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#so now i’m re-obsessed
seventh-district · 1 month
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i’m not like other girls, my “Rest” stats are a heart rate of 110bpm and a HRV of 14 fucking milliseconds. :)
#Seven’s Public Diary#vent#vent post#cw vent#cw vent post#cw health#cw heart#i’m so stressed :) i am soooo fucking stressed and my body is Suffering because of it#i want to just lay here and stare at the ceiling but. maybe a little venting will help#sighhhh wish [N]MbD Sun were here to obsessively fret over me#he can be mean about it idc. at least i’d have someone acknowledging how bad things are for me#sometimes i wonder when the last time was that my body Wasn’t in fight or flight to some degree#have i Ever actually relaxed#hhhhhhh c-ptsd is a bitch#anyways there’s so much to vent about but i’m. doing my best to be vague. i need to be more vague about things#a lot of stuff i can’t vent about anyways. it’s too personal#so instead i’m gonna complain abt how i haven’t been able to play Genshin or Star Rail for nearly a month now#and about how slowly my back is recovering. it’s like every time i re-injure/have a flare up. it heals.. worse. slower and lesser#i dunno how it’s ever gonna get better. truly better. maybe i’ll live with this forever#if being fat is the problem which is definitely partly is. then yeah i’m fucked#all of my problems just make each other worse and i don’t know where the way out of it all is#every time i think i’ve found it i’m wrong and i just make it all worse#anyways as soon as i figure out how to strengthen my core without breaking my back. it’s over for u bitches#‘u bitches’ being uh. all of the shit that needs doing that i cannot physically fucking do right now#i miss being able to sit down. and i’m Regretting de-converting my standing desk back to sitting bc now. i cannot use my PC#which means i can’t fucking do a some of my work or play my silly little gacha games and i’m mad abt it#i’m mad abt a lot more serious things too but again. can’t talk abt it so i’m gonna focus on trivial shit instead#anyways. sorry as always to everyone i haven’t spoken with lately. and in general. i’m so drained from the Everything that i just. can’t.#it shouldn’t be this hard for me to stay in touch w ppl but. it is. guess i’ll add that onto my list of things to be stressed about#i’m so tired of everything man. and i hate being so negative and mean when im stressed & in pain. makes me feel like im becoming my father
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dayas · 1 year
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Alright I was tagged by @jojameswinter and @alphinias so here we go!
7 Up Writing Tag Game
An excerpt from the no longer secret Jiara SWATH AU for the Royals square from Jiara Bingo
At that very moment, Kiara dangled precariously from the apple tree, reaching as far as her arm and the fingers attached to it would stretch. The apple she snatched down nearly tumbled from her palm and took her with it, but she wrapped her arms around the sturdier branches and threw her head back, laughing at Pope’s sharp intake of breath and the exhale that followed it.
“I did advise caution,” he told her, shakily accepting the fruit. Kiara’s shoulder rose and fell, and she sat beside him, swinging her legs over the edge of the large branch they occupied.
“I did not fall, did I? Thus, I was cautious enough.”
Soon enough the apple is forgotten about, tossed to the ground by a startled Pope upon hearing the voice of his father calling for him. He and Kiara descended the tree quickly, scampering off before the call grew closer.
Spring turned to summer, and summer to autumn. With the fading of the light and leaves from the trees came the worst tragedy Kiara could fathom.
As every good thing must, the princess’ golden childhood came to an end.
Tagging @ghostiewriter @whitetrashjj @onlyhereforangst @rojaswarren @jiaraisinthegoodplace @goingfullpogue @hmspogue
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dust-of-embers · 5 months
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I may have a bit too much Lego…
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(This is only the loose stuff upstairs, the proper sets are downstairs in the garage cuz we didn’t have room)
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juniperhillpatient · 1 year
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motion sickness phoebe bridgers is about princess carolyn & bojack
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exbeaut · 2 years
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Cruel prince series?? Anyone??
#if yes can we discuss Holly black#bc I’m almost done book of night and like yes I have found myself reading the book in one day but#I feel like#I’m not reading it in one day bc it’s SO GOOD AND I CANT STOP#it’s more just like yeah it’s good it’s decent but if I didn’t love the cruel prince series I prob wouldn’t like it#just bc of having read cp series many times I’m used/can accept her ‘style’ of writing#and like by style I mean the annoying things about it like how she describe clothes they are wearing down to the brands#like I thought the cringed ass descriptions in cp of like Jude wearing converse and a star tshirt were due to the times like 2013?? or whate#but now in this brand new book she is describing her wearing the black tee and vans and I’m like?? do we need to do that#but like I’m used to/and expect that like cringe wattpad type descriptions LOL u know not wattpad but u know the vibe it’s like ifykyk#but anyway I’m not saying book of night is bad bc I do like it I’m enjoying the book and read like 2/3rds of it at work today#it’s good don’t get me wrong but it’s not like omg insane I can’t stop I’m addicted and need to know what happens#basically I’m not hyper fixated on it LOL#but anyway idk what I’m saying rn but it’s good?? but not like OMG GOOD GREAT AMAZING#anyway if anyone is feeling these things or has read/fixated on cp series talk to me about it pls#but also just want to state that I wasn’t like OMG I LOVE THIS SERIES with the cruel prince series like I read all three books in a day#like a day and a half idk it was like a weekend I had half off so like after 4pm Saturday until Sunday night#but then re reading it twice (??I think twice might be 3x tho)since the first time it’s like yes now I am obsessed and love cp series and#Jude and Cardan 😭😭😭😭#but anyway what I’m saying is that I knew from the first time I read co the first Holly black book I had read that her writing was well...#something I had to adjust to and force myself to ignore the cringey aspects of it and it’s just like cringey in my POV u know like everyone#is different#but anyway I am rambling sm rn I make no sense but I’m just trying to make it clear I don’t dislike Holly or her writing but I’m just#admitting that her books that I consider favs of mine are considered it more bc I had fun and felt things while reading it and less bc of#like idk the intellectual quality of the prose of that makes sense
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trolithfoxyflint · 2 months
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Oh, the pixels 😮‍💨 will I ever figure out how to post to tumblr? Probably not 🤣
Anyways, I’ve decided to just post the art I’ve been doing here finally. Maybe like one a day? Idk we’ll see if I remember… fair warning: most of it is BTS lmaoooo my muses 😔🙏🏽💕
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letstrywritingmaybe · 9 months
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If all goes well then I will get to finish the otp prompts and CoAi week in time. I’m still incredibly busy and stressed irl, but we’re moving in the right direction so there’s that? I just hope everything keeps going well…
Enough about me, let’s talk fic cause this is what this side blog is for after all. Why do these otp prompts keep getting so long? Why can I not just have a simple au/idea? There’s always so many skips, I know they all need to be their own fully fleshed out verses but I really don’t have the time to spend on them… I’m exaggerating when I say it’s a long fic, we’re just under 4k (not done yet) so it’s really not that many words. But it’s a lot for me okay! I’m impatient and I don’t write pretty things or describe everything perfectly. I’m literally like okay yeah so this happens cause of course it does. So yeah, this is why I say I’m not really a writer. It’s really just me rambling and thinking about all the possibilities. Sometimes I think about doing the bullet point fics again, that was great for me. I get to explore the fic without actually writing the whole thing
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balletfilmss · 4 months
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LOVERS LAKE
✸ pairing : luke castellan x fem!reader
✸ synopsis: you & luke escape to the lake and away from counselor duties!
✸ warnings: pre-tlt, established relationship, kissing, me believing whole heartedly that i can fix him
✸ authors’s note: ignoring that it’s literally christmas & this is so summer-coded, charlie bushnell brought back my original series luke obsession so here you go 🙈
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the lake was arguably the best place to be at camp half-blood, even for someone who hated the water and was all but dragged their by somebody else who loved it.
that someone was you, and the somebody else was luke.
that boy loved swimming in the lake like the stars love sitting in the sky, and the only thing that made it better was when you were there with him.
between knowing that fact and the pleading look in his pretty puppy eyes, how could you say no?
so now you and him were in the lake together, on a rare escape from your responsibilities as counselors during rec time. you may or may not have been hiding from your campers by staying hidden by the boathouse that stored the camp’s supply of canoes.
you were clinging onto the wooden dock while your boyfriend swam about, still putting on your angry facade at him after he threw you in the water initially.
was the way he scooped you up in his big strong arms and grinned like a little kid when he jumped in with you absolutely adorable? yes. did that mean you were going to let him get away with it? absolutely not.
pouting with your arms wrapped around the dock leg, you watched as the boy’s head disappeared underwater, not missing the mischievous glint that lingered in his eyes beforehand.
and just as you had expected, a wet head of dark curls popped up just beside you. just to be annoying, he shook his head like some kind of dog and laughed when you scrunched your face up at the flying drops of water.
the little loser laughed at you. now you were definitely mad, and would’ve crossed your arms and harrumphed if you weren’t still holding on to the dock like you’d die if you let go.
“are you ever gonna leave that poor dock be and actually come swim with me?” he asked, batting his pretty long eyelashes like he was pleading for you to do what he asked.
“go away.” you grumbled, looking away from him.
“aw, c’mon sweetheart.” he cooed, his tone teetering between teasing and sincere.
you felt familiar hands wrap around your waist as luke pried you away from the dock, ignoring your words of protest.
“you are literally going to drown me.” you frown as you have no choice but to hold onto him.
look, it wasn’t that you couldn’t swim, it was just that it was going to take one hell of a monster chasing you to make it happen.
“oh my gods, i am going to die.”
you were now out of arm’s reach of the shore, left with nothing but your boyfriend to keep you afloat. dam it.
“would you relax? i’m not gonna let you drown.” he chuckled, smiling at your antics as he kept both you and himself afloat.
“well you pushed me in, so you may as well.” you responded, sticking your chin up in dramatic negligence.
“hey, it was push you in or get caught and have about seventeen campers join us. which would you rather have?”
the first option, obviously, but you weren’t going to tell him that.
instead, you stuck to the silent treatment, which meant luke was left to his last and final resort.
“guess you leave me with no choice then,” he feigned a regretful sigh, even though you both knew he was ecstatic to do what he was thinking.
“wha- no. no no no no!”
luke had let go of your waist for no more than two seconds before you had screamed and clung onto him for dear life, your arms tightly wound around his neck and legs around his waist.
“i’m going to kill you, castellan.” you grumble, unable to see his reaction as your cheek was pressed against his.
there it was again, that gods damned chuckle of his that made your heart do little somersaults.
“love you too.” he said humorously. but when you didn’t reply with the same phrase, it was his turn to pout.
“hey.”
between the pout in his voice and the poke he delivered to your sides, you knew that your inattention had had just the effect you wanted.
this was the dance the two of you had done several times before. he’d annoy you, you’d ignore him and then you would relish in the way he turned into a lost puppy when it lasted for ten seconds too long, proving once again just how tightly you had him wrapped around your finger.
“hey. hey. hey.”
he poked you again and again, repeating the same word in hopes that you’d look at him, but you remained relentless.
“i’m not forgiving you that easily.” you insisted, as if your faces weren’t inches away from each other and water wasn’t the only thing between your body and his.
once again, he knew you too well to know there was little truth to your words.
he pressed a kiss to your cheek in hopes to get you to finally turn your head and look at him. again, nothing.
“hey, pretty girl.” he whispered, growing desperate and excruciatingly impatient. “would you at least look at me?”
feeling as though you’d drawn it out rather excessively, you listened and looked at him.
immediately, your lips were captured by his in a sweet kiss, the lake water seeping in between and tainting the flavor.
when he pulled away, luke wore a smirky kind of smile that made you want to kiss him again just to get rid of it and the giddy little feeling it gave you.
“am i forgiven now?”
he was, but instead of saying that, that was when you splashed a wave of water in his pretty little face.
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amourane · 16 days
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so this is love
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pairing: theodore nott x hufflepuff!reader
genre: fluff
w/c: 2.7k
summary: there's a weird feeling that erupts in theo's chest whenever he looks at you and for the first time in his life his mind goes silent.
warnings: none!
a/n: i honestly love this so much and it's so so sooo cute!
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Theodore Nott was many things. Quiet, judgmental, emotionless and most importantly handsome. One of the prettiest boys in Hogwarts yet the most unapproachable. No one had ever seen a smile grace his lips and if you had tried to converse with the Slytherin he would only stare at you with blank eyes waiting for you to go away. He spoke little words but it was enough for people to get the point. Unlike his rowdy group of friends, he wouldn’t merrily join in conversation, rather make snarky remarks every now and then, an uninterested look always on his face. A scowl or a smirk always tugged at his lips as he listened to what his friends had to say. 
Even though Theo never voiced his thoughts out loud he always knew what to think. His mind was constantly running at a hundred miles per hour. Every little thing he wanted to say flitted through his mind. It was as if his head was a cacophonous symphony. 
Yet as he looked at the girl in yellow robes his mind was oddly quiet. He watched her silently as she dropped her ingredients into her cauldron. It was a rare moment. One he had discovered a month ago when he had finished his potion early and looked around to see if anyone else was done. There you were. Eyes scanning the contents of your Potion’s book but it was quite clear you had finished brewing whatever was in your cauldron as you leaned back into your seat. 
Theo’s mind was silent. 
There were no thoughts, no opinions, no judgments. He stared at you and it made him uneasy. There was something about you that unnerved him. He didn’t recall you from his other classes and it was the first time he had even seen you in Potions. As he felt the comforting silence settle in his head he concluded one thing - you were interesting and he was going to keep an eye on you.
“Nott, mate, what are you doing? I’ve been asking you to pass me a quill for about a century, have you suddenly gone deaf?” Blaise nudged Theo out of his trance and the brunette blinked for a second before passing over a quill. His partner frowned before following where his eyeline previously was and he smirked. “Still obsessing over the little Hufflepuff I see. Who knew you were capable of having feelings.”
“I don’t fancy her.”
“I never said you did.” Blaise’s smirk widened. “You came up with that on your own.”
Theo felt his face heat up. It wasn’t true. He didn’t like you, not in the slightest. He was merely fascinated at how you were able to turn his manic mind into a state of tranquillity. He looked over. You were talking to your partner beside you and Theo assumed she had said something funny because a grin had overtaken your pretty features and a giggle slipped past your lips. Theo didn’t fancy you but he couldn’t deny that you were the prettiest girl he had ever seen.
//
“He’s staring again.” Hannah said as she poked your side to get your attention. “It’s like he’s drilling holes into your skull. Do you think he wants to hex you?”
You looked up from your cauldron with a frown as you faced your friend. “He doesn’t stare at me, don’t be silly Hannah. I’m sure he has a reason for looking this way.”
“Y/n you’re terrible at finding excuses for anything. It’s so obvious he’s looking at you and his glare is starting to scare me a bit.” 
Behind your fellow Hufflepuff was Theodore Nott. Your eyes glaze over his perfectly tousled hair and his dark coloured eyes. He really was handsome. You watch as he says something to Blaise and you see a tint of pink touch his cheeks. Cute. You smiled to yourself. Merlin, he was really cute.
Theodore Nott had been watching you for a few weeks now and you weren’t oblivious enough to not notice the Slytherin’s gaze. At first you didn’t know how to react when you first felt his eyes on you. It was weird. Every time you would turn around he would already be looking down at his piece of parchment, scribbling something down with his quill. You had never caught him staring at you but you could certainly feel it. The piercing feeling of his stare made goosebumps rise on your skin. In a way you found it endearing. Sometimes you would turn around and find him, nose deep in his textbook and you could faintly see the tips of his ears blush red. It was those times you would giggle to yourself. 
It was arrogant to assume that Theo felt that way about you but for some reason you couldn’t help but get a little giddy at the thought he might. That someone like him would even think about going out with someone like you. That the cutest guy in your year would fancy you. Then reality came crashing back and you knew that a Slytherin would never be seen with a Hufflepuff much less date one.
“Hello? Earth to Y/n? You still there?” Hannah waved her hand in front of your face. “Merlin, one mention of Nott and you go all dreamy on me. When are you going to ask him out then?”
Your cheeks flared up with heat and you couldn’t help a smile that tugs at your lips. “Shush Hannah.” You try to sound serious but with your blushing face and bright grin it’s hard to do so.
“You’re actually whipped, Y/n.” Hannah let out a laugh and you let a giggle slip past your lips at her statement. You didn’t feel the need to deny it after all, maybe it held some truth. 
//
Theodore Nott always knew what to say and when but as he stood in front of you he found himself speechless. Now as his eyes wandered over your delicate hands and beautiful face he couldn’t find the words that needed to be said. His mind was quiet again. Silence. He opened his mouth to apologise for bumping into you and nearly knocking you over but no words came out. So he did the next best thing, help you grab your books.
You were scrambling to grab scrap pieces of parchment that had escaped the grasps of your books and Theo grabbed the Herbology textbook you had dropped. He watched as you gathered your things before finally meeting his gaze. You smiled and he felt his heart stop. Suddenly it was as if he was being engulfed in a tidal wave. There was a twinkle in your eyes and it set off a spark in his chest that he didn’t know was there. Theo felt himself grow hot as you stared at him and for the first time in his life he felt self conscious.
“Thank you.” You said and he felt his ears ring as your voice echoed through his mind. “I’m really sorry I wasn’t watching where I was going and I was in a rush to get to my next class. I hope you aren’t hurt anywhere.”
A beat passed.
Theo blinked. He watched as your bright expression slowly morphed into one of concern. He watched as you reached out to touch his arm.
“Theodore?”
“It’s Theo.” Is the only thing he can think to say before he realised how it must’ve sounded rude. “But you can call me Theodore. I don't mind.”
Another beat passed.
The two of you were now standing in the middle of the hallway as other students passed by. Theo could hear their whispers as they looked. The curious eyes wondering what a Slytherin could possibly be talking to a Hufflepuff about. For a second Theo thinks he’s upset you and you’re going to storm off but he’s proven wrong. The bright smile returned to your face.
“Well Theo, I’m going to need my Herbology textbook back, I’ve already been late twice this week.” 
“O-Oh yes right, sorry I forgot.”
Theodore Nott has never once stumbled over his words. Yet as he stood in front of you he found himself wrapped in a world he had never known before. He felt himself grow even warmer and he reached a hand to loosen the emerald tie around his neck. This was unlike him. He never went speechless, he never struggled to find a smart quip or retort and he most definitely never stuttered. You brought out a side to him that was new and he didn’t know if he liked it or not.
“Thank you for helping me Theo, I’ll see you in Potions.” You waved goodbye as you hurried off down the hallway. 
Theo’s eyes remained glued onto your frame as you ran. A rising bubbly feeling began in his chest and he felt his heart quicken. He gulped. You had long disappeared from his view but he still felt a burning sensation on his cheeks and he tried to cool himself down with his hands but it served no use. Giving up, he turned away and marched down the hall determined to figure out whatever he was feeling.
//
“You know staring at her won’t make her your girlfriend Nott.” Mattheo smirked as he watched his best friend. The others at the Slytherin table tittered with laughter and Theo rolled his eyes. He was now used to his friend’s teasing and even though it was relentless he didn’t pay any attention to it. Why would he? It wasn’t true anyway.
“Very funny Riddle.”
“You know me Theo, always the jokester.” He winked as he sipped the pumpkin juice in his cup.
“But seriously Theo you should ask her out if you like the girl. Salazar, it's better than drilling holes in the back of her head.” 
“Pansy’s right Nott, we’re all tired of you mooning over the girl just go ask her out already and then the two of you can go snog in the broom cupboard.” Draco snickered and the other Slytherins erupted into another round of laughter.
“Well you’ve got it all wrong I don’t fancy her.” Theo looked at his friends with a scowl present on his face. “She makes me feel all these things and I hate it. I hate how different it is. I hate how quiet everything gets when I look at her. I hate how she makes me feel and it’s all horrible and downright disgusting. It’s like I’ve got a fever whenever I’m around her and I’ve somehow contracted some life-threatening heart disease. My mouth dries up and I stumble over what I say and it’s not like me at all. So no, you’ve all got it wrong because I don't fancy her.”
With that Theo leaves the table, dinner untouched, with red cheeks and a rapidly beating heart. His friends watched dumbfounded as their friend trudged away. They all exchange knowing glances before shaking their heads at his obliviousness to his own feelings.
