#which relate to the handle but seem pretty random

[sixeyesgojo]

all good things come in threes

☾ Summary: Winning a bet against Gojo ‘big ass ego’ Satoru isn't as easy as you thought. But you can't complain either. ☾ Characters: highschool!Gojo Satoru x reader ☾ Word count: 6k ☾ Content warning: use of petnames, implied height difference, tooth-rotting fluff, Gojo's a little shit and has negative rizz ☾ Author's note: My heart was going through STUFF. ☾ Tags: @nagumoan @heresan @peachsayshi @trueformsukuna @gojos-princesa @cursedmoonchild

White tufts of hair. Round sunglasses. An annoying facial expression directed at you. That was your view. You let out an exasperated sigh. Out of everyone available at the time, they just had to choose you to partner up with Satoru. It was to make sure the young conceited sorcerer wouldn’t go overboard or well, get ahead of himself. Sure, his abilities were extraordinary and even at a young age, he had already displayed an astonishing understanding of his cursed techniques and various other battle-related skills. Everyone knew that Satoru was set to be a pioneer and that he didn’t exactly need a partner to fulfill his missions. You knew about his abilities, how they worked and his modus operandi, already having had experience partnering up with him on various missions. But those had been wildly different as they required a partner, a second person. This one clearly didn’t. Yet they still sent you with him, knowing full well that he could handle it himself. These damn fossils.

It was understandable that Satoru had his own opinions about this rather unexpected turn of events. After having heard his initial protestations, which contained the words “no faith”, “incompetent” and how he was “not some random weakling”, you’ve had enough and it began to annoy you. Neither of you were responsible for orders being passed down as they were; and both of you knew that some of them did not make sense, some of them were plain unreasonable and some of them just seemed antiquated, obsolete, outdated. If anyone had enough power to object orders from above, it was the young sorcerer in front of you. However, he didn’t bother to do so. As for you, you had questioned the intent behind the task assigned to you, but simply accepted it as it was. There was no helping it anyway. In the end, you were just a cog in a giant and screwed system.

And so, you were stuck with him on a mission to rescue civilians and eliminate a first grade curse. “I still don’t understand why I need a partner for this. Do I look like a total wimp?” he complained and pulled a grimace.

You rolled your eyes at him, clearly displeased at the situation yourself, “I bet they assigned me to keep your big ass ego in check.”

For someone who had grumbled that much about you being his partner this time around, Satoru certainly seemed entertained in one way or another. At least, a small part of him seemed to revel in the situation. “And I’m sure you will do an excellent job at keeping my ‘big ass ego’ at bay,” he retorted sarcastically, all while giving you that damn smirk. No one else in the world could look so smug while being a prick. So what if you found him attractive? So what if his teasing made your heart skip one or two beats? So what if the smirk made you want to kiss it off of his stupid face? His personality was foul enough. At that moment, all you wanted to do was to smack him but you knew exactly that his bothersome Infinity wouldn’t let you.

“Ugh, I don’t exactly enjoy being stuck with someone who constantly complains either. I’ll just get this mission done as quickly as I can and then we’re both free from each other. Deal?” you rambled. Your keenness to end this all as soon as possible made his ears perk up and upon hearing this, the white-haired teenager dropped his empty can on the ground, “Woah woah woah, hold your horses. I am pretty sure you can’t even defeat the curse as fast as I can, so who’s stuck with who?”

You shrugged as you picked up the metal can, ever so trusting in your abilities. Although you knew he was the strongest, that didn’t mean you couldn’t beat him to it, right? You just had to be clever about it. “Fine, let’s make a bet then. Whoever lands the finishing blow on the curse wins,” you suggested and tossed the metallic container into a trashcan. Satoru raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms. “Loser has to do whatever the winner wants,” the sorcerer decided. He seemed interested enough.

“Fine by me. Don’t cry about it when I win,” you said, grinning at him. He grinned back at you, all too confident in his victory already, “I’m afraid I’ll be the one wiping your tears.”

Days passed. Finally, the fateful day was here.

“Will you hurry up?” he urged you. “I’m already on my way,” you replied, annoyed at being rushed by him. Why were you two walking to the scene in the first place? “Come on, we don’t have all day,” he continued. You rolled your eyes. Not everybody had the privilege of having stilts for legs. Still, you sped up in order to catch up to him.

“This is the place,” Satoru pointed out, stopping abruptly. He held his arm out in front of you, as if to keep you out… if one was delusional enough, the gesture could have been interpreted as a protective one. Promptly, you shook your head. There was no time for such thoughts. You could daydream later—focus was more important now.

“There are still people inside. We need to evacuate them first,” he inferred, looking into your eyes. Your mind then switched to mission mode immediately.  “Then we can take it down together.”

You nodded; even without verbal communication, the allocation of tasks was successfully conveyed. Vanishing from his sight, you were off to evacuate anyone that was left in the vicinity. Sure, Satoru could find the curse and get rid of it on his own. Then he would have won the bet easily. However, something in your gut told you that he wouldn’t do that. He could be fair… sometimes—even if it was for his own enjoyment. Admittedly, he wasn’t a bad partner on missions; he just wasn’t the greatest personality-wise. But he certainly had a charm to him. That’s how he unknowingly wrapped you around his finger…

The evacuation went as smooth as it could—with one or two stray bullets that would not listen, as per usual. Since you had already done this lots of times, you were able to finish up quickly and get the civilians to safety with the help of the assistants: the Windows.

“I’m here,” you announced to him as soon as you were back. And you were right! He just leaned against a wall, waiting for you. “About time. I almost thought you wouldn’t come anymore because you got scared shitless. You ready to take this thing down?” He asked. You smirked at him, “You bet I am. Ready to kick your sorry ass.”

Chuckling, he swung himself into a proper standing position. “Alright. I see you’re being as feisty as ever. Remember: The loser will have to do whatever the other person wants after all this is over,” the tall teenager reminded you with a cocky grin. Oh, he was so sure that he would win. His eyes gleamed with excitement and he was ready to fight this curse to ensure his oh-so-sweet victory over you. Of course, he had already thought of his prospective prize.

As if on cue, the curse appeared behind him and roared. In the blink of an eye, two giant claws came swinging at Satoru. You didn’t hesitate to activate your own cursed technique, successfully blocking the slash attack at frightening speed.

“Mark me impressed,” Satoru laughed. It wasn’t his first time seeing you in action but he couldn’t help but tease you, “You’re still not on my level but it’ll do.”

You rolled your eyes, “You say this every time we’re partnered up. Doesn’t it get old?”

He simply laughed as you both dodged an incoming blow. The two of you continued to face off with the curse. Before long, both of you had landed blows on the enemy. He was holding back for some reason—that’s what you thought—otherwise you were sure that this level of curse would have been taken care of by his hands already. It was neither weak nor was it anything drastically above your level. There was one thing you were sure about: He was stalling—and you played right into his games. But your pride wouldn’t let you drop out of the bet. 

It wasn’t long until the curse crumbled to dust. You panted a little, looking at the white-haired sorcerer. The enemy was gone now but he didn’t look like he had broken a single sweat. He dusted himself off and straightened his posture.

“Now about that winner and loser thing…” he began, “I think you can guess the winner.”

You huffed. Damn. Despite holding out well, your plan was a failure. But a bet was a bet, right? “Fine, what do you want me to do?” you probed. He wouldn’t ask you to do bizarre things for him, right?

Satoru tapped his chin, pretending to think, when in reality he had already known before the fight even started. You looked like you poured your whole heart into winning, so he couldn’t help but hold back a little.

“Then… how about going out for ice cream? It’s on me. I think I deserve ice cream after working so hard,” he finally spoke. At first, you thought your brain was playing pranks on you. “Wait,” you paused, “Are you asking me out as your prize for winning the bet?”

A playful grin spread on his face. “You could definitely say that.” He specified, “But I also just really like ice cream on a summer day and I think we deserve some. What, are you chickening out now?”

You looked at him quizzically, questioning whether this was a joke on his part. You felt your heart speed up and the tips of your ears became warmer by the second. “Fair. A win is a win. I guess I’ll go have ice cream with you,” you muttered. Was he scheming something? Did he… perhaps like—

He chuckled and proceeded with a half-teasing tone, “You guess?” The laughter that followed after was soft. “We gotta report back first and then we can go.” Without further ado, he turned on his heel and walked away. The grin that was on his face was not visible to you. “Ugh, shut up,” you grumbled, still somewhat flustered. Nevertheless, you followed him. This damn heart wouldn’t let you rest.

The briefing didn’t take long at all—the mission was a success. After making a report, the two of you headed to a nearby ice cream store. As you stood in line waiting for your sweet cold treat, you looked at his face. He was even better looking than you originally thought. Come to think of it, you might have never looked at him from up close. Suddenly, he turned to you. “What flavor are you getting?” Satoru asked curiously.

You looked at him and answered, “Lime with mint.” It was one of your favorite flavors.

“Lime with mint, huh?” he repeated and looked towards the sky as if you had just asked him a deeply philosophical question he needed to ponder about. “Not a bad choice. I’m getting mango. Can’t go wrong with that.” He paid for the ice cream, as promised, and guided both of you to a nearby bench so you could enjoy the treat. His eyes were positively gleaming with delight after he sat down. It was happiness that resembled yours whenever you got ice cream. “Why lime with mint?” Satoru wondered. With a shrug, you replied, “I just like lime. With mint in it, it’s more refreshing in summer. Have you ever tried?”

Satoru shook his head, so you allowed him to have a taste. You could pinpoint the exact moment when he realized that your statement was the truth: It was nice and refreshing indeed. He made a mental note that your ice cream taste was impeccable. “Any other flavor you enjoy?” he probed. It took a moment of thinking until you came up with something, “Matcha ice cream. I like mango too.”

“Good call. Mango is one of my favorites for sure,” he said as he took a bite of his scoop of ice cream.

“I’m wondering,” you said aloud, “why did you choose to ask me out as your reward? I expected… actually, I don’t know what I expected but it was definitely something else.”

The sorcerer pondered, thinking about how to phrase it. “Like what?” he asked. “I don’t know. Maybe kissing your ass, being your accomplice for pranks or something like that. That would be on-brand for you,” you joked. You would have never expected such a turn of events.

“That would have been an amazing idea, actually,” the guy mused. In retrospect, it would have been better if you hadn’t said anything to not fuel his dumb ideas. “You absolute jackass! Nobody wants to kiss your ass!”

Even though you should have expected such a reply coming from him, you couldn’t help but feel a tiny bit scandalized at the mental image of you kissing his rear. Gross. You shook your head to get rid of the imagery.

And yet, your curiosity hadn’t been quenched at all. As impatient as you were about his reply, you further probed him on the matter, “So… about my question…?”

As if to hide any embarrassing feelings, your opposite snickered. “Right… about that…” he cleared his throat, “I just kinda like our banter a lot… and you. So I figured that I should just shoot my shot. ‘What are they gonna say? No?’ was what I thought but see, a bet’s a bet! And I won!”

Oh. Oh.

Your eyes widened. So it was like that. 

Gojo Satoru? The Gojo Satoru? The conceited prick Satoru? Your crush Satoru? And you? Together? Never in a hundred years. But… it’s not like you had any right to complain about it, seeing as your heart was threatening to break out of its bony confinement.

“Hey, hey, hey. No need to look so surprised. I’ve been trying to get closer to you, didn’t you notice?” he asked, tilting his head to the left side, as if to get a better glimpse of your surprised expression.

“You thought being the most annoying prick to ever walk on Earth would do the trick?” Your jaw dropped. A strange expression of surprise flitted across your face for a split second. He shrugged his shoulders, “Well, it definitely worked—after all I got your undivided attention, didn’t I?”

Flabbergasted—that’s what you were. However, your composure quickly made a comeback and you could only laugh. A million-watt grin greeted you. Damn this man. He knew how to charm you, intentionally or not. “It sure did, you know! But not in the most positive light… Instead of calling me weak, you could have asked me what my favorite color is, what my favorite food is or something like that… Things normal people do!” you told him truthfully. Rather than arguing back, Satoru raised his free hand in defense, “I didn’t say you were weak, I just said you’re not on my level!”

You couldn’t help but raise your eyebrow and he quickly dropped the topic. Deciding to take your advice to heart, he asked you about your favorite cake and any ‘hidden gems and recommendations’, as he called them. The sudden change in topic threw you off a little, but as long as he tried, right? You were almost inclined to reward him with a good noodle star. Not that you’d do that. In place of that, you opted to go with the alternative: provide him with the information he asked for. So you thought about it carefully before answering him. He listened intently.

“I’ll keep those in mind. Making a mental list for the next time we hang out,” he grinned at you, tapping his temple. “You want to hang out again? I’m not boring you out of your mind yet?” you asked puzzledly, still in disbelief that he showed actual interest in you outside of work. “Why wouldn’t I want to?” He seemed slightly confused and raised a white eyebrow.

“Do you not want to?” He glanced at you with his bright, sparkling eyes. The notion of spending more time with you excited him. The enthusiasm was reflected in his cerulean eyes. When you thought about it, it only made sense, considering he had just confessed that he found you intriguing. “I just assumed you couldn’t stand me because I wasn’t as strong as you because you kept being mean to me,” you admitted somewhat shyly.

“I’m not that mean!” He said, acting shocked, though you noticed he was trying to hide a chuckle.

After a few seconds, Satoru sighed and clarified, “I can be a bit mean at times but I promise I never hated you or anything.” He smiled and you swore it was a smile that could threaten to make your knees a bit weak. Lucky for you that you were sitting on a bench. It was almost unfair how blessed he was with good looks. He continued, “I actually enjoy your company. You’re interesting and fun and I can tell you’re not afraid to bite back but you can be friendly if you want to. If anything, I like that a lot about you.”

A slight feeling of abashment prompted you to avoid his gaze. This was unusual. You weren’t used to him being so openly kind. “You know, I’d think I prefer you teasing me… without being straight up rude,” you confessed. His eyes widened briefly. Yet, a smirk soon returned to his face, “I see. You’re a masochist. Just kidding! I can definitely do that. It’ll be interesting to see how you react to me teasing you.”

Of course, you wouldn’t let that sit on you and you bit back, “Don’t expect me not to fight back, though.” And there it was, the slightly awkward atmosphere from earlier dissipated and everything returned to your usual banter.

Satoru clicked his tongue, “Trust me, I don’t expect you to be anyone but yourself. But I’m still looking forward to what you’ll do when I tease you, though.” He winked. “Not only are you an interesting person, but you’re fairly cute too.”

Who? You? “Huh?” you blurted out, baffled at the sudden compliment. With the way he was grinning at you, he had to be messing with you since he enjoyed seeing your reactions. “Did I say something wrong? I wasn’t lying. You’re adorable. Do you think you’re not?” Oh, he was definitely messing with you.

“Not really,” you shot back. You knew you weren’t ugly but hearing a compliment from someone as stunning as Satoru was something else. But cute and adorable…? That wasn’t exactly the best way to compliment someone you wanted to get attention from. If anything, it fueled something almost akin to spite within you. You felt the urge to tease him back.

“Come on, it was a genuine compliment from me. That’s gotta count for something, doesn’t it?” he pouted. You couldn’t detect any kind of indication that he was lying. “Thank you, you’re not so bad yourself,” you complimented him back. “Really?” he let out a gasp that was obviously fake, “I’m not so bad?”

You nodded, prompting the white-haired man to raise his eyebrow as he contemplated. “You’re right, I’m not bad,” he nodded in agreement with you. 

“I am great,” he said, a smirk forming on his face.

You chuckled, “You know. I think if it wasn’t for your foul personality, I would have fallen for you long ago.”

“Foul personality?” Satoru gasped as he brought a hand to his chest to grab it. “Maybe you’re just as mean as I am!” A laugh escaped from your throat and it was like music to his ears. “I never said I was nice, did I?” you fired back at him and he couldn’t help but grin. “See? I think I like you more when you're sassy. Maybe we're not as different as you thought,” he spoke. After a moment, he added, “I wouldn't mind if you treated me like this all the time. I could even get used to it.”

“So the great Gojo Satoru likes being degraded, I see. Noted,” you teased him again. One of his hands moved to his mouth to cover it, pretending to be horrified. He leaned forward and you could see a mischievous glint in his eyes. “I don’t think ‘degradation’ is the right term here; I just enjoy teasing you and... being teased by you. Is that so bad?” he asked. “Then,” you began and stood up, the ice cream was long finished. You placed your index finger beneath his chin, moving it up so he was facing you as you got closer to his face. He could feel your breath. “Do you like this?” you asked. Your goal was to get back at him for flustering you earlier. So why was your heart beating so fast?

“I think I do,” he simply said. His pale blue eyes seemed to peer at you, piercing you, as if looking for an answer to a question that had been left unasked. Despite being in a sitting position, he still radiated a confident aura. Suddenly the closeness you had created between the two of you was too much for you. Your body backed away automatically but you found yourself unable to move any farther from him—he didn’t let you. Instead, he reduced the gap between the two of you even more, slowly coming closer to you.

His fingers had already sneakily encircled your left forearm without you noticing. Mesmerizing eyes robbed you of your ability to move. You didn’t notice you held your breath until you needed to inhale sharply. Who was teasing who now? Caught like a deer in headlights, adrenaline rushed through your veins as anticipation clouded your mind. That was the moment you realized that you were into him more than you’d like to admit. You swore you could hear your heartbeat pounding loudly in your ears. The tension became too much and the ringing in your ears amplified and—

And then he closed the gap between you. Your brain blacked out. All you could think about was his lips on yours. Saying that you didn’t like his lips melting into yours was a lie. Satoru was leaving a sweet hint of his mango-flavored ice cream for you to taste, as if to claim you as his.

After a few seconds, Satoru broke the kiss. The shit-eating grin on his face was telling. “I think I liked this more though. You should let me do that more often. Maybe every day,” he winked at you. He looked at your frozen expression and chuckled; he genuinely had fun flirting with you. Still dazed from the kiss, your brain was unable to conjure any thoughts. All you knew was that you wanted—no, it was a need to kiss him again. As if your body would be set ablaze if you didn’t listen to your desire, your lips chased his and you kissed him again.

Satoru blinked. He was a bit taken aback at first but quickly returned the kiss, closing his eyes. After all, he had just boldly said that he wanted to do it more often. When you broke the kiss, he leaned forward before speaking. You noticed that the tip of his ears were a little red. It was a cute detail that you wouldn’t have noticed from afar.

“Damn, you’re a really good kisser,” the sorcerer said in a low voice, smiling at you. “Can I try again?” he asked, the smile still adorning his face. “All good things come in threes, I suppose,” you smiled back at him and leaned in again. Who would have thought that you would kiss this guy?

Without hesitation, the sitting Satoru pulled you into his lap and he kissed you again, heart beating faster with each passing second. After a few moments, he pulled away.

“Yeah, three sounds like a good number… but I prefer Infinity,” he said breathlessly. His cheeks were slightly flushed, a sign that he was enjoying himself. The white-haired adolescent reached up and pulled a stray strand of hair out of your face and tucked it behind your ear. He playfully added, “We should do this more often. Don't you agree?”

“Now you’re just being greedy!” you joked as you hit his chest playfully. It was only now that you noticed that his Limitless technique wasn’t in effect. “Greedy? Who? Me? Never!” he gasped again, pretending to be hurt over your accusation. “You hit me pretty hard there. I could have gotten hurt…” He glanced at the hand you used to hit him, “Do you want me to hit you too? Or maybe I should ask for damage compensation?”

You could tell he wasn’t serious by the way he smiled. “If you go on and hit me with your lips, then sure. Alternatively, I can offer lip service as compensation. Choose your poison, choose your hell.”

For a moment, he looked at you with mock horror. Then, he broke out in laughter at your statement. “Actually, that first one sounds like a good idea. I’ll go ahead and hit you with my lips then. But gently. Because I’m a gentleman.” He tenderly placed his two hands at the side of your face and slowly pulled you closer to him. Tilting his head slightly, he leaned in until your lips met. It was very gentle and your heart was filled with excitement, with exhilaration, as he kissed you. As your hands gripped his uniform tightly, you slowly lost yourself in the kiss, getting drunk on his lips. Maybe you should curse him for being a good kisser.

Satoru ended the kiss with a peck on the corner of your mouth and looked at you with a soft gaze, the softest you had ever seen on him. The dazed look on your face made him laugh again, “Don’t get too drunk on my kisses.” Stroking your cheeks with his long fingers, he laughed once again when he saw your pouting face, “You’re adorable, you know that?”

“Correct me if I’m wrong but you’re not entirely unaffected by kissing me,” you stated as-a-matter-of-factly and raised an eyebrow at him, crossing your arms. Being called out like this was embarrassing but it was pretty clear that you weren’t the only one affected with how the tips of his ears became slightly redder with each time you touched lips.

His lips formed a smile, “They’re addictive, if I’m being honest. I don’t… I don’t want to stop kissing you. I could do this all day, every day.” 

“If kissing me is addictive, then I think I’m doing a great job at affecting you,” you chuckled. The way your mouth moved as you spoke and the way the corners moved upwards to form a cheeky smile; he couldn’t take his eyes off. His heart thumped loudly in his chest, his thumb moved along the corner of your mouth. He couldn’t stop staring, the urge to lay his lips on yours once more strong. “You’re fun to be around. I like you, a lot. I’m enjoying how I feel when I’m close to you. I love whatever effect you have on me,” he spoke clearly.

He was fixated, enchanted, spell-bound even. “Is… Is this a confession?” you asked, hopeful eyes peering up at his. You took notice of the entranced look on his face. He blurted out, “I think I already fell for you a while ago.” As he realized what he had done, his eyes widened in shock and he wanted to slap his palms on his mouth, but he didn’t because that meant letting go of you. This time, it wasn’t fake shock but he genuinely didn’t think he’d blurt it out like that. But it was okay, because you liked him too. What was the use of pretending you didn’t?

“I think that makes two of us then,” as you admitted it, you felt your ears blazing with heat. “I’m saying that I like you too.” 

It took him a moment to process in his brain. Despite being academically clever and praised for his intelligence and wit in battles, you found it took him rather long to work out the meaning behind your words. “I knew you liked me, despite your sass.” No need to hide it now that he’d taken a look inside your heart. “We’re a dangerous duo,” the sorcerer noted, amused by his realization. You agreed with him, “Just two flirty kids who give trouble a run for its money.”

“Hey,” he suddenly began after a few moments, “Have you ever dated someone before? Are there any current or ex boyfriends I need to be worried about?” Satoru’s voice came out softly and he looked at you, awaiting an answer that would please him… because if not… he felt his heart drop at the thought. You wouldn’t… right?

Uncertainty clouded his mind as he looked at your face. “I have dated someone before but it didn’t work out. I’m not seeing anyone at the moment,” you clarified and wagged your index finger at him. “And honestly, even if there was… I think you’d do a great job at keeping them away,” you added.

And then, relief washed over him. With hindsight, he should have asked that before kissing you—a small part inside him admonished him for it but his heart couldn’t help but leap at your words. Quickly recomposing himself, he grinned back at you, “I bet with all the sass, sarcasm and cheekiness you’ve got, you can keep them away just as easily by yourself.”

Obviously, you had a comeback up your sleeve, “I never said I couldn’t. But you’d do a decent job at it. Because anyone would be scared of a tall white-haired dude who is full of himself.”

A hearty laugh came out of his throat; he expected nothing less from you. You were good at getting back at him in the most entertaining and beautiful ways. There was no doubt that you were able to handle his ‘foul’ personality well. “So we’re both good at keeping guys away from us, huh? You really do think I’m full of myself, don’t you? So why didn’t you reject me before?” he questioned. “Judging from what happened earlier… I might not be that good at keeping guys like you away from me. I wasn’t born with your technique after all. And I’m not sure if I want to keep away a guy named Gojo Satoru from me,” you grin at him and pinch his cheek gently.

“I’m flattered,” he fake-sniffed and then he leaned even closer, “So did I hear that correctly? You don’t want to keep a tall, almighty and handsome guy like me away from you? Hm?”

“No, I don’t want to keep you away from me. But I think if we dated, we’d be dangerous to other people. Our superiors wouldn’t approve of it, I am sure,” you mused. It was logical but Satoru gave you a bizarre look, “And you care about what some old farts have to say? Strange thing to be worried about when you’re someone who usually fires back right away.”

“I was just saying. I don’t care about what they think; I like playing dangerously. Wouldn’t be in this line of work if that wasn’t the case,” the words coming out of your mouth made him feel delighted. The smug look on your face only added to it.

“That makes us a dangerous duo, huh? The perfect pair to take down curses and cause trouble, I kinda like that,” he clicked his tongue as he finished speaking. The thought of the two of you wreaking havoc was fun and thrilling, admittedly. Principal Yaga was sure to get white hair at this rate—not that Satoru cared too much about it, as long as the old man didn’t die of shock or cardiac arrest.

“You bet,” you shot him a cheeky smile. “Then it’s settled, wouldn’t you say? You and I are an amazing partner match, sweetheart. Just a danger to society,” Satoru established.

“That’s sort of ironic, considering that our job is to protect society as it is,” you remarked. And yet, it didn’t matter to you at all. All you felt at the moment was the pleasantness of the world, of Gojo Satoru’s presence and coming clean with your feelings.

“Hey, since you brought it up already… I’m going to assume that you’re fine with dating me…?” He briefly looked at the ground, then back at you. The little bit of uncertainty in his tone was almost cute to you. For the first time, the usually cocky and confident platinum—haired sorcerer wasn’t so sure about his words in front of you. Seeing him like this wasn’t so bad, you noticed.

You got on your tiptoes to gently place a peck on his cheek. Your actions were contradictory to your following question: “What makes you think you’re worthy of being my boyfriend?”

You were only teasing him, hoping that your sweet kiss was answer enough. Part of you hoped that he got the playful tone in your voice. But when he glanced down at you as you struggled to reach his lips on your tiptoes, a wide grin spread across his face as you leaned in and kissed him. His heart raced as he snaked his two arms around your waist to steady you.

