeun, clean yourself up and come to my office.” It’s then you can feel your heart drop and the fear kick in. You’re in so much trouble.

“Here, Y/N.” You turn to see Aleah handing you your bag. “That was fucking awesome by the way. Text me later.”

Taking your bag from your friend, you follow the dean with heavy strides. You’ve never been in trouble before. What exactly happens when people get into trouble? Does he yell? You’re sensitive. You’ll cry if he yells at you. Hell, you’re already on the verge of crying.

Entering the office, he points to the line of chairs outside his door. You do as you’re told and sit down. You’re trying your hardest not to cry in front of the receptionist at the desk, but you can already feel your body shaking and your eyes going blurry. You look down, pretending to fix something on your somewhat wet skirt. You don’t realize how wet your hair and shirt are until droplets begin to fall from the ends of your hair.

Everything is a big mess, and so the tears begin to fall. Some fall on your hand while some roll down your cheeks. You sniffle as you quickly wipe at your warm cheeks. A pair of shoes come into your line of sight followed by a towel draping over your head. You look up to see Jungkook kneeling down to meet you at an almost eye level.

There’s a Band-Aid above his left eyebrow, his left eye slightly purple. Other than that, he looks the same to you. His hair is a mess from probably running his hands through it out of frustration. After developing a crush, and having him in a few classes, you couldn’t help but notice the little things.

“For you to dry yourself,” he says, gesturing to the towel on top of your head.

“Thank you,” you whisper, voice cracking just a bit. You begin to dry your hair, wiping at your tears as well.

“I’m sorry about Naeun,” he tells you, giving an apologetic smile.

You shake your head. “It’s not your fault.”

“In a way it is. Even though we aren’t together, every person she hurts is my fault because we’re not together…” he trails off. “If that makes sense.”

“Jungkook. I thought I told you not to leave until I say so.” Looking behind him, you see the school nurse standing in the hallway with her arms crossed over her chest in annoyance.

Jungkook sighs. “Guess that’s my que to leave,” he mumbles, looking back to meet your eyes. “Can I walk you home after school?”

You can feel your heart racing. “I may not be here after school. He might throw—I mean kick me out before then,” you tell him, fumbling over your words a bit.

He smiles. A smile that makes him scrunch his nose and remind you of a small animal. “I don’t think he’ll do that. If I can get off with a warning, then I’m positive you’ll get off with one, too.”

“Jungkook!” the nurse yells.

“I’ll see you after school.” He gets up to his feet and follows the nurse back down the hall. He turns around, walking backwards as he cups his hands around his mouth. “At your locker,” he calls, grinning and waving at you before turning back and around and following the nurse out of sight.

You can’t help but smile, cheeks turning pink and a flutter in your stomach. You feel more at ease by his words. Maybe you won’t get into trouble, but it seems the dean caught you in the act of smashing food in her face. Just you pulling an act.

So, you wait and wait. Five minutes turns to forty and still no sign of the dean coming out of his office. Even as Naeun comes in ready to pounce you, the dean does not call either of you in for another hour. Every now and then you’ll glance in Naeun’s direction from across the room, but you always look away when you realize she’s glaring at you.

“Naeun,” the dean says. You look up and watch him gesture with his finger for her to follow. Naeun gets up from her seat and follows him inside his office, the door closing.

And so again, you wait. You glance at the clock, watching as time ticks closer and closer to the last bell. Will he ever call you to discuss your punishment? It’s giving you anxiety as time ticks on.

Finally, to your relief and fear, Naeun storms out of the room, not even looking at you as she leaves the building. You look to his office door, watching him step out and look down towards you. "Come in," he addresses, walking back into his office. You get up, feeling your legs shake and hands clutching the towel as you enter the room.

You've been in his office numerous times, but never for getting in trouble. You're usually in here with questions about the club competition and the funding to get there, but never to get yelled at. You can feel yourself on the verge of crying again, but you blink them back, not wanting to look like a child in front of the one who can expel you.

"Take a seat Y/N," he says, taking a seat at his chair behind his desk. You immediately sit down, watching him as he picks up a light brown file folder from his desk. Opening it, his eyes scan whatever is in that folder. "I am quite surprised by what I saw earlier today," he states, not even looking up at you.

"I am so sorry, Sir," you croak. "I-I don't know what came over me—I just lost it. She threw water at me and started telling me it's my fault, and I just couldn't take it—but that doesn't excuse my behavior." You’re a babbling mess.

"I saw everything, Y/N. I know what happened." He finally looks up to meet your blurred eyes. "Jungkook told me to stay behind "just in case" as he put it, and I was surprised to see that he was correct." He closes the folder, leaning back in his seat. "I'm not going to suspend you or put you in detention. I'm just going to ask you to not do that again. You're a good student and I don't want you to ruin your chances of going to the competition in February. So"—he clears his throat, leaning forward and interlocks his fingers together on his desk—"I'm going to let you off with a warning, okay?"

You nod vigorously. "I promise I'll never do anything to end up in this situation again." The dean nods, shooing you off with his hand. You get up, thanking him like your life depends on it as you leave his office. When you’re out of the room, you feel so relieved and so exhausted from trying not to cry.

How was Jungkook able to guess that you wouldn't get into trouble? You'll have to thank him when school—

Right on cue the bell rings, indicating that school is over. You grab your bag from the chair where you left it on, draping it over your head and telling the woman behind the receptionist desk goodbye. You walk out the door and into the hall filled with students eager to get out of the building and home. Making your way towards your locker, feeling excited to see Jungkook standing there, you’re trying your best not to run.

You don't get that far when you are stopped by your best friend. "How did it go?" she asks, pulling you to the side to avoid the busy hall. “Are you suspended?”

You shake your head, feeling the biggest smile grow on your face. "I got off with a warning."

"That's great because do I have news for you," she says, looking around. She turns to you and tells you in a low voice, "I was told that the reason Jungkook got into a fight with Aaron was because Aaron was making fun of you and your confession you planned on doing. Jungkook just... jumped him."

"Really?" you ask, voice loud and completely shocked.

"Shh! Yes!"

"I can't believe he'd do that. He could have gotten in so much trouble," you say more to yourself than to her.

"He didn't get in trouble?" Aleah questions, shock written all over her face.