“That guy seriously needs to realise that sometimes not being an emotionless prick isn’t going to kill him.” Pansy dug into her beef as she scoffed at her friend’s stupidity.
Unbeknownst to the Slytherins a certain Hufflepuff was watching as their friend stormed off, her eyes never once leaving his ruby red face and the angry glare that accompanied it. She excused herself from her table before slipping away to follow a certain brunette.
//
Annoyance was the main thing that Theodore Nott felt at the moment. Anger at the persistence that he had a crush on you when he didn’t, he knew he didn’t. You had cast some sort of spell on him. Some sort of hex that made him notice every little bit about you. The way your smile lit up the room, the way your laughter echoed in his mind like the happy tinkering of a bell. Every second he saw you it was as if you overtook his senses. Clouding his sight with your beauty, suffocating him with your sweet scent, muffling his ravenous thoughts until everything was calm. 
When Theodore Nott looked at you he felt an overwhelming emotion, one that he couldn’t explain, but it made his hectic thoughts still and as cheesy as it sounded it made time itself stand still. When Theodore Nott looked at you he noticed every fine small detail like the way you like to smile at yourself whenever you get a question right or the way you tap your fingers on the desk when you’re concentrating. When Theodore Nott looked at you he felt his heart soar and he isn’t used to feeling this unnatural emotion that had been brewing inside of him.
He didn’t even notice you were behind him until he heard your voice. Soft and gentle and kind. He spun around. You had a look of concern etched upon your face and you stepped closer towards him and he backed away feeling his heart quicked once again. He glared at you hoping that his stare would force you to go away and would force whatever he was feeling to disappear.
“Are you okay Theo? I saw you leave and you didn’t touch your food, did something happen?”
You were so caring, so nice, so calm. You were so many things and Theo couldn’t take it. Couldn’t take looking at you when he could hear his heart pumping. “What are you doing to me?” He whispered, backing away further.
You frowned. “I haven’t done anything Theo. Are you sure you’re okay you look quite red and-”
“You’re lying.” He seethed. “You’re lying because why are you making me feel these things? Why does my mind go quiet, my thoughts stop, the words fail? There’s no explanation to this. I don’t understand why my heart races and everything suddenly feels hotter around me. I don’t understand this feeling I have inside me, some magnetic force that keeps pulling me to you. You’re everywhere Y/n.”
His glare intensified as he spoke, each word punctuated by a slow, deliberate step forward. “I look at you and I feel things I’ve never felt before, this bubbly warm feeling. Whenever I’m around you I can’t think of what to say. I close my eyes and I see your smile, your eyes. I can hear your laughter even if we’re in the noisiest classroom. You’re everywhere Y/n. So tell me, what have you done to me?”
A beat of silence.
The both of you stare at each other. Your frown had long gone and now you simply looked at the Slytherin in front of you trying to decipher his anger.
“It’s love Theo.” You take a step closer. “All the things you’ve just said - it’s love.”
Theo froze. His expression remained stony yet his eyes betrayed his thoughts as he looked away for a second. He blinked before looking at you once again. Your eyes, the eyes he couldn’t help but notice everywhere he went, looked back at him. His mind was no longer quiet. An outbreak of noise erupted inside his head and he struggled to grasp what was going on. He couldn’t focus. All he could hear was his own voice in his mind, overlapping, shouting, screaming, crying. It all came crashing down and Theo didn’t know what to do.
Then your lips collided with his and he stilled. The noise died down. Chaos ceased. Theo let his eyes flutter shut as he kissed you back with fervour. Your lips were soft and you tasted sweet like strawberries. He wrapped his arm around your waist and you were warm as you leaned into his touch. He felt your arms tangle in his hair and he smiled at the feeling. This felt right. This didn’t feel weird or disgusting. It was something he never thought he would feel. 
The both of you broke apart and you blinked looking at Theo with your beautiful eyes. His heart continued to race. You beamed up at him and he couldn’t help but smile back. You were so pretty, so gorgeous and you had just kissed him. His mind was finally quiet again. The strange feeling that filled his body now didn’t feel so foreign at all in fact it felt natural as he gazed at you.
“It’s love Theodore Nott. That’s what you feel.” You give him another kiss. “And it’s what I feel too.”
Theodore Nott was many things but as he closed his eyes to kiss you once again there is only one thing that he wants to be - in love with you.
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lucyandthepen · 8 months
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salted caramel | lmh ( m )
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you hadn’t been aware that mark’s jealousy followed the rules of baseball — three strikes, and he snaps?
read the first part here!
pairing: barista!bf!mark x reader verse: college!au rating: r warnings&tags: unprotected sex, mentions of creampies (although not an actual one), hickeys, possessiveness and jealousy, exhibitionism, sort of phone sex in conjunction with said exhibitionism, oral (m!receiving), mark has an understated but unending obsession with mc’s stomach, tummy bulges, we always love an implicit bigdick!mark, donghyuck is kind of a little shit and basically he has to cross a few lines for this “plot” to get to where it gets word count: 20.3k
a/n: this is a bit rushed and panicked because I basically wrote it in a feverish 2.5ish days… i’m so sorry that the pacing might be a little off, especially since I can never tell if it’s actually too fast or not. this is also unedited and unbeta’d but oh well because i never edit my stuff before posting and just re-edit when I re-read! regardless, i hope it’s something that you can enjoy, and i couldn’t pick between sweetest bf ever!mark and hottest mf ever!mark, so i guess you get a little bit of both!
if you liked it, please consider reblogging to support (especially because this may get flagged for mature content)!
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You should have noticed it the first time, but in your overall defense, you find most things that you take note of about Mark Lee to be more on the highly positive and greatly endearing side — or, maybe, you just have a tendency to paint him in that kind of light.
You can’t really help it; he’s still got that halfway shy, softly adoring look in his eyes whenever he sees you, which is more often now than ever before, and you just can’t do anything but reciprocate, if only to see his eyes grow a little brighter. You wonder if Mark’s aware that if this were a Shakespearean scenario, you’d easily fall on your sword for him without question, for as long as he asked, but you don’t think there’s any pressing need to remind him — not with the way you spend most of your free time figuring out ways to be with him. You’re certain he should know, what with the fact that every time he looks at you, even just a glimpse, your gaze is always on him, ready to make eye contact whenever he turns his head — something he often acknowledges with one of those signature blushes that spread like wildfire across his cheeks, up to the tips of his ears.
It also should be unmistakably clear that you’re head over heels for him, given how at least once a week, he’s got his face buried between your legs in an attempt to hear the thing he wants you to say the most (see: his name, in varying pitches and decibels) — but if he doesn’t notice then, you can’t hold it against him; Mark’s mouth is so attentive that you doubt his mind is anywhere else apart from what inch of you his tongue is going to meet next in that moment. At least, that much is true for you.
He should at least know, what with you waiting for his classes to end so you can walk to Starbucks for his afternoon shift; you even race the twenty-minute distance to the Department of Mathematics, still holding your European Renaissance History textbook from your last lecture, just to make sure you’re there right as he gets out — a fact he has to know is an act of devotion, considering how often he finds you heaving for air and leaning your back against the brick wall outside the Accounting 150 Lab. Even his professor knows you as Mark Lee’s admirer, which is all well and good, but if you had the breath to spare, you’d correct his terminology for accuracy. Girlfriend. You’re Mark Lee’s girlfriend.
It’s a fact you don’t mind reminding him of but that you actually have to do quite often, because when you call Mark the appropriate counterpart — boyfriend — his eyes still widen, like he’s hearing it for the first time. It’s cute, just like everything else about him. You just have to wonder, at times, if he doesn’t believe you.
Whatever. It doesn’t matter; you’ll just keep telling him.
You don’t have any classes with Mark this semester, which is a shame, considering your favorite pastime over the last few months had just been to stare at his side profile and wish he’d look over so you could kiss him, but the fact that you spend almost every day with him now, using that time to remind him of how much you want to kiss him and actually getting it to do it right then and there, pretty much more than makes up for your previous schedule of daydreaming.
However, hanging out with him doesn’t always mean you’re just with him; you came to learn this after the first week of the new semester, and you’ve now gotten used to the fact that with Mark Lee sometimes comes his band of tall, often loud friends.
The loudest by far is Lee Donghyuck, the mysterious figure last semester that you’d only known by one syllable, now easily recognizable (and no longer enigmatic by any means to you) by his booming voice and even more demanding personality. He’s supremely outgoing, a trait you can’t say you mind, but there’s an interesting contrast between Mark, who tends to say things after carefully considering his ideas, and Donghyuck, who seems to just burst out in fits of impulsive rambling that often leads to some kind of semi-structured debate. It kind of gives you whiplash, in a funny, slightly perplexing way.
The whole friend group likes to meet up at Starbucks while Mark is on his shift, and now that they’ve come to know you as that girl Mark didn’t teach a single thing in College Algebra to but still somehow got lucky with (something you’ve wasted immense efforts into correcting but have ultimately failed to do so), you now find yourself sitting with them, all somehow waiting for who appears to be the nucleus of this group to stop taking coffee orders and hang up his (cute, but you’re the only one that thinks so, actually) green apron.
Again, you don’t mind it; new people aren’t an issue to you, and you’re also interested in finding out more about Mark through those closest to him. You get to see the few ways they’re alike in contrast to the staggering number of things that make them amusingly different from one another. Despite the broad spectrum of their intersecting interests, you’ve come to learn, through the conversations you’ve had to sit through over the last month, that they have varying opinions on said interests. For instance, you know they’re all into video games, Japanese manga, and long-winding fantasy movies, but every conversation takes flight the moment there’s even a spark of dissent from one person — and the source, usually (and quite unfortunately), is Lee Donghyuck himself.
Today is no exception.
“Dude, you’re crazy,” Zhong Chenle practically seethes. Whether by sheer coincidence or actual desire, he’s the one who most often finds himself staring Donghyuck down, trying to bend the latter’s will into admitting defeat. Donghyuck, on the other hand, has mastered the art of looking supremely unperturbed, especially when Chenle is in the heat of his rage. “The ninth was the worst, hands down.”
“Art and rendering were so solid.” Donghyuck raises a finger, and you’re not sure if it’s to start off a list or to shut Chenle up. You don’t want to ask, anyway, too busy finding amusement in the shifting expressions of despair, rage, anguish, and murderous intent on the latter’s face to speak up. You presume that’s why everyone else isn’t stopping them — or maybe they’re just preparing their own defenses and points to raise. “Intuitive combat and flawless combo chains. The fucking open world? Which other installment in the franchise offers that much depth in the gameplay?”
“Depth? Do you even hear yourself right now?” Chenle grips his head so tightly that when he pulls his hands away, there are actual red marks across his forehead and temple, and his bangs are askew. “What kind of depth comes from cloned movesets? The character designs are so stupidly traditional too. And—”
“There’s a unique kind of beauty in familiarity.”
“The open world was a disaster,” Chenle plows on. “It was so empty, and the map was the farthest thing from intuitive. It’s quite literally the worst thing KOEI has ever done. That’s exactly why they went back to the limited map strategy in later installments. Even the spin-offs.”
“I thought the grappling and ambush systems were pretty intuitive. Ingenious, even.”
It’s a singularly amusing sight — Chenle is one insult to his pride away from imploding, and Donghyuck is just checking the dirt under his nails like he’s waiting in line to take his school ID photo. Park Jisung, one of the quieter ones in the bunch, tries to diffuse the tension by clearing his throat and going ‘I actually really liked the Age Of Calamity Zelda one they released with all the different campaigns,’ but that just goes unnoticed by either party.
“You once failed an ambush play just because you were stuck behind a wall you couldn’t scale. Don’t say shit about the ambush and grappling mechanics.”
“Unlike some people sitting around this table, I learn from my mistakes. That’s also probably why some people — not naming names — just can’t appreciate the artistic beauty that is Dynasty Warriors 9.”
Donghyuck doesn’t even look up from his cuticles when Chenle explodes.
“You’re fucking impossible!”
“Can you guys relax?” Lee Jeno, who had somehow miraculously found the space and silence in the breaths between the entire argument to doze off, opens one eye, only slightly irate. “You’re making a scene over a dead game franchise.”
“It’s not dead; they’re on hiatus,” both Chenle and Donghyuck chime in together, apparently finding a moment of unique solidarity to shoot Jeno down before going back to glaring daggers at each other. Jeno shrugs, gives everyone else at the table an I tried kind of exasperated expression, and settles back into his seat, the one eye already closing before he’s fully folded his arms across his chest.
Your eyes wander away from the group over to the counter. You’re thankful for the fact that most of the time, you just get invited to share a table with them without necessarily being trapped in the middle of a conversation — especially one as heated as the one Chenle is prolonging while jabbing his finger accusingly at Donghyuck, as if he’s trying to pin a crime on the latter instead of just explaining why Donghyuck’s opinion is ‘borne of ignorance.’ When they’re all caught up in their business like this, you end up being able to revel in your more or less unobstructed view of Mark behind the barista’s station, where he’s busy piping an extra helping of whipped cream on top of a strawberry frappuccino for a kid that’s already jumping up and down next to the pick-up station.
The biting winter had already given way to the first signs of spring, and the Starbucks Mark works at has a supremely effective central heating system that allows people to shed their coats. This works in your favor, considering Mark wears nothing but a button-up shirt over his apron while he works, and he’s got this habit of rolling up his sleeves so they don’t catch any stains. You’re pretty sure he has a second motive, though; surely, he’s aware of how the view of his arms, muscles tightening under his skin whenever he even lightly grips something, drives you crazy. You’d bet a month’s allowance he’s doing it on purpose so that you start entertaining the thought of yelling at everyone in the branch to fuck off so you can grab him by the front of his stupid shirt so you can kiss his stupid face. Or ride it.
And for some inexplicable reason, he still has the audacity to act like there’s nothing amiss. When he looks up at you right after pushing the frappuccino towards the little girl, his eyes still brighten, almost innocent in their gaze, the corners of his lips turning up surreptitiously, hiding the smile he seems to save for only you from everyone else in the room.
You smile back, but when he turns away to take someone’s order, you let out a heavy sigh and take a long sip of your vanilla sweet cream cold brew until you start reaching the last dregs of it under the ice. Your brain pretty much cries out in protest, but you know it deserves as much as a mental cold shower for entertaining the thought of asking him to bend you over the counter at five-thirty in the afternoon in a Starbucks.
Stupid Mark. Stupid brain. Stupid fucking people in the room.
The warm breath in your ear alerts you to a slowly approaching presence, but you don’t have the reflexes to turn back to its source before it starts talking.
“Got anything to add to either of our cases, ___________?”
“What?” Your palm comes up to rub your ear as Donghyuck pulls away, laughing lightly. You’re sucked back into the foreground of the conversation, but you’re just as lost now as you had been before you started tuning them out in favor of your lust. “Uh — no. Sorry. To be honest, I know nothing about… sorry, what were you guys talking about again?”
“See, that’s how normal people act,” Jeno grumbles, both his eyes flying open this time. “Instead of hosting a presidential debate about Dynasty Warriors.”
“Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” You’re quick to add, and Jeno looks mildly amused at your attempt to still mollify the rest of the group. “I’m sure I would have liked it. If, you know, I actually had been introduced to it at any point in my life.”
“And if you had, I’m sure you’d have the taste to assert alongside me that the seventh installment was revolutionary,” Chenle sniffs, but he’s looking more pointedly at Donghyuck, who’s still ignoring him, save for the fact that he’s now looking at you instead of at his nails (which doesn’t feel like such a great upgrade).
“Nah, she’d be on my side. ___________ looks like she’d appreciate a good, scenic open world and grappling system. Right?”
“Uh…” you say smartly.
“Man, shut up.” Chenle throws his hands in the air before he stands up, his chair scraping against the floor as he pushes it back with astounding force. “Got me so pissed off I need to pee now.”
You have no idea what the correlation is between getting annoyed and needing to use the bathroom, but even if you wanted to bring up your doubts — which you don’t — Chenle is long gone before you can get your thoughts together. It’s only when he’s out of earshot that Donghyuck leans in, almost conspiratorially, to whisper to you again.
“Actually, I think the ninth sucks too. But isn’t it kind of funny how worked up that fucker gets?”
“To be honest, I’ve never known anyone with quite your talent in riling people up,” you admit, and even though you’re not sure what kind of meaning you want attached to that, you notice that he decides to take it as a compliment all on his own, his chest puffing out in pride. “Too bad I have no idea which opinion is really right, or I’d weigh in, too.”
“Not a Dynasty Warriors kind of girl, then?”
“No one is, Hyuck,” Jeno snorts, shaking his head. “You two are the only people I know who still played that past the fifth installment.”
“Fair. I nurture a love for old franchises.” Donghyuck leans back, looking supremely satisfied at how he’s managed to tick off one of his most important ‘to-do’ points of the day. “So what’s your poison, ___________?”
“What’s that mean?”
“You a Gardenscapes kind of girl? Tekken? Maybe you like some good ol’ fashioned LoL?”
“I honestly don’t have the hand-eye coordination to play,” you confess. “I know Mark likes to play PUBG from time to time. I mostly just sit and ask questions, though. The few times I tried playing with him, I swear any normal person would’ve cried. He had to babysit me like crazy. It was a miracle he didn’t throw me out.”
“She even tries to play with him,” Donghyuck whistles lowly. “Dude, how’d Mark get a chick like you?”
“Meaning?”
“You’re way too good for that dope.” His laugh is light and good-natured. “Never thought a moony-eyed weirdo like him would actually wind up with his dream girl — which he’s called you, more than once, by the way. Fucking disgusting, but… I get it. Doesn’t make it less crazy or weird to hear, though.”
“Sorry to put you through that.” You smile, using your straw to stir the contents of your cup. A warmth spreads through your shoulders and down your arms to the tips of your fingers as you digest what Donghyuck’s just said to you, and you find your eyes trailing back to Mark, who’s pulling off his apron. His eyes are already fixed on you, and when you lock gazes, he mouths a wait for me that makes you want to squeeze the life out of something in pure joy. You settle for a soft sigh. “I guess it won’t help if I say your friend over there’s my dream guy.”
“It absolutely will not,” Donghyuck groans, faking a gagging noise that has you laughing. “But tell you what — if you ever get tired of Mark playing PUBG and ignoring you like the clown he is, I’ll find you someone else more your speed.”
“No thanks,” you snort, taking the last sip of your drink. “More than that, I’d just want to be some kind of helpful to him if I ever play with him again.”
“We can help you with that too,” Jisung volunteers. “Jeno taught me the basics. I’m sure he can teach you too.”
“Yeah, and I’m guessing you’d be a better student than mister “how come you didn’t tell me I had to focus the crosshairs myself” over here,” Jeno chuckles, surreptitiously pointing at Jisung when you cast him a questioning look.
“I’m pretty good at sneak attacks myself.” Donghyuck makes a show of pretending to slice your neck before grinning smugly. “We’ll take care of you. Mark won’t know what hit him next time.”
“What’s happening to me next time?”
You feel Mark before you see him, his hand landing on your head lightly and smoothing your hair back in an idle, gentle motion to announce his presence. You look up at him, already beaming, and he returns the favor as his hand settles on your shoulder.
“We were just talking about replacing you. Both as a friend and as a boyfriend, for your poor little dream girl here who’s just too nice to turn you down.” Donghyuck lies like it’s second nature; you wonder if that’s a Finance major thing or just a him thing.
“And you’re offering that to someone who didn’t ask for it?” Mark snorts, nudging Chenle’s bag over so he can sit in the empty spot.
“She’s so caught up in your sticky little web that she can’t struggle against you.” Donghyuck feigns a heavy sigh that suggests he feels sorry for you before he puts a hand on your free shoulder, shaking his head in a convincing kind of pity. “I’ll save you, so don’t worry. Mark can’t keep his grubby hands on you forever. Whenever you need to be saved, I’ll come a-running to free you.”
There’s a tightness on one shoulder that disrupts the balance of your torso, and you find yourself leaning closer to Mark. Your hand finds its way to his knee, giving it a light squeeze under the table, and his grip loosens by a fraction. Donghyuck’s as quick to let go as he is to hang on.
“We were just talking about PUBG,” you correct, and Mark’s eyes snap to you. “I was asking for help — you know, so I won���t drag you down the next time I join in?”
