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hypocriticaltypwriter · 19 days

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More questions upon ye!!!

So is this bride in the au! Is that supposed to be Crysta/Cheri or someone else?

Did Michael go out and find a random bride, or did the boys pick her specifically?

Are the four of them fighting for her affection or are they trying to split the love equally with her?

Question in relation to the Billy Idol song: it has plenty of references to virginity loss and pregnancy out of wedlock. In this au do the boys plan on consummating the marriage~? And back on the question I had before about them fighting over her, are they also fighting over who gives her a baby first?

Does she even love the boys at all (maybe got some Stockholm Syndrome) or is she doomed to be trapped and unhappy forever?

Thank you 💜

SQUEEEEE IM SO SORRY IT TOOK ME THIS LONG TO GET TO YOUR ASK LAV!! Thank you so so so much for the questions! I loved spending my freetime this past week thinking of some good answers! As well as developing the AU a little more, so thank you truly! 🫶🏻🫶🏻

The bride is Chrysta, yes! Though, the AU itself is for my own self indulgence in my weird addiction for strange dramatic vampire ideas/dreams, but I want the AU to be for everyone! So honestly, anyone can imagine the bride to be whoever they want! An X reader, insert, OC, go ahead and imagine your own story and take on the boys I don't mind!

Did Michael just find a rando for the boys, or did they choose her specifically? Well... Yes AND no. Like in just the Lost Boys in general with Chrysta, she helped out with Grandpa Emerson or stopped by with some meals her aunt made, so she knew Mister Emerson well. In the AU, the only difference is that she knows all of the Emersons well and visits to bring by some flowers for the Church's garden!

She had become an offer after one late night when her curiosity about the holy grounds got the best of her late one night and she went exploring, finding some rather pretty flowers and picking some to possibly take home or give to the Emersons, when she found the almost hauntingly beautiful red and white roses she'd ever seen climbing up a wall and gate she just had to steal a few! But as she went to take some, a noise startled her, and her finger caught a nasty thorn, leaving a good injury that stained the thorn and petals in her blood. The sound was Michael, who quickly told her to get away from there and hurry back home before she got into any more trouble.

So, the boys hadn't exactly seen or found her, but it was her blood they were immediately drawn to like moths to a flame. And it didn't take long for Michael to know exactly who they were demanding for either as he had a recollection of that night he caught a very curious and blissfully unaware Chrysta getting a little too close to the vampires domain...

The boys try and do their best to share their love for their new coven member! But sometimes they get a bit over protective and territorial. Especially Marko and Paul, they aren't big fans of sharing when they don't feel like it..

Ah, yes... Their was supposed to be a little Honeymooning lovin after they had got their hands on her... But consummation to a bride who's pretty much horrified of you and your very being isn't exactly easy - and they weren't going to force her or harm her, of course not! They wanted their new pet to like them. They needed their pretty little creature to fall for them as hard as they did for her.

And baby bats in the future are still in consideration... There would probably be a fight for who gets a baby first, but without a doubt it'd be David. He always has the first say when it comes to the vampires.

And FINALLY... Does she fall for the boys? Im... Still figuring this out- CAUSE ON ONE HAND SOME SORT OF BEAUTY AND THE BEAST ESQUE LOVE STORY HAS ME IN A CHOKE HOLD DONT GET ME WRONG...

But I'm just... There's something about a tragic doomed ending that just has me even more by the throat - something like Phantom Of The Opera or even Labyrinth that has this... Creature in desperate need of love but the way they try to achieve it through cruelty and harming others just to keep the very thing they want like a treasure to own rather than a person is something I can't help but love. It's so wrong but oh my GOD the way is written or seen on the big screen feels so right. 😭

It's just a guilty pleasure. I'd REALLY love to touch on it more with this AU.. 👀

#cherry rambles #🦇🤍White Wedding AU🤍🦇#fruitbats🦇🍒#the lost boys 1987 #the lost boys #tlb #tlb 1987 #the lost boys x reader #selfship #self ship community #self ship #fictional other

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introvert-dragon · 7 years

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Hiccupy heart (Chapter 3)

Summary: It didn’t matter that Hiccup and Astrid used to be best friends, somewhere in grade school or middle school, back when life used to be fun, with him having plus one leg and one mother, before everyone hit their growth spurt. Until Hiccup finally got his soul mark; And guess who’s name was it? Astrid Hofferson. Soul mate AU.

Previous Chapter | FF.net | Ao3

A/N: An Update in a week!? I did it!

It’s all thanks to your awesome support guys. Keep em’ coming! Even though I got only 1/3rd views compared to the first chapter - you guys are still awesome.

Without further ado,

(No beta for this chapter, watch out for errors.)

It took him all weekend, but Hiccup finally had a plan in mind. A very simple and effective plan; Avoid Astrid Hofferson, in any form or kind (thoughts included), like a plague and eventually move on with the whole Astrid being his soul mate thing, that was it.

In theory, what could possibly go wrong? The less he saw her in his life, the fewer ideas would be getting on his head, that would likely end up with him embarking on another quest for Astrid Hofferson and Highschool Royalty.

With great effort, he managed to do just as he planned. Until Hiccup randomly craved for the cafeteria's infamous 'The Goethi's Soggy Fries' with special yak buttermilk dipping. So Hiccup decided to make a quick stop to the cafeteria before he headed home.

There shouldn't be a problem with that. From what he knew, there was still at least half an hour before Tennis Practice ended.

As soon as he arrived in the cafeteria though, there goes his plan. Astrid Hofferson was there sitting on her boyfriend's lap for all of the cafeteria to see.

That shouldn't be a problem for Hiccup, He simply needed to turn his head around and look the other way. But goddammit! His boyfriend seriously needed some lesson in public display of affection.

Hiccup could clearly see the annoyance showing in her perfect beaut... Astrid's face. He really needed to get a grip. He almost let himself worship her face, and oh my! Look at her freckles they're so– Gah! –and there goes his resolve.

Hiccup reminded himself that She always knew.

Something flared up inside him, the tip of his finger tingling unbearably, his fingers clawing on his palm. He wasn't sure if it was anger or jealousy.

It should have been him.

Astrid must have been feeling so good for herself, having a boyfriend who was a living embodiment of Jon Snow, only with a tattoo on his chin, but a little bit on the brainless side(which he was sure made things easier for her), who, was not a hiccup like him, who was supposedly her soul mate—Soul mate she didn't want. He was Eret son of fucking Eret. Hiccup could tell that Astrid probably... not probably— she definitely wished that the name on her wrist would have been Eret's not him.

Hiccup wondered if Astrid had started dating Eret before or after she got her soul mark. He wished it was the former; not that it mattered.

Hiccup watched as Eret's lips tried to go for Astrid's neck once again, but Astrid just elbowed the muscle-head hard on his ribs. Gods, Eret couldn't get a fucking clue.

Hiccup would have treated Astrid better, but he knew that Astrid was not someone who wanted to be taken care of. She was Astrid Hofferson. She always made clear that she was perfectly capable of herself, and she certainly proved that. In fact, she got hundreds of broken nose, and bones to attest that.

His breathing felt heavier as he felt something burning red in his chest. He didn't realize how hard his eyes were trained on the couple until his eyes met Astrid's for a split second. She diverted her gaze but Hiccup continued to glare as their eyes met again.