"Yeah. He got off with a warning like I did," you tell her.

"Holy fuck," she laughs. "So, the only two that got suspended were Naeun and Aaron."

“Wait, they got suspended, but Jungkook and I didn’t?”

“Hilarious right?” Aleah laughs as if she told you the funniest joke she has ever heard. You’ve never seen her laugh so hard to the point where tears begin to form and fall. You shake your head in defeat. “Oh, c’mon. Don’t tell me you don’t find this funny,” she argues, crossing her arms over her chest.

“I don’t have time to laugh. Although I don’t get why Aaron was suspended when Jungkook was the one who initiated the fight,” you wonder. A group of laughing teenagers walk by as Aleah shakes her head.

“I was told he already did things that were just piling up because he’s the captain of the football team.” Aleah shrugs, gaze wandering off to the crowd walking past. Some towards the exit while others head towards their clubs or to practice. “It’s stupid that they took so long to suspend him, but are you ready to go?” she asks, turning towards you.

The two of you usually go to the park and hang out for a while before going home. You two either gossip or do homework that one of your instructors gave you. You’re always there for each other. Whether it be in friendship or in homework, you always help one another out. Today, however, you’re not going to follow her to the park. You feel bad, but knowing her, she’ll be pushing you towards your locker.

"I can't today," you tell her, feeling giddy.

"Why?"

You took in a deep, shaky breath. "Jungkook asked to walk me home." You watch as her eyes go wide. "He's waiting for me at my locker," you finish.

Just as you predicted, Aleah is pushing you in the direction of your locker. "Well don't keep him waiting! Hurry up and go!" You laugh, walking on your own. "If he does anything to you that you don't like, let me know and I'll go kick his ass okay?" she yells.

You turn around to look at her encouraging smile. "I'll let you know the second I'm home what happened!" you call back, waving to her before turning back around and making your way towards your locker.

Reaching your hall, it’s empty except for Jungkook. You can see him leaning against the lockers, looking down at his shoes as he kicks imaginary dust. You can't help but imagine what it would be like if he were to wait for you every day to walk you home. Like he’s your boyfriend. Holding your hand, listening to you talk about your classes, as you listen to him about his practices—you’d even wait for him after practice when you didn't have your club meeting. He’ll smile at you with that scrunch he does with his nose, give you a kiss on your cheek, and eventually your lips.

You shake your head of those thoughts, ignoring the racing of your heart as you make your way down the hall towards him. When you’re close enough, he looks up to meet your eyes. He smiles and you swear you see the light around him shine brighter. "Did you get in trouble?" he asks.

"Ah, n-no. I got off with a warning like you said I would."

He smiles even brighter. How is that even possible? "Told you," he begins, pushing off the locker, "You had nothing to worry about."

"But you did," you counter, remembering what Aleah told you. "You could have gotten suspended for starting a fight."

"But I got a warning," he returns.

"You didn't have to do that for me. All people do is talk, but never do anything," you exclaim, shifting from one foot to the other.

"But I didn't like the way he was talking about you," he speaks under his breath, but you hear him, and you’re at a loss for words on how to respond to that. You've never had anyone defend you the way he did. You want to hug him. "Shall we head home?" He takes a step forward, looking at you to see if you'll follow. You quickly do, walking alongside him as the two of you head towards the door that leads to the front of the school.

The walk is silent, neither of you saying anything to one another. It's not that you don’t mind. You enjoy the feeling of walking beside him. Just knowing that you can walk with him just this once is enough for you. Even if he rejects you because Jungkook is the nicest person you have ever met. He always treats you like everyone else. He's never rude and always says hello when the two of you see one another at home or even at school.

"So, um," he begins, clearing his throat, "I heard about the rumors..."

Your heart stops. Hell, even you stop in your tracks. You’re not ready for his response. "I'm sorry," you sputter. "You can just ignore everything that you heard. It—it was..." What can you think of as an excuse? You were so confident in telling him your feelings, but now that you're standing in front of him with him asking you about it, you lost your nerve. All your confidence is gone.

"Oh," he says, looking a bit disappointed. Did he want to hear it from you?

He says nothing else as he continues to walk ahead. You jog to catch up. What do you say? What are you supposed to do? It seems like you ruined the entire walk because you were going to confess to him. You want to hit yourself.

For the rest of the walk you glance at him to see what sort of expression he has, but you can't read him. You have no idea what he’s thinking and all it does is make you more nervous. Eventually, your house comes into view and you still have no answer. Just a feeling of frustration for yourself. You reach your house first, the two of you stopping at the walkway leading towards your front door.

"Thank you," you tell him, looking anywhere but at him.

"It's no problem. We live next door."

You shake your head. "No," you begin, gathering the courage to meet his eyes, "Thank you for defending me. No one has ever done that for me—well, except for Aleah, but no one has ever gotten into a fight for me."

Jungkook shrugs. "Well, Aaron is an ass, and he shouldn't be talking bad about someone he doesn't know."

You nod in understanding. "I appreciate it and I'm sorry you got hurt in the process." Silence follows after. The two of you seem to have nothing else to say. "Well, I should go in." You gesture to your house with your thumb. Walking up the walkway you tell him, "Bye." He waves as you turn your back to him, glancing at your windows to see if your parents are watching. Thankfully no one is peeking through the curtains.

"What if," he calls. You turn back around to see him still standing in the same spot. "What if"—he whispers to himself—"I want to hear the rumors." He takes in a deep breath. "From you."

"W-what do you mean?" you stutter.

Jungkook glances at your house behind you before walking up to you. "What if I want to hear what you have to say?" He looks down. "Will you tell me?"

You feel like you’re going to throw up. What is happening? He wants to hear your confession? What could that mean?

You're a mess. You're a huge mess.

What surprises you and him is when you say, "I like you." Oh God. You want to run in the house and hide forever. You're never going to go to school again. You're going to move countries—

"Me too."

You look back up to meet his eyes, blinking a few times. "What?"

You can see his eyes widen in shock, as if he just realized what he said. "I-I said I like you, too."

"Really?" He nods. "When?"

"Since you moved next door." He scratches the back of his neck, clearly unsure as to what to do, but you're just as lost as he is. "What about you?" he suddenly questions.

"Same," you reply.