“I don’t mind whatever you do in-game.” He’s quick to comfort you, even if you don’t actually need it, but it feels warm and cold “I’m just glad you wanna try it with me.”
“No, but I kind of want to learn too. So it can be fun for both of us. Also so you don’t have to keep avenging me after five minutes,” you laugh. Mark cracks a smile then, and you don’t realize his expression had been slightly harder until it softens under your gaze.
“Then I’ll teach you next time.”
“No, I want to surprise you with how cool I get. And then next time, I’ll even beat you.” You turn to Donghyuck, slightly unsure. “Uh… I can beat him, can’t I?”
“If you play different teams, yeah,” he confirms. “Trust me. I’ll help you kick his ass.”
“Or we’ll both kick yours,” Mark chuckles, his grasp now tightening and loosening intermittently. He’s massaging your shoulder lightly, and you end up sinking deeper into his side. You don’t miss the slightly nauseated amusement that passes across Donghyuck’s face nor the way he mouths ‘sap’ to Mark, who ignores this comment in its entirety.
“Yo, hotpot at seven? Renjun’s asking,” Chenle announces as he returns to your table, his phone in one hand and a crumpled paper towel in the other. “Jaemin can’t make it, though. Study group or whatever shit he always says.”
“I’m down,” Donghyuck immediately replies, and Chenle’s eyes shoot heavenward, like he’s already asking for the divine strength to not sock Donghyuck in the face later.
“Can’t,” Jeno yawns, both his arms outstretched as he tries to move the sleep out of his spine. “Pre-test tomorrow.”
“Dude, it’s a pre-test,” Donghyuck rolls his eyes. “You don’t have to study if they’re just testing how much you know before studying.”
“Gotta study all the same.”
“I gotta pass too,” Jisung looks actually apologetic. “I promised my mom I’d help her move some stuff to my aunt’s place tonight.”
“Boring,” Chenle grumbles before turning to the both of you. “Lovebirds?”
“Rain check,” Mark shakes his head. “Family dinner. My brother’s home for the weekend. How about Monday instead? Most of us can’t make it anyway. At least Jaemin doesn’t have study group either.”
“If that’s even what that weirdo’s doing,” Chenle sighs, already punching in a message to send to Renjun. “Fine; I’ll ask about Monday. You guys better actually reply to the goddamn group chat. I can’t coordinate in six different private chats ever again.”
“You can put my name down already,” Mark casts you a sideway glance, and you nod immediately. “Two names, actually.”
“I’m good on Monday too. When we see each other again, I’ll bring some prospects for you to sift through,” Donghyuck adds to you, and you laugh. “Cool guys. Jocks. I know this upperclassman all the girls say is really hot. I think I still have his Messenger from when we did a group discussion last semester.”
“I’ll have Mark look at them so he can reject them all for me,” you promise. Donghyuck feigns affront before looking at Mark in utter disbelief.
“How the fuck did you snag a girl like this, man?”
“I’m pretty sure she once told me I… what did you say?” Mark glances at you amusedly. “I had some moves, I guess.”
“You mean stutter and blush in her presence?” Donghyuck can’t decide how to look at you without being even the slightest bit offensive; he just settles on incredulity. “And that won you over?”
“Most powerful move in the Mark Lee playbook,” you shrug, grinning. “Had me from the first ‘um,’ and he’s had me ever since.”
“You lucky son of a bitch,” Donghyuck snorts, and neither of you misses the slightly abashed but unmistakable smugness in Mark’s face when you lean in to rest your head on his shoulder.
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The second time it happens is on that Monday, in a far more noticeable capacity. You just aren’t quick enough to read the signs, as usual.
But in your defense (again), it hadn’t felt all that significant.
“Fuck, this is spicy,” Na Jaemin sucks air in through his teeth and lets it out in a sharp whistle that’s broken by a laugh that’s not necessarily at anything funny. Maybe he’s just laughing at the sheen of sweat across his forehead that he has to wipe off with the other side of his napkin.
Miraculously, the hotpot plan pushes through, with no small amount of effort in coordination on Chenle’s part; he’d even texted you just to make sure he’d gotten the head count right, despite the fact that Mark had already confirmed your attendance twice over. Even the often elusive Na Jaemin, who always seems to have one or another study group to attend on most nights, manages to come and is currently busy mixing his peanut sauce in his little bowl with such vigor that you can’t help but wonder if he’s not trying to drown the mala-flavored strips of meat in it completely.
“That’s why I said you need a bowl of water for dipping, you dimwit,” Donghyuck points his chopsticks at Jaemin’s messy plate in a way you can only describe as nagging, even if that’s actually impossible. “You’ve got super mala breath now.”
“Don’t know about me, but I can smell yours all the way from over here,” Jaemin quips back with an easy kind of nonchalance, hastily ducking the balled-up napkin that goes flying across the table. It lands on the floor behind his chair harmlessly.
It’s nice, you think, that Mark’s friends like to invite you to their outings now; despite all the jokes they’ve made at his expense, they’ve been consistently open to having you around. You’re not necessarily the type of couple that acts in a way that disgusts people into moving to a completely different table anyway, and you allow their conversations to unfold easily without ever interrupting, so you think that this arrangement works for all parties involved.
They’re even louder outside Starbucks, you’ve come to note; the restaurant is significantly busier than the cafe anyway, filled with people on their company dinners, so Mark’s friends all seem to want to rival that boisterous energy. Weirdly, you like it, even when they’re already half off their seats and one (Chenle) is just about to strangle the other (Donghyuck). The laughter flows freely, and there’s a messiness to the whole affair that makes it impossible to feel uncomfortable.
Even Mark pipes in occasionally, offering his opinion on topics he knows much more about than you, and you can’t help but admire how everyone listens to him when he starts to speak, even if he has nothing realistically important to say. His friends might find it odd that you’d been so drawn to him, but they just don’t know that even they’re victims of Mark’s natural magnetism, also falling quiet and eager to hear his voice, his light-hearted laugh, in response to the things they say.
But even when he’s mostly distracted by conversation, there’s a part of him that continuously pays attention to you in his own way. He nudges his ginger and soy sauce bowl towards you with the side of his wrist so you can dip your beef in, even if you’d adamantly declined him giving you your own bowl of it in the first place (you’d always thought you were peanut sauce or nothing kind of girl, but one sneaky venture into Mark’s sauce proved you wrong). His hand hovers over your head when you drop your chopsticks and bend over to pick them up from where they’ve rolled under the table, making sure you’re bump-free when you resurface.
And his palms always, always settle somewhere on you, no matter what he’s doing. If one hand is busy feeding himself, the other is intent on warming your thigh, passing over the denim in slow, steady strokes. His fingers tickle your knee when you laugh, just to make you laugh a little harder — you’d even almost kneed the table at one point, much to Huang Renjun’s alarm. But the most common place for his arm is around you, fingers lightly bunched into the side of your shirt, like he’s worried loosening his grip on you further will cause you to vanish. It keeps him close to you, keeps his scent and warmth washing over you in gentle waves, so much so that you often have to remind yourself that he’ll be the target of much light-hearted mockery if you so much as lean into him and rest your head on his shoulder.
But it’s hard to resist it, especially when his hand seems to be intent on outlining every curve on that side, passing over your hip and dipping into your waist. The motion allows him to slowly but surely lift the fabric of your shirt, up until there’s just enough of an opening for his palm to slip under, and suddenly it’s much warmer on that side, with the light roughness of his hand grazing at your skin. His fingers always stretch apart, like he’s trying to feel as much of you as he can, and the pads of his digits have a tendency to graze the plane of your stomach — his nails sometimes even travel featherlight just next to your navel, etching out words you can’t really decipher. Like he’s writing a message just for you.
It makes you feel like no matter what he’s doing, a part of his mind is always on you.
“You guys want to see that new horror movie? The Ghost Within, I think it’s called,” Jisung asks the group from over at the other end of the table, having to raise his voice significantly to make sure it isn’t swept away by the raucous laughter from across the restaurant. “I think it’s coming out in a week or two.”
“I’d be okay with it,” Renjun shrugs, although he doesn’t look enthused. “Kind of looks like a cliche horror with all those cheap jump scares and shit, but I’m down if you all are.”
A wave of assent passes over the group in general, but you notice Mark doesn’t immediately respond. You take this opportunity to lean in and confess your stance.
“If I have to sit around and watch a ghost pop out at me from a big-ass movie screen, you may never again see me in the same wonderful light you do today,” you warn. “Remember me as I am, not as I will be, Mark Lee.”
He snorts, coughing lightly as a mixture of ginger and fishcake sticks in his throat. “Yeah — we’ll pass, I think.”
“Scaredy-cat,” Donghyuck teases, and you’re surprised that Mark doesn’t come to his own defense. There’s something romantic in him not wanting to be the one to sell you out, but you suppose there’s also a kind of chivalry in being the one to take the bullet.
“Actually, I’m the one who can’t handle it well,” you smile in apology. “Sorry. I don’t have much of a reputation, so to speak, but what elegance may be attached to my name, however misplaced, is something I really want to maintain. At least until I graduate.”
“In short, you don’t want Mark to see you scream and cry,” Chenle deduces. You can’t even find fault in him figuring it out so quickly.
“Bingo.”
“Well, we can solve the problem,” Donghyuck claps his hands, getting everyone’s attention for no good reason. “__________, you sit beside me, and Mark can sit on the far end of the row. With how dark it is, he won’t see anything, and I get to sit next to a cute girl in a movie theater. Win-win.”
“Thanks for the offer,” you laugh, shaking your head. “But it’s not a win-win if I accidentally grab your hand out of instinct.”
“It is to me,” Donghyuck winks, and you feel Mark’s hand stop brushing over your stomach. His fingers curl in lightly, almost like he’s trying to make a fist but can’t quite get to that point out of personal restraint. “Or better yet, you could do what we all think you should do and dump Mark for someone you won’t be ashamed to cry in front of. I, for one, would not even bother to comment on whatever emotions you’re going through in the middle of a movie, so what do you say? It’s a pretty sweet deal, in my humble opinion. Me versus Mark Lee. The showdown of the century, right here in Hai Di Lao.”
You’ve noticed that the more Donghyuck piles onto his little teasing rampage, the more forcefully Mark tugs you over; his fingers aren’t just skimming over your skin but have now grown into the habit of gently pinching it, as if begging for your attention. It feels nice but also a little urgent, although it’s hard for you to understand why; the whole foundation of this group is built on teasing each other until someone (Chenle) snaps and lobs a bottle cap at someone else (Donghyuck), so it should be normal for Mark to be at the receiving end of some light banter.
“Should we ask the hostess to referee the match, then?” You ride along with the joke.
“No way. You’re the one calling the shots.” Donghyuck sits up a little straighter, putting on a smug face. “Okay, pick, __________. Me or Mark; who’s got the better punches?”
You make a show of acting thoughtful, even tapping your chin to pretend considering it deeply, but there was never any doubt on your choice. Still, you can’t really decipher the sudden slowness, the light tremble in Mark’s palm as it travels to your hip, where it settles, heavy, over the curve.
“It’s a complete knock-out,” you finally announce, grinning. “Championship belt goes to Mark.”
“Man, if I had a girlfriend as straight-shooting about her feelings for me as you are about your feelings for Mark, I’d propose in a day, max,” Jeno groans, half-exasperated and half-amused all at once.
“Man must’ve saved a nation or something in his past life,” Donghyuck grimaces. “No way he deserves a girl this hot and crazy about him. Hey — got any tips on stopping natural disasters or something? I could use a sexy, loyal girlfriend in my next life. Or maybe I’ll just poach yours in this one and see what it feels like.”
“I would actually deck you, so don’t even try it,” Mark snorts, his arm now winding full around your waist. You’re flush against his side, and he uses this opportunity to do something he doesn’t often do in front of his friends: show explicit affection by pressing a light kiss just behind your ear. It tickles, his breath grazing your earlobe, and you giggle, squirming in his hold. All he does is smile and pull you in tighter.
The bill’s split eight ways, but Mark’s fishing out cash to pay for your share even before you can get your wallet out from the bottom of your bag; it’s one of those quick, instinctive moves he likes to use on you, where he pushes the money and sends the bill back to the staff before you can even protest in full, so you have to settle on thanking him by returning the earlier favor — landing a peck on his cheek, which flushes a warm and contented pink the moment your lips make contact.
You just pointedly ignore the snickers that run around the table, particularly from Donghyuck and Jaemin.
The group splits ways at the front of the school dorms; most of them head in after their goodbyes, while Chenle backtracks towards his apartment building off-campus, mumbling something about how he hopes his roommate’s in because he accidentally left his key in the bowl next to their doorway. Mark should be piling in with the rest into the dorms, but he has a habit of insisting that he take you to the subway station; you’ve long since given up on convincing him against tagging along, mostly because he looks slightly hurt whenever you try to get him to stay put. You’re not going to complain anyway; for as much as you like being around Mark’s friends, it’s even better when you have this little slice of alone time despite the hassle it brings him.
Your fingers are linked when you walk under the street lights, the campus road leading to the station entrance significantly less busy at this time of evening; it’s cool enough for you to have an excuse to press yourself into Mark’s form, and he accepts this additional burden with an immense amount of grace, his arm finding its way around you again. Two minutes later, his palm is pressed against your bare skin once more, rubbing small, gentle circles just above your pelvis.
A part of you wonders if you’ll be able to do this — lean in, flush against him — when the summer heat starts to stick, but rather than really worrying about the logistics, you realize you’re more hung up on the idea of spending this summer with him.
“Sorry,” Mark murmurs out of the blue. Your eyebrows shoot up, and he looks down at you sheepishly. “Isn’t hanging out with my friends kind of driving you crazy?”
You hum in thought before shaking your head in resolution. “Not really. Not in a bad way, at least. I like how close you guys all are — and how big the group is. It’s usually just Yeji and Jisu with me, and they’re definitely not as rowdy. The change of pace is pretty fun.”
“Yeji and Jisu,” he echoes. “Your best friends. I haven’t met them yet, have I?”
“Not yet. Jisu started a part-time job across town, so we can’t get our schedules to align right just yet.” Your hip collides gently with his. “Should I let you, though?”
“One day… I think it would be nice to hang out with a less migraine-inducing crowd for a change.”
“I’ll tell them, then. They want to meet you.” You crane your neck up slightly, lowering your voice into a hushed whisper that’s completely unnecessary. “They want to know if you’re as cute as you look in your pictures.”
Mark draws back, laughing incredulously. “How do they know what my pictures look like?”
“I stalked your Instagram and showed them,” you answer simply. He throws you a funny look that’s equal parts disbelief and amusement. “They liked that one with the Spider-man costume.”
“Please don’t,” he groans, passing a hand over his face. “I should have taken that down, but I didn’t think anyone would care.”
“Why? I like it.” Your hand’s the one that manages to slip under his sweater this time, fingers trailing down his stomach; you feel him suck it in for a second in surprise before he lets out an exhale.
“I can’t ever understand what’s going through your head,” he chuckles, and you think it’s unfair that he manages to extract your hand from under the fabric while his is still firmly pressed against the side of your stomach. “You saw that and still wanted to date me?”
“Mark Lee, you simply underestimate how much I adore you. It’s kind of hurting my feelings at this rate.”
You’re just a few inches shy of the circle of light cast by the subway station sign. Your feet try to bring you forward, but Mark lingers behind, just outside the curve of soft white on the pavement, and his hand slips from under your shirt. You turn, and his hand skims down your arm instead, fingers locking around your wrist. With the slight distance between you, it looks like you’re caught in motion.
“I still can’t wrap my head around it sometimes.”
“What?”
“I just look over at you and feel like it’s not real. Like you’re going to disappear, and I’m just going to wake up from a dream and see you the next day, just some other stranger who doesn’t even know my name.” He licks his lips, and you want to reach out and kiss him already, but you know he isn’t done talking. “And I’m going to remember how much I liked you in that dream, but you won’t ever feel that same way.”
“You know I’m right here, though, don’t you?” Your fingers mimic his, squeezing around his wrist. “You can feel me. I’m here with you.”
Hesitation flashes across his face even when he nods, and you notice his eyes flit down to his shoes before looking back up at you — a habit of avoidance you know he’s trying to correct. “Sometimes I have to wonder if they’re right.”
“If… who’s right?”
“Them.” He jerks his thumb back in the general direction of the school dorms. “The guys. You know — when they ask me how I got a girl like you… the truth is, I don’t even really know. They can’t believe it, and it’s so crazy to me that I still sometimes can’t myself. So I start wondering if—”
You don’t let him finish this time; it’s rude to interrupt, you know, but you also know that what he’s about to say is probably something neither of you wants to hear anyway. Your lips connect with his, firm and demanding, and his words die in his throat, melting into a soft groan that vibrates against your skin. When you pull away, you don’t create the same distance, and Mark’s hands find their way to your waist, slightly trembling.
“They’re wrong,” you murmur, a quiet strength in your voice. “So stop wondering and just be with me.”
A smile starts tugging on the corners of his mouth, and the next moment, he’s nodding in assent, in wholehearted agreement, and the next kiss you share is one he starts, far more gentle than earlier.
“Next time I catch you entertaining nonsensical thoughts, there’ll be consequences.”
“Are you threatening me?” His laugh is colored with incredulity.
“Yes.” Your tone is firm, but your grin gives away too much of the jest. “Maybe I’ll ground you for a week, or something really childish.”
“I’d take it if you were with me.”
“That’s not how it works,” you snort, gently flicking the tip of his nose. He scrunches it on impact. “You’d be in solitary. You must reflect on your actions and all that nonsense. Meanwhile, I’ll be out having some good hotpot with everyone else.”
“If that happens, promise me one thing, then.” He maneuvers your stance until you’re both back in the blanket of darkness, just out of reach of the subway entrance. “Don’t sit next to Donghyuck.”
“And let him and Chenle give me an earful about how bad-slash-good the first Human Centipede movie was all over again? I think not.”
“No, really.” Mark buries his face into your neck, and you hear the quiet inhale as he breathes in your scent. On instinct, your hand comes up to thread through his hair, nails gently scratching at his scalp. “I don’t want you sitting there and hearing him talk your ear off about how much I don’t deserve you or that he’ll help you find someone better.”
“You know he’s just joking — and I’m just joking, right?”
“Just promise me.”
You pause, wondering if it’s in your best interest to tease him for whatever act he’s pulling, but there’s a shortness to his breathing that makes the whole situation feel weirdly tense. He’s really waiting for something — an answer. The right answer, maybe.
“I promise,” you finally say, and you know you’ve said the correct thing when Mark’s lips press a soft kiss to your collarbone, like he’s sealing in your vow.
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On the third time, Mark pretty much gives up.
The strangest thing is that it starts at a time when you’re not even actually together; if you had to pinpoint the exact moment, it probably had to be when Donghyuck had walked you to the dorm from library. No — maybe even before that. Somewhere in the time you’d spent in there, he’d thought up yet another way to push Mark’s buttons. You just didn’t really know the exact minute he’d first seen you with Jung Jaehyun.
You don’t know how Jaehyun does it; he skips half his classes and somehow doesn’t even get in trouble, let alone fail. You’d only met him last semester, but he was just about the only person who was halfway familiar in your Anthropology 120 class, so you thought you could at least feel comfortable enough to chat with him about the weather or what had happened in the last meeting. You don’t expect him to strong-arm you into being something of a literal proxy for him; the first week of the semester, you’d spend almost each lecture period gnawing on your nails and fretting over the fact that your signature for attendance looked nothing like his. By the second week, you’d already come to realize that it doesn’t matter because he had only attended one lecture — the first one — thus far and your professor was as clueless about Jaehyun’s handwriting as you. By the fourth week, you had resigned yourself to being his slightly unwilling associate for his random escapades, allowing him to copy off your notes and turning in his homework for him.
Now that you think about it, that’s probably how he does it.
You sacrifice your free time for him today, caged up in a library for pretty much the afternoon. You can’t help but resent him, not just because the whole room is stuffy and the librarian keeps passing by, clucking to remind people not to litter between shelves, but also because you’d much rather do things that are important to you — like pretending to flirt with Mark for the first time when you place your order and watching him act like it’s the first time you’re saying something so sweet to him, except he’s definitely not pretending. Instead of watching Mark’s face color that cute shade of pink and that sweet little smile pull at his mouth until he’s basically biting his lips back to stop himself from grinning, you have to bore yourself with the sight of Jaehyun trying to decipher your handwriting.
