vitzi9

Latest Posts by vitzi9

This is the worst timeline. (x)

shigaraki who falls in love with a cute cashier at the 24/7 konbini he frequents. they're a foreigner and seem to not know much japanese, especially the conversational style, only using formal words with him when he says it's not necessary. he sees them every night, after all. he tries his best to flirt, and they're always quite nice to him. maybe it's because they're really that nice, or maybe it's because they have no idea what he's saying. either way, he's got butterflies in his stomach when they look at him.

little does he know, this foreigner is an avid true crime fan that recognized him the very first moment they saw him. they know what he's saying. they know he's flirting. they also know that denying his advances or going to the police will put a target on their back, so they've been nodding along and smiling for 3 weeks now, praying it doesn't escalate. it does, though, when shigaraki asks them for their number.

do you think you could do some Dabi smau where he has a kid with reader and all the fluffy things?

I’m in pain after the last one </3

if you’re not comfortable do not feel pressured to do it! <33333

-🐦‍⬛

domesticated | t. todoroki

parenthood was not in the plan, but now there's a glitter drawing of you and touya on the fridge.

I'm speechless, the talent is immaculate

love in the margins | t. iida

a short, slow-burn library romance, ft. one blueberry muffin, exactly zero jokes, and a boy who takes flashcards way too seriously. (4597 words)

you meet tenya iida under circumstances that can only be described as tragically collegiate: a peer-led study group in the furthest, quietest corner of the campus library, surrounded by half-dead fluorescent bulbs and the palpable despair of students on the brink of burnout.

it's the third week of the semester, and you're already floundering.

you hadn't intended to be. in theory, you were going to stay on top of things—read the chapters early, color-code your notes, maybe even start a study group of your own. but somewhere between sleep deprivation, an avalanche of discussion posts, and the mysterious black hole that is the university's online portal, you fell behind. hard.

introduction to public policy has been your academic nemesis from the start. the textbook reads like legal jargon swallowed a thesaurus. the professor talks in dense, circular metaphors. every quiz is a minefield of trick questions and ambiguous phrasing. you are, in every sense of the word, academically drowning.

so when a brightly colored flyer promising a "collaborative review session" caught your eye on the bulletin board outside the lecture hall, you didn't think twice. you showed up. desperate. caffeinated. terminally underprepared.

and now you regret everything.

the room smells like dry-erase markers and nervous sweat. a whiteboard at the front is covered in illegible graphs. someone has already spilled a latte on the floor. the guy leading the group talks fast and loud, his explanations full of buzzwords and gestures but lacking anything remotely useful. you suspect he's just regurgitating the study guide at a slightly faster pace.

the other students seem to agree.

one by one, they start to trickle out. a girl leaves with the excuse of "office hours." a guy mutters something about dinner. another just quietly packs up and disappears, not even bothering with a pretense.

by the end of the hour, only two people remain: you, clinging to a futile hope of salvaging your gpa... and him.

he sits across from you with the kind of posture that makes your back ache just looking at him. tall, composed, and absurdly polished—like someone who writes essays three days early and carries a spare pen in case someone forgets theirs. his navy-blue sweater is wrinkle-free. his glasses catch the dim library light. his notes are not just color-coded—they're thematically organized, annotated with footnotes and marginalia in tiny, immaculate handwriting.

he hasn't spoken once. he hasn't needed to.

he radiates competence like it's a moral obligation.

"you're still here?" you ask, more surprise than judgment.

the boy looks up, blinking as if surfacing from a well of deep concentration. he adjusts his glasses with a practiced motion.

"yes," he says, voice clipped and oddly formal. "you are as well."

you arch an eyebrow. "no offense, but... are you actually getting something out of this?"

his expression doesn't change, but he tilts his head slightly—almost like he's assessing you.

"of course," he replies. "engaging in structured group review enhances cognitive retention and contextual understanding. it's an effective method for consolidating knowledge prior to a high-stakes assessment."

you blink. "so... yes?"

he doesn't hesitate. "yes."

you snort—audibly. it escapes before you can stop it. and to your surprise, a faint smile flickers across his mouth.

"i'm tenya iida," he says, extending a hand across the table with the kind of precision reserved for formal introductions at university mixers.

you stare at his hand for a moment, then take it. his grip is warm. steady. confident in a way that makes you sit up a little straighter.

"y/n," you say.

his smile grows just slightly. "it's a pleasure to meet you, y/n."

he releases your hand and immediately pulls out a second set of flashcards from his folder. of course he has a second set.

"would you like to quiz each other?" he asks, dead serious. "alternating questions could be a mutually beneficial method of review."

you stare at him.

he stares back.

something about him—the earnestness, the posture, the complete and utter lack of sarcasm—disarms you. it's like he's the living embodiment of academic sincerity. you're not sure whether to laugh or agree.

you do both.

"...sure."

you don't know it yet, but that's the beginning.

⋆˚✿˖°

you don't plan on seeing him again.

it's not personal. it's just that study groups are the social equivalent of jury duty—temporary, miserable, and best forgotten. you assume tenya iida is one of those hyper-dedicated overachievers who only exist within the academic ecosystem. he probably recedes into a cloud of flashcards and moral fiber as soon as the library closes.

you are, however, proven categorically wrong the following wednesday at exactly 8:03 a.m.

you enter the campus café half-awake, mildly hostile, and fully dependent on the idea of caffeine as a substitute for sleep. the plan is simple: grab something with enough espresso to make your eye twitch, stare blankly at your phone for fifteen minutes, and pretend the crushing weight of institutional learning isn't slowly hollowing you out from the inside.

but fate—or perhaps syllabus-based divine intervention—has other plans.

because when you step inside, there he is.

same posture. same glasses. same stupidly crisp button-down like it didn't just come out of someone's laundry but graduated magna cum laude from it. he's seated at a table by the window, surrounded by highlighters arranged like soldiers, reading the textbook that has been your personal tormentor since week one.

and next to his coffee?

a single blueberry muffin.

you hesitate, caught in that weird space where it's too late to pretend you didn't see him, but also too awkward to walk past without acknowledging him.

before you can make a decision, he looks up—and smiles.

not just a polite, "ah yes, i recognize you" smile.

a real smile. brief, but sincere. like he's actually glad you're here.

he waves you over.

you hate how quickly your legs respond.

"didn't expect to see you here," you say as you slide into the seat across from him, instantly aware of how tired you look in comparison to his perfectly combed hair and terrifying punctuality.

"i study here most mornings," he replies. "the ambient noise level is consistent, and the natural lighting is optimal for focus."

you blink. "that is... alarmingly specific."

he inclines his head. "i find that consistency breeds productivity."

you want to tease him, but the truth is, it's kind of admirable. alarming. but admirable.

he gestures to the pastry between you.

"would you like half?" he asks. "it's fresh. and i believe we have, at this point, established a cordial enough rapport to justify the sharing of breakfast items."

you stare at him.

"do you always offer muffins to people you've only studied with once?"

he doesn't even flinch. "only when they look tired enough to deserve one."

your mouth twitches.

"you've been saving that line, haven't you."

he looks mildly offended. "no. though i could annotate it in my planner if you'd like."

you laugh—genuinely this time—and accept the muffin. it's warm, sweet, and annoyingly perfect. just like him.

you don't pull out your flashcards. not immediately. you sit there in companionable silence, splitting the muffin and sipping your drinks like it's something you've always done. like this is normal.

you tell yourself this isn't a date. obviously.

it's too early in the day for romance. you're both clutching textbooks like weapons. he hasn't even made a single joke. (you're not sure he knows how.)

and yet—

when he leans in to show you a section he highlighted—carefully annotated with footnotes and marginal notes that are somehow neater than your typed essays—your shoulders brush. you don't pull away.

he doesn't, either.

later, you realize that you don't even remember what chapter you reviewed.

but you remember the sound of his voice as he quietly explained it. the way he passed you the last bite of muffin without saying anything. the way his fingers curled ever so slightly when he set his pen down between you.

you remember thinking, with a strange flutter in your chest: this could be something.

not yet.

but maybe.

⋆˚✿˖°

you tell yourself this is still just about school.

you repeat it like a mantra as you meet him at the library every tuesday and thursday without fail, settling into your now-permanent seats by the windows like assigned partners in some ongoing group project that no one else remembers being assigned to. his bag always lands on the table first, followed by a reusable water bottle the size of your emotional baggage. he brings extra highlighters now—plural—and starts leaving a green one near your elbow like he’s not even thinking about it.

you, in turn, stop pretending to study anywhere else.

because the truth is, you don’t concentrate better when he’s around—not even a little. he’s distracting in the worst possible way: tall and tidy and terminally composed, with a voice like a podcast host and a smile that you pretend not to notice every time he glances over at you with something like pride in his eyes.

and the worst part?

it’s working.

your grades are going up. you understand policy terminology now. you caught yourself referencing a case study unprompted in another class, and the look your professor gave you made it feel like you’d just been knighted.

you’d thank him for it—sincerely—if he didn’t look so smug every time you nailed a quiz.

“you’ve clearly been applying yourself,” he says one evening, looking over your annotated notes like they’re some kind of sacred text.

“i’ve been applying your study methods,” you reply, then instantly regret it, because the smile he gives you in return is devastating.

and that would be fine—annoying, but fine—if it weren’t for the fact that he’s started sitting closer.

not drastically. not inappropriately. just... close.

close enough that when you both lean in to look at something on the same page, your shoulders brush. your knees knock. his hand lingers near yours when he passes you a pen, and he doesn’t move away quickly. sometimes—and this is particularly evil—his thigh rests against yours under the table for minutes at a time, and you’re too proud (and too panicked) to say anything.

you’re not flirting. not really.

you’re both too stubborn for that.

but something is happening. you just don’t know what to call it.

one thursday afternoon, the sky is gray and heavy with the threat of rain. the windows in the library fog up slightly, making the whole room feel smaller, softer, somehow more intimate. your shoes are damp. your brain is fried. you’re barely holding onto your focus.

but he’s already there, sitting at your usual table with a mug from the downstairs café and a folder labeled “legislation review: week 5.” there’s a muffin. of course there’s a muffin.

he looks up as you approach. smiles. “you’re early.”

you blink. “so are you.”

he shrugs. “anticipation is efficient.”

“what does that even mean?”

he hesitates, like he’s genuinely considering it. “it means i enjoy this.”

your heart does something stupid.

you take your seat before your face can give you away.

thirty minutes in, your brain stops processing information entirely.

you’re trying to focus. really, you are. but his leg is pressed against yours and you swear it’s getting closer every time he shifts. it’s not even the contact itself that’s distracting—it’s the fact that he doesn’t seem to notice. like it’s just normal. like this is how he always studies with people.

(does he?)

(no. he can’t.)

“y/n?” he says, and you jolt like you’ve been electrocuted.

“hm?”

“i asked if you’d like to walk through the case brief again. you seem... distant.”

you clear your throat and try not to sound like someone whose brain has just been wiped by a thigh. “yeah, no, i’m fine. just tired.”

he nods solemnly. “understandable. your coursework has been particularly intensive.”

he says it like he knows your schedule better than you do—which he might. you’ve seen his planner. you’re pretty sure he’s memorized the entire academic calendar, national holidays included.

you try to return to your notes.

you fail.

eventually, you lean back in your chair and exhale.

“okay,” you say. “i need to ask you something.”

he looks up, immediately attentive. “yes?”

you glance around—no one’s within earshot— and lean in slightly.

“this thing we do.”

he blinks. “studying?”

“no. i mean yes, but no.” you gesture vaguely between the two of you. “this. the muffins. the flashcards. the... sitting so close i can smell your laundry detergent.”

he goes still.

“i’m just trying to understand if we’re, like...” you hesitate. “is this just a really intense academic friendship or are we... flirting?”

he doesn’t speak for a long moment.

then, carefully: “i hadn’t realized my proximity was making you uncomfortable.”

“it’s not!” you say, too quickly. “it’s just... confusing.”

“confusing how?”

you fidget with the cap of your pen. “because we do things that feel... date-adjacent. and i don’t know if that’s just how you are with people or if i’m—” you stop yourself before you can say not imagining it.

his brows draw together, faintly perplexed. “i apologize. i didn’t mean to cause confusion.”

you blink. “so you are flirting?”

his ears go pink. just slightly. “i wouldn’t define it as flirting. but i do enjoy spending time with you.”

you squint at him. “that’s not a no.”

he hesitates. then, quieter: “it’s not.”

oh.

you stare at him. he stares back.

and then—like the universe can’t stand unresolved tension—your knees bump again.

but this time, he doesn’t shift away.

and neither do you.

⋆˚✿˖°

you don’t call it a date.

not out loud.

not even in your head, really—not technically. because you’re not dating. you haven’t kissed. there’s been no confession. there’s been no moment of clarity where either of you has stood dramatically in the rain and said i think about you all the time, which, honestly, is a bit disappointing.

but you still change your outfit three times before meeting him for coffee on saturday.

you still hesitate in front of the mirror, adjusting your sleeves and second-guessing your hair, muttering get a grip under your breath like it’s a prayer.

you still pause at the door to the café, one hand on the handle, and remind yourself—again—that this isn’t a date.

you’re just meeting up. casually. like friends.

friends who sometimes sit with their knees touching under library tables. friends who share muffins and steal glances and somehow always find reasons to linger a little too long in doorways.

friends who, if they weren’t so emotionally constipated, might’ve figured this out already.

but you push the door open anyway, and the little bell overhead chimes bright and familiar.

he’s already there.

of course he is.

tenya iida is punctual to the point of pathology. if you told him to meet you in the afterlife at 3:00 p.m. sharp, he’d be there early, holding a clipboard and a fully prepared powerpoint.

he’s sitting near the window, back straight, hands folded politely in his lap. his hair is a little messy from the wind outside. his sweater is navy—clean, simple, a little oversized in a way that makes you stare longer than you should.

he sees you and stands immediately, which is both adorable and completely unnecessary.

“you’re early,” he says, voice warm.

“so are you.”

he doesn’t reply, but the smile he gives you is soft around the edges.

you order something with too much caffeine and not enough nutritional value. he offers to pay, like he always does. you decline, like you always do. it’s a silent tradition now, a ritual of stubbornness. he lets it go with a quiet nod, but not without giving you that look—the one that says i was raised right and this physically pains me.

you find a booth in the corner, a little more secluded than the rest. the sun spills in through the window in soft golden streaks, and for a moment, it feels like you’re somewhere outside of time.

“i’ve never seen you wear that color,” he says as you sit down.

you glance at your shirt. “yeah? too much?”

he shakes his head immediately. “no. it suits you.”

your mouth goes a little dry.

you recover quickly, leaning back and sipping your drink like it doesn’t mean anything. like the warmth crawling up your neck is from the coffee and not the compliment.

“so,” you say, clearing your throat. “what’s on the agenda for today? rigorous academic analysis? philosophical debates about economic ethics? impromptu pop quizzes?”

he tilts his head. “i thought we might take the day off.”

you blink. “from... studying?”

“from everything.” he shrugs, a little sheepishly. “i realized we’ve never spent time together without a textbook between us.”

your heart does something strange.

“you mean like... just hang out?”

“yes.”

“like friends.”

he hesitates. just barely. “yes. like friends.”

the words hang in the air between you—awkward, uncertain, but not unkind.

you nod, slowly. “okay. yeah. we can do that.”

and you do.

you talk. not about school, not about deadlines or group projects or the upcoming midterm. you talk about dumb childhood stories and weird food preferences and the fact that he once tried to start a recycling initiative in his middle school and was very upset when no one followed the sorting chart correctly.

you tell him about your obsession with terrible reality TV. he listens with the seriousness of a man taking notes for a thesis.

he tells you about his older brother, and how much he looks up to him. you tell him about the stray cat that used to follow you home in high school, even though you never fed it.

he laughs—really laughs—when you tell him about the time you broke your nose in gym class trying to dodge a volleyball and ran straight into a bleacher.

“i’m sorry,” he says between gasps. “i don’t mean to laugh at your pain.”

“no, you do,” you say, grinning. “and it’s okay. i would too.”

at one point, your knees bump under the table again. this time, neither of you pulls away.

it’s later than you mean it to be when you finally leave the café. the sun is dipping low, the sky tinged with lavender and orange. the street is quiet, and the wind bites just enough to make you zip your jacket up.

you walk together. not toward the library, not toward another class—just aimlessly. like people who have nowhere else to be.

it’s peaceful.

and weirdly... intimate.

you’re not talking. not really. the silence between you is comfortable now, lived-in. every so often your hands brush, and you wonder—wildly, stupidly —what would happen if you just reached out.

but you don’t.

because this isn’t a date.

it’s not.

except maybe... it is.

“this was nice,” you say, when you finally reach the crosswalk where you’ll part ways.

he nods. “i enjoyed it.”

there’s a beat of silence.

“we should do it again,” you say. casually. like it doesn’t mean anything.

but he looks at you like it does.

“i’d like that,” he says. and then—“you’re very easy to be around.”

your breath catches.

you want to say something. you’re easy to be around too. i think about you when we’re not together. i don’t know if i’m imagining this but i hope i’m not.

instead, you say, “you’re weirdly charming, you know that?”

he blinks. “i—thank you?”

you grin. “it’s a compliment. mostly.”

he laughs. soft. pleased. “i’ll take it.”

he takes a small step back, like he’s about to leave —but then pauses.

“y/n?”

“yeah?”

“if this had been a date...” he clears his throat. “would that have been... agreeable to you?”

you stare at him.

then, slowly—carefully—you nod.

“yeah,” you say. “i think it would’ve been.”

he smiles. it’s small. tentative. but it lights up his whole face.

“then maybe next time, we won’t pretend.”

you feel like you’re floating.

“deal.”

he nods once. then, with a strange, lingering sort of hesitation—like he’s not ready to go yet—he turns to leave.

you watch him go.

and for the first time in a long time, you feel... hopeful.

⋆˚✿˖°

you don't know what you're expecting.

when he texts you the next morning—same time tuesday? not for studying this time. if you're free.—you stare at it for a good ten minutes before responding. not because you’re unsure of your answer (you’re not), but because the implication hits like a freight train.

not for studying.

not as friends.

just you. just him. again.

this time, it’s a little different.

this time, he’s calling it what it is.

you don’t overthink your reply (for once). you just type yeah. i’m free and throw your phone face-down before your heart can beat out of your chest.

and when tuesday rolls around, you are twenty minutes early.

you tell yourself it’s because the weather’s nice and the walk was shorter than usual and you didn’t want to cut it close. but the truth is, you’ve been ready since noon.

you’re wearing the sweater he said he liked once, months ago, after a study session where he handed you a highlighter and your fingers brushed and you both paused like the world might end. it’s not even your warmest or your nicest sweater. it’s just... the one he looked at a little too long.

you don’t want to admit what that means.

you sit in your usual seat by the window. a small table, worn edges. your coffee in hand. no textbooks. no flashcards. just the sound of the café around you and the low simmer of anticipation in your chest.

he walks in three minutes early, which is basically scandalous by iida standards.

you glance up, and the second your eyes meet, he smiles.

it’s not his usual polite, committee-appropriate smile.

it’s something else.

something softer.

he sits down across from you like he’s been doing it his whole life.

you stare at him for a second too long.

“you’re early,” he says, like it’s a fact worth noting. his voice is gentler than usual.

“so are you.”

“a rare occurrence.”

“should i be concerned?”

he laughs—quietly, warmly. “i thought you might say that.”

you both go quiet.

not awkward quiet. just... full.

full of everything you’re not saying.

you sip your drink and hope your heart doesn’t explode.

twenty minutes in, you realize you’ve forgotten what time it is.

again.

you’re talking about something stupid—a professor you both silently hate but never speak ill of in class—and he’s mimicking their voice in a whisper, hand shielding his mouth, and you’re laughing.

like genuinely, honestly laughing.

like you don’t have a hundred things weighing you down.

he always does that. makes everything feel easier. lighter.

it’s dangerous, how much you like it.

how much you like him.

you haven’t said it. not out loud. not even to yourself.

but the truth is: you’re in trouble.

deep trouble.

because tenya iida has the power to wreck you in a way no one else ever has.

not because he’s dramatic. not because he’s charming (though he is, in that annoying, understated, golden-retriever-with-a-perfect-credit-score kind of way).

but because he’s steady.

because he means things.

because when he looks at you, it’s like you’re someone worth understanding.

and you’ve never been loved gently before.

not like this.

you walk out together.

neither of you mentions how long you stayed. it’s dark out, but neither of you cares.

you walk close, side by side. your hands brush once, then again. his fingers twitch toward yours, and you pretend not to notice—not because you don’t want it, but because you’re not sure what happens if you reach back.

you talk about nothing. and everything.

he tells you about the time his older brother accidentally dyed his hair blue with a shampoo prank and how no one in their house was allowed to mention it for an entire year.

you tell him about the time you accidentally set off a fire alarm trying to microwave leftover curry in a dorm that very explicitly prohibited strong-smelling food.