With an eye smile so boyish that it made you blink once, twice, Satoru was quick to respond, “Opposite day already passed, you brat. I think it’s only fair to deduce that if I’m worthy of your kiss, I’m most likely good enough to be your boyfriend.”

“Hmmm, you think so?” you grin mischievously at him and slung your arms around his neck. Your goal was to rile him up a little, it was in your nature to be a little annoying about it.

“I’d say a kiss is a good sign, sugar,” he retorted with a sassy tone in his voice. He tightened his arms around your waist, effectively hugging you closer to him. There was no escape for you—not that you wanted to flee from him anyways. On the contrary: You rested your head on his shoulder.

“Then I think it’s in order that my official boyfriend kisses me now and goes on a date with me,” you murmured into his ear. A slight movement indicated that he was reacting to your whisper. He gulped and swiftly got his cool back. “That can be arranged,” Satoru smiled as he moved his hands to the sides of your face and closed the gap once more. After separating from your lips, his arms moved back to their original spot.

He snickered to himself, “I can’t believe you’re so cheeky and smooth.”

You stuck your tongue out at him—and to him, you looked so adorable doing it. “Being a menace who is cheeky and smooth is my forte,” you claimed brazenly. “How does it feel to be my boyfriend?”

“Being handsome and strong is part of my job as the notorious kid from the Gojo clan. But being your official boyfriend was not in the job description when I signed up to be a sorcerer. I’ll take my incentive bonus payment in the form of love and affection from you,” he joked and nuzzled your nose. Satoru’s warm hands found yours and he didn’t hesitate to intertwine your fingers.

“Then I guess our first date will be a salary negotiation,” you laughed back at him. This was the start of something beautiful, but also the start of double trouble for some poor souls. Not that any of you cared anyway.

White tufts of hair and round sunglasses would accompany you more frequently from now on.

#gojo satoru x reader #gojou satoru x reader #gojo x reader #gojo x you #gojou x reader #satoru gojo x reader

[brickmvster]

potato, potato, my little baby potato...

Pairing: Ellie x Dina

Tags/warnings: fluff, pregnancy, childbirth, domesticity, motherhood, slice of life, pregnant dina

Word Count: 1766

Synopsis: A peek into Ellie and Dina's life before JJ was born.

Author's Note: wrote this back in june of 2022 and posted it on ao3, decided to post it here too bc why not <;3 here is the ao3 link!! also idk how well this will do bc I know this site mostly has x reader fics but I love elliedina with my whole soul OKAY. please enjoyyy comments are appreciated!!

When Dina first noticed her small baby bump, it filled her with pure joy. She remembered standing in front of the bathroom mirror, gently rubbing her stomach, eyes full of admiration. Ellie was behind her, hands wrapped around her waist, experiencing a fluttery feeling in her stomach at the thought of her being a mother – which is something she never would've imagined in her wildest dreams. In a dangerous world like the one they navigated, she never believed parenthood would be an option for her, nor was she really interested in it. Ellie thought children were cute, sure, with their contagious giggles and chubby faces, but she knew taking care of one would be more responsibility than she felt she could handle. But with Dina being with her, she felt this unbridled sense of confidence. Dina was caring and loving by nature, and Ellie had a hunch motherhood would come to her easily – with Dina by her side she had someone's footsteps to follow in.

Despite being pregnant, Dina was still very active around the house, much to Ellie's disapproval. Anytime Ellie saw Dina on her feet, whether she was doing the dishes, taking out the laundry, or even getting up to put her plate in the sink, she always made a face similar to that of a displeased mother who couldn't get her sick child to lie down. But Dina always retorted with "It's not like I'm completely immobile yet, so don't worry." 

Dina also spent a lot of time preparing for their baby's arrival, with the help of Ellie and some fellow Jackson residents. 

Maria had connections with a lot of people in Jackson. Random strangers were kind enough to give Ellie and Dina a ton of baby-related things, like a crib, toys, and even books. They spent a whole day setting things up and figuring out where to put certain items, and when they had finished, Dina began to cry, feeling overwhelmingly grateful. Ellie was right there with her, rubbing her back in a soothing manner and holding her close, almost being brought to tears herself as she gazed upon the empty crib.

A few more weeks went by, and Dina's baby bump was getting pretty large. Dina started complaining more about her back hurting, and she couldn't be on her feet for very long. Nevertheless, she still helped Ellie around the house when she could, with small breaks in between. She began using the bathroom more frequently, which quickly began getting on her nerves, as it disrupted her sleep, or interrupted a good reading session. Ellie would always chuckle whenever they were in bed together, her nose buried in a Savage Starlight comic and Dina practicing her embroidery, when all of sudden Dina would groan loudly and reluctantly get out of bed, angrily making her way to the bathroom for the seventh time in just thirty minutes. 

Then, of course, it got to the point where walking was something Dina did only when she needed to. It had been eight months and her stomach looked like it was ready to burst. Ellie found herself helping Dina walk up and down the stairs, getting out of bed in the morning, and even getting up and off of the toilet. Jackson residents also gave away some maternity clothing, which Dina often lounged about in. Even though pregnancy was miserable for Dina, Ellie couldn't help but notice how beautiful she had gotten. Dina had always been attractive in Ellie's eyes, even since they were kids, but Dina really seemed to glow now. 

Before, Dina's hair was always in some sort of up-do, because she was always doing various tasks around the house and needed it out of her face. But since she's been lazing about more often, she usually wore her hair down, and Ellie was in love with how thick and long it had gotten, her unruly curls framing her face in the most breathtaking way. Her skin was brighter, and it almost seemed to shine in a way that totally captivated Ellie. Sometimes, Ellie would find herself ogling at Dina whenever she was doing some random, mundane task, to which Dina would always notice and turn into the prettiest shade of red.

Right on the cusp of her delivery date, Ellie and Dina had a small baby shower. They had a wonderful time, Dina spending hours unwrapping cute onesies, even more toys and a couple parenthood books. It all felt so normal, so domestic, that it almost made Dina cry again, but she kept it together for the sake of her guests. 

It was late at night when their child decided to arrive. Ellie was wide awake, reading her comic book, while Dina was trying to figure out a crossword puzzle. It was quiet and the room was basked in the cozy, soft lighting of the bedside lamp. Dina couldn't seem to figure out the last word of her crossword and decided to give up and try again tomorrow morning with a fresh mind. She turned to her side, groaning at the heaviness at her stomach, and shut her eyes. Ellie glanced at her briefly, smiling softly and whispering "Goodnight, babe." 

The room was quiet once again, Ellie getting immersed into the fictional world of Savage Starlight, but after about five minutes, Dina was startled awake, feeling wetness trail down her legs. She sat up rather quickly, as quickly as she could, anyway, and Ellie turned to her with a confused and slightly concerned expression. 

"Do you need to use the bathroom again?" Ellie asked, ready to get up and assist her girlfriend. Dina shook her head, her eyes having widened ever so slightly, cheeks flushed, and heart rate steadily increasing. 

"Ellie… I think… I think it's time." Dina said. It took a little bit for the words to register in Ellie's mind, but when they did, she was immediately kicked into action, setting her comic book down and getting out of bed. 

"Okay. Let's get you comfortable, yeah?" She said, peeling away the damp comforter that was on top of Dina. She had Dina lie down a little bit while still staying somewhat upright. Dina instinctively opened her legs, trying to get started on removing her underwear. Ellie helped her, pulling them completely off and discarding them haphazardly. Afterward, Ellie quickly ran to the bathroom and grabbed a towel, aiding Dina in rolling over so she could place it under her. She had also grabbed scissors and placed them on the nightstand.

Ellie's palms were sweaty. She remembered asking a mother at the baby shower how to prepare for birth, and Ellie tried her best to recall the woman's advice. It was stressful, trying to think while Dina was screaming at the top of her lungs, holding Ellie's hand so hard that her knuckles had turned white as bone. Ellie just tried to be as encouraging as possible, keeping her tone of voice even and steady throughout the whole process. 

Eventually, the room was no longer being filled with Dina's cries of pain but instead her labored breaths and the shrill sound of a baby crying. Their child had finally entered the world.

Dina, with tear streaked cheeks, immediately reached out for her child. Ellie held him briefly, smiling so hard her cheeks were growing sore. He was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen in this ugly, ugly world. Ellie made quick work of cutting the umbilical cord before carefully handing him to Dina.

"Hello handsome." Dina spoke softly, grinning tiredly. Ellie was overjoyed at the sight in front of her. They were mothers now. For Ellie, this was the most nervous she had ever been. Not even fighting hordes of infected had her this scared. But she was also excited to step into this new era of her life. She knew that motherhood was going to be a bumpy ride, but so long as Dina was with her, she knew that she'd get through all of the trials and tribulations just fine. 

"I think I've got a name." Dina said, bringing Ellie out of her thoughts.

Ellie raised an eyebrow. "Oh, yeah? Whatcha got?" She replied, a small smirk resting on her lips.

"How does JJ sound?" Dina asked. Ellie's smirk grew into a wide smile of approval.

"I like that. Suits him perfectly." She said. 

After JJ was born, life for the two new mothers definitely became more hectic. 

JJ would start crying late at night, and Ellie, wanting her beloved girlfriend to get all of the sleep she could get, was always the one who got up to calm him down. She would gently bounce him, humming some random tune to get him to relax, before lying him back in his crib. Ellie missed out on a few hours of sleep because of this, but she didn't mind it one bit if it meant Dina would wake up well rested (sometimes, though, Dina would pretend to sleep just to hear Ellie sing).

Feeding JJ could be nightmarish too. He was a picky eater sometimes, and would throw food on the floor or spit it out onto his bib, causing Ellie to roll her eyes and Dina to giggle at the sight. Dina was definitely more patient when it came to JJ but she knew Ellie would get there – slowly, but surely. 

Changing diapers was mostly a Dina thing until Ellie got the hang of it. Before, she would always put them on backwards, much to Dina's confusion. 

Aside from all of the difficulties, there were plenty of joyous moments that the two mothers shared with their son. Often, Ellie would play guitar for him. Whenever Ellie was out hunting, or doing some general sweeps around the outer perimeter of the house, Dina would spend that time coloring with him, or playing with wooden shapes. She tried to get him to participate in activities that would not only be fun for him but educational as well. If Dina was busy, Ellie loved to (carefully) run around the house with JJ on her shoulders, his contagious laughter bouncing off of the walls. 

At night, Ellie and Dina loved to read him bedtime stories, both playing multiple characters and doing the silliest voices they could come up with until JJ slowly drifted away into a peaceful slumber. 

The both of them would then climb into bed together, exchanging "I love yous," after which Dina would continue to read her parenthood guidebooks and Ellie would begin yet another chapter of Savage Starlight, the both of them sitting in a comfortable silence.

#ellie williams #tlou #the last of us #tlou fic #ellie tlou fic #the last of us fic #ellie x dina #dellie #elliedina #ellie tlou fanfiction #ellie williams fanfic #ellie williams fic #the last of us part 2 #tlou2 fic #tlou2 fanfic #ellie williams x reader #tlou2

[earthstellar]

Earth Music on the Lost Light: Human Music That Cybertronians Like

we know for a fact that the Lost Light has access to human media, primarily movies, TV shows, and music-- and we know they generally seem to fucking love most of it, or at least find it interesting

but what would everyone's tastes be, in regards to Earth music?

time to talk about music for a long time!!! strap in, enjoy some tunes

we already know Cyclonus has impeccable taste and enjoys some of the best jams the 80s had to offer.

I can't help but imagine Rodimus being given a media archive of Earth tunes to approve for the Earth Dance would only result in chaos

(it's not like he would say no to anything, he absolutely blanket signed it all, it's just an obligatory thing-- or Ultra Magnus tells him it is, solely to keep him away from Important Captain Things that he would rather handle himself or hand off to Megatron, lmao. the shit that really needs to get done)

and this is how Rodimus discovers the somewhat questionable yet amazing genre of "mid-90s underground techno rave mix tapes"

(somewhat related, I still think Testarossa might as well be Rodimus' theme song, although it's not a 90s track and has more of an 80s synth vibe)

Rodimus would love that "computers are the future, fuck yeah let's make Digital Cool Future Music" mid-90s shit, there is no way he would not. it has the exact energy level that appeals to him and is also cheesy and weird and chaotic. and has like 500 different sub-genres, so his selection is endless, lmao.

he would probably find it cute that this is what humans imagined to be the peak of "digital sound" at the time. like lmao this was the best humans could do when asked to create music that sounds like it was made by robots or other mechanical space future cyber lifeforms--high concept!!! he would probably find it interesting and endearing. this is what organics think non-organic music is like!!

anyone acting as DJ at Swerve's on any given night would be so, so mad that Rodimus keeps requesting shit like "DJ MASSIMO ITALO DISCO BEST RAVE TUNES LIVE FROM LONDON 1995" or "DJ ARMPIT SLUDGE FEST HOUSE-RAVE-DRUMS N BASS SET 1996" for them to play, lmao

not individual tracks. the whole album. entire mix tapes of random, somewhat questionable mid-90s techno house rave bullshit.

that having been said, that good ass early 90s trance techno might send him into a spiral depending on his mood at the time, lmao (it's been known to happen)

but at the same time I can imagine him sharing tracks like Solar Quest - Space Pirates with Drift and they'd both just sit there and jam out, but quietly, thinking about shit while sitting in a port window next to each other (this was peak sleepover party techno, Back in My Day-- many deep conversations were had while listening to stuff like this, lol)

Drift would probably find some of Rodmus' recommended stuff to be pretty good for meditation-- although once he finds out about the human drug culture involved and certain concepts of experimental consciousness etc. that surrounded techno/rave and other related genres, it might cause him to pull back a little bit

(until he finds out about kandi culture, in which case, Drift would love the idea of hand-made unique bracelets and sentimental trinkets being made and exchanged at warehouse shows purely out of Good Vibes and Love for Fellow Beings and it turns out actually he fucking loves this shit, a chill vibes based "expand your mind" kind of music subculture appeals to his Spectralist sensibilities and he likes sharing tunes with Rodimus in return)

Drift picking tracks on his own would likely lead him down more of a classic rock road, but more of the chill side of things, more of the folksy type of classic rock -- I can see Drift really enjoying Spirit in the Sky - Norman Greenbaum or California Dreamin' - The Mamas and the Papas. or like, Incense and Peppermints - Strawberry Alarm Clock.

I mean, Drift might even go Full Earth Hippie and end up liking Green Tambourine - Lemon Pipers, lmao. in fact I am fairly certain of this.

I can see Drift loving Aquarius/Let The Sunshine In - The 5th Dimension. the whole vibe would probably appeal to him.

he'd quite possibly also like I Need a Dollar - Aloe Blacc, but it hits him in a place that still hurts to think about. so it's in rare rotation.

meanwhile Ratchet would probably be fine with classic rock too, like the good Dad Rock shit, just a lot of tracks from the 70s/80s -- a couple tracks he and Drift could probably agree on would likely lean more into the experimental/psychedelic rock side of things, like White Room - Cream or something like Wheel in the Sky - Journey

Rodimus tries to troll Ratchet by recommending Old Time Rock n Roll - Bob Seger, but joke's on him because it turns out Ratchet loves it, lmao

Swerve would go all out on classic bar jams for the evening playlist. Chill, good shit like Do It Again - Steely Dan.

Megatron would love Sinnerman - Nina Simone; He'd send it to Drift in a command crew level secured data packet, and they would both feel the hell out of this song. They don't need to talk about why. They never mention it to each other.

Megs would also probably love These Old Bones by Dolly Parton (mostly due to the lyrics, rather than the upbeat tune, but he would find it relatively relaxing), as well as 9 to 5 (of course), and similar music. Country from back in the day when country music was more about the struggle of poverty and the working life of rural people. Country music from back when songs told all the untold stories. He can respect that.

He'd listen to You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive by Patty Loveless and it would get him right in the fucking spark. Megatron is the Cybertronian equivalent of an Appalachian miner, god dammit. He understands.

Megatron would also like Johnny Cash; He would overthink Ghost Riders in the Sky and it would depress him, partly because it reminds him of Seekers... sigh.

I think he'd also like Cold War - Janelle Monae. He'd be way into good lyrics; What's being said in a song matters most to him. "This is a cold war, you better know what you're fighting for..." Indeed.

anyway I like thinking about what jams Cybertronians might like from their available selection of Earth tunes

#long post #transformers #maccadam #maccadams #idw drift #idw 1 #idw transformers #mtmte #lost light #idw ratchet #idw rodimus #idw swerve #idw megatron

[spectrumgarden]

I keep thinking about how no one seems to think about nuance when it comes to like, the concept of "autistic traits / symptoms" and discussing them, and how that is intertwined with the push to not consider it a disability. And its complex to discuss, but here's my convoluted thoughts. I know it's long but I hope people will take the time to read it.

There are in fact people who do fit some commonly associated with autism traits that are not impaired by them. Let's make up a guy, for a second:

They like routine and repetition a lot but easily handle change in them. For example they wear the same set of clothes for years with no desire to ever branch out, but if you made them wear something else they wouldnt really be bothered by it as long as they dont think it's super ugly, etc. They like to watch the same movies over and over but happily agree to watch other things with their friends when spending time together, and are engaged and interested in those movies. Etc. They speak very formally or choose "complicated" words for things that could be expressed easier. They however do not face problems with communication beyond annoyance of others because they're able to rephrase things easily to be understood, and they also have a normal back and forth in conversations and initiate conversations normally. They sometimes engage in subtle self stimulating behaviors and recognize the desire to do so during boring or stress inducing times (which pretty much everyone does, btw). They dislike loud environments but do not respond with melt- or shutdowns or any other "severe" reactions, and while for example preferring to go to a museum over a club, they easily go through their daily life in busy areas like city centers, shops or cultural events like parades without issues beyond like, mild annoyance and no desire to stay for longer than necessary. They have strong interests in seemingly random topics and spend quite some time researching or engaging with those, but they do not view the world through the lense of said interest, they do not neglect caring for themselves or fulfilling academic or professional responsibilities because they are so engrossed in their interests, they are easily able to hold conversations about other topics. I could go on.

This person would not be diagnosed with autism by any doctor who pays attention to the impairment clause of the diagnosis. They would probably be told "you're subclinical / you do not meet enough criteria / ..." While his person would probably relate quite a bit to (parts of) descriptions of (level 1 and / or low support needs and / or high masking) autism. And this is an imaginary person I made up, but these people obviously exist (and as a side note, are probably what people refer to when they talk about "everyone being a little autistic" etc)

And this person being told they're not autistic might be upset. Because clearly, they have so many autistic traits. They relate to so many videos! But the thing is! There is no impairment! The one thing that connects all of the symptoms related to autism to the actual diagnosis. This does not mean they do not in fact relate to the autistic experience. This does not mean these parts of their life or personality are fake / non existent / not important to who they are and how they experience things. But it is important to differentiate. If they consider themselves autistic, if the world considers them autistic, it waters down the definition to a point of being categorically useless from a medical standpoint, from a standpoint of figuring out who needs support and in what ways. Who needs (early) intervention, who needs extra support in school or at work or at home or in public.

And like. Humanity at large will probably always want to shove themselves into random categories. "Which character are you like?" "What is your personality style?" "What is your star sign?" or "which sports team do you support", and countless more come to mind. I dont think this imaginary person is wrong or silly for wanting to find a category of people they are like, or recognizing this similarity with some autistic people. I wouldnt even mind if they made up a non-clinical category / group of people who relate to autistic experiences without the impairment. It would get the point across that it is a group of people with shared experiences, but it is not the same as autism.

However autism is increasingly treated like something thats just a personality type without impairment, by people online and offline. And when they go "this is an autism symptom" without nuance, without looking at the need for impairment, or even differential diagnosis, it spreads that attitude. "Liking to eat the same foods is an autistic trait"... or is it normal to have food preferences to a degree if it does not cause you stress to eat new foods, if you are capable of eating other food if hungry and presented with them and not the food you prefer? Or is this person anorexic and their mind has created categories of "allowed to eat" and "not allowed to eat" based on arbitrary categories relating to their fear of weight gain? "Only eating with small spoons at home is a common autistic trait"... or is it a harmless preference as long as you are still able to eat food outside a strict routine set up with zero possible deviations? Or is it a person with OCD and eating with small spoons is a compulsive behavior for some sort of intrusive thoughts?

I could go on forever. But in the end, these short sentences are all the same. They are, at the same time: autistic experiences and allistic experiences, because they are so non specific. They are watered down and any additional information is removed.

autism is about a specific combination of experiences that impair you. That's literally all it is. It does not automatically turn us into a category of "other" that is fully not possible to relate to, because we are human too. And some of it will be relatable to people that are not autistic!

And there is value in discussions of experiences of autistic people that go beyond the impairment, as long as we do not forget about it, or treat it as secondary instead of the defining factor. I dont mind if autistic people bond over something they're not impaired by, that they see as a common experience, for example not easily going along with authority. Being creative. Preferring the small spoon (without being impaired by it while having other impairments), whatever, and call those common autistic experiences. But those are not the pillars of what make up autism and solely relating to them should not be your reason for calling yourself autistic. Neither should relating to commonly impairing symptoms without being impaired by your version of them. The impairments resulting from abnormal development are what makes someone autistic.

There needs to be more nuance, detail, when discussing autism symptoms. And the push to, at the very least, expand autism into an area of experiences that do not cause impairment of any kind, or worse claim it never caused impairment, need to stop. It does not help anyone.

I genuinely think part of the whole "everyone is autistic these days" crowd who likes to go after people and invalidate them has picked up on some of this, but they lack the skills to criticize it for what it actually is and / or they want there to be a simple solution, which is that everyone who calls themselves autistic online who does not fit their very stereotypical view is faking. They are wrong of course. But I dont think this comes out of nowhere. There is something to criticize about how autism is treated in many circles, especially among younger people.

I'm really not sure how to end this post because I like to come to some conclusions on my long posts but just. Uhm. The way some people treat "autistic traits" as completely unrelated to the impairment they cause while staying exclusively autistic traits is wrong. The way people try to redefine autism is harmful and in the end not needed because they could simply invent other words for that experience.

#actually autistic #autistic adult #autistic community #actually disabled #i feel like im poking a sleeping bear with this one. poking a hornets nest. whatever #but yeah it needs to be said i think. and i have the privilege of my “smart sounding” speech being more likely to be listened 2 so. *shrugs #long post #(very long... oops. i think this is the longest thing i ever wrote on here) #also this took me. i believe over 2 hours to write! im not good at this actually! i moved 80% of these paragraphs around multiple times - #- deleted entire paragraphs. merged them. rephrased things again and again and again #its exhausting #because when i think about this i can think through this entire concept in a couple minutes but trying to get it across takes hours ://

[distortedataraxia]

"Life isn't just about fun."

Y/n x sk8 the infinity (platonic)

wordcount : 14,587

Type : one-shot

Warnings : mention of hospital accident, school related bad memories (?) swearing/cursing, negative thoughts, and i think that's about it!

Author note : Hi! It's been really long since i posted, i wanted to challenge myself to write something way longer than usual, and i've been pretty down in the dumps so it's hard staying active. I'll get to your requests soon, i'm sorry it always take so many months for me to catch up to them! I hope you'll appreciate it nontheless, it's the first time i write a one-shot so long, don't hesitate to send in a few advices if you want! I hope this isn't too much out of character and that y/n can be relatable. It's not easy writing a relatable y/n. I tried to have a moment for each characters but kinda failed, i hope that's okay and that i can write each of them better overtime! Well, now that's out of the way, i hope you enjoy! ★take care ★

The summer holidays have been good, despites the overwhelming heat making you sweat to your heart content.

You could handle the heat with your friends around you while making sure to stay dehydrated, really, whenever you went to see your friend weither it was to eat at a restaurant, harass shadow, skate around random places, try new tricks, race at S, discuss about skateboards and make skateboards : you could rarely every worry about the heat. It's like the heat never existed in the first place, but of course, as soon as you get home you will inevitably notice a shower is reallly necessary if you don't want to turn into a glue stick human form of thing just by sweating.

Time really does fly by when i'm around my friends.. you think to yourself, the summer holidays are coming to an end very soon..

And every nights i feel it.

This is going to be a long night for you, a very long night.

There is no better feeling than staring at a wall with closed eyes. If that makes senses.

In fact, you couldn't really sleep, you kept waking up every 2 hours, scared of missing your alarms, afterall you'd be bummed out if you were to miss your first day of school. It's not that you enjoy going to school at all, it's just that if you'd miss the first day of school you'd probably get into troubles with your parents, and you'd feel double lost at school, which isn't so cool to be honest.

So you kept trying to sleep, rolling around in your bed to try to find a comfortable position, and… stay here until you stop crying. Because yes, tears were leaving your eyes right at that moment, your eyes were burning and your head was hurting and it was hard to sleep. Breathing was a bit troublesome, it might seem dramatic, but you still felt all of these wandering emotions anyway.

You had some fears concerning school, or a lot of fears. You remembered all the bad years you spent, having to complete your homework in time and stay good enough to your teachers and parents no matter what, forcing yourself to try to even listen to the teachers' lesson and remember it, having to suck up all the weird looks from your classmates whenever you answered something dumb or did something weird from their point of view, while you had to look unaffected whenever the teacher or your classmates said something dumb… School wasn't a place where you could be yourself, it wasn't a place where you could express your opinion, it's not a place in which you're ever good enough, not a place where you feel able to develop any sort of potential if you had any, and it's not a place in which you had fun at, if anything, all the bad years at school were just taking colors away from life, a lot of colors. The endless homework to finish at night wasn't so pleasant aswell, you could remember the allnighter or allnighters to catch up on your homework or lessons. Hours of class felt more like a black hole sucking up all of your energy, what was the use of having energy and going through the day if you're going to do this your whole life? Was something you thought more than once or twice.

What if it happens all over again?

You really hopped to stay in the same class as Reki and Langa this year, but it wasn't for sure, you guys could be picked to be in different classes for all you know, why do you have to even change classes every years? It's a breeze when your class sucks but not when your class is actually somehow not that bad. And what about all the new people?