“You should really be more legible with your strokes.” He has the audacity to chastise you as if he’s the one doing you a favor by giving you constructive criticism.
“You should really come to class more often,” you bite back, although there’s no real heat to your words. You just look out the window and watch the sun sink down behind the university hospital building, wondering if there’s a chance you’ll still be able to catch Mark before his shift ends.
“Would if I could.”
“You actually fucking can,” you say tiredly, and even the way he turns the page is so impossibly slow. “Can’t you just take a picture?”
“Nah; writing it down carefully really helps my retention of this kind of stuff.”
“So take a picture and then write it down carefully.”
“With your ridiculous handwriting? I’d probably fail.”
“So come to class and write it yourself!”
Your hiss increases in pitch, and it calls the attention of the librarian over to you. She swoops in, clicking her tongue, but she’s not even looking at you. Her eyes are zoned in on Jaehyun, who meets her gaze with so much innocence it’s hard to imagine you’d wanted to smack him two minutes ago.
“Jung Jaehyun,” the librarian snaps in an undertone. The slow, punctuated way she says his name suggests she knows him fairly well — and not in a great way. “I see you’re back in here after your probationary period.”
“Sorry for the trouble, Mrs. Park.” He grins up at her, looking anything but apologetic. “I promise I won’t get in your way again today.”
“And this one—” She points to you, and you point to yourself in shock at being pointed to, and Jaehyun’s pointing at you and mouthing ‘this one’ with excessive mirth in his eyes. “Isn’t another one of those girls you plan on defiling my sacred space with?”
Jaehyun says ‘we didn’t defile anything’ at the same time you say I’m going to throw up, and the librarian just adds to the noise by shushing you on top of that jumble of words.
“I’ll be keeping a close eye on you two,” Mrs. Park warns before stalking away, tutting at a library assistant for wrongly shelving a volume of Encyclopedia Brittanica.
“Please, Jaehyun,” you groan, crossing your arms over the table and flattening your forehead against them. “Just hurry up. Release me.”
He ignores you, still leaning closer to your notebook to decipher your handwriting. “I would like to set the record straight and make it known I didn’t fuck anyone in the library.”
“What’d you get probation for, then?”
“Just making out.” You notice he has the energy to grin wickedly even without meeting your eye, even while he’s still scrawling on his own notebook, and you groan something incoherent and irate once again. “What are you in such a big hurry for, anyway?”
“Has it ever occurred to you,” you grumble, raising your head. “That some people might want to do better things than sit here and watch you write stuff for ages?”
“No,” comes his simple reply. You bop your head onto your arms a few times in the hope that the impact will shake you out of this nightmare and you’d find yourself waking up in Mark’s arms instead, but you have no such luck. “By better things, do you mean fucking Mark Lee in someone else’s bedroom? That’s real defilement, by the way.”
“How’d you hear about that?” You squeeze your eyes shut and growl under your breath. “Fucking Youngho.”
“You doing that too?”
“Shut — please, would you hurry?”
He pointedly purses his lips in an effort to keep himself from letting out what you can only assume is, by the glint in his eyes, a witch’s cackle. “Almost done, man. Relax a bit. So did you guys get together — like, together together?”
You initially contemplate not telling him, but Jaehyun’s nosiness is probably going to reveal the truth to him sooner or later anyway. “Yeah. What’s it to you, though?”
“Nothing. You’re lucky.”
For the first time today, you feel like Jaehyun has finally said something right. “Yeah — yeah, I am.”
“I bet his friends don’t seem to think so.”
“Is this something you know because it’s a guy thing or because you’re so nosy that you just can’t help but listen in on every other juicy conversation around you?”
“A bit of both,” he chuckles. “Mostly just because I know Lee Donghyuck was giving him a hard time about it last semester.”
“I noticed that too — a bit, anyway. But it’s just banter, I think.”
“Probably. Imagine being his friend and getting a girlfriend; it’s like… the perfect ammunition for teasing. But I’m pretty sure half of the things that come out of his mouth are jokes meant to annoy.”
“What about yours?”
“I get it,” he sighs, shutting your notebook resolutely. It makes a thud that alerts the librarian two tables away, and she glares at you like you’re climbing onto Jaehyun’s lap in the middle of the References on the Korean War aisle. “I’ll set you free. Thanks, by the way, for letting me copy from you. Same time next week?”
“Or how about you look up the schedules for our classes and actually come instead of piggybacking off of my efforts and making snarky remarks about my handwriting while you’re taking advantage of my goodwill?”
“Sounds like too much effort on my end,” he yawns, waving you off as you stuff your notebook into your bag. “Later, ___________. Say hi to Mark for me. The normal way — not the girlfriend way, please.”
You stick your tongue out at him before you make a mad dash for the door, ignoring Mrs. Park as she shushes your footsteps on the marble. You’re so intent on fishing your phone out of your bag that you almost ram the door into the person standing behind it.
“Oh, fuck— Jesus, I’m sorry, I wa— wait, Donghyuck?”
“Great to see you too, ___________.” He rubs his jaw where the edge of the door grazed it. “You in a rush?”
“I was just about to go see if Mark was still at Starbucks.”
“His shift’s probably almost over. I’m headed back to the dorm if you wanna tag along.” When you nod, he starts leading the way, breaking the silence again soon after. “Were you in a study group, or something?”
“No,” you jerk your thumb backwards towards the minuscule form of Jaehyun, who’s now busy wasting time and space playing something on his phone where you’d left him. Donghyuck’s eyebrows shoot up. “He’s my classmate who never comes to class. I was just lending him my notes.”
“Oh, Jaehyun, yeah.” Donghyuck snaps his fingers. “We were classmates last semester. He never went to class either, but I don’t know who he mooched off of to pass. You guys close?”
“Not really. I just fell into the trap of being too nice to him.”
“It’s funny,” he hums, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “Jaehyun seems more your speed. On paper, at least.”
You can’t help but look taken aback, and Donghyuck laughs at your expression. “What do you mean, my speed?”
“Not sure.” He pauses, trying to find the right words to explain himself. “Someone who’d fit more into your social circles. Someone who probably likes Formula One and considers men’s health magazines to be classic literature.”
“That’s your impression of my social circle?”
“You know what I mean. People like Jung Jaehyun or Seo Youngho. I literally thought you were dating him last semester, so it was totally crazy to hear you asked Mark out.” He scratches the back of his neck. “Like… you asked him out. Not even the other way around. That’s ridiculous.”
“Why?” You know he doesn’t mean anything bad by it; Donghyuck has next to no filter, and something about him being unable to process your relationship is honestly a little funny. “A girl can’t ask a guy out?”
(You try not to think too hard about the fact that up until you’d cornered him in Youngho’s room, you had been praying to whatever god could hear you to convince Mark Lee to do the romanticist thing and ask you out.)
“Nah, dude. Like… a girl like you asked a guy like him out.”
“I didn’t ask him out because he was a guy like that,” you say pointedly. “I asked him out because he was a guy I liked. I wouldn’t have asked anyone else out if it weren’t him.”
Donghyuck falls quiet for a while, and only the crunching of the leaves underfoot accompanies your walk. “You really like him that much, huh?”
“I’m crazy about him.” His nose scrunches up like he’s been hit with a horrible smell, and you laugh. “Can you stop giving him a hard time? Or tone it down? I know you probably don’t like it—”
Donghyuck’s chuckle is light and easy. “I’m not teasing him because I hate it; let’s be clear on that. I actually really like that you guys are together. I’ve never seen him this happy with anything or anyone.”
“Then why are you—”
“Because he’s Mark.” A devilish grin creeps up his features as he holds the door to the dorm lobby open for you. “And teasing him is my favorite thing to do.”
You shake your head; you can’t help your amusement, but you’re not sure you fully understand this kind of friendship. You suppose if Mark is okay with it in its totality, then there isn’t much you can say to change it either.
The next twenty minutes pass in comfortable back-and-forths; Donghyuck is, as you already have learned, an expert conversationalist, and while he doesn’t aggravate you the way he does Chenle, he does manage to navigate a quick-fire kind of exchange of thoughts and information that allows you to see the speed at which he thinks. There’s barely any lag between when he digests what you say and when he responds. You suppose there’s a measure of wit in that, but it’s also a little bemusing to see someone speak without at least running it through the conscience checker every once in a while. You decide you’ve never met anyone quite like Lee Donghyuck before.
He’s in the middle of asking you what the Anthropology professor is like because he’s planning on taking it as an elective if he can when you notice a familiar figure pushing into the lobby, backpack swinging on a folded elbow.
“Mark!” The brief confusion on his face morphs into a surprised joy when he spots you on the couch, even though a bit of it lingers upon recognizing that Donghyuck is seated next to you. He walks over in long strides, and your posture straightens to meet his palm as it comes down gently against the crown of your head again; it bumps lightly, causing the both of you to laugh.
“Hey, you.” His voice is warm and fond in its greeting, and you beam up at him. “Did you have a busy afternoon?”
“Unfortunately. Did you just get back from your shift?”
“I passed by the co-op to check out the new university letter jackets. Design’s pretty dope.” He nods towards the elevator. “You wanna head up for a little bit?” You almost get to respond before your companion cuts in instead.
“Hey. Can’t you see we’re having a riveting conversation over here?” Donghyuck sniffs, making a show of hitting Mark’s shin lightly with the heel of his shoe. “Have some respect.”
“Is the conversation so riveting that I can’t take my girl for the evening at all?”
You mouth out a no, but Donghyuck’s flair for dramatics has him humphing and shoving Mark’s hand away from your hair. “Yeah, man. At least let us finish up.”
“What’s this even about?”
“How Jung Jaehyun asked her out in the library today,” Donghyuck replies easily. You start, shaking your head immediately, but Mark’s jaw slackens a little upon hearing this. Donghyuck continues loudly over your protests, and you can’t keep your voice straight because you’re adamant and yet, somehow, still laughing incredulously in your shock. “Oh, dude, let me tell you. He had his arm around her like this — and he was giving her the bedroom eyes… I wouldn’t have blamed her if she folded, honestly.”
“Mark, no,” your stupid gasp comes out as half a giggle as a result of Donghyuck trying to reenact his imaginary scenario. He’s slung his arm across your shoulders and pulled himself in, doing his best expression of a pleading dog’s gaze, which is both perplexing and hilarious. “He’s just kidding—”
“Then he got all close like this—” Donghyuck presses his forehead against yours, and the view he allows himself blocks him from having to look at Mark. You, on the other hand, are still trying to resist a misunderstanding, your palms up and every part of your body that can move shaking vehemently, but you can see Mark’s face turn a violent shade of red you can’t remember having seen from him before. “Spoke all low — you remember he had that sexy, husky voice, right? ”
“He’s just messing with you,” you wheeze out, trying to extract yourself from Donghyuck’s hold, but he only tightens his arm around your neck, almost to the point where you can’t inhale properly.
“And he said ‘you’re the hottest chick I’ve ever seen—’ then you know what he did, Markie?”
Mark doesn’t respond; you’re not even sure if he can, considering his Adam’s apple is bobbing dangerously like he’s one misstep away from exploding. You laugh again, stupidly, because you don’t know what else to do; you know Donghyuck’s teasing him, and you know Mark usually takes it in stride, but you’ve also never seen the latter look so focused on anything that didn’t involve a math problem or eating you out. “No, really, nothing hap—”
You don’t even have the space to finish your sentence. Donghyuck’s too quick when he grabs your face and plants a comedically sloppy kiss on your cheek, bursting out in laughter when he pulls away. You can only sit there, probably as stunned as Mark looks, raising your hand slowly to wipe the spittle Donghyuck left behind in his wake.
“Oh, Jesus,” Donghyuck rasps out between snorts. “Your face is priceless, man.”
“Not funny,” Mark grumbles, and there’s a hoarseness to his voice that makes you feel like it’s barely controlled.
“Also not true. I just bumped into her on the way from the library. We were talking about one of her classes or whatever.” Donghyuck dramatically wipes the tears from his eyes, and you sigh, nudging him. “Sorry, sorry. I couldn’t resist. Man, don’t even worry. She’s downright crazy about you. Even if Jung Jaehyun had asked her out—”
“Anyway.” Mark reaches down, lacing your fingers together, pulling you up and closer to his side like he’s worried you’ll catch Donghyuck’s crazy. “If that’s all of it…”
“Yeah, yeah. You two lovebirds go moon over each other already. I just love seeing your face like that.”
Mark snorts, yanking on Donghyuck’s earlobe punitively, and the latter cries out sharply (and a little exaggeratedly) at the pain. Mark doesn’t even seem to care; he leads you to the elevator and punches in his floor. You barely have time to call out a belated ‘bye’ to Donghyuck, who acknowledges it with a raise of his palm, before the doors slide shut.
It’s a slow elevator, given that it’s an old building, and the first couple of floors pass without much noise between the two of you. You’re not unaware of how tight Mark’s grip is on your hand, but you don’t comment nor take it against him. By the fourth floor, you’re raising his hand up to your lips and pressing a kiss against his knuckles.
“Nothing happened.” You confirm his unasked question, and you see a modicum of tension leave his shoulders. “He was just messing with you because he thinks it’s funny.”
“Yeah, I know.” Even if he says it like that, there’s still lingering doubt in his voice. “Were you with Jung Jaehyun today, though? Is that why you didn’t show up?”
You nod. “He was copying my notes for Anthropology. Guy barely shows up to lectures, so he borrows my stuff. I can’t believe he hasn’t been suspended yet. Or punched in the face by the people he leeches off of.”
“No kidding.”
You step out on the sixth floor with him. Even if you already know where Mark’s dorm is, you let him lead the way, and he ushers you into an empty and dimly lit living space while taking his shoes off. His roommate barely seems to be around; you’ve seen him all of two times, and it doesn’t look like he’s here either right now. You pause anyway, listening to any signs of life just to be sure, but when you both confirm that there’s no one but the two of you, you busy yourselves with turning on the lights and plugging in the water dispenser.
You work in relative silence; it isn’t anything unusual since you’ve done this a million times, and you’ve come to learn that small talk isn’t necessary when you’re just washing your hands or opening the refrigerator aimlessly even if you know you both plan on ordering in. But there’s a weird aura around Mark that you’re not sure how to place; he doesn’t seem like he’s mad, but there definitely seems to be something off — a problem, at least, that you’re not sure you know how to ask about.
So you just try to diffuse whatever it is by completely ignoring it.
“Pizza or Chinese?” You ask, flopping onto the couch as he plugs the television into the outlet. He looks up at you, and you notice his eyes are slightly dazed, like you’ve just woken him up from a dream. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” His voice is hoarse the first time he says it, so he clears his throat and tries again. “Yeah, sorry.”
“What’s on your mind?”
“We just had pizza, so I’m thinking Chinese is the better option. Cream shrimp? Fried rice? Not the salted fish one, though, maybe.”
You hum in assent, but when he straightens up from behind the television, you extend your arm to him, attempting to clarify yourself. “I mean, what are you thinking so hard about?”
“Nothing.” His answer’s a little too quick. A moment of awkward silence passes where you telepathically tell him you know he’s lying and he has to come to terms with his horrible lying skills, and he sighs, crossing over to the couch and settling beside you. Immediately, he tangles your fingers together, belatedly returning the favor from the elevator and brushing his lips across your knuckles. “He didn’t ask you out, right?”
You know he knows the truth, so you decide to bat your own question back at him in an attempt at rhetoric. “What would it matter if he did? The answer would have been the same, real or imagined.”
Mark pinches the bridge of his nose, inhaling slowly. There’s a red flush on his neck that’s only started fading, it seems. You reach out and skim your finger along the vein that runs down the side of his throat. “I know. I don’t like it all the same. I hate… even thinking about it, actually.”
“Really — nothing happened. If you don’t count the fact that I almost strangled him for keeping me there — which I’m sure you’d agree doesn’t count as anything in favor of him.”
“I heard Jung Jaehyun’s kind of a playboy.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
“Nothing. I don’t know.” His head lolls to the side, and his eyes hold a sadness that pulls at your heart. “It means he really could have made a pass at you. Or you could have — I don’t know. In the end… I just worry.”
“Don’t you trust me?” Your lower lip juts out, and his eyes widen slightly, his head shaking before his mouth can even work out a proper response.
“No — I mean, yes, absolutely. It’s — I mean, it’s just—” He inhales again to gather his wits, two fingers still rubbing his forehead. “I trust you, without a doubt. I don’t trust other people — not around you. Not Jaehyun, or Youngho, or—”
“Or Donghyuck?” You smile a little apologetically at his embarrassment, clear on his face when his eyes stray from yours. “Mark, you know he’s only messing with you, right? I thought it was a funny thing for you guys.”
“It’s not funny if it’s about you,” he mumbles, more to himself than to you. He looks up at you again, chewing on his bottom lip. “I know. I’m trying to control it. Sometimes… I don’t know why it gets under my skin. I guess it’s because it could happen — you… finding someone else. I kind of hate the thought of that.”
“And if I said I hate it even more than you?”
His gaze softens, something like relief passing over his features, but the rest of his body still holds a significant amount of tension; you know by the way he’s running agitated circles on the back of your hand. You gently tug on his arm, allowing yourself to use it as an anchor to shift your weight. Mark makes a soft noise of inquiry but says nothing more, waiting until you’ve maneuvered your body to settle on his lap.
The view is reminiscent, and you can see that the core memory you share flashes through his mind too. A small smile, still somewhat reluctant, plays on Mark’s lips, and you hate that it’s all you get right now, so you rectify this by leaning down and leaving a small, chaste kiss on them. You pull away much too soon, and his head follows in response to the distance, chasing your lips until you’re realistically too far to reach. His arm extends instead, swiftly tucking your hair behind your ear.
Your fingers close around his wrist, and your head turns, continuing the kiss against his palm — short and firm.
“Stop doing that.”
His eyebrows fly upward in questioning, his other hand freezing in its trail up your thighs. Even his breath seems to catch, and what’s left of it comes out as a raspy whisper. “Stop being jealous? I’m… I’m trying.”
You shake your head. “Stop being sexy when you’re jealous.”
The ‘what’ he seems to want to ask dies in his throat, his mouth only able to form half of the word before you interrupt, your lips taking in the rest of the syllable. When you kiss him this time, there’s a slow hunger to it; your teeth find his lower lip even before he’s able to get into the rhythm of kissing you back. You just want him to know — everything about him drives you wild, even when he doesn’t know it.
You’ll never grow sick of the taste of him, you’re sure; today, he tastes even more enticing, the hint of something rich mixing in with the stronger flavor of coffee on his tongue. It’s familiar and comforting, and it’s only when you break away, both your faces flushed from a prolonged lack of air, that you puzzle out what the taste is — the lingering aftermath of a vanilla sweet cream cold brew, one he must have prepared in anticipation of you this afternoon.
You briefly squeeze your eyes shut and thank whoever’s listening for the gift of Mark Lee.
“Mark,” your murmur, your voice much softer, intent on coaxing him into releasing his worries. “You know, right?”
His ‘hm’ is only half-there in focus, the rest of his attention on his hands, which have found their way to your ass and have started digging his fingers into the flesh beyond your jeans. You have to tilt his head up with one finger under his chin, and there’s a whirlpool of emotion in them: curiosity, desire, and, interestingly, a quiet, almost suppressed kind of anger.
“If it isn’t you,” you whisper. “Then there’s nobody else.”
You see his jaw tighten, feel his grip against you do the same, and his brow furrows, like he’s trying — much too hard, and for no good reason — to stop himself from tipping over. You don’t like that either; if he’s there, you think, you should take him over the edge.
“But if you want them to know so badly, then…” You tilt your head to the side, exposing more of your neck, bringing the expanse just a little closer to his mouth. “Why don’t you go ahead and put your claim on me?”
You swear you see his pupils dilate right before he presses his mouth to your skin. With a low, almost pained groan against your neck, he latches his teeth in lightly, and you feel the soft sting, the increase in pressure the moment he starts sucking a mark just above your collarbone. There’s a wet, messy pattern to his movements, always punctuated by the sweep of his tongue to soothe your flesh. Even with that, his movements are slow and careful, still gentle in the way he’s handling you, but you feel it anyway — all of his tension’s concentrated in his grip, the way he keeps you close, hips pinned against him as if he’s worried anything less will cause you to disappear.