He giggles and you swear your heart is going to explode. "I didn't know you liked me. If I did, I wouldn't have stuck with Naeun for so long. When I heard the rumor, I never felt so happy," he confesses.

"I didn't think you'd like me back," you admit. Why are you acting like this was a casual conversation?

"That's crazy. You're smart, beautiful, funny, the sweetest person I've ever met. Your smile is contagious." You can feel the heat on your cheeks, and it seems Jungkook notices it, too. "Come to my game Friday?"

You want to say 'yes', but instead you say, "I have a club meeting. We usually don't finish until nine."

He hums in response. "Your NOSB club meeting?" You’re shocked that he knoww but you nod in response. "I understand. You have a competition to win, so study hard okay?" You nod again, completely baffled that he knows what club you’re in. He nods as well, glancing at your house once more. “I should go,” he tells you. “I’ll see you tomorrow?” You really wish you can do anything but nod. Sadly that is all you do seeing as your voice is betraying you. Smiling, Jungkook leans in, pressing his lips to your cheek to give you a quick kiss.

You’re frozen in place, watching him quickly head towards his house, not even glancing at you. Touching the spot where his lips once were, you can’t contain the smile spreading as you head inside. Wait till you tell Aleah.

“What do underwater earthquakes, landslides, volcanic eruptions, or explosions generate?” Macy, the club leader, questions.

Jiyeon, standing at the opposite side of the room to be your opponent answers, “Whirlpools.”

Macy shakes her head. “That is incorrect.” She turns to look at you. “Y/N you get to answer.”

You think back to your study notes. “Tsunamis,” you answer.

“Correct!” Macy says with a proud tone in her voice.

Your club is currently split into two groups, practicing for the competition. You just got your team in the lead as you go to sit down and watch another member go up to the podium to answer the following question. You’re trying your best to focus on the questions, but your eyes keep glancing at the clock above the whiteboard and thoughts go back to the kiss and Jungkook admitting to having the same feelings as you. It’s like a dream come true. Never in a million years would you expect Jungkook to feel the same way, but he does and you are jovial. All you want to do is go to him, see him smile at you, hold your hand, hug you, and so much more.

“Correct,” Macy yells, bringing you back to the room. She collects the flashcards she used for questions from the desk she sits at. “Well we went past our usual time,” she announces, getting up from the desk. “Make sure you get home safely if you’re not going to take the bus.”

You glance at the clock one last time seeing that it is 9:05. You look up estimated times as to how long games are, and there is a slight possibility that the game may be playing still. You grab your belongings, casually waving bye and making your way out the door. The second you hear the door close, you sprint down the hall. The basketball game is on the other side of the school, so you’ll have to run the entire way just to try and make it to what's left of the game or to an empty court.

You run as fast and as hard as you can, legs burning, air coming out in short and desperate breaths. Rounding the corner, you almost slip but manage to regain your balance and continue to run. To your surprise you can hear the crowd cheering from the closed doors at the end of the hall. That means the game is still playing. Pulling open one of the doors you walk in until you’re standing next to the bleachers, a clear view of the game. Jungkook stands in the center of the court, yelling at his teammates. Within the crowd of moving players, the ball is passed to Jungkook. He glances around in front of him, seeming to look around for an opening. He mutters to himself before staring ahead and jumping up, tossing the ball.

You watch the ball fly across the court, hitting the rim once, twice—swish! The crowd erupts in cheers, the team members surrounding Jungkook as he yells in victory, fist in the air. You clap along with the crowd as some go to the center of the court and others leaving, talking about the game. You've never seen a basketball game, but from the way everyone is cheering so loudly you would have loved to have gone to one of his games; sit in the crowd, cheer when shots are made and boo when the opposing team does something. You don't know a lot about basketball, but you're willing to learn for him.

Jungkook's eyes meet yours from within the huge group surrounding him. He smiles brightly at you and your breath catches in your throat. He pushes his way through, jogging up to you. "You made it!" He’s sweaty, hair sticking to his forehead.

You exhale, "I didn't make it in time. I just saw the last shot, but I missed everything else. I'm sorry—" You’re cut off by his lips meeting yours. You feel yourself melting as you close your eyes, feeling his soft lips move against yours before pulling away.

"Sorry, I shouldn't have done that," he whispers against your lips. It seems as though he doesn't want to stop, even as he apologizes. You cup his cheeks, pressing your lips against his once more. It’s like a million butterflies fluttering in your stomach, the sound of the cheering people disappearing, and all there is in this building is you and him. He pulls away again, this time further but not far enough as you feel his breath against your lips as he asks, "Would you like to go on a date?"

You open your eyes to meet his. Smiling, you tell him, “Yes.”

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emuchipmunk · 5 years

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SpideyTorch Teacher AU

The first day of school was a busy time for everyone, but Peter Parker, the chemistry teacher at the local high school, was strangely calm on his way to work. Despite the 2 cups of coffee he’d already had that morning and the third one Peter had in his hand as he turned on the lights in his classroom, he was completely relaxed. It could have been the fact that he’d spent the past two weeks setting up his classroom and scrambling around trying to remember where he put all of the school supplies last June, or maybe it was the fact that it was his third year teaching and by now he knew how to handle the rowdy high schoolers and keep them interested in the labs. Of course, it was probably the fact that his husband was hired onto the staff full time this year so they were working together, having lunch together, planning lessons together…

He was texting some of the other teachers as tired students started trickling in with quiet greetings as they got settled into their seats. Since Peter taught regular chem and the photography elective, he recognized a few faces from last year’s class and gave little nods as the students looked around the classroom.

At 7:55 the warning bell rang and a few more students came in and quickly got settled in. Peter got up from his desk as all the teachers said their goodbyes in the group chat with promises to meet up for lunch or in common planning periods. He wrote Mr. Parker on the board in big ugly block letters as the last few students came in and the 8 o’clock bell rang signalling the start of the school year.

Johnny Storm ran to the other side of his classroom to calm a fire down that had broken out at the stovetop. It was a few weeks into the school year and the home ec class had been making pasta, somehow one of the students managed to catch noodles on fire while they were in a pot of water. Luckily, Johnny had a specialty for controlling fires and he suspected why the school kept him around. Once the fire was put out and Johnny had walked around checking on the students one more time, he sat back down at his desk and picked up his phone to check a text.