This time, Hiccup's resentment wasn't directed to her boyfriend. It was all on the owner of the name written on his left forearm, his 'so-called' soul mate.

Astrid flinched, she tried to hide it but he noticed and for a moment her eyes showed hints of mortification; He was probably imagining things.

Hiccup closed his eyes, breaking the gaze and breathed a long-drawn sigh to calm his drumming heart. He opened his eyes to meet hers again and suddenly felt his left forearm throbbed sharply, causing him to drop the extra large bucket of fries from his trembling hands.

Hiccup ran away with no particular destination in mind. He just needed to leave, anywhere away from Astrid. He just couldn't stand the sight of her ... It was too painful.

Unfortunately, being a one-legged man, he could only run so much and wasn't supposed to run like that in the first place. Pain, soreness, and cramp overcame his left leg—he needed to sit down, and check on it.

Then Astrid was there, standing near him, watching him with her eyes wide, filled with terror. Hiccup almost cowered at her gaze and wished to vanish without a trace from the universe.

No—He wasn't going to be defined by his stupid attraction to his soul mate anymore.

Hiccup took a deep breath and met Astrid's gaze with as much as courage he could muster. Without breaking the gaze, He stood up straight despite his left leg's protest, squared his shoulders, tucked his chin, and walked away with as much as dignity a one-legged man could.

But it was all an act, his refusal to appear weak in front of his soul mate. As soon as he got home, Hiccup didn't even bother changing his clothes as he went straight to his bed, burying himself in layers of pillows and blanket.

Hiccup found himself screaming in his bedroom, self-destructing for all he cared.

After he was done with his self-destruct sequence. Hiccup felt numb and tired in many ways, that he could do no more than stare at the ceiling of his room, while he contemplated his life.

Hiccup had tendencies to tunnel vision, not that he was a narrow-minded minded person. He was just 'too stubborn for his own good' quoting his father and Gobber. And that specific trait probably got him most of his trouble.

Unlike his father, who loved to remind him that 'When I was a boy... I knew what I was, what I had to become –blah blah blah and rest of the story–' and Oh boy... If Hiccup ever had to hear that story again, he might very well bang his head against the rock, probably and get a skull-crushing headache – but it would be totally worth it if he never had to hear that lecture from his father again.

He was rambling, again, even in his own mind. The point was when Hiccup set his mind on something; an objective, a crazy invention, or a very impossible teenage crush turned into first love. He won't stop at anything to achieve it, but... well, only most of it ended up in failure or trouble.

And for once in his life, Hiccup actually got something right. Astrid Hofferson was indeed his soul mate. It was not just his daydreams or fantasy anymore. It was a fact, with physical evidence etched in his own skin.

But this time, he knew when to stop. In most cases, the reason Hiccup could never stop was all because of his curious mind, and the teenage part of him wanting to prove something.

She always knew.

If Astrid always knew that he was her soul mate. And was very clear that she didn't want him to be her soul mate.

What was there to prove for him? So what now?

The wound was still fresh for him, and the 'Pull' was still there, only that he never felt the 'Pull' this powerful, only in a bad way. If before when he would as much as breathe the same air as Astrid – He would feel like oxygen was overrated. But now that he got his soul mark, it was as if his attraction for Astrid was now oxygen itself. And oxygen was no longer overrated. He was like a moth attracted to a beacon of flame even if he knew that it would burn him.

That was why he needed a plan to avoid Astrid, in any form and kind. Even if he could still manage to walk away from his soul mate every time, he could act dignified and strong in the presence of his soul mate his whole life. But–

But in the end...

Hiccup, with all of his heart, still loved Astrid Hofferson.

The whole realization was painful. It was impossible for him to get over all his feelings for his soul mate over a weekend. Not especially when his feeling, had a very strong legitimate root – thirteen years of friendship, followed by a whole high school of worship.

It was impossible. Hiccup would never get over her.

Hiccup needed to do something, anything at all. He needed to be somebody, someone – For himself. This time it was about his life and his alone.

He tried to visualize a much better version of him. Where Hiccup didn't had the need to prove himself, to his father, his soul mate... or even himself. Where he would have Thor's mighty hammer for his arm instead of his noodle arms, both of his legs, and maybe he could play a ball game, and people would accept him.

Wouldn't that be something, Hiccup thought.

Hiccup sighed, getting tired of staring at the ceiling. He let his head drop to his right, his eyes landing on his favorite flying dragon-rider poster.

The one with a one-legged hero flying with his one-tail-finned black dragon.

Flying...

Fly...

Fly. If only he could fly away from berk, leave the archipelago. And in that way, he was sure to avoid Astrid Hofferson that way.

An idea struck to his mind...

Maybe Hiccup could actually do that...

Didn't his father always wanted him to enroll in a 'Real Program Degree' in an 'Actual University'?

He could do just that by studying abroad, where the top universities in the world were. And maybe, for once in his lifetime, his father would be proud of him... His boy enrolling in an Ivy League, Harvard, Yale... or wherever he wanted—with his academic performance it shouldn't even be an issue. Maybe he could get himself a scholarship in one of those universities, though money wasn't a problem for him. It wasn't like Hiccup will be missed either – he highly doubted that. His father barely came home every week.

This new plan of his was perfect—it would definitely work.

Unfortunately, this plan also involved him giving up on his own plans for college. And there goes one of his dreams. The said that dream involved going to the same college as Astrid Hofferson, he figured that his dreams were nothing less a fantasy.

It was a just stupid pinky promise from childhood. It was not like she remembered any of it.

"It was stupid," Hiccup muttered to himself.

"Yes, so stupid," Hiccup repeated as if he was trying to convince himself otherwise.

Besides, it was not like he had a choice – the only way his father would agree on this plan was Hiccup had to take a law degree.

But If it meant getting away from all these, where he could start fresh and try to be a better version of him. It was a compromise he was willing to take.

Million ideas started flowing in his mind on how this plan would just work out for him.

Four to Eight years in law school, give or take – even longer if he decided to take law for post-grad. That was a lot of time for himself – to discover himself.

He could get a dog.

He could travel.

He could meet new people who didn't know him as a Hiccup.

He could start fresh, and there was more to life than just his soul mate.

But none of them would be like being with Astrid Hofferson.

Hiccup shook his head, brushing off the thoughts before it festered his mind.

Hiccup let out a long-drawn sigh, sitting up straight, shrugging layer of blanket off him. At least his mood felt brighter with the notion of the freedom he could have soon.

With nothing more to do, Hiccup plopped back down to the bed, scrambled his pockets for his cellphone and fiddled with it for a while, until he started yawning and eventually dozed off.

The next time Hiccup opened his eyes – he was still dreaming.

After all, There was no way Astrid was in his room, sitting on his bed, watching him sleep. To prove his point, Hiccup reached out a hand to hold the said image of Astrid. And just about Hiccup was about to touch her, Astrid reached out for his hand and held on to it tightly.

The sensation of her hands and the feel of their soul marks resonating... It all felt too real... He didn't want it to end–

–Ding! Dong!

The loud doorbell woke him up, the whole vision in his dreams vanishing into smoke, as he jolted up straight, feeling shivery, goosebumps all over his skin, and cold sweat covering his body. Hiccup shook his head, to clear his foggy head, and calm his breathing.