“you’re a menace,” he says, laughing.

you bump your shoulder into his. “you say that like it’s a bad thing.”

he glances at you. “i didn’t say that.”

you both stop at the crosswalk—the same one where you stood days ago.

the same one where he asked if this had been a date...

you’re not pretending anymore.

and yet.

you don’t know what to say.

you just look at him, the wind brushing through your sleeves, your fingers cold where they’re shoved into your pockets.

he looks at you.

longer than before.

long enough that your heart stumbles.

and then—quietly—he says, “can i ask you something?”

you nod. “of course.”

his voice is softer than you’ve ever heard it. careful.

“why me?”

you blink. “what?”

“why... this?” he gestures gently between you. “i know i’m not the most exciting person. i’m not particularly funny or... spontaneous.”

you frown. “iida.”

“i’m just trying to understand,” he says. “why you keep showing up.”

you want to say because i like the way you talk when you’re tired, or because your laugh makes me want to listen to every dumb story you’ve ever told.

you want to say because i’ve never felt so calm next to another person in my entire life.

instead, you say, “because when i’m with you, i don’t feel like i have to be anyone else.”

his expression shifts.

his jaw tightens. his eyes soften.

he takes a step closer.

“i don’t want to mess this up,” he says.

“you’re not.”

“i don’t want to misread it.”

you exhale, a laugh escaping despite yourself. “you’re not.”

his hand lifts, hesitates—then lands gently against your cheek.

you stop breathing.

“may i kiss you?” he asks.

you nod before your brain catches up.

“yeah,” you whisper. “you may.”

and he does.

it’s not rushed.

it’s not fiery or desperate.

it’s patient. reverent. like he’s memorizing the feeling. like he’s been waiting for the right moment and this, finally, is it.

his lips press softly against yours, and your hands lift automatically to his jacket, holding on, grounding yourself.

when you part, he leans his forehead against yours.

you’re both quiet for a moment.

then he says, “i’ve wanted to do that for a long time.”

you smile. “i could tell.”

“was i too obvious?”

“painfully.”

he laughs, arms sliding around your waist like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

“this is still new,” he says. “i know that.”

you nod.

“but i’m willing to take it slow.”

“okay.”

“i’ll be patient.”

“okay.”

he pauses. “and i’d like to take you to dinner. an actual dinner. with reservations and menus and probably overpriced appetizers.”

you grin. “are you asking me on a real date?”

he lifts your hand and presses a kiss to your knuckles.

“yes,” he says. “i’m asking.”

“then yes,” you reply. “i’m saying yes.”

you walk home hand-in-hand.

you don’t have to say anything.

it’s not pretending anymore.

and for once—finally—that feels like enough.

tell my mom we're in love | h. sero

fake dating wasn't on your holiday to-do list—until sero invited you home for tamales and chaos (3525 words)

you regretted this the moment you stepped out of the dormitory and into the sharp chill of mid-december air, a duffel bag hanging off one shoulder and your dignity already teetering on the edge. trailing beside you was hanta sero, practically vibrating with the smug energy of a man who had just talked his best friend into making the worst decision of her academic career.

and technically, he had.

somewhere between his mother's increasingly invasive matchmaking attempts and his inability to say the word "no" like a normal person, he'd decided the solution was to invent a girlfriend. and of course, of course, he'd chosen you.

"come on," he said now, as a cab idled at the curb, white exhaust curling into the crisp air like smoke from a slow-burning disaster. "tell me this won't be fun. just a little bit."

"i think i'm too emotionally aware to find this fun," you muttered, hoisting your bag into the trunk as he leaned beside you with his usual careless grace.

sero grinned—that unbothered, insufferably pretty grin that always made it harder to stay annoyed with him for long. "emotionally aware, huh? sounds like you're already getting into character."

you leveled him with a look. "if i'm your girlfriend, you're going to need to stop flirting like a golden retriever with a god complex."

"babe," he said, slipping into the backseat beside you with the kind of unearned confidence that should have come with a warning label, "flirting is literally how i survive in social settings. don't take this from me."

you stared out the window, hoping the freezing glass would cool the creeping warmth crawling up your neck. "we're not actually dating, hanta."

"right," he said, and he sounded amused, not wounded. "but we could be really good at it."

you didn't answer. he didn't press.

the cab pulled away from the dorms, and for a moment the silence between you was companionable, like it always had been. you'd known sero for years now—long enough to understand that his laid-back demeanor was as real as it was performative. he was the kind of person who made a room feel lighter just by being in it, but who also knew the weight of silence better than most people ever would.

he didn't make you feel like you had to be anyone but yourself. and that, unfortunately, was the root of the problem.

somewhere along the road from "we're just friends" to "please pretend to be my girlfriend so my mom stops trying to marry me off," things had started to shift.

not all at once. not obviously.

but they shifted.

now he was dozing beside you, his head tilted toward your shoulder, and every bump in the road made him inch closer. you should have nudged him off. you should have drawn the line.

but you didn't.

instead, you studied the soft lines of his face—the relaxed set of his mouth, the faint crease between his brows like his dreams were just a little too fast for his thoughts to catch—and you wondered what the hell you'd gotten yourself into.

by the time the cab slowed, the sun had dipped low, casting golden light over a neighborhood that looked far too idyllic to be real. sero's house was two stories of warmth and welcome: string lights curled along the porch railing, a wreath hung slightly crooked on the front door, and smoke drifted lazily from a chimney that promised something warm inside.

standing at the threshold was a woman with sharp eyes, a kind smile, and the unmistakable aura of someone who could both bake you cookies and emotionally destroy you in the same breath.

sero's mother.

you froze.

he didn't.

without hesitation, sero leaned in, brushing your hair behind your ear like it was the most natural thing in the world. his voice dipped just low enough for only you to hear. "smile like you love me."

then he reached for your hand.

his fingers, long and warm, laced effortlessly through yours.

you didn't pull away.

and that was the moment—standing at the edge of his childhood, your fingers locked in his, heart skipping in the kind of rhythm you weren't prepared for—that you realized you were in far more danger than you thought.

because part of you didn't want to let go.

the cab hadn't even rolled to a full stop before sero's mom was standing in front of it, arms crossed, eyes already locked onto her target like a seasoned general. you had seen pictures, sure—sero had shown you a few over lunch one day, swiping through images of his mom with an almost reverent fondness—but none of them did her justice.

she was radiant. that was the first word that came to mind. not in some soft, dreamy way, but in the sharp, unmistakable warmth of someone who had mastered the art of existing unapologetically. she had a scarf looped carelessly around her neck, dark hair pinned up with wisps escaping, and that immediate, unnerving energy unique to mothers who know everything before you say a word.

"hanta," she said brightly as you approached. "you took forever, mijo. i was about to call."

and then her eyes slid to you.

her whole face changed.

"qué linda," she said, stepping down toward you without hesitation. "you're even prettier than the pictures."

you opened your mouth to answer—say something polite, maybe even charming—but instead you were pulled into a hug so warm and familiar you forgot how to speak altogether.

she smelled like cinnamon and butter, like café and home. her arms wrapped around you without hesitation, solid and reassuring, and you blinked twice before realizing she wasn't letting go just yet.

she pulled back, hands on your shoulders, eyes scanning your face with curiosity. "how old are you, mija?"

"seventeen," you managed. "ua student. same class as hanta."

"top twenty," sero chimed from behind you, proud and useless.

his mom smiled wider. "good. you'll need that to keep up with him. he talks too much."

"i'm right here," sero said, offended.

"and what's your quirk, sweetheart?" she asked, guiding you inside like she owned every molecule of the house—which she probably did.

"just a luck quirk," you replied. "it's not anything big or flashy."

"flashy's overrated," she said. "flashy gets you on magazine covers, but smart keeps you alive. hanta could use some of that balance."

sero made a wounded noise. "i'm right here."

you stepped into the house and tried not to gape. it was warm and lived-in, with mismatched furniture and soft lights, and framed photos in every direction. you passed at least three different versions of baby sero—one with cake on his face, one dressed as a shark, and one in a tiny suit looking like he'd lost a bet.

you were immediately ushered to the couch, where sero flopped down beside you like he'd done this a thousand times. his arm stretched along the back of the cushions behind you, easy and casual, but you felt the heat of it like a brand against your neck.

his mom sat in the armchair across from you, one leg crossed, hands folded, expression deceptively pleasant.

"so," she said. "how long have you two been together?"

"six months," you and sero answered in unison.

your eyes met. you both smiled.

it was practiced, but god—it didn't feel like a lie.

"how'd you meet?" she asked next.

sero leaned forward like he was telling a secret. "training. she beat up kaminari. i've never recovered."

you tried not to laugh. "he followed me around for a week."

"i was courting you."

"you were loitering near vending machines."

"i was being persistent," he corrected. "it worked, didn't it?"

his mom watched you both, eyes narrowed just enough to make you sweat.

"and what do you like about my son?" she asked you, suddenly.

your mouth went dry.

sero glanced sideways, surprised.

but the answer came easy.

"he's reliable. and funny. and he listens—really listens. like you're the only person in the room."

you could feel sero's eyes on you, and the room felt warmer than it had a second ago.

"he's easy to be around," you said, a little softer now. "i feel like i can breathe near him."

a long silence stretched across the room.

then sero bumped your shoulder with his own, voice low. "you're not supposed to make me blush in front of my mom."

his mom smiled, pleased. "i like you."

you smiled back, because how could you not. "thank you."

"i made tamales," she said, rising to her feet. "sit tight. i'll get you a plate."

"do you need help—?" you started, half-standing.

"no, no. you're a guest. you sit and let yourself be adored."

she vanished into the kitchen with surprising speed.

the moment she was out of earshot, you collapsed sideways onto the couch.

"i blacked out," you whispered. "what did i even say?"

"that i'm amazing and you love being around me," sero said smugly.

you shot him a look.

he leaned a little closer, voice dropping. "also, you were adorable. you didn't have to go that hard. i almost forgot it was fake."

you didn't answer.

⊹ ࣪ ˖

dinner came after a comfortable lull in the afternoon—just enough time for you to grow used to the house's warmth, the quiet hum of kitchen sounds, and the sound of sero humming to himself as he helped his mom plate tamales. there was something undeniably domestic about it—watching him lean over the counter, sleeves pushed up, swiping a bit of masa from the corner of a dish with a grin when he thought no one was watching.

you caught yourself watching.

a little too long.

and when he turned around and caught your eye, offering you a wink that made your stomach stutter—you looked away, pretending to study the wall like it had secrets.

the house filled slowly with more noise, more feet, more voices. by the time dinner was ready, the table was surrounded by people—his siblings, all younger, all chaos incarnate. there were five in total, ranging from what looked like barely ten to maybe sixteen. all of them clearly adored sero, and all of them clearly had a thousand questions about you.

"are you really his girlfriend?" one of the younger girls asked, blinking up at you from her seat at the far end of the table.

sero, already sitting beside you, reached for your hand under the table without hesitation. "of course she is," he said easily. "she puts up with me. that's gotta mean something."

you glanced sideways, surprised by the way his thumb started tracing circles into your palm. his fingers were warm, his grip relaxed, like this was a habit and not a performance. your first instinct was to pull away—but you didn't. you let him hold on.

"do you like him?" one of the boys asked bluntly, somewhere between a dare and a test.

you looked over at sero, who was already looking at you.

and the smile that spread across his face wasn't teasing. it wasn't even smug.

it was soft.

"i do," you said honestly. "he's easy to like."

one of his sisters actually swooned.

their mother returned from the kitchen, a stack of warm plates balanced in her arms. "aye, look at you two," she said fondly, setting down the food. "you look like you've been married five years already."

sero snorted. "that's because she already tells me what to do."

"someone has to," you said, nudging his leg under the table.

his knee pressed into yours and didn't move.

the meal began in full, voices rising over each other, stories flying back and forth like birds across the table. tamales were unwrapped, passed down, devoured. rice and beans steamed in bowls at the center. someone spilled horchata and got teased for it for fifteen minutes straight.

sero kept his hand under the table the entire time.

sometimes on your knee. sometimes brushing your fingers. once, briefly, resting on your thigh with a touch so casual and confident you forgot how to breathe for a second.

"so how did you know?" his mom asked halfway through the meal, raising an eyebrow. "that you liked each other, i mean."

you blinked. "um."

sero didn't miss a beat.

"she made this face at me once," he said, totally serious. "during training. right after i got my ass handed to me. and i thought—yeah. i'd let her ruin my life."

you choked on a sip of water. "that's not what happened."

"you raised your eyebrow," he insisted, "like i was both impressive and pathetic. it was very motivating."

"you were bleeding."

"romance is about timing."

the table erupted in laughter.

"you're ridiculous," you muttered, but there was no bite to it. you felt lightheaded from smiling too much.

his younger sister leaned over the table toward you. "you make him less annoying," she said seriously. "he's, like, way less weird with you here."

"he's still weird," someone else muttered.

"hey," sero said, deeply offended. "i'm the glue of this household."

"you're the glitter glue," one of the boys shot back. "unnecessary and all over everything."

the conversation swirled, but it was warm. easy. you felt like you'd slipped into a rhythm you hadn't known you were missing. sero's family didn't make you feel like an outsider. if anything, they treated you like a permanent fixture—like they already liked you, just because he did.

and sero—he kept looking at you.

in the quiet moments between bites. when you laughed at something his brother said. when you wiped your fingers on your napkin and he passed you your drink like he'd already anticipated you'd reach for it.

"you're really good at this," you whispered during a lull, leaning in.

"at what?" he asked, voice low, chin tilted toward you.

"this," you said. "pretending."

his eyes flicked down to your mouth, just for a second.

"what can i say," he said quietly. "i'm something of an actor."

you snickered.

and then his mom called your name from across the table.

"you like dessert, mija?" she asked, already bringing out the plates.

you blinked twice before answering, forcing a smile. "of course. thank you."

sero didn't look away from you for a long time.

dinner had long ended. the noise had faded. sero's house, once pulsing with overlapping voices and clattering plates, now thrummed with a different kind of energy—low, contented, quiet.

his siblings had scattered, full-bellied and sugar-sticky, off to bedrooms and couches and wherever else they disappeared to in the evening. someone had turned on a dusty old playlist in the den, and the soft hum of vintage boleros curled through the walls like warmth that refused to die.

you stood in the hallway between the dining room and the back door, hovering in the in-between of things: of conversations and thoughts, of what was real and what had only started out that way.

you weren't sure what to do with your hands.

or your heart.

sero appeared beside you like he always did—quiet-footed and comfortably close, smelling faintly of soap and masa and something sweet from dessert you hadn't caught the name of. his sleeves were still pushed up, revealing his forearms, and you hated that you were looking at them. not because they weren't worth looking at—they were—but because it meant your guard was down. again.

"come on," he said softly. "balcony?"

you didn't answer. you just nodded and followed.

the air outside was sharp and clean. the kind of cold that wakes you up without being cruel. you wrapped your arms around yourself more out of instinct than discomfort. the balcony was small, with a windchime shaped like a lizard hanging from the overhang, and a view of soft suburban rooftops and yellow windows scattered like lanterns across the horizon.

you leaned against the wooden railing. he did the same.

neither of you spoke.

you were too full of the evening. of tamales and laughter. of too much touch under the table. of words you'd said with a smile that weren't lies—but weren't supposed to be true either.

the problem wasn't pretending.

the problem was that pretending didn't feel like pretending anymore.

you didn't know when it had changed. maybe it was gradual—each time he laced his fingers through yours without asking, or rested his hand on your thigh mid-story, or offered you a grin across the table that was so familiar, so soft, you forgot why you were here in the first place.

but it hit you now, standing beside him in the chill—this unshakable, irreversible knowledge:

you were in love with him.

god, you were in love with hanta sero.

not just in a surface-level, crush-colored way. not just in the i-like-how-he-makes-me-laugh way. it was deeper than that. older. something that had snuck in when you weren't looking and taken root so quietly you hadn't noticed until it was everywhere.

you were in love with the way he held space. with the way he listened without trying to fix you. with the way he let the world land on him lightly, and still carried it in both hands when it mattered.

you were in love with someone who didn't even know you weren't faking anymore.

you exhaled.

"you're quiet," he said, not looking at you. "regretting it already?"

you shook your head. "no. it's just... weird how easy it was. with your family."

he hummed. "they like you."

"they liked that i made you less annoying."

"that is the highest compliment in my house."

you smiled, faint. "they're sweet. loud, but sweet."

"you kept up fine."

"i think i blacked out for half of it."

"you were golden," he said, softer now. "you always are."

you turned toward him slowly.

the lights from the kitchen spilled faintly through the curtains behind you, catching just enough of his face for you to see how relaxed he looked. how present. how close.

you swallowed.

"hanta?"

he looked over at you, brows raised. "yeah?"

there was a beat of silence.

"i don't know how to lie to you," you said.

he blinked once.

then again, slower.

"what?"

"i mean," you continued, hands curling around the edge of the railing. "i've been trying. all day. and i thought i could. i thought i could pull it off—play the part, pretend—but then we got here, and your mom hugged me, and you touched my hand under the table, and i just... i don't know when it stopped being a bit."

his eyes searched your face like he was looking for something he'd already lost.

"hanta," you said again. "i'm in love with you."

his face froze.

the air between you seemed to still. the windchime didn't move. the whole world narrowed into this one pinpoint moment, bright and fragile and terrifying.

he stepped back—just barely.

"you don't have to keep pretending," he said. carefully. cautiously. "no one's watching anymore. you can drop it."

you stared at him.

"i'm not pretending," you said.

another beat. a sharp exhale.

his lips parted slightly. his brows furrowed, not in confusion, but in disbelief. in the kind of fear that came from wanting something too much and being afraid to reach for it.

"you're serious."

"i've never been more serious about anything in my life."

sero let out a long, shaky laugh. it cracked halfway through.

"say it again," he whispered.

"i'm in love with you."

and this time, you reached for him.

your fingers curled into the fabric of his hoodie, and you felt the moment he melted—slow and overwhelmed, the way something melts that's been cold for too long.

"you've got to be kidding me," he muttered, leaning into your touch. "i thought—god, i thought i was the only one losing my mind over this."

you smiled, eyes stinging.

"you weren't."

"i've been in love with you since second year," he admitted, voice breaking a little. "you kissed my cheek that one time after i carried your books back from the nurse's office, and i nearly died. like, actual cardiac arrest."

"that was a year ago."

"welcome to my long, slow descent into insanity."

you laughed, quiet and ridiculous.

and then he kissed you.

it wasn't rushed. wasn't showy. it wasn't a fireworks-and-credits-roll kiss.

it was the kind that happened in doorways, in hallways, in quiet rooms where hearts beat too loud. the kind that changed nothing and everything all at once.

he kissed you like he meant it.

you kissed him like you'd been waiting your whole life to.

when you finally pulled apart, his forehead rested against yours.

"you're real?" you whispered, breath catching.

"i better be," he said. "otherwise you've just confessed to a figment of your imagination."

you swallowed a grin.

his thumb traced your cheek.

"i thought this would end in disaster," he said quietly. "that pretending would ruin everything."

"and?"

"and now i don't want it to end at all."

you leaned in, bumping your nose against his.

"then it doesn't have to."

he smiled, and kissed you again.

not like he was pretending.

like he was home.

We need more walkable cities. I am so tired of my transportation turning to aquatic life. It’s so inconvenient.

No One But You

Male Yandere x Reader

Still trying to keep a low profile, you are once again out in the city. Just one random face in a sea of strangers. But by now, you've learned that it's wise not to dismiss what feels like "just being paranoid". Someone is following you, and you're starting to miss your weird internet stranger...

Parts: [ 1 / 2 / x ]

[content warning for depicted violence and mentions of violence/murder and sexual situations, not for readers under 18]

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ✦ · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

It’d been a long time since he’d lost control like that. 

Staring at the drain, he silently watched the water circle it. He couldn’t remember if he’d ever killed someone if it wasn’t to sleep. It felt… different. 