“Hey guys, I gotta go stop into another classroom for a minute, I’ll be back. If anything goes wrong, blame it on Mr. and Mrs. Storm-Richards across the hall right? You know the drill.” Johnny slipped into the hall and quickly started making his way to Peter’s room.

As he walked through the halls he saw Barry standing in Hal’s doorway and grinned. He couldn’t hear what Barry was saying but he could see that Hal’s face was turning bright red and the students in the room were looking at each other knowingly so he could assume it was some lame joke or some not-so-subtle flirting. He’d have to remember to roast Barry later on the group chat for it, but right now he had more important things to do. Johnny grinned to himself and sped up a little bit.

A short walk later and he finally was outside Peter’s room, prepping himself to go in. Not that he was nervous, he just need a second to make sure the students weren’t holding any glass or taking a test. Johnny may be a goofy guy but he still wanted to make sure the students got good grades and he didn’t want to be the cause of them failing. Peter would never let him forget it if he did anyway. When he heard Peter finish answering someone’s question, he knew the time was right.

Johnny cracked open the door and saw Peter facing away from the students, talking and writing something on the board. He took the opportunity to sit down at one of the empty desks after miming to the kids to keep quiet, and pretended to start taking notes. Peter turned back around and kept going with the lecture until he saw a hand raise up in the air from the front of the classroom.

“Mr. Parker,” Johnny started, “I was just wondering if you could explain–”

“Joh–Mr. Storm, please. Don’t you have a class right now?” Some of the students started quietly laughing as Susan Storm-Richards came to the doorframe. Peter sighed as the students got even more distracted but kept his mouth shut as Susan grabbed Johnny’s ear and started pulling him out of the chemistry room, saying something about the probability of two students burning noodles in one class period.

Another hand raised in the air and Peter looked over warily.

“Yes, Jessie?”

“Mr. Parker, I was just wondering why you let Mr. Storm come in here all the time? You seem to get frustrated every time he’s here and he interrupts class all the time.” After Jessie finished, they put their hand back down and waited for the teacher to answer. All the students seemed to zone back in and lean forward in their seats and Peter had to think quickly.

“Well it’s just. Johnny–I mean Mr. Storm–and I are two of the younger teachers here so it’s easier for us to get along with each other than the old as dirt teachers like Mr. Wayne and Mr. Stark. I can send memes to him and not have to explain them. Did you guys know that I had to explain pepe the frog to Mr. Stark to get him away from doge?” Peter really hoped that his joking around would distract from the slip up with Johnny’s name, and it seemed to be doing the trick when he saw the scrunched up faces of the students at the mention of the ancient meme.

Thankfully, the bell rang and school was over for the day. Letting out a sigh of relief, Peter started packing up his papers to grade and saying goodbyes to the high schoolers as they left his classroom. He would have to plan a big lab for tomorrow if he wanted to avoid gossip again.

–

Thanksgiving break started tomorrow and teachers were giving out some final tests before the week off. Peter thought the last thing his kids needed was another test, so he had planned a fun lab with no write up due for it. The kids were having a blast while Peter monitored the room, checking the clock every few minutes to make sure they could clean up in time before the bell rang at the end of the day. Once the clock hit 2:45, he decided that it was time to end the lab.

“Alright, we gotta start cleaning up! Pour the liquids down the waste sink, wash the graduated cylinders out and leave them to dry, you know what to do.” The high schoolers started buzzing with excitement at the idea for the end of the school day for a whole week and they got all the clean up done in 10 minutes, leaving five minutes to chatter. Peter started pulling papers out of his desk and slipped a ring onto his finger like he did every day. He looked up when the room suddenly got silent and saw that the class was staring at him.

“Um, can I help you?”

“Mr. Parker…” Jessie started but wasn’t sure how to end the sentence. They all looked around at each other and waited for someone else to say something.

“Mr. Parker, when did you get married? Did you tell us while we weren’t paying attention or something? We could have gotten you a gift.”

“That…” was not what I was expecting, he meant to respond. Peter hadn’t realized that his students had never seen him put his wedding ring on at the end of the day, usually everyone was moving around trying to sort out that night’s homework or finish a test before the bell rang. “Well,” he started again, “I’ve actually been married for…three years now. Right after I finished grad school but we’ve been together since high school.”

The kids started looking around in stunned silence trying to register what they just heard their teacher say. It was certainly unexpected, he didn’t seem like the married type and never mentioned any kind of significant other or romance in general. Just ionic bonds and aldehyde and boring things like that.

Just then the bell rang and everything that happened in the past five minutes seemed to have been forgotten as everyone scrambled to get out of the classroom and start the week off from school. Peter sighed, which seemed to be happening more and more often, and continued packing up his stuff before going home.

–

Despite what Peter thought would happen, the kids had not stopped trying to find out who the mysterious person he married was, and he was almost ready to tear his hair out about it. On one hand, it meant that everyone got their work done early almost every day, but on the other, it meant that he got interrogated with all the extra time left at the end of class and he had to pretend to be lesson planning or grading papers to get away from it. But just because he wasn’t talking to them doesn’t mean they weren’t talking about him like he wasn’t there.

“Do you think it’s someone in the school? It has to be someone in the school.”

“Of course it has to be, he practically lives here. He doesn’t have the time to get together with someone outside of the school.”

“No, it can’t be a teacher here! Remember, he said it was someone he knew in high school, they’ve been together since then.”

Right as Peter was about to interject, someone opened the door. Everyone looked over and saw Mr. Storm standing in the doorway, looking a little more frazzled than they’d ever seen him.

“Hey Mr. Parker,” he started quietly, “can I talk to you in the hall for a minute?” Seeing the usually obnoxiously cheerful Mr. Storm in this state must have worried everyone because it was completely silent as Peter made his way through the maze of desks to the hall. He quickly closed the door behind him and turned to face Johnny.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Nothing, just. I’ve been hearing a lot of gossip going around the school. A few days ago I guess some of my kids saw me put my wedding ring back on after I washed my hands – we were making bread and I didn’t want it to get messy so I took it off – and I guess they had never known that I was married and they asked about it but I didn’t know if you told anyone and I didn’t wanna say anything because it’s like a secret identity and stuff I guess and…” Johnny trailed off and looked at Peter for the first time since he started off on his ramble. Peter looked back through the window of his classroom door and saw that his students were all on their phones or talking to each other. He looked back at Johnny and laughed nervously.