It was just a dream... Astrid hadn't visited him for over four years, not even when he had an accident – She had no better reason to do so now. And yet, Hiccup couldn't help but feel a sinking feeling in his chest.

Ding! Dong! The doorbell rang again.

Hiccup groaned, he didn't really want to step out of his room for the day. He was sure it wasn't his father as his father just sent a message that he won't be back until a week. He contemplated to ignore the doorbell, and try to get back to his sweet dreams–

Ding! Dong! Ding! Dong! Ding! Dong!

Hiccup grumbled, swearing under his breath. Seriously, even in his dreams, he couldn't spend be allowed to be with his soul mate. Urk. Hiccup needed to get hold of his mind, It wasn't going to happen and was never going to happen.

She always knew, Hiccup reminded himself as if it was his mantra.

Whoever the visitor was seemed determined to continue with the barrage of doorbells – and for some reason, Hiccup had a bad feeling about this.

Begrudgingly, Hiccup stood up from his bed and stretched his limbs exaggeratedly as if he was trying to delay the time. The doorbells continued and Hiccup decided that stretching any longer wasn't going to help. Hiccup didn't bother getting himself appear presentable and just headed straight downstairs to 'excitedly' welcome the unwelcome visitor.

Hiccup sighed as finally, he arrived in the entrance of the house, stopping right in front of the gigantic two-door. He debated to grab a weapon for self-defense, but it was not like people in Berk were bold enough to cause trouble in Stoick Haddock's mansion. And if ever someone was planning something against the law, like, if ever someone was going to kidnap him for a ransom... They probably got the wrong household – they should know better how majestic his relationship with his father was.

So Hiccup finally unlocked the door, wincing when felt his left forearm pulsed when his left hand made a contact with the cold metal of the doorknob. When he was about to twist the knobs, the door was opened from the other side, and he was found himself drowning at a too familiar pair of ocean eyes, and dazzled by the ever so radiant golden-blonde hair.

There was Astrid Hofferson standing on the other side of the door. And before Hiccup could delve on another theory that he was still dreaming.

"Economics Project," Astrid said simply, and walked past him, welcoming herself into his home.

Gotta love dem’ cliffhangers. :P I told you the story will start picking up… and we finally get the real confrontation/interaction next chapter.

I’m not gonna lie, I’m not confident with this chapter… So it would be great to hear from you guys, feed me with your validations… I need it! the next chapter will be even tougher to write. :D

How was it? Please don’t forget to hit like and/or reblog.

#httyd #hiccstrid #hiccup #astrid #httyd fanfiction #httyd fanfic #my writing

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asksythe · 7 years

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Wait so FTGOG!AU Kagome and Kagami route has an out of wedlock kid? Does any other route or do they all have children born in wedlock? Oh! Scenarios for how each individual baby daddy reacts to his unknown offspring (funny somewhat serious please)? Does Kagome get heat for having a kid outside marriage?

1/ Yep, Kagami route has an out of wedlock kid. We get to see this kid in the epilog of the route when Kagome brings him/her over to meet the daddy.

2/ One other route has the potential for out of wedlock children. The Hasharima route. More specifically, the horrible tragedy permutation of the Hashirama route where Kagome (or rather players choosing her decision) loves beyond rationale and despite knowing that she’s in for a lifetime of pain and loneliness, decides to keeps loving him regardless. In the normal route, Kagome and Hashirama know to stop before too many people get hurt. Their attraction is undeniable, but their being together hurts too many people and even the courses they are walking towards. There is, however, one permutation of Hashirama’s route that can be unlocked with the right quest choices. In that permutation, there are two children from Kagome by Hashirama. I do not recommend this permutation however since it requires some extreme breaking of Kagome’s character. It will require me to execute some pretty extreme scenarios to bring her to the point where she lets her feelings overwhelm her reasoning and past experience at being the side woman to Inuyasha and Kikyo. There’s a reason I call this specific permutation ‘moth to the flame route’.

3/ In Kagami’s route epilog, three years after the end of the great war (against Madara and Kaguya), Kagome visits Konoha again ostensibly to open a new chapter in their diplomatic relations. In truth, however, the trip is so that she can meet Kagami (who she once thought of as a little brother/protege figure up until the moment he confessed that he loved her, and then died for her) and sees if he still feels the same about her.

They meet in Hashirama’s office, with Kagami being summoned without being told who he is meeting fresh from a mission. Kagami, up until then, has been pretty miserable since he believes that he’s nothing more than a fling for the love of his life (which is kinda true in a sense since his feelings for her were pretty one sided until the moment Kagome decided that fudge it, she’d been lonely for so long and she wanted to be loved). He reacts to her presence with… well… how do you react to seeing the love of your life after three years of missing and longing and thinking you were nothing more than a momentary lapse of reasons for her?

Well, anyhow, their interactions from that point start out coy and hesitant, with neither side quite sure of themselves. Eventually, Tobirama suggests that Kagami guides her around the village for a tour (haha! Only sane one Tobirama sees the writings on the wall and this is basically his apology for screwing with / abandoning Kagami in the aftermath of the failed assassination on Kagome). It’s during this walk that they refamiliarize themselves to each other. Eventually, Kagome asks Kagami point blank whether he still feels the same about her. He’s surprised and a little skittish. By this time, she’s the most powerful woman of their world and a monarch and he’s just… a soldier of Konoha and a member of clan Uchiha. By the conventions of that era, he has no business even standing within five feet of her as anything more than a bodyguard or a vassal. Still, he decides that he has nothing to lose, so he answers honestly that yes, he still feels the same.

That’s when she brings out the kid (or rather, her bodyguard brings him to them). Kagami breaks down crying then (a little) because he comprehends what she means to say behind this gesture. Their relationship when viewed by the conventions of this era is incredibly unequal and in bad taste. The man is supposed to provide for and protect the woman, but Kagami has almost nothing for her. More than that, he was the traitor who once sought to kidnap her from her own country. That whole guilt/sinner complex I talked about in the big Kagami post. By their own conventions, he has no chance whatsoever and he knows it. To ask for forgiveness from her is already pushing it, let alone to ask for her love and her hand in marriage. Certainly, affairs between royalty/noble and their ninja guards have happened in the past and there are a handful of instances when the individuals in question were indiscreet enough to let their flings resulted in children, but usually the parentage of such children or even the children themselves were kept secrets out of shame and propriety and also as a warning against the ninja parents who might think to use those children to ask for benefits or influence the politics in those countries. Kagome could have easily done the same thing. Hide the parentage of said child and carry on as if nothing is wrong at all. She is more than powerful enough to do that, and having Kagami be known as the father of her child does nothing but hurt her political position. So, in allowing him to know and allowing him to even see his son in the first place, Kagome is basically declaring that she accepts and cares for him enough to do something deemed very unwise by the majority of nobility and fellow monarchs. It’s a more powerful declaration than words of love at that moment.

And then she goes one step further. She asks if he still wants the same thing he said three years ago. She asks if he still wants to be with her, to see the world, to raise a family, to grow old together. It’s basically Kagami’s best day at this point.