When you weren't in their class, you could recall zoning out more, dissociating more. Strangely enough, they usually seperate people from their friends so that they focus on the class, but you're more prone to focus if your friends are here, let alone, if they ask for your help with any homework, you feel a kind of responsability and a will to help, so your grades uncounsciously got better so that you could help out Reki who's being late on classes because he's staying up late to skate at S and barely listening at class, so you could also help out Langa who's having struggles taking notes and understanding everything, because even if he spoke japanese, he still had a hard time to adapt. But even if your grades were to be lower or not different, it felt way better when you were willing to work for it not just to not get in troubles, but also to help your friends. Maybe it wasn't entirely for you in that case, but it already felt better.

But whenever you mess up and feel unable to help, it feels bad. You actually had a bad dream once in which messing up continuously during group projects with your friends led them to burst into tears because it was really too much.

There's just, a lot of things to worry about. You have to study about your future, you can't just skate all day long and have fun with your friends, and they'll be fine without you, life isn't like that, it's not just about fun…

Ah…

You stared blankly at your arm.

You absolutely dreaded this day. School for you was like a survival game, you'd play, try not to fail and lose just like you'd go to school everyday and try to keep everything up to just not fall apart.

Well, to be honest, last school year was a bit more manageable with Reki and Langa around, surprisingly enough, they made your days at school usually less boring, and if the all three of you guys were unhappy or not doing good, you could complain together ; About the teacher's teaching methods, the way this or that spoke to you, the way you got caught watching skating videos instead of reading-

You could really cool down a bit with them around, things were way less stressful than they could have been. And somehow you felt more productive with less pressure felt.

So, in the end, maybe it wasn't that bad, you could get to spend more time with Reki and Langa, and you wouldn't have to die to the summer heat.

Or maybe not, maybe you won't end up in the same class, maybe you won't feel brave enough to sneak your phone between your pages to pretend to read anymore, maybe you won't be in a good class, maybe you'll get picked on by your classmates and maybe-

afterall, it is true that you could spend much more time with Reki, Langa AND your other friends outside of school, if they weren't on vacations without you that is. School can be a real seperation factor for friends, and it sucks, it can be very isolating.

But school is important, nontheless.

I think.

Are the all-nighters productive? Are they healthy? The stress, the social fears, just… everything overall that comes from school, except the time you spend with Reki and Langa and the rare lessons where you learn something that is actually helpful for you.

Probably not.

You've tried not to think about it, but really, the more time passes, the less you're able to sleep well or spend your days without worrying as to weither or not you're making the best of the summer holidays, without feeling guilty for doing nothing when the heat is killing you or you're tired. Time is so scary, the meaninfgul times fade away so fast, and you lose so much occasions on making the best of your life, time always gets you.

Finally, the morning came, you could hear the birds sing, the sun was shining through the curtains, making you regret ever opening your eyes who were now burning at the burning source of light, you wanted to hide under your pillow and blankets and never see the light again. Why get up when you can just sleep ? Your alarm rang, it gave you a headache, a headache that'll follow you probably all day long, you had to get up now. Goodbye to the everyday without worrying of what's coming next day. What a life.

I mean, everyone has to work or go to school, it's society, it's just life, there's nothing to complain about, be grateful that you have it easier than some people. Or even, most people.

Besides, you still have Reki and Langa right? It'll be okay, right? Even if you don't end up in the same class, you could look up to every ends of the days to skate together and every mornings to skate together, same for the free time.

That is, if your schedules aren't too different and if you even have the energy to skate and hang with your friends, you could remember days in which as soon as you'd get home, you'd fall to your bed, fall asleep and skip dinner, only to have to catch up on your homework in another stressful morning and find something to eat in the fridge your family emptied the night before.

School is back. Holidays were great, but everything came to an end. Nothing ever last forever, does it ?

You yawned and tried to stretch yourself to wake up but your eyes were shutting tight, your every single thoughts begged you to fall back asleep and rebel agaisnt whatever keeped you awake, before you knew it, 5 minutes already passed. If you wouldn't have put multiple alarms to wake you up every minutes, the amount of time in which you were late would have greatly multiplied, by ten maybe, well, if you were never late because of that ; that's because you skated very fast to school or ran. These alarms really pain you but they still save you, a great plenty of time, you probably would have been late right now without them. On the first day of school, your sleep schedule is not even set on time.

Be grateful.

You sit up and get up, feeling every ounce of your body wanting to fall down and just lie in the ground to sleep, you try your hardest to motivate yourself to get dressed, making a mess out of your wardrobe, you'd have to clean that later and put your clothes in order, or deal with it and have your parents scold you for it until next holidays, but really all the thoughts that came to your head were negative, you didn't even bother to think about your friends yet, you just wanted to sleep it off, sleep it off so much you wanted to cry, get away from reality. As you kept getting lost in your thoughts, your arm hits your wardrobe and furnitures.

Ouch. The hit was a bit brutal, you were stressed and you were scared. Your arm felt like it was burning, why did you have to get that arm hit and not the other? How lucky can you get? Is it a lack of luck or is it just your problem for not sleeping enough?

And before you know it, you already have to leave your house in 5 minutes. 5 fricking minutes, and you just got dressed.

Mornings were really fast, especially if you're as tired as you are right now. You could get up and leave your bed and you already have only 10 minutes left to somehow get dressed, eat, brush your teeth, check that everything is ready, make sure to use the toilets, wash your hands, and happily get out of the house with your skateboard to get to school! How you loved going to school every mornings!

Well, last year you could feel positive going to school most days, it's the year when you met Reki and Langa at, one of the most liveliest years of your life. But now that you know them, you rather spend time with them outside of school.

You were tired, completely tired, your heart was beating fast, so fast and hard it was hurting, like some sort of drums inside you, the bat would dum- dum- slap your heart out just to keep you awake. You could barely keep your eyes open, your hair was a mess, all you wanted to do was hide yourself under your blankets until the school year ends. You only want this to be a dream, it's just a bad dream, school never existed… Is hiding and denying all you're ever good at?

But maybe that's a bit harsh, isn't it ?

What a great start of the year, surely the year wouldn't go well if you kept that up.

You didn't have time to eat breakfast, or else you'd be late, so you started walking out of your room and you fought the stairs. Not literally don't worry, we respect stairs here

As you were about to step out of your house to get to school you receive a message on your phone on a groupchat. A groupchat between you, Reki and Langa.

"Y/n, we're waiting for you at our usual spot, where are you?? :("

You smiled, for a second there, you felt like summer holidays were still going on. You felt as if you had nothing to worry about. Your friends were really important to you, they held a special place in your heart. And they made you look forward to everyday, everyday felt more like a pleasant surprise with them around. Maybe just maybe, you don't have to worry about this school year.

Or maybe you do, maybe you do have to worry about this school year.

The messages having reminded you to take your skateboard, you grabbed your skateboard after turning off your phone, almost forgetting to take your skate, almost forgetting about how you got into skateboarding and almost forgetting the entire last year you've spent with Reki and Langa. Too busy overthinking about the past years before that one.

Maybe it was better to expect the worse to not have your hopes crushed, but would that make you happy?

You put your phone in your backpack, left the house, and pushed to get to your skateboard, trying to be careful of where you're riding despites your attention span being lower, trying to keep your foot well positionned and not accidentally press your back foot against the tail of your skateboard which would make you.. fall off if you press hard.

Skating was a bit harder this morning, the thought of school came back to you very soon and it drew out your motivation fast, very fast.

You were really tired so it was hard, but the thoughts of your friends cheered you up a bit, so you skated to your usual meeting spot, thinking about how Reki and Langa must be waiting for you right now. And soon enough, you recognized a shining red-head and a outstanding blue-head, you surely couldn't miss them by accident even if your vision was blurry, not a lot of people around there has had their hair dyed.

You wondered, would reki's head shine more with no hair or does it shine more with red hair?

They finally noticed you skating towards them, they turned to you, it seems like Reki was staring at his phone while Langa's head was peeking over his shoulder to see the screen. You waved at them and they waved back, you smiled instinctively, until you suddenly fell of your skateboard and rolled down the floor, making sure to protect your head while trying to keep your other arm safe. But you still hurt your arm, which is sadful.

"Ouchhh-" you yelped, usually you'd laugh whenever you fall of your skateboard, it was silly, you fell off because you kept your eyes on your friend and not the floor. You liked them just way too much. But you just didn't feel the energy in you to laugh, something just didn't click inside, you couldn't laugh. Maybe you're just grumpy because it's the morning, maybe you're just not in the mood. Whatever it was, you didn't feel the willpower to laugh it off as you usually do.

"Y/n !" Reki screamed running towards you "Don't be reckless, you hurt yourself at your last race ! " he crouched down to your level "here, let me help you" he took your arm and checked your bandages "did you even change them!? He asked frantically, eyes focused on your bandaged arm, as Langa walked towards you and caught your skateboard for you. —I forgot. you answered, in an honest and tired laugh, it was so hard getting even dressed in the morning that you forgot to check your bandages. —This can't be good.. The redhead sighed and looked at Langa Langa, pass me the bag Langa tossed him his bag over, hitting Reki in the face Ouch ! That wasn't cool Langa ! he complained —Sorry, i didn't mean to, are you hurt ? The blue haired boy panicked —No, i'm fine, anyways… Reki's hand searched for something in the bag Ah there it is ! He got his hands out of the bag and took out a disinfectant and some bandages Now let me check that."

Reki always had this sort of thing ready in his bag, as getting hurt is common when you skate.

He inspected your arm and your wrist, your bandages were getting red, he got rid of them to check your injuries "Oh they're healing faster than i thought, even though they should have already been healed, thank god they're still healing though. But you're bleeding." He smiled, almost motherly to you, making sure that you don't panick, the thought of reki as a mother was very funny to you as it crossed your mind, but the cursed images of reki being pregnant following your thoughts were more cursed than funny "I'm gonna have to use disinfectant, Just tell me if it hurts okay?" he uses the disinfectant carefully, you groaned in pain a bit but it was fine. "There we go." he then proceed to put some new bandages over your arm and wrist, and Langa complained " you never took this much care of me whenever i bled. —You never got really that injured, you only ever bled, it's nothing we all bleed from time to time when we skate. Reki tried to explain himself, still focused on your arm. —You let me faint. —Oh shut up, i panicked and ran to you for the record. —Like a prince in a shining armor ? you asked, randomly, Reki stopped bandaging your arm for a second, only a second, and then he continued bandaging your arm. —I wasn't charmed, I was already uncounscious. Langa argued —Are you falling in love with Reki or something Langa? You wanted to be charmed? You tried to tease him, Reki just finished bandaging your arm and jumped over to turn around and put the stuff back in his backpack, seeming a bit agitated and quick to hide his face, he then spoke —Don't say things like that y/n ! We're bros, nothing like that —I was speaking to Langa, not you. —Oh you get what i meant ! "

You didn't continue trying to tease them, this was largely enough and you enjoyed the way Reki was talking to you but turned away from you and Langa was just staring at the both of you completely zoned out, dumbfounded.

They were really fun to be around with. Your morning was already much less depressing, Reki really cared for you and Langa did too. You reallly hopped to be in the same class as them, even if you felt like a thirdwheel, you don't want classes schedules to disrupt your common routines.

For a moment there, it felt like you guys were already in the same class, but would that be too optimistic? Should you actually hope?

"So… Are you guys, perhaps… excited for school ?" you asked, curiously. They looked like they had much more energy than you, it's as if summer holidays never actually ended. Their face looked so bright, they seemed so happy and careless, as if summer never really ended. Reki and Langa looked at you curiously, finally, Reki spoke ;

"Definitely not. —Eh!? How can you have so much energy then!? I don't get you. —Personally, Langa speaks I'm excited whenever i can spend time with you or Reki, and school is important to me, i need to improve my japanese skills and understand how things work around there. Langa explained, honestly. —Right… Well, as long as i'm not a thirdwheel. —Don't even say that word, it makes me think about my final race with Adam. Reki groaned thinking about it, he acted like he was going to puke, Langa chuckled. —Was that race this bad? You were really good. —It was fun but.. I really don't enjoy skating against Adam and you know that Langa, i don't get you, you almost died when racing him down that crazy path last time ! —Oh, that's true. Langa recalled, having actually forgotten this detail —You really looked like you were falling mindlessly, you weren't even moving and then you suddenly moved and took your skateboard and won the race, what even got into you? You really scared me you know? I was worried. You both are crazy, you got injured last time too y/n Reki spoke, with a genuine troubled expression on his face. —Reki, you get injured much more than i do. You spoke, with a stern voice —The word fun saved me. Langa spoke, out of the blue, with full honesty in his voice —What? You mean the word fun we put on your fixed skateboard?"

Reki turned to Langa with a curious face. You looked at the time, you guys were already going to be late at this rate, you coughed "guys, we're going to be late." your tone was a bit harsh, but you really didn't want to be late.

"Oh crap! Langa, y/n, let's go ! " and there you guys went, skating to school, fast.

Your friends looked very energetic, it killed you that you couldn't be as energetic, honestly, it's been a few days or weeks since your energy drastically dropped to the thought of school, and you couldn't tell if your friends noticed, but you were afraid to be a burden to them. They were shining so bad, and you were starting to feel like you were staying in the dark, maybe you always were in the back afterall, but everytime, it seemed Reki, Langa or Miya found a way to cheer you up or make you feel like you belong.

Reki and Langa did a few ollies and some random tricks while you just cruised. It's crazy how they're late and still able to flex, have fun and pull up some tricks. Well, it was like this last year too.

You met Reki and Langa at school, and met your other friends at S, and these friendships really made your life much more brighter. Could it be constantly the case though? What if they were the one brightening up your days - but you weren't the one brightening up their days ? That thought hit you a bit inside, like a small bullet passing through your body, but slowly, and with barely enough pain, you felt a small wave of negative emotions, it hurts a bit, but you felt a bit empty, in a way.

You felt the air pass through your lungs, burning, as the cold air hits your face, and finally, you reached school. Somehow you made it despites the overwhelming feeling that the air is so heavy it'll crush your bones.

School is back. ~

You slid your skateboard behind your backpack and walked to your assigned classroom after the school announcement concerning the begginning of the year, you were not in the same class as Reki and Langa, of course.

That's not all that mattered though. Your grades mattered too.

You're not going to die by working a little and spend less time with your friends, come on. You could still spend time with them nontheless later.

Before you go, you exchanged a small wave in Reki and Langa's direction, they waved back; these two were in the same class it seemed. Maybe they were better without your grumpy-self though. They seemed much more happier than you were, were you just overthinking and dramatising everything?

You reached your classroom and when the teacher told you to, you sit down, taking the sit at the back, avoiding to talk to anyone. Why bother? Approaching people isn't on your to-do list at the moment.

The class was already loud and obnoxious, just like a circus. You paid no attention to the noises and as to avoid getting bothered by the noises, you stared at your desk and zoned out, thinking about all the times you went skating with your friends. It was the only thing you wanted to think about right now.

Despites your efforts to not be bothered by all these voices, you still heard a few people talk

"The manager of the fruit stand always sat and only sold vegetables —What!? You mean the fruit stand down your street ? —Yes, atleast the vegetables are cheap. So me and my mom always go there the saturday mornings. —I wouldn't buy my vegetables there if it was a fruit stand only selling vegetables…"

This random conversation you heard was completely unrelated to school, you sighed, but who were you to care? It seemed like people knew each other, you were probably going to end up alone this year, is it so bad though?

The teacher coughed and asked for everyone to be quiet, and the class continued talking. Why were you even here? This is supposed to be the first class, usually during the first classes people should be quiet, atleast on the first classes of the year. But who were you to talk? You can't lie, you really wished you could talk to Reki and Langa like this right now, but you guys aren't even in the same class.

Between all the talks you could hear, you heard another one, still completely unrelated to school, there was a brown-haired girl talking to a black haired boy, the girl looks cute you thought, the boy spoke : "Why do you LoOOooOOOoOve me Stanley? —I like your blue eyes. She replied as if it was a sufficient reason to like someone —Why did you only tell me now ? He stared at her with his PieRcIng BlUe EyEs —I didn't want any new girls stealing you away from me. Your classmate declared in full confidence —…Wow so possesive grrr~ He said before the two burst out laughing —You're so stupid the girl chuckled, a smile on her face —Stupid for you ? he asked, playfully "

And there you witnessed a newborn couple that was probably going to last a few days or weeks, on the first day of school.

Everyone didn't look like they cared about the first class. You wished you could not care aswell, but you cared, you cared a plenty lot, this was supposed to be important. You couldn't not care with all these anxious thoughts going on in your head.

Why can't i see? you thought to yourself, wondering why you couldn't see things the way your other classmates did. Everyone else seemed so much more happier than you did. Why do you have to be like this? Why can't you see things the way they see things? Why do you have to mess up so bad on this?

When you finally stopped your thoughts and snapped back to reality, you noticed the new couple stopped talking and were looking at you whispering some things. Shit, you stared too long. You quickly turned to look at your desk.

Finally, after some time the teacher managed to get the class to be silent, he presented himself, talked about how everything works this year, and asked everyone to present themselves one by one, to break the ice… apparently.

A girl on the left front beggined ; "My name is Mallory and i love riding horses on my free time. —You mean men? the boys snickered"

Long after that, it is finally your turn to present yourself.

"Uhm, i'm y/n.. and i love skating with my friends. —You have friends!? Someone random in the class exclamed themselves, even though they barely knew you for even an hour, some people laughed and the teacher told the class to be quiet"

It's crazy how people make assumptions on even people they never talked to and saw for only minutes of their lives. This is gonna be a long class, ice breaker wasn't really working out, was there even ice to break to begin with?

School is back, i guess. ~

The class ended, it's finally free time, you went to sit on your skateboard at the rooftop, the place you, Reki and Langa discussed going to if you were ever seperated at school and wanted to meet up. Eventually, Reki and Langa walked up to you.

The class was long, everyone was loud and judgemental, it was… definitely great.

"Hey, y/n" Langa spoke with a gentle voice "Wanna go skate in the playground ?" he asked and you looked at him, with a frown on your face "we're gonna get in troubles again, and i'm injured, for you to know." Langa insisted "But you still skated this morning despite your injury, and it could be fun, you seem down, come on come with us" he almost pleaded, you couldn't say no to him at this point, reki finally spoke "I mean it's your choice if you don't wanna skate i understand, but you're acting just like you were when we barely knew you, come cheer up a bit with us, won't ya ? If we get in troubles i'll take the blame if that reassures you." you looked at Reki, with a curious look on your face "How can you even take the blame for something like this ? —I don't know, I'll come up with something. Reki shrugged, you looked at the floor, a bit hesitant, but ended up saying —Fine fine. you saw the boys' eyes light up —Let's go then ! "

You stood up and took your skateboard with you.

You guys ended up skating at the corridors before reaching the playground, of course, a teacher was there and you ended up having to run away from a teacher with your skateboard in hands. You guys were caught as always and got in troubles, Reki did his best to put the blame on him but it didn't work out, now you three have to stay after school and help the janitors clean, atleast it's better that it's the three of you guys in troubles than only Reki. Ah, and the teachers took your skateboards, Reki literally groaned and Langa looked like he was going through all the stages of grief at that moment.

"Oops? Reki muttered under his breath when the teacher finally left you guys I hate cleaning He complained innocently —If it's with my friends i think it's okay, i help my mom clean the house most times. Langa said, looking as if he was recalling all the times he helped his mom with the laundry, the cooking and the overall house chores, as her husband died, Reki turned to you and spoke —Sorry, we didn't want to get you in troubles, we just thought you'd cheer up a bit since the first school day doesn't seem to be going well for you- —How was your class guys ? you asked out of nowhere, after having zoned out, cutting reki's speech off as if it was nothing —Huh!? Oh uh, i don't know, i didn't really pay attention, the window was more attractive. Reki answered, taken a bit off guard you didn't pay attention to what i was saying thou- —You mean the reflection of Langa next to you was more attractive? —How did you- i mean, no homo though. Reki scratched the back of his head, a bit embarassed, these two were so obvious, you stared at Langa, he seemed zoned out —Langa ? you called to him, he looked at you and then he said —I'm confused. —What are you even confused about ? Reki asked, with a nervous voice —I'm confused: when people ask me what's up, and I point, they groan."

You facepalmed.

"Dude?! When people ask you what's up they ask you how you are, not what's literally up ! Reki spoke, dumbfounded —Japanese is difficult. Langa remarked, thoughtful, looking at the ground —You mean english is difficult!? Reki retorted, remembering the many times Langa tried to teach him something in English —I guess any language can be difficult for anyone."

You were not participating in this conversation, staring in disbelief at Langa.

you zoned out, thinking about the way your new classmates were staring at you in class, and all the whispers you heard in your direction.

"say y/n, how was your class ? Reki turned to you, curious I mean, you're not in the same class as us and you asked us so.. —It was fine. "

Your answer was short and automatic, you know that tone and voice when you reply automatically and it's technically you talking but it doesn't feel like it's you - like you don't even think the words you say but somehow they leave your mouth as if they were the complete truth ? As if you had to answer this specific answer at all cost to protect yourself and act like it's the truth, so much you replied without thinking ? That's exactly how you felt when you spoke, and you hated it. You couldn't control it though, your brain decided it was best to lie.

And yeah, maybe it was best, Reki and Langa didn't have to know about anything, you didn't want to make them feel akward. I mean, it's always this way, whenever you feel the slightest bit down, everyone is always akward or replying "ah" or "oof" or "Sorry", it's as if what you said bothered them in a way, and you just didn't like it.

You noticed Reki and Langa exchanged a glance, did they notice your weird behaviour and caught on your lie or is it just a gay-type of glance ?

You continued talking, trying to sound convincing "I mean, the class was rather loud but it was pretty funny, there was this newborn couple and the guys joked around a lot-"

The bell rang, it was time to seperate again. Thanks god the bell interrupted you, because you didn't even know what you were saying. Still you didn't want to go back to the classroom, you wanted to stay with your friends.

"What? Already!? Reki complained, looking like he was going to be out of his mind if the bell rang one more time —Please focus this time Reki, instead of staring at me. Langa remarked, blankly, it took Reki off guard —I wasn't staring at you i was staring at me ! He defended himself, he put his arm over Langa's shoulder and tried to coonvince him I was staring at my hair because i thought about getting an haircut, you know ? You noticed sweats appear very fast on Reki's face —Right. Langa spoke, half-convinced You never changed your haircut in over a year, you only ever take your headband off when you're mad at me. —Let's go to class now, i need to tell you something. Reki changed the subject and started walking away, before turning to you and waving See you on the rooftop at lunch y/n ! "

You guys waved at each other, and you went back to your class. It was loud, once again, and you could hear a bunch of random conversations again, unamused.

"My uncle's favorite pastime was building cars out of noodles. —How do you even -"

"You know my favorite song? It kinda goes like this, tired of explaining, as these seasons keep on changing —Is this even Japanese…? —No it isn't."

"Which is greener, purple or red ? —Red is greener than purple, for sure. —Look at that color circle, purple is closer to green than red is ! —Does that even mean anything… Purple is made by blue and red, why wouldn't be red greener ? "

"What do these results on this quiz mean ? —You're like the peanut butter. The creator said so. —Wha- but i wanted to be a cheese! so that i could be cheesy with rome- —You're not always who you want to be."

The teacher eventually got the class to quiet down and called for everyone's names one by one to check weither they were present.

Your name wasn't pronounced, weird. But you paid no attention to it.

The teacher begun with an history lesson, a classmate raised his hand and asked something, he wondered why at 18 he was old enough to go to war, but not old enough to buy cigarettes.

You couldn't focus, your head was heavy, until eventually, you noticed the teacher was looking at you.

"Uhm, excuse me.. he called out to you, not pronouncing your name, he coughed, akwardly —Yes ? you asked, a bit taken off guards, were you going to get in troubles for not listening ? —What's your name ? He asked, a bit unsure of his question, staring at a paper, the class was looking at you —y/n l/n —Hm let me see… no you're not in this list. The teacher remarked Weird… What class are you supposed to be in ? —This class sir, it was written on the paper. you show the paper and the teacher examinates it, he looks embarassed —There must have been a mistake somewhere, maybe this is why Aoi haruka isn't here, let me contact my colleagues."

The class was silent, and after a few minutes, an adult came to the class to pick you up and lead you to your class, when you left the classroom, you could hear whispers in your directions, the adult apologized to you explaining your name got mixed up with someone else.

You walked with the adult, reaching another classroom. They knocked on the other classroom door and explained the situation to the other teacher.

"Please excuse me, we mixed up the names and got two students mixed up, i'm here to put y/n l/n here and take Aoi haruka to her actual class. —Oh uh, it's okay… Aoi haruka, please go, and uh.. y/n l/n, please go sit down"

The teacher looked a bit embarassed by this situation.

You entered the classroom, a bit nervous, everyone was looking at you, you looked at the whole classroom to search for a place to sit at, and saw a girl standing up with her backpack and stuff and leaving the classroom, it must have been Aoi Haruka. You looked at the seat, it was next to Langa.

You were in Reki and Langa's class in the end.

You could feel immense relief when you realized, and went to sit down next to Langa, Langa and Reki looked at you curiously, there's a paper on Langa's desk, there's sentences with a very good japanese writing on it next to bunch of badly written japanese sentences, Reki and Langa were probably passing notes about something, you could read a few words from the distance, but only a few, you managed to read your name and the words mission and lie.

What were they planning? When you think about it, what if they were talking behing your back like the other people who you thought were your classmates probably did ? You decided to shake it off, you were probably going too far. You want to trust Reki and Langa… Don't you? Aren't you a good friend?

…

Yeah.

Reki whispered something to Langa, and Langa then leaned his head towards you to whisper something to you.

"Reki asks what are you doing here —My name got mixed up with someone else, i was apparently supposed to be here"

Langa leaned his head back towards Reki and whispered to him what you said, Reki gave you a thumb up.

You smiled. Maybe you were luckier than you thought.