“Yeah, my kids found out a few weeks ago and they’ve been hellbent on figuring out who it is ever since. It gets them to do their work though so they can play 20 questions with me at the end of class so I can’t complain. Too much,” Peter added with a shrug. “If they have to play detective a little bit to figure it out, at least they’re learning.”

They both stood there for a second before Johnny started grinning.

“I have an idea. Gotta go, babe, I’ll see you at home later.” Johnny squeezed Peter’s arm and practically ran back down the hall, leaving a stunned chemistry teacher to return back to class just to be berated with more questions. At least they’re getting their work done, he reminded himself.

–

“Hey Johnny? Can you come here for a second?” Peter and Johnny were in their apartment later that week, Peter grading tests (all of them doing excellent work) and Johnny in the kitchen cooking dinner and trying to figure out how he could teach Booster’s crockpot mac and cheese to his students.

“I’m a little busy right now, what d’ya need, Pete?” He waited for a response and when he didn’t get one, he poked his head out of the kitchen to see Peter sitting on the couch, his work all but forgotten as he stared at his phone.

“All these random people just started following my photography account on instagram,” Peter said, scowling down at his phone. The spam started during the school day and hadn’t stopped. More followers is good for his photography at least.

“Ah, I’m sure it’s fine. You’re getting the attention you deserve, babe, I wouldn’t worry about it.” Once Johnny heard his husband’s hum of agreement, he got back to working on the recipe for his lesson with a little smile on his face.

–

It had been a few days since the instagram following wave had hit and Peter was still a little baffled by it. Especially since he could hear the voices of his kids outside the hall, not coming inside the classroom, which is weird by itself, but what they were talking about caught him off guard too.

“Look at this one, there’s a shadow walking right next to him, it has to be the person.”

“David, we live in New York, it easily could just be someone walking next to Mr. Parker on the sidewalk.”

Peter knew exactly what they were talking about, it was one of his more recent posts, a picture he took while him and Johnny walked to brunch a few weeks ago after lots of test grading the night before. Why are they looking at my instagram? How did they even find it? He made a note to himself to go talk to Johnny in his planning period. He poked his head outside when the 7:55 bell went off and all the students quickly hid their phones before walking inside and oh-so-subtly changing the conversation topics to the high school baseball game the night before.

After two hours, Peter finally had his planning period to prep for photography fourth period. A quick little visit to Johnny’s classroom shouldn’t slow him down too much, he justified as he shut his door behind him and started down the hall. He looked in Mr. Allen’s room next door and saw Hal leaned against his desk gesturing wildly with his hands explaining some airplane physics to Barry, who was watching with heart eyes. Maybe they’ll figure that out one day, Peter thought to himself as he sped towards his husband’s room.

As soon as he opened the door, Johnny looked up from helping someone with a project and smiled softly. Peter hadn’t been in his room for a few weeks and he looked around before his eyes latched onto something written up on the whiteboard at the front of the room.

Follow @PParkerPics and tell me your favorite picture for a piece of candy, it said up in huge letters. Johnny followed Peter’s eyes to the board and turned bright red as he turned back to see Peter with his arms crossed and an eyebrow raised.

“What? Come on, your pictures are fantastic! It’s not doing any harm, it’s not like you post anything too personal or revealing or anything!” Johnny crept up closer to Peter until both of them were grinning and started laughing.

“I came down here to ask why my kids were talking about my account and now I guess I have my answer,” Peter said as he started heading for the door still facing Johnny. “I’ll see you at lunch, I have to finish prepping for photography.” With that he turned on his heel and started back on his way to the science hall. He had an idea that his students would love.

–

He let the detective work continue for a few more days before he brought it to the students’ attention that he knew what was going on. It was a simple picture, just a whole bunch of colored instructional papers spread across the coffee table leftover from handouts in class. He didn’t even show Johnny the picture before he posted it, he looked busy enough hunched over the desk grading some papers. The caption was simple enough too, any outsider wouldn’t think anything of it.

Get to it, detectives.

After he posted the picture, he heard Johnny’s phone ping as he got the notification and slid open instagram. Peter heard his husband let a little giggle out as he looked at it.

“Nice one, Pete. I’ll be ready for the crowd of hyped up high schoolers tomorrow.”

Peter checked his phone again a few hours later and saw 23 new comments on the picture.

HighballJordan: proud of u both for making it public

TheTimDrakeWayne: congrats to you guys, good luck once they figure it out

There were a few other comments like that from their coworkers but there was also a thread from what he assumed were students. He clicked on it and laughed, leaning over to the other side of the couch to show Johnny.

JessieLA: guys there has to be something in here that gives it away

David467: he wouldn’t have left the caption unless he KNOWS

AnimalAmy23: guys guys GUYS LOOK AT THE CORNER OF THE PICTURE.

JessieLA: oh my GOD there’s only one teacher that wears flame socks everyday

The rest of the thread was various kids that him and Johnny had in their classes screaming about finally knowing who it was and surprised reactions from students that genuinely thought the two of them hated each other this whole time. Peter laughed again as he put his phone down and cuddled up to Johnny to finish the movie they’d started a while ago.

“You know it’s gonna be a shit show tomorrow right? Your kids are gonna hate you,” Johnny said quietly with a light tone.

“Yep. They earned it though with all the hard work they’ve been putting in trying to get done early to question it out of me. Perfect scores all around on the test I just finished grading.” Peter looked over to the stack of tests that he would bring back to the students tomorrow and grinned as he breathed one more sigh of relief now that it was finally out there.

–

The next day, Johnny went in early to leave a pie with “Happy anniversary babe” written across the top of it in the chemistry room. It’s not even close to our anniversary and you know it, Storm, he can here Peter saying in his head. His name wouldn’t be Johnny Storm though if he didn’t love starting a storm of gossip though.

The students are gonna love it, he thought as he started to leave. Johnny was in the doorway as Peter walked in and he gave his husband a little peck on the cheek before dashing out of there to his own classroom to avoid having something thrown at him for the pie.