So after a while, they go to the Uchiha clan compound and talks of marriage and clan relations start. It’s not only a new chapter for Kagami but also a new chapter for clan Uchiha. Royal marriages are huge and have far reaching implications. There’s a reason nobility and royalty don’t acknowledge the ninja parentage of their bastard children after all. A Kagami-Kagome marriage means a blood link between the Uchiha clan and the world super power nation Gems. So by marrying Kagami, Kagome basically gives the Uchiha (by then already feeling the pressure from the subtle machination and politicking from Tobirama and other anti-Uchiha factions especially in the aftermath of a world war caused by Madara).

That’s the ‘a new future for the Uchiha’ sub-ending. This sub-ending can only be unlocked via Kagami’s route (the good permutation where he doesn’t just die) and leads to the half of the Uchiha clan migrating to Gems. And oh yeah, this is the only sub-ending with crown prince Shisui (and long-suffering royal bodyguard Itachi who is constantly pestered by a small squad of royal Uchiha children and that infuriating Shisui)!!!!

4/ Yes, Kagome does get heat for having a child out of wedlock especially once the parentage of said child becomes known. But she simply doesn’t care, and by that time, her position is strong enough and her nation wealthy enough for that heat to be irrelevant to her and her work.

#Ask Sythe #From the Garden of Gods

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blauhaher · 7 years

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i’m like 110% sure this is so not what @lestatthewolfkiller had in mind when asking for adam an k and i’m so sorry about that. it was originally supposed to be a drabble (i forgot how long those are supposed to be tbh) about adam and k, an au where adam never stopped to fix gansey’s car and things turned out differently or something like that but it turns out i had to make it about occult gangs and the like. idk honestly. tw for the usuals, violence, murder, dissociation, etc.

adam knows pain like the back of his hand. he doesn’t understand it, its meaning or why it’s directed at him, but he knows everything about it nonetheless. there’re not many things he can say he owns completely, just the uniform he wears, really, simply because that wasn’t included in the admission fees, and not much else. but pain, pain he owns and knows and controls at his will. he can embrace or escape it as he pleases and nobody can do anything about it. not even his father, who seems to control everything else about him and his life.

it’s not like he’s trying on purpose not to fit in, but he has enough things to worry about without adding trying to make friends to the list. between having to make enough money to cover his living expenses and keeping up with his scholarship, human interaction that isn’t strictly necessary to his survival gets promptly pushed at the bottom of his priority list. it doesn’t matter if after an entire year he still can’t tell which boy he vaguely recognises from which class, he only knows that he’s made it to the end of an entire year of consciously ignoring everyone and he’s still alive. he’s fine.

if he finds himself looking at some of the friendly interactions around him with longing, he tells himself it’s just because after handing in his last essay he has suddenly too much time to spare.

he has no problems admitting to himself that he’s the type of person that fits into stereotypes and plays the part they have dictated for him without much fuss. he knows that henry cheng is supposed to be just as carefree and good-natured as he wants others to think he is, and that richard gansey the third is supposed to be the golden boy of aglionby and even has perfectioned the right kind of handshake for it, and he also knows that adam parrish is just as anonymous as his tragic backstory suggests. they only thing that makes it bearable is the fact that his story is supposed to end on a good note. he is supposed to be the hard working white trash emblem that manages to get a place at yale and get the best paying jobs the market has to offer. he is content with not being much of anything, if not brittle bones tied together by a fierce survival instinct if that’s what his role requires in order to get there.

yet, the same principle doesn’t seem to apply to kavinsky and his lot. instead of following the general guidelines of what being the typical obnoxious immigrant rich kids entails, they seem intent on causing more trouble than they are worth. he sees their cars and their chains and their matching tattoos on their necks and thinks that’s going just a little too far. that’s playing their characters just a little too over the top for anybody’s liking.

some of the older students even try to point that out before getting the beating of their lives.

some professor try to tone it down before getting their tires slashed and their pets sliced open.

their principal tries to speak to their parents about it before getting threatened about their conspicuous donations coming to a halt.

there’s nothing to be done but patiently wait for them to graduate or finally end up in juvie. either way, that’s none of adam’s business. all he aims for it’s his piece of paper and that’s all he’s thinking of when he’s at school.

he tries to think only of that at home as well, but his father has other plans for him. it’s nothing that he specifically does or thinks or says, it’s just his existence alone that seems to get on his nerves enough to decide to put his hands on him. he had tried at first, tried to act and think and speak differently, but the end results were always the same.

he stops wasting energy on that pretty soon, though, his mind working on escaping the situation as soon as his father gets the look on his face that he knows will mean a rough night. his mind wanders away from his body at first, a trick he had discovered almost accidentally, just to end up drifting towards an ephemeral world of his own creation. it’s calm there, and clean and spacious. the trees surrounding him caress his cheeks and whisper nonsensical things so soothing he has troubles remembering where he comes from. he knows he has a life he has to return to at some point, but whatever time he can spend in his imaginary forest is his favourite time of the day. he has no responsibilities there, there’s no pain, no struggle, only whatever he wants to be there. only whatever he commands and allows and desires. his role there is to simply enjoy, and coming back to his real body is a self-inflicted violence as harsh as his father’s blows.

it seems like it’s not just pain he can control, then. he’s not sure when he began to be able to come and go as he wills, but now that he’s completely aware of it, he wonders for just how long he had been denying himself something that seems to be his by right. that’s probably what the trees have been whispering to him all this time, right? and he’s in enough agony to accept even something as absurd as that. even something like magic. and why shouldn’t he, after all? he’s desperate enough and the trees know it. and if sometimes he wakes up in places he doesn’t remember wandering to that’s such a small inconvenience compared to the things he gets to walk away from thanks to the forest’s influence that he forbids himself from being a coward about it.

when the white mitsubishi pulls up next to him, he’s strangely not surprised to see it there. he’s even less surprised about the fact that its driver is not alone, other cars stopping around them soon after to form a rudimental sort of circle around him. he’s so not getting away, so he braces himself for what it’s about to come. he doesn’t waste time trying to remember what he might have done to piss any of them off, he knows it’s useless. the pain is coming anyway, that’s what his father has taught him.

except, when the window gets rolled down, there’s no sneer on kavinsky’s face. his sunglasses firmly in place, he just seems to be looking at him in a contemplative sort of way, as if wondering exactly why he himself had decided to stop upon spotting him walking alongside the highway’s guardrail.

the door on the passenger’s side unlocks with a metallic sound, and the further he tries to search for answer in the reflection he sees on the lenses of the other’s sunglasses, the more he comes up empty. the inside of the car is way too dark for a july afternoon, another fact to add to the list of things that should make him want to run away, yet, he can’t prevent his right hand from reaching for the door’s handle. that’s when kavinsky finally cracks a smile, all teeth and hunger.

he has never seen a demon smile before but he’s pretty sure he should be feeling way more scared about it than he does right then.