And maybe they weren't.

the class passed, it was way much better, the other class was kind of funny to be honest, but it was really tiring on the first day and they didn't seem to like you so, it's really better this way, and you get to be next to your friends.

But you need to focus on your school work don't you? You can't always hang out with your friends and have fun, life isn't like that, you need to work and be responsible. Be grateful you have it easier than other people, make the best of your school time because it will be harder once you start having a job.

Ah… right.

The teacher talked and you started taking notes, struggling because your wrist hurt, this is the wrist you usually write with, it's injured since your last race at S. Langa looked at you.

"Do you need any help ? he asked, with a calm expression on his face and a tint of worry —No it's okay, i rather not bother you, besides i can't even understand your writing. you whispered back, a bit harshly at the end, you internally slapped yourself for it. —L/n, is there anything you want to share with us ? The teacher spoke, looking at you, your classmates looked at you, you hated it —Uhm actually sir, their wrist is injured, so i was asking them if they needed help. Langa spoke instead of you —Thank you Langa but I was asking L/n to talk- —I CAN HELP ! reki raised his hand and exclaimed himself —Alright… Thank you for your enthusiasm Reki… the teacher replied, looking like he gave up at this moment —Sit next to me, y/n reki spoke —Ah yes… Langa, could you please exchange your desk with l/n's for the class from now on until their wrist heal ? —Yes. Langa moved and you guys switched desk, it looked like Langa was a bit sad to not be next to Reki anymore, but he was happy to be of help in any way —Thank you, Reki, Langa you mumbled, Reki smiled to you —It's nothing "

You got injured after a race at S a few days ago, you were racing Reki. You weren't doing so bad during the race until you thought that if you got injured maybe you wouldn't have to deal with school, and coincidentally, you lost balance, rolled down to the side, and hurt your arm and wrist. Reki was upset and worried and your skateboard continued rolling until it fell off a cliff and you never saw it ever again, but Reki had a spare skateboard for you, thankfully.

The class passed faster than the last class, Reki helped you and took notes for you, though he was pretending to take his notes about the lesson, his notes were mostly about skateboarding if anything, he looked more focused to help you though. Reki seemed kinder to you than usual, it's not that he's never kind, he's always been kind, but it felt a bit more insistant this time. ~ The bell rang, you put your stuff in your backpack and Reki helped you.

"Y/n" Langa spoke, you turned around to face him "yes ? —My stomach hurt. He said, Reki closed your backpack and walked up to him, concerned, he asked —Did you eat anything weird this morning ? Do you want to go to the infirmary ? —This morning, I ate a sock because people on the Internet told me to. You stared, blankly, trying to process the information, and Reki exclamed, in disbelief —What people on the internet !? Langa you can't listen to everything the people tell you to do, how did you even get yourself to eat a sock!? —It didn't taste good. —No kidding it didn't taste good! Langa look at me, did you swallow the whole sock ? —Yes. —So that's why you were having a hard time skateboarding earlier! "

To be honest, you didn't even notice this, but now you were worried for your friend, Langa. And you let Reki speak to him and explain to him that: no, eating a sock isn't safe.

Langa was really something, he was still skating better than you this morning even though he swallowed a whole sock, how did he not choke? ~ Long story short, he got drived to an hospital. For eating a sock. Because people on the internet told him to. Reki looked mad.

You were sitting on the rooftop with Reki, you both were silently eating.

"Langa really is reckless, he scares me"

Reki broke the silence.

You contested : "I don't think he's scary —That's not what i meant, but i mean, sometimes i literally have nightmares because of him, he can't go on and accept every challenges people offer him, i mean, the race with ADAM and now the sock? What's next is he going to mess with the FBI or something!? —I wouldn't even be surprised at this point.. you sighed —Right? I wonder what goes through his head, i mean, what's fun in eating a sock? —I don't even want to imagine. "

And there's a silence again. Until Reki broke it once again, looking at you with a stern look on his face.

"y/n, you won't be as reckless as him right ? —Huh? —I mean, last time you raced at S you got injured, we were racing, y'know… —Well hey, atleast you won ! You tried to reassure him —I want to skate with you but i don't want you to get injured, you know, and you just fell off so suddenly, it didn't even feel like it was an accident if i was honest You felt yourself internally panick, you didn't even know yourself if you did it on accident or on purpose. —No, don't worry it's just a silly little injury, it could have been worse. you tried to reassure him, Reki shouldn't be too worrieed about this, it's not like he never gets injured, he was injured for half of the memories you have had with him, he needs to think more of himself too. —Oka once told me, it's not bad to take care of yourself sometimes, you know ? his tone became a bit more stern —What do you mean ? —You don't look like you've been even sleeping at all y/n, and for the record, your injury was supposed to be healed by now, but you keep using your injured arm and your body is not getting enough rest, i'm worried that you'll actually make it worse."

You stayed quiet at his words, Reki sighed.

"y/n, please take care of yourself, i really don't want to lose you too"

you remembered him telling you about his old friend, you felt bad for even thinking for a second that maybe Reki didn't care about you, but now you needed to think of a way to reassure Reki, this was your fault for being reckless. You smiled and said "Hey hey, i swear it's going to be okay, i'm not being merely as reckless as you or Langa are sometimes " you joked and added "I never raced ADAM"

Reki looked at you with a silly angry face "Well it doesn't mean you can go around and make your injuries worse! You don't want to have to quit skateboarding do you? —Oh, come on it's just an arm —Just an arm!?"

You finished your lunch, and as you were about to get up while Reki was scolding you relentlessly about your injury, you tried to grab for your skateboard, and cut Reki's scolding off "Let's get our mind off of it and skate- —Our skateboards got taken away, y/n —Right"

You sighed, it felt empty without Langa. You felt silly for asking to skate into the school's grounds when you were the one refusing it this morning when Langa asked.

Did it ever feel this way when you were gone?

It felt empty even though Reki was still as lively as ever. If Langa was there though, you knew you wouldn't have been able to escape Reki's scolding, he's been pretty insistent for you to take care of yourself since that injury.

"Thinking about Langa, I hope he's doing okay…" you thought out loud, Reki nodded

Reki looked more quiet than usual, he was still talkative but less, it seemed he was thinking about something. No wonder why though, one of his bestfriends was in a hospital.

Well, bestfriend, that's understimating what the both of them really are. They have one hell of a bond. Even you can notice; their eyes contacts are everything. Even If they aren't romantic, they are still much more than bestfriends in ways words can't describe.

He got up and smiled "Well If It's Langa we have nothing to worry about, he always gets out of troubles somehow"

you nodded, chuckling a bit. It's true, Langa always get out of troubles.

The bell rang, you walked to your classroom together. You sat next to Reki, feeling weird that the seat next to you was empty, you missed Langa already.

The class passed, and when it ended it looked like Reki has fallen asleep while he was trying to take notes for you, but you were too zoned out to even notice.

A voice snapped you back to reality though.

"Just because the water is red doesn't mean you can't drink it… Langa what are you even talking about"

It was Reki's, you looked at him, confused, he was actually awake? You stood up and put your stuff back in your backpack, ignoring the burning pain in your arm.

"What do you mean? " you asked, before realising he has fallen back asleep. Reki is one to talk in his sleep afterall, he always does, you could still remember the day he woke up, stood up from his desk and screamed for Langa's name loudly in utter panick in front of the whole class when he was worried about his race with ADAM. You could also remember staying up with Langa when you guys were having a sleepover, just to hear what Reki would say in his sleep, there were no boring nights with Reki even when he was asleep, he was full of surprises, just like Langa, in a way.

"Reki?" you put your hand on his shoulder, he jumped and screamed "AH ?!!" you gestured for him to calm down. ~ Finally, the school day ended, more silently. You were in front of the school, Reki told you to wait here, you knew you had to stay one hour after class anyways to help the janitors clean, so it didn't reallly matter much.

"What are we even waiting for Reki? The teachers are waiting for us. —Just wait"

You stayed silent, until you noticed Miya walking up to you "hey slimes, so are we gonna go get the skateboards or what? You better pay me back after that. *You stared, confused, before turning to face Reki. —Reki, what is this about? *Reki sighed* —Long story short y/n… I'll have the two of you conduct a prison break ! —Wait you don't mean- —We're going to get our skateboards back and get away from here ! Reki exclamed himself, proudly —And then he'll become my cat. Miya added, killing Reki's joy in just a sentence —Don't act smug it's just one day ! —Wanna make it two?"

you stared at them, surprised, Miya didn't bring his skateboard.

So you were going to get your skateboards back and Miya was going to take Langa's skateboard back.

And then you could break out of school.

You stared the ground, your face frowned, and you spoke "They'll call our parents for that —Oh don't worry, i've done this plenty of time with Langa, you just never got into that much troubles before —What? But- you whole lots of crazy!- —They always forget! Infact, when i tried to wait for them to give me back my skateboard, they always forgot, so we have to get these back ourselves before they damage our babies ! —Fair enough i guess.."

You didn't want to imagine Reki giving birth to a skateboard, so you just went along with his plan hoping he'd stop using the name "babies" for the skateboards. ~ You were out of school with your skateboard, at the small skatepark you and Langa usually go to, you could remember Langa practicing tic-tacs here.

You were sitting with Miya as Reki was skating around

Miya yelled at his new human pet " drop, you must! —On it!" Reki dropped down the ramp, and failed, miya snickered

"Wow, and i thought i promoted you to a a golem! —You did!? Reki sounded happy Also If i failed, that's Langa's fault! Reki complained, which led Miya to be confused, he asked —How so? —Today I heard something new and unmemorable. Langa literally swallowed a sock because people on the internet told him to, i can't focus! —He did what!? So that's why he couldn't go pick up his skateboard himself!? Miya looked heavily surprised, he stared at the ground, hiding his concern"

Reki started skating again and raised his voice "Yes, he never changes!" Reki was obviously shaking and struggling to keep his balance, he looked tired and stressed, damn, you hated to see him like this. You looked away from him for a bit, and looked at Miya.

"Miya, how was school ? you asked, curious —It was fine i guess, you ? —You know how people get pregnant around their belly? Well i get brain pregnant, it's like i'm giving birth to so many neurons i'm gonna explode"

Miya stared at you and questionned your sanity. You looked back to Reki who was skating, you decided to cheer him on "Never back down never what!? —Never give up! Reki screamed in enthusiasm, before he falls on his balls and scream in more pain —Are you okay!?"

Reki sat up and gave you a thumb up, before standing up, visibly in pain. You started to wonder if you should join him, he seemed to continue skating despite his struggles, and you were just watching him with Miya, not doing an effort at all.

You can be such a burden sometime, you're almost certain being looked at this way while you're struggling must not feel cool. You remember being scared of people's looks when you started skating.

Reki went up to you, and asked you

"Hey, so y/n how are you feelin- —Meow for me, slime. Miya cut him off and Reki meowed, embarassed and annoyed, you laughed That's a good cat. Miya commented before Reki said —Oh shut it Miya, if we have a beef one day i'll make sure you regret that"

You looked at your phone and noticed that you had a message on a groupchat with Reki, Langa, Miya, Joe, Cherry and Shadow.

…You have a lot of groupchats. Like one that excludes Joe just for Cherry, and one to exclude Cherry just for Joe.

Shadow : " I'm racing a rookie tonight ! Watch me blow them off at midnight ! scary laughter "

It's scary how he used the scary laughters seriously as if he was talking to bots and roleplaying

Cherry : "I'll pass"

Reki looked at your screen, before saying "maybe we should go to Joe's… —Hm? you turned your head to face Reki, he seemed thoughtful. He turned to Miya and said —Miya, let's- —Call me master and meow. —Frick you! —It's apart of the deal —Fine- Master, let's go to Joe's meow —There there that's better. Miya pet Reki's hair and Reki looked like he was trying his best to compose himself, you tried not to laugh —Who's paying ? you asked —My cat is paying. —I didn't even- but yes that's true"

a few seconds passed, before Reki screamed

"WAIT I FORGOT I HAD A JOB !"

Your eyes widened, and you all skated to Reki's workplace, Reki apologized and you volunteered to replace Langa since he was unavailable tonight, since he… ate a sock. Miya was playing on his console while you two were working, you were pretty much zoned out and it looked like Reki would talk mostly to Miya anyways, you were zoned out but you could hear him complain whenever Miya told him to act like a cat, some things about this being inadequate at a workplace.

~ Finally, after that, you guys skated to Joe's restaurant, it seemed the restaurant was still open and Joe was waiting for you, Shadow and Cherry were all here, they seemed to know you'd come. Maybe Miya or Reki texted them to come.

You guys ordered some meals, and Shadow tried to steal Joe's kitchen to cook instead and show his great cooking skills, he wanted to cook you waffles or something… somehow, with his secret recipe. For shadow, excitement replaced fear until the final moment where Joe was able to stop him from using the kitchen furthermore.

Waffles are always better without fire ants and fleas, afterall. (This is an Italian restaurant).

It seemed the restaurant was originally closed but Joe made an exception for all of you because Reki convinced him to.

You were sitting near the window next to Miya, facing Reki. You asked : "So, what are we doing here Reki ? —I wanted to pass some quality time with my friends, you know.. eheh He looked like he was hiding something —That is your friend ? Miya pointed to Shadow which Shadow immediately noticed —Hey! I'm not your teacher or anything! Shadow raged, and Miya shrugged —You could have just invited everyone except Shadow on the groupchat excluding Shadow. Miya said, indifferent, playing on his console —WHAT GROUPCHAT?? Shadow yelled, before Joe told him to quiet down"

you stared at the table, a few moments later, Joe handed you guys over a few plates of food, as you guys ordered. Cherry was sitting next to Reki.

Shadow was renting, something along the lines "My dentist tells me that chewing bricks is very bad for your teeth. But no bricks can hurt my teeth behind this mask! I'm a true man!" you couldn't really understand what he was even saying, too zoned out to even try to understand. If Langa was here, he'd have been very happy to eat all of the restaurant's leftovers. You heard miya tells shadow "Well good for you idiot, just tell me if you want me to call a mental hospital for you"

You were happy you were all together, but you couldn't help but think about tomorrow's school day, you were definitely going to be even more tired than you were today tomorrow.

Joe kicked Shadow out of the restaurant for being a menace to his kitchen in the end as Shadow continued to try going back to the kitchen of the restaurant.

The first school day was tiresome, even if you were in Reki and Langa's classroom, you felt a sort of stress concerning your future, you didn't want to mess your life up. Life isn't just about fun…

Miya nudged your shoulder to get you to listen to whatever they're talking about, and he spoke "Thank god Joe was able to get Shadow out of his kitchen, if Joe ever lets Shadow cooks for us, I won't think twice i'll go : bye-bye-bye —This feels familliar you spoke, the way he said the end of his sentence looked like a song, strange.. —What does? Miya asked —Oh- nothing, nothing."

You stared at your plate and ate a bit, you were slow though. Reki was silent, after some time, Cherry spoke.

" Today I discovered something i never knew about carla before. —Which is ? Joe asks —Nothing. —If you want everyone to have a conversation so bad, atleast come up with something more creative."

the room was silent, Joe and Cherry wouldn't even speak, Reki looked at Joe, with pleading eyes, you were confused. Joe sighed and speaked:

"Say y/n, are you going to S tonight? —Uhm… You thought, S was really fun, and you really didn't wanna go to school and all, maybe you could just go to S and call it your life cheatcode- —I don't advice you to If you're still injured. Cherry said, glancing at your arm —I'm fine guys, i swear —You're not going to race anyone though, right ? Reki asked, looking concerned —Well actually i was thinking about it. you admitted, Reki looked at you with a face of despair and Miya spoke —You're so reckless y/n. —Y/n! please don't hurt yourself! Reki pleaded —It's no use Reki, they don't understand you… —What do you mean they don't understand me!?? —They zoned out again" ~ Long story short, the group convinced you not to go to S tonight, and Reki ended up convincing you to sleep at his place tonight for a sleepover so that you wouldn't be alone in skipping S tonight, but also to be sure you don't go there. He already sneaked to S without his friends knowing before, and he doesn't want you to do that too.

You walked out of the restaurant with Reki, Miya already went home, Cherry already left, and Joe had to clean after you. You already texted your parents that you would be on a sleepover with Reki tonight, you also mentionned that Langa would be there so that they wouldn't ask too many questions, even though Langa wasn't here.

"What a long day" Reki stretched, and looked at you "Let's go"

You both started skating, until it started raining, your skateboard wasn't set for rain, shit.

"Shoot! Y/n this way ! " Reki called out to you, skating away, the rain was getting slowly, no, quickly heavier and heavier, and you ended up falling off, you got up and took your skateboard and ran, Reki was already far away.

Big thunder noises

Oh, there's a thunder. ~ You reached Reki's house, panting and barely breathing, covered in mud, barely standing on your own. He panicked and apologized a thousand times when he noticed you got even more hurt, he took you to his house quickly not wanting to let you get even colder, and he checked your injuries once again, this time, in his bathroom, just in case something was missing in his bag, he was sure to find whatever it could be in the bathroom.

The bathroom looked clean, it was a small room but sufficient, you sat on a chair, Reki opened his bag and a drawer, before checking your arm first, your wounds visbly opened again as your bandages were red. How amazing. Reki probably didn't like seeing your bandages being red so often.

"Damn, now this must be my fault this time. Reki mumbled, as he got rid of your bloodied bandages and pulled up a disinfectant Thanks god the wounds aren't that big, you could have ended up in the hospital like Langa, because of me… —Hey, no, we're fine, we didn't predict the weather."

Reki seemed distant as he stared at your arm, he mumbled something inaudible. He was zoning out while lightly using the disinfectant, you didn't like this. So you spoke.

"You're not a god, you know. —And you're not either, so stop being so reckless will ya? He retorted, unhappy —Say the one who was blaming himself a few minutes ago! You didn't want to let this slide, Reki was done changing your bandages, and he spoke while putting back the bandages supplies into their places —I'm not blaming you! I'm just, well, worried for you you know! —There's no reasons to be. You stared at the ground, ready to deny everything, Reki spoke, almost reading your mind —Where else are you hurt? —Nowhere! You tried to stand up but your legs gave up pretty easily Agh- You almost fell but Reki caught you, some of the dirt of your clothes got to him, you both were still dripping wet, and you were covered in mud, it was a bit awkward, but Reki was there for you, he was like a brother to you —Hold into me, where does it hurt? —My knees —Shit "

Reki cursed and slowly had you sitting back in the chair, telling you to not move and not be reckless.

You and Reki held something in common, you both were pretty stubborn when it came to being fine.

Right now, Reki looked lost in thoughts as he checked your knees, and as he suspected, your knees were hurt, but it didn't look too bad yet, he sighed and looked at you in the eyes "We're going to get that checked tomorrow if it doesn't get better, okay? —Okay..? You sounded hesitant, as if it was weird for him to care about you,but it's not supposed to be —So you can't stand? —Actually yes I can! you tried to let go of Reki's grip, but you held into the chair instead, Reki sighed —Alright, uhm, you're covered in mud, do you want to take a bath? I have some spare clothes for you if you want? He politely asked, feeling bad that he let you get hurt like this —I mean, yeah alright you replied, not knowing why you could possibly say no, being covered in mud really wasn't pleasant"

This isn't the first time something like this happened, you smiled, this is why Reki always had spare clothes just in case, because you can recall the three of you getting all muddy so many times, and you guys would usually have sleepovers at Reki's house more than anyone's house. You knew what was going to happen was that you would take a bath, and then Reki would do so too when you leave the bathroom, clean and changed and as you go get your other clothes cleaned.

You might catch a pretty bad cold tomorrow. ~ After you took a bath and put on the spare clothes that were ready for you, you ended up in the living room, desperately holding into whatever you could hold into, you were told to sit down and not exhaust yourself. But to be honest, you uncounsciously wanted to exhaust yourself, so maybe you could ghost through the whole year, was it selfish? It's just the first day…

The family was really loud and lively, even at night, you recalled that it was often like this whenever you had a sleepover with Langa at Reki's house.

It's weird that Langa isn't here… It feels so empty even with all of the noises going on, Reki must be feeling stressed out. Just as he showed at the skatepark earlier, barely able to keep balance on his skateboard.

You heard one of Reki's sibling, try to tell a story to another sibling, something along the lines of "The llama couldn't resist trying the lemonade…", It felt very silly.

The atmosphere was warm, you sure never get lonely in here, this place is full of life. It was such a warm and fuzzy atmosphere, you couldn't help but smile a bit. Though the noises gave you a headache. Surprisingly enough, it still wasn't too late for Reki's siblings to be awake, somehow. Well, it's true that Reki's mother was desperately trying to calm the siblings down and get them to sleep, you were in the living room, your backpack out, you already had homework on the first day of school, and you could barely focus.

After some time, Reki came downstairs, he seemed to have cleaned himself up and changed himself faster than you did, he walked towards you and sat next to you, opening his backpack aswell.

You both tried to focus with the awkward silence going on between you, it was funny because no one could hear the silence as the house was really loud, but you could still feel it.

After some time, Reki scratched his hair, stretched and sighed "Man, I didn't listen to a single word the teachers said today —You didn't? —You did? —Yes, I mean… you hesitated, you mostly remember having negative thoughts about yourself today, you looked down at your paper I don't really remember anything…"

You felt Reki's gaze on you, you didn't know if it was a thoughtful look, a mocking look, a look of disbelief, or a look of concern, you didn't dare to move your head to know, sometimes it's better not to know, so you tried to focus on the printed writing of your paper.

"Is this history? you asked, Reki gulped —I thought it was maths —But there are centuries on the paper —True… But you have to calculate the centuries right? —Reki…"

You sighed, this was getting nowhere, you were barely reading. Mostly reading with your own eyes but not your brain, a simple sentence was like a treasure hint, each simple little words just wouldn't reunite or make sense in your brain. At that exact moment you just wanted to spend time with Reki, you didn't want to work, it was selfish, yes, but you couldn't help it, you didn't want to drag Reki into troubles though. You knew you were tired, but if you slept right now, you knew that you'd still be unable to work the next morning, it stressed you out, you didn't want to mess up on the second day of school aswell. You couldn't let all these bad feelings stop you, you didn't want to make yourself up excuses not to work, you felt like it was your fault, like you were the one who uncounsciously made yourself feel bad to have an excuse to work less and feel better about yourself. Though it was doing the opposite, and maybe you weren't right about this.

Thoughts were spinning around inside your head as your eyes focused on the sheet of paper and your textbook, you were completely zoning out.

How are you going to do this? How are you going to handle all of this? You messed up, all you had to do was not overthink it and here you already tired yourself out for a whole period, and you're dragging Reki into it aren't you? How stupid can you be? This is important, school is important, you can't just ignore that, it's not all just about fun. Why would it be?

"Y/n" *Reki called your name, looking at you "Hey, Y/n" *he insisted, you shook your head as your eyes widened, you stopped your trail of thoughts* "Yes ?" you tried to hold in your tears, but instead, you yawned, which got a few tears out of your eyes anyway, you whipped those tears away: you were just tired, that was all. Why else would have tears left your eyes? You're tired, nothing more. It was just one or two tears, a natural reaction from yawning, isn't it?

That is, before you realized it, the tears didn't stop leaving your eyes, it wasn't caused by just the yawning, you couldn't control yourself and your thoughts right now. Reki panicked, "Woah y/n! Hey please don't cry uhm-" you hid your face. when you realized.

Fuck, this wasn't the time to be dramatic, your other bestfriend was in the hospital, and all you could think about was yourself. How selfish can you be? Why are you ruining everything?

You weren't looking at Reki but even you could hear his panic, you tried to wipe away your tears and to calm down, it wasn't working out. Reki spoke, trying to be reassuring and comforting "hey, hey, it's okay- it's going to be okay, look at me- Well it's okay if you don't want to look at me, do you want to talk about it? What's up? —It's nothing, I'm just tired you said, your voice was shaking, you couldn't even make your voice sound normal, Reki's siblings were staring at you, great, you're making a scene now. —Is this the school stressing you out again? He asked, you stayed silent and your eyes widened a bit as you stared at the ground, Reki put an hesitant hand on your shoulder and spoke —Hey, it's okay, we're in classes of 30 people, they never check our work- —But I can't mess up you cut him off School's important, life isn't about just fun, work exist too Reki stayed silent for a second, before saying —Hey, I have fun at work you know —Huh? But this is a part time job!- —Does it matter? "

You paused, questioning your life's choices, Reki continued

"Hey, let me show you something" He stood up and led you an hand, you got up and he helped you walk, you guys walked toward the place he usually goes to to work on his skateboards in his garden, it seemed it stopped raining a while ago, probably while you were trying to focus on your work.

"Remember this place?" He asked, you nodded. Of course you can't forget, Reki made you multiple skateboards for free here, it was loud hearing the machines sometimes, but you can never forget a place with such fond memories.

Reki walked and grabbed a piece of wood "your skateboard got wet right? It needs to dry, this can last months, so to wait, i can make you another skateboard before this one breaks" he said, taking the usual measurements of the wood and tracing some lines, you were confused, weren't you guys talking about school and work just now? Why is he suddenly talking about skateboards again? I mean, atleast he was really passionate about it…

You stared at him, a bit dumbfounded, as he work, and you asked, before he turns on that godamn machine that had your ears dying on spot.

"Why are you doing this? —Well, because, if i let you skateboardless and dying to the stress of school, what will i think of myself for letting you down like this? —You're never letting me down, and, as I've said, life isn't about just fun anyway- —But it can be. Why torture yourself? He turned on the machine to cut the wood, making sure to follow the lines he traced precisely, communicating would be harder now, you had to raise your voice —It's not that simple! —Pick some trucks and some wheels"

Welp, there it is, Reki was being stubborn again, does he even understand you?

You sighed and stared at the available trucks and wheels, Reki was a bit too nice, he always gave you wheels and trucks for free.

Small wheels are for tricks, big wheels are for cruising on rougher surfaces. You pick out some wheels, and some trucks. When you think about it, Reki could just make you a board and you could replace the trucks and wheels yourself, why was he doing this?