He’d killed someone just because he was mad.

Because he hated them.

Because they got in the way of you. 

And…

He would do it again.

He’d had the thought to himself that the reason he wanted you with him, wanted you at all, was so that he could sleep. That the intense need he felt was some baser instinct of his to help control the things he couldn’t, to make his life easier. 

But now that you were gone, killing didn’t seem as… effective as it used to be.

The voices were already creeping back in, and he felt exhausted. And even with the blood of his former employer still all over the motel bathroom, sleep felt just as out of reach.

Had he built up some kind of resistance to his old band-aid solution?

Now, it looked like you were the only thing that would work, maybe… Or was this something else entirely?

Maybe…

He just needed you.

The heat of you next to him in the night. The stillness of his thoughts as he studied every detail of your face. The steady rhythm of your breathing as you held him close.

The beat of his heart under his hand as he steadied himself against the shower wall.

His other hand creeping down his chest, he closed his eyes as the uncomfortably hot water ran down the same path. The steam was becoming a bit suffocating, but it felt amazing on his sore muscles.

His breath caught in his throat when it was your hand replacing his own, drifting over his stomach, the sensation soothing his nerves after overextending himself.

It was you.

Calming the voices. 

Consoling him. 

Praising him.

Calling him yours.

Your lips grazing his jaw as your hand trailed down, your fingers ghosting over his skin.

He choked out a gasp as you whispered in his ear, your fingers wrapping around him.

You told him he looked so cute, all flustered, Colin gasping and panting as you bit his neck.

“Don’t… “ He cried out, biting his lip. “Don’t st… stoooop…”

A soft chuckle was all he could hear, his own moans and whimpers drowned out by the tinny hiss of the shower head.

It was all too much… You were talking to him the whole time, telling him exactly what he needed to hear to feel just a little bit more. More more more… He needed something, something else… It was right there. He just had to… had to-

You told him to let go, to give in to you. He chased after that feeling, his nails digging into his shoulder. You…

You were everything to him. He wanted… He wanted you. It wasn’t enough, but it was too much. Too much…

“Yes…” He moaned, muffled as he pressed his mouth to his shoulder, feeling so damn overwhelmed. “Please please please PLEASE-!!”

A strangled, choked sob escaped his throat, it felt like his whole body was in spasms, and he wished you were there to hold onto. He wished it was your shoulder he was biting instead.

“F-fuuuuck” He mumbled around his own skin. “I can’t… it won’t stop…”

His legs trembled and almost buckled under him, his hips bucking into a painfully empty space where you should’ve been, not just his hand. Panting hard, blood dribbled from his mouth onto his chest, circling the drain alongside everything else.

“Fuck…” he panted, his wet hair clinging to his face. 

He felt like it’d been a long time since he’d done that. He wondered to himself if it’d always felt that intense…

Or was it because of you?

The water was getting cold. Maybe it had been for a bit. He couldn’t remember. 

His thighs burned, but it felt… nice. So much warmer and almost… comforting compared to the burn he felt after a kill. He let the water roll over him for another minute or so to cool him down. 

You were gone. You’d been gone that whole time, but the you that he’d seen, that he’d felt… they were gone now too. He stared at his own hands, wishing yours would come to him again. 

You were… changing something inside him. He’d been so empty for the longest time, something about you-everything about you was filling him up, making him into something new.

He was thinking a bit more clearly lately. Just enough to… remember how to be a person again. Or at least… enough of a person to realize he needed to calm down. To get his head on straight long enough to figure out a few things.

. . .

“Yeah…” he sighed, pulling back the curtain. The floor, the sink, the mirror… Everything was still covered in blood. “There’s still so much to do…”

. . .

“It’s not like it’s the first time I’ve cleaned up…” he sighed, grabbing a towel for himself. “I know how to get rid of this. I need my tools…”

. . .

“There won’t be anything left when they come back.” He squeezed his eyes tight in frustration. “They won’t see. I wouldn’t scare them like that…”

There was a lot to do. But something stuck out to him.

“I guess I lost my job.” He hummed to himself. But spying what was left of his boss, he had an idea. 

Being a small part of the motel’s business, he knew enough to keep things running, to keep up standing reservations with big regulars and creeps. 

And given the kind of customers the boss catered to, it wouldn’t be… unthinkable that he’d crossed the wrong people and those same people were the new management of the place, the most hostile of all hostile takeovers. 

And, if they just so happened to imply that the old boss was hiking up the rates and a bit too loose-lipped to the wrong people, which in fairness, he was… They probably wouldn’t mind staying again, if promises were made. 

Of course, all new staff would be employed. No one left from the old regime. New cleaners, new front desk guy, so Ryan had to be let go. Same way his boss was, as far as they would know.

He would have to be a few new people, behind the scenes. But the money would all be his now, and with the right words to the right people, the real him would still go unnoticed. He could take just enough bookings to get by, plus it would lessen the chances of getting found out. 

Chris could just not show up to his shift at the bar, and eventually they’d just assume he wasn’t coming back. He had too much to do here.

After all, the money would go a long way towards finding you.

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ✦ · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

The money you’d gotten had been some relief to your situation. The last few days had been… okay. 

You’d used some of it to get a gym membership in cash and under a fake name. It was a cheap, reliable way to get a regular shower and a locker to store some of your stuff that was too risky . The money would also go a long way at a few different cheap hostels for about a month or so. You could afford some cheap food and the occasional trip to a laundromat, the one downtown with the broken cameras, but all of it was just a temporary fix.

You still had to hide like a scared animal. Your old life was so far away now, it almost seemed like a completely different reality. There was no looking for a permanent place, no job search, no trying to figure out what you would do long term. Though that was probably the smartest thing to do, it just… wasn’t really possible then.

Anyone you spoke to could be the person that would later realize who you were and who was looking for you and then it would all be over. So you never walked the same route anywhere, and you never stayed anywhere more than an hour, all the while watching doorways and jumping at every sound.

You didn’t used to be so jumpy. 

Back when things were normal. 

You tried not to let your mind wander often, because if you did, it usually went back to the same place.

The small motel room.

The safe and secure feeling. 

The warmth of him against you.

The sound of him mumbling in his sleep.

Squeezing your eyes shut, you tried to tell yourself it was for the best. You would’ve had to leave eventually. That you couldn’t stay in one place for too long.

No matter how safe and hidden away you felt you’d been. 

No matter how much you maybe kind of regretted leaving.

No matter how much you missed him. 

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ✦ · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

It wasn’t long until things started to seem off.

First, it was this instinctual fear, the cold, panicked feeling of someone looking at you from somewhere you couldn’t see. 

In the past, you would’ve just dismissed it as feeling anxious. But lately, being paranoid had been your saving grace as of late. 

A few days later, some of your things in the gym locker seemed just slightly out of place, just enough to set off alarm bells.

Not long after that while walking to your hostel, you noticed footsteps behind you. Alert to their presence but not initially suspicious, you slowed your pace just a bit. Sure enough, the unseen stranger down the sidewalk slowed, their steps falling in line with yours. Another test, your pace a tiny bit faster, and suddenly it was obvious someone was following you.

Quickly cutting through an alley at random, you circled back a few blocks and headed in a completely new direction, successfully shaking your tail. 

You canceled your stay through your phone, booking another on the other side of town and taking only side streets to get there. You didn’t know who had been behind you, but you didn’t get to sleep that night, your mind racing with the worst possibility.

If it had been some random mugger or worse, it would almost be a relief. But you couldn’t help but suspect the obvious. 

That someone had found you.

In the voices and noises of the city streets, you could swear you heard your name. No one was calling out to you, it was more of a hushed whisper, like someone was noting where you were or telling someone else about you. It was so faint you almost wondered if you imagined it. But that wasn’t the way to think when you were actively hiding yourself away. 

Little things kept piling up, and you were more on edge than ever. But there wasn’t much you could do about it other than try to stay hidden.

Every time you had to go out into the city, it was agonizing. You were no longer just scared, you were tired.

Tired of always having your guard up. Tired of lying awake at night, wondering if tomorrow would be the last day you’d be able to hide. Tired of all of it.

You didn’t deserve any of it, you didn’t do anything wrong…

But you still were being made to suffer like you were, and you didn’t know how much longer you could do it.

You were leaning against the side of a beaten-up food truck downtown, waiting on your order. No cameras, no names, cash only, and you couldn’t get cornered. A quick getaway was easier here than if you’d gone indoors somewhere with exits that could get blocked. 

But it meant that the cold air was beginning to bite at your fingertips. It wouldn’t be too long until you were warming them up with your order as you walked back to your room for the night. Your breath would have to do for now, wispy puffs of it slipping from between your fingers and up into the air. It was a quiet moment where you could just breathe.

But it didn’t last for long.

“I knew it.”

Your first instinct was to run. You practically threw yourself off the side of the truck when your frantic gaze finally found where the voice had come from. 

But you froze, your voice caught in your throat.

It was Colin.

“I thought that was you.” he seemed so relieved, like he’d been so… worried?

And there was that smile you couldn’t stop thinking about, and you could feel that same familiar warmth in your chest, despite the cold.

But you felt stuck. How was he here? In a city with millions of people in it, what were the chances that the two of you would run into each other again?

“It’s good to see you.” He stood in place, maybe seeing how nervous you seemed. “Are you… good?”

You didn’t know how to answer him. You wanted to talk with him, maybe just to be near him again, maybe just to hear his voice. But it wasn’t safe out in the open. You didn’t know who exactly was after you, or what they wanted with you, but that meant you also didn’t know if they would hurt Colin if they saw you with him. 

He took your silence for what it was. 

“Hey, are you free? Can we talk?” He asked, looking hopeful.

A beat, then you nodded. But you told him it couldn’t happen right then. You checked your phone, asking him if you could meet him in an hour.

“Okay!” He quickly agreed, not even trying to hide his nervous smile. “Where should we meet?”

Just to be safe, not to say it out loud, you told him to meet you where the two of you’d first met, your “special place”. He grinned, saying the phrase to himself under his breath as started to walk off.

He froze, thinking something over, before stepping back to you quickly and taking your hand in his, giving it a squeeze.

“Promise you’ll come?” You’d never seen what could almost be called “puppy dog eyes” on a grown man before, but they were practically pleading with you as he held your hand. 

It was cheesy, but your heart raced. You hoped he didn’t notice you trying to avoid eye contact.

You agreed, and though he seemed reluctant to let go, eventually he did, and you watched him slip away into the crowd.

A few minutes later, the food truck vendor called your number, and normally you weren’t one to eat on the move, but you felt like you needed to get moving. 

It was a bit of a trek to the motel, and you took a lot of side streets jut in case, but there weren’t a lot of places in the city where you knew you wouldn’t be spotted. And a lot of the public transportation had cameras, so walking was really your only option nowadays. But you also just… wanted to go back there again. Once you finally got there, it all just felt…

Right. 

You’d been so on edge the last few weeks, you never really felt safe anywhere. Every new room or building was just a place you could exist. But here, you felt like you knew what everything meant. Like it was all going to be okay.

And you knew it was because of him. 

Just like that first night, he answered the door, but he was almost like a different person. 

He was still kind of a mess, but there was something in his eyes. He looked less… lost. Kinder. Much less nervous. But the way he looked at you had changed the most. 

You weren’t afraid of him, or what he might do. Not anymore. 

“I didn’t know you were coming, so this is all I have…” He handed you a mug, the little pod coffee machine having just finished up. 

You smiled, telling him it was okay. The coffee was wonderful after you’d been out in the cold. He was making a cup for himself now, trying to choose between the little pod flavors. 

The machine whirred away as it made his coffee, he looked like he was trying to say something, but it seemed like he finally tried because as he stirred in a bit of sugar, he let it out. 

“I… I really missed you.” He muttered, maybe hoping you wouldn’t hear him. But he perked up with this bright, dumbstruck look when you finally said that you’d missed him too. 

“You did?” He seemed genuinely surprised, like he would’ve never expected you to say that in a million years. “That… that makes me kinda happy, won’t lie…”

A minute of somewhat awkward silence as he finished preparing his coffee, you still sipping away at yours with a comfortable smile behind the mug where he couldn’t see. It had been a bit since you’d been able to smile like this.

“How, uh… How are you holdin’ up these days?” he asked, plopping down next to you. 

The almost automatic, small talk response of “Fine” nearly slipped past your lips, but even the thought of saying it felt so… upsetting? Wrong? Like you didn’t want to lie to him.

Colin seemed to pick up on the change, because his face clouded with worry. Setting his coffee down, his hand crept towards yours, hesitation, then his fingers brushed yours. Despite yourself, despite all your uncertainty, you laced your fingers with his.

Everything just kept spilling out of you. You finally told him about everything. How you’d just been a normal person living a normal life and then it all changed in an instant. How you’d been out on the streets for a long while, how you were hiding from someone-or maybe a few someones, you weren’t sure-who wanted to hurt you? Or track you down, at the very least. There was so much you still didn’t know.

And how you just couldn’t keep it up. How every day felt worse than the last and it was just so hard to keep going, or… to keep finding a reason to at all. 

Suddenly, you were pulled against him, pressed into his chest as he held you close to him. A pang of guilt in your gut, you hadn’t meant to dump that particular feeling onto him. But, when you’d reflexively tried to apologize, you couldn’t even finish the word “sorry” before he held on tighter, shaking his head.

He held you for a long while. It wasn’t uncommon for him to have fallen asleep to the sound of your heartbeat, and you could see the appeal now. When you finally pulled back, you’d calmed down a bit. With him so close, you really got a good look. 

It was impossible not to notice the state of him. His disheveled, greasy hair and the slump to his posture, the horribly tired look in his eyes. The dark circles were just as bad as the day the two of you’d met.

You asked him.

Did he not find someone else?

“Someone else?” he asked. He seemed confused.

Someone else to sleep beside, after you were gone.

His palm held your cheek so gently. His hands were a tiny bit cold, but you found that you didn’t mind. 

“I didn’t look,” he sighed. “Ever since you left, I’ve just been… surviving.”

That same pang of guilt hit you. Did he really not? Or was he just trying to seem…

Loyal? Committed? But why?

“I was really hoping I’d see you again.” His hand left you, and you hated how you wished it wouldn’t. “You just left without saying goodbye.”

Some part of you was still trying to push him away, telling yourself that you didn’t owe him a goodbye. That it wasn’t your fault if he had felt…

Disappointed? Empty? Maybe even a bit abandoned… 

It felt both wrong and cheap when you offered a simple apology, when you told him you didn’t know if you could do it when he was there. But…

“But you had to move on.” he offered, a tired smirk silently telling you he understood. Or at least you hoped. “I was kind of worried though… Your note made it sound like you were in some kinda trouble…which I guess was true.”

The note that you’d rewritten so many times that day, you’d been worried you’d run out of time before Colin got back that day. It had so briefly explained your situation, and what you thought he needed, and maybe deserved, to know. 

Colin, 

I have to leave, and you’re reading this, so I’m already gone, I hope.

It’s not safe for me to stay in one place for too long. 

I want to, but I can’t stay.

I felt safe here, with you. You don’t know how much that meant to me these days.

I know you’ll find someone to help you sleep, but it can’t be me anymore.

Thank you for helping me,

And when you’d been about to sign your name at the bottom, you’d worried, maybe needlessly, that it would leave a sign of where you’d been. If the wrong person could see it, Colin could get caught in the middle of all this. 

But it felt wrong not to.

So you did.

It was just a simple thing meant to be a simple goodbye, to make leaving him seem easier. But it hadn’t gotten any easier. 

Colin seemed uneasy with how quiet you were being. He seemed to be searching for what to say, but he was getting… sidetracked. 

You noticed his eyes kept darting down, then sharply meeting your gaze with a few flustered blinks, like he was trying so hard not to be obvious. 

He was watching your lips. And when your eyes lowered with an amused grin, you swore he blushed all the way to his chest.

“S-sorry, I didn’t mean nothin’ by it. You… You just, well, more like I just got uh…”

You offered one word: Distracted? And he squeezed his eyes shut in a panic, lips pressed in a thin line as he dragged a hand down his face. 

You didn’t know where it was coming from, but you boldly asked him:

Do I distract you?

“Yes.”

You froze, wondering if you’d heard him right. His eyes were avoiding yours, but his words were more direct than you’d ever heard from him. 

“I can’t stop thinking about you…” He muttered behind his hand, still looking away. “ I never stopped.”

It was such an uncharacteristically forward thing for him to say that for a moment, you just froze. While you were still processing it, he kept going. 

“I’ve lost so much of myself. I barely knew who I was anymore. But with you…” His breath was shaky, and he was idly tugging at a loose thread in the bedspread. “With you, I can feel myself becoming… a person again.”

Before you could ask him what he meant by that, he still wasn’t finished. 

“If you leave, everything… it’ll all go back.” he muttered. “Back to what it was, who I would be… I… I don’t want to go back to that. You’re the only thing keeping me here.”

You questioned: Here?, your eyes darting to the room around the two of you. 

“No!” He sounded pained, dipping his head in exasperation, looking so worn down. “No… no, here. Here.” 

He held his head in his hand, breathing heavier.

“It’s been so long since I’ve been here, really fully here, w-without anything creeping in.” The room was so eerily, suffocatingly quiet apart from his forced words. “If I go back there now, it’ll be so much harder to find my way back. Here. To you.”

You weren’t sure you really understood the panic in his words, but if you being here really was helping him, even a bit…

Taking his hand in yours, your thumb grazed the back of his hand as you figured out what to say. 

“I need you…” he whispered, looking almost ashamed of himself.

You told him the same. You needed him. And that was the truth. 

His eyes were wide, and then it was your turn to avoid him looking at you.

And… more than that… 

You felt your face getting hot, but you pressed on and said it.

More than that, you wanted him. 

You felt his hand on your cheek, and his lips swiftly pressed to yours. 

It was intense and sudden, but it was true. You wanted him. Grabbing his shirt, you pulled him closer, softly moaning against his lips.

“I want you… It’s been so long… since I wanted anyone… Anything.” he gasped between each kiss. 

Somehow, you knew what he meant. Running for so long, wanting someone… something, was practically a luxury. You had to focus on what you needed, what would keep you alive and safe. 

But Colin…

Needing him was easy. 

You wanted every bit of him. 

He pulled back, just enough to pepper your cheek, your jaw, your neck, your shoulder with those same desperate kisses. 

“Stay…” he pleaded, pressing himself close to you. “Please… stay with me. It hurts…”

He held your hand to his chest, and you could feel how hard his heart was pounding. His head dropped to your shoulder, the heat of his breath on your neck.

“It hurts when you’re not with me… When you disappeared, it felt like my heart got ripped out. Everything was so… numb.”

He kissed at your neck, pressing in further when you scrunched up at the sensation. 

“I won’t let you go again.” He muttered into your skin, his teeth grazing it as he panted. “Stay with me… here.”

His lips on yours again, his hand crept to your thigh. Hesitant. Waiting for some sign of your discomfort or rejection.

But it never came.

You wrapped your arms around the back of his neck, pulling him with you as you leaned back. He pulled back, still panting, his eyes searching your face.

You told him to stop worrying. That you weren’t going anywhere.

And that was all he needed.

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ✦ · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

“Are you up?” A soft voice called to you, the light of the new morning spilling into the room through the blinds. 

Half-awake, you pressed yourself against his chest, tucking yourself further into the arms wrapped around you. 

You stirred at the laugh he couldn't help but let out, a deep rumble in his chest under your head. Running his fingers through your hair, you seemed to settle at his touch, sighing softly against him. He wondered if you were really asleep or just being stubborn. 

“You’re holdin’ on tight… such a  cuddlebug… Bug. My lil’ lovebug.” he muttered to himself, a hand rubbed soft, little circles in the small of your back. “… It’s hard to believe you’re actually mine, bug. All mine…”

He kissed the top of your head, and you smiled a little bit in your sleep. He had to bite his free hand to keep it under control, to keep it from touching you like he had that night. He missed your noises, the face you made when he kept getting you so close and then slowing down again, hearing you beg and plead for something you were too wound up to really put into words. 

He hoped you would stay here with him this time.

He wanted you to be his, but he… he wasn’t sure he wanted to force you. Not yet at least.

He’d already crossed a line he couldn’t come back from. And he was going to keep that to himself. If you ever found out…

You’d been so hard to find.

He’d spent weeks putting out feelers for you. Looking around places to get cheap, warm food and a bed for the night. You stayed away from places with a lot of cameras and anywhere you had to be I.D.’d, so you weren’t gonna get found like that.