—

the rest of the boys seem to be made of the same deceiving, double-edged material kavinsky is. despite not having the same kind of power as their leader, they take and demand and drain everything they touch, leaving a wasteland behind them. the words and numbers tattooed in white ink on their neck only contribute to making people avoid them even more. the locals know better than to oppose whatever transcendental force is aiding them. they are already used to having an entire house of clairvoyants to carefully avoid, adding a bunch of teenagers to that doesn’t really make much of a difference to them.

adam traces slowly the number XV on kavinsky’s neck and the letters below it. the raised lines that form the words the devil almost feel surreal under his fingertips and he has the sudden urge to press his nails down just to check.

the other must feel the slightest change in pressure even though he’s fast asleep, but he only stirs enough to pull him closer by the fistful of his shirt he has been holding onto since falling asleep the night before. they hadn’t gone anywhere that night, taking the time to actually rest without visiting the forest. there will be time for that. all the time in the world, actually.

adam closes his eyes and lets himself fall further.

instead of feeling disappointed, once he learns exactly the source of kavinsky’s sudden interest in him and just what he’s capable of, he suddenly feels like everything starts making sense. of course something was missing, of course there was some way for the magic to do more than whisper nonsense to him. he had been a phone cord without a handset to connect to this whole time, and now that that he is finally complete he can start properly listening. he can stark speaking. asking, even.

there’s this girl from another school that has a certain aura to her. he sees her sometimes, when she comes to the school’s gates to meet up with richard gansey the third and another of the aglionby’s students he has never talked to in his life. he thinks there might be some sort of connection between them, something he unconsciously recognises and associates to her more than the multicoloured hair clips and the occult symbols hanging from his neck, something that goes beyond the simple fact that the light seems to always play so nicely with her features.

she has a memorable face, the kind that can’t exactly be described as a classical beauty but it’s equally just as ancient. he doesn’t know what his fascination is tied to exactly, he just knows that it’s there and that he’s drawn to her like a moth to a flame.

a hand curls around his forearm before he can take a step into her direction. kavinsky doesn’t let him burn.

there seems to be no limits to what kavinsky can ask for when they are together. one second they are lying side by side on the fur carpet in his bedroom, the tv stuck on a blacked out channel and the lights above them flickering, and the next they are in the forest, and they are running and finding and taking, taking so much, taking as much as their hands will fit, taking everything they can think of producing.

his room starts looking less like a bedroom and more like a storage room. there’s just so much impossible stuff at some point that they are forced to move to another one altogether. not like there’s a shortage of space in such a stereotypical reality tv show mansion, anyway.

he expects to get pressured into doing the same things they do. to ride in their cars and smoke their weed and dress their way but nobody ever says anything about it. he just comes along and watches, not saying or doing anything. he just sits on the mistubishi’s hood and watches, his lashes half lowered to shield himself from the beatings and the robbing and the snorting, his body and mind growing more and more numb.

the dragon tattooed on kavinsky’s back is too realistic for adam to feel comfortable looking at it. it curls and snarls under the coloured lights of the club, and he’s pretty sure that it’s somehow actually moving. he tries to reason with himself that’s just a trick, a combined effect of the lights and of every minute movement of the muscles under it, but as he follows kavinsky to their side of the VIP section he can’t tear his gaze away. the thin white wifebeater the other is wearing is not nearly enough to dull the effect of the vibrant ink and for a moment he wonders if it’ll actually claw its way of his skin and swallow him whole.

he keeps staring nonetheless.

kavinsky is king and whatever he decides turns into law even for those not under his rule. he never lets anyone else get too close to him now. it’s subtle, he has to admit that, but at the same time it becomes as clear as day that adam parrish is suddenly off limits. one of the boys is always waiting for him outside the door of his class once it’s finished to escort him to his next one. his lunch is already on a tray and paid for when he gets to the cafeteria. there’s a phone in the pocket of his jacket the next time he reaches into it, and, as soon as the last bell rings, the sound of the mitsubishi’s speakers is defeating enough that he makes it a point to slide into its passenger seat as soon as possible to avoid further embarrassment.

if his schoolmates look at him in various stage of disbelief, distaste and wonder, kavinsky acts as if it’s nothing. it doesn’t seem to be coming from the goodness of his heart, he doesn’t seem like the type to have any after all, or from the pity that adam’s life often inspires into others. he doesn’t mention the sudden change in treatment once, and adam doesn’t question it. why should he, when he’s finally got something nice for himself after all?

swan is looking beautiful and bored as usual, eyes lazily tracking the rhythmic movements of the bat skov is holding as it smashes against this guy’s ribs. it’s not the first time he’s seen something like this but he thinks he’ll never get used to the sound of bones breaking. he’s cradling his phone carefully between his cupped hands, thumb hovering over the green button that will connect him to 911. that’s what he does, that’s what he tells himself he’ll do if things will take a turn for the worst.

but his soul won’t cooperate and he’s left watching himself watch swan watch someone die and wishing he’d look like he does just once. it’s such a disturbing realisation he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

he knows others may think they’re fucking. he sees them drawing conclusions and filling in the blanks of their private lives with what’s most comforting to them. of course it would make sense for them to be fucking. of course adam is just another piece of trailer trash that will jump at any opportunity to get a taste of the good life. except, there’s no good life to be had and there’s equally no sex behind closed doors.

once he lies on his side on the king sized mattress, kavinsky only curls his fingers into the fabric of his shirt without a word before drifting off. he doesn’t dream and adam doesn’t dare to sleep.

he doesn’t want to make such generic assumptions, but it’s starting to become pretty clear to him that kavinsky is the devil. not in some jokingly, admonishing way, and not in some play-of-words sense that takes his tattoo into consideration either, but more in a literal-evil-energy type of way. he could suppose that, since magic seems to be pretty real, then things like evil forces or demons should also be very much a possibility. he has no other names for the bird-shaped monster that sometimes try to attack them when they’re not careful with their taking, after all.

he tries asking about it one night. all he gets in return, all he ever does when he gets too clever for his own good and asks questions that have an obvious answer to them, is a quirk of kavinsky’s mouth. when he smiles, the artificial lights make the platinum of his bottom grills look even tackier than usual and adam can’t help but roll his eyes at the sight. it just makes the other smile harder, his lips savage and his hands quick as he pulls him against his side so others can’t accidentally bump into him as they cross the dance-floor. he still doesn’t get the appeal of paying to be in a room with low lighting, blaring music and a mass of sweaty bodies just to pay some more to get away from all that but the cushioned seat of their sofa is not something he can complain about.

needles somehow are not that bad when it come to their association with pain. needles usually meant hospitals and sterilised places and feeling better and being taken care of so, even if it’s a completely different needle this time, he doesn’t flinch when it touches the tender skin of his neck. the roman numbers don’t take too long, but it’s when the artist starts filling in the lines of the letters that it actually gets to him. the white ink feels as if it’s melting the skin right off of him, and he has to ask for refuge to the forest in order not to cry.

once it’s over and there’s protective gauze over the skin, he expects to somehow feel different but nothing comes.

he’s probably already where he should have been all along.

the trees finally speak clearly instead of whispering, even if only when kavinsky is next to him, and it’s a thrill to finally recognise that it’s the same language he agonises over during his hours spent doing homework in the library. it’s latin, and his knowledge of it is enough to understand exactly the simple request that’s being made from seemingly every single sentient being in the forest. an exchange. something in return for everything they have taken so far and will continue to take in the future. an offering. a sacrifice.

the word per se doesn’t really scare him. he’s been sacrificing things his whole life, he was born a sacrifice himself when his mother could have decided to take the easy way out and cut off all possible connection to his father by cutting off his life in the process. yet, here he is. he’s here and he’s ready for one more sacrifice. the last one he’ll ever be able to make. it’s what his role entails, after all.