When he was done cutting down the board, he asked "you done picking your trucks and wheels?" you nodded "mhm" he smiled and looked at the wheels and trucks you picked before nodding aswell, not surprised by your choice. He spoke, almost teasing you.

"You know, you really never changed your style of skating. —I don't really want to. You replied, Reki chuckled —You don't have to if this style suits you"

Reki started taking his supplies to color and decorate your board, you looked at him do so, and he asked "The same theme as usual? —Yes, please don't get too silly about it. You said in anticipation of whatever was about to come, Reki can be all but predictable sometimes —Will do!"

Reki got to work after putting a support under the board so that the paint wouldn't go over all the desk, and you just stared at him, feeling useless. He was used to working on this now to no surprises, and he was extremely fast, he surely looked like a professional. To you, he was like the God of skating, and you're sure many other would agree with you.

"Hey, y/n, want to add a touch of your help too? Let's spray some paint together —Can I really? —Yeah, it's your board not mine, as long as you don't spray paint all over my face I'm cool with it."

You smiled, feeling excited, you chose a color, specifically your favorite color. You started trying to draw some lines on the back of your board, not really confident. Reki nudged your shoulders to tease you, so you fought back.

Before you knew it, your board was full of colors and failed drawings, this definitely wasn't your usual board. And you both had full paint on your clothes, and some on your skin. You both were laughing and hardly breathing, when you calmed down, Reki looked at your board and declared "I shall call it the double painted friendship Reki-Y/n creation board, aka the Reki y/n dp friendship board!" you sighed, there he went again with his ridiculous nicknames, but you didn't dislike it either. If anything, Reki's enthusiasm was cheering you up, at this exact moment, you couldn't even bear to think about school, you just wanted to have fun. So what if they say life isn't just about fun?

You turned to face Reki, your eyes widened, and you looked at yourself. This was a catastrophe, you both were full of paint. Reki looked at you and looked at himself and realised the mess you both have done aswell, he had a curious and surprised look on his face for a second, before his smile brightened, and proud of himself he declared "Well looks like we both had a relooking!" you sighed and smiled "this isn't very healthy" he laughed "Don't worry, the paint is offensive once every 10 years"

"Let's let the paint dry for now." Reki said, before turning to look at you "You good?" you paused and thought, before answering "Yeah, i'm fine, why do you ask?" Reki sighed and said "I was scared you'd flood my house back there. —Hey! I'm not that much of a crybaby! —I'd rather have you cry than stay alone though. Joe once told me to never end up on my own."

You paused and stared at the table "Yeah, that's a good advice" you mumbled, before turning your head to face Reki, a curious look on your face "Say, why did you do all of this? You didn't have to let me pick out some new trucks and wheels, we could have just put the ones from the old board on the new board, you know? —Y/n, this is not the first time your trucks got wet, and i'm afraid they're getting rusty —They are? —Even a 4 year old would notice. —Hey! "

You guys laughed, and you asked "what do we do about the paint? —Let's go get it cleaned before it dries on our face, it's not raining anymore so we can go back to my house and to the cabin when it dries"

You were able to stand on your own, but when you took a step, it really hurts a lot, but you felt like you could handle it, things are way much less painful when you're in a better mood, it's crazy.

Once you entered his house again, you saw one of his younger sister, Koyomi, eating an ice cream and directly turning to talk to you "Hey y/n, i've got something for you —You're not sleeping? Reki asked —Nope, couldn't sleep with all the charades our younger relatives put in the house"

Koyomi took some papers and handed them to you "Here, nanaka and chihiro made these for you, they said they hoped it would make you feel better"

You took the drawings, these were drawings made by one of Reki's youngest siblings, a stickman kind of drawing with some hearts. It seemed even they cared about you. you stared at the drawing, while Reki said "Hey Koyomi, don't stay up too late. —You aswell" ~ After you both cleaned the paint off your face and arms, you went back to the place where the paint dried. You already felt much better, you made sure to keep the drawings somewhere in your backpack, these were silly, but you wanted to keep them in your room or something when you'll go back to your house.

Your phone bzzzzed, you turn on your phone and checked the notification, it was a message from Langa on the trio group containing you, Langa and Reki.

"Hey guys! I'm out of the hospital! :) The sock was no problem much, i'm on my way home!" Reki turned to you "Hm, what are you doing y/n? —Hey, look at this, Langa's out of the hospital you said, Reki immediately looked at your phone without any hesitation and said —Wow, so he really got out of troubles huh? —Yup, once again."

You smiled and typed a message on your phone "Hey Langa, I'm at Reki's house right now, I hope you have a good night, see you at school tomorrow!" you sent the message, before you knew it, reki took out his own phone and typed a message "Hey Langa, btw, i made y/n a new board, wanna video call to see it?".

You saw the message appear on the groupchat, and before you knew it, Langa already sent a videocall ask, you refused as Reki already turned on the video call and one was enough.

It seems the paint has dried already.

Reki picked the trucks and wheels you chose to put them and fix them on your board, you only noticed now but these also got colored in the process somehow, it gave your board a new type of look, you couldn't help but smile. When Reki was done, he took care of the grip tape, and when that was done aswell, he looked at you to present the final result while showing Langa through his phone the final result, and proud of himself, he asked, a big genuine smile on his face "Well! What do you think??" you clapped, genuinely amused. Langa praised Reki.

Reki grinned "I know, i'm the best when it comes to making boards —I helped painting the board too! —You sure are an artist y/n l/n."

Reki laughed, and you heard Langa laugh too. You were smiling, you didn't even know what time was it, you didn't really care about the time anymore, though you could notice dark circles under Reki's eyes, you didn't know if you had them too.

After a small moment of silence, Reki talked, in a low soft voice "Hey, y/n —Hm? —You're right, life isn't about just fun. you dropped your composure when he said this —What do you mean? —Life is about being happy, silly! He messed your hair up, leaving the screen on the desk and leaving Langa confused, he smiled you really are an idiot you know? he teased you, not actually meaning it —Hey! Atleast I care about my grades! You defended yourself, Reki grinned —You know, when it comes to school and grades, i'm not really worried, you build yourself a path towards the future by being happy and doing the things you like, don't you? —Well, it's true but… —So why torture yourself? You'll be just fine, a day of not doing homework won't kill you, hey, what makes you happy? —Being with you you blurted out and everyone else you added, Reki seemed a bit caught off guard, he scratched his head and blushed a bit, flattered, he spoke —Well then use your mind a bit more for us and less for school, I promise you you'll figure everything out at your own pace —Can I really? —Do I inspire you? he asked out of the blue, semi-hesitant, semi-confident —Reki! you nudged his shoulder and laughed —What? —Of course you inspire me! —But i'm not good at school and grades, I don't even care about school as much as you do. —Yes, but you're so passionate and good at what you do. I'm not even sure of what i want to do in the future. —All I did was enjoy what i enjoy. He paused and smiled brightly I love skating, the fun is infinite, it never ends!"

You heard Langa's confused voice through the phone, the lonely blue-haired teenage boy spoke "Y'know y/n, when it comes to school and work, i rather see you happy with average grades than stressed out and on edge with good grades, just like we found you were last year"

You felt a bit embarrassed and nervous, so you stared at Reki, internally begging for him to change the topic. He smiled, and said "it might not be easy, but hang in there, i promise everything will be okay, school won't pick your path for you, school will force you to pick a path, of course school is important, but a balance is important aswell, we can't have you so stressed out that you break down on one sheet of paper everytime, what kind of friends would we be if we let you alone to struggle like this? I don't think that would be very fair, you know. Life may not just be about fun, but sometimes it is. What's more important anyway is to be happy anyway isn't it?"

His confident and long monologue was interrupted by a big sneeze.

Oh, you had all that nasty stuff over your face, dear god.

Reki panicked and ran to grab some tissues, you tried not to laugh at the way he ran, welp, this was really worth not going to S for.

You stared at the phone on the desk and Langa saw your face and laughed as you picked the tissue Reki handed to you.

Through the phone, you heard Langa's voice "y/n, you know, I'm happy with you guys too —You better be." ~ You fell asleep in your sleeping bag, and the next morning, you both were completely sick. And you forgot to complete the homework you were supposed to turn in today. You still weren't even sure if it was an History sheet or a Maths one.

But did it really matter? You had so much fun yesterday, and you cheered up, sometimes it's cool to loosen up.

This is the type of memory you won't regret when you'll be at death's door. This is the type of memory that really matters.

Of course school did matter, but when it slowly kills you and you have no idea of what you want to do, what do you do? How do you balance personal life and school?

Life isn't just about fun sure,

It's about appreciating the moment that's happening right now. And right now, you didn't want to think about school.

Rather, you wanted to think about getting some meds, because you both were REALLY a sick mess.

And little did you know the papers you both left on the living room table didn't last long when Reki's siblings woke up.

Oops?

#sk8 the infinity x reader #sk8 x y/n #sk8 x you #sk8 x reader #sk8 the infinity #reki x reader #langa x reader #platonic fanfiction #sk8 reki #sk8 langa #sk8 anime #sk8 miya #sk8 cherry #sk8 joe #sk8 shadow

[clxja16]

The Little Sister

Gifs not mine

Charles Leclerc x Verstappen!Reader

Genre: max verstappen’s sister au!

Warnings: family death, smut, angst, lots of arguing, drama, orphan child

Word Count: 6K+

author’s note: I want to make it abundantly clear, I am in no way a jos apologist, that’s all.

Part two

——————————————

“It’s lights out and away we go,”

You watched them get away, each of the cars speed climbing. Your brother was in one of those cars, going around and around in circles. You always rooted for your brother, he is the reigning world champion. You sat next to your father in the paddock, watching the monitor of the race. Kelly was on the other side of you guys. But unbeknownst to them, there was another driver who had been occupying your mind. Whom you secretly rooted for under your breath. You watched as he and your brother drove side by side into the turns. You watched the red car closely. Almost cheering out loud when he passed your brother. Charles Leclerc, had you turning into a Ferrari fan instead of a Redbull fan.

-

Y/n L/n Verstappen, the baby of the Verstappen kids. However unlike Max and Victoria, you are not the biological child of Jos and Sophie. Just before your sixth birthday, your parents were on a flight to Singapore for business. The plane they were on, never made it to the airport. It has forever remained unclear what exactly happened, but they were presumed dead.

Your parents informally considered Jos and Sophie to be your godparents, so when they found out your parents were ‘dead.’ They immediately took you in, however the technicalities of it took a long time to sort out. And even though Jos and Sophie refused to blame you, you felt that you were the reason for the divorce.

When they did separate, you lived with Victoria, and Sophie. That was always mom, and sister to you. Max and Jos started to come around more again when you were in middle school, and Victoria was just starting to be a teenager. And although Jos, Sophie, Max and Victoria aren’t family, they never made you feel different. Jos and Sophie always treated you like one of their own children, and they are always going to be mom and dad to you. Max and Victoria were the same, you weren’t just a random orphan, but their sister. And they were your older siblings.

Based solely on how you guys act around each other, it seemed as if you guys were actual blood family.

-

After you graduated from high school, you began to stay with Max more. It started with just going to a few of his races, then you began to help out with his scheduling, then you began being his personal assistant. You schedule all of Max’s non Formula 1 commitments, as well as the F1 related ones, you handle his social media content, you do his training schedules, his flying times, you schedule his dates with Kelly. There is basically nothing that Max does, that you don’t know about. And since being his little sister, you also live with Max.

You can’t say you really mind though. You get to travel around the world and see new places all the time, you get pretty good pay, you don’t have to pay rent or utilities, you don’t pay for your traveling and you get random gifts every now and then. Like just the other month, Max had bought you a designer handbag, because he thought you’d enjoy it. So all in all, the arrangement you have, works out marvelously in your favor.

There is just one, teeny tiny downside to all of this. And that would be Max, he can sometimes be just a bit overwhelmingly protective. For example, at the end of last season there was a major party for Max being world Champion. Pierre was getting just a little too friendly that night, after having multiple rounds of drinks, which in turn made Max cut Pierre off for the rest of the night, and Max also gave you a ‘babysitter.’ To, in Max’s words, “shoo away all the bad guys.” Another time, just this season, you were with Max flying over to another race, and Max had invited Daniel Riccardo and Lando Norris for the plane ride. Max felt that Lando was being ‘overly flirty,’ that Max made Lando sit next to Daniel, instead of you, for the rest of the flight.

And just a few weeks back before the summer break, you were at a nightclub. You were drinking and dancing, granted dancing very provocatively, but safely nonetheless, and Max dragged you out the club and back home. You genuinely think that the reason you haven’t had a serious relationship is because of Max. But you know he means well, and he really hasn’t crossed the line. It is just frustrating sometimes. You still love your brother, and even with his over protectiveness, you still feel like you’re living your best life.

-

Then there was Charles, the Monegasque driver for Scuderia Ferrari, was someone you’ve only recently been more acquainted with. You have known Charles since before his time in Formula One, you have known Charles for about as long as Max has known Charles. But just like Max and Charles’ relationship, you guys didn’t see each other much outside of race weekends. Charles was never considered to be one of Max’s close friends, so Charles didn’t come around much, like Lando or Daniel.

It wasn’t until this year's Australian Grand Prix, did you start becoming closer to Charles. When the race ended on Sunday, Max went with Danny to go visit his family. You told Max that you were just gonna go get dinner Pierre, then head back to the hotel. Unbeknownst to you and Max, Pierre had more planned for the night.

You ended up like 4 shots deep in the middle of a club, celebrating Charles’ first grand slam. And the next morning, you woke up in Charles’ hotel room, with nothing but a bright red Ferrari shirt.

Since then you and Charles had started sneaking around, visiting each other’s hotel rooms during race weekend, casually bumping into each other to walk the paddock together. What started out as a little fun, turned to be something a lot more serious before your eyes. Before you even knew it, you were smiling at all of his text, dying to get home to tell him everything that happened in your day, silently hoping that he would pass Max on the track to win. Charles had completely taken over your mind.

-

You laid in Charles’ bed once again, “I have to go home,” you whispered ever so softly, for Charles to hear.

“You don’t have to,” Charles looked down at you in his arms, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear.

“I promised Max I would be home for dinner,” you began to wiggle your way out of Charles’ grasp. Charles let you go, his fingers running down your bare arms. You began to go around the room picking up the discarded clothing. After a second or so of watching you, Charles got out of bed, pulling on an abandoned pair of shorts.

“Mon chérie,” Charles spoke softly, “stay for the night.” Charles wrapped his arms around your waist from behind. Softly pressing light kisses down your neck.

“Maybe another night,” you offered, turning back around to face Charles.

“Fine,” Charles gave in, letting you go, but just before you could make it to the door, Charles pulled you back into his embrace. Pressing his lips against yours, “I’m gonna miss you,” he whispered against your lips.

“I won’t be gone long,” you smiled.

-

You sat at the dinner table with Max, Kelly, and Penelope. Kelly had cooked chicken parmigiana tonight. The meal was lovely, Penelope was telling everyone about her day.

“Y/n, where were you today?” Max asked, his question cutting clear across the table.

“Just out, had some lunch with friends, ran a few errands.” You answered as you cut the chicken, “did you need me today?”

“No,” Max answered, looking at you a little suspiciously.

“Maxie leave her alone, she's an adult now,” Kelly came to your defense. Kelly is the only person that you told about your situation with Charles, when she accidentally saw a very flirty text from Charles. Kelly knew exactly where you were this afternoon, and exactly who you were doing.

“I just wanted to know, that’s all.” Max huffed out stuffing another piece of chicken in his mouth.

You mouthed a ‘thank you’ to Kelly when Max wasn’t paying attention. To which she just smiled at you. After dinner you spent the rest of your night on the phone with Charles, being slightly careful not to speak too loudly for Max to hear.

-

Summer break was coming to end, and that means Max’s schedule was getting increasingly more busy, which in turn means your schedule was more busy now. Training hours, interviews, FIA meetings, drivers debriefing, Redbull strategy meetings, and many many more.

“What’s next?” Max asked, as you guys were finishing up another interview.

“You have training, then dinner with Checo and Horner.”

“Dinner? For what?”

“I’m not entirely sure, Horner just said that he needed to schedule a dinner with you and Checo as soon as possible,” you answered.

“What are you doing for the rest of tonight?” Max asked.

“I am gonna finish going through your emails, then finalize tomorrow’s schedule, and reconfirm with the airport about take off time for tomorrow’s flight. By the way, it's an afternoon flight, so we’re having dinner in Belgium. After I do all of that, then I might get dinner with a friend.” You finished off, “is that alright with you Father?” You asked in your most sarcastic tone.

“Haha very funny, I just wanna know what my baby sister is doing,” Max responded as the two of you made it to the car about to head home. Max dropped you off at home, before leaving for the gym.

You went inside and watched Max driving away before texting Kelly, and heading out to Charles’ place.

-

That night you sat on Charles’ bed, on your laptop going through Max's emails, just like you told Max you would.

“Mon Cherie,” Charles came up behind you, pressing those soft kisses to your neck that you loved, “what are you doing?”

“My job,” you quipped back.

“Shouldn’t Max be doing this himself?”

“I get paid to do this for him, the least I can do, is do it in a timely manner,” you responded.

“You’re supposed to be spending time with me, before you need to go back home.” Charles turned your face to look at him.

“Last email, I promise, and then I’m all yours,” you answered, turning back to your screen, to finish typing up your response. You heard Charles let out this most exaggerated sigh you could ever hear. You couldn’t help but giggle as you pressed send. “Okay, I’m done now. All yours.”

“Finally,” Charles said, as he pulled you into his arms.

After that, you and Charles just cuddled in bed while a movie played in the background and the two of you talked about your days. It was moments like these that made you question your entire situation, relationship, with Charles. You and Charles have been officially messing around since April, but it was now September. You guys were clearly more close than other friends with benefits, but Charles never once asked you to make it official. However, he wants you over his place all the time, he has a drawer for you at his place, he acts like he wants more, he just hasn’t said it.

You want to ask what you guys are, but at the same time, you were the one that said friends with benefits. Not to mention you’re the one that refuses to tell your brother about your situation with Charles. All in all you don’t have a right to judge or demand answers from Charles when you’re not entirely sure what you want. This was much easier when you didn’t hang around Charles’ place after fucking, or when you didn’t have a drawer at his place, or when Charles didn’t cook you meals just because, or when coming over meant literally one thing. Now things are just messy.

-

“Shit,” you woke up in Charles’ arms in a panic, your fairly loud cruse, causing Charles to wake as well.

“What?”

“I should’ve been home last night,” you began to gather your things, trying to rack your brain for an excuse to tell your brother.

Charles sighed loudly, “I don’t understand what the big deal is, if you just tell him y/n.”

You paused, not entirely sure why you’re so hesitant to tell Max about Charles, “it’ll be too awkward to tell Max, it’s just not a good idea.”

“So you enjoy having to do this, having to lie to your brother constantly y/n?” Charles asked, now standing in front of you.

“Charles, can we please not argue right now?” You wouldn’t say it in this moment, but Charles wasn’t the most important person to you right now. Reassuring Charles wasn’t important right now, getting back home was.

“I don’t wanna argue mon cherie,” Charles sighed, if there was anything Charles hated more than watching you leave, it was arguing with you, “but this is getting out of hand.”

“We’ll work something out, but I really need to go,” you pecked Charles’ cheek before walking out.

You raked your brain the entire ride home, trying to come up with any type of excuse that would satisfy Max. And when you finally got to the apartment, you noticed only Kelly was in the living room area. You took a breath of relief.

“Where the hell have you been?” Kelly whispered to you, “hurry up and get in your room before he gets out.”

“I’m sorry,” you whispered as you rushed into your bedroom, silently shutting the door behind you.

You changed into some pajamas, wiped off whatever leftover makeup you had on, and rolled around your bed to look like you slept in your own bed last night. When you felt satisfied with your cover up, did you hear your name being called loudly.

You walked out of your room, to see Max standing there, with Kelly by his side.

“What time did you get home last night?” Max asked, his arms crossed and his face stern.

“Why so serious, Maxie?” You asked with a playful smile, “I’m not really sure but it was late.” You answered as you walked past Max into the Kitchen for a cup of coffee.

You could hear Max sigh, “I just wanna make sure you’re being safe.” You don’t remember much from before your parents died, and the right after is mostly a blur, but there’s key moments that stand out. Like the first time you went back to school since the funeral, and almost all the other kids thought that a little girl with dead parents was the most hilarious thing to ever happen. Max found out that you were getting picked on, and decided to take matters into his own hands, he almost got expelled from school that day.

“I promise I’m being safe Max, I’m not a little kid anymore,” you turned back to look at your brother. He was always going above and beyond to protect you from the world. Not that you knew, but Max always felt that you had too much hurt in this lifetime already.

“You’re still my baby sister.”

-

That night after dinner, Max walked you to your hotel room, like he did for every race weekend. Luckily for you, Max wasn’t too focused on you, his mind already on Sunday. You watched him walk back down the hall, towards the elevators going back to his own room. As soon as you were satisfied, you texted Charles you’re room number.

You slipped out of the clothes you were wearing, deciding to jump into the shower before Charles came over. When you finished you dawned a lacy red lingerie set. Just as you finished, fixing your makeup to look done up for Charles you heard a knock on the door. Peeping through the peephole, to see Charles there standing, wearing a hoodie and a pair of shorts.

You hated when he dressed overly simple, but had your cheeks flushing. You hated that it didn’t take much from him to get you swooning. You hated that he had you wrapped around his finger, and you hated that he had done it effortlessly. You hated that he really pulled you without even trying.

You opened the door for Charles, wearing nothing but that exact lingerie set.

“Cherie, mon Cherie,” Charles started off taking all of you in, he then pulled at your waist, to bring you to him, looking up at you now, “you really are something else.”

“I hope a good something else,” you said, batting your lashes at Charles.

“The best, something else,” Charles answered, pressing his lips against yours. He walked towards the bed, pushing you along, while making out the entire time. When you felt the back of your knees hit the bed, you fell against it, now looking up at Charles.

His eyes, looking you up and down, as he pulled off his hoodie, while simultaneously sliding off his shorts. Leaving him in nothing but his boxers. He left kisses up your body, starting at your ankles. Going to your knees, then your hips, avoiding the place where you wanted him most. Kissing your waist, and stomach, carefully leaving kisses on each of your breasts. Going up to your collarbones, then your neck, and across your jaw. Passing your lips and going to your nose, each of your eye lids and your forehead lastly. The act started out very sensual, but ended up being charming.

You could feel the fire in your cheeks, and as you looked up at him with the most smitten smile your face had ever adorned. “You are so beautiful,” Charles whispered, almost like he was talking to himself.

Charles pulled you into another kiss, he was taking his time. Charles was not the most patient man on Earth. He often rushed into bed with you, but this time was very different. He was being gentle and slow, he was taking his time.

You felt his fingers slide into your panties. His touches felt light, almost like he wasn’t even touching you. He pulled your panties off, and instead of tossing them to the other side of the room, like he would normally do. He just slid it off you, and dropped it on the floor, not paying any attention to that, and keeping his eyes solely locked on you. His fingers found their way through your folds. Gently rubbing soft circles on your clit, as he placed soft kisses to the area.

Charles began slowly bringing you to your high, soft licks, gentle ease of his fingers sliding in and out. You tugged at his hair, trying your hardest not to move. Charles enjoyed forcing you to stay put, he enjoyed having to hold you down to bring you to your orgasm. He enjoyed it so much, that he had hoped you would buck your hips towards his face any moment now. However you showed great restraint in remaining still, so much restraint that he ought to be proud.

Charles slowly started to go faster, now pumping his fingers in and out of you at a steady pace. Bringing you to your orgasm faster than you initially realized. Charles then started kissing his way up to your lips. You lifted your leg to hook around Charles waist, as he deepened the kiss further.

“God, you’re beautiful,” Charles spoke softly against your lips.

“Charles,” was all you managed to whisper.

Charles continued to kiss you, as he pulled off his boxer, slipping inside of you. Your eyes went wide feeling the stretch, melting further into the bed and into the kiss. When Charles finally pulled away from the kiss, you felt so full, almost loopy in the head. He loved you like this, drunk on his cock.

“Cherie,” he called softly, he pulled your face to look at him. When you met his eyes, did he start to pull out, and slowly glide back in. He watched your face carefully with every movement he made. As he continued to move in and out, slowly.

Finally when you whispered a meek, “faster,” did he start to pick up the pace. Charles knew all the spots to hit that had you seeing stars. Again you repeated “faster,” not feeling completely satisfied. And you saw Charles smirk just a little, before going even faster.

He then grabbed your leg that was around his waist, moving your ankle to his shoulder. He pressed little kisses into your calf, as he continued to pound into you. You felt little tears roll down your cheeks, as the pleasure completely washed over you.

Charles loved the sight of you completely fucked out, as you came down from your high. He grabbed your phone that was tossed aside, as he wrapped his other hand around your throat. Your head tilted to the side a little, a love drunk smile on your face, with your post-orgasm eyes. It was this moment that Charles snapped a photo of.

You felt your eyelids get heavy, you almost fell asleep, until you felt Charles start to move again. That’s when you knew, only you came so far.

-

The next morning, you woke up in bed alone. Charles had written you a note that he left on the nightstand. It read;

Have to get back to my room, before getting down to the paddock. I’ll see you there, mon cherie.

Xoxo,

C. L.

P.s I hope you wear red for me today.

You couldn’t help but blush at the note that Charles left. You rolled out of bed and were heading to the shower, when you heard a knock on your door. Thinking Charles might have forgotten something, you went to the door, still with only the bed sheet wrapped around you. You looked through the peephole, just in case, to see Max on the other side. You thanked god, that you double checked before opening the door.

“One sec,” you shouted out, as you rushed to the closet, pulling on the complimentary robe. You threw the sheet back onto the bed, and pull on a pair of panties while simultaneously kicking your bra from last night under the bed.

You opened the door to your brother, “yes?” You asked, trying not to look somewhat normal.

“Did you just wake up?” Max asked, “you know what it doesn’t matter, we need to go, I’ll meet you in the lobby.”