#i havent written in so long #forgive me please #and this is part of something bigger #I just wanted to establish the spideytorch #and hint at halbarry first #spideytorch #johnny storm #spiderman #mine #teacher au

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paganinpurple · 7 years

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MariChat May - It Was You - Day 3: Homework

But Me A Coffee?

Hello, yes I’m still doing these but I only have 10 left to complete so I’m getting there slowly but surely. This is on AO3 and FF under It Was You

It Was You

<<Chapter 1 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16

Chemistry

Chat slunk in through her skylight stealthily, dropping down to her bed without even a creak. He prowled across the bed to the railing which lined her bed and peered over at his prey.

Marinette was sitting at her desk with her tablet and a textbook open in front of her. From the looks of things she was working on an assignment and based on the way her face was scrunched up in concentration, she was having a hard time making progress.

He grinned widely and leapt down suddenly to stand beside her, failing to suppress a snicker when she shrieked and fell out of her chair at his unexpected appearance. She climbed to her knees and leaned over the seat of her computer chair, pouting at him in annoyance.

“Bonsoir,” he said, leaning over to look at her as she continued to glare and letting his eyelids drop halfway, “How is my Princess on this fine evening?”

“Chat Noir,” she snapped as she got to her feet, “why did you have to frighten me like that?”

“Well,” he replied, moving around behind her swiftly to rest his chin on her shoulder, arms entwining around her waist and dropping his voice to a low rumble next to her ear, “from the way you squeaked, you can't blame me for mistaking you for a mouse and stalking you a little.”

“That would sound so creepy coming from someone without a cat themed outfit,” she snorted back, although Chat couldn't help but notice she shivered a little as his breath ghosted over the shell of her ear.

He tightened his arms around her waist and started placing little teasing kisses against the hollow beneath her ear. She squirmed and he smirked as he grazed his teeth against her skin. To his surprise she reacted in the way he least expected as she unclasped his arms from around her, spinning out of his hold to sit at her desk again. He stood with his arms still held out in front of him and blinked in disbelief at her quick exit.

“Not now Kitty,” she said, “I have to finish this or Mme Durand will chew me out in front of everyone again.” Her voice sounded strained and she chewed her lip absent-mindedly after she had finished speaking.

Chat's ears drooped a little as he remembered Marinette's entrance to Chemistry class yesterday morning. She had completely missed home room and had arrived ten minutes late to the first class of the day, which was unfortunate since it was the strictest teacher's subject. She hadn't even given Marinette a chance to explain herself before going on a tirade about lab safety and how running into a lesson in progress could be catastrophic had there been dangerous substances in use. There hadn't been. She'd been demonstrating the chemical structure of a compound on the board at the time.

After lecturing the poor girl for another ten minutes, during which Chloé had begun to laugh behind her hand, their teacher had told her to complete an additional exercise from their textbook as well as the rest of the homework she was assigning and to have it completed by the next lesson. Which was tomorrow. And Marinette wasn't particularly good at chemistry to begin with.

He glanced at her. No wonder she looked so stressed out; she must be having difficulty with the work.

He jumped up to sit on the desk beside her for a moment before he remembered that Sabine didn't like that, and settled himself into the chair next to her instead. He leaned over her textbook and glanced down at her progress on the tablet.

“Want a hand?” he asked her, placing an elbow on the desk and propping his head up with his hand.

“Depends,” she said, turning to look at him, smirking, “Are you any good at this?”

He grinned back at her sly smirk, enjoying her teasing. “One of my best subjects,” he told her honestly.

“Hmm, so my Pretty Kitty is good at school huh?”

“Only at logical stuff. Maths, sciences, languages...I suck at anything creative,” he admitted, shrugging his shoulders.

“I dunno,” she said, her smirk transforming into something much more enticing, “You were plenty creative last night.”

He gulped in the moment it took him to collect the shreds of sanity that tried to fly away from him; he could see her eyes drawn to the movement and she stared at his Adam's apple as it bobbed.

As he quickly pulled himself together he adopted an equally seductive look on his face and leaned in close to her face, his lips hovering over hers.

“That's because I'm great at Chemistry,” he purred out and delighted in the way Marinette's breath hitched and her eyes dilated as she looked at him.

Again, she surprised him by suddenly grabbing for her tablet clumsily and moving over to the chaise. There she shook her head exaggeratedly and dropped down to concentrate on the work she was trying to complete.

He scratched behind his head anxiously and scooted his chair over towards her, unable to keep himself from feeling slightly hurt over her brush-off of his advances which he honestly felt she'd instigated. He resolved himself to laying off the flirting until she was done with her homework. He cleared his throat before he started speaking in an attempt to show her he was genuinely being serious.

“In all honesty, do you want help?”

She looked up at him, a tinge of mistrust in her eyes which hurt him further than she probably realised. The look melted away almost instantly though and he hoped she could tell he wasn't trying to be pushy.

“Yeah,” she said, “but no funny business. I really need to get this done before tomorrow.”

“Cat's honour,” he said, raising a hand to give his usual salute as a promise before taking a seat on the chaise next to her and beginning to explain the basics of ionic bonding.

“So?” Marinette asked him from her place next to him, “How did I do?”

He looked over her answers, noting there was one or two which weren't quite right but which showed enough understanding to avoid her failing the question altogether. He didn't want to bring her down by pointing out any failures though, not when she finally seemed more confident in her grasp on the subject after only an hour's study with him.

“Really well!” he told her, “If she finds anything to give you a hard time about on this, I'll be very surprised.”

She grinned widely at him, pleased with herself, and obviously relieved that the work was over and she no longer had anything to worry about. She dropped her head to his shoulder and her thigh brushed against his.

“Merci Pretty Kitty,” she said, “I guess you're pretty brilliant as well.”

He could feel the heat pooling across his cheeks beneath his mask, much more affected by praise when it came from her than when he heard it from photographers and other models, or even when he could overhear his father praising him to investors and the like at parties.

“Merci,” he said back, looking down at her and beginning to turn on the charm, “But the Pretty Princess is still much more creative than I am.” He placed a kiss against her hair.

Chat watched as her face blossomed into a lovely pink shade, her smile remaining in place despite any embarrassment she felt. She turned in place atop the chaise so that she was facing him and unfolded her legs to place one behind him and slung the other across his lap.