kavinsky is furious. he screams and pushes him away, his hands strangely soft and yielding against his chest even though his words could cut steel. there’s no way he could ever accept this. his father in exchange for freedom and the ability to create copies he could tolerate. losing adam and the possibility to create from zero he could never. it would mean losing everything again, and he has sworn to himself long ago that nobody would ever have the possibility to steal from him ever again. he was the one who took, he was the one in charge, the one running this town and the forces within it. nobody got to choose for him, not even the very source of his power, not even something so old he couldn’t even begin to fully comprehend. there had to be another way. he has to build one, to steal one, to make one.

he trashes his room until it’s too dangerous for anyone to enter it. he curls up between the broken furniture and the shards of glass and only lets adam hold his hand but not touch any other part of his body. he’s on fire from the inside out and he knows he’s going to burn everything to the ground with him.

he can’t tell which one of them comes up with the idea first. for kavinsky, it means nothing, just the reenactment of something he has already experienced once. for adam, it means everything, to turn his whole world and beliefs upside down.

nonetheless, it just builds and builds from little things piling up. from the zip ties in the mitsubishi’s glove compartment to the pack of disposable latex gloves on the back seat to the way kavinsky looks at him and at him only all night. he knows. of course he knows. they have been together long enough that they rarely have to speak anymore.

the forest does all the talking they could ever need.

he traces the lines of his own tattoo by memory. the straight line of the single roman number, the curve of the letters under it. I. the magician. it means power and action and taking matters into his own hands. it means not watching from the sidelines anymore. it means not freezing anymore at the first blow, it means not letting his mind run away, it means not lowering his lashes anymore. it means driving to his father’s house on a wednesday’s night, the only night of the week his mother has her church meeting and won’t be there to witness anything. to suffer uselessly. to look at his son in the eyes and recoil.

it takes almost all of them to carry his father’s unconscious body from the living room to the car parked right outside his house. the tied hands and feet make the process only slightly easier considering they have to move in complete silence since a trailer park doesn’t make for the most discreet neighbourhood, but they eventually manage to get the trunk to close and their asses as far away from there as they can.

the forest hadn’t specified whose blood the sacrifice had to consist of, after all. and they intend on taking advantage of that little misstep fully.

he should feel something, he supposes. pain, to the idea of getting rid of his own father, of the person that had generated him, but he had learned to control that a long time ago. remorse, for taking another’s life when it should have been his own, but he had seen none in kavinsky’s eyes when he had explained exactly why he was so familiar with patricide. hesitance, at least, to do something so out of character for him, to get so far from what his rag-to-riches story was supposed to be, but he’s been wandering so far from that path he has no means of getting back on that track. he doesn’t understand why he’s left in the first place. he doesn’t understand why it took him so long to leave it in the first place.

yet, when he stares into the depth of the forest, so far out he feels his gaze will eventually be able to reach exactly what hides in the heart of it, what exactly feeds on such things as blood sacrifices, he feels nothing but relief and accomplishment and freedom.

kavinsky rests his foot on his father’s body, the hand that curls around the handle of the athame he’s holding relaxed and casual. he’s done this before, after all. he doesn’t envy his casual stance anymore. he sees it mirrored in his own.

if somebody puts their hands on you, you cut them off. isn’t that what he had tried to teach him all this time, after all?

adam takes the knife from kavinsky’s hand and asks for the demon to show itself.

it’s late at night and they have nowhere to go. they’re just speeding on the highway because they can, windows rolled down and the other boys’ cars snarling around them, uncaring of the fact that they’re occupying the opposite direction’s lanes. there’s no one else around at that hour, for the simple fact that everybody knows that those are kavinsky’s streets only.

neither of them has said a single word all night, the music coming out of the speakers loud enough for the both of them. he watches the lights around them melt into one another, his cheek resting on the arm he has partially hanging out of the car. a hand is suddenly in his hair, pushing some of it aside before pressing hot like a branding iron to the side of his neck where his tattoo has now completely healed. the wind blows on his face and everything feels right in the world.

adam smiles.

#trc #adam parrish #joseph kavinsky #the dream pack as the major arcana #isn't occultism just so much fun #also what's the ship name for those two #kavish #??#who even knows #w

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shipping-goggles · 7 years

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“Some Sort of Neighborly” (8/11) | Once Upon a Time

Title: Some Sort of Neighborly - (8/11) Fandom: Once Upon a Time Rating: M Genre: Romance/Humor Words: 3,593/30,417 Completed: 02/06/2017 Summary: Modern!AU Captain Swan. They're not neighbors, not exactly, and they're not friends either. It's pretty hard to find reasons to bump into the woman who lives next door to your best friend, especially after your only interaction with her has been waking up on her couch one Saturday morning. Sequel to Rude Awakening.

I can’t decide whether the beginning of this chapter is spoilery or not, so, just to be safe, no over-the-cut preview this week ;)

On AO3 here | On FF.net here | On Tumblr under "Read More"

Some Sort of Neighborly

Chapter 8

The strings tug at his fingers as he brushes them, just light enough to feel the reassuring silent twang in response.

He should be used to this by now – and he is, for the most part. The soft lighting in his corner of The Jolly Roger. The old barstool Smee had dragged out of the back. It’s all worn and familiar, like the touch of a longtime friend after coming home, just as it’d been the day after Liam’s funeral – after Killian had taken all the papers, handed them to Smee, and taken his place on the tiny stage without looking back to where he used to stand behind the counter.

It’d just been too easy to keep glancing over at that empty space beside him.

It’d been easy to keep searching for that flash of long mahogany hair in the crowd, too. Until the day that it hadn’t.

(You love playing for people. What Robin said hadn’t been wrong, exactly, and yet – something in him hesitates, and it tastes bitter with the tang of his cowardice.)

The floor is reasonably packed today. Liam would have been proud for the turnout they’re managing to scrape, but Killian won’t take credit for all of it, even if live music had originally been his idea. Over by the control box, Tink gives him the thumbs up, and he taps the microphone to test the speakers before he clears his throat.

“Thanks for coming out tonight.”

He’d once been wary of lifting his eyes beyond the edge of his guitar, but he’s been making a conscious effort to really look at the members of his audience, even if they aren’t particularly paying attention. Most of them aren’t, in fact – he can’t blame them; alcohol is an excellent companion for those who come alone – which makes him work even harder to appreciate the ones who do.

And that’s probably the only reason he notices them.

An unmistakable pixie-cut hovering by the far end of the bar. The tall man beside her. Lipstick so red he’d have to be blind to miss it, and a long blond ponytail that nearly causes his fingers to slip off the strings altogether. They enter halfway through the fourth song, and even if Ruby hadn’t wolf-whistled at the highest note in the bridge, he’d have had a difficult time making it through anyway.

Bloody Robin.

He isn’t sure if Emma’s wide smile is maddeningly smug or a legitimate beam of satisfaction, but whatever it is, it’s blinding, and he can’t look away. She isn’t wearing that outrageous red dress from so long ago, the one of which she’d apparently been fond for snaring perps (his only context for her social attire, to be fair), though he doesn’t think he should be thanking anyone when the alternative is a leather jacket and tight jeans that he can tell fit her far too well, even from this distance.