“I’ll be down in like 20 minutes.”

“Just hurry up, I don’t want you arriving at the paddock by yourself.” Max said, as he was walking away already. You finally closed the door, and took a breath of relief. You quickly rinsed off in the shower, before finding an outfit to wear and doing some light makeup. You wore the standard Redbull shirt, but you wore a red scrunchie in your hair for Charles.

-

That night when free practice was over, Max stayed in the paddock with the team, working on the strategy for tomorrow’s qualifying and Sunday’s race. Charles was doing the same with his own team, that left you alone initially for the evening. Until Kelly found you, and told you to come along to dinner with some of the other WAGs of the paddock.

So now, you sat at dinner with Luisa, Lando’s girlfriend, Carmen, George’s girlfriend, Lily, Alex’s girlfriend, and Kelly. Dinner was going just fine, until Kelly asked, if you were seeing anybody new. Even though she fully knows your situation at the moment.

“I mean, it’s complicated at the moment,” you answered, gritting your teeth.

“Is it a driver?” Luisa asked,

“I don’t imagine Max being happy if it is a fellow driver,” Carmen adds in.

“Alex has his suspicions, as do I,” Lily said, eyeing you up and down.

“Does everyone know something I don’t?” You asked as you looked around at the girls.

“Y/n, have you not been paying attention to the gossip,” Luisa asked, almost shocked.

“What gossip?”

“Rumors are going around that, ‘reigning world champion, Max Verstappen’s baby sister, y/n Verstappen, is seeing a fellow F1 driver.’” Carmen quoted from an article that was recently posted online.

“Shut up, that’s not an actual article is it?” You asked slightly, panicked.

“It’s an article alright, so tell us is there someone you’re seeing that’s a driver?” Lily asked, you could see the smiles on all the girls. They truly meant no harm tonight, they just wanted to know what was going on. They wanted to know, because it was interesting, nothing more than that. If you were them, you would be doing the exact same thing.

You sighed a little, and giggled, “it’s complicated right now and I don’t even know how he feels about this, I can’t say anything.” There was no one to blame but yourself for being in this situation.

All the girls slightly groaned and laughed. They were very respectful about not pressuring you to give up a name, but they did want to know more. And you obliged, trying to tell them as much as possible without giving away Charles’ identity.

That night when you walked back to the room, just you and Kelly now. You looked over at Kelly, “heads up next time.”

“Y/n, come on now, we both know you’re more serious about Charles than you want to be. You need to tell Max already,” Kelly looked at you seriously.

“I know that but it’s not..”

“It’s not what, y/n?” Kelly cut you off, “you spend more time at Charles place than at home anymore, this has been going on since April. At first I thought this was only during race weekends, only a little fun, but every weekend, every opportunity you get, you’re with Charles.” Kelly took a breath, “I understand that you’re afraid of what Max is gonna think, but he knows something is going on.”

“What do you mean he knows?”

“He knows there’s someone new in your life, he doesn’t know it’s Charles, but he knows.” Kelly could see the gears in your head turning, unsure what to do anymore, “why are you so afraid of what Max thinks?”

“I don’t know,” Kelly looked at you, like she didn’t believe you, “I really don’t know. Max has always made it clear, to me and Victoria both, that we weren’t allowed to date his friends. I feel like I went against him.”

“He’s not gonna be as upset as you think, tell him soon.” Kelly left you with that last statement.

-

You despised having to tell Max anything. But you knew you needed to do it. You wanted to tell Max before you talked to Charles about what your guys' relationship is. However you knew that telling Max during a race weekend wasn’t exactly ideal, so you figured you tell him after Sunday.

Then Max won in Spa, and you couldn’t possibly ruin his win in Spa, by telling him about Charles. And you needed to be there for Charles, this return after summer break wasn’t exactly how he planned for it to go. You couldn’t make this time difficult for Charles by asking him to think about your relationship before preparing for Zandvoort.

Then it was race weekend again, and it’s just not good to tell Max when he has other things to focus on. And your mom and sister were here to watch the race too, you didn’t want to cause a family fight during an important race.

So you didn’t mention it, and as you worked in the Redbull hospitality room, Kelly came up to you, and you knew what she was gonna say.

“I thought…”

“I know,” you cut Kelly off, “I’m gonna tell Max, soon just after the race on Sunday.”

“You better do it soon y/n,” Kelly said, “I love you, and when I found out about you and Charles, I was so happy for you because you looked so happy, but this is insane already. You and Charles should be going on dates in public, should be posting pictures together, should be a normal couple by now.”

“I don’t…” you took a deep breath, “I don’t know if Charles even wants that.”

“Do you want it?”

“Honestly,” you smiled to yourself, thinking about you and Charles, “I do. I really like him.”

Kelly smiled, “Tell Max, so you can tell Charles already.”

-

Saturday night, just after qualifying, Charles was laying in your bed once again. He said he wanted to see you before tomorrow. Even though Charles was right next to you in the room, he was far beyond your reach.

“Where are you, Charles?” You asked, as you laid cuddle up next to him.

“I don’t think I’m gonna win it this year,” Charles said.

“The season isn’t over yet.”

“I don’t even know if the team wants me to win,” Charles sighed, “maybe I’m not meant to be champion.” One thing you loved about Charles, he always took responsibility for his actions. One thing you hated about Charles, he took responsibility for everything, even if it wasn’t his doing.

“You will fight again next season, and the season after that, you will be champion, one day,” you spoke truthfully. Everyone knew it, everyone knew that Charles has the talent to be world champion. Even Max knew it, one day Charles would be champion.

“You think so?” Charles looked at you and smiled.

“I know it,” you smiled back, looking into Charles' eyes. His eyes were so filled with love, it almost made you sick.

-

“I meant to do it, I really did, but I got distracted,” you spoke to Kelly.

“Y/n, there’s too many rumors going around. Max is going to find out one way or another. You need to be the one to tell him, if not it’s gonna make everything worse.” Kelly scolded you, and you knew she was right. “It was different when no one noticed, but everyone is catching on already.”

Now or never.

-

You meant to tell Max, you really did, you were gonna do it before dinner. Privately, but tonight nonetheless, the family was getting together to celebrate Max’s victory. Then Max got called into an emergency meeting by the FIA, along with all the other drivers. And you being the great little sister you are, was waiting for Max at the hotel, before going back to the family house for dinner.

However the meeting changed everything. While at the meeting, the drivers were waiting for the directors to show up, no one knew exactly why they were being called in tonight. Charles was sitting next to Lando and George talking about the race. That is when Charles got a text from you.

Your contact in Charles’ phone being, ‘mon cherie <3,’ this peaked Lando’s interest.

“Who’s that Charles?” Lando asked eyeing Charles up, while George looked just the same.

“Pierre,” George called over, knowing that if anyone knew anything about Charles’ love life, it was Pierre, “who is Charles seeing right now?”

“No one,” Pierre said confusedly, and at that moment, Lando snatched the phone out of Charles' hand running away. He then tossed it to Carlos.

“Who is it Charles?” Lando asked after the toss.

“No one you know,” Charles answered as he rushed towards Carlos.

Carlos tossed the phone to George, “who is who?”

“No one,” Charles ran across the room to George.

George then tried to glimpse at a photo in the message, but ultimately tossed it towards Pierre, who was standing in front of the door now, “come on mate tell us.”

Pierre got the phone, looking at the photo that was open, his face turning pale when he realized who it was, “mate, no,” was all Pierre could manage to say. However before Charles could snatch the phone out of Pierre’s hand, in walked Max and Daniel.

It didn’t take long for Max to notice, a half naked picture of you with Charles hand wrapped around your throat, on the screen. “Gasly…” Max started off.

Pierre interrupted, saying, “it’s Charles’ phone,” before tossing the phone to Charles.

“Why is my sister on your phone, Leclerc?” If cartoons were real, there would be steam coming out of Max’s ears.

“Mate, I can explain,” Charles started off, as he slid the phone back into his pocket.

“You’re fucking my baby sister?” Max’s voice boomed throughout the room, “she’s a damn child Charles.”

“Come on mate, she’s twenty, two, zero. Four years, four years between us, how is she a child?”

“I know you Charles, you’re not the type to settle down, what are you gonna do, leave her when the season gets too tough.”

“Excuse me, are you suggesting that I’m just gonna bail on her as soon as life gets difficult?”

“That’s what you did to Giada, and that’s what you did to Charlotte.”

“Mate, that’s unfair to throw that in my face, when you know that’s not what happened.” Charles stood his ground, so angry with you for putting him in this situation, angry with Lando, George and Pierre for causing this. Angry at Max for throwing his past relationships in his face like that.

“You’re using my sister, and when you’re done, you’re gonna break her heart.” Max took a step closer towards Charles, “and when you do, I’m gonna put you into the ground.” Max was also angry. Angry that you deliberately avoided telling him the truth. Angry that you decided Charles was the best person to mess around with. Angry that Charles didn’t man up and tell him when this started. Angry that you went behind his back to date a driver. Max was so angry that he threw whatever he could at Charles, even if it wasn’t fair.

-

You sat in your hotel room, waiting for Max’s call about the meeting being over and you guys could go home. Instead you got a call from Charles.

“Hey,” you answered sweetly, happy to hear Charles voice.

“Y/n,” Charles tone sounded sad, maybe tired, definitely not his normal.

“What’s wrong?”

“Max knows, he saw a picture on my phone.”

“What do you mean he saw a picture?” Your own tone started to get defensive, “Charles what the hell happened? I told you I would tell him and then you go ahead and start pulling stunts to let Max know.”

“Are you seriously suggesting that I did this on purpose y/n?” Charles’ own tone getting more defensive.

“How else did he see a picture on your phone unless you showed him?”

“If you would listen for a second, Pierre had my phone, it was weird circumstances. If you would’ve just told Max in the first place none of this would be a problem right now.”

“Are you trying to suggest that I’m at fault right now?” You asked, getting more defensive and riled up right now.

“You are at fault, you should’ve just told Max from the beginning.”

“And what’s your excuse? You had many opportunities to tell Max, I never told you to not say anything, you made that decision on your own.”

“I would’ve told him, but you said this was just sex.”

“You’re the one that made this more complicated than just sex Charles.”

“You could’ve ended it whenever it got too complicated for you y/n,” Charles sighed out. Both of you guys could see where this was going, even if that’s not what either you wanted.

“Fine, this, whatever it was, it’s done.”

“Fine,” Charles responded, before hanging up. You wanted to scream, to cry, to yell at the world, to rip your heart from your chest. You cursed yourself for being in this situation, for loving Charles, for not telling Max in the beginning, for being so scared.

Before you could do anything you wanted, you heard a knock at your door. You went to look through the peephole and there was Max, red in the face. You laughed a little at yourself for being stupid enough to be in this position. You opened the door, letting Max in.

“Charles, Charles Lecler. That’s who you chose to go after,” Max started off, his tone already angry.

“It’s not that big of a deal,” you responded more monotone than you expected.

“You deliberately lied to me multiple times. I have made it abundantly clear to you and Victoria, to not go after a fellow driver. And you completely disregarded that. Charles is just using you for sex and you think he loves you. You think he cares about you. You don’t matter to him, he’s gonna continue to use you until he’s had his fun and then he’s gonna leave you just like he did to all the girls before you,” Max said. His words laced with a stinging venom that you despised. He brought you to tears faster than you wanted to, and he made your blood boil for suggesting those things about Charles.

“I don’t understand why you care so much, this is my life and I ought to live it how I see fit.” Your tone was more cruel than Max’s, you had never been so angry in your life until this moment. “You continuously treat me like I am a child, it’s because of you that none of the boys in school asked me or Victoria out, it’s because of you that me and Victoria have never been in a serious relationship, it’s because of you. And your continuous act of being my father, when you’re not. You’re not even my real brother.”

As soon as the words left your mouth, you wanted to take them back. You wanted to rewind in time, and stop yourself from ever opening your mouth. You wanted to go back to before the meeting to tell Max before this all happened. You wanted to go back to when Kelly told you to tell Max. You wanted to go back to when Charles asked how much more lying. You wanted to go back to Australia, and stop yourself from taking that last shot.

“Max, I didn’t…”

“I see, if that’s how you feel.” Max spoke, as he walked out of the room.

Part two

#first #five #tags #don’t #work #charles leclerc smut #formula 1 #max verstappen #charles leclerc #charles leclerc imagines #formula 1 fanfic #formula 1 imagine #formula 1 smut #formula 1 au #formula 1 fluff #formula 1 angst

[directdogman]

Hey DogMan, random question but do you still like the Dsaf games and the fans keeping the series alive?

I wrote out 6 different incarnations of this answer and I had to delete them all because they either sounded more bitter than I was intending or sounded too optimistic to be honest. This is my best draft. I promise it ends on a very positive note, if it seems negative at first. Also, I know this is long, but this is very important for me to state. Just give it a chance.

The truth of the matter is: 

I work on Dialtown now. Statistically, almost everyone who plays DSaF does not try Dialtown out, which I know because I have access to both my GJ and Steam site-analytics. The reason why: because Dialtown is not Five Nights at Freddy's related, pretty simple. DSaF's success has literally nothing to do with any of the positive qualities of my own work: it's because it's a fangame of a very famous series that some big youtubers promoted years ago. That statement is true of most FNaF fangames and I’m 100% at peace with that fact. The series doesn't really need to be 'kept alive'. It gets hundreds of downloads a day (despite being over for years) and has every single day since I started DT development. I get nothing from DSaF. GJ doesn't even give me ad revenue anymore. I just host the games bc people would download them from dodgy sites and get viruses otherwise. It’s the right thing to do. There's DT ads all over the DSaF page, so, y’know, DSaF fans know where to find me. The fact they don't follow through shows that these fans aren’t interested in DT. They're uninterested because they know Dialtown isn’t another FNaF fangame, y'know? Therefore, it's a lil odd when I get questions about whether or not I'm happy whether or not the series is still alive because it doesn't have a whole lot to do with me, these people don't like my work, they like FNaF. These are Scott Cawthon's fans, not mine. I'm still very much attached to some of the characters I made, though telling DSaF fans that my original (non-FNaF related) DSaF characters appear in DT did not attract them to DT. I like the story I told in DSaF, but telling fans that DT's story has similar themes but is WAY better executed did not attract them to DT. DSaF's success is specifically and totally... just because it's a FNaF game on GJ that people have heard of and ultimately, the same thing largely happens to other game devs when they move on from making fangames. I’m not in any way unlucky in this aspect, this is very normal. It’s very important for me to say: I'm not a victim or anything, quite the opposite! Dialtown has done better than I ever thought it would as an independent product and it's really neat to say that DT achieved (mild) fandom status, even though the DSaF fandom broadly ignored it and most youtubers in my circles refused to touch it because it wasn't Five Nights at Freddy's related and therefore: easy clickbait. I have so many DT fans that never touched or even heard of DSaF, and that's really special to me. It shows that the game succeeded on its own merits, and that it isn't just riding on DSaF's or even FNaF’s coattails. I love the Dialtown fandom. The amount of fantastic fanart I get is astounding, just look at what I share here and on Twitter! I have intelligent, empathetic and very supportive fans and I couldn't be HAPPIER with my current fanbase! I even get MONEY for doing DT, which is such a really nice bonus. DSaF was just something I did for free, kinda... thanklessly. The fandom was honestly really hard to handle at times, very volatile and the amount of fucking crazy people that felt entitled to vast amounts of my time was just... ho boy. I never got paid a cent to deal with any of that (save for me having a lil Patreon tipjar during 3′s development which didn’t net me a whole lot either), I just... did it out of the kindness of my heart, and in the end, it seemed pretty unappreciated, seeing how that fanbase talks about me on other sites now. I’m not really sure how ostracizing a developer for content in a game that someone still follows/actively promotes, when the developer doesn’t stand by that content and has humbly apologized for it, but the game timelessly displays it forever makes a whole lot of sense, but hey, what do I know, right? I’m so so glad to say: I've never had to delete DT fanfics that display minors in NSFW situations! Not as much for DSaF. I've never received a graphic (or any sort of) death-threat from a Dialtown fan. Ditto. When I mess up, my fandom helps me correct my errors and improve myself without insisting I intentionally did something wrong as soon as they have a possible argument to make. I remember when I launched DSaF 3 and one of my artists included a very commonly used word (big internet meme at the time) that I found out was offensive later. Some DSaF fans instantly made out that I’d intentionally said something offensive and wanted to go scorched earth without even approaching me to ask first. Being seen as a human by my fanbase is so so important to me and I’m really happy to learn from and acknowledge my mistakes if people are willing to let me do so. I’m a human and I’m always up for learning how to be a better one. I don’t want to do anyone intentional harm, so if you ever see stuff in my writing that can be more sensitive to delicate social issues/marginalized groups, please (politely) let me know. I love-love-love my current fanbase, no other way to put it. So, this isn't a sad story, but a happy one. There's content in DSaF that I outright HATE now, and DT is entirely free of it! DSaF had some ignorant (not intentionally hurtful, mind you) jokes in it (being a meme game from the last decade), and DT is free of that content as I've now learned better. I'm happy with how things have turned out. Of course, I get that not everyone can move on from things, people on the internet like conflict, they like ostracizing others and taking other people down a peg. It’s not really about about protecting anyone or anything like that, more so just angry people wanting to bully others but wanting to phrase it like they’re doing a good deed because they can’t bear to be spoken to the way they speak to others. So, they exclusively target people they can blame for saying something ignorant in the past and will go digging for something to throw at a person they want to see others target, often finding quotes from times when people were en-masse way less socially conscious and before someone’s views evolved. It’s different being a public figure on the internet because your social evolution is public and locked in time. To become more socially aware/sensitive, you have to first have been less socially aware and finding someone that is openly and very supportive towards marginalized groups said something ignorant without realizing that they’ve apologized + corrected isn’t really as big a thing as people think it is. Likewise: Telling someone to kill themselves, no matter what they’ve done, does not make the world a better place under any circumstances and if anyone tells you otherwise, they are not looking out for your best interests. We live in a very radical and angry age where people are looking for someone to blame for how bad things have gotten. Be kind. The world needs it. But to circle back, DSaF is not a part of my life anymore and while the idea of going back to it one day and 'fixing' it (even still now!) is very appealing because it was my first big thing that people played and it’d be cool to do it again, but better and show off my new skills: my main priority right now are my loyal DT fans, who don't just follow my work because it's popular, but because they genuinely like it. They like my characters, my stories, it's not just a FNaF thing. I'm so, SO grateful for my current fanbase, y'all have no idea, and if you’re a DT fan reading this, remember: that includes YOU. I really hope this helped clarify my exact position on things. I'm very very okay with how things have turned out, don’t get me wrong. I simply couldn't ask for a cooler fandom and better friends than I have now and I don’t wanna go back to how things were before.

#dsaf #dayshift at freddy's #dialtown

[buckys-little-belle]

Hey could I request a Steve Harrington x shy little reader? Like the reader doesn’t even know they are a little until Steve explains and they get even more shy but Steve explains everything and comforts them? And Steve tells Robin since she is the only other person you are comfortable with so she can be Auntie Robin!!

Family Video

Steve Harrington x Little!Reader (They/Them pronouns) (Side Aunty!Robin x Little!Reader)

Warnings: Reader has a bumped head, reader cried a bit, reader does not know they are a little

Notes: I combined these two asks just because they seemed to work together? I don’t know, I took some creative liberty but I like it, and I hope you all do too! (I do think that I have another idea for the head bump one but I thought I would add it in here incase I don’t end up using it!)

SFW : Please keep all interactions with this post and with this blog SFW

- - - - - -

“Look.” Robin said, pointing to Y/n a consistent customer of the family video. “Wonder what kids movie they’ll pick this time.” She laughed, not in a rude way, truly just confused.

“Maybe they have a younger sibling!” Steve reasoned, stacking a few movies at the counter. “Or a cousin, who knows.”

“We both know they don’t have a sibling.” Robin responded, all three of them had gone to school together, Robin and Y/n still attending a few classes together.

“Okay …” Steve said, wracking his brain for a reason. “Maybe they just like them?” Steve shrugged his shoulders, looking at Y/n as they roamed the “children and family” movie section.

“Which I get.” Robin sighed as she pulled up Y/n’s renting records. “But they only take out children’s movies, do they not get bored of the pretty shapes and colours and no plot?”

Steve sighed, he really didn’t know how to approach the situation, Y/n was extremely intellectual, knew how to have conversations, did well in school, was very interested in so many different things, and yet they never got movies that were anything like their interests, or movies that related to them in anyway. “I guess not.” He mumbled.

- - - - - -

“Robin!” Steve yelled out, entering the store 10 minutes late for his shift.

“You’re late Steve! I had to handle weird Mitch all by myself!” Robin yelled back, mad at how Steve was so obnoxiously late.

“Oh stop, he’s like 80.” Steve sighed, out of breath, placing a notebook onto the counter. Looking more like a customer than an employee.

“Old people can be creepy to Steve.” Robin reasoned.

“Okay, okay.” Steve breathed, opening the notebook to a random page, the page covered in messy and almost illegible handwriting. “I’ve figured it out.”

“Figured what out?” Robin asked. “You haven’t taken notes in years. What could you possibly be writing down.” She chucked, amused by his seemingly concentrated yet exhausted state.

“Y/n.” Steve smiled.

“Y/n?”

“Yes, you know, ‘why do they only watch kids movies’!” Robin nodded, interested in if Steve had any real information. “Well I went to see Eddie.”

“Eddie, as in ‘Eddie the freak Munson’?” Robin asked, now extremely confused as to what Steve is up to.

“Yes, you remember him and … I can’t remember her name, but she always seemed to act like a kid around Munson?” Steve asked, awaiting an answer.

“Um, kind of.” Robin responded.

“She was like top of the class but when you saw her at lunch she would be colouring and drinking a juice box, laughing at Munson like he was actually funny.” Steve explained, throwing on his work vest, fixing a few of the buttons.

“Yah I remember that, but what does that have to do with Y/n?” Robin asked, beginning to loose interest in the conversation.

“Well I asked him why she acted like that, like a kid.” Steve said, his eyes moving all along the notebook and the messy words it held. “He said it’s ‘age regression’, you regress back to a childlike state, some people use it to heal their inner child, some do it for fun, often it’s a coping mechanism for stress.” Steve flipped the page. “I think Y/n might be a regressor, Eddie says speech also changed, as in ‘littles’ will talk like they did as a kid.”

“Like when Y/n babbled to us.” Robin offered. “Her speech sort of slurred.”

“Exactly!” Steve cheered. “I was confused at first, they seem put together and their life also seems fine.” Steve mentioned. “But their mom lost her job last year and I bet the weight of that has fallen on their shoulders. I mean I don’t know, I think they probably don’t even know what their doing. Which could be scary, I mean in a child like state it’s not like they can take care of themself, I just worry …”

“Steve?” Robin interrupted, “Just talk to them!”

“But what if they …”

“Steve if you are worried about their safety you need to say something.” Robin looked at him with a knowing look. “It is quite genuinely your responsibility now.”

Before Steve could even argue Y/n walked into the store, their most recent rented movie in their hands. “Hi Y/n!” Robin called out, making Y/n look over at the two workers.

When they did turn their face was in full view, a few tears rolling down their face as they faintly smiled. “Hi.” They whispered, trying their best not to cry.

Y/n ignored Robin and Steve’s concerned looks, instead walking towards the children’s movies once again. When they turned the reason for their tears was on full display, a small cut on the side of their forehead, a bit of dried blood surrounding it. “Y/n?” Steve called out, his voice shaken.

Y/n peaked around the corner, standing closer to the main counter. “You have a little cut.” Steve said, crouching slightly to really look at the full wound. “Looks pretty bad, can we clean it up for you?” He asked, looking back at Robin who gave a friendly smirk.

“‘m sure.” Y/n answered, Steve patting the counter in a gesture to hop up, a small stool placed at the edge to make it easier to climb up. “‘s it gonna hurt?” Y/n whispered, their bag and movie sat next to them on the counter.

Robin answered. “It might sting a bit, but it will only be for a second.”

Steve stood in front of Y/n, a first aid kit now at their side, along with Steves hands, caging them in, keeping them safe from falling off.

“Ready?” Steve whispered. Y/n nodded, not totally ready, but Steve and his soothing demeanour helped calm their nerves. “Okay, this may sting a bit, It’s just some water to clean the scratch okay?” He said, waiting for any confirmation that Y/n was okay with his actions.

“‘m’kay.” They whispered, just loud enough for Steve to hear them. He gently dabbed the scratch, making sure to be careful, just doing what was needed, then putting a bandaid over the scratch, rubbing his thumbs lightly over their head, checking for a bump.

“I think you’re all good.” He smiled, Y/n patting him on the shoulder as a gesture to say ‘thank you’. Robin smiled at Steve, he seemed so in his element, so purely happy to be needed, so happy to be helping someone. “Y/n?” Steve asked, getting their attention once again. “Do you know why you get all small?” He asked, Y/n immediately heating up and trying to shrink in size.

“‘m not small, ‘m big, ‘m fine.” They said defensively, worried about what Steve’s intentions were.

“It’s okay if you feel small. I’m not making fun of you, it’s okay to feel small.” He reassured, his hand on their shoulder, making eye contact whenever Y/n would allow their eyes to wander his way. “I just worry about you is all, this scratch is scary!” He cautioned, hoping they would grasp his true worry.

“‘m sorry, ‘s nofin really.” They insisted, their eyes finally meeting Steve’s.

“How about you come here when you feel small?” Steve suggested. “We have a tv in the back, you could watch anyyyy movie you want, but I could at least make sure you’re safe.” He pointed to the back break room, Y/n’s soon to be haven.

“And at school if you ever need anything you can come to me.” Robin offered, her head tilted to the side, hoping her openness and willingness to help could help ease Y/n’s worries.

“Really?” Y/n asked, confused by, but welcoming, the generosity.

“Of course.” Steve said, a big smile on his face as he grabbed the long discarded movie Y/n had brought in, checking it through the system and placing it in the ‘to sort’ pile. “Why don’t you grab a movie now?” He asked, gesturing to the entire store.