Using his new management persona, he’d asked around the bigger crime folks the old boss was associated with if anyone was trying to find you. 

And eventually, it all paid off. 

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ✦ · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

A few days earlier…

In an “office” downtown, which was really more of a crappy apartment above a seedy massage parlor, Colin met a man.

His business associates called him “The P.I.”. Whispers in the wrong circles said that this was the guy you hired when you wanted to find someone, but couldn’t risk a paper trail. He wasn’t cheap, and he was willing to get his hands dirty, but he usually got the job done. And discreetly at that. It helped that he wasn’t a real private investigator. Just some asshole who could get shit done.

“Now we can discuss things properly.” Colin sighed, wiping his knife on his jacket lining. 

“I noticed you following them, and it was just too easy to follow you back.” He laughed. “And some contacts of mine said that you advertise yourself as a P.I., but really you’re a killer…”

But The P.I. didn’t respond. Or rather, he couldn’t.

“Now, I dunno your side of the story. Maybe you’re just some hired gun protecting your boss by tying up some loose ends. Maybe it’s person? Maybe you loved them and they rejected you, do you have a hard time takin’ no for an answer, my guy? Maybe someone else loved them and used you to get them back, whether they want to or not.”

He walked around to the back of the man, gasping on the floor, clutching at his neck.

“Hell, maybe you’re like me. Maybe you just want to kill. Maybe the thought of their blood between their fingers is the only thing that makes you feel alive. Part of me can understand that. Maybe…”

He groaned, crouching down.

“Maybe maybe maybe maybe…” Colin muttered, shaking his head. Dragging a hand down his face, skin tugging down with it, somehow soothed his tired eyes. “Too many unknowns, too many fuckin’ variables here. I’m done, ya know? With you gone, my little bug’ll feel safe. That’s all I give a shit about.”

The man’s eyes were darting around, like he was still trying to find a way out of this alive.

“Now… maybe- god, there’s that fuckin’ word again… But you might have friends, out there somewhere. They might want to get revenge, or finish what you started, for whatever the reason. So, nothing personal. But I think I’ll just…”

A sudden stab to the man’s gut, and a wet, gurgled scream somehow managed to escape.

“Yeah, I think I’ll use you to… send a message.”

. . .

He usually wasn’t one for theatrics in his kills. No fuss, no muss. They usually just “disappeared”. He had no impulsive, childish desires to play with them or open them up to see what made them tick.

You wouldn’t know it, looking at his handiwork here. 

He made a mess. Nothing too dark, like a weirdo art project to taunt whoever would find him and care. But enough to say that whoever had hired him shouldn’t have.

He found a “file” on you, if you could even call it that. Photos, habits, ways to find you, names you might go by… How you were meant to be killed. Someone had hired that man. He sighed, not remorseful, but almost annoyed. He’d gotten a lot of… joy? Something like that, out of imagining he was killing a former lover of yours or another stalker, competition either way. 

But, this also (annoyingly) meant that this wasn’t over. 

A pause. His thoughts raced as he put the pieces together.

This meant…

This meant that you still needed him.

He’d come here with the intention of keeping you safe, he knew that. He’d considered not telling you he’d come here, or what he’d done, so you’d stay scared. Uneasy. Dependent. 

So you’d stay with him. Lie next to him at night, hold him, be held by him.

But now, he wouldn’t need to lie…

Maybe… 

Maybe… you’d even love him.

He smiled, biting his lip, your face the only thing he could picture. He’d never felt so… light. So… happy? Like the thought of you made him so detached from everything else in the world, tethered by you to everything he was or would ever be. You were everything.

This was love. It had to be.

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ✦ · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

Someone was looking for you. The details were under wraps, but someone out there was desperate to find you, and he knew that they wanted you dead. 

And they had a rough idea of where you were. 

He needed you. He wanted you. And once he knew why you were so closed off, why you’d built up those walls, he’d had an idea.

He would keep his eyes on you and anyone else after you, and steer them in the wrong direction. No one else was going to touch you.

So making you a little more afraid would leave you no option but to come back to him. 

You needed someone to trust. And he needed you to trust him. 

In the time you’d left him, whenever he’d see you freeze in your tracks on the street, trying not to let on how scared you were at whatever you did or didn’t really hear, his chest ached. He wanted to be with you, holding your hand, letting you know he was yours, that you’d be okay. But he couldn’t, back then.

Not until he was sure you were his. For good.

And he’d done it! He’d led you back to him. You were lying against him and he could feel your body heat, listen to the sound of your breathing, watch the rise and fall of your chest. And just as he'd felt before, he felt his muscles relax, his eyes felt heavy... You were here. And everything was exactly as it should be.

“You’re mine, Bug.” He kissed the top of your head, holding you in his arms. “I’m never lettin' you go again…”

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ✦ · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

this took FOREVER lol

it just kept gettin longer and longer, and then i kept having to go back and re-read my own writing to make everything at all coherent D:

but it's done! more Colin writing could happen, but this is the end of the "main" story. i will take writing suggestions/requests for Colin and his Bug, if only to get the creative juices flowing again

the nsft scene at the beginning is as explicit as im gonna get without like a sperate nsfw account i can verify ages on lol, i don't write a lot of straight up smut, and i like that kind of writing when things are more alluded to rather than relying on over-describing everything with words that make my little ace brain feel fried 😐 (it's not that bad lol, but i know some of y'all ain't 18, and trying to purge/verify 1000+ people sounds exhausting)

followers/reader who asked to be tagged, i remembered y'all :3 :

@lost-in-the-night-skiess @unabridgedjournalsofaloser @iamapotatoe @fem-dom-roze @caged-birdies-blog @fandangoballs @ameliachastain @ssak-i @thigh-o-saur @sharkcravingcables @btsgangleader @httpsgiaiko @satoru2716 @greatwitchsongsinger

(hopefully that's everybody)

im pretty sure this is all well and edited, but knowing me i'll re-read it again and find a typo or an unfinished sentence and fix it.

until next time ✌️

-minty

Ghost: Do you want to play 20 questions? Y/N: Sure! Y/N: What's your favourite colour? Ghost, laser fucking focused: Triangle. Do you love me?

Try the Priest

Suguru x f!reader

summary: Your best friend, Suguru Geto, has a warrant on his head. You hadn't heard from him since then, and you thought your friendship was as good as dead. So why is he on your front porch?

Warning: angst, spoilers, imposing Suguru

AN: So, I wanted to try something new. It’s not heavily proofread or flowy so please lemme know what you think. Not sure if I’ll continue with a part 2 yet

Someone you’d considered your friend.

Went to classes with. Assisted in missions with. Fought alongside—taking down a variety of curses. Patching each other up after particularly grueling missions. Sharing many late night hang out. Staying up late reading shitty quotes from your favorite terrible books. Laughing til your sides ached and tears pooled your eyes. Braiding his hair. Telling him secrets you’d never shared—not even with Satoru.

And it came with the territory.

Doing your best to pull him up from his down in the dumps energy. Noticing him sinking deeper into his mangled thoughts. Hugging him and telling him you were there for him if he ever needed. Begging him to just talk to you, and feeling utterly worthless when you couldn’t genuinely cheer him up. When it seemed he couldn’t confide in you. When it seemed he didn’t think of you the way you’d thought of him. Putting those feelings aside, because you couldn’t stand to see him so unhappy. Bringing him food when it seemed he just couldn’t remember to eat—long-since losing the urge. His mind lingering on the taste of each consumed curse. In his moments of hysteria, when he was curled up on your mattress—so lost and broken that you hardly recognized the man you once knew—he’d would finally confess those thoughts swirling in his mind.

Suguru Geto was someone you considered your best friend.

But you no longer recognized the man on the camera before you. The pale walls closing in on you. Photos strewn on corkboard. The man, you’d heard, slaughtered a village of people. assuming the leader role in an infamous cult. The same cult who incentivized Riko Armani’s death only months prior. You weren’t the only one absorbing this information, but it felt so personal. His betrayal. His defection. His indifference to you and the others.

But, more than anything, you’d felt so very guilty. The man you called your best friend—your closest friend, hadn’t relied on you in his darkest moments. Not really. You blamed yourself for this. For the deaths of hundreds. The look of pure agony on your second best friends face when he’d heard the news. Your lack of intervention when you’d seen him spiraling off the rocker. When he’d utter the word ‘filthy monkeys’ under his breath, like a broke record sputtering out. You been the only one around him during those times. When he’d lost all that weight, developing those dark circles on his normally handsome face. You had seen the signs, where even Satoru might not have. But you hadn’t thought he’d form an outlet like this. He’d lash out like this. You couldn't have known. They were both grieving in their own ways, after all.

‘—SUGURU GETO FLED. IN ACCORDANCE TO ARTICLE 9 OF THE JUJUTSU REGULATIONS, HE IS NOW CONSIDERED A CURSE USER AND SUBJECT-TO EXECUTION.’

You instinctively tune out the notice. Numbness seeping into your very fiber. The cold, frigid air of the underground cellar surrounding you. You’d never thought there’d be a day, not even in the deep recesses of your mind, that the righteous sweetheart, Suguru Geto, would be subject to an execution order. Let alone become the cause of hundred of innocent deaths, and the fear behind many. You desperately wanted to talk to him. Desperately wanted to see him again. Ask him if it was true. If it wasn’t a ploy to jerk the chains of the special grade sorcerers. But you were also hit with the small, yet so present, urge to ignore it. To pretend you hadn’t heard it and assume nothing was amiss. That this wasn’t actually happening. And that Suguru was lounging at your apartment, probably hogging the space of your couch. Taking over your bed space just to get on your nerves. Scavenging the snacks you secretly kept for him in your fridge. Or scrolling mindlessly through his phone at your kitchen table, teasingly asking you what took you so long to get back.

But that isn’t where you were. And that wasn’t what was going to happen. And Suguru Geto was a notorious murderer at large. He was as good as dead, along with those he now associates with.

In the months following, you…survived. You’d often have Satoru or Shoko over, they surprisingly took it better than you had. Satoru especially pain closer attention to your actions. Likely in response to missing all of the signs with Suguru. Or maybe because he knew just how close you two had been. You’d often zone out for days. Satoru would shovel spoonfuls of strawberry cake into your mouth, insisting that at least it was something. And at least you got your calories. You found yourself mistaking their presence, on more than one occasion, for Suguru’s. Which would lead to another breakdown that’d require fussing over. But you’ll give yourself credit here. You’d finally,after several long grueling months, set into your previous rhythm. You didn’t require as much maintenance—feeding and cleaning yourself. And you needed much less reassurance—no he wasn’t dead, yet.

Then you saw him. The shadow of a man that had been impersonating Suguru, was now restored to his full former glory. You’d almost thought you’d saw a ghost, opening the late night knocks like that. Standing right next to your pot of camellias, holding a few letters seemingly from your mailbox. A small grin crossing his face, as those eyes lit up oh-so-slightly at your appearance at the door.

Feeling far to nostalgic for comfort.

He looked good. Healthier. Stronger. You wanted to feel scared. Wanted your body to match your mind, to flee from this terror of a man that’s been causing you so much grief lately. But your body just didn’t respond to him that way. Refused to.

You felt a sigh of relief leave your lips, unwittingly, as you stared up into those purple eyes. You thought you’d never see those again. You thought the next time would be when he’d be lying on a steel table, draped in white linens. No—not again. Never alive.

“Suguru” you say to yourself, words nearly a whisper, with disbelief coating each syllable. He nods at you, his lips never dropping that eye capturing smile. “In the flesh.”

You stare at him for a moment, not sure how to react. Why was he here?

“What…what are you doing here?” Your voice strained, and though you didn’t want to admit it, you could feel the back of your throat well up slightly. You knew if you were t careful, you’d revert to the you from months before. You seemed to catch him off guard with your word, as he looked away, having the gal to come off shy.

“Can I come in?” After a second, you nod, peaking your head around the doorframe—your apartments walkway, not seeing a soul in sight. He stood firm as you come within touching distance of him, cautiously peering the corners, before taking a few steps aside to let him in.

As he steps through your front door, you’re left feeling…small. Unbearably so. He was always tall, but you’d never seen him so imposing. The Buddhist priest attire, though not entirely surprising, was so new. So different. And all the same, it made him much more intimidating. You continue stepping back a few paces as he makes his way inside, before he closes the door himself. He carries himself to your living room, your floor plan memorized. He’d been there—practically lived there—enough times in the years you’d known him.

This wasn’t a man you knew.

“Geto, you shouldn’t be here.” He gave small acknowledgement to the distinct line you drew in your words. You speech painfully formal, your tone a pressed politeness. The only hint of irritation showing in his shoulders and the way his smile tightened. Your name—your first name, fell from his lips in absolute familiarity. “Its been a while.”

You stare at him dumbfounded for a second, as he makes his way to your couch, settling in. As if you’d invited him in for an afternoon cup of tea. His energy took up the whole room, looking so out of place. He wasn’t stupid. He knew what he was doing.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

“And yet, here I am.”

“Why—why are you here, Geto.”

His eye finally trail back to you at the sound of your voice spitting his last name out, so coldly. He’d been taking in the space, searching for changes in his surroundings. Searching for changes in you.

“I can’t just visit an old friend?” Your arms tighten around yourself in a self soothing gesture. Nails biting into your skin. You pull your gaze from him, not able to maintain the somewhat defiant stare.

“You can’t just show up unannounced. If they find you here—“

“Still worrying about me?”

“It’s dangerous for you to be here. Not for you. Not for me. You should g—“

“I missed you.”

The words stalled your thought process. The words ringing in the air, not settling properly. He wasn’t the Suguru you remember. He was entirely different. But those words still carried that familiar softness, the one he’d always reserved for you or Satoru. The ones that never failed to melt your heart, and make you cave.

“You…missed me?” The silence strung through the air. Buzzing. His grin grew at the hesitation through your voice. The confusion. He leaned back into the couch, taking a lax stance that didn’t fit the unwelcome atmosphere. Far too confident in your opinion.

“Of course I missed you. Did you think I wouldn’t?” As if he wasn’t a mass murderer. As if he hadn’t left you and Satoru.

“I…” you stalled again. Just what were you supposed to say to that? To him? After all this time.

“Why are you really here, Geto.”

“Suguru.” You stare at him, in disbelief, eyes narrowing. “It’s Suguru. Don’t act like you don’t know me anymore.” He’s saying this as if it were the most important thing in the world. Not the fact that he was a wanted man.

“I don’t know you. And I don’t know why you’re here. Leave before I-“

“Before you what? Kill me?” The words were a sharp taunt. He knew you wouldn’t. Knew you couldn’t. Your chest tightened at the thought, his words a blade pressed against your neck. You muttered out, “Don’t make this harder than it has to be.”

And, ignoring you, he persists. “You won’t though. Will you?” The challenge there. “That’s not who you are.”

“You don’t decide who I am.” You nearly hiss, “you of all people don’t get to walk in here, acting like nothing has changed. Like everything’s okay—like we’re okay.” His eyes darkened at your words, and his smile faded.

“I never said nothing has changed. But that doesn’t mean we can’t talk. After everything we’ve been through-“

“Everything we've been through?” His words felt so thoughtless at the time, not entirely realizing the provoking nature. You were practically shouting at this point. “You mean everything you walked away from? Everything you destroyed?”

He didn’t even flinch. His voice calm and firm, “I didn’t come back to argue. I came back to see you.”

“Why?” The word burst from your mouth, raw and sharpened with each emotion you’d felt since he’d left. The thoughts and feeling piling up by the second. His words inciting another to add to the pot. “Why me? After everything—after everyone—why did you come here?”

His eyes remained fixed on you for a moment. Your shouting hadn’t fazed him in the slightest. He’d had to have expected it. You’re almost panting, each nerve ending abuzz. Boarding on another mental breakdown.

When he finally did speak, his voice was lower. Almost hesitant. “Because you’re the only one I can’t leave behind.” You search his face, desperately searching for a hint of deception. Searching for a lie. But this man was never one for lying, at least he hadn’t been.

Your voice comes out a whisper, shaky and somewhat wound up, “That’s not fair. You don’t get to say that. Not after what you’ve done.” You could feel the build up behind your eyes. Red, hot, and unwitting. You held back as much as you could, showing him no weakness. But you’d already failed in that aspect. Much like how you failed in the ending of your friendship with him.

“I know it isn’t fair.” His voice about as soft and quiet as yours now. “But it’s the truth. I couldn’t do it. I tried.”

The room was much too suffocating. Your eyes much to hot. His confession hitting like a sucker punch to the jaw. The meaning behind his words, shallowly beneath the surface tension. But you wouldn’t be reaching for it. You felt so utterly worn—which is such a shame since you’d finally been getting back to a somewhat normal pace.

Here comes this man, crashing back in and challenging your every moral—your very being once again. You mustered up the courage—mustered up the strength to set him straight. To set yourself straight.

“You should go.” Barely audible. Yet the silence of the room reverberated each word, clearly. His eyes tried to catch your gaze, as you made it you mission to get him out of there as quickly as possible. Save that sanity.

“Do you really want me to?”

“Yes.” You respond immediately, but it sounded so hallow. Automated, at best. Even to you.

“Then tell me to leave. Tell me to get out of your life. Now. Tell me you don’t miss me. That you don’t want me here.”

Your throat tightened up, a lump forming that was impossible to swallow. Each line he gave, more abrasive than the last. You open your mouth ready to deal that final blow—reaffirm those words, but closed it again. He watched you closely, his expression unreadable. For the first time, you’re coming to terms with just how much you missed him. Just how deeply you cared for him. Your best friend. Your closest confidant. Your high school crush. Your everything. There was so much left unspoken between you two. Were you ready to throw it away? Would you lose your standing in the sorcerer world and be exiled too? Would you be okay with that?

“I thought so.” He said, a hint of satisfaction staining his tone. You try to ignore the tears threatening to spill over. The thoughts racing in your head. You physically pull away, your back finally to him. You can’t stand to see his face, let alone handle this situation right now.

You loved Suguru Geto. And it seemed he felt something for you.

Your back stayed to him. For a moment that stretched far too long, neither of you spoke a word. His last words were left floating in you’re head. Had it really been as hard for him to leave as it had been for you? You found the love for him deep below the anger and betrayal. But that didn’t mean you could act on it. It didn’t mean things weren’t different now.

Pulling you from your thoughts, you felt warmth at your back, before you had even felt his energy. Your breath hitched as his arms enveloped you. He was so close. Too close. Yet you couldn’t pull yourself away from the comforting gesture. You tilted you head back, hoping to catch the expression on his face, only to find those dark eyes already watching you. He was taller now. Much taller than before.

“Suguru, what are you doing?” Your voice trembling, much weaker than you wanted it to be. He didn't answer immediately, opting to watch you longer. His grip tightened around you, almost testing to see if you’d push him away. His head dipped to the shell of your ear, “Just…reminding myself.” Before settling into the crook of your shoulder. The hesitation was clear in his voice, making him sound much more…docile than a man that’d slaughtered an entire village or taken over a destructive religious cult. You almost felt yourself stiffen at the overly familiar contact.

His warm, earthy scent filled your lungs, encoating you in its sentimentality. You’d missed this too. You’d missed him. Your body settled for you, before you could pull from him. Before you could think of why you should be cautious around him. And the thought flowed from you lips before you could even process the desire to carry on this conversation with him. “Of what?”

“…That you’re real.” Your heart clenched painfully at his confession. You’d been wondering the same thing the second you saw him in your doorway.

This didn’t feel real. Maybe another nightmare featuring yours truly, maybe you could expect a ringing gunshot through the room. An astounding thud. Only to find him collapsed on the floor behind you, his blood soaking your pajamas.

His head dug deeper into the crook of your neck, almost nuzzling—as if he’d seen your thoughts. But he wasn’t aware just how much he’d put you through.

“Suguru…” you tried to sound firm, angry even—

“I know.”

You let out a sigh. Were you even angry anymore? Was this sadness flooding your chest? Sympathy? Love? Desperation?

“I know I don’t deserve this. But for a moment.” His voice even and constant, before breaking. “Please, for a moment let’s stay like this.”

come home

Yandere Sorcerer

Imagine "falling" for a yandere sorcerer...

You had met Aod years ago, the owner of a local magic shop. Considered a master of many fields ranging from runes to potionology to even astrology. He was a unique man to say the least. One day while you were in there to buy some more Wolf's Bane, he awkwardly asked you on a date. Something you happily accepted.