He wants to call her out – call all of them out, to be honest. But when the song ends, he knows he needs to take a generous swig of water and soldier on with his set. There’s nothing to be gained from putting them in an awkward spotlight, even if he knows it’d coax the scowl out of Emma’s lips, when they can just up and leave at any given moment.

They stay.

They manage to snipe one of the standing tables near the back, and he watches as Will brings them their drinks, a second round, a third. Every time he looks up, he feels his gaze being drawn towards their corner, like a moth to a flame – and every time, Emma’s mouth seems to tilt upward the moment she snags his eye. He’s not nervous, per se, but there’s certainly something to be said about the rush that swells in his blood for playing here now, the one whose feeling he’s almost forgotten. Like picking up the guitar for the first time. Like falling in love with the music.

(He shouldn’t be even entertaining that thought about anything else.)

(But he swears she doesn’t takes her eyes off of him, not once. So maybe he is.)

He’d once been proud of his ability to carry a crowd through a good couple of hours, except now his set list feels just a few songs too long. He knows he’s in for a world of ribbing once he’s finally free, but he also has his own teasing to do about her bringing all of her friends here, and the itch just under his skin to simply march right off the stage and make a beeline to their table is more than a little distracting, especially as he nears the end. The crowd grows larger and louder the later it gets. He’s suddenly struck with the ridiculous notion that he might not even be able to find her once he’s finished.

It turns out, though, that he doesn’t have to worry about that even before he’s made it halfway through the last song.

One moment, he feels distinctly as though he’s exchanging a secret with her across the space of Liam’s bar, one he tucks away in the spot under where the ring beneath his shirt touches his skin.

The next, he glances over, where all of her friends still stand – and she’s gone.

What the fuck is wrong with me?

She almost wishes she really did have to use the restroom, like she’d muttered to Mary Margaret before she’d slipped away. But at least here, in the back hallway of The goddamn Jolly Roger – because of course Killian should play in the most notoriously niche bar in the city – she doesn’t have to feel like she’s hiding. Like she’s a child, scared of the dark, of thunderstorms, of those shiny black social services cars all over again, instead of a perfectly functional adult with perfectly functional relationship problems.

Honestly, they aren’t even supposed to be problems anymore. But she should have known Neal would fuck everything up, like he always used to do. If only he didn’t have to do it in person, and now of all times.

She should be out there. She wants to be out there. Robin had told her Killian’s show would end at midnight, and her phone had read five till the last time she checked it – right before she looked up, straight into the brown-eyed, laugh-lined face of the one person capable of breaking her resolve.

She hates it, hates him. And she hates herself even more for how she runs.

Well, she doesn’t technically run, though for her skittering heart and how tight her lungs feel, she may as well have sprinted. No, she’d locked eyes with him across the room, registered his shock even through her own numb realization, and waited until he’d started moving. It was only when she’d lost sight of him trying to nudge his way through the crowd that she’d excused herself and started shoving past in the opposite direction, which means she’s now trapped between the freedom of the back exit and the sound of applause that ripples around the corner, from the main room.

Her back pressed against the cool wall, she breathes into the enclosure of her hands, tilts her head down to rub her eyes.

This is absurd. Humiliating. Downright maddening.

He doesn’t deserve a place in her life, not anymore – so why is it always so difficult to cut him away?

“Emma?”

She jumps.

It isn’t him.

“Killian?”

Silhouetted in the dim bar light, it’s difficult to make him out until he steps into the hallway. She isn’t sure whether it’s more embarrassing to attribute the leaden feel of her tongue to her current state of mind, or to the fact that he’s dressed to the nines (maybe she’s a little biased; their leather jackets do match) and doesn’t even have the courtesy of looking worse up close.

“What are you doing back here?” He’s slung his guitar around to his back so that it hangs upside-down, but it feels ridiculous that she should want it between them instead, like some sort of shield.

His unwelcome question slices an even worse realization into the fog of her thoughts. She grimaces. “I missed the end of your show.”

“For all the trouble you went through to find me,” he says, a hint of a sympathetic smile on his lips, “I can’t imagine it wasn’t for good reason.” He glances somewhere behind her as he nears. “Unless the call of nature was just too compelling?”

“What?” She follows his gaze to the set of worn wooden doors set into the back of the hallway, but then only rolls her eyes, even though she’d used that same excuse. “No. What are you doing here?”

He taps the guitar behind him. “This one needs safekeeping before I can start to brave the pandemonium out there.”

It’s only barely an exaggeration, and if just to mask the misplaced pride that flickers through her, she makes a point of reminding him: “No screaming fangirls.”

“Not yet.”

“You were really good.” It’s an admission she would have otherwise made, but it feels cheap with her attempt at diversion when she says it now. “I think David has a new crush.”

His handsome grin turns crookedly contagious. “Is that right?”

“When your posse gets here, he’ll probably join them.”

“And what about you?” he asks.

She snorts even as she feels her mouth twitch. “In your dreams.”

“Perhaps,” he says lightly, “of a very specific sort.” He’s stepped close enough that she can see the rouge that colors his the pale skin of his cheekbones, undoubtedly the mark of performance adrenaline. It makes him look almost boyish in his vibrancy, his eyes bright, so blue she knows she’ll have trouble looking away.

“I don’t want to know about you and your harem fantasies,” she tells him with a sternness that’s probably completely transparent.

“There’s no harem,” he assures her. “It’s only—”

“Oh—shit!”

She grasps his shoulders, hauls him to the side between where she sinks into the wall, as if she might disappear into it, and the length of the hallway leading back into the bar.

Her mind shutters, and her thoughts skid to a painful halt but for the awareness of her heart, vaulted into a violent, uneven overdrive, the breath of her abandoned words snagged halfway up her throat like it’s suddenly burst into shards.

Had he seen her?

“Swan?” Killian asks, bewildered. “What—”

She shushes him sharply, instinctively. He’s tall enough that he might block her from view, and that guitar on his back is certainly helping, but—

“What are you—?” He makes to twist a glimpse over his shoulder, so, before she can think twice, she grabs him.

By the face.

His skin is smooth, warm beneath her touch.

“Don’t move,” she hisses under her breath.

He blinks at her for a good moment before he seems to get a handle on himself. “Swan,” he whispers fiercely. “What in blazes is going on?”

The words burn as they leave her mouth: “Neal’s here.”

God, of all the fucking bullshit timing. She knows she’s put Killian in an awkward position, but she’s frozen, still afraid he’ll turn around if she lets go.

Worse, she might risk a peek, too.

She sucks in a steadying breath, but it shudders in her lungs and tastes distinctly like clean sweat and salt and a spice she can’t name. She can’t think. She had her chance to escape, but now she’s resorting to using a human shield and hoping Neal hadn’t turned in time to spot her wrestle Killian in place. Hoping he won’t walk down the hallway.

Hoping Killian can’t hear the way the blood is pounding beneath her skin like a frantic, pitiful wreck.

She wouldn’t doubt it if he could feel it, honestly. There’s a scar on his cheek she never noticed before, just above the tip of her thumb, and the pads of her palms prickle with the scratch of his beard. She should let go.

She needs to let go.