“Help me down please?” Y/n asked, holding their hand out for Steve to grab.

Steve easily obliged, helping Y/n find the stool and balance when on the ground. “They already have manners.” Steve cooed to Robin, watching Y/n wander to their favourite section, a content look on their face.

“Told you so.” Robin laughed. “And you weren’t gonna talk to them.

Before Steve could argue he heard Y/n call his name.

“Coming!” He yelled back, giving Robin a cold look but happily making his way over to Y/n, the newest addition to family video.

#steve harrington #steve harrington x gender neutral reader #steve harrington x reader #steve x little reader #steve x little!reader #steve harrington x little reader #steve harrington x little!reader #stranger things age regression

[fairytale-poll]

MOD'S CHOICE POLL

Mod's own propaganda under the cut:

Sasha as Red Riding Hood:

During submissions, I became so absolutely excited when I saw this pop up. I don't know who decided to submit it, but they unlocked some childhood memories for me. Back when I was a child, my family visited Pakistan (my parent's country of origin) for the entire summer. One day I, bored, asked for some movies to watched and my parents and uncle brought back some clearly bootlegged DVDs dubbed in Hindi/Urdu, and Bratz Kids Fairy Tales was one of them. I watched it so many times, you have no idea- I think that I might have wrecked the whole DVD with how much I watched it. (A similar thing happened later on when I obtained a clearly bootlegged copy of Bratz Fashion Pixie too but that's another, non-Red Riding Hood related story.) I wasn't surprised that it was eliminated right off the bat, but my childhood nostalgia dictated I put it here, or else I would be betraying the 7-year-old in me.

Shang, Tao, and Paotze:

Another childhood favorite of mine. This picture book has such beautiful art and I remember being very surprised by the story as a child. I found a PDF of it online to reread when the contest started and honestly it still holds up. The three sisters that are the Red Riding Hood in the story I feel are genuinely very clever. And for nothing else, look this one up solely for it's beautiful art which is just breath-taking whether you're a child or an adult!

Lamb:

Not going to lie I never played this game. My good friend who I adore submitted this to the poll and it immediately got eliminated and I just felt bad lol. But it does look cool & I trust their taste so I do think that this game is great. I want to play it but I am really bad at getting myself to play games.

Aku:

Samurai Jack is a CLASSIC and I dare you to not watch this clip and crack up. Mako was a gift of voice acting and I miss him so much. Also this episode is just pretty amusing.

Amy Lee:

My sister was actually the one to submit this and I will use her own propaganda here: "Evanescence was a voice of a generation." Honestly this song is kind of just okay, there are better Evanescence songs, but got to respect the effort they put into the music video. Who can resist to choose Amy Lee anyway?

The Path sisters:

Like many people who know this game, I know it through Izzzyzzz's two video essays on it. I didn't play the game afterwards, but I did watch some play-throughs since I don't play many games + it seemed mostly like a walking simulator anyway so I felt like I got the same effect. It is AMAZING and has so much story and analysis and I love shit like that... In particular, Scarlet, Ruby, and Rose are my favorites whose stories really resonated with me, even if I haven't exactly gone through their life experiences. Ginger too. And there's some really horrific imagery in Robin's...I would recommend everyone find a way to experience this game-- whether that's playing it, watching Izzzyzzz's videos, or finding a walk-through/analysis of it, it's worth it!

Lisette:

So this manga is sort of obscure but it is also sort of nostalgic to me. Well, nostalgic by proxy. My sister read it when I was younger and told me some details about it and for some reason it stuck with me. Like??? For no reason. It's not even that good lmao. The first chapter right off the bat is pretty edgy & handles sensitive topics very badly. But goddamn if I do not think about random elements of the story for no reason. I don't really remember shit about Lisette but hey this picture of her looks really cool.

Red:

If you notice a theme among these being "nostalgia" you would be right, as this was another nostalgic offering from my childhood that I would watch semi-annually. I was also fond of the sequel, though I thought it felt like a different series than the first one. (Which isn't unusual with animated sequels to popular movies, but the fact that the sequel was set-up by the ending of the first one implies it was planned? Weird). But anyway Red is iconic and funny and voiced by Anne Hathaway and also her sad emo song "Red is Blue" sometimes still gets stuck in my head, so take that as you will.

Chacha:

I know absolutely nothing about this series. But it looks very cute so I like it. I love cute magical girls they deserve the world. Also I looked it up and apparently the Studio who did the Akazukin Chacha anime would later do the Yu-Gi-Oh animes from the 2000s and 2010s, so there's the obligatory mention of nostalgia.

#red riding poll #mod's choice #sasha #bratz kids #shang tao and paotze #lon po po #lamb #little lamb #aku #samurai jack #amy lee #evanescence #call me when you're sober #the path #scarlet #carmen #ruby #ginger #rose #robin #lisette #ludwig revolution #red puckett #hoodwinked #hoodwinked too: hood vs evil #chacha #akazukin chacha #red riding hood #little red riding hood #poll tournament

[drawingducktalesducks]

Violet: Webbigail! We require assistance!

Webby: Violet!

Violet: My sister seems to be malfunctioning- she woke up this morning- MORNING. Not afternoon- And she shrieked, and has been staring into space ever since. Do you have any idea what-

Webby: VI WHAT DID YOU DO?!

Violet: I- What?

Webby: I SWEAR if you’ve snuck another piece of cursed junk home when I wasn’t looking, I'm gonna- HRrrk!

Violet: Webbigail does not refer to me as “Vi”. Only Lena does that.

Violet: You… are an imposter.  

Webby: I’m awake at stupid seven in the stupid morning, is what I am! Let go!

Violet: …… Lena?

Webby: Now she gets it!  

Webby: Webby- Webby, c’mon. It’s weird I know, but we really need your nerd brain and Scrooge-specific trivia, okay?

Lena: eeeeeeee

Webby: Webby?

Lena: aaaaaAAAAAAAAA-

Webby: Pink! Snap out of it!

Violet: Try hugging her.

Webby: And like, what, that’ll swap us back?

Violet: Unlikely, but the shock of being taller than you may restart her systems-

Lena: OH MY GOSH I’M THE TALL ONE NOW???

Violet: -and I am proven correct again, as usual.

Webby: oh I hate this

Lena: Lena! I KNOW I WOKE UP IN YOUR ROOM BUT I DIDN’T READ YOUR DIARY THIS TIME I PROMISE!

Webby: I’m a little more freaked by you being in my BODY, Pink, but great! Thanks!

Webby: wait. this time?

Lena: Yes! Your poetry is LOVELY by the way and I’m definitely not counting the days until you show it to me so I can bask in it during a non-shadow war emergency situation!

Webby: You’ve read my-

Violet: Webbigail, we need to read your journal.

Lena: Okay! Turn around is fair play!

Violet: We are not looking for embarrassing content equal to that of my sister’s poems, which would be hard to come by in any case-

Webby: Hey!

Violet: -instead, we must discover what magical artifacts you have handled recently, as that is the most likely source of my building headache.

Lena: Oh! Headache? I thought it was the mutual possession that was the problem?  

Violet: Why do you suppose I have a headache.

Webby: Webby- which poems did you read?

Lena: A pretty one!

Webby: Yeah right but, was it just evil? Or-

Lena: Evil!

Webby: -oh thank duck

Violet: Then you are missing out. Her flowery word choice and dramatic flair are far better utilized when waxing poetic about-

Webby: Don't you dare-

Lena: The cursed crystal of contrived circumstance!

Webby: ...wow, that’s convenient    

Violet: Quite.

Lena: No no the runes said “contrived” not “convenient”- It’s something we found on yesterday’s adventure!

Lena: Scrooge thought it might let him pick up random lucky finds of money, like Gladstone does. Only we couldn’t get it to work! It’s still really pretty though, so he let me carry it back home, and keep it on my nightstand…

Violet: And during that time, did you say or think anything relating to exchanging bodies with Lena?

Lena: No!

Lena: We-ll, not her body, anyway.

Webby: You mean we’ve swapped brains?

Lena: I mean I, I was missing you a teensy tiny bit while on the adventure! So I maybe might have been thinking about you… and, wondering about you… and maybe wishing I could know what you’re feeling…

Violet: On which topic?

Lena: CLASSIFIED.

Webby: That's sweet, but you know you can always just ask me how I’m feeling.

Lena: Uh huh, right.

Lena: I mean sure, when you felt like you were morphing into your evil aunt who enslaved and traumatized you for fifteen years, the only words to come out of your mouth were a happy anniversary song to me.

Lena: But yes. Feelings talks. Mm-hmm. Yep. Definitely!

Webby: ..Okay fine, so i'd rather die than talk about feelings. Sue me.

Violet: If I thought doing so would get you into therapy, I assuredly would.

Lena: AND I'D BLACKMAIL THE BEST LAWERS TO... keep you.. out of therapy?

Webby: Aw Pink, you really do care.

Lena: Wait no- I mean yes obviously, but- therapy good- only, hmm, well, if you didn't WANT to go then I guess would still blackmail the lawyers-

Webby: You're so cute

Lena: Um- oh, uh- your welcome! No no, thanks!! NO NOT NO THANKS JUST THANKS NOT WELCOME!!!

Webby: Webby

Lena: YOUR WELCOME TO CALL ME CUTE why am I still talking-!?

Webby: Webby breathe, it's okay. I get it

Lena: oh thank goodness

Violet: Indeed. And now so do I.

Lena: You do?

Violet: Regarding feelings and the point of willingly sharing them, the key process to reversing this situation and easing my cranial spasms has finally become clear.  

Lena: It has???

Webby: why are you smirking, Vi.

Violet: I smirk because… Webbigail. You must read Lena’s poems about you.

Webby: SHE WHAT

Lena: HER POEMS ABOUT WHAT???

Webby: No! Nuh-uh! That is SO not happening!

Violet: Then enjoy being shorter than her forever, for I wash my hands of this absurdity.

Webby: No no no no, there’s gotta be another way- VI! Vi get back here and help!

Violet: I have done all that I can…

Webby: HAVE YOU?

Violet: No. But this is more amusing. Farewell.

Webby: VIOLET!

Lena: Lena?

Webby: Y-yeah?  

Lena: Is that true? You… you’ve written actual literal poems about… um…

Lena: … me?

Webby:

Webby:

Webby: So me being the short one. That’s a thing, huh? We could totally get used to this.

#Ducktales (2017) #Violet Sabrewing #Webby Vanderquack #Lena #Weblena #Sabrewing Sisters #incorrect quotes

[thedeliverygod]

Thoughts on recent chapters

I feel like it's been a while since I've made a longer post and I've just sort of shouted about a few random things here and there and I slept most of this afternoon so I have energy to spare lol

Firstly we start with... that. Hiyori. Where do we go from here?

A lot of people have looked into this and I pretty much agree with most takes.

Yato makes her his shinki. But it comes with a bag of questions now that we know a gods greatest secret is survivable per Nana and Kazuma (Yukine & Nora I consider outliers because they have names given by the koto no ha which sort of seals off their ayakashi devolving process--though I do think at this point even if the name Hagusa were removed Yukine would be fine. Nora it's a bit harder to speculate because this has always been her situation). Hiyori is known to multiple gods and shinki throughout heaven. Her very existence makes the gods greatest secret a giant problem unless Yato keeps her away from, well, pretty much everyone except gods and the shinki listed above. Because there's no standard way to know for sure if a shinki will be able to handle to knowledge; because it *is* survivable doesn't mean they will survive it.

Deification. If Tenjin can be deified because he has anger issues then Hiyori can be deified too for better reasons. Honestly. I don't know what it would take to make this happen but @pentamerous brought up the fact about her and Yato's emas being tied and blessed by Okuninushi so idk if that could be factored into this equation maybe?

The "bad" ending-- Hiyori is just dead and no far shore methods are used to 'revive' her. In this scenario I see Grandma Iki being fucking pisseddddd that Hiyori died literally a few days after her and being like wtf are you doing here??? lol. But that's just me and my comedic relief speaking.

Hiyori isn't actually dead because everything in Father's "new world" is an illusion.

The 4th option is tricky but I believe it holds validity. I made a post a while back I think Father's new world sort of strips everyone down to how they view them selves/their deepest insecurities/their most basic form if that makes sense. At least that's theory 1.

This is why Yato is a child (he often views himself as a child in his most insecure moments, relating back to the awful crimes he committed as a kid, but also for emotionally insecure moments such as realizing other humans would be the ones to 'truly' save Hiyori after the hospital incident.) This is why Nora is in her sort of 'snake' form that she hates.

Yukine is an outlier though which I've brought up before. Clearly he's an ayakashi wolf but why is he suddenly a wolf? In his 2 ablutions and and before he was named by Father, he was transforming into a sort of bat/bird type of ayakashi. While he was battling with Yato under his name of Hagusa, however, he did sort of start a wolf transformation and we all made cat boy jokes until his wolf form appeared more recently.

Theory 2 is that literally everything in this "new world" of Father's is under his control and all the visuals are to match. Which sort of matches to what he says despite the fact he says he can't totally make it "bend to his will". He sees Yato as the child he can manipulate. He sees Nora as the ayakashi girl he 'saved' but has outgrown his use for. Yukine he also saw as another one of his tools, much like the wolf ayakashi Father seems to favor, so maybe that's where the wolf form came from? Though that doesn't quite explain the partial transformation before but -shrug-. Of course he wants to see Kaya and he *does* but she's a mangled yomi version of herself, aka not what he wants. But she's long dead.

As Yato is talking with Father about Kaya and sort of trying to understand/reason with him, Father transitions into hinting towards talking about Hiyori. "Who do you see Izanami as?" and then mentions that she's somehow there and that he should be "happy to get to see her. However, as this is happening, Father is sort of manipulating a wave of water which is what reveals Hiyori and the Sakura tree she's under.

The question is, is she really there? Is he able to use her image accurately because she's still alive if it is an illusion? If it's not an illusion, is there some sort of rules that can be broken/amended in terms of bringing Hiyori back to life without pissing off Amaterasu/Heaven? After all, Father's "new world" is not exactly yomi, heaven, or Earth. And we know Father has basically broken all of heaven's rules to begin with.

Lastly, we have the topic of Yato's reaction. We were teased with his aramitama when Yukine was in the box. Now Hiyori is "dead" and Yukine is half dissolved into the ground. I think it's only fair father has the 'monster' he created turned back on him tbh but I also don't want Yukine to see Yato acting like a demon for lack of better words since they just made up and the poor kid is traumatized enough.

bonus question: where the fuck is Bishamon because her twin pistol shinki (Kazuha and Karuha) are fighting the weird ayakashi in the most recent chapter with the god squad and their shinki???

and she specifically only had Kuraha and Kinuha when she was calling out for Kazuma and reunited with him. And it's weird for her youngest shinki to just be by themselves????? the only reasoning I can think of is Amaterasu literally summoned all the damn shinki from heaven when it was raining shinki in the earlier chapter but maybe Bishamon will literally be on the next page or so in the 2nd part of the chapter and it will make sense given that context.

#noragami #noragami spoilers

[ryuichirou]

Replies

Also shorter ones today… mostly related to our previous replies and posts!

Anonymous asked:

After seeing Eel Floyd with Riddle

AND THOSE BITE MARKS 👀👀👀👀

I gotta know -

Did Floyd slip and slide in Riddle?

Or

Also

Did Riddle magically goldfish form and the two had merman sex???

Honestly I wasn’t thinking about Riddle also becoming a merman, but they absolutely have to have merman sex at some point, otherwise it just isn’t fair (to me) lol

And to answer your first question, yes, there might have been some slipping and sliding in Riddle involved~

Anonymous asked:

re: the gaslighting Jade ask. I randomly stumbled on your blog from other ones, and I literally blocked you because shroudcest triggers me. Ultimately, we are responsible for our own safety. As long as it’s properly marked for (which yours clearly is since I blocked you the second I made a tumblr), really all we can do is filter the things that hurt us out.

(im agreeing with you btw. draw what you want i cant stop you. just feel like i in particular make a point worth mentioning from seeing that. you can answer this or not bc obviously i probably wont see it anyway)

Anon! Whether you see this reply or not, thank you very much for writing this despite having us blocked lol

You really are making a good point, and I am glad that you are taking care of yourself and avoiding uncomfortable stuff. I really encourage it. Thank you for understanding and for approaching this issue with respect.

Have a good day.

Anonymous asked:

Gaslighting IS Jade’s love language. Also mushrooms.

Facts, Anon <3 He doesn’t waste his gaslighting and mushrooms on those he doesn’t find entertaining love!

Anonymous asked:

Honestly I can totally see Cater as the kind of guy that now and then buys a random manga just because the cover looks aesthetically pleasing, although if they are BL they are probably more oriented towards shonen-ai than explicit content. But also he wouldn't really read them because he finds the stories and characters a bit ridiculous (is he a bitter anti-romantic? or maybe his sisters used to collect shojo manga and he associates the love story genre with them?). I bet when he had roommates he had fun leaving one of his manga lying around, just to see people's reaction and go "aw, shoot, you saw it? that's sooo embarassing..." or something like that

To be honest, I can see that too. Cater seems like someone who isn’t all that into anime and manga, but is aware of it enough to recognise that the cover is pretty and that there is something gay inside (he might figure out the latter thing later as he looks inside the book lol). His sisters really could be into it though, so I can see him having certain associations.

lol Cater’s roommates “finding” his manga though… Don’t act so coy, Cater 😭

Anonymous asked:

Goddammit! Idia, you cannot escape me for long, one way or another, your chest will be licked! *shakes fist at the sky*

I love how this is turning into a Looney Tunes cartoon…

Anonymous asked:

Idia doesn’t have nipples. He accidentally shaved them off. Tragic 😔 L in the chat for his nipples.

Damn. I’m afraid I have bad news for the previous Anon.

Anonymous asked:

Do you have any HCs for Neige and/or Chenya?

We do have HCs about Neige/Vil and Chenya/Riddle (1,2)!

Anonymous asked:

It is I, 🐩 anon,

So I got a friend into twst and tell me why her favorite character is goddamn Crowley? I'm currently trying to convert her to Divus supremacy. Enough about this. Let me ask my silly little question.

Is there anything about TWST's story plot that you dislike or wished it was worked on more? Or character you wish were more fleshed out? 

Your friend has quite the taste… She is probably a genius of sorts 😔🙏

I feel like I was pretty vocal about it, so I am sorry for talking about it again, but I really didn’t enjoy how Ch2 was handled and Leona in general, to be honest. I wrote a post about my grievances a whole year ago, but my stance didn’t really change. We’ve rewatched the majority of the main story since then, and I thought that maybe with fresh minds and fresh eyes we would enjoy Leona at least to some degree, but unfortunately it didn’t really help. The events don’t really help either…

There might be some other things, but this is the one I think about every time when we talk about the flaws of TWST writing.

Anonymous asked:

what is your notp?

A bunch of Leona ships come to mind, i.e. Leona/Malleus, Leona/Vil, Leona/Idia 🤔 But also a bunch of Trey ships, like Trey/Jade or Rook/Trey…

Anonymous asked:

if you had to go on a date with one of the twst boys who are you picking? i'm picking idia

Idia is a great option, Anon; he would be so uncomfortable and awkward, getting nervous about the smallest inconveniences and whispering “thank god” every time you don’t force him to do something… I would pick him to, but my second option would be Jamil. I think he’s pretty chill.

Katsu would've picked Jade because of course, this is the best pick.

Anonymous asked:

any old fandoms that you feel out of love with?

Can’t think of any, Anon… I feel like we never fall completely out of love with anything, just move on, but there is always an opportunity that we’ll come back at some point. Things like Homestuck are still on our minds constantly lol

There are some titles that we kind of started watching, but then stopped because it wasn’t fully out yet, and since then we kind of lost interest for this thing. And with some of these titles it’s very unlikely that we’ll ever go back, but it’s never 1000% impossible. But then again, it’s not like we loved these titles…

Anonymous asked:

Funfact: The crowley that crowley is named after used to perform sex based magic with men

Damn I hope this is what our Crowley also does. This is his dark secret that is very poorly hidden

Anonymous asked:

I think Riddle would be a really good teacher's pet

Oh he would <3 He is a teacher’s pet.

Ironically, I feel like this makes him a bit boring for Crewel…although it depends…🤔

Anonymous asked:

What is a ship you rarely draw but you love

I don’t draw any of them enough, I love them all! Waaaaah :(

I feel like I don’t draw Sebek/Silver nearly enough for how much we love them, Rook/Epel is also a rare one but we love it, Sebek/Idia could use more love, anything with Jamil too…

Anonymous asked:

Please share with us a full list of the preference of the TWST boys? Top or bottom? I typed up a list for you to use!

Anon, we have a list in our pinned post! But since you’ve typed up a list, I’ll go through the list again :) We also have a post in which we explain our reasoning for each choice, so you can read it too if you’re interested.

Oh! And if you meant some other types of preferences, please let me know. In that case though, we have a list of the boys’ kinks, which isn’t the same thing, but pretty close; so you can read this one too if you want <3

Riddle – bottom

Ace – top

Deuce – bottom

Trey – top

Cater – top

Leona – bottom

Ruggie – top

Jack  - top

Azul – top

Floyd – top

Jade – top

Kalim – top

Jamil – bottom

Vil – bottom

Rook – top

Epel – bottom

Idia – bottom

Ortho  – top

Malleus– bottom

Sebek  – top

Lilia  – top

Silver– bottom

#replies

[araveninthedarknight]

A brother's secret is another's nightmare

A little note before we get into the actual fic, I am not the best at writing, my spelling is shit (thanks dyslexia) and I have the mouth of a sailor.. Also, I will probobly end up with veryyyy Out of Character Yasushi and Binzo but it's whatever 🤷🏻‍♂ hopefully you enjoy it non the less.

Sumary: Binzo's secret twin brother who no one really knows about is friends with Oya, and gets set up on a blind date with his crush by said crush's bestie and eventually all chaos ensues, ala high and low's typical fashion

Warnings: Extreamly terrible writing, swearing, its a high and low fic so violence and language are kinda inevitable. I use a random name i got from google for the main character, please don't be mad lol

______________

Binzo has always been fiercely protective of his secret twin brother, that much was for sure...But the twin knew that his brother would be so absorbed in his affairs with the Suzuran's Raho faction, he will never find out about his own hidden life, right?

The young teen boy, Binzo's secret brother named Yuri had long stayed a secret, his brother knew everything about him and wanted to protect the fragile seeming boy, but because of his position in the Raho faction at Suzuran, he had not been around as often, and getting bored easily, Yuri took to making friends with other boys his age, one being Fujio of Oya and then the others of oya too. Two boys in particular became close to him, Kyoshi and Yasushi, becoming inseparable as a trio, and soon enough the ladder of the two found himself crushing on the mysterious boy, named Yuri.

His brother thought him to hide who he was related to well, so he knew being anywhere near Oya as a rival's brother would not work well, but when he was with them, he didn't even remember who his brother was, or the school he attended. He simply was him and falling hard for Yasushi...which considering Kyoshi knew pretty much everything about his partner in crime, fellow chaos gremlin and brother from another mother, he knew both boys had fallen for each other over the span of a few months. Todoroki and the others soon would grow annoyed with the two trying to flirt but backing away with it as if the other wasn't just as shamelessly in love with them too. Kyoshi planned with Jamuo to set up the head strong couple on a blind date, one where you would think nothing could go wrong, fool proof in the eyes of the excited Oya gang's most excited.

Yuri approaches a beautiful cherry blossom tree, one by a body of water that glimmered in the light, a little garden with a pond that had frogs singing softly through the warm breeze. Yasushi had followed a lit path to a blanket, soon meeting up for what both boys had thought was a group hang out, though it seemed fancy in the eyes of the two but none the less brushed off as an attempt at a high school friend night that was made to be affordable but still look nice.

"Are we the only ones showing?" Yuri breaks the silence of the shy couple after reading a simple text from Jamuo to have 'fun' on 'the date'..

"It appears to be that way.. but they are missing out on some really good food!" The blonde who tends to seem sour to untrained friend eyes said to the other teen, his dark red dyed hair shone like a dim and dark halo. "But I think we were just set up... On what would be called a blind date." The chuckle Yasushi let fall from his slightly chapped lips causing butterflies to fall into Yuri's stomach as he swept dark red velvet locks from his face with a bobby pin that he always carried with him.

As the two teens one oya, one secret suzuraun spoke softly, blushing, laughing and behaving like a couple, another teen, also from Suzuraun looked on in disbelief, he knew his twin had tried to follow his orders, protecting Yuri from being a target for opposing school gangs, but he had no clue his younger by five minuets brother was friends with Oya. But he knew he would be able to handle himself in a fight, taught by Binzo himself to survive one if absolutely needed. He left not thinking much of it, and missed something in the distance that would for sure have caused his blood to boil, maybe even start an all out war between schools.

"Yuri, I really really like you. As more than a friend. And tonight was wonderful, we both needed it more than I thought, away from everyone else, away from the chaos for a few hours. Will you be my boyfriend officially?" This seemed like the first time Yasushi had ever been so anxious, not something he did often, and of course his heart in his ears made him worry that the other boy could hear his pulse loud and clear in the soft moonlight.

"Of course 'Shi, I love you with all my heart, I have for a while now. As silly as it sounds, my worries of it being one sided only are just subsiding, I am glad you like me too." Red velvet hair tickled the blonde's face as the secret twin of Binzo leaned in and kissed a rival of his own twin, blood rushing adrenaline through him as he did, now his boyfriend, and he knew this would have to be his one and only best kept secret from his protective zombie fighter of a brother. The kiss sent both boys off into the world of bliss, hands intertwining with a delicate care, love the only emotion surging through the crisp spring nightfall air.

A couple attached at the hip was now a common sight at Oya, and though no one other than Kyoshi said it, they were all glad the two had finally gotten together, Todoroki himself seemed to let out a breath of relief when he laid eyes on the hands holding onto one another that belonged to Yasushi and Yuri, though he kept it to himself, he knew it would balance the energy of the erratic blonde before him.