When reaching the cafe the next day, he handed you a box of homemade chocolates urging you to try one. Feeling the sweet treat melt on your tongue, it was the best chocolate you had ever eaten. And the date just kept getting better from there. It felt like love at first sight, as if you two were made for eachother.

Your relationship moved fast, faster than anybody in the village had seen. Within a month you both had already moved in together, and a month after that you were already considering marriage. People would occassionly come to talk to you, saying things were moving too fast and that maybe you should slow down. But you never listened, why would you? The world has been so much brighter ever since you and Aod started dating. You never wanted this to end.

He was the perfect fiancee. Providing for you, caring for you, loving you more than anything. What more could you ask for? Who cares if things were moving fast, that's just how in love you two were.

Though one day you were left sick in bed, coming down with some kind of stomach bug. You remained in bed in order to heal. Aod walked into your shared bedroom, holding a teacup in his hand, the tea he would brew for you every morning. Placing the tea on the side table, insisting you to drink it even if you could barely keep anything down, saying that it would make you feel better. Refusing to leave the room until you drank the entire cup. Once you had done as told, he gave you his usual kind smile before turning around and leaving the room.

You lied in bed for what felt like hours before your stomach lurched around inside of you, causing you to need to grab the bucket beside your bed. Upon emptying your stomach into it, you were shocked to see what was inside. It was the usual digusting greens and yellows you would expect. But there was also large blotches of bright pink within it, dropping the bucket on the ground in shock as you tried to stand up from the bed. You legs shaking beneath you as you broke out in a cold sweat. Your heart was beating a mile a minutes as it felt like the room was losing the color it once had. Your only thought...

Where the Hell were you...

It felt like the past few months were a blur, the last thing you remember clearly was arriving for your first ever date with Aod. Everything else was a blurry mess. You were left with a feeling of terror as you walked out of the bedroom, trying to reach the front door. Something deep in your mind was screaming at you to get out before Aod came, to get out and get help before he returned.

Though before you reached the front door a firm hand grabbed hold of your shoulder, a familiar voice sounded out behind you.

"Dear, what are you doing out of bed?"

It was Aod. You tried to pry yourself out of his grip and scream for help but he quickly pulled you into his chest, covering your mouth with his hand. He tried to talk to you but all it took was a single look in your eyes for his gentle gaze to change into one of frustration. He kept a hand over your mouth as he dragged you further into the house. Easily overpowering your struggles as he forced you into his office, locking the door behind you both.

Dragging you towards a large cupboard, Aod opened one of the drawers revealing countless bottles of the same bright pink concoction you had just expelled from your stomach. He brought one of the bottles to your lips and upon having to fight you, he began to pry your mouth open with his hand. Now pouring the sweet tasting mixture into your mouth, forcing it down your throat.

It only took a few minutes for the room around you to become blurry again, as if your brain was going numb. The color returned to your surroundings as Aod pulled you into his chest, gently stroking your head with a soft smile. His voice gentle as he whispered into your ear.

"Don't worry, it's okay now Dear. You just got a little restless there for a second."

His smile spread as he nuzzled his face into your neck, speaking in a voice dripping with obsession. Looking down at the ring on your finger.

"I've been thinking. We should get married as soon as possible and finally leave this backwards town. It will finally just be you and me. Would you like that Hun?"

You looked up at him with glassy eyes, a loving smile on your lips as you nodded without a thought. After all, what was so wrong with that? Aod was the best fiancee you could have asked for...

good things will happen 🧿

things that are meant to be will fall into place 🧿

Based on actual events....

Morning routine ☀️

“I just think you’d be happy with us,” Luffy insists for the fifth time that week, and exhausted, you reach over your shoulder, where he’s leaned over, practically resting his chin on your shoulder, and you grip his face, squishing his cheeks. 

He pouts, but doesn’t break free, and you turn to look at him, giving him a frown. Your eyes lock for a few moments as you challenge him to keep speaking, and he, never intimidated by you even for a moment, even when you are trying, continues talking.

“Just think about it more?”

You’ve thought about it, many times in fact, and every time he returns to this neck of the woods since you met just several months ago, a similar conversation arises. The naivete in the idea of you leaving behind everything you’ve built for this pirate you knew nothing about a year ago amazes you, but Luffy has always had such a confidence and almost innocent directness to the way he communicates his desires that you find it harder and harder to not question your own resistance each time. 

This time he’s particularly persistent, possibly to the point of being annoying. You apply a little bit more pressure to the grip you have on his face until his lips jut out and he whines.

“Hey, that hurts you know!” 

You let go, even if you know you could never truly hurt him, and sigh. 

“You know, asking more times won’t change my answer,” you remind him as he makes a show of stretching his face back to normal, then watches you stack a pile of books together and store them away into a cabinet. He’s keeping you company in your workroom as you finish up the last of your notes before leaving the clinic for the day. These days he no longer uses your friendship with Nami as a pretense to come and see you, and no one is sick - instead he strides in like he’s important to you in his own right, and you hate that he’s right about that. 

You wonder who even lets him in these days.

“What would it take aside from asking?”

You look at him again, tilting your head slightly. 

“To change my mind?” you clarify. 

Luffy nods. You’ve started walking, and he follows closely behind, your sweet shadow as you lock up the room and place the key in your pocket, hands behind his head as he accompanies you down the street to your favorite restaurant. 

Since the last time Luffy came to your city, a month has passed, and for the first time, you have admitted to yourself that you genuinely missed him - seeing his smile in an almost empty cup of coffee, or hearing his hearty laugh in a group of friends huddled at a bar, thoughts drifting to what it must be like for him on the sea whenever you have an idle moment.

Always joyous and free, sea salt and sunshine sinking deep into his skin.

Being by his side sounds more enticing every time he brings it up, but he doesn’t need to know that. In fact, perhaps he should think the opposite, you decide.

You stop suddenly in your tracks, and he stops too, watching you carefully as you make your first demand of him. 

“Bring me a pearl and I’ll think about it,” you start. Luffy looks confused for a second, eyebrows furrowed, and crosses one arm over his chest, his other hand tapping his chin. 

“I mean we could go to a jewelry shop right now but I don’t see why-”

Your look into his own eyes is fiery, interrupting him firmly. “As big as my head. The kind you’d only find hundreds of kilometers deep in the Calm Belt.”

The words are meant to be delivered neutrally, but their content is laden with irrationality.

You pause, waiting for his protest, but Luffy doesn’t complain. Instead he’s listening intently, dark eyes just as focused on yours, on the drivel coming from your lips and perhaps on deciphering the unspoken code beneath it.

Code that isn’t I don’t want to go with you, but Why would you go through the trouble for someone as bothersome like me?

Perhaps he picks up on the subtext a bit, too smoothly. “Is that all you want?” he asks, finally.

You inhale sharply, and resume your walk.

“Yes. Unless you bring me one of those, I don’t want to talk about ever leaving with you again, Luffy. Don’t even come back to see me.”

Unfazed, Luffy smiles even though you’ve given him a nigh impossible task - in fact, you’re not sure these giant clams exist at all, and it would be a fool’s errand to search for one, but he laughs. 

“Deal.”

Leaving the matter as it is, you resume your walk, and at some point Luffy must have taken your hand, because by the time you’ve made it to where you’ll have dinner together (and invariably he’ll clean out your wages for the entire week just in meat), your fingers are interlocked as though they’ve belonged linked the entire time. 

—

Luffy leaves the next day, leaving a note that is short and sweet on your kitchen table.

Be back soon.

You figure you’ve possibly seen the last of him in a while and your stomach turns gently at the thought.

—

Three days pass and because your friend Nami hasn’t yelled your ear off by transponder snail, you figure Luffy has dropped the entire ordeal and not wasted his crew’s time by going off track to do something absolutely stupid at your request. 

Another three pass and you worry he is stupid enough to try to do it despite being hated by the sea, and you resist the urge to call it off yourself. 

But you have to trust that he could understand how you felt. 

As impossible as it is for him to do this for you, it’s impossible for you to leave your earthbound life.

—

But ‘impossible’ sits on your nightstand that night.

A perfectly round pearl, as big as your head (bigger even if you were to hold it up and compare the object in a mirror)and polished to an impeccable shine, waits for you, with another note.

You ran out of food. Be back in a moment.

When Luffy comes back, large bags of groceries in hand to restock your empty fridge (even though he’d end up cleaning it out himself that night), he finds you in quiet tears.

Slowly, he lowers himself to the ground, allowing his arms to wrap carefully and gently around your body until you’ve leaned into him fully, your sniffles muffled as you let your face hide pressed against his forearms.

You don’t ask how he did it because the act itself is enough, and he doesn’t speak until you open your mouth first -

- to say “Hi, I missed you,” even if you’re overwhelmed. 

Luffy hums in assent, and lets his face nuzzle into your hair further, the simple act asking you again, please come with me without him needing to say it out loud, even if the pearl he’s moved heaven and earth to bring to your doorstep allows him to.

To which your heart, as though you were being proposed to with this very act, finally says yes.

Imagine Giving Zoro A Massage After Training

Zoro Ronona X FemReader

Rating: T

Warnings: Suggestive themes, mentions of blood, insults, stubborn Zoro, arguing, Zoro and reader have short tempers

Word Count: 1.3k

(A/N:) Happy New Year everyone!! Man how the time flies when you’re having fun. Or at least trying to anyway! Anywho we made it another year and I look forward to spending more time writing and bringing more stories for my readers to read! I’m still in a One Piece mood as I try very hard to catch up (I still have a LOOOOONG ways to go) but I can’t help myself I can’t wait to share my ideas I’ve already gotten for these OP babes. So yes I most likely am jumping the gun but a fangirls gotta do what a fangirls gotta do. So please enjoy these tidbits as I explore this world and all the wonderful characters in it! But please everyone have a safe year and if all else fails just enjoy every moment that you can. Struggle through the hard ones, grow from them. Laugh through the good ones, grow from them as well. Life is all about growing and becoming the people we’re supposed to be. I love you all and I hope for this to be your best year ever! <3 Man that got deep didn’t it? Anyway I’m rambling now but until next time happy reading! ~Countess

Afficher davantage

I can’t get this fic out of my mind. Thank you @mytanuki-kun 🙏🏻😌✨💕

𝑺𝒘𝒆𝒆𝒕𝒔 - 𝒁𝒐𝒓𝒐 𝒙 𝑹𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒆𝒓

This is a quick little Valentine's Day fic for Zoro! Short and sweet (pun intended,) but I loved writing it. I have a few other things I'll be trying to post leading up to Valentine's Day, but at the very least I've managed to get this out. I may end up editing it after the fact as I usually do.

CW: SFW, strong language, alcohol, tsundere-ish Zoro, female reader

~2k words

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

“I hate chocolate.” 

“Good. These aren't for you, anyway.”

Zoro grumbles under his breath as he follows you out of the little confectionery shop, begrudgingly holding a bag of various chocolates. He's never been a fan of sweets, not at all, not even a little. So when you dragged him inside on the one day you have off the ship, he was a little annoyed, to say the least. 

“What, so you bought this many for yourself?” He asks. His steps keep in time with yours as he walks beside you, careful not to lose you in the crowd.

“Nope. For the crew.” You explain, peeking into the bag you carry. “I thought it'd be nice to get everyone something since it's almost Valentine's Day.”

Shit. Zoro knew he was forgetting something. 

“Right. Valentine's Day.” Zoro mumbles, glancing down at the bag again. 

God, how could he forget? Everyone's been babbling about chocolates, roses, festivities, and the cook has certainly been the worst offender, asking every woman aboard if they'd be his Valentine. Somewhere between his training, their fights at sea, and taking naps with you, he lost track of time. His eyes remain locked on the bag of chocolates, and just as he's trying to push the strange blend of feelings from his mind, he feels you tugging on his arm. In his train of thought, he'd started veering off the opposite way. 

“Whoa, there. Ship's this way, Mossy.” You say in your goddamn adorably teasing tone. It makes him clench his jaw. 

“Yeah, I know. And don’t call me that.” Zoro responds curtly, bristling with annoyance. 

It just makes you laugh. 

“Whatever you say.”

---

Zoro stares at you from across the deck, watching you hand chocolates to your crewmates. Luffy's confused at first, then overjoyed; Usopp’s awkward, then grateful; Franky's making his stupid poses; Nami's taking it off your tab; Robin's thanking you; Brook's asking to see your panties; Chopper's wiggling and grinning; Sanji's nose is bleeding; blah blah blah. All the same antics, the same lines, yet all Zoro is focused on is that look on your beautiful face as you give out your Valentine's chocolates. Your eyes light up with every ‘thank you,’ every hug, and all Zoro can do is think about how the hell he forgot about Valentine's Day. 

But it's too late now, isn't it? The ship has already left the port and he didn't buy any flowers or gifts. He sucks at making cards, expressing his feelings, baking cookies - basically, anything that could make a decent Valentine. Then there's the most troubling part of all. Is he even your Valentine? Does it even matter?

You've been dating each other for somewhere around two months now. That doesn't necessarily mean that you're Valentine's, though. Nothing was ever said, neither of you asked the other, and at this point, he's not even sure how to bring it up. It seems rather obvious to him that you'd be each other's Valentine's, but that's what makes it even more frustrating - what seems obvious to Zoro isn't always obvious to others. Sometimes he's exhausted being surrounded by so many idiots (though he refuses to admit that he’s one of them.)

But not you. You're the idiot he doesn't get tired of. But, god, why did it have to be chocolates? Valentine's Day has always seemed like some kind of worthless, annoying day where everyone just gives out candy and useless junk as an excuse to make out. Making out, Zoro can handle - sweets, not so much. But then there's you, who's all sugar and spice and everything nice. The antithesis of what he's supposed to like, but your attitude has proven irresistibly charming to the stoic swordsman. 

The way your smile beams across the ship could end wars, call ships away from danger, light up the moonless sky as it so often has when you've been on watch together. It's damn near impossible to deny how much he loves to see that look on your face, and even more irritating that currently he's not the one that put it there. So, chocolates. Zoro can't do that. But that smile? He'll maim, kill, and die for it. He reasons that maybe there's a simpler way. 

---

You're a little skeptical when your boyfriend asks you to come up to the crow’s nest in the middle of the night. Hell, neither of you is assigned watch and it's well past your usual hours for training. Usually, this late at night, Zoro's fast asleep in his hammock if he's not tucked into your bed with you. So, what gives?

“Just shut up and trust me.” He chides, his tone slightly irritated but mostly playful. Well, that's Zoro.

As you follow him out onto the deck, the cool night air hits the exposed skin from your pajamas. The stars are beautiful, glittering above in a way that's almost distracting, but you don't linger your gaze on them for too long. Instead, you stay closely behind Zoro, your arms crossed over your chest long enough to keep some semblance of warmth. The journey up the crow’s nest is longer than you'd like given the temperature and your sleepy mind, but you swear you can almost smell something weird wafting down from the open door hatch. 

It's not only until you peek inside that you recognize the scent of lavender, and through the candlelight, you recognize a large blanket, several pillows, a bottle of sake, and some kind of food on a few plates. As you're trying to register what you're looking at, Zoro pulls your hand gently to assist you up the rest of the way. 

“What is this?” You ask, and the way your lips curl into a smile makes Zoro's heart stutter. 

He lets go of your hand, walking across the planks of the crow’s nest to his makeshift picnic. It’s a romantic setup that took him all evening, and he can recall the several conversations he had with himself to try to figure out something to throw together. He’s a little satisfied with himself - smug, even - but he maintains his usual demeanor for now. Zoro doesn’t want to get ahead of himself, after all.

“Well, what does it look like?” Zoro responds in his classic, gruff tone. “Made you a picnic. Since it's Valentine's Day and all that.”

Your eyes glance around the candles, and while the setup is fairly simple, you can't deny the wonder you feel at the sight. Never once had you expected anything like this from Zoro. Quite truthfully, you thought he would have forgotten or written off the whole thing as stupid. Taking a few careful steps, your gaze finally glances back up at him. 

“Where did you…I mean, food and candles? I really didn't…”

Zoro hums, and his lips finally quirk up into a cocky smile for a moment. He couldn’t keep that smug feeling aside for long, especially when your eyes light up the way they do.

“Candles are from Robin, and I owe Nami for tricking the cook into getting us some snacks.” He responds before his eye flicks back up to yours. “You like it?”

“Like it? This is the nicest thing anyone's ever done for me.” You grin, and you move to close the space between you two. It makes Zoro's heart stutter yet again. 

“Really? Is the bar that low?” Zoro replies with an amused huff. “Didn't think it was all that impressive. I pulled it together sorta last minute when I realized Valentine's Day meant so much to you.”

“It doesn’t.” You respond quickly, and you let out a laugh at Zoro’s shocked expression. So, you elaborate. “I mean, I like Valentine’s Day because it’s an excuse to express how much people mean to me. But the holiday itself doesn’t make or break anything. I wasn’t expecting you to actually care about it, which is why I never said anything.”

Zoro seems contemplative for a moment, his eye trailing carefully over to the makeshift picnic. He lets out a huff, one hand resting casually on his sword, the other against his thigh. 

“Of course I don’t care about Valentine’s Day.” He says, almost snapping. Guess you struck a nerve. “It’s a stupid holiday designed for people like that love cook to hit on women. I didn’t even know it was Valentine’s Day ‘till you bought all that candy.”

Despite his harsh tone, you can’t help but smile a bit wider at his response. He seems irritated, and likely just because he was in his own head about it. And god, that smile you give him…

“But I care about you, moron. That’s why I threw this together.”

Zoro sits down on one of the blankets, patting a pillow next to him for you to join. You don’t hesitate, and as you sit down you watch as Zoro grabs the bottle of sake and pulls the cork out with his teeth. He spits it aside, taking a long swig of it. If the candles weren’t so dim, you might have been able to notice the way the tips of his ears light up red. 

“I already told you that this is the nicest thing anyone’s done for me. You don’t have to feel weird about doing it just because I wasn’t expecting it.” You finally speak up, a hand moving to rest on his forearm. “Seriously, I appreciate this. It’s honestly really…sweet.”

Zoro takes his free hand holding the bottle of sake, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand with a sigh. He’s definitely embarrassed, but that sweet tone of yours makes something in his chest feel lighter. 

“Yeah, well…I don’t normally do sweet. You know that.” Zoro says, setting the bottle of sake down between the both of you. And he knows that you know that - hell, you probably know him better than most people. “Just felt like now that we’re dating, I wanted to see you…have a good Valentine’s Day.”

“For someone who claims to hate sweet, you’re very good at it. Thank you, Zoro.” You reply, leaning against him just a little bit. The skin-to-skin contact makes Zoro heat up a bit, and when you lean in closer, you can’t contain the small giggle that leaves you. “But I feel like I should let you know that Valentine’s Day isn’t for another few days.”

Zoro’s expression drops once again, and that stupid annoying feeling of irritation fills him. His head snaps in your direction, and he visibly bristles. It makes you laugh.

“Dammit! Why the hell were you giving everyone chocolates so early then, woman?” 

“Because I didn’t want them to go bad! Plus, I’m horrible with surprises. I get too impatient.” You laugh again, and that laugh somehow both irritates and soothes Zoro. He’ll never understand the effect you have on him.

Grumbling, he grabs the bottle of sake again. Before he can bring it to his lips, though, your hand moves up to his chin, gently pulling it so that he looks right at you. With a grin, you lean forward and press your lips tenderly against his. That irritation in him is gone, and his eye slowly shuts as he feels you both melt into the kiss. Goddamn, Zoro hates sweets, but the taste of your lips against his is addicting. His chest aches when the kiss breaks, but your lips linger against one another.

“Happy Valentine’s Day.” You murmur.

Eddie x bookworm!Reader angst-to-fluff, where Eddie is always picking on Reader because he has a crush on her, but she thinks he’s just being mean. Like he’ll say “read anything good lately, bookworm?” because he genuinely wants to talk to her about what she’s reading, but she assumes he’s teasing her like everyone else. And then a fluffy ending where he actually has a real conversation and admits that he likes her? Love you, bb! @munson-blurbs 💚

Eddie would love bookish girls like us, Bug! We’d be his favorites and everyone else would be jealous hehehe. I loved this request and I hope you enjoy!

Words: 2k

The library is supposed to be your sanctuary. It’s supposed to be where you can go and be with the books, spending time picking out the perfect one before settling down in a chair to see what new adventure awaits you within the pages. But he’s here again. The metal head who thinks it’s fun to pick on you. It’s no secret that people at school are constantly calling him a freak, so he obviously knows what it’s like to be teased and picked on. So why does he do it to you?