“Do you want to practise getting creative then?” she asked seductively. He waggled his eyebrows at her in response before carefully lifting her to sit in his lap fully.

“You bet,” he said before diving in for the first of many kisses.

They became lost in each other for quite some time, and before Chat could quite comprehend how Marinette had negotiated him onto his back to straddle him and lavish his neck with attention, the sound of someone clearing their throat brought him screeching back to reality.

Marinette jerked backwards, rolling away from him before she had a chance to remember that the chaise wasn't wide enough for that and falling to the floor for the second time that night. Chat shot up into a sitting position and looked over, wide-eyed, at the small Chinese woman and her much larger husband who's heads were poking out of their daughter's trapdoor. He grabbed at a nearby cushion and hugged it to his lap.

“We wondered if you kids would like a study break,” Tom asked, a huge grin on his face, “I made tarte tatin for a snack. Although, it looks like you already took a break to de-stress.”

Chat glanced over at Marinette who hadn't moved from her spot on the floor and who was currently attempting to hide her scarlet complexion behind her hands. She was groaning quietly to herself.

Deciding that he'd had enough of feeling embarrassed for all nine of his lives, Chat made the abrupt decision to just own the situation. Maybe Marinette's parents would tease him less if they thought there was nothing to gain from it. He turned back to her parents and smiled at them.

“Tarte tatin sounds awesome Tom,” he said, turning back to Marinette as she dropped her hands at the sound of his voice. He changed his smile to a smirk as she looked at him, “Sound good, my Pretty Princess?”

Marinette glared at him and he snickered along with Sabine's tinkling giggles as they delighted in her annoyance at being found out.

“You owe me five Euros Tom,” Sabine said to her husband, “I told you they'd have to be caught before they owned up to it.”

Buy Me A Coffee?

#pip writes #marichat may 2017 #it was you #day 3 #homework #all 31 prompts out of continuity #for one big fic

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amandafoxy1 · 4 years

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It’s only when you dive deeply into the science of liquid soap making that you realise how interesting and chemistry-rich every little step of that process is. I rarely get time to just meander through a personal project as I’m always caught between feeling guilty about the things I still have on my science work ‘to do’ list or feeling out of time due to the ebb and flow of normal life. Thankfully the Coronaverse has taken a large number of options and choices away from me (while giving me heaps more to deal with – turns out that the one time people do need and listen to chemists is during a pandemic) so spending two days on a liquid soap suddenly became a thing.

I’m sure that most people who will read this will have a basic understanding of soap making. For those who don’t and by way of a quick summary here’s the science.

Saponification: Turning oil into soap with the help of a chemical called ‘lye’ (short for alkali).

Chemically both vegetable and animal derived oils are triglycerides. Triglycerides are a combination of one part glycerin and 3 parts fatty acids. The lye (Sodium Hydroxide mostly for soap bars and Potassium Hydroxide for liquid soaps) can be made into a very high pH solution and added to the oils upon which they start to react chemically to take on a new set of chemistry.

During saponification the triglycerides (which are also known as triesters due to their structure) are broken open by the addition of the lye which cuts through the glycerin/ fatty acid bonds to liberate (free) the fatty acids and glycerin from each other. The fatty acids quickly combine with the positively charged metal oil from the lye to form what we call a ‘salt’ only these salts are not like the salt you put onto your chips, these salts are bubbly and surface-active and are better known as soaps. These soaps are anionic (-ve charged).

Meanwhile the glycerin is now left sitting pretty, intact and free. In this form it is highly water soluble, moisturising and heavy (heavier than water). It’s worth noting that glycerin is a type of alcohol and is sometimes referred to as Glycerol or spelled Glycerine. All three are one in the same and are brought to you by saponification.

So when making liquid soap we use Potassium Hydroxide as that produces a softer soap. Lots of people know that and would repeat that phrase without really thinking any more about it but I can’t help but ask more questions:

Potassium soap is softer than what though?

By how much is it softer and how do we measure that?

Why is this soap softer anyway?

The answers are quite interesting (to me, at least).

I found a paper that gave the Krafft points of different salts of fatty acids. This was the best paper I could find to answer my question with regards to potassium soap being softer than what?

If I look at the data given for potassium vs sodium soaps, the two most common and most familiar to soap-makers I find that the Krafft Points of Potassium Soaps are much lower than the sodium:

Here’s the data showing the resting (non-changed) Krafft Points of some common soaps:

Potassium Laurate. 10C

Sodium Laurate 25C

Potassium Myristate. 25C

Sodium Myristate 45C

Potassium Palmitate 45C

Sodium Palmitate 60C

Potassium Stearate 55C

Sodium Stearate 70C

Great, but what’s that got to do with liquid soap making, you may ask.

Krafft Point (and it was someones name so don’t spell it Kraft).

Krafft Point is a feature of ionic surfactants. It is the point (temperature) at which the surfactant becomes useful i.e: where its solubility is such that the surfactant can start forming micelles and display surfactant-like behaviour. Another term for this point is its Critical Micelle Concentration (CMC).

Now that may not sound too interesting at this point but it is interesting if you’ve ever made liquid soap and wondered what on Gods name it’s thinking when it just won’t mix into water after you try to dilute it after making it.

What’s happening there has a lot to do with the soaps Krafft Point and while it seems very simple based on what I’ve just said above (that the Krafft point is a simple temperature related thing) it gets more interesting when you consider how a soaps Krafft Point can be altered!

Altering a Krafft Point.

Regular salts such as Sodium Chloride, Potassium Chloride and others affect the Krafft Point, depressing it (making it lower) up to a point, above which the surfactant may ‘salt-out’ (a term for when the environment is too salty for the soap and it responds by losing its shit). Now lowering the Krafft Point is a good thing as it means the soap will be fully soluble at a lower temperature rather than having to be heated. We want our cosmetic products to be fully functional and in their best shape between the temperatures of around 5 – 45C and while that’s not always strictly possible, it’s something to aim for. Understanding that for liquid soap, you can stack the odds in your favour by understanding the Krafft point is powerful stuff.