“Every time you worry, remember you can do this.” You pause, your breath catching in a lilt as his teeth dig in a little more fiercely. “You’re the only one that can.”
His lips detach with a soft groan, fingers squeezing your ass tight for a moment. Warm breath cools against the damp patch on your neck, and a second later, you feel his mouth graze against the few inches of skin, sensitive and slightly raw. “I know. It’s just not fair.”
You hum in questioning, but he doesn’t answer immediately; his mouth busies itself just under the mark he’d surely left, already starting up the same routine. You’d let him, and you want him to, but you want to hear his voice more. Your fingers tangle into his hair, and you use that hold to ease his head back, urging him to look up at you. It’s almost a mistake, seeing him like that — lips slightly swollen and definitely slick with his own saliva, parted just a little to reveal teeth he’d been desperate to nip your flesh with again. It crosses your mind that Mark has a mouth made for kissing — no, that isn’t accurate.
A mouth made for you to kiss.
“What’s not fair?” You ask softly. Even now, he takes his time in answering, his eyes falling close for a second; you watch him swallow, lick his lips, breathe in before he speaks, and all of those mundane things he does somehow make you lose your mind all the more.
“How badly I keep wanting you,” he breathes out, his eyes slowly opening. “And how it makes me think everyone wants you just as much.”
His hands leave the curve of your ass, traveling up your shirt, resting against your sides. He holds you like he’s careful in trying not to break you, his fingers spread wide to make sure his thumbs almost meet against your stomach, but there’s a smoldering headiness in his gaze that tells you he’s thinking a little too hard about wanting to break you.
“I touch you like this, and I think that everyone would kill to do the same.” His fingers squeeze against your flesh, inching upwards until they rest just under your breasts; his thumbs stroke the curved underline of your bra. “I think about kissing you and it feels like everyone’s thinking it at the exact same time. I look at someone next to you, even if you don’t know them, and I wonder if they want to pull you close, if they want to feel you against them just as much as I do. When I—”
He inhales sharply between his words, and the exhale comes out somewhat shaky. For a moment, he grits his teeth, jaw flexing in an attempt to keep himself in check. You worry he doesn’t want to continue — doesn’t want to let you hear it, but it feels so important that you can’t let it go. “Tell me.”
“When I think about fucking you,” he breathes out, voice barely audible. “Whenever I look at you and think about how much I want to feel you around me, feel you cum around me… I just know everyone else wants the same thing, and it’s driving me crazy because… because they can’t.”
It’s there again, flashing in his eyes — a determination that reads almost like fury.
“They can’t,” he repeats, his voice firmer. “I won’t ever let them. Never.”
You don’t stop him this time when his mouth reclaims your skin. You let his thoughts fuel the need in his movements, allow yourself to move only in reaction to what he does — the tilting of your head to give him more room, the tightening of your fists against his shirt to keep yourself steady. A surprised mewl leaves you when you feel his teeth pinch against your flesh again, and it’s harder, sharper this time, his quiet anger finally dictating his strength. You grapple for words, but they come out in weak gasps.
“It doesn’t — doesn’t matter,” you manage to whimper out. “How many people think that way, how much they want me that way. I only ever want you.”
His breathing is caught, warm, in the pocket of space just between you and his mouth; it tingles against your skin, tickles your senses into heightening. Your fingers unfurl, pressing against his chest, and you can feel his quickened heartbeat thrumming under your palm.
“God, please,” he murmurs, the soft peck of a kiss landing against your collarbone. “Please, tell me.”
“Mark, I’m yours.” There’s no teasing in how you say it; it was never meant to rile him up. It even escapes sweetness, the romanticism it usually comes with when you remind him on any other occasion. This is a promise to him, something you’re reinforcing as fact, something that can’t ever change. “I’m always going to be yours — no one else’s. I’ll never let anyone have anything that’s yours. Ask anything, take everything you want. I’ll never say no to you. Only you — always you.”
You know something’s different in a number of ways; his arms circle around you, but instead of keeping you firm and stable in his lap, they’re tight, squeezing a whine out of you, holding your torso flush against his. His face never leaves the crook of your neck, but you hear — feel — something there — a soft growl of need, of frustration that begs release. Suddenly, you find yourself off the couch; you barely have the presence of mind to wrap your arms around his neck and tighten your thighs against his sides before he’s carrying you to his room, kicking the door open and letting the rebound of the impact against his wall slam it shut behind him.
You’ve been in Mark’s room before, so there’s absolutely no need for you to take in the scenery when he sets you down on his bed. It doesn’t matter anyway, even if this were your first time; Mark’s crawling over you, his face flush and eyes sharp with hunger, and he looks so enticing that you wouldn’t want to pay attention to anything else around you anyway. His limbs cage you in, arms on either side of your shoulders and his knees just by your thighs, and you don’t really know why he’s already panting, but it just makes you want him all the more.
“Never,” he groans out, leaning down to nose against the patch of skin his mouth had worked on. “I’m never going to let anyone take you, ever. You’re all mine.”
His name fades on your lips, carried away by a moan when his mouth reattaches itself to your neck; it moves, almost frenzied, to renew the mark he’d left, make it a deeper red, a slightly bruised purple. You’re usually careful not to do anything that will require any attention or cover-up after, but Mark seems a little too far gone to care, and you realize you like him best this way.
Even with all the attention he gives your neck, his fingers are busy; they work on the button of your jeans, sliding them down with the help you offer by raising your hips. They only reach halfway down your thighs, his reluctance to come back up for air stopping him from peeling them off completely, but it’s all he seems to need for now.
Eager fingers ease between your thighs, two at once, pressing against your folds. You’re unable to spread your legs like you usually do, but this tightness makes you all the more sensitive, and you keen as his digits fit themselves into your slit. Frustratingly, they don’t move right away, and you have to raise your hips again just to get some sort of friction. Even then, Mark doesn’t take the hint — or, perhaps, the bait — keeping a light pressure against your clit without doing anything else. His focus is still on your neck, now slightly aching under his lips, and when he finally pulls away, you see a look of triumph on his face. He tilts his head back slightly to admire his work — the blooming dark patch you’re sure he’s left where your skin tingles the most.
“If I said I wanted to mark you all over, would you let me?”
“What makes you think I wouldn’t ask for it?”
He chuckles, tightening the pressure of his fingers against your clit; you say something that sounds halfway between ‘Mark’ and a sob.
“I want to, so badly.” He admits, gaze still fixed on your neck. “I’d want to see you walk out of here, walk into class covered in them. I’d want people to ask you how you got them, and who gave them to you. And I’d want you to say it proudly — that it was me who did it. That I fucked you all night and made you mine over and over again.”
“Why don’t you?” His eyes snap up to you, a small smile forming on his lips. “I want to say that too. Let me brag about having you. Let me tell everyone how good you always make me feel. Then you can tell everyone who doesn’t believe you, too — how I let you take me every single time. Show me off and tell them to look at how you made me yours.”
Another laugh escapes him, but there’s more disbelief than humor in it; he seems to find it amazing, that you can just agree with what he says, no matter how strange he thinks it is.
“Show you off? If I mark you in other places, do I have to show them every part?”
“Do you not want to?”
“I want to, and I don’t.” He pauses, slightly amused, and you know he’s remembering the first time you fucked. “I don’t them to see your body, but I want them to see what I did to it. I don’t want them to look at what’s mine, but I just want them to know it is.”
“Then you can fuck me in front of everyone and make them watch you ruin me completely.”
He shakes his head, even if desire flashes clear across his features. He busies himself with actions while he mulls it over, tugging your jeans down alongside your panties and casting them aside before he straightens up. His eyes rake over your form; you’re bare from the waist down, your shirt halfway ridden up, the underside of your bra peeking out from under the hem. Again, his eyes land on your neck, and his smile widens slightly.
“Can’t.” He decides finally. “You’re too pretty for that.”
You hum thoughtfully, and he raises his eyebrows. He doesn’t move, even when you sit up, shifting yourself so you can tuck your calves under your thighs — not even when you reach out to undo his belt or tug down his zipper. He only reacts a little when your hand presses against his hardness through his boxers, the girth now easily familiar to your palm.
“What about something like this?” You ask, inching closer to the edge of the bed. You’ve started slow strokes against him, the fabric creating extra friction, more heat under your palm, and you watch his jaw clench as he swallows back a soft grunt. “Would you let them watch me do this for you?”
“Let me think about it,” he chuckles softly, and you nod, letting your fingers work to make your point. You don’t have to undress him completely to get what you want; all you need is to tug down the front of his boxers to free him, and you already have him wrapped in your palms, stroking his shaft to full hardness.
“Think faster,” you urge, and he shakes his head, slightly bemused. “Are you telling me you wouldn’t even want them to watch me jerk you off?”
“At least give me a full minute.”
You laugh lightly, whispering a ‘fine’ before you press a soft kiss against tip. He inhales sharp through his teeth, already sensitive, and you waste no time in letting your tongue flick out against the smooth head. He doesn’t need the lubrication, realistically; his precum’s already leaking from the tip, mixing in with your saliva as you run your tongue around it. All you do is make him a little messier, a little slicker, your spittle running down his length.
Taking Mark in your mouth is a demanding task, but one you’re always up for; there’s something uniquely satisfying about letting him fill your mouth, inch by inch, and watching his breathing hitch and stutter until your lips are closer to the base than to the head. What you can’t reach, your hand always squeezes around, eager to make sure he feels good completely. His expression is sublime when you draw your head back the first time, sucking as you do so — his eyes are half-lidded, and he doesn’t stop the moan that falls from his lips. His gaze is fixed on you, hazy but still able to drink the sight of you in, and you’re not sure how, but you almost feel like you could get off to watching him watch you taste him.
You try, somehow, vaguely conscious of the movement of your hips; you’re grinding at nothing at first, so your knees give way just enough for you to press yourself against his sheets. It’s slightly uncomfortable, a strain in your thighs that you’re not really used to, but you don’t care; Mark’s sharp inhale at seeing you attempt to grind your pussy against his mattress is pretty much as arousing as anything else. His cock twitches hard in your mouth, and you suck just a little harder, a little messier, your head bobbing down to meet your hand, still firmly wrapped around his girth.
The room’s filled with nothing but slick sounds and soft groans; Mark’s hand has found its way into your hair, tangled into a makeshift ponytail, and while he isn’t guiding your mouth to do anything, you can feel his hips stutter then start to move, pulling back when your head does. He tries to hide it, tries to keep himself steady, but pride blooms in your chest when you note that he can’t; he wants to feel like he’s fucking into your mouth, into your hand, the way he does when he takes your pussy.
It’s relatively quiet for that time, nothing but muffled moans from you that mix in with his noises, but you only realize you’d been waiting for an answer to something when he speaks up again.
“It’s… still a no for me.”
Your movements slow, your gaze lifting to communicate your mild confusion to him. You don’t want to ask; you just don’t want to lose the taste of him on your tongue just yet. He looks down at you, smiling with overflowing tenderness, almost like he’s apologetic.
“Even just this — you’re too pretty when you do it.” His hand reaches down, thumb stroking over your cheek. “I can’t let anyone see what you look like when you’re like this. They’ll keep thinking about you doing it for them. And you’d only do it for me — right?”
You nod immediately, your response causing your mouth to slip down his shaft just a little more. It elicits a guttural noise from him, one that fuels you into sucking him just a little harder, your enthusiasm overtaking your restraint. His fingers have let go of your hair, stroking it back into smoothness, almost comforting in their movements.
“God, I wish you could see yourself; you’d know what I mean,” he continues to murmur, his voice just a little louder over the eager, wet noises you’re making. “How pretty you look with your mouth wrapped around me. How perfect you are when you’re kneeling like this for me — how happy you look when you’re sucking me off. I can’t share that with anyone. Fuck — not ever.”
Your mouth draws back, completely this time, and your tongue presses against the underside of his cock. You lick a long stripe up his shaft, moaning softly at the light throb you feel, and you watch him tip his head back. The groan that follows soon after is almost close to a frustrated growl, ending in a whispered ‘shit’ before his eyes land back on you. He watches you press kiss after kiss against his tip, coaxing the precum out even more, and you take special care to leave more down each inch of his cock until you’re finally able to release your hold on his base so you can leave the last one there.
His hand combs your hair back before it falls to cup your chin, his thumb swiping at the corner of your mouth to gently clean up the froth of spittle there. You smile up at him in thanks, and his thumb sweeps over the seam of your lips to follow the slight curve.
“So pretty,” he repeats, and your cheeks glow pink under the palms that caress them. He leans down, pressing a kiss to the tip of your nose. “Pretty as hell, fucking perfect — and you’re all mine.”
You kneel up again, chasing his lips with your own, and he locks you in his arms as his tongue slips its way past your teeth, the aroma of coffee still on it. He leaves today’s taste of him against your tongue, on the ridges of your teeth, until you feel like you’ve all but consumed him, and you whimper softly when he pulls away, urging you to turn around and lean back into his chest.
His mouth reattaches itself to the same spot; it’s like a home base for him, and he breathes in your scent from there before giving the same patch of skin a light suck, almost as if he’s worried it’ll fade in a few minutes’ time if he doesn’t give it attention.
“Show me.” Hands slide down to your hips, squeezing them lightly, like a prompt for your response. “Show me how pretty you are for me.”
His palms never leave you, not even when you detach yourself from his chest and bend down; your elbows meet the mattress, but your hips stay raised, giving him a view of your pussy. Your gasp easily turns into a moan when his digit dips into your wetness again, his other hand pushing gently at your asscheek to keep you open.
You think he’s about to slip his finger in, the tip brushing against your entrance, and you tense in anticipation, but it doesn’t happen; he continues to run his finger down your slit, careful not to linger against your clit for too long. The result is that you tighten around nothing, and you hear him suck in a breath as he watches your hole grow smaller for a second. You laugh breathily, resting your chin against the backs of your hands, one folded atop the other. “Pretty enough for you to fuck?”
“Do you have to ask if you already know?”
“I want to hear it anyway.”
His finger slips into your hole, finally, and you keen softly as he breaches the first ring of tightness. He doesn’t really move it, just tests your tightness, feels you contract around him as if to know what his cock will feel in a few moments.
“Your pussy’s too pretty not to fuck,” he manages out, and his throat sounds as tight as you feel. “Seeing it like this… makes me think there’s no way anyone can resist. It’s exactly why I can’t let anyone see you like this.”
You hum as his finger presses in deeper, and you know it’s nothing in comparison to the real thing, but you like feeling that mild stretch, the depth it reaches all the same. “How should we let them know, then? That I’m all yours.”
His finger stills, and you hum softly, swaying your hips to shake him out of whatever trance he’s in. He’s grown quiet, but there’s a thoughtfulness in this pause, like he’s seriously considering your question. You laugh lightly, ready to tell him you’re just egging him on until he fucks you, but he slips his finger out of you, leaving you clenching around nothing again. You can’t help the confused noise that comes out of you, but you at least know he isn’t completely backing away, his other hand still firmly on your ass.
“Mark, what—”
You get your answer in the thud that interrupts your question — he’s tossed his phone onto the bed, having it land next to you. Something in your blood runs hot, and your fingers tremble when you pick it up. You see yourself reflected in the blackened screen — excitement in your eyes, your lips glossy from your blowjob.
Mark’s silent as you let the meaning of his actions settle; wordlessly, he slips his finger into you again, followed by another one this time, and you shudder in pleasure at the difference in the stretch. He doesn’t ask, but you can tell he’s wondering if he’s gone too far— if you think he’s crazy. He lets his fingers stay anchored in you, unmoving, waiting for you to say something, but from where he is, he just can’t know the smile that passes your face.
Finally, he tries to speak up. “We don’t have to— I just meant—”
“What’s your passcode?”
He breathes out, the exhale quivering as much as you probably are. “Your birthday.”
Your smile only widens when you tap the screen to life and see a picture of you — you don’t even remember when he’d taken it, but it’s a shot of you sprawled on his bed, bundled in his blanket and reading something that looks oddly like your textbook for your European Renaissance History class. It’s grainy and dimly lit, a stolen photograph of you, but it makes your heart swell, and you laugh lightly as you key in your birthday; the screen unlocks, allowing you access to all his applications.
“What’s funny?”
“Just thinking about how you should replace this wallpaper.”
“To what?” He sounds bemused.
“The view of me you have now.”
His fingers curl in you, pressing down against your walls, and you push your hips back in a bid for more friction; you hear him hiss out a ‘fuck’ under his breath, and his hand digs harder into the flesh of your ass.
You open Mark’s contacts, scrolling down aimlessly. Most of the names, you don’t recognize, but you see a few familiar ones crop up here and there. He doesn’t ask, only starts pumping his fingers into you in quiet anticipation, wondering how far you’re willing to take it, how much you’ve bought into this crazy idea.
“Mark,” you call out, and he hums in response. “You trust me, don’t you?”
“With my life.”
“So if I called Donghyuck right now—” His fingers hook into you, the delicious pressure on your walls making you squeak instead of finish your sentence immediately. You twist your torso to meet his eyes, and you’re slightly surprised but not at all displeased to see something crazed lingering in his gaze. “How much of a show would you want to put on for him?”
He shifts his weight, his knee sinking into the mattress as he slots it between your legs. This change in position allows him to angle his fingers a little differently, driving down into you with a force that makes you squirm. You almost forget you’ve asked him something again until he leans in closer, his murmur almost drowned out by the slick sounds of his finger pressing into your hole.
“Just… enough for him to know you’ve always been mine.”
Your thumbs are shaking when you scroll through his contacts again, up and down until you find the right name — Lee Donghyuck — and Mark watches you intently, wordlessly, as you press his number, start the call, and put it on speaker.
The wait feels like an eternity, with Mark’s finger slipping in and out of you in a steady, languid pace as you watch the line connect, but in reality, Donghyuck really only answers after the fourth ring. “Yo, Mark.”
His voice is casual, lacking in any sort of expectation; you can hear explosions and gunshots in the background, and you’re willing to bet he’s in the middle of an action movie. You’re proven right when you hear random English babbling soon after.
“Hi, Hyuck.”
“___________?” He sounds genuinely confused that it’s you that greets him. “Where’s Mark? You okay?”
“He’s right here with me; don’t worry.” Your voice is a soft croon, and he has to lower the volume of the television to be able to hear you better. “We’re totally fine. What are you up to?”
“Watching Resident Evil. Uh, is there a reason you called?”
You want to draw out the lie of something casual for as long as you can, but Mark doesn’t let you. His fingers push, suddenly forceful, into you, and you let out a soft cry into the receiver. You look back at him, eyes wide with amusement, and he shrugs, having at least enough sense to look slightly abashed at his experiment.
One moment, you’re listening to a female voice shout something, and the next, Donghyuck’s side of the call is silent except for his breathing. When you don’t bother explaining what had just happened, he takes matters into his own hands.
“Hello?”
He sounds equal parts affronted and amused, like the shock of it has tickled him. You can’t help it; you laugh too, but it’s quickly cut off by another whine when Mark pulls his fingers out. Donghyuck makes an incredulous noise.
“Now, what the fuck is all this about, you freaks?”
“You kept wondering why I ended up asking Mark out,” you evade his question with another one. “Should I tell you why, if you’re that curious?”
“No way. Have fun, weirdos,” he laughs, and the line goes dead a second after.
You snort out a laugh, and Mark mumbles something that sounds vaguely like that was crazy before he leans down and presses a kiss to the small of your back. You make to turn so you can finally face him, but you’re distracted when his phone screen lights up again, and Donghyuck’s name flashes across it.
You exchange amused glances before you pick up the call, and you don’t even get a ‘hello’ out when his voice rings out, sharp and clear.
“But pretending I am,” he says, as though he hadn’t hung up the call a few seconds ago. “Exactly what kind of answer would I get?”
“The kind that’ll hopefully shut you up for good,” Mark pipes in instead of you.
“What’s that even going to sound like?” Already, Donghyuck’s activated whatever toggle in him that gets him to push Mark’s buttons. This time, though, you can’t say it works against you; you feel Mark inch closer to you, and a moment later, the fat tip of his cock nudges against your entrance. “I bet you can’t even get her to yawn, man.”