The paperback in your hands is pretty small, but that doesn’t stop you from trying to hide your face behind it, hoping Eddie doesn’t notice you. But you know it didn’t work when you hear the chair on the opposite side of the table from you being pulled back and someone drops down into it.

“Hey, bookworm.”

Taking a moment to close your eyes and take a deep breath behind the cover of the book, you lower it and give Eddie the most unfriendly smile you can manage.

“Edward.”

“Don’t call me that,” he says, wrinkling up his nose.

“Don’t call me bookworm,” you retort.

“It’s not a bad thing,” Eddie says.

You ignore him and go back to reading. Well, pretending to read anyway, but really waiting for him to get up and leave.

“Whatcha reading?”

Slowly, you lower the book down enough where you can peer over the side of it where it clearly shows the title.

“Little Women,” you answer anyway.

“So, like, girls?”

“Sure.”

“What’s it about?”

“Eddie,” you say with a sigh. You lower the book down and slide your bookmark into the page you left off on. “What do you want?”

He leans back in his seat and frowns at you as he laces his fingers behind his head.

“To know what your book is about,” he says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“No,” you say with a shake of your head. “What do you really want?”

The bell rings and you don’t give him time to answer your question before your things are back in your backpack and you’re out the door.

Luckily, you don’t see Eddie the rest of the day. The next day, you’re not as lucky. As you're getting the books you need out of your locker, you see Eddie coming down the hall out of the corner of your eye. Hurrying so he doesn’t have the chance to come and tease you, you swap out your things and clutch what you need to your chest. You hardly make sure your locker is properly closed before you’re turning away and walking quickly down the hallway, hoping he won’t spot you.

When you step into your French class, you finally release the breath you’ve been holding in your chest. Head down so no one else will notice you, you open your French notebook and turn it to a clean page for the start of class.

Someone drops down in the seat next to you, but you don’t look their way until you feel them leaning into your personal space. You’re shocked when Billy Hargrove is there, so close to you, an easy smile on his lips.

“Hey, smart girl.”

You’d bet good money he’s calling you that because he doesn’t know your real name.

“Um, hi,” you say. There’s a group of girls on the other side of the classroom who are whispering to each other as they watch the two of you.

Billy’s tongue pokes out against his top lip as he looks at you through his thick eyelashes. It’s a look you’ve seen him give dozens of girls around school. He wants something. And you know it’s not you, so that leaves only one other option.

“You’re really good at this French stuff, yeah? Well, to tell you the truth, I’m struggling a little bit. Do you think there’s any way you could help me out with that? I’d really appreciate it.” It’s a good thing you’re sitting because his smile is enough to make your knees give out.

“I’m not really a tutor,” you tell him, shrugging your shoulders. It’s the truth, but you’re also pretty sure he wouldn’t be able to understand your French because he’d make you a stuttering mess just by looking at you.

“Anything I can do to change your mind?” Billy asks, tilting his head. His voice is so sultry it should be illegal.

“I-I don’t think so.”

Billy tsks and shakes his head.

“Well, damn. Let me know if you change your mind, sweetheart.” He knocks his fist against your desk before going back to his own seat.

The teacher walks in and everyone takes their seats, one of the girls who was whispering about you taking her seat right behind you.

“You’re not as smart as everyone says you are,” she leans forward to whisper in your ear.

Mrs. Shay has her back to the class so you take the opportunity to turn around to face the girl.

“What?”

“For a nerd, you’re pretty dumb. Billy Hargrove was willing to spend time with you and you said no. Tell me, how many guys actually want to be around you? Let alone ones that look like Billy.”

You quickly spin back around so she can’t see the tears forming in your eyes. She’ll only be meaner if she sees she gets a reaction out of you. It’s hard to concentrate for the rest of the class, both interactions replaying in your head the whole period.

Lunch is next and you can’t bring yourself to go into the cafeteria full of students. It’s a nice day out so you decide to go sit outside and eat your sandwich in peace. You’re looking forward to picking up your spot in Little Women as you settle on the grass, back resting against the brick building, but come up empty after looking in your bag.

“No,” you whine to yourself as you double check for the book. Still not there. You must’ve left it in your locker. Alone with just your thoughts and your sandwich, the lunch period seems to go on forever. You get up a few moments before it’s over and go to your locker to grab your novel in case you get a chance to read it in any of your afternoon classes. But it’s not there either. You slam your locker door closed and knock your forehead against it. Where the hell did your book go?

“Hey! Bookworm!”

You don’t need to look up to know who’s calling for you. There have been many times in the past you’ve been grateful your locker is right next to the girl’s room, and this is another one, as you slip in, acting like you didn’t hear Eddie.

Once the bell rings, you wait a minute for the halls to fill with students before joining the sea of teenagers. A quick glance around and there’s no sign of Eddie. You don’t press your luck though and make a beeline straight for your biology class.

The end of the school day can’t come fast enough. Heading to the library after the final bell is like being a salmon swimming upstream as everyone makes for the exits. A sigh leaves your lips once you’re safely inside and find a table in the corner to hide yourself at. Unfortunately, you’re only allowed a few peaceful moments.

“There you are, bookworm.”

It feels like the last straw. You groan and drop your head down to the table, but Eddie still pulls out the seat across from you and plops down in it.

“I’ve been trying to give this back you.” There’s a slide across the table and you pick your head up to see your tattered paperback of Little Women. “You dropped it in the hallway this morning. I tried calling for you but I guess you didn’t hear me.”

“Oh,” you say, stomach sinking with guilt. “Thank you.” You’d just come to expect the worst from people, so Eddie’s act of kindness comes as a surprise.

“No problem,” Eddie says. He leans forward on his forearms and smiles at you. It’s such an open and kind smile that it makes your head feel a little fuzzy. You’d never noticed how pretty Eddie is before. His dark eyes watch you and your cheeks heat up under his gaze.

“You know,” Eddie says. “I don’t think I could’ve forgiven Amy.”

“What?” you ask, face scrunching in confusion.

Eddie nods his head towards the book on the table between the two of you.

“Amy. She burnt Jo’s manuscript. That’s pretty shitty. And I’m pretty sure Laurie is in love with Jo.”

“Oh.” You look down at the cover of Little Women, your fingers coming up to ghost over the edges. “You’ve read it?”

“I started to,” Eddie says with a shrug. “Just don’t tell O’Donnell I was reading that in class today instead of listening to her drone on and on.”

“You were reading it today?” you ask.

“Yeah,” Eddie says. He looks down at the table in front of him and knocks his shiny silver rings a few times on the wood. “You didn’t tell me what it was about yesterday, so I decided to find out.”

Thinking back to Eddie finding you in the library yesterday, you remember him asking about what you were reading. You’d assumed it was some ploy to make fun of you, but it seems he was genuinely curious. The guilt tightens your stomach even further. You’re not sure how to apologize without admitting to him you’d assumed he was being an asshole.

“Um, do you want to finish the book? See how it ends?” You extend it to him and Eddie’s head snaps up to look at you.

“Really?” he asks, sounding more excited than you’d expect.

“Sure,” you say. “I’ve read it three times already so I’m in no hurry to finish it. Go ahead.”

Eddie’s face lights up in a grin and you mentally shake yourself for never noticing how absolutely adorable he is before.

“Thanks,” he says. He takes it from you and holds it in his hands like it’s precious and made of glass, not a book that looks like it’s weathered many storms. “Maybe when I’m done we could talk about it?”

Now it’s your turn to be surprised.

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah,” he says, avoiding your eyes. “Maybe we could get coffee or something? Or, pizza if you don’t like coffee.”

You stare at him for a moment before responding.

“You want to hang out with me? Voluntarily?”

His face pinches into a frown as he meets your eyes again.

“Why do you sound so surprised?” he asks.

“I just…” You sigh. “You’re always calling me a bookworm. I figured you were picking on me like everyone else does.”

“Oh.” His face falls and he quickly shakes his head. “Shit, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know that bothered you so much.” He sets the book down and rubs his hands over his face. “I guess I was just teasing. I’m not good with emotions and feelings.” He shrugs his shoulders.

“What do you mean?” you ask.

“Ugh,” he groans, but there’s a shy smile on his face. “You know how in, like, third grade, how boys will sometimes pick on girls they like?”

“Yeah,” you say with a nod, clearly missing the hidden message in the question.

He huffs a laugh and gestures to himself.

“Guess I’m about as mature as a third grader.”

Your eyes widen and Eddie can’t help but chuckle in amusement at the look.

“You’re saying you like me? Is…is that what you’re saying?”

“You’re supposed to be the clever one here,” Eddie says with a smirk.

“And you’re…you’re serious?”

He frowns at this and leans in closer towards you.

“I would never joke like that. I know what it’s like to be picked on. It fucking sucks. I’m not about to inflict that on someone else. Especially someone as cute as you.”

Heat blooms on your face, so warm you’re sure you must look like a tomato. Eddie sits up, straightening in pride that he had that effect on you.

“Um, okay,” you say quietly. “Well, finish that book and we’ll go talk about it over pizza.”

“Like…a date?” Eddie asks in a hopeful voice.

“Yeah, a date.” You can’t help the giddy smile that comes to your face.

“Shit, I better get started then.” Eddie opens the book and leans back in his seat. You giggle, thinking he’s joking, but you see his eyes start to actually scan the pages as he reads. Taking advantage of his distraction, you let yourself look over him. His frizzy hair hangs at his shoulders, bangs pushed to the left side of his forehead. His long body reclines in the chair as he reads, his tongue poking out of his pretty lips. He’s beautiful.

You can’t wait until he’s finished with the book. Then he’ll understand what you mean when you say you’d love to be the Jo March to his Friedrich Bhaer.

the hat rule. (e.m. x fem!reader)

the hat rule (n.): you wear the hat, you ride the cowboy.

summary: when eddie dresses up as a cowboy to a night out with friends, you decide to steal his hat.

pairings: eddie munson x fem!reader

warnings: reader is described to be wearing a dress. reader is also dressed up as a black cat. premise is everyone is wearing 'slutty' costumes. overuse of pet names. public teasing, unprotected sex, choking kink, oral (f receiving), ass slapping. 18+.

wc: 13.3k+

happy early valentine's day, babes. shout out to @hellfire--cult for beta reading, as well as @andvys for giving me this idea to begin with.

If someone had told you last week that you’d be attending a slutty costume themed night at a club tonight, you would have laughed in their face.

And yet here you were, at Steve Harrington’s apartment, donned in a black cat costume that shows more skin than you have in years.

The elaborate plan had sparked on a random day after Steve encountered a flyer for the event. It was a nightclub your group had attended before, and one look at the line free drinks for participants had Steve running down your entire group to insist that you all needed to dress up, to participate in this, for the luxury of free Tito’s. 

He’d never considered that the ad might not be targeted towards the male population. And now, you were all gathering at his apartment to pregame, ‘slutted out’ as Robin had so kindly put it – men included.

Nancy pulled out some sort of angel costume she claims she had bought but certainly not worn a few years back, Robin had conglomerated an alluring pirate attire from items you hadn’t even been aware were in her closet. Jonathan arrived in his erotic yet pensive writer’s costume (you’d hardly understood it, but he seemed confident, so you all went with it), Argyle in tow donning some sort of seductive surfer costume, in which you certainly recognized the unbuttoned shirt and cargo shorts that had had a pocket knife taken to them to disregard a few inches. Steve even stuck to his own demands, going all out – a sensual bunny costume.

And then, there was Eddie.

Eddie fuckin’ Munson. 

“Pick your jaw up off the ground, sweetheart,” he teases as he shuffles around you in the kitchen to grab a drink, “Gonna start catching flies otherwise.” 

“There’s a joke in there somewhere about how sweet I am, right?” you blandly reply, keeping your eyes on your room temp cocktail that Steve had so graciously mixed for you upon your arrival, “Something where you call me honey or sugar, yeah?” 

Eddie pauses, bottle of vodka in hand, looking at you with big eyes lined in coal, “Oh, baby, you know me so well.” 

“Cut the pet names, Munson.”

You try to scowl. You really do. But you don’t mean a damn word you say. 

Sweetheart. Baby. Hell, even honey would have done it for you when he was wearing that costume. 

Tight leather pants, flared at the ankle. Worn leather boots that certainly had to have been thrifted, clicking with each of his steps. A cow print vest, and just a vest, over what looked to be an oiled chest. 

And that fucking hat smashing down his curls, adding a shadow across his face that only built into the illusion. 

You hate him. You hate this stupid party. You hate Steve for ever suggesting this. 

“You don’t mean that,” he sing-songs as he pours his own drink into a red solo cup. The vodka mixes with cranberry juice, you think, before he’s dropping a few ice cubes out of the freezer. “Or maybe you do, and I should try saying them with a southern drawl,” Fuck, he does a good southern accent. Slow and syrupy sweet, molasses down the throat as he flutters his lashes at you, “That better, darlin’?” 

You pluck the thin black straw that had been added to your cup for flare, probably stolen from a hotel at some point by Steve and positively meant for drinks of the coffee variety, and flick it in his direction without hesitation. 

“Terrible,” you flatly lie, “Cowboys aren’t even from the south, idiot. They’re from the West.” 

You have no desire to hear Eddie’s Western accent. No desire to hear Texan twang on those lips, putting on his best John Wayne impression. In fact, the faster you can get away from him, the quicker you can get yourself under control. 

It had always been this way between you and Eddie. Push and pull. Will they, won’t they. A game of cosmic shores as the two of you toed at each other’s orbits and bantered effortlessly. Flirtatious threats, inappropriate compliments, lewd innuendos – you had done it all, specifically with Eddie.

That’s just how the friendship worked. 

The friendship. 

Friend. Nothing more, nothing less. 

Eddie won’t leave you alone, though, choosing to lean up against the counter beside you, forcing his way into your peripherals, “Damn. You’re right. Wayne would kill me if he knew I mixed that up.” 

“Oh, I think he has plenty of reasons to knock some sense into you.” 

“Yeah?” he leans forward, tauntingly, a smirk playing at the corners of his mouth, “Why don’t you do it for him? I think I’d like a slap more coming from you, honestly.”

He’s acting like he always does. This is normal. The fact that his entire torso is on show and you can’t stop staring at the way his tattoo on his peck is shimmering doesn’t change that. 

You play the role, knowing your part well as you lean in as well, forcing a smile right back at him, “Wanna kiss my knuckles before I do it, or am I gonna have to do all the hard work here?” 

“Oh, trust me, you’d never have to do all the work with me, ba-”

“Can you two get a fucking room?” Robin interrupts as she enters the room, clearly coming in for a refill but getting more than she bargained for. 

You’re aflame with the shame and embarrassment, feeling it lick from your ankles up to your throat, as Eddie only chuckles lowly. 

“Sorry, Robs,” Eddie chirps, not sounding apologetic at all, “I promise I’ll behave myself the rest of the night.” 

And yet, despite the words you’re hearing him say out loud, he does the exact opposite. 

There’s no real need for him to do it. There’s plenty of space amongst the kitchen for him to maneuver his way out without laying a single hand on you – and yet he still fucking does. 

His palm is shockingly warm when it curls around your hip, his other hand occupied with a drink, encouraging you to move a step forward so that he can brush behind you far too close for comfort. You nearly stumble over himself as he does it. The feeling of his barren chest barely bumping your bare shoulder blades sends your mind reeling, and his staple rings that have incorporated into his costume press right through the thin fabric of your dress.

Your breathing stops entirely as he pauses, the slightest bit of skin still brushing against yours, and leans in with a boyish grin, “We’ll both be on our best behavior tonight – right, kitty?” 

Something clicks in your mind. The way the nickname rolls off his tongue as he’s looking at you with eyes flaming with mischief, hand lingering on your hip for far too long. 

Your eyes flicker up to the hat on his head, and you smile slowly, meeting his toying gaze, “Right, cowboy.”

Best behavior, your ass. Tonight, you have decided, ends the will they, won’t they of it all. 

It’s about to either be the best night of your life, or the worst. 

—

Another shot with Nancy. Another smoke with Argyle. Another adjusting of Steve’s corset when he complains he can’t breathe (he certainly can, but you’re starting to think he just likes the attention). The pregaming continues on as more of Steve’s friends from work show up, the apartment slowly beginning to buzz with the chatter of more strangers than you can count on one hand.

You’re not even at the club yet and you’re already regretting your revealing attire.

Eddie stays mostly preoccupied with his own devices, and only gets scolded a handful of times by Nancy. You can hear every lewd joke he makes, of course. At some point, you make a private drinking game out of it; a sip for every time he makes the stereotypical joke of ‘save a horse, ride a cowboy’. 

Well, it was a sip the first time. A slightly larger gulp the second time. A chugging of half your drink the third time. 

“There’s no fucking way,” Steve laments at the table the boys as well as a few guests you don’t recognize have taken over for a game of strip poker, “Jonathan is cheating. Or counting cards.”

“I concur,” Eddie mutters around his cigarette, scowling at his losing hand. 

“You’re also cheating, asshole. This is the first round you’ve lost the entire game.”

“Or maybe I’m just really good at cards, Harrington.” 

“Oh, yeah? Well, maybe I’m really good at-”

“He’s not cheating,” Nancy interrupts with a sigh from the couch, lounging as she’s served as a referee of sorts for the group. Her entire body weight is draped against Robin, and you’re certainly not going to comment on Robin’s hands toying with her permed locks, “Stop being a sore loser and just strip.” 

You get why Steve was the most upset. He was down to his underwear and socks, corset tossed somewhere far behind him and bunny ears placed on Robin’s head in place of her pirate hat that she had claimed became too warm. 

“I think Steve should trade both socks and put back on the bunny ears,” she quips as she reaches up for the headband, flicking at one of the floppy ears, “He’d look cuter that way.” 

“Fuck off,” he snaps, throwing up a middle finger as Argyle finally loses his shirt. 

When your attention has drifted, you know he did exactly that, though. 

The game had been boring you half to death, honestly. Watching Steve strip without fail every round, hearing the loud cheers from Argyle when he managed to win a few rounds in a row and exclaimed it was a turkey (it had taken a ten minute intermission to explain to him that was bowling, not poker), watching a few of the girls that Steve had invited fawn over him as they carefully removed boots and gloves when they lost – none of it sparked your interest. The only saving grace had been every smug look Eddie offered as he’d win, time and time again. So far, he’d only lost his boots. 

He was hot when he was cocky. There was no way around it.

And now, as he carefully pondered as to which part of his precious costume to part with, you were on the edge of your seat. He was lovely and enticing when he was excited, when he was jubilant with victory, but as a sore loser? 

Dear God, Eddie Munson was a gorgeous specimen with a pout on his lips. 

“Trying to decide what to take off, Munson?” Jonathan notices the way Eddie is hesitating, even through the offset of conversations that had sparked up in the brief pause amongst the growing group.

You lean forward on the couch, almost subconsciously. 

You don’t care what Stacy from Steve’s job thinks of their manager or the latest drama ongoing there, and Steve would probably agree with you if it weren’t for Stacy’s all-red, latex Devil costume.

Eddie scoffs, waving a hand over his attire, “Obviously. You know, it’s not easy to choose when you have a costume as damn good as mine.” 

“What? Don’t think you’ll be as pretty without your hat?” you decide to contribute to the teasing, shocking yourself in the process. 

The last thing you should do when you’re staring him down in this way, is bring attention to yourself. And yet you were, like some fucking idiot with a death wish. 

“You think I’m pretty?”

It’s the fluttering of his lashes as he says it that gives you the courage. They match all that fluttering in your stomach, all that buzzing across your nerves. Because – yeah, you thought he was real fucking pretty. You’d spent the last half hour imagining how pretty he’d look in all sorts of places, too, especially between your sheets and between your thighs. 

You’re up off the couch, taking confident steps towards where he’s seated at the ground on the other side of the coffee table. It’s a little inconvenient now, but it had been a blessing in disguise for most of the game as you’d had a front row seat to the sight of him. 

“Oh, don’t get ahead of yourself,” you tease, entirely ignoring that lightheaded feeling you get anytime Eddie looks up at you this way. Half-lidded eyes, crooked grin. He’s dangerous and he doesn’t even know it, “I only meant you were pretty with the hat.” 

“You wound me,” he gasps, dropping back on his hands dramatically, his pout now for dramatics rather than genuine, “Gonna stand there and tell me I’m not pretty when I dressed up just for you?”