Not too long later, Oya and Suzuraun united to fight, and while Yuri had stayed out of it all, he had rushed to pack a big duffle bag of first aid, knowing that his love would be battered pretty well, and the last time it had happened, the dark red haired boy had let his sobs free, his fear as he kissed his lover's lips and tried to be ever gentle with him, causing him to vow he would always come through with as much as he could to help him from then on after a particularly hard battle.

Long forgotten were the thoughts about his brother having been dispelled from his mind, not thinking he would be there as he rushed to where he knew his darling blonde devilish angel would be, the fight had clearly been over, bodies groaning in pain on the ground, the boy carefully stepping to avoid them but looking for a mop of blonde hair tied up on one side into small braids that only went half way down the side of his head, cascading into a soft flow of sandy clouds.

"YASUSHI!!" Yuri scurries to his partner, opening the bag he brought and pulling him to sit by him on a stack of mats he had formed in the gym to help be more comfortable for the other. "Fucking hell, you look like you got the shit beat out of you with a fucking iron fist darling." Pouts the hidden twin, his frown making his adoring boyfriend let out a pained chuckle as he holds his middle, "I am ok baby boy, just a little run down, nothing I can't handle." Yasushi promises, missing Binzo having an alarmed look on his face as he sees his brother patching up an oya, the same one he was with months earlier in the garden, and then to his horror kissing Yasushi, being careful of the split lip and blood drying on in flaky cakes of smeared crimson. "Babe, you had previous injuries, its only natural I worry." Yuri sighs, remembering the fear he felt when he saw a haggard Kyoshi and a not much better Yasushi.

"WHAT IN THE FUCK IS THIS MIYAUCHI YURI?!?!" Binzo roars, causing his twin to jump and all of the occupants of the gym to fall silent, non of them expecting a relative to Binzo in their midst.

"You said you wanted no one to know we were twins right? This was me being not your twin, blending in and falling hopelessly in love with my boyfriend." Yuri says, anger laced in his tone that his brother would dare cause a scene, especially while he was tending to wounds of someone from the fight. "Wait-wait wait..."Tusksaka sais, befuddled by the sudden commotion that all were watching with pure shock, "Yuri is your twin? Heads up, Yasushi and Yuri have been dating for months, sooooo um... yeah, they are together and you will have to buck it up. We all love your brother, and he too is friends with Fujio, much like Raho himself."

"HOW DID WE NOT KNOW HE HAD A TWIN??" Mercy says, he sounded alarmed,surprised and at the same time impressed as his voice cut through the thick tension that hung upon the air, like a thick blanket in winter.

"I had him keep it hidden to protect him, told him to act normal because I didn't want him a target, but I also taught him to fight for emergencies, he has a mean right hand hook, I have to say. But I worried he would be a target, one that could be avoided, so I hid him...Had I known about this...."Binzo feels the air deflate from his lungs, letting out a sigh, "Hurt my brother and you will have to pay."

Yuri hears his twin grumble as he walks away, hand running though his crazy hair, his signiture look of his own.

"Sorry you had to find out like this and see him blow up." Yuri whispers, laying his head on Yasushi's shoulder as he felt his partner wrap his slender arm around his waist, something the two often did on Oya's rooftop on a sunny day.

"All that matters is that I love you." Yasushi says softly, breaking his normal tough guy act long enough to kiss his head and then glare at the crowd, "What the hell do you all think ya are fucking looking at??"

This was only the start of something bigger, a love for the ages.

A/N: Soooo.... first high and low fic in the books.. I hope it was ok, but I am super proud of it because I don't Know if I have ever willingly written something so long before in my life. I apologize for all of the out of character moments, but I just felt the need for fluffy goodness with a small pinch of angst.

#high and low the worst #yasushi high and low #high and low the worst x Cross #high and low fanfic #high and low the worst fanfiction #im soft for Yasushi sorry #Secret! twin brother of Binzo OC X Yasushi #my writing #this is the first time i have written high and low so they are a bit out of character but i am proud of this non the less

[spontaneousglitterbees]

Legally required to ask for Kokichi for the ask game

[For this ask game]

gosh ur so right anon. I am so sorry this got readmore levels of out-of-hand full spoilers for NDRV3 and also rated C for Current Hyperfixation.

favorite thing about them

Counter-intuitive, but I know my past self (including the era when V3 came out) would have hated Kokichi for the same reasons I like him now. Mainly:

I really did go into V3 expecting to loathe Kokichi as a nuisance at best; I’d been spoiled on Ch. 4  before getting into DR because I thought ‘my aim sucks I won’t play it anyway’  and, loving bees and assorted bugs as I do, I figured Gonta would be my favorite. And I mean, he’s up there, but this little shit. How dare he be an engaging character.

Unsure where I said it previously, but Kokichi seems like the kind of guy who would run a How to Beat [X Movie] channel out of earnest (admit so or not) love for the thought experiment of it all, which isn’t just relatable, but a very interesting Type of Guy to have in your killing game scenario. The one constantly pushing the boundaries, but not quite meta-level aware they’re in a video game; genre-savvy and trying to Actually Accomplish Something Constructive. He also goes about it in such a way that launches a couple malatovs at every bridge he has, which, having been anxious and overly rejection-sensitive in high school, is fucking wild to me. You are going about this in the worst way you could, on purpose, and that is fascinating. Mentally I am putting him in a microscope slide because What Is Your Deal

Plus, the way he constantly has some kind of front up to a point where Saihara can’t decide who he really is by the end of Ch. 5… hmm chameleon complex? I find it quite simple, really. Unclear to me if they meant to make him Like This but doubling down on constant over-performance of social signals because communicating frustrates you and it lets you feel some small degree of control in your life is (in my experience at least) very autistic of him and as a result hearing the whole V3 cast consider him entirely indecipherable down to the bitter end… oof ouch real anxieties? 

least favorite thing about them

A) Some of the iconography they chose for his talent. Which I’m pretty sure they pretty much ditched outside promos? So B) Some of his art in the wake of Ch. 4 is… wonky, but not in a way that looks fully deliberate? It undercuts the drama for me a bit. I think Kokichi seems much more menacing when he drops pretenses entirely and just goes blank instead of trying Very Hard to act out a particular emotion (like he does pretty much all the time). Instead of the demon face, something more like this?

favorite line

I blame this for getting "The more that you suffer, the more I enjoy it" stuck in my head, plus the combo of "Now you'll never, ever forget me for the rest of your life! [...] I stole your heart, so now I'm satisfied." The two surface Kokichis asdfghjkl

Looking for quotes though it came to my attention that in Chapter 2 he says "[...] I wanna win this killing game! So I'm not gonna run from it, I'm gonna crush it! That'll be waaaay less boring, don'tcha think?"  kicking screaming they knew exactly what they were doing

shipping and handling

tbh I less ‘ship’ and more ‘please make them interact with one another’, so grains of salt I suppose!

brOTP

Kokichi + Miu. Gotta find who in the amalgamate server said ‘in any other circumstance they’d be besties’ because they are Correct.

OTP

This is a self report but like fuck it we ball Kokichi ♢/♠ Kaito

If you know the intricacies of what that means you may be entitled to—

Pretty much this vine

nOTP

I guess I'm a little squicked thinking of Kokichi/Gonta in a romantic sense? See at least in TAPP they've still got a Lot to talk about before comfortably calling one another 'friend' instead of 'working on it'

random headcanon

Ah a lot of these are already sprinkled in TAPP so what’s one y’all haven’t heard before,,

He started painting his nails during the game initially to interrogate (RE: get-to-know) Rantaro, and kept doing it to discourage himself from biting his nails and cuticles all the time. There's only like one sprite where he does it, but I think it could be a nervous tick

TAPP!DICE may not be real but the tea party policy absolutely is

I've drawn him in skirts doing outfit memes, but I think for him it's less concrete than feeling like dressing femme sometimes and more that, post-game and organization-less, he has no idea who he's supposed to be anymore and is throwing pretty much everything at the wall in many facets of his life. Including but not limited to saying 'screw uniforms' and seeing how long it takes him to get in trouble with HPA for wearing different clothes every day. After long enough unchallenged he starts getting his classmates to do it too. Considering... their entire circumstances in TAPP, they get away with a lot more than the other classes 

unpopular opinion

Is it unpopular to say that some of the info from Kokichi’s FTEs should have been in the main plot? The knife game scene, besides being my favorite, seriously clues the player into what he’s like beyond the artifice without having to posthumously dump that exposition in his room, and that a lot of players confused by him are likely to miss out on characterization that would clarify things Irks Me.

song i associate with them

Oh, only one song? Too bad, 'cuz I Can’t Decide - Scissor Sisters

My other cop-out is 'Cause I’m a Liar - Mcki Robyns-P, which I’m working on a cover for in Synth V

Other than that? I haven’t built up nearly enough song-based associations with the DR cast yet somehow, but I’ll throw in Queen of Nothing - The Crane Wives which is less a Kokichi vibe than “I’m writing TAPP!Kokichi in the wake of Chapter 5” vibes. Isn’t this what you wanted? Time sure feels like it’s running out. Finish what you started, Queen of Nothing, wearing such a heavy crown.

I don’t know if this is in the spirit of the prompt but the thought did occur to me that a Trial 5 animatic to I’m Alive from Next to Normal would slap really really hard actually.

I need more peppy songs in my life, is what I’m gathering.

favorite picture of them

Let’s split it like this:

Favorite from the game? Probably this one

The face of a man asking “what are you gonna do, shoot me?” promptly before getting shot.

Sprite? This one

Is it genuine curiosity? Is he mocking me? Some mysterious third thing? Yes.

and a fanart that lives in my brain rent-free (the-everlasting-ash). Linking instead of reposting bc please support the original artist. There are many, many wonderful pieces of fanart out there, but this one carved a niche in my brain and stayed there (it is the cover image for DR art on my phone on account of Stunning).

Also for the uninitiated on TAPP- [Talent Acquisition Pilot Program AU Masterpost]

#answers #Anonymous #ask games #danganronpa #dr #new danganronpa v3 #ndrv3 #danganronpa v3 #drv3 #kokichi ouma #kokichi oma #took me so long bc i made a gif and a sprite edit #genuinely surprised I couldnt find that bit from randy writes a novel in gif form #so i made it myself (thats why the gif is amateurish OTL) #also first DR sprite edit i hope its okay #i kept the pose the same and just tried to change his face and reduce the shadow intensity #sometimes the most powerful menace is a lack of it #TAPP AU #TAPP AU adjacent

[wenevergotusedtoegypt]

Feeling a bit lost with how to handle this whole food allergy situation with 1.5yo.

I asked a question a while back in a Facebook group and a bunch of the answers were telling me that I should get a 2nd opinion because food allergies shouldn't be diagnosed solely based on allergy skin/blood testing, in the absence of experiencing an actual reaction. And it's like...guys...I don't know what to tell you, but he has been diagnosed with these allergies by TWO separate allergists, the latter of whom doesn't feel it's safe to do a food challenge with him for peanuts. You are random internet people with allergic children. He's the doctor. I can't reasonably operate by assuming his advice is wrong.

Anyway, I feel like we're in a weird situation because 1.5yo has only had a small handful of allergy-like symptoms in his life, despite regularly being exposed to most/all of his actual and potential allergens. So it doesn't seem like he's that sensitive, but...we don't exactly know what he can and can't handle. On the one hand I obviously want to be safe, but on the other I don't want to make difficult changes to our lives unnecessarily. It's hard to know what level of guardrails to put up. When I asked about this, his allergist said not to give him peanuts, hold him while eating peanuts, or let little kids who just ate peanuts touch him without being wiped down, but otherwise to keep doing what we've been doing.

So last night we had takeout from a restaurant we hadn't been to before. Nobody's food had any obvious forms of his allergens in it. At first I wasn't going to give him anything from the restaurant, but he was super upset that he wasn't getting what everyone else got. I called the restaurant and asked what oil they used to make their fries, and the guy said he was pretty sure but could not confirm that it was canola, which is fine for him. So he ate several fries, and then he ended up having a burger bun that had ketchup on it (no sesame seeds on the bun), and a very small amount of some garlic mayo sauce.

All of a sudden half his lower lip blew up.

The thing is, in the midst of all this, 4yo had semi-bodyslammed 1.5yo face-first on the kitchen floor, so I wasn't actually sure whether the swollen lip was an allergic reaction, or an injury. I gave him Benadryl to be safe, and by the time my husband got home 2 or 3 hours later it had gone down enough that he didn't notice anything until I pointed it out. So maybe allergic reaction? Like, I don't feel like injury-related swelling would go down that fast. But I also have no idea what he could have been reacting to from the items he ate. So maybe no more restaurant food for him unless it's somewhere known to be allergy-friendly? Except he's had food from restaurants tons of times before we knew he had allergies, and never had an issue. So is that really a commitment we reasonably need to make? It would be super inconvenient and frustrating. I don't even know.

[the-infamous-coat-of-baron-zemo]

Just One Of The Perks

Nathan Bateman x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 2,950

One Shot | Literally just random nonsense out of me. Not beta read. 

Nathan was in a mood. 

You weren’t sure what had caused the sudden onset of his current behavior. After working alongside him off and on for almost a year, you thought you had a handle on him. 

You couldn’t have been more wrong. 

He was actually ignoring you.

Not in the way you’d usually believe. He’s not ignoring you because he’s too busy, or that he can’t be bothered to have you in his presence, writing the most important code of his life. 

It’s something else. You’d call it borderline avoidance, but that’s not in his nature. 

You weren’t one to typically walk on eggshells around him either. If anything, he had you figured out pretty well. He is a genius after all. And you were an open book, not feeling the need to hold anything back with him. You had a sneaky suspicion he actually liked the fact you actively engaged with him, giving your opinion on anything and everything. 

To be honest, you enjoyed provoking him. It was almost like an experiment. Seeing what reactions you could get out of him. He’d eye you curiously from time to time. You wouldn’t be surprise if he had figured out your little game, but he’s never called you out on it - so you assumed you were safe. 

You could tell he was bored with every day people. He generally showed disinterest if the conversation wasn’t relating to something he needed. And Nathan wasn’t one to waste his time attempting to break down everything into laymen terms to the average human. 

So, you did your best to keep him on his toes and challenge him - push back. 

When you first met, you thought for sure his opinion of you was that you annoyed the absolute shit out of him.

You smiled at that thought.

Truth be told, you talked, a lot. And Nathan made you nervous. You’d never give him the satisfaction of knowing that; so you covered your nervousness with random chatter. Which is why you felt you were exasperating to him. 

As you had slowly peeled back some of his layers over time, you became less intimidated by him. Though, you’re pretty sure the first couple of months you spent with him, he was ready to throw you out of his house for rambling so much. 

You couldn’t really blame him. He was used to spending most of his time alone with his AI robots. One of which doesn’t even speak. Therefore, conversation in his home was sparing.  

However, you were observant too. And even if Nathan didn’t outwardly give the impression he was interested in what you were talking about, his actions told a different story. Nathan wasn’t one to mince words. If he didn’t want to hold a conversation with you, he would let you know and walk off. 

You’d come out to his reclusive home in Alaska, two months on, one month off.  In the beginning, he definitely spent as little time around you as possible.

But something changed around the six month mark. It was little things at first. Joining you on your morning run. Lazily sitting with you in the common room, while you furiously typed away on your laptop, running over his code. 

You made various excuses for his behavior. His runs with you in the morning? It’s because you both got up early, and Nathan prided himself on staying in shape. So why not get some extra workout time in before he started on his punching bag? 

Sitting with you in the common room? Checking up on your work to make sure you weren’t fucking his code up. 

But then there were actions you couldn’t explain. Like, walking you through a block he’s hit in his work and asking for your advice. Actively seeking out your company and hauling you outside with him for hikes when he was upset. Or making you take a break from pulling an all nighter on one of his projects, trying to get you to dance with him. And he knows, knows you’re terrible at dancing, but he doesn’t seem to care. He just pokes fun at you and proceeds to drag you to the open floor space. 

It was unnerving. And you weren’t sure what to make of it. 

Days such as this one, your mind tended to wander. More often than not, Nathan was occupying more space in your head.

And to think how different it all was at the start. 

Quite frankly, when you first met him, you couldn’t be bothered with him. He really pushed your buttons in the beginning too. You could tell he took pleasure in riling you up.

You remember your first meeting with Nathan, like it was just the other day.

You had a deadline to meet, and the mad genius had the audacity to interrupt you in the middle of re-writing a code he sent you.

Okay, technically - he sent it to your boss, as it was his job originally to quality check Nathan’s work from time to time. It gave Nathan the opportunity to continue his work unimpeded, if he had someone look it over for bugs while he hammered away at his latest break through. It was never a fully coded program either. Nathan protected his work at all costs, so when he wanted his code checked, he sent it in pieces and in random sections. That way, no one person could ever cobble it together and try to sell it off to the highest bidder on the black market of the internet. 

An ingenious idea that you actually agreed with him about. 

You quickly realized early into your job at Blue Book that your boss was an idiot. Your original boss, before Nathan entered the picture. Sure he could smooth talk his way through anything, but code? Not a chance. He was average at best, but somehow managed to weasel his way to the top of the executive food chain. In charge of quality checking the coding at Blue Book, he had done a good enough job - that Nathan had started sending him bits of code. 

You always got the code first. Looked it over, made a few adjustments and passed it on to him to approve and send back to Nathan. 

You noticed the time stamps of the emails being returned to Nathan, confirming his code and attachments of any adjustments made. They were almost always immediately after you sent your confirmation to him. 

He was sandbagging his job, and you were the one picking up the slack. 

You tested your theory one day. You opened the program and embedded comments inside various parts of the code. Once you finished, you sent the short piece of programming for your boss to give it a once over. As you guessed, he didn’t catch any of the comments you added. He sent it back to Nathan approved. 

The following day, you were sitting on your couch at home, fingers flying over the keyboard, glasses slipped down to the lower bridge of your nose, and listening to music loud enough to be heard outside your noise cancelling earbuds. You were wearing an oversized sweatshirt, large enough for one side to slip off your shoulder and pair of denim shorts. Your legs were tucked to the side, feet bumping up against the couch back. Your feet were adorned with some very fluffy socks. 

If you were spending your days coding, you were going to be comfortable dammit.  

As you were in the groove, your music was interrupted with a blaring noise. The incoming call alarm, indicating someone wanted to video chat. 

You glance down at your phone, not recognizing the number. Your fingers pause, hovering over the keys. You were debating whether to answer. It could be someone from Blue Book. The phone number did have a three digit prefix associated with the office. 

You tapped the side of your earbuds, deciding to take the call and sent the video feed to your television in the room, so you could continue working. Best case scenario you could simply hang up, worst case scenario, it was your boss calling to nag you about something asinine. 

Not bothering to look at the screen, you returned your attention back to your work when you heard an unfamiliar voice, but extremely familiar face pop onto your video call. 

“You are not the Chief Software Developer,” a confused voice calls out. 

You tilt your head to the side at his comment, but never slowed down working, “Thank you, Captain Obvious. You know I was in doubt before, but now that you’ve clarified things, I can rest easy with this new found knowledge.”  

“Aren’t you a just a ray of sunshine?” 

“Is there something I can help -,” turning your head towards the video feed, you trail off realizing who on the other end. You halt your typing and adjust your glasses. 

Looking down at your phone, you finally noticed that the call was being forwarded from your boss’s line at the office. You forgot you had re-routed the calls to your phone, so you could work from home today. 

Well, shit. 

“I’m glad I finally have your attention,” Nathan muses.

You watch as he leans back in his chair, arms folded across his chest. 

“Mr. Bateman,” you acknowledge with a nod of your head to him.

“So, you’re the real brains of the operation.” 

A statement. Not a question. 

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean, Mr. Bateman,” deftly avoiding his comment. 

“Bullshit.” 

That got you to raise your eyebrows.

“The notes in the most recent code sent to me.” 

You snort silently. So he did catch them upon receiving the updates. 

“I had wondered for quite some time, why the small programming code I’ve been sending over the past few months, showed an impressive improvement in such a short amount of time,” Nathan states. 

Biting his lip, he leans forward on his desk. He points his data pen at the screen, “Derek was never great at coding, but he got the job done. What I’ve been receiving is well beyond his capabilities. So, through the process of elimination, it was clear you were the only one with potential qualifications to review my work. And why the fuck are you a personal assistant?” 

“Brilliant deduction. Glad to see all those years at MIT are finally paying off,” you murmur back to him, a small amount of amusement flitting over your face.

“Heard that honey.” 

You blush profusely at his reply. 

“You didn’t answer my question. I don’t like asking twice.” 

You sigh, taking off your glasses and rubbing your eyes. 

“I-I work as a personal assistant, so I can spend my free time on passion projects.” 

“Okay, whatever. Listen, you no longer work for Derek. You work for me, now. So pack up your stuff, you’re going to spend the next two months at my compound in Alaska.” 

You nearly drop your laptop.

“I’m going to regret asking this, but why?” you question.

“Because you’re efficient and good at what you do, and I need you to continue doing that work here, uninterrupted from the office with no other responsibilities other than what I’m directly giving you.” 

You mull over his demand. 

“I still want time to myself to work on my own projects,” you carefully negotiate.

“Done,” he says, dropping the pen he had been twirling in his fingers. 

“When do you need me to arrive? you ask, grabbing your phone to pull up your calendar. 

“Tomorrow.” 

“Tomorrow?” you roll your eyes. The nerve of this guy. “Thursday,” you request back, scrolling through your phone while glancing at Nathan from the side. 

“Wednesday.” 

“Tomorrow is Wednesday Mr. Bateman,” you flatly state, unamused. 

“Just checking to see if you’d notice.” 

This asshole. 

“Friday, then” you smile serenely. Two can play this game.

You watch as Nathan narrows his eyes at you. 

“Do you see it as part of your job to annoy me?” 

You purse your lips in an effort not to smirk. 

“No, Mr. Bateman, of course not,” you say seriously. 

Nathan sits back in his chair again. 

This time you do smile at him, “Just one of the perks.” 

There was fire flashing in his eyes as he tries to stare you down through the video call, but then you see a small uptick at the corner of his mouth. 

“Be here Friday. I’ll have information sent you.” 

Before you have a chance to respond, he hangs up, promptly ending the call. 

“Rude. Goodbye to you too!,” you grumble. 

You packed your bags two days later, and the rest was history as they say. It was such an unorthodox meeting, but you look back at it fondly now. 

Getting up from deck, you pull out the flash drive from your laptop, gather up your gear and head inside to find Nathan. It was your last day with him before leaving for another month tomorrow. 

Using your keycard, you let yourself into his lab where Nathan is hunched over a new blueprint.

He doesn’t acknowledge you as you approach him. 

You stop on the other side of the table and slide the USB over to him.

“All the latest updates are on the drive for you,” you say in passing. 

Nathan grabs the drive and turns to toss it onto his desk behind him. 

“I need you to take a look at this piece from this morning,” he motions you over to one of his screens. 

You flip your wrist to read the time. It’s late and you need to sleep a few hours before making the trek to the chopper in the morning. 

“Send it to me. I’ll take a look at it tomorrow on the plane.” 

If you hadn’t been paying attention, you would have missed the way Nathan’s shoulders tensed. 

“Fine,” he brusquely says. 

You see him close off and turn away from you, bringing his focus back to his project. 

Before he makes it back to the table, you grab his arm lightly to stop him. 

It’s one of the few times you’ve actually physically touched him.

“Nathan,” you murmur. 

You must have really shocked him, because he startles from your touch. You rarely use his name too. You can count on one hand the number of times you’ve said his name. Normally, you just addressed him as Bateman. 

Nathan doesn’t turn around, but his eyes find your hand resting on his arm. 

You move slowly towards him, gently maneuvering until you’re at his side. 

“Let me go. You should be packing,” he states, as he tries to shake off your hand from his arm. 

You can see his failed attempt to dislodge you, because you refuse to let go.

“Go on. I have work to do.” 

“You are so infuriating. For all your genius, you really are clueless sometimes,” you ground out, irritated. 

He meets your gaze, fury burning in his eyes at your scathing remark. It’s reminiscent of the very first time you saw him on that video chat so long ago. He opens his mouth to no doubt make some retort that will probably hurt your feelings, but you cut him off by launching yourself into his arms for a hug. 

You shock Nathan for a second time. You hear him inhale deeply. His hands are hovering over your back, but you don’t let go of him. 

Maybe you made a mistake. Nathan hadn’t moved from his position. You were about to pull back, when you hear a whispered, “God dammit.” 

And then you were engulfed in a bone crushing hug. 

You lost count of how long you were both wrapped around each other, but you didn’t care. It was everything you could have ever hoped for from Nathan. He gave in - just a little. For just this moment, and you were going to savor it for as long as you possibly could. 

Your eyes watered thinking ridiculously that he’d see you again soon. It’s not long this time was going to be any different than the other times you left and came back. 

But something had fundamentally changed. 

Your fingers scratched his back softly as you buried your head at the top of his shoulder. 

“I’ll miss you too asshole,” you sniffle at him. 

You feel him squeeze you impossibly closer at your words and feel him huff into ear. 

You turn your head and wipe your eyes with the sleeve of your shirt as your pull back from him.  

You meet his eyes and through his glasses, you swear they look tinged red. But you weren’t going to say anything. 

Closing your eyes, you smile and nod at him. You turn to walk out of the lab, but point at his desk on your way out, “Don’t forget to look at the changes I made to your work. And try not to get too drunk while I’m gone.” 

Nathan just rolls his eyes at you. 

Moment over, it seems. 

As you get to the door, you hear him call back to you.

“Hey, sunshine.”

You pause with your hand resting on the door handle.

“You see it as part of your job description to be this agitating?” 

You push the glass door open, looking back to smirk at him playfully, “Just one of the perks.” 

Nathan bows his head, before gazing back at you through the glass.

“You can’t get rid of me that easily, Bateman.” 

You walk down the hallway to your room, giving him one last glance. 

He smiles at you knowingly. 

#nathan bateman x reader #nathan bateman #oscar isaac #ex machina #one shot