Mark doesn’t have to respond; you do it for him when he pushes in, torturously slow, as if to draw out your moan. It works a little too well, with you keening into the phone, and yet no part of you is acting for his sake. As familiar as the stretch is, it’s not something you’ve ever been able to commit to memory fully, and it feels like a new breaching of your tightness each time. Your legs fold in slightly, a useless movement that attempts to get you adjusted to his size faster, but Mark interprets it as discomfort, his hands tightening on your hips.
“You okay?” He sounds genuinely worried for a second, forgetting that Donghyuck’s still on the line. Your cheek brushes against his sheets as you nod, trying to meet his eye even in this position to let him know you’re being honest.
“Fucking big, Mark.” You hear Donghyuck tsk from his end, and you laugh breathlessly. “You don’t like knowing he’s big?”
“I just hate that fucker,” Donghyuck quips back easily, but there’s no seriousness in his voice. If anything, it sounds a little raspy, with him clearing his throat soon afterward.
“Well, I’m crazy about him,” you whisper into the call, and your breathing hitches as Mark finally bottoms out, groaning at your tightness. “I’m crazy about the way he touches me, the way he tastes. I’m crazy about how big his cock is, how deep it gets when he’s inside me, how he stretches me out — fuck—”
Your verbal rampage is cut short by a loud moan as Mark draws his hips back and pushes forcefully into you; you haven’t fully adjusted, and you’re even tighter now from what you’re saying, so the friction inside you is nothing short of delicious. He starts a pattern of thrusts, not bothering to build up from his usual slow and steady pace — hearing you talk that way and knowing that Donghyuck is listening is enough to get him to abandon self-imposed restrictions.
“Mark,” you whine out, accidentally pushing the phone a little further away as you reach out blindly for him behind you, and he catches your wrist to let you know he’s there. “Mark, fuck, it feels so good—”
You tighten around him as if to prove your words, and he growls in response. You find yourself having to press your cheek in a little harder into the mattress as he gathers your wrists together into one hand, pinning them to your lower back, and it’s with that hold on you that he leverages his thrusts, pumping into you a little harder each time.
You’re not completely unaware of your surroundings, but it takes a while for you to process the sounds coming from the phone’s speaker — labored breathing, the sound of a zipper being pulled down. You want to wonder if this is working a little too well, but nothing comes from your mouth apart from soft whimpers, and it’s all the cue Mark needs to be the one to fill in the relative silence himself.
“You’re so fucking pretty,” he whispers, and you feel his lips press between your shoulder blades. It feels like a chaste kiss at first, but he leaves his breath there, still flitting over your skin as he continues to speak. “I’ll never get tired of how pretty you are — how pretty you always sound for me. Doesn’t she sound pretty, Hyuck?”
“Fucking pretty,” Donghyuck agrees, though his voice sounds somewhat distant. You can only sob back a quiet ‘fuck me, harder, harder,’ in response.
“Can you imagine how much prettier she looks under me?” It’s almost a full-blown conversation now, but even if Mark’s addressing Donghyuck, the rest of his attention’s fully on you. He adjusts his stance, still keeping his hold around your wrists as he angles himself deeper into you, causing you to cry out and squirm in pleasure. With your face pressed against the bed and his weight driving down into you, you feel utterly trapped, in the best kind of way. Mark, in the way he is now, is inescapable, almost incorrigible, and he pistons deeper into your pussy, his free hand brushing your hair away from your shoulder so he can leave a kiss against it. “Bent over, legs spread just a little, all for me to take. Pretty little hole wet for me, and so fucking tight. Can you imagine that?”
“I’m doing it right now.”
“It’s a thousand times better in person. Trust me.”
The same hand slips between your thighs, two fingers spreading your folds apart; the middle one circles your clit in a pace that matches his thrusts, sudden and shocking, and you arch your back upwards slightly with a choked noise. He finally releases your wrists, and you claw at the sheets helplessly to keep yourself somehow upright as the force of Mark’s hips, their impact against the backs of your thighs, pushes you forward, closer to the phone again. The stimulation is merciless, endless, and in the haze of your pleasure, you wonder if you should make Mark a little more jealous everyday if it gets him to act this way.
“Mark, I…. I’ve been— s-since—”
“Not yet,” he whispers, his teeth sinking into your shoulder as if to bring you back to reality. You shudder at the pain, the pleasure that accompanies it, and when you squeeze your eyes shut for a moment, you notice that a few tears escape your eyes. “Hold out for me a bit, okay? Please. It’s not enough. Not yet enough.”
You wonder if ‘enough’ is a concept the both of you even understand when it comes to wanting each other; already, you feel desire pooling in your stomach, threatening to spill from you, and clenching around him isn’t helping you stop it the way your body seems to think it’s supposed to. It also doesn’t help that Mark’s fingers are relentless, one still drawing tight, heavy circles around your clit, and the other creeping up under your shirt to tug down the cup of your bra, letting a breast spill into his warm palm. He kneads with an unusual — but not unpleasant — roughness, and you squeak out incoherently as he tweaks at the hardened bud of your nipple, pinching it between his thumb and forefinger.
“Hold on for me a little,” he continues murmuring, even after you shake your head and whisper ‘can’t’ to him over and over. “Do it for me. Tell Donghyuck — tell him how good it feels. How much you want to keep feeling me inside you.”
You don’t even know what to say; the pleasure that washes over you, the new kind of roughness that Mark exhibits has you drawing a blank, and you can only whine in a last attempt at protest, only for your tongue to start moving on autopilot, fueled by your want.
“It’s not enough,” you echo — and even if it feels like it is, even if it feels even more than you can possibly handle, something tells you that it’s true. “Not enough — need to feel you more, Mark. God, I want to feel you stretch me out, fuck my little hole into the shape of your cock— until no one else can fuck me but you—”
“What,” Donghyuck breathes out, his exhale coming across as static. “The fuck.”
You don’t have to explain; your babbling’s doing most of the work in that regard anyway, and you can tell by the wet, staccato noises on the other end that Donghyuck can easily piece together the scenario anyway. He’s jacking off to the both of you, something in your mind whispers, and the notion of that alone has you tightening around Mark’s cock. The change doesn’t go unnoticed, and his fingers sink deeper into your flesh; you cry out softly when you feel a jolt of pleasure as he gives your clit a sudden pinch.
“How much tighter can you get?” He sounds incredulous but also, interestingly, proud — there’s a smug tinge to his voice that arouses you even more. “Does it feel that good?”
“Fuck, yes,” you breathe out, the syllables quivering in your throat. “So good I’m going to lose my mind. Let me — God, please, let me—”
“Not yet,” Mark mumbles, and you whimper as he slows and slips out of you, his hand gently rubbing your folds in what feels like comfort — a small apology for his overt enthusiasm that you don’t even really need. “Just a little more. I need to see it.”
“See what?” Donghyuck’s voice is barely above a whisper, hoarse and pretty much muffled by the sound of his hand pumping his own shaft. Your head’s light, so your body moves on its own when Mark inches away slightly, giving you room to turn yourself around and lay on your back. You’ve barely even settled when he lifts your hips, dragging you closer to him and easing your thighs apart to slot himself between your legs.
His cock weighs heavy, pressed up against your folds, and he pushes his hips in a superficial thrust to get them to spread. His eyes fall briefly on your swollen clit, the wetness that you left on his shaft, even more of it still leaking from your hole. When he looks back up at you, there’s something triumphant in his gaze.
“Fucking gorgeous,” he coos, so lovingly it’d be hard to imagine his cock still sliding against your folds if you couldn’t feel it yourself. “I’ll never get enough of your perfect pussy — so perfect that it was made to take me.”
“See what?” Donghyuck presses, an impatience now coloring his voice. Mark chuckles, nodding at you and mouthing silently. Tell him.
Your inhale’s shaky, quivering like the rest of your body, and you don’t ever break away from Mark’s gaze, even as you speak.
“His cock fucking me in my stomach.”
Donghyuck’s ‘Jesus fucking Christ’ is drowned out by your cry of need as Mark pushes back into you. There’s no lag time now, no wait for any kind of adjustment; he takes you in one motion, until you feel his hips hit the backs of your thighs again. Your walls flutter around him, unable to process his size fully, and all that comes out of you is a string of messy mewls that’s constantly interrupted by the wet sounds of his thrusts.
Your body feels almost weightless, the only thing you can understand being the feeling of his cock pumping into you, stretching you out further. You’re only able to shake yourself out of the reverie when you feel his hands push back against your thighs, folding you in half, before they crowd atop your stomach.
“God, I need to feel it,” he groans out, his palms skimming under your navel, searching. “Please — do it for me.”
Even with your brain muddled, you don’t even have to try to figure it out; you let him feel it every time he asks. You inhale, deep and slow, until your stomach sinks, and the walls of your stomach flatten against his cock, which pauses briefly in its movements as he revels in the newfound feeling.
“That’s my girl,” he murmurs, and you flush in pleasure, in satisfaction at his praise. “Love seeing my cock inside you.”
He adjusts himself before he starts pumping into you again, burying his shaft all the way to the hilt each time; each thrust is followed by a soft sob from you, and you reach out, planting your hands on top of his. You obviously can’t feel his cock under your palms, but you don’t have to anyway; the fit’s tight enough that it feels, ridiculously, like he’s fucking your whole body, like he’s pressing into the deepest part of your core. You just want him to feel it more — the movement of the bulge under his hands, the resistance it has to push through to get to your stomach.
“Love feeling me inside you,” he continues, and his breathing stutters then, signaling that he’s also barely hanging on. “Love seeing how pretty you look when I rearrange your insides.”
You mouth out a disbelieving ‘what the fuck’ that earns you a simple smile, but Mark’s unrelenting in his movements anyway, his palms completely covering your stomach.
“Dude, I wanna see it too,” Donghyuck reminds you both of his presence when his voice comes through the speaker. “Put her on video.”
“No way,” comes Mark’s swift, firm reply. Donghyuck makes a noise of protest. “This is just for me.”
“Selfish as hell, calling me without really sharing.”
“The point wasn’t really ever to share.”
Mark’s hands suddenly press down on your stomach, and you stifle a soft scream; the pressure increases tenfold, as does the tightness of the fit, his cock brushing against your walls in a way that makes you feel breathless — it makes you feel used. Your hands fly up, fingers locking behind his neck, and you squirm under him, knowing fully well that you can’t escape anyway — not that you really want to, anyway.
“Mark,” you warn him again, your voice thin and airy. “I can’t anymore — I really—”
“I got you,” he murmurs — something you’ve come to learn he always says, always wants to let you know. He’ll be here until you break, until you can’t take anymore. “One second, okay?”
“Bro, what? Are you serious—” Even Donghyuck sounds confused, although his voice is tight too; he must be close, your mind weakly registers, but it doesn’t matter. Mark, albeit reluctantly, slips one hand away from your stomach — for a good cause, he must think, and you learn what it is when he ends the call, effectively cutting off Donghyuck’s complaints. Your eyes widen in confusion, but all Mark’s gaze is to you is reassuring, gentle, and he leans down to press a soft kiss to your lips before he answers your unspoken question.
“Can’t let him hear you cum,” he murmurs against your mouth. “That’s only for me, isn’t it?”
You nod, letting the movement of it brush your lips against his. “You’re the only one I’ll cum for — the only one that can make me.”
Above your head, his phone is trilling noisily; the vibrations course through your back, weak but persistent, and for some reason, it heightens your arousal all the more. Mark ignores it completely, single-mindedly focused on pistoning into you with the bulk of his strength. His hands push down just under your navel, increasing your awareness of the feeling of his cock, him fucking you, coaxing out your climax.
“Do it. Show me how pretty you look when you cum for me.”
You don’t think it’s possible for him to inject any more strength into his movements, but he proves you wrong time and time again; the wind’s knocked out of you as he braces himself and fucks you harder, sharper into the bed, and the only noises you can make are weak whimpers and choked sobs. Your mind’s so overrun with pleasure that your climax hits your body first before your mind fully parses it; your back arches again, and you mewl out something broken, something that sounds like his name as you come undone.
Mark still doesn’t relent, the tremble in your legs somehow only inspiring him to put more power in his thrusts. Even through the dazedness that comes with all the stimulation, you can see the fine details you’ve come to know so well — the tightness in his jaw, the growing flush across his collar, the quick heaving of his chest. He’s close too, so close he’s just holding himself back out of sheer force of will to make sure he can watch you come down from your climax completely. You don’t know why he has to, but you want to see him let go too, and you scramble for words, for more touch — pressing your thighs firm against his sides to keep him close, locked — just to get him there.
“Will you mark me up one last time?” You breathe out. He reacts almost instantaneously, moving to lean down and press his mouth against the still-untouched side of your neck, but your palm on his chest stops him from doing so. Surprise crosses his face, followed by slight confusion. You squeeze your thighs against him, trying to make your point, but even then, his brow furrows. “Mark me — inside.”
His eyes widen, and his hips stutter before they resume pace, his fingers digging into your stomach almost painfully as he tries to keep himself in control. “I— no, you know I can’t…”
“Do you want to?” You egg him on, your hand dropping from his chest to land on top of his again, adding to the pressure until you’re sure he can feel every small movement, every throb of his own cock inside you. “You can, you know — make me yours, from the inside out.”
“God — we can’t; you know we’d be in so much trouble.”
“But I’d let you anyway, if you wanted to. Do you ever think about it, Mark?” Your fingers toy with his, almost like you’re having a casual conversation instead of a situation in which he’s deep inside you, already aching for release. “Fucking your cum deep into me, letting it seep into my stomach — making sure no one else can fill me up?”
“Jesus,” he growls, and he reluctantly slips his hands out from under yours to grip your thighs. Realistically, he has enough strength to peel them away, have you release him, but his hold just tightens, not really making any motion to do so. You see the thought flash in his eyes, serious even just for a moment. He thinks about it all the time.
“Think about it,” you urge, your voice soft but close to a demand. “And every time you do, remember one day, you will — because you’re the only one that can.”
He tilts his head back, letting a growl rip from his throat, and he finally manages to push your thighs apart. You let him, let them fall apart so he can slip out of you. You watch him shift upwards, his knees on either side of your torso, and you’re met with the erotic sight of him fisting his cock in front of you, urging himself into completion. You do the only thing you can think of to help; you open your mouth wide, pushing your tongue out, silently asking for his load.
“Even when you do that, you’re fucking pretty,” he groans out, and his thumb presses his cock down, resting the underside flush against your tongue as he rocks his hips. “How much prettier are you going to look with my cum all over your face?”
He doesn’t have to wait long to find out, and you don’t have to respond; he gets the answer he wants with one last thrust against your tongue, and you close your eyes briefly, allowing yourself to drink in the taste, the smell of his cum as it streaks across your cheeks, all over your lips. You hear his release as it comes too — the soft rumble from his chest, the release of air that gently whistles through his teeth.
When you open your eyes again, Mark is looking down at you, a warm flush creeping up his cheeks and ears again; he’s breathless, panting as he comes down from his high. From the daze of his climax, a slightly sheepish look of apology crosses his face, and he reaches down, seemingly without any real plan, to clean you up, only to withdraw, slightly bemused, when you shake your head.
A laugh escapes him when you shimmy out from under him, straighten up, and extend your arms upward, puckering your lips in slight demand. You think he might reject you, but Mark doesn’t even hesitate longer than a second. He swoops down, capturing your lips in a fierce kiss, and your thighs press together tight as you enjoy the feeling of his tongue swiping away his cum from your bottom lip before he takes it between his teeth, sucking softly as if to clean you completely.
When he pulls away, his head dips into your shoulder; again, his face turns to press against the mark he’d left, and his teeth nip at the soft bruise that’s already begun to blossom. Satisfied by the soft noise you make at the sensitivity you feel from the contact, he breathes out, long and steady, against your skin.
“Just… can’t get enough of you,” he finally exhales, pressing another kiss to your neck; it’s gentler, situated just under your jaw.
“You don’t ever have to think about having enough,” you whisper, leaving a light nuzzle against his shoulder. “Just always think about having more.”
He lets out a breathy laugh, but he nods, accepting your offer anyway. A moment of silence passes, where you’re wrapped up in each other, his weight against you in a blanket of heat, and it stretches to what almost feels like an eternity — if not for the phone suddenly ringing again, Donghyuck’s name coming up on the ID. You both start, and Mark reaches over, fumbling with the sides of his device before he finds and toggles the silent switch.
“Seriously,” he grumbles, watching the call drop just for it to start up again, the screen flashing.
“We kind of left him hanging, to be fair.”
“No fairness.” Mark tosses the phone to the foot of the bed, where it lies, facedown and buzzing. “He got more than he deserved today.”
You watch him as he slips off the bed, rearranging himself before clipping his jeans button back into place. He whispers a gentle ‘be right back’ and exits the room, leaving the door only slightly ajar. You hear the water run in the bathroom, and a few moments later, Mark returns to your side, holding a damp towel.
He leaves a kiss after each light swipe across your face, as if to apologize for the pain he thinks he might be causing; you laugh, partly because it’s ridiculous, but mostly because you like it. He cleans your mouth last, even though there’s already nothing left, just so he has an excuse to leave a long, lasting kiss there.
You think it’s the last you’ll get for now, but he surprises you by bending down even further, hiking your shirt up your torso again. His hand rests on your thigh, keeping himself balanced as he presses a flutter of kisses around your navel, lingering at the exact spot that sits above where he knows his cock hits every time he bottoms out in you.
“One day,” he whispers into your skin before he looks up at you, his eyes shining. “I’ll really make you all mine.”
“Dummy.” Your voice is just as low, and you pull his head up again, enjoying the brush of his hair against your hand, the swoop of his jaw under your palm. “How many times do I have to tell you?”
“Every single day, considering I’ll never get tired of it.”
You hum, not one to deny him of what he asks anyway; you push him back onto his calves, climbing back onto his lap; it’s your favorite way to be near him, you decide, with almost nothing between you, almost everything of yours touching everything of his — like you fit in him perfectly. You rest your cheek against his shoulder, feeling their soft rise and fall as his breathing steadies, and you squirm a bit, if only to make sure his arms are locked securely around you — to make sure he won’t let go. Just like that, in his arms, you say it again — a truth, a fact, and a promise.
“I already am.”
4K notes · View notes
halcyone-of-the-sea · 9 months
Note
Hiya!! I’m obsessed with your writing. You’re my favorite writer on here, I dream of your stories!
Would it be possible to request (either with Ghost or Price, I love them both equally) something like they were young love but he breaks up with reader cos he wants to keep her safe and thinks he knows what’s best for her. Then during a mission gone wrong, they need a safe house but somehow the enemy found out all the locations of their approved safe houses. He remembered her place is close by and tries his luck. Maybe she gets mad at him for making decisions for her or maybe he learns about her difficult past that happened without with. But with a happy ending? ☺️
Only if this inspires you! Thank you again for sharing your beautiful writings!
If You Bite My Hand Again
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PAIRING: Simon 'Ghost' Riley x F!Reader
SYNOPSIS: How dare he show his face to you after all of these years. How dare you still find it in yourself to love him.
WORDCOUNT: 6.6k
WARNINGS: Heavy angst, abandonment, arguments, mentions of death, blood, insinuations of torture & mental illness troubles, Simon's comic backstory, hurt/comfort, sort of suggestive?, anxiety attack, somewhat happy ending, etc.
A/N: This was really fun to write, lol, enjoy Anon!
*I do not give others permission to translate and/or re-publish my works on this or any other platform*
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You never should have met him. In fact, it seemed like the universe had been adamant to make you not run into each other on that chilly October morning almost…well…it has to be more than thirteen years ago, now. So long. 
As you head to your kitchen and glance at the clock, the hands point to a perfect three-fifteen—an hour of pitch-blackness and whispering winds that dash past the musty glass of the windows. The thump of your footsteps blocks out the heaving sigh that falls from your mouth; rubbing at your eyes like a cat as great bags sag from tired flesh. 
The dreams weren’t uncommon. 
Simon still reigned supreme in the conjuring of them, ingrained into the sinews and pulled thin by a hand constantly working them—knitting a sweater of memories addled with age. Moth-eaten. 
As you snap on the light of your tiny and run-down kitchen, the bulb fizzing and the dishwasher still emitting that squeal as it always does, you think about him before grabbing a glass. Water hits and fills the thing up as your eyes blankly stare, fatigued but yet never more awake. 