You have to take a deep breath to compose yourself, cross your arms to steady your guard, “Just for me?” 

He was playing that same old, tired game of yours. The same dance the two of you had memorized the steps to – and something inside of you has grown restless of it. You don’t want to keep skirting around each other with double-meaning jokes, you don’t want to keep painting humor over your flirtatious remarks. You want a damn answer to the age old question of will they, won’t they?

And you want that answer to be will they – terribly, terribly so.

His eyes trail along the room slowly, not avoiding you but trying to draw out the anticipation in you as he sucks in a breath, “Okay, and maybe for Steve. And Nancy. And Argyle. And Jonathan. And- Well, I’d say Robin, but I don’t think she’s looked twice in my direction all night.” 

“I haven’t,” the brunette chirps happily from the couch, still letting the weight of Nancy comfortably dig into her. 

You have no idea how she’s tuned into the conversation, given the way most of everyone else around the room was entirely ignoring the two of you. 

“So,” you all but purr, leaning down to be more level with Eddie. You already know where his focus wanders when his eyes don’t meet yours, “Not just for me, cowboy.” 

He’s distracted, staring at your chest as you notice him slip up in his brave facade for a second. Almost as though you’ve gone too far, pushed the limits a bit too hard. Good. You want to break this. You want to shatter whatever cage the two of you have built.

In one smooth movement, your hand reaches out and snatches the hat right off his head. 

He lets out a yelp and tries to grab it away from you, but you have the advantage as you stand up straight once more. Your free hand reaches up and tears off the cat ears you had donned, and in their place, the hat is deposited. 

It fits you a little big, and you nearly make a joke about the size of Eddie’s head. 

“Hey!” he argues, moving as though he might stand up and put up more of a fight, “I didn’t say the hat is what I wanted to take off.” 

“Took too long,” you shrug innocently. 

“Yeah, well, just carefully add it to the pile,” he jabs his thumb over his shoulder, towards his boots, as he relaxes back into his recline.

You should probably behave yourself. 

“No.”

But this is more fun. 

Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up in shot, disappearing behind the bangs that are flattened far more than usual. The entire crown of his head is absolutely crushed. No sign of his usual frizzy roots and unruly volume, “No?”

“No,” you confirm a second time. 

And you’re done with this game of back and forth. 

The hat’s staying on your head. It smells ever so faintly of his shampoo, the slightest whiff of his cologne even, and it’s staying on your head for the exact reason he believes is about to be a gotcha! moment.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he’s just tipsy enough that he’s not putting on any specific accent. Instead, his natural Appalachian accent inherited from his uncle begins to break the surface, “Surely you know about the hat rule.” 

Damn right, you know about the hat rule.

You cross your arms, huff a little, tilt the hat for effect, “The hat rule? Please, enlighten me.” 

“You wear the hat, you ride the cowboy.” 

Perfect. 

You don’t even attempt any sort of surprised act. No exaggerated gasps, no fumbling to remove the hat. You knew all about this rule, and it had been one of the first things to come to mind when you’d seen him enter this damn party with the hat on. 

“Yeah?” you question, mocking raising your eyebrows at best, “Hm. What a shame.”

And then you turn on your heel, not awaiting a single response from Eddie as you escape to the kitchen.

You almost wish you would have stayed an extra second to properly witness his reaction. There’s no doubt in your mind that he’s gone pretty and pink, a flustered mess for at least a second as low laughter sounds from the rest of your friends. A tell-tale snort from Robin, and a silent cackle from Nancy. You swear you even pick up on one of the extra guests muttering a confused what just happened? that goes entirely unanswered.

Strip poker doesn’t continue on for long after that.

You refill your drink, this time sans the alcohol, and return to find Steve has officially begun to call for cabs to the club. He busies away on his phone as everyone debates who’s riding with who, the entire party slowly coming to life as everyone stands to prepare to leave for the main attraction. 

When you meet Eddie’s gaze from across the room, the shadow of the brim of his hat cutting into your vision a little, his cheeks match the cranberry juice in your cup. 

Good. 

—

The ride to the club is a blur, and all that really stands out to you is that Eddie makes sure he does not ride in the same cab as you.

Which is fine. Really. It doesn’t cause a single spark of panic in your chest. Not one. 

You’re definitely not working yourself up over the thought that your plan is crumbling right before your eyes, that you’ve gone too far and entirely misinterpreted everything Eddie has ever done during your entire friendship. You’re not mulling over every dirty joke, not dissecting every single line that felt like he was flirting with you and attempting to look at it with fresh eyes. No, the entire ride to the club, you are definitely not beating a dead horse dead. 

Maybe you should have set off to ride the dead horse and not the cowboy. Maybe, then, Eddie would have gotten into the fucking cab with you. 

Your anxieties only worsen once you get inside the club. Pulsing beneath your skin, right in rhythm with the music. Your entire group had each been handed a drink ticket on your way in, and you had noted the fact that the girls of the group were slipped extra tickets. 

Nancy had given all her tickets to Robin, and Steve had given his singular ticket to Stacy. 

“So,” Robin runs up to your side, Nancy not far behind, “Do we waste our drink tickets on shots or real drinks?” 

“Real drinks,” you immediately reply, eyes scanning the bouncing crowd for a certain head of curly hair, “Shots are… well, they can be cheap. We can just avoid the top-shelf shit.”

Was Eddie really going to ignore you the entire night? 

He needed his hat. He couldn’t ignore you the entire night. 

“You’re right,” Robin shuffles the drink tickets in her hands, turning to Nancy, “On a scale of one to ten, how bad would it be me to ask you to flirt with men to get me-”

“Give me ten minutes and I’ll have us a round.” 

Nancy’s smile is sweet, courteous, as she gives Robin’s shoulder a squeeze on her way past her. 

Where the fuck is Eddie? 

“Did you see where the guys ran off to?” you blurt out. Most of the guys, aside from Steve, took the same cab. 

Robin also joins you in a quick survey of the club, lifting onto her tippy toes to squint over the current light show, “Honestly? I have no idea.” 

Fuck. 

As she drops back down onto her heels, Robin looks at you knowingly, eyes flicking up between your twisted expression and the hat on your head. 

“Trying to find a certain cowboy?” 

“What?” you look at her, already defensive, even if it was stupid at this point. Who cares if everyone knows you have a crush on Eddie? Who cares if everyone finds out the very foundations of your friendship with him were built upon quite a bit of truth? “I mean- yeah, he kind of needs his hat to complete his outfit.” 

“Should have just given him your ears for an even trade,” Robin shrugs, clinging to your elbow to avoid getting separated as a few bodies push past the two of you, “I’m sure he’ll pop up soon enough, though. Besides, I don’t think anyone’s too focused on what everyone’s costumes are as long as they’re… well…”

“Slutted out,” you finish for her flatly, trying to not get jealous as your eyes look across the sweaty crowd, stomach churning as you wonder how many other sexy black cats in the crowd would be approaching your cowboy. 

You fucked up. You shouldn’t have taken his hat. 

“Exactly!” she’s excited, unaware of your crisis, already moving along from the topic as she spots Nancy somewhere near the bar top, “Look, free shots!” 

The free shots don’t do much to quell your unease, but free alcohol is always nice.

You take the liquid down, burn and all, more than willingly. And then again, not even five minutes later when Nancy has caught the attention of another random man at the end of the bar. You almost partake in a third, but you finally hear a familiar voice saying a far too familiar joke. 

“You know what they say,” he’s flirting – he’s using a tone of voice that he has never used with you, and it’s clear he’s fucking flirting, “Save a horse, ride a cowboy.” 

Instead of continuing your drinking game from Steve’s apartment, you slam the shot back down and mutter some sorry excuse of being right back to Robin and Nancy before taking off in the direction of Eddie.

He’s stood a few stools down at the bar, hands leaning against the worn wood as his arms bracket a pretty blonde. It almost looks as if the line might be working on her. 

“If you’re a cowboy,” she giggles, and you almost stop dead in your tracks, “Then where’s your hat?” 

Well, that’s as good of a queue for your arrival if any. 

“Good question,” you pipe up as you take a few brave steps towards him, “Where is your hat, cowboy?” 

You’d expected him to be angry, or startled, or possibly even immediately take off running in the opposite direction of you. He doesn’t. 

He slowly turns, and his flirtatious smile has turned into more of a salacious grin as he faces you, “Well, well, well. Nice of you to join us, Kitty.” 

The blonde looks between you two a few times before shimmying down off her stool, “I think…. I’m gonna go. Nice to meet you, cowboy.”

You expect Eddie to react, but he hardly does. A quick glance in her direction, a pathetic wave. 

You’ve just trampled over one of his chances of getting properly lucky tonight, and he isn’t even phased. 

“Been lookin’ for you,” you mumble, looking over him. His hair seems to have been unstuck from his scalp a little, at least. As though he may have been running his hands through it repeatedly, “Thought you might have gone home without your hat.” 

“Not a chance. I haven’t forgotten about the rule, you know.” 

Something twists in you, deep in your gut, between your hips. 

“No?” you hold your breath as he leans in a bit closer to you to be able to hear over the music, “Good thing I haven’t either.” 

He tilts his head, eyes glittering in the multi-colored lights, “You haven’t? Then that means you’ll be giving it back, right?” 

Over my dead body. 

You’re on a mission tonight. You’ll either be ending this night in sore disappointment, drinking away your sorrows of rejection, or you’ll be ending up in a bed with Eddie. It’s up to him. 

You lift a hand to the worn rim, tugging it a bit more securely onto your head, “Not a chance, Munson. You know where to find me once you’re done playing around.”

As soon as your fingers leave the rim, holding tense eye contact with him, his own hand is coming up. You tense, worried he’s about to steal the hat back now, but he doesn’t. Instead, his fingers pinch the same spot yours just had, slow tracing over the rim as his tongue darts out to carefully wet his bottom lip. 

From the front point, around to the side. When he reaches the bit above your ear, his touch drops to your cheek and tucks back some of the baby hairs sticking to your skin with sweat. 

“I do, don’t I?” he hums, voice dropping a bit lower, focused entirely on you. “I don’t think I’m the one playing around right now, though, Kitty.” 

Does he think you’re joking? Does he actually, genuinely think this is all a game to you? 

You nearly make the decision to grab him right there, right at this moment, and shatter all the tension. Get his lips on yours and drag him into the darkest corner just to prove to him how serious you truly were. 

Suddenly, his hand drops away from you entirely, and you almost want to whine. You miss that warmth, that feathery caress, until it aches. “It’s okay, though. Always knew cats were playful things.” 

Is there a dark corner somewhere near you two? Is there a dark hallway to drag him into? Just enough shadow to cover all the sins you’re desperate to commit, just enough light to see that blush rise across his cheeks again. 

“I’m not playing,” you whisper, eyes drifting down to his hand cradling a glass. Something deep and russet, just like his eyes. Likely whiskey. You wonder if you’d be able to taste it all over his tongue before you had him putting it to work where you need him most right now. “Whenever you get that through your big head, come find me.” 

“Big head?” he throws his head back in a laugh, and the tension mists away in seconds. “Who says I have a big head?” 

“I do, as the one wearing your hat,” you readjust it for emphasis. 

You thought the tension had misted away until he’s smirking, tsking a little, “Oh, thought you meant the other one.” 

It’s a replay of the scene in Steve’s apartment, but this time, the roles are reversed. You’re the one left in shock, mouth agape, as Eddie spins around and walks away, leaving you to sit with what he’s just said. 

“Bastard,” you breathe out as you watch him disappear in the crowd, eyes locked on his broad shoulders until one too many bodies separate the two of you. 

A bastard you want awfully, terribly, bad. 

—

You wish you could say you threw back drink, after drink, after drink. You wish you could say you danced with a hundred different beautiful strangers, and each one strayed your mind farther from Eddie. 

You wish you could say you did anything but what the reality of your night had been.

A few men had approached you, only to be turned down repeatedly. Most of your night was spent all but moping at the bar, eyes diligently scanning the bouncing crowd for a certain curly haired figure that seemed to escape you. One moment, you’d catch him pressed against a flirty stranger, hands holding onto whatever bare skin was available to him. And then, his eyes would find yours, and there would be a spark; a wink, a smile, a whisper across a bustling room daring you to come out and play with him. 

You never did. You’d look away, take a sip of your plain coke, and wait a few seconds until it was safe to look back and find him seemingly vanished. 

That in itself had started to become a game. Just like the hat, weighing heavy on your head. 

You’re starting to accept that maybe you had just been a bit too brave. You’d jumped the gun, flown feet first into cold and ragged waters you weren’t prepared to navigate. You knew you wanted a change with Eddie, but were you ready? If you had been, you would have accepted one of his various invites. Would have strode across the room, shoved away whatever man or woman he was dancing with, and slotted yourself into their place. You would have been swaying your hips in rhythm with his rather than allowing him to cycle through strangers, and you’d be reminding him that you wore his hat. 

You’d be the one bringing up the hat rule to him consistently, not him to you. 

When the night begins to wane, you’ve already talked yourself out of it all. 

“I’m heading out,” you announce to Robin when she finally returns back to where you’ve sat at the bar to babysit their drinks, hopping down from the stool before she could argue, “I’m getting way too tired.” 

“What?” your friend gasps, face pink from the heat of being in the crowd, a shimmering sheen of sweat across her forehead, “No! Stay! We can take turns watching the drinks, or just-”

“Robs,” you smile as sweetly as possible, patting yourself down to make sure you have all your belongings. A whistle sounds from a group down the way at the bar, and you ignore them, “It’s seriously okay. You’re having fun! I’m just a senior citizen who needs some sleep. My bedtime was like…. An hour ago.” 

You highly doubt you’ll be getting any rest when you return to your apartment. Maybe some confidence can be built out of fantasies, letting your hands wander and sheets catch fire with all that could have been if you hadn’t talked yourself out of your perfect plan. 

Maybe, imagining Eddie’s hot hands on you rather than getting to properly feel them will light a damn fire under your ass for the next opportunity that arises. 

“I…” she sighs, glancing over her shoulder in the general direction of Nancy, “Okay, fine. But do we want to do brunch or something tomorrow?” 

Not a chance, you think rather quickly, eyes scanning once more for the metal-head-turned-cowboy. Not if Eddie’s going to be there.

“Sure,” you lie, already knowing he will be there, “Just text me.” 

With that, you make your grand escape. 

Borrowed hat on head, phone in hand, you push your way out of the club with a newfound determination. You want to get home and take off this uncomfortable dress, finally do away with the thigh highs that have been rolling down at the most inconvenient of times, driving you insane the entire night. Trade the sexy attire for something comfy – stay true to the cat essence as you curl up beneath your blankets for the night. Hang that damn cowboy hat on your door as a cursed reminder-

“Where do you think you’re going, Kitty?” 

You stop a few feet short of the curb, a cab ordered as you turn to find that bastard leaning against the wall. Cigarette smoke is still clinging to the air around him as he looks at you curiously. 

“Home,” you shrug, trying to ignore your pounding heart. You’d figured you wouldn’t see him again tonight, that your fate had been sealed. “What are you doing out here?” 

“Smoke break,” he lifts his hand with the cigarette pinched between two fingers casually, pushing off the wall to come closer, “It’s hard work, keeping you entertained all night.” 

You scoff, falling back into what’s almost a normal rhythm for you two, “You were not the one keeping me entertained all night.” 

“I hardly saw you dance with anyone at all.” 

“I did!” you try to defend yourself, deciding this could be fine. Some casual conversation as you wait for your ride, a way to pass the time. This is fine. “Robin dragged me out into the crowd at least twice.” 

“I watched you swat a guy’s hands away not once, but three times.” 

“Unsolicited touching isn’t a compliment. He should have taken the hint the first time.” 

Eddie nods in eager agreement, taking another drag of his cigarette, “Damn right. If he had gone in for a fourth try, I was considering dragging him out here for an early smoke break.” 

“Why do I highly doubt it would just be a smoke break?” you question, glancing at him with a smile. Scandalous plans aside for the night, embarrassment swallowed down whole, it’s nice to remember that Eddie is a friend. Albeit a bit flirty, and capable of driving you fucking insane, but he’s a friend.

And maybe that isn’t the worst thing in the world. 

“Oh, no, yeah. You’d be posting my bail.”

“Why me?”

“Because you’ve got my hat, ” he reaches out and flicks the brim with his free hand, and you freeze up a little. You had hoped he wouldn’t mention it again, “Kind of makes me your problem until the end of the night. Speaking of….” 

You already know what he’s about to request as he trails off. This is it. You either give up the bit, hand the hat back over, and go home for the night – or you make one final attempt to get what you had wanted.

Eddie. You wanted Eddie, as more than a friend. 

“I’m gonna need that back, sweetheart.”

At least he’s asking politely, you consider, before it hits you why he’s asking rather than taking. 

The looks across the room. The way he’d been unbothered by the girl he’d been flirting with running off at your appearance. The way he never just took back that fucking hat when he’d been provided ample opportunity. 

He thinks it’s a game for you, and keeps bringing it up, because it isn’t for him. He’s giving you one last chance to back out, or to stand your ground. To say you really want this. 

And fuck, you really want this. 

“Nope,” you lean into his space, pressing closer, fully committed. Your phone dings with the notification of your ride approaching, and you fully ignore it. “My hat now, cowboy.” 

He quirks an eyebrow, and you hear the crunch of gravel behind you. Your ride. “Is that so?” 

“Yep.”

Another ding, another buzz of your phone.

Go ahead. Bring up the hat rule. 

“That your ride?” he asks, tilting his chin in the direction of the car. 

You glance over your shoulder, “Pretty sure it is, yeah.” 

“And you remember the hat rule?” 

Your stomach twists with excitement. Your previous pity party is long forgotten – you’re still hoping to get out of this dress, but you highly doubt you’ll be slipping anything on after it. “I do.”

“Great,” those hot hands you’d been fantasizing about the entire night suddenly reach out to you, gripping your hips tightly as he tugs you into his body. You collide with his chest as he leans down and whispers in your ear, “In that case, that’s my pussy now.” 

His lips linger against the shell of your ear an extra second, warm breath sending chills up your spine before he’s keeping an arm around your shoulders as he guides you to the car. His cologne and the scent of tobacco is suffocating, and you crave to drown in it. You want him to consume you; you want him to take over every breath you breathe, every move you make, to finally get those hot hands and lips everywhere you’ve only dreamt of. 

You barely hear him confirm with the driver that it is in fact your ride – you can only focus on that hand on your lower back, palm heavy on you as his thumb traces arcs that nearly spend you spiraling. 

“After you, kitty,” he murmurs, motioning for you to slide into the backseat first. 

In that case, that’s my pussy now.

You hope he ruins you. 

In the backseat of the ride, it’s all polite distance and hands to yourself. You can’t even make eye contact with the driver, terrified he might be able to mindread and see all the filthy thoughts racing through your head. 

Eddie between your thighs, mouthing at your hips. 

Eddie hovering over you, pulling your knees to your chest as he stretches you out. 

Eddie, proving that your pussy is in fact his for the night. That it was made for him, sculpted out to fit the curvature and every single vein of him. 

Eddie simply fucking your brains out. 

Some polite conversation is exchanged, mostly between Eddie and the driver. The classic questioning of how the night has gone, small talk that buzzes in your ears mindlessly. 

The entire time, you can see Eddie’s hand in the space between you two, fingers tapping away at dark leather incessantly. His rings shimmer like a siren calling to you. 

It’s a small movement, when your own hand drops near his. You keep your eyes trained forward once you begin your mission, inching your pinky closer and closer until it finally collides with his. You swear, you feel him fully jump out of his seat. 

Slowly warming the water, you start off simple – playing with his fingers. Gentle caresses over his knuckles, little pricks to the pads of his fingers. He tries to capture your hand in his, but you have bigger plans at play here. 

You’ve spent the entire fucking night waiting for this. You’re going to have fun with it. 

He huffs after you deter his second attempt at properly holding hands, his knees falling apart a little further. You twist at the ring on his middle finger, a clunky skull you’ve always admired. It has minimal signs of wear, probably pure silver if you had to guess, and you can only imagine how cold it’s going to feel against your skin. 

You can only imagine the imprints it’ll leave if he grabs your hips just right. 

“You know,” the driver hums mindlessly over the low volume of the radio, “You guys are my first ride of the night, surprisingly. Thought it might be busier with all the parties and clubs, but I think it’s just barely picking up now.”