Glycerin and other alcohols (including sorbitol, propane-diol, hexylene glycol, ethanol etc) improve soap solubility in water, thus reducing its Krafft Point. I instinctively thought of adding more glycerin to my liquid soap in an attempt to increase its solubility because I did notice that my soap batter seemed to be far too attracted to its self to bother with trying to break the waters hydrogen bonds and make a little hole for its self to sit in. I felt that the glycerin could ‘soften’ the hold the soap had on its self somewhat and in doing so, create an opportunity for a new relationship to form (between the water and the soap). It turns out that glycerin interferes with the bonding between the soap molecules thus opening up a gap for water to get in. When concentrated the tails of the soaps form bonds between them (Van der Waals) which require some energy to break. The glycerin improves the changes of bonding happening between the water and soap rather than just within the water and within the soap. However, it turned out that just adding more glycerin was only half of the equation, the whole mixture needed to be re-heated for the real solubility magic to happen. Glycerin + Heat + more mixing = beautifully solubilised liquid soap.

Upon reading further, the requirement for an extra dose of heat wasn’t surprising as I was right, the energy needed to break the soap-soap and water-water bonds was high enough to make the situation difficult, adding that extra boost of some heat energy lubricated the process enough to make forming soap-water bonds much easier and more attractive.

NOTE ON EXTRA GLYCERIN (or other alcohols for that matter).

Now there has been some talk of adding glycerin to the lye prior to saponification, apparently it’s quite a well known method to speed things up. Basically people dissolve the Potassium Hydroxide in Glycerin on a stove top (the lye is not very soluble in the glycerin) and then add that to the oils. I can see that this works by concentrating the potassium hydroxide and speeding up its attack and if people can handle that, fine. However, it does look quite a bit more dangerous than adding the hydroxide to water and then adding the glycerin to boost solubility later on.

Some people seem worried that the extra glycerin may be reacting with the lye to produce other chemicals, sometimes toxic things. It is highly unlikely that any further reactions than basic saponification go on during this process, even if a microwave is used to get the liquid soap dilution part finished quickly. The polymerisation of glycerin into Polyglyceryl esters is possible with just heat, lye and glycerin but it takes 8-14 hours and is typically done at temperatures of around 300C and / or pressures around 60 times greater than we find on earth. Half the problem with the information on the internet is that there’s a glimmer of truth in it but that someone reading a science paper has mis-understood it or taken a theoretical risk and turned it into a certain threat. Basically you can add glycerin at any stage you like and be fine, I guess it’s up to you but I feel adding it after is safer and easier to control.

Other ways of influencing Krafft Point.

Temperature affects the Krafft Point as mentioned above, for ionic soaps it is normal for the soap to become more soluble in high temperatures and less so in the cold – this is why some people’s Castile soap goes cloudy in the winter. You can see from the above examples with different fatty soaps, the temperature at which these things become soluble can vary and in some cases be far too high without intervention to make a practical product. The soap I made contained around 16% Potassium Palmitate/ Stearate both of which are not that soluble in water under normal conditions. So I HAD to play with the Krafft Point to stand a chance of getting my Coconut soap clear and lovely under normal conditions! It’s that simple.

Concentration of the soap affects the Krafft Point – a soap has to be present at its Critical Micelle Concentration to reach this point, below that it may exist as monomers only, rather than micelles. Now this isn’t usually a problem in soap making as you are creating a concentrate but it is worthwhile knowing and there’s definitely problems at the other end of the scale too when your liquid soap dilute is made too strong – you’ll end up with floaty bits of a surface hard layer if you exceed the holding capacity of your water. Remember that the soap is forming micelles and there’s only so much space for them to sit and spread out in, after which point they start to become attracted to the ‘other’ surfaces such as the interface between the air and the top of the product. If that happens, dilute your soap.

pH affects the Krafft Point too. Solubility is always affected by everything (it’s an applied, rather than absolute measure) and pH is an important factor of that. Different oils saponify into different fatty soaps, usually with carbon chains ranging from C12 – C18 but sometimes outside of that on either end. These individual fatty soaps each have their own solubility parameters and pH ‘sweet spots’. What changing the pH does is change the degree to which the head (or functional group) of the soap is activated (protonated or deprotonated). If the pH gets too extreme the soap can lose their heads altogether but within the soaps sensible mid-range, this property of soap can help you reach an optimal degree of solubility.

But there are multiple fatty soaps in a vegetable soap, which pH do I aim for?

With a blend such as that which we find in liquid soap, there’s usually a ‘majority rules’ pH point where the soaps all sit happily in the mixture. As this does depend on your particular soap recipe it can vary between makers but the solubility sweet spot is typically between pH 9-11. One thing I found with my particular recipe is that it settled at a pH of 9 when first made but reached its peak balance point between solubility and mild feeling when adjusted up to pH 10. Keeping this in mind, it’s pertinent for liquid soapers to keep that pH meter handy at all times as everything you do to your soap during dilution could affect its pH. You can try and calculate this by looking at your particular oil formula and calculating what your dominant (or most abundant) fatty soap chemistry is then tracing back its happy place pH. Otherwise just observe the clarity of your soap as you gently raise and lower the pH. Same, Same.

So with that I’ll sign off…

While soap has been widely studied and saponification has been a reaction that humans have undertaken throughout history, it’s still surprisingly hard to piece together the science that helps us answer the ‘why’s’. I guess that’s part of what keeps it relevant and interesting as both a hobby and a job. It always excites me to dive into something that seems ‘known’ only to find that we really know next to nothing at all. Keeps life interesting.

I hope you are well and if, like me, you’ve not been (I got a dose of flu, it really sucked and my lungs are still a bit dodgy, probably not helped by that long summer of bush fire smoke but hey ho, if I’m here for a good time and not a long time so be it) just do your best to enjoy it.

Amanda x

PS: Along my reading travels I found this paper on bush fire retardant foam. Apparently that’s now a potassium soap base due to its high environmental tolerance. Lots of pink foamy stuff was dropped onto the places around us this summer so it’s good to know that I can whip up a few tonnes of this and keep us safe.

Some Liquid Soap Chemistry It's only when you dive deeply into the science of liquid soap making that you realise how interesting and chemistry-rich every little step of that process is.

#beauty #bubbles #chemistry #chemistry teaching #clean skin #cleaning #Cosmetic Science #creating skincare #laboratory work #liquid soap #natural cosmetics #saponification #science #soap making #surfactants

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