The tremors in your hands persist.
You never should have met him.
Your feet take you to Primary, laces a mess atop your little shoes caked in mud and grass—you’d chased after a butterfly through the front yards, getting caught in your neighbor's bushes and having to slip your way out before she could rampage outside with her broom. 
It was no surprise that your face was lit with a bright smile, eyes shining like fire that your teachers had given you a special name for—“Ember.”
The very thing that could start a blaze over and over again as long as it still was alight.
Laughing and peeing out leaves from your hair; flattening out your uniform, you stride with pride ingrained into your body. Well, you did before you heard the soft sniffling coming from down the alley. 
Halting, your ears perk at the sounds, smile freezing as you blink quickly. Looking to your left, you lock onto the hunched figure of a boy. 
Perhaps only a year or two older than you, you stare in curiosity as he consciously paws at his cheeks, walking out of the alley in broken and odd strides. His uniform is ruffled, wrinkled, but not in the way yours was.
He must have fallen and hurt himself, you reason with a child-like frown pulling on your lips. Blinking at his blond hair, you get a glimpse of red-rimmed brown eyes.
The boy halts, looking at you widely, fear and pain emanating from his expression. You’re the first to speak, brightness still in your eyes but a deep innocence that comes with youth. All you saw was a boy your age in pain—that was strange to you. You knew what getting hurt was like; you fell and scraped your knees often, or hit your elbows on corners. Sometimes you would cry from that…did the same happen to this boy?
“You’re crying, aren’t you?” Brown-Eyes stares, hurriedly pushing at his face to wipe tears but only succeeds in making his face red from the material of his uniform. “Did you fall down? I do that pretty often—it’s okay, my Mum says you’ll be better after a hug and a kiss!”
You smile and stand straighter. 
“I,” the boy begins, sniffling. “I didn’t fall. I’m not clumsy.”
You tilt your head, confused. “Well…then why are you crying?” 
“That’s none of your business!” He snaps, brows pulled in as he comes forward on the sidewalk. Your face twists as you huff in annoyance. 
“My Mum says to treat everyone nicely. That wasn’t very nice.” 
“I don’t bloody care, do I,” you’re sent a scathing glance as he passes. “I didn’t ask for you to speak to me. Leave me alone.” 
Naturally, you follow after, cheeks gaining heat.
“You’re being mean! Apologize!” 
“Would you run off already?!” The boy shouts, and perhaps something fires in that small brain of yours—a thought and a semblance of self-realization at the shame that emits from his tone. A tight squeeze of vocal cords. 
He was ashamed. Ashamed you’d caught him. Seen him. 
Your feet slow back to a stop, watching him hurriedly continue on and hearing the quiet gasps of breath. After a moment, you grit your teeth and run the distance; seizing him around the middle in a hug of stubby fingers and tightly closed eyes.
The boy startles, body hardening and a cry escaping his lungs. “Get off of me!” He shouts, hands snapping down to yours and digging under your hold. 
“No!” You call, stubbornly. “My Mum says that hugs make everything better—”
“Stop talking about your Mum!” The boy stomps his foot to the ground, chubby cheeks turning crimson as he tilts his head back to look at you, tears still dripping off his chin. 
A stiff silence falls but like a green branch on a tree, Brown-Eyes’ form twitchingly loosens, his prying hands softening as you hold tight—digging your nose into his spine. He minutely flinches, but you only hug him more. 
You’re both late to the building, and your teachers are going to give you scoldings. But right now, on a chilled October morning, you hug this strange, crying boy and blink your fiery eyes up at him. 
After he relaxes fully and the sniffling stops, you let go and smile brightly again, looking up into his open expression of innocent confusion. Whatever had happened, he must have fallen pretty hard, you thought, pulling out another leaf from your hair. You giggle and hand it over as a gift. 
The boy hesitantly picks it up and looks at it before turning back to you. 
“Call me Ember.” 
A pause. A hesitation. But your eyes shimmer and he relents with the memory of the hug in the front of his mind. Such a strange encounter. 
He speaks, looking away from you with flushed cheeks, muttering out as his tear streaks dry.
“...Simon.”
You walk together the rest of the way.
The reality was, if you had gotten caught by your neighbor, had snatched that butterfly—had even stayed in those bushes for three more seconds, you would have missed him. And if Simon hadn’t run out of his home crying, he never would have locked onto the burning reality that was with you. 
You put the glass to your chapped lips and take a long sip, throat bobbing as you take down the liquid with tears burning your eyes. Blinking rapidly, you swipe at the water at the sides of your mouth and shake your head, sighing. 
“Why can’t you leave me alone?” Your voice bounces off the walls, peeling paint and moving the dust stuck atop the fridge. “Damnit, Simon.” 
Today was worse than the others—everything building and stacking like some castle of misery and pain; windows too narrow to let in any light and your form stuck in shadows longer than an endless rope. There were just so many things that suffocated you now. 
And in the endless nights, the brain desperately looks for comfort. 
You hate that it only comes from the memories of him. 
“I have to go to work tomorrow.” Your subconscious reminds you as you blankly stare out the window above the sink, seeing the streetlights and the cone of warm light—it flickers every so often, a blinking taking place like the eye of a large, brutish, wolf. 
Work, then the grocery store, then back home to eat a tasteless dinner and fall back to sleep. An empty house with empty walls and empty memories. 
Your hands put the glass in the sink, coming back up to rub and dig into your eyes until the itch behind your flesh stops. A thump of a low pulse is felt in the thin skin, orbs of your optics moving before you pinch into the bridge of your nose and drop them with a slap of a hand to the counter. A harsh breath exits your mouth, but it’s quickly strangled away into a sound of ragged shock. 
Outside, under the light, the silhouette of a man leans heavily on the pole, feet shaking under him and face pressed into the shadows as his shoulders heave. You stare, wide-eyed, as your heart jumps to a rapid pace. 
“What the fuck?” Your mouth utters, watching the man push off the light and stagger with a heavy limp and a jerking body of immense stature. Whoever this guy was, he was out of his mind—and coming right for your front door. You startle to go and secure it, feet slapping the ground and face twisted. 
“What the fuck?!” Gasping, you re-check your locks and frantically look for something else—the stool where you place your keys meets your eyes. You grab it and place it as a barrier to the handle, tilting it on two legs and blinking quickly as whatever sleep-sheen that had been in your gaze leaves in one swoop of adrenaline.
Grunting wafts in from under the door, haggard inhales and a sudden slam of a body hitting the door. You stifle a scream and back up quick steps, slapping your hands to your mouth.
Sure, you might live in a shitty neighborhood, but no one had ever tried to just straight-up break in high or drunk off something. Your mind slashes to the knives in the kitchen drawer as the wall shakes again—something sliding down to the ground and a grunted whine. 
Just before you run off, you hear it. An utterance; a disruption of airwaves. A whisper, a plea. Your brain ceases to function with one foot back the way you came, hand on the frame with the knuckles tight. 
In one instance it all comes to a screeching halt. 
“Ember…” 
Who called you that anymore? The rare instance where you’d meet your classmates in the world they would mutter it; also be asked a few questions before they went on with their lives. You pause in your panic, slowly gazing back at the barrier and the stool like you’d just discovered you’re under the sights of a sniper. 
There’s a sliver of something that inserts itself into your brain. Fear or hope, you can’t tell. But that can’t be right. 
He left. 
“Ember!” You flinch, the deep Manchester accent grating your heart into shreds. No. “It’s me!” He says, followed by a horribly gritty cough. 
There’s a weak thump against the door, mumbled curses, and growls as if a wild animal mimicking human speech. You almost wished for that, considering you now knew the exact person behind the door down to his atoms. The brown of his eyes and the way his cheeks looked as they were stained with tears. 
His laugh. Simon’s voice. Everything.
Simon.
You’re rushing to rip the stool away with a clatter and a jerk as it hits the far wall, undoing the locks with shaking hands as you grasp the handle and wrench it sideways. 
His form slams to your feet with a loud grunt as the door hits the wall. 
“Fuckin’ hell! Mind your bloody—!” Whatever he said was lost to you as you stare at the bloodied form of the man you had thought you’d seen the last of. Tactical gear, terrifying skull mask, black on black with weapons galore. But that voice told you all you needed to know.
Simon Riley is alive and very much breathing. 
The same boy you still loved. 
The same boy who’d broken your heart.
After October the years with Simon seemed to strengthen. You always walked together in the mornings—or, at least, you always waited for him. The dawn of your friendship strengthened and hardened to an unbreakable amount of mid-day rays; vast and sunny. 
When he was sixteen he asked you to be his girlfriend, hand in his pockets and ache on his chin as he grunted out broken sentences. Stuttering and awkward. You’d smiled with your bright eyes and giggled before kissing his cheek—feeling his sigh and him melting into you with a grin of his own, unable to meet your eyes for a moment. 
Later, when he said he’d wanted to leave his apprenticeship at the grocery’s butcher shop and join the Special Air Service, you’d been along for the ride—anything to get him away from his father and brother. You knew what was going on, even if he was still so hesitant to allow you any glimpse of his home life.
When he’d shy away at the Halloween decorations of skeletons as if the skull would jump off the page and tense at loud cheering, you knew. You did what you could, but there was only so much for you to suggest or say without him shutting down. 
When you’d offered your flat as a safe space after graduation, desperate to help your Lover, he’d stared and blinked in shock; tilting his head at you before smiling softly and taking you into a hug. Wherever he went, he knew he’d always have a place by your side.
So, throughout his leaves of absence from the military, he’d come home to you—bruised and tired, but still the same Simon you fell in love with. You’d cook for him, tease at his shaved hair as he gave you those puppy-dog eyes, and talked him through your classes at University.
You would fall asleep on his chest, feeling the hard strength he was gaining and the way he held you tighter than he ever had; conscious of himself but not wanting to part with you. 
The love the both of you had was akin to a blaze of fire, and you often found Simon simply staring into your eyes in times like those—watching silently and rubbing his thumb along your spine until your face burned. 
He was always so gentle despite everything; you loved his perseverance, his drive to be good despite nearly every factor telling him he couldn’t be. Slowly but surely, he was forging his own life. 
In 2003 he managed to take a break from the military to get his family straightened out. His brother, Tommy, went to rehab—Simon stayed with his mother and a year later he kicked his father to the curb and out of his and his family's life entirely. Finally free. 
You managed to meet his lovely mum, still so bright, and even interacted with Tommy once he got out; went to the younger brother’s wedding in ‘06 and met Beth, his wife. When you saw Simon’s mother and the way she carried herself, you knew where your Love got his pride from. The two were so alike it was a sight to see. 
While it may not have been conventional by any standard, Simon proposed to you in the back garden of Tommy’s cheap wedding venue. Alone, so as not to cause a scene. Willow trees and a small stream of water. Fireflies. The words ring in your soul with every waking moment, and they will stay there until it all goes silent with the grip of death.
He didn’t want to use his mum’s ring—the one that holds so many bad memories for both parties. He’d used the gold from it though. Went to a man who bled him dry for money to have it re-cast. 
It was simple. A small, glinting, ruby pressed in the middle. 
“It was always goin’ to be you, Ember, yeah?” he’d muttered in his deeper voice, formal attire holding you both tight. “So…don’t make me beg too much, Sweetheart. You know the old lady’ll kill me if I get stains on my suit.” 
“Beg?” You responded, tears in your eyes but such a wide grin on your lips. The stars above you twinkle like the pupils of your eyes—the same burn still trapped. “Oh, Simon, come on, now.” He connects his forehead to yours, hand still in the middle of you and presenting the accumulation of all of his love. The other wraps your waist. 
He was shaking slightly. 
“I would never make you beg for my love, Brown-Eyes.”
You both share a breathless chuckle and lock lips, smiling like fools as he sighs into you. 
In a happy world, that would have been the beginning of a perfect life. A happy house. A happy wedding. Happy deaths. 
But something went wrong on one of his deployments. 
Missing for months, he came back…wrong. With a fiery temper and sharp snapping words—wounds on the outside as well as inside. His eyes were feral, like a dog held back by a broken chain carting around its feet. 
Simon never spoke about it—the missing days. The weeks. The months. 
You broke yourself over it, trying to help but not knowing what would make it better. Some days there were flickers of soft expressions, but it was as if he were dragging himself up from a pool so deep it was bottomless to show them to you. Simon rarely smiled. He rarely sent an affectionate glance. 
He didn’t let you touch him. 
And then he called the entire engagement off with a letter on your counter only holding four words. 
‘Don’t look for me.’ 
And then Simon’s mum, Tommy, Beth, and his nephew had all died. Been killed. And you were just supposed to move on? Live with that? There were times when you had breakdowns so bad you couldn't leave the house for days—the house that Simon and you had bought together. 
All of those years. 
All those vows and shared nights.
And he disappeared on you.
You have him sitting on the couch, watching silently from the chair across the room as he finishes wrapping his leg with the bandages from the first-aid kit you’d provided. 
More like chucked at his gut.
No one had said a word, and the air was as tense as a noose—choking any oxygen that traveled into your throat. Simon was getting blood all over your flat cushions, the crimson saturating the fabric as you sit rail-rod straight, hand clenched on your thighs. 
Simon’s avoiding your eyes.
“Take off the mask,” you hiss, pupils slits. If he wasn’t going to address it, then you were. Simon freezes, not breathing as his hands fall stationary around the bandages. 
“I’ll be fine in a while—”
“Take off your fucking mask, Simon.” You can’t help the way you snap, face burning with shame and hate. How dare he show up now, after all of these years of mourning him and the relationship you’d built as kids. Simon wasn’t just your boyfriend—your fiancé—he was your best friend. 
And all he’d done was left you a four-fucking-letter note before leaving you behind.
The geared man sighs silently, and you see his shoulders sag. His grip travels up as he straightens his spine in a fluid motion, pain medication working through him in waves of numbness. 
His brown eyes bore through you as if he were a ghost. Under the fabric, his mouth thins. “Ma’am.” 
Even his voice is older. More dead. How could this be your Simon?
Your heart bruises your ribcage as he grasps the top of his skeletal mask, gloved fingers peeling back the sown layers until you get the full image of a man more damaged than before. You have to stop yourself from sobbing right then and there; your throat going dry.
So many scars. Milky white and spread vastly—they weren’t pretty. Up his cheeks, down his brow line; even at the corner of his mouth and seeping down his neck. A crooked nose with damaged cartilage. Strangling a gasp, it comes out as a great expelling of horror, eyes going wide with shock. 
You hate how you want to rush to him, take his face in your hands, and try to brush them away as if marks on paper. But you don’t make any such movements beyond a hunch of your shoulders. 
“Not pretty, eh? Guess I should’ve warned you.” Simon rubs at his forehead, blond locks, hanging around his temple, and the black of face-paint stuck in his sockets. “Didn’t mean to fuckin’ drop in like this, Ember. Bloody bastard thing for me to do.” 
You flinch at the name, looking away as you’d been peeling back his skin with your eyes. “What are you doing here, Simon?” Anyone with a brain could hear the cracking hardness in your words. Face blank. 
He studies your features, taking in the changes and the bleakness of your expression. Brows furrow slightly before they go back to a state of nothingness. Simon glances around the room, finding the condition of things concerning but doesn’t show it. 
“Nothin’ you need to worry about comin’ back to you, Sweetheart. Just work.”
“It is when the bastard who abandoned me shows up years later, bloody on my doorstep. Stop acting so self-righteous,” you growl, snapping, “I should toss your arse outside and let them have you. And don’t fucking call me that.”
Silence descends, and your words echo. It’s like now that he was here everything hurt ten times more than when he wasn’t. 
“I never wanted us to end up like we did—”
“Bullshit!” You’re on your feet and stalking to him, pointing with your finger as he hurriedly stands up as well and looks down in shock as you press your digit into his bulky vest. “You shut your mouth, Simon Riley, and you let me explain something to you.” 
He keeps silent, mouth parted and scars shifting around his stubble. His hands slightly held out at his sides and hovering over your hips—not touching you but there just in case. Simon’s brown ords are carefully widened at your tight exclamation. The sound of his clearing throat enters the living room before you speak again. 
“I waited for you, hoped and prayed that you would show me at least a,” your throat bunches, but you push through. “A modicum of respect and show your stubborn self up at my door with apology flowers and a guilty smile on your lips. You know who took care of your family's burial plots, you fucking piece of shit,” his eyes flinch closed a bit, turning his head down as his breath hitches. “Me! You fucking disappeared!”
You know you shouldn’t be yelling, shouldn’t be pounding on his chest with a fist as if he was a door and you the knocker, but, dammit, it’s been years and he just shows up? Like this? Ten times the size he was—scarred and torn to shreds; laced with muscles and an expression of vacancy. Simon holds to your words, hanging off of them with a down-ward turned chin and eyes that lock with yours through pale lashes. 
“Maybe I-I did, o…or pushed some things that I shouldn’t have,” you hold back your tears, but your voice still wavers, tapering off like a line without a hook, “but I didn’t deserve that, Simon.” The first traitorous sob breaks through. “I didn’t deserve that.”
His eyes shatter into a myriad of kaleidoscope bits and pieces, brows flicking from one point on your face to another in quick slashes of guilt. But he still doesn’t touch you. Not until you tell him it’s what you want.
Simon opens his mouth but closes it just as quickly, unable to find any words that would even matter. You let your tears slip down your cheeks, dribbling off your chin. The man’s chest hurts, pulse thumping to mirror yours. 
“I waited for you and you broke me,” you whisper, mouth twisting with odium towards the man under your fist. “I wanted a life with you, Simon, no matter the trials.”
“I didn’t mean to…” The man trails off, clenching his jaw. You scoff, backing up a step and pressing your palms into your eyes. 
“But you did.”
“I had to keep you safe, Ember.” Simon’s fingers twitch outward, eyes frantically moving around as you sniffle and shakily walk away to the kitchen. He follows, desperately on your heels as your spine bows forward with resounding cries of anguish. “I...I wasn’t right in the head, I need you to understand I didn’t want this! I never wanted to fucking hurt you!” 
Your hand connects with the junk drawer, tearing it open and digging a hand inside as he pleads with you to listen. 
“If I didn’t leave I was worried I’d do something—!”
“Then you should have trusted me!” Your hands rip out the ring held on a small leather strap. The ruby glints where it always sits, held in tarnished gold. You chuck it at his chest and suck down breaths so you don’t pass out. “I would have listened! Gotten you help! We don’t abandon the ones we love, Simon! Not us!” 
Simon catches the object by slapping a hand to his chest, pinky finger latching through the leather cord before he jerks his limb back up. When he looks at the ring, he goes utterly still, gazing back up at you slowly. 
“We were supposed to be different,” you sob, trapping it behind your hands. He’s shaking, brows tight and lines along his face as he brings a free hand to run through his locks, gripping the strands for a moment and pulling. “Simon,” you say again, and he looks back at you with glossy eyes. “We were supposed to be better.”
“What did I do to you to deserve that,” he stares, his jaw is loose and he can’t stop clenching and unclenching it. You can see his heart working through his breast. Bloodied. Beaten by fists and slashed with knives. “What did I do to you?”
“Nothing,” he gasps, taking a step forward. “Fuck, Ember, you didn’t bloody do anything to me besides love me.” 
You sputter out, “Then why did you leave me here alone?” Your knees buckle and he darts forward, catching you under the arms as you wail out, shoving on his waist, “You never should have come back. Never should have come back.” 
He lets you push him off; lets you back up to the counter as Simon tilts his head higher to stave off the tears in the sides of his eyes. He’d known coming here was a bad idea, for lack of a better word, but after the Op went bad and all of his safe houses were compromised, he didn’t have a choice. It wasn’t to say he didn’t regret his actions in the past with you, or that he didn’t punish himself for them, yet at the time it was the only thing he could do to give him the sense that you would be better without him. Safe. 
After everything that had happened, he wasn’t in the right state of mind anymore. You deserved so much better. But hearing all of this…
Christ, could he have been wrong? Everything blurred; hurt. Hearing your sobs was like a knife to his heart every time, digging and cutting with serrated edges at the veins and pumping muscle, carving away flesh to shed the pounding redness to light. You held that heart in your hand and in his he held the ring—the ring he’d given to you as a promise of love and honor. 
A pact of loyalty. 