It’s only because he’s so close, because she’s watching him so closely that she can tell when something shifts behind his eyes. The change is nearly imperceptible, but even as his lips press together into a thin line, as if he’s hiking up his chin, his gaze turns into something more subdued, a more fervent blue.

She doesn’t have to ask to know that he understands.

“Do you trust me?” he asks, his voice low, reassuring.

She needs to let go.

She nods.

He takes that last step forward, backing her against the wall – it’s nowhere near forceful, but she feels the breath drawn out of her lungs anyway, as if tugged by a string – and reaches into the space behind her head. The hair from her ponytail falls in waves around her shoulders as he pulls the elastic away.

Gathering her curls between his fingers, he presses his hands to her cheeks, his forehead to hers. Her own hands slip from his face. On reflex, her eyes slide shut and she forces a quick inhale, but he doesn’t move further. He simply hovers there, still as a statue.

An involuntary shiver darts down her spine, zipping the heat of his touch down her neck, down, down, to where the small of her back presses against the wall.

“What are you doing?” she manages at last. She should be speaking quietly anyway, but right now, her voice sounds but small.

“Making an uncomfortable scene,” he murmurs. His broad palms curve against her skin, gently dragging her hair along with them, and she realizes, belatedly, that he’s trying to hide her face from view. Meanwhile, the only place her hands can fall naturally is on his shoulders, along the crook of his neck above his collar.

She swears she can feel his pulse fluttering beneath her fingers, too.

“The scene of the musician who left the stage to canoodle with a fan?” she asks. She’d think it a resourceful distraction – who likes looking at PDAs directly, after all? – if only a number of other ways to describe the situation didn’t come to mind first. A bad idea, she curses faintly. The best idea he’s ever had. “I thought you weren’t interested in an adoring harem.”

“I’m not,” he says. There’s a long pause, during which she takes the chance to swallow the lump in her throat. She’s afraid to breathe – afraid if she does, she might involuntarily shift closer into the warmth between her cheek and his palm, and stay there. “Truthfully, love, there’s only one person here whose opinion I care about.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Would it be too obvious if she wrapped her arms around his neck?

“Do you think he’s gone?” She can feel the vibrations of his words, the sweet huff of warmth they make on her tongue. If she pulled him closer, she could feel them everywhere.

And, somehow – she’s not surprised to realize how much she wants to.

“I don’t care.” It’s barely a whisper against his skin, and then it takes but a tilt of her head upwards for her to lean in and kiss him, soft as the push it’d taken to fall.

The morning he’d woken up on her couch, she still remembers, he’d looked up at her like she was the sun: brilliant, breathtaking, as though his gravity had shifted very suddenly and thoroughly, for which she was the sole cause and culprit. He’d been hungover and completely disoriented, but she swears her mind has never been clearer right now, and still she knows – nothing but the soft yield of his lips, the rich taste of his muffled sound of surprise, the way he hesitates, stiffening, before his mouth begins to move with careful, deliberate purpose, a smooth slide, a rough bristle of scruff against her skin.

A sigh escapes her – an embarrassing noise of bliss – but it’s lost somewhere between where she ends and he begins as she slips her tongue into his mouth, feels his quiet groan in response. Though she isn’t sure when it’d happened, she realizes belatedly that she’s well and fully backed into the wall from shoulder to hip, trapped against every hard line in his body, and she lets her head fall backward between the gentle grip of his hands, allowing him to deepening the kiss. It doesn’t take very much coaxing for his lips to grow more insistent, a slow plunge out of the realm of her capacity for rational thought.

But even if she can’t think, she does know one thing: this, whatever this is, feels like something sliding into place, a heavy bolt shifting with a perfect, satisfying click into a spot deep in her chest she’d almost forgotten existed. It feels right, and real, and so good she has to grasp the collar of his jacket tighter for fear that it might all disappear in a flash, before she can admit that she wants it to stay.

He breaks away for air much sooner than she thinks should be necessary, regardless of how urgently her lungs protest, as every other part of her body protests for something entirely different. Her eyes squeezed shut, she can still feel his warmth trickling gooseflesh across her skin, like tiny rivulets of static hauling her towards him still, and she refuses to let go even as he feels his breathing slow.

He doesn’t move away either.

Without completely meaning to, her hands wander up his collar, around the back of his neck, to run through the short hair behind his ears. The way every one of her nerve endings seems to have come alight, the simmering glow brewing just under the surface of her skin – it feels a lot like the brimming ache of desire, and, in putting a name to it, she’s ashamed to realize that it’s not as wholly unfamiliar as she’d like to believe.

“I’m getting out of here,” she says quietly. It takes him a moment longer to pull back, and she opens her eyes to watch him stare, his blue gaze dark, dazed, with the remnants of their kiss; he keeps blinking, as if trying to regain focus on her words. Her nose brushes against his. “What are you going to do?”

His exhale is a flutter on her lips. “Emma…” he mutters, hoarse, trailing – but she knows she’s not imagining the way his fingers twitch tighter around her face.

Still, she hesitates. “Do you have to stay?”

“No, but—” he begins, before he seems to cut himself off. “Swan, your friends—”

“I’ll text Mary Margaret,” she assures him, when it seems like he has no intention of speaking in full sentences. “She’ll know.” She’d left them in the trajectory of the reason she’s back here in the first place, after all, and that’s probably more of an explanation than they really need – even if it isn’t the full truth.

(For both David’s sanity and her own, she’ll spare them those details.)

But Killian remains silent, his eyes darting between hers with something she can’t place. When they slowly draw down her face, back to her mouth, she feels her skin prickle down the curve of her back, and she licks her lips out of instinct.

She curls her fingers into his hair, though it isn’t enough for what she forces herself to say.

“Either way, I’m calling a cab.” His mouth twitches, and she wants to lean back in, coax it out of a frown. He wants it, too – that kiss aside, she knows he does – which is the only reason why she doesn’t dread his response, for all her quivering heart seems to disagree. “I’m not going back out there.”

She can’t find a hint of shame in admitting it, either. The lopsided rhythm that floods her pulse is born, instead, from quiet anticipation, one that leaps at the sight of his jaw clenched as tight as the look in his eyes. She doesn’t know what to make of it, except for the hot breath that he exhales, torn between desperation and frustration – but whatever he’s thinking, there’s nothing she can do but wait, wanting, trying to contain the thought of how that muscle in his cheek might feel under her fingers in a very different set of circumstances, with a very different kind of tension running through every inch of his body.

He watches her for a long, agonizing moment, and then, with barely a second of warning, he’s surging forward across that tiny space between them, crushing his lips to hers in a rough kiss that sears.

She might be chagrined at how quickly her nerves dissolve into relieved gratification, but, as it is, she has better things on her mind – things that only hitch higher into the realm of pure distraction when he pulls away and she makes out the look on his face, darker than ever.

“We both know your apartment is within walking distance from here,” he says, quietly. “It’d be remiss of me not to make sure you made it back safe.” The rough edge to his tone makes it sound like it might be the worst sin in the world, but she doesn’t care. She smiles, and she doesn’t even bother checking if anyone’s looking as she takes his hand and leads him backward, towards the door at the rear of The Jolly Roger.

Towards home.

Towards something more.

#cs ff #cs mc ff #captain swan #once upon a time #emma swan #killian jones #captain hook #writing #some sort of neighborly

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