Simon doesn’t even realize he’s crying until the blurring edges of his vision make itself known. His eyes bore harshly, prodding into you as he makes known what he’s been broken since he first locked gazes with you again. The man’s voice shakes, accent deep and tight.
He asks the first thing that comes to his head.
“What happened to your eyes?”
“What?” You ask, incredulously, brows furrowed as your hand digs into the counter to keep you upright. Simon stares deeper, the sides of his eyelids wrinkling with a not-so-hidden sheen of great concern. Unbearable pain.
“What happened to your bloody eyes?” Where had the spark gone? That flare that grew and spread like fire that was the entire purpose behind your name. An unconquerable ache for life. 
You only watch him with a parted mouth and tear-stained lashes, sniffling. Simon tries again, taking a step forward on unsteady feet. 
“Please, Sweetheart, d…don’t, don’t…” He can’t finish, the leather cord intertwined into his fingers as he comes closer. “Don’t tell me I took it away. Not my Ember. Not my Girl’s fire.”
Your eyes are so overflowed you can’t even see him as he hovers over you, fingers coming up to brush your cheeks as his mouth is open in hard pants of breath. “No, no, no. Fuckin’ bastard, not me. Not over me, please.” It’s like Simon’s not even talking to you but rather himself. 
He mutters in fast sentences, eyes panicked. “You were supposed to be better off—‘posed to move on. Why didn’t you? Why didn’t you find someone else?” 
“You’re an idiot, Simon. An idiot,” you sag into his neck, nose digging into his pulse as he quivers, legs having to reset themselves. His heat melts into you as your body gives out with a final sob, “It was always going to be you.”
His arms snap around you like a vise, dragging you into him as he breaks and stifles his whimper on your scalp, breathing right by your ear; gasping for breath. 
“M’sorry,” he mutters, so silent below his sniveling stutters, “M’so sorry, Sweetheart. This is all my fucking fault.” 
You shake into his chest, face nuzzling and desperate to smell his scent again—tired from all the yelling and fighting. It was still late, you still needed to go to work tomorrow…but Simon. 
Oh, Simon. How could he be so…him?
Your sobs are quieter than his, tiny cries that make the man’s arms tighten around you every time. Hands coming up, you can’t stop the way you want to hold him; how you wish to keep him close to you and push him away all at once. How dare he? 
How dare he still make you love him after all he’d put you through? 
Simon sags to the floor with you in his hold, head bowed and trying to gasp down his vulnerability as tears stain your shoulder. It’s as if the realization that he’d made a mistake had broken him back down to when he was young, past hatred of messing up infesting his brain like maggots. A fear of it, even. 
The man presses quick, panicked kisses to your neck as his breath hitches every other second, rocking you back and forth. 
“Didn’t mean to do it,” Simon utters. “Didn’t mean for it to hurt you—” 
He breaks off and you realize that despite the years Simon’s mind was still very much fragile when it came to home life. You blink and take a deep breath, unable to get out of his unrelenting grip. 
Your hand travels up to find the back of his head, spreading through his hair and massaging his flesh. When things got bad you used to do this with him. Give the man something to focus on so he could pass through his hysteria quicker.
Simon’s ribcage bangs against yours, nearly hyperventilating with how he’s trying to hide his small grunts and whines.
“Simon,” you clear your throat, trying to calm yourself down as seriousness sets in your tone. “Simon, breathe.” 
Your ears twitch, noticing him listen to you as he takes down a long gasp of air and breathes out in puffs on your neck—hot and humid. 
“Ember…”
“Shh,” interrupting, you shush him in tiny whispers, still rubbing at his head. “Brown-Eyes, just sit here, okay?” You feel a jerky nod, his fingers squeezing your flesh off and on as he mimics your own lung pattern. 
It’s a few minutes before he goes completely still again, and you feel the burn of shame from his face in your clutch. The relationship was strained—or whatever you could call this—but you never wanted to see him in pain. Never.  
You knew he was better when he sighs deeply, completely going limp in your arms; great weight leaning into you as you lean back to the cabinets to help with the pure might of his physique. With a slow hand, you un-velcro his vest and his gear, letting it hit the floor with dull thumps and clatters. 
He doesn’t protest, doesn’t move to help or hinder. You would give anything to know what he was thinking. 
“M’sorry,” Simon whispers and you respond accordingly, softly.
“You’ve already said that, Love.” He grunts, taking in a long, deep breath. 
“Need you t’know it.” 
“...I do.”
“Okay.” You close your eyes and stave off your anger at everything happening right now. While it would feel better to yell at him until dawn, what would that even achieve? Everything had needed to be said, had been. And you’d never felt lighter than at this moment. 
You knock your head against him, the both of you panting for breath and hands vibrating with leaving adrenaline. Sweaty and twitchy. 
“You never should have done that, Simon.” Whispering, you sigh. “I needed you. I needed you here. With me.” He stays still, but you feel his lips press deeper into your pulse. You’re practically in his lap, back to the woodgrain. 
In a moment of weakness, or pure longing, you pull his head back and situate your hands at his cheeks, looking over his scars and his broken skin as he lets you move him how you wish. His half-lidded, red, eyes stare—grip around you not letting up. 
Simon doesn’t speak as, unprompted, you kiss the shattered bridge of his nose; you only feel the fluttering of his lashes as they tickle your cheeks. 
“I was scared of myself.” He mutters. “After they died…” His family. “I didn’t want to put you in danger, Ember. Not you.”
“We would have figured it out, Simon. You know that, deep down, you do.” Brown eyes find yours as you tilt his head. 
“You sure?” He asks, desperate for an answer even though he doesn’t know himself. 
Thumbs run up and down his stubble. Your face creases, “...I don’t know. But we could have tried.” 
Simon’s eyes close tightly, and his face tilts to press his lips to your palm, quivering breath exhaled with the strength of an open balloon. Your ring was still stuck in his digging grip, and it was never going to leave for the rest of the night. 
“Yeah,” he whispers, gravely voice lax. 
Studying him now, in this light, knowing he was so afraid of what he might do if he got into an episode, you were stabbed with agony in your heart. To be that afraid of yourself to that magnitude was nearly unimaginable to you.
Nearly. 
“What now?” You ask lowly, the last remnants of tears drying as Simon opens his eyes slowly, looking back at you. 
“Don’t know.” He admits. “I have to leave.”
“I have work tomorrow,” you relate. Your teeth find your lip, biting it. 
A small awkward chokehold captures the both of you. The reality was that both of you were akin to strangers again—such was the curse of lost years and trials you’d faced along the way. 
Brown-Eyes and Ember were dead, yet you still called their names like phantoms of sleek black fabric and chained recollections of a boy with red cheeks and a girl with muddy shoes. The walks to school were there, the dates, and the late nights spent in good company. Touches to skin and open-mouthed kisses. Fireflies that whizzed and the glinting of gold as wind ran through the willows.
Dark corruption stained the faint idea of happiness; of a good world. This was not reality. It was some joke of an existence. 
If life were fair, Simon Riley would have never grown up in that house—his father wouldn’t have latched onto his brother and done dark deeds to wrap the little brown-eyed boy in red tissue paper and barbed wire. A present and sheen of mild sociopathy; separation of any pain or torment. A fighting boy. A boy born with blood on his hands and stuck behind his eyes every time he swung a fist. 
It was a curse to love him. And it was a curse that burned your soul with his very name. 
“Are you going to go?” You ask, eyes blank but yearning for what little comfort you can grab. It had been so long.  Simon blinks, his head still in your hands; body not moving.
He knows he should. He isn’t sure if there’s anything left for him here or not. 
Simon connects his head to yours and you still. “Do you want me to?” 
“Do you love me?” You blurt, blinking at him and confused. Simon’s lips part. “Or if you walk out that door do I plan on never seeing you again?” 
You're about to open your mouth and continue before his own slots perfectly against it.
You gasp lightly, taken aback but in no way opposed. He still felt exactly the same, flesh still tasting metallic and tinged with violence down to his DNA; raised with survival instincts as his greatest ally. Until you. 
With you survival became secondary. 
Your hands go to card through his hair, latching and lightly pulling as Simon’s body shivers; growling against your lips in a dance of heated flesh and damp cheeks. Hearts hammer with the restraint of years. 
“I would never make you beg for my love,” he murmurs between lapsing passes of his mouth, open kisses and dark glances. “Tell me where you want me to be.”
You whimper against him and he goes back in, pressing the base of your skull to the cabinet as hands grip and slide, kneading your skin. 
“Tell me,” Simon whispers. Pleads through grunts. “Ember, tell me.”
“Here,” you admit brokenly, pulling him closer to you as you’re lifted and placed on the countertop. “I need you here, Simon. I need you with me.” 
Fingers capture your chin, keeping your head angled up as your eyes beg. Lips bush with every word, gazes wild as if two leopards locking jaws over a kill. 
“Fight to get me back.” Brown sparks with purpose, a small puff of air hitting your mouth as eyes darken over. In this moment, you do not know if you’re dying or living. “Make it right.”
“Affirmative.” Simon moves his head back, taking your ring and looping the cord around his neck, he keeps it there as you watch, breathless. Your face creases with question. The man’s lips flicker when he sees this, coming back and grasping your hips as you instinctually latch to his waist. 
“I’ll give it back when I’ve earned the right for you to be called mine again. Seems I have work to do, Sweetheart.” He kisses you once more, firm and true. “First, I’ll ‘ave to figure out if my Girl can get her spark back, yeah? I’ve proper gone and fucked it up.” 
That night you lay in the heap of limbs and sheets that couple the both of you together. In the morning the questions would start, and Simon knew you’d take nothing short of the truth. 
And he’d give you it. All of it. 
Because Simon Riley knows well enough that you don’t go and bite the hand that feeds twice. Certainly not when it was you. Certainly not when it offers a love he would never hope to find again, in this life or the next.
So you keep the other close and sag into a deep slumber, not to wake for a long, long time. 
And you’d both never slept better
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art · 1 month
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Creator Spotlight: @chaaistheanswer
Hi everyone! I am Clara, but you can also call me chaa! I am a digital artist based in Auckland, New Zealand, with a bachelor’s degree in Creative Media Production. After graduating from uni, I moved out to pursue my art career and I’ve been a freelance digital artist ever since. I love concept art, especially character design! Creating characters influenced by my love for fantasy is what I live for. Thank you for stopping by, and I hope you enjoyed my art! And thank you, Tumblr, for this opportunity!
Check out our interview with Clara below!
Did you originally have a background in art? If not, how did you start?
I specialized in art in high school and have a bachelor’s degree in Creative Media Production from Massey University with an animation pathway. For our thesis film, which I worked on with several of my classmates, I took on the role of producer, art director, and concept artist. Our short film was featured in the Wellington Film Festival Terror-Fi in 2020. After graduating, I went on to become a freelance artist, but my goal is to work for the gaming industry as a character concept artist. Ever since I first picked up a pencil, I knew I wanted to become an artist!
Have you ever had an art block? If so, how did you overcome it?
Art block is quite common among artists, and unfortunately, I too have fallen prey to the affliction. I have several ways of overcoming art block: watching movies, playing games, reading, or going out for a drive with my sister. These are just a few things I love to do to help keep my creative juices flowing!
What is one habit you find yourself doing a lot as an artist?
I tend to obsessively research about completely unrelated topics while I draw. I find learning new things helps improve my concept designs, especially in creating backgrounds for my characters.
Over the years as an artist, what were your biggest inspirations behind your creativity?
Video games and anime were my biggest inspirations! Anything with a captivating story that’ll send me to the edge of my seat, and loveable characters. I’m particularly drawn to high and dark fantasy.
How has technology changed the way you approach your work?
Technology has made a huge impact on us artists over the last few years. I used to draw a lot on paper, but since getting a tablet, I find myself searching for the undo and redo buttons and even trying to zoom constantly while I draw on paper. I used to only draw for myself as well, but after posting my art online, I now have an audience to whom I can share my art. Because of this, I am able to earn a living doing what I love by creating illustrations for clients.
What is a recent creative project that you are proud of?
I am very proud of this recent commission I’ve done for a client! Fortunately, the piece turned out exactly how I wanted it to look, and my client was very happy with the result. I am also in the process of working on a Webtoon, which is going as smoothly as I hoped it would be before its re-release!
What advice would you give to younger you about making art that's personal or truthful to your own experiences?
The best advice I would give my younger self is to never hold back! Try not to think about the negatives of creating and sharing art that you believe in. Embrace vulnerability, and don’t be afraid to dig deep into your own emotions and experiences. Always explore, and don’t limit yourself to your own bubble. And most important of all, stay true to yourself! Stay true to your values and beliefs, and never compromise your own authenticity for the sake of pleasing others. Your art is a reflection of you as a person.
Who on Tumblr inspires you and why?
@yuumei-art has been an inspiration to me since my early Deviantart days. I admire how she uses her skills to focus on environmentalism and cyber activism. @nipuni is another inspiration of mine. I found her when I was in the process of recovering from Dragon Age Solavellan hell. I admire how she manages to capture faces well while also sticking to her style. Her paintings are so beautiful and very pleasing to my eyes!
Thanks for stopping by, Clara! If you haven't seen her Meet the Artist piece, be sure to check it out here. For more of Clara's work, follow her Tumblr, @chaaistheanswer!
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valfeathers · 8 months
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BENS!! i forgot how fun drawing/designing pastas can be,,, i’m re obsessing
ramble down here btws,, //death mentions since he is a ghost
ok so ben is an old fave and i have thoughts. this first new hc design isn’t that remarkable except for the fact that instead of trying to make ben look like a dark/‘corrupted’ link, i tried to draw him like a kid in a hand-stitched link costume.
i will be drawing/writing(?) ben as a kid btw, specifically a ghostly 12 year old kid whose hobbies include trying to stress his cohabitants into early retirement.
the ben fullbody on the left is a slightly more corporeal form that he uses when out in the open and interacting with people in person. while still ghostly (like. swipe at him and your hand will go straight through him kinda ghostly) it’s more solid and has more of his features that he possessed before his death. he floats!! that’s his main mode of transportation in the open. he floats.
the one on the right is one that you’d see onscreen! he’s quite literally ‘rendered’ differently giving his victims that patented dread associated with ben. uncanny valley yk
when scared or upset his pupils vanish leaving you with those empty dark scleras. this doesn’t happen often though!
anyways that’s all for now!! an anon asked me to draw hoodie so i’m off to go do that :)
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leovenuslatina · 4 months
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˚₊‧꒰ა 𝑪𝒍𝒂𝒊𝒎 𝒕𝒐 𝒇𝒂𝒎𝒆 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚
why/how you became famous?
˚₊‧꒰ა ♡ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚
this is the first in my fame series! this series is all about what your life of fame will be like !! enjoy !!
‧꒰˚ʚ🎀ɞ˚꒱ ‧ this is just a reminder that tarot isn’t permanent or set in stone YOU decide how your life goes no one or nothing else now take a deep breath and choose the pile that calls to you ‧꒰˚ʚ🎀ɞ˚꒱ ‧
⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧⛧°。
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⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧⛧°。
🎀 pile one 🎀
four of cups, page of cups, eight of wands
⋆。‧˚ʚɞ˚‧。⋆
pile one i see you being famous like an over night thing. maybe you post a silly video or something while you’re bored at home and out of nowhere you blow up!When it comes to massing a following, being genuine with a big personality can be an irresistible combination for you. People are drawn to your authenticity, and you are someone that exudes genuine qualities coupled with a larger-than-life personality you’re magnetic. you are refreshing and invigorating to encounter. you are true to yourself and unapologetically embrace your unique qualities. This authenticity shines through in your posts, words, and interactions, creating a sense of trustworthiness that undoubtedly attracts others. A big personality adds another layer of charm as it infuses excitement and enthusiasm into every moment. People are naturally captivated by you who radiates positive energy and have the ability to bring joy into everyone’s life. Ultimately, it is this winning combination of genuineness and a big personality that draws people in and makes them love you so much. Suddenly, your follower count skyrockets, and notifications flood in from people all over the world. It's surreal, to say the least. Comments pour in praising your humor or admiring your beauty. Your inbox is flooded with messages from brands wanting to collaborate. From being an ordinary user scrolling through memes and cat videos, now everyone wants a piece of you - interviews, guest appearances, sponsorships - it seems endless.
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ extra ୧⋆ ˚。⋆
boredom
disappointment
re-evaluate
announcement
birth
good news
hasty action
motion
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。
🎀 pile two 🎀
two of swords, ace of pentacles, ten of wands
⋆。‧˚ʚɞ˚‧。⋆
you’re famous pile two because of what you say and what you talk about what you say and the things you talk about really resonates with others! you may be a motivational speaker or writer someone who really gets to people deeply with just your words. i see you a lot in the spot light and on like red carpets in fancy dress and dripping in diamonds. you have a beautiful smile so you might be funny or a comiden actor/actress. pile 2 people are so obsessed with your mind i don’t know what it is about but the way you think is remarkable to others. you’re constantly pulling people in with your opinions on whatever topic . you could be a talk show host ! giving wendy but better. you’re so welcoming and sun shining all over everyone who is a fan of yours. pile 2 if or when you become famous your recognition and success will be extremely abundant ! you’ll be so well loved and very well known.
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ extra ୧⋆ ˚。⋆
balance, bambi, deer 🦌, red, red carpets, peace of mind, cameras, emotional stability , finical, gain , luck , talk shows , recognition, success
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。
🎀 pile three 🎀
seven of cups, temperance, the tower
⋆。‧˚ʚɞ˚‧。⋆
pile 3 you’re famous for something you’ve always wanted to do something you’ve dreamt of doing for your whole life. this career is something you definitely manifested. this maybe something you wanted to do ever since you little. i’m seeing your inner child guiding you to this career. you’re famous because your life is inspiring! people see how hard you work and have been and all you’ve been through. people from all over are drawn to you because of you being so true to yourself and not ashamed to be who you really are. you may become a actress i see you might have a flare for the dramatics and or performing on a sort of broadway stage. you become famous pile 3 because you’re a very ambitious person who goes after any and everything you want.
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ extra ୧⋆ ˚。⋆
dreams and ambitions , stars ⭐️ , inner self, capable, control, dramatic change, new start, blue,
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。
🎀 pile four 🎀
the well, three of pentacles, eight of pentacles
⋆。‧˚ʚɞ˚‧。⋆
you’re definitely an artist !! you’re extremely comfortable with your medium whatever it is painting or music or whatever you make your art with your extremely skilled ! whatever it is that you create resonates will millions. and you’re praised heavily for your incredible art work. everyone is so impressed how you can be so skilled you are at such a young age. people are truly amazed by your talent. if you’re an artist can see your artwork being displayed in huge museums in from of crowds of people. i see opportunities falling right into your lap so if you do desire fame and fortune simply remain indulgent in you passions that will lead you to true happiness
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ extra ୧⋆ ˚。⋆
nurturing
opportunities
creative
excellence
satisfaction
mastery
success
teamwork
purpose
new skills
apprentice
⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。⋆⋆ ˚。⋆୨ ♡ ୧⋆ ˚。
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wewontbesleeping · 2 years
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Reminder: you can get high on a first kiss. and you can get by on sweet tea and gods graces!
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meiluu · 10 months
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Leon S. Kennedy RE:2 NSFW Drabble
MDNI 18+
Head resting within the crook of his elbow, your mind is overwhelmed with the amount of pleasure that’s coursing through your body. Leon has his arm around your neck-keeping you in a headlock position, while the other rests on your hip. A fast and rough pace has your eyes glazing over in ecstasy, each thrust punching a moan out of your abused lips. In your peripheral you get the mouthwatering view of Leon’s biceps bulging with each thrust. “Yes-Yes, you feel so good.” His voice is a rushed whimper.
Leon had come home from a long and irritating patrol with one thing on his mind, you. Being with you allowed for Leon to get a reprieve from his job, you were his own personal heaven. And right now he felt that he was as close to the real thing when he was inside of you. Warm walls squeezing him with every thrust, massaging every vein on his cock. Your soft and pliant body was the perfect remedy for any annoyance Leon encountered. You were his good girl, his only girl- the one he planned on marrying. But all of that could wait because his priority was the get you to cum around his cock.
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I’m literally obsessed with this re2 Leon look, the rolled up sleeves and the slicked back hair GYAT…Leon always looks so handsome <3
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