“Yeah?” Eddie asks politely, nodding as he looks out his window. Perfect, “I think you’re right. It is getting pretty late-”

He’s entirely distracted, your hand out of his line of sight as it moves in on its target. 

His thigh. 

Just a few inches above his knee, your hand grips at what is clearly sensitive flesh. You watch his entire body turn to stone when you do it, and he moves his head quickly to look in your direction. 

You’re looking straight ahead. 

There had been a time, a few weeks ago, where you’d learned Eddie had… sensitive knees. You’d been joking around about one thing or another, and when your palms had gripped at them through the torn fabric of ripped jeans, he’d nearly launched himself across the room. He just kept insisting they were ticklish, that that skin was just delicate.

You’d seen the tent in his jeans then. You’d just been a bit more polite, a bit better behaved that day. 

“What are you doing?” he hisses in a whisper, reaching for your hand, but you’re quick to slide it even higher. 

His hips jump a little, and the driver is none the wiser. 

“Nothing,” you innocently say, still looking ahead, watching the passing streetlights with intense interest. “Absolutely nothing at all.” 

The entire ride, at every red light, your hand inches higher. 

And every time, you relish the way he squirms in your peripherals.

By the time you’re five minutes out from your place, you’ve riled him up to impossible heights. Every little noise has him on edge, constant twitching and shifting in his seat as he tries to get you to just look at him. You know he’s catching every sly smile that attempts to creep up on your lips – you’re pathetically failing at every turn to cover them up. 

You think you have him like putty in your palms as you give yet another squeeze to his thigh, fingers starting to dance up even higher. When your eyes flicker to his crotch for just a second, you see him straining against that tight leather. 

And then he flips the script. 

You’re so focused on your own goals, you never see that ringed hand creep to your own thigh. It’s not until cool metal nips at you, briefly, before you feel the warmth of his hand overtake, that you realize the predicament you’ve gotten into. 

Just as your hand was beginning to skim over his crotch, Eddie’s hand found solace between the meat of your thighs. Even as you try to clench them together, deny him the access he was seeking out, he finds his way in. Scandalous fingers dipping under the hem of your dress, fighting fire with fire when he lets his middle finger brush across the fabric of your underwear. 

Your touch from him nearly retracts entirely. 

“What?” he leans in closer to you, the driver still focused on the road, “Don’t like a taste of your own medicine?”

As he says it, his fingers dip lower. Hovering right over your protected clit, making your entire abdomen clench. 

You swallow hard, a bit of your jagged pride somewhere amongst the spit as you turn your head to look at him, “I don’t know what you mean.” 

“Still playing games I see.” 

In sync, the two of you lock eyes as you continue to test waters. You apply pressure with your palm and note the way his breathing hitches, and he draws a feather-light circle around the wet patch forming in your underwear. You can feel your bottom lip quiver as you try to refuse to give him any satisfaction, but when he’s this close, it’s a hopeless battle.

When had he gotten so near you? What happened to all that static distance from when you’d first crawled into the backseat?

You’re trying to only focus on your own hand. Eyes darting to guarantee the driver is still oblivious as you roll the heel of your hand harder against the seam of his pants, and biting your lip to hold back a successful grin when he has to cover a gasp with a cough. It’s all fun and games until the action is rewarded with his payback; his knuckle curling up against your cunt through your panties, pressing in hard before slowly sliding his way up, up, up. 

He deliberately stops when he catches on your clit, and you’re the one coughing now. 

“Had enough?” he mutters under his breath, looking at you with half-lidded eyes. He looks good in this lighting, flashes of the streetlights bathing him in soft yellow, headlights of other cars fluttering in through the windshield as they hit his brown eyes just right to bronze them. 

“Never.”

You almost think you’ve won when his knuckle pulls back. 

But suddenly, his entire hand is cupping your cunt, two fingers pressing against your fluttering hole as another drags up your slit slowly once more. This time, when he reaches your clit, he continues moving in small circles. 

You have to bite your lip to hold back any noises, eyes closing for just a second as you hear him huff out a laugh. 

The final damnation is when he brings his lips to your bare shoulder, merely grazing your skin with them as he mumbles, “You sure about that, Kitty?” 

You clench around nothing, and you know when he feels it from where his fingers remain pressed against you. His own hand twitches as the finger circling your clit stutters for a moment. 

“I-”

“We’re here!” the driver says, not having looked into the backseat yet as he finds a safe place to pull the car into. In an instant, you and Eddie remove your hands from each other. You’re both visibly flustered – you can feel how warm your cheeks have gotten, and you can see clouds of pink splattering over Eddie’s chest and neck. 

“Thanks,” Eddie is the one to speak up as the car comes to a halt, not even waiting for the driver to put the vehicle in park as he throws the door open. 

A bit rushed, but still polite as ever before he’s grabbing you by your bicep to pull you out of the cramped space right along with him. 

You can hardly muster a weak wave to the man as Eddie is dragging you towards your apartment building, knees still a bit weak and mind still blank after getting a taste of your own medicine, as Eddie had put it. 

He doesn’t let go of you until you’re at your front door, those cursed shaking hands of yours fumbling with your key ring. 

“Here, let me-” he starts to offer, reaching for the keys that continue to clank together, just as you find the one you’re looking for. 

“I’ve got it-” you try to cut him off, just as you drop the fucking keys in your haste. “Shit.” 

You quickly drop to the ground to grab them, pausing once you have the metal digging into your palms once more. There’s no real reason for you to do it, but you do – you take a second to look up at Eddie from this position, and nearly drool at the sight of it.

Him, standing over you, still a bit flushed and still visibly uncomfortable in his pants. Pretty curls a mess and lips darkening from how much he’s been biting them. 

You want him to ruin you. You want him to absolutely, entirely and utterly destroy you.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he laughs, chest heaving a bit as he watches you carefully, pupils slowly growing in the dim light of your building’s hallway. 

You can see his bare torso clenching, the twitch of his hands at his sides – the same fingers that had just been caressing you over your underwear in the backseat of a stranger’s car. 

“Like what?” you’re dragging out the moment, taking time to appreciate the sight of him. 

“Like you want me to just press you up against the wall and fuck you out here, for everyone to see.” 

That’s a new one. That’s a vision that hadn’t come to you in all your dirtiest dreams of the night. 

It sends your clit throbbing. 

You rise slowly, pushing the hat back a bit to see him better, keeping your voice quiet so your neighbors won’t hear as you ask, “Would you? If I asked nicely?” 

He doesn’t let out a laugh, but a breath of air, like you’ve just sucked all of the oxygen out of his lungs. 

No need to say it – you know he would. You probably wouldn’t even have to ask nicely. 

You’re staring at him when he finally moves, one hand snatching your keys out of your hand and the other gripping you around the waist. Back to pulling you, man-handling you to get you right where he wants you – where he needs you. 

One second, you’re pressed against his body in the hallway. The next, he’s managed to unlock your front door and throw you both into the safety of your apartment. 

Hidden from the world, and you’re still reeling as you wonder what it’d be like for the entire building to witness you calling out his name. Or him calling out your name. 

Here within these four walls, Eddie has put some space between the two of you, staring with blown out eyes and a shaking chest as he breathes out, “Sweetheart.”

A few seconds pass, the two of you just standing there, the click of the front door’s lock being the only thing echoing in the silence. If you focused over the roar of the blood pounding in your ears, you might catch every single gasp of his as he stares in awe – but your focus is elsewhere. Far away and out of grasp for the time being. You can only think of one thing, and one thing only. 

Your body isn’t your own as you move to get exactly what you want; you drop to your knees hard enough that you should cringe at the thought of the pain that will linger, possibly for days, but it doesn’t even cross your mind as your hands begin to fumble with Eddie’s pants. The oversized, gaudy belt buckle is in your way, glinting at you as if mocking the way your shaking hands can’t undo it fast enough. You’re about to give up and just start unzipping the leather pants, desperate to get your hands, and your mouth, and your eyes on him properly, when he stops you. 

“Hey,” he sounds breathless - he is breathless - as his own hands quiver a bit and grab onto yours, “Hey, hey, hey. Slow down.”

Those hands let go of your wrists and reach for the hat, and you’re quick to try and swat them away only for him to grab at you, surprisingly gentle, as he drags you back up to your feet. 

“Wear the hat, ride the cowboy – right?” you insist, chin held high, your gaze refusing to waver from his. 

His slow and buttery grin makes you lightheaded, his low chuckle sends shakes through every nerve and bone. “That’s right, but maybe the cowboy wants to take his time. Ever think of that, hm?” 

Were you moving too fast? Were you going to scare him off? 

Small, baby steps are taken by Eddie, the click of his heels shattering against your wooden floors until his hips are flush with yours. 

And - oh.

Oh. 

That surely didn’t feel like you were scaring him off. 

You could feel the outline of his cock, hard against your hip, as he gives a little roll. He catches his bottom lip between his teeth, nostrils flaring with a hard breath, and the fear leaves as quickly as it had arrived. 

He wants this. You want him. 

“I’m not a very patient person,” you murmur, eyes glued to his lips now as his head leans in closer, and his hands begin to explore your body. Taking their time as they travel down your arms from where he’d held onto your biceps, slowing as they reach your wrists. Even the press of his thumb against the sensitive inner skin there sends jolts up your spine, little gasps attempting to escape your mouth. 

His fingers tangle loosely with your own for a few moments before his palms find your hips, and he continues his journey. 

“That’s okay,” he whispers back, close enough now that his lips have begun to brush against your own. His nose bumps yours as his hands skate up over your ribcage, thumb sweeping out over the hill of your breast and intentionally avoiding your nipple, “I can teach you, baby.”

Your mouth finally collides with him at the words, nearly going limp in his arms at the words. 

You’ve thought about kissing Eddie for a while now. Every time a snarky remark fell from his lips, you’d wonder how his tongue might taste afterwards. Every time he’d pout his lips at one of your comebacks, or blow a kiss teasingly in your direction from across a room, you’d wonder how hard you might have to bite down to make him bleed. Every drag of a cigarette you’d witnessed, every hard gasp in faux offense, every breathless chuckle at a joke he didn’t want to find funny but did – you had spent a lot of time wondering what it might be like to steal all the air from his lungs, to kiss him until the two of you were both blue in the face. 

“Can’t the lesson wait until tomorrow?” you mumble against him as his mouth, your own fists now gripping onto the lapels of his vest. His hands have reached your shoulders, memorizing the outlines of the curve of your neck where it meets your collarbones, the slope of your chest as you take hot and heavy breaths. 

“Nope,” he insists, pulling back from the kiss, a little bit of spit on his pink lips, “But it’s nice to know you’re thinking about tomorrow.” 

A hand finally finds your chin and pinches it carefully between his thumb and fingers, a careful grip on you to angle you just right so he can all but devour you. Lips, tongues, teeth – it’s a messy ordeal, and you almost make a smart-ass remark that this kiss doesn’t feel very patient. 

But you can’t. Eddie’s taken away all your breaths, all your words, as he starts to guide you backwards. 

Your knees hit the cushions of your sofa, making you jump back from him with a gasp, palms going flat against his chest. 

He feels good. Tender skin soft to the touch beneath your hand, tattoos tempting to trace the outline of. Later. 

“Figured you might want a more comfortable ride,” he laughs against you, breath smelling ever so faintly of mint and whiskey washing over you, before he dips to mouth away at your neck.

You drop back onto the sofa, bite your tongue on a comment about how this cheap piece of furniture most definitely wasn’t the most comfortable option, simply eager at the fact he was letting this move along. 

You want him, you need him, and you have no time for patience. 

His exploration of touches have lit you aflame, and you’re growing a bit desperate at this point. It might be pathetic, it should be embarrassing, but you really don’t care. 

“By all means,” you break out of his hold entirely, catching the way his hand holding your chin lingers a few extra seconds, reluctant to let you go, “Take your seat, Cowboy.” 

He joins you on the couch, eyes never leaving yours even as he throws himself down. Knees spread wide, inviting lap on show, cock still straining against his pants. 

The best seat in the house, as far as you’re concerned. 

“You just gonna keep starin’,” he mocks lightly, looking you over slowly. Taking his time, you suppose, “Or you gonna get over here?” 

His words are all you need. You’re quick to climb onto his lap, swinging your legs so that each thigh brackets his hips, your cunt pressing down on crotch carelessly. You love the way it feels – the outline of him hard against you, the cooling effect of the leather, the sharp edges of the zipper catching just right. 

“There,” he huffs out, grabbing onto you when you give the slightest roll of your hips, “Now we’re both in our seats.” 

When you go to press down harder, guiding yourself over his lap, hands steadying you by gripping his shoulders, he surprises you by his hips jumping up to meet your slow rhythm.

“What happened to being patient?” you try to tease him right back as your forehead meets his, hat comically struggling to stay on between the two of you, “Thought you were gonna take your time with me-”

“Between you and me, I’m not gonna last,” he pants out, hands finding your hips. Those rings you’d been fantasizing of leaving an imprint on you are doing just that as he guides you, “Been dreaming of you too long, sweetheart. Wanted this for so long.” 

Your heart nearly stops. Your hips stutter, pausing as his words rush over you. 

“What?” 

Your head lifts away from his completely, grip on his shoulders tightening. 

He’s wanted this, too? This entire time? 

Eddie takes your pause as a bad thing, a terrible omen as his face pales, “I mean- I just-”

“Munson,” you say lowly, narrowing your eyes at him, “You’re telling me, this entire time, you’ve been flirting with me?” 

Had that tone he used with the girl at the bar been flirting as you’d thought, or simple for show? You’d so cluelessly assumed he’d never used that tone with you because he’d never genuinely flirted with you – and yet, it seems, he’d never used that tone because he’d been genuinely flirting with you. 

“I-” his cheeks are brilliant red, and the wide eyes are from something different than lust now, “Maybe?” 

“Maybe?” you almost laugh, throwing your head back. The hat falls off, but Eddie is quick to retrieve it, “My God, we’re fucking idiots.” 

“Hey, I’m not the one who stole my hat-”

“I like you, dumb ass,” you state plainly, “I wanted this for a while, too.” 

He pauses, one arm outstretched as his hand grips onto the hat, “What?” 

“Been thinking about this, too,” your voice drops a little, almost a whisper, even though you two are the only ones in the room. For all you know, you two might be the only two people left in the world with the way he’s looking at you, “Thinking about you and your lips. Thinking ‘bout your hands and the places they’d go,” as you point out every detail, his body seemingly reacts. A lick of his lips, a squeeze of his hand still on your hip, “Thought about your fingers and tongue a lot, too. How good they’d feel inside me.” 

His hips thrust up at that, and suddenly, he’s placing his hat back atop your head. 

That, it seems, was all the encouragement Eddie needed. 

He deals with that belt buckle that had given you hell, bouncing you a bit on his lap as he fumbles with yanking the entire belt off and tossing it to the side. One hand busies with undoing the button and zipper of his jeans, as the other starts to bunch your dress. 

“Nice and slow,” he insists, looking up at you, absolutely vibrant. Somewhere between the tightness between your hips, all the throbbing between your thighs and in your chest, you feel a sort of bubbly delight creeping up along your spine. “Got it, kitty?” 

You nod once. Twice. On the third nod, he cuts you off with a kiss. 

Your dress is up to your waist, and you don’t know how, but he manages to shimmy off his pants without throwing you off his lap entirely. It’s impressive, really. Probably a symptom of him having thought about this, dreamt about this. He’d probably thought up every scenario possible, and was prepared. 

“Oh, and these?” his fingers find the waistband of your panties, tsking a little as he pulls at the elastic and lets it slap back against your skin, “Those definitely have to come off.” 

“Whatever you say, cowboy.” 

You take your time sliding off his lap, making sure to grind against him before you properly lift away. He throws his head back in a groan, Adam’s apple bobbing as you stand up straight. You take that moment to just admire him, capturing the clench of his jaw to memory, the way his eyes screw shut in pleasure at your influence. 

He’s fucking perfect. You’re sure there’s others who disagree, but you’d pay them no mind. He’s perfect, and he’s all yours. 

You make a show of taking off your panties only once he’s properly looking at you once more, craving his eyes on you as you keep all your movements fluid and steady. No rush, exuding all that patience he’d prattled on about. 

You want to see his face when you gently toss the black lacey piece in his direction, watch him fumble with his own desperation to catch them. 

“Seems a bit unfair that I’m the only one undressing,” you hum as you go a step further and begin to shimmy out of the dress.

“Yeah, well,” he grins cheekily at you, fisting your panties, a hand trailing down to the waistband of his boxers as he eyes you, “One of us was showing a bit more skin than the other.”

“Take off the vest, Eddie.” 

Your command is velvet, and he’s quick to obey. His hand stubbornly refuses to let go of your panties as he rushes to shrug out of the thin fabric over his shoulders, tossing the vest to join his pants and your dress on the floor. 

“And the boxers.” 

You stand there, in nothing but his cowboy hat, as you wait pretty and patient for him to listen. And listen he does. 

The moment his boxers are discarded, his cock is standing at attention, leaking from the tip and deep shade of pink that matches his kiss-bitten lips. You think it might be the prettiest color you’ve ever laid eyes on as you watch a drop of  precum slip down his shaft. 

He’s pretty, even in the fucking pants. 

Girthy, thick enough you almost arch your back before you’ve even sunk down on him. All veins and soft skin, a sensitive tip that you’d trace your tongue over for hours if he let you. 

“Gonna just stand there, or are you going to ride your cowboy?” 

He surely meant to sound more cocky, but the words come out as more of a whine as you watch him twitch under your stare. 

He’s right though, and you’d rather get him inside you than spend another second gawking. There will be time to pay more attention to him and his pretty cock tomorrow. Right now, you need to finish this god-forsaken mission. 

Your thighs find his hips just as his hands find yours, choosing to grip the couch rather than his shoulders as you steady yourself. 

Nice and slow, his words echo in your mind. 

You could have prepared yourself more, but you’d already made it clear to Eddie that you are not a patient person. The fact that you even take your time as you sink down on him, going as far as to grab him by his base and guide his tip to smear precum across your clit, is impressive. 

The stretch is a bit painful. A bit much. A bit dizzying. But you refuse to stop as your jaw drops, eyes fluttering shut in ecstasy. 

“Fuck,” you breathe out softly as you feel him fill you, “Fuck, Eddie.” 

“Feel good, baby?” he questions, reaching up to grab your chin just as he had before. Forcing you closer to him, forcing you to look him in the eyes just as he bottoms out. 

You don’t answer him as you both moan out. 

You stay there for a second, unmoving as you swim in the feeling. Feeling him press into the depths of you, the overwhelming warmth and the coil in your abdomen tightening ever so slightly. 

It’s better than you had imagined it. No daydreams could compare to the feeling of Eddie’s cock finally, finally filling you. Stretching you out, making you his. 

“Go ahead,” he grits out, entire body tense, clearly holding out on you, “Ride your cowboy, kitty. Don’t make me ask twice.” 

Nice. And. Slow.

Three little words that ricochet through your mind as you start to slowly bounce on him. Lifting ever so slightly, dropping back down, aching to feel him even deeper inside of you. Feeling the quiver of his thighs to match yours as you repeat the action, gasps and whimpers falling from both your lips. You’re about to try and kiss him, try and swallow all those delicate noises from him, when he stops you. 

“No, no, no,” he’s chuckling, giving your hips a few squeezes before his palms rub down your thighs, the friction sending you on edge, “C’mon, now. We both know that’s not how you ride.” 

His hands rake over your skin, down to your knees, lighting scratching and squeezing along their entire pathway until they make their way back up to your waist and hips. 

“Do it like this, sweetheart.”

He guides you, no longer allowing you to lift up. You sink all the way down on his cock, whining out at the fullness, before he starts the pattern. 

Back and forth. Gentle circles amidst the rocking. Your clit grazes his pubes, and the coil in between your hips has never tightened more quickly. 

The motion feels familiar - like riding a bull. 

This feels right. You still press down, still clench down on him hard enough to make you both slip out obscenities, but it’s getting you there. 

At some point, Eddie’s grip on your hips slips, but it’s fine – you’ve got the rhythm down perfectly. Slow, intermittent figure eights between the rolls of your hips, his occasionally slamming upward to reward you with that deepness you need. You can feel him in your stomach, in your chest, in your throat. 

You get a bit daring, and take one hand to his shoulders, as the other reaches up for the top of the hat on your head. 

Just like a cowboy. 

“Like this?” you pant out between harsher rolls, eliciting curses that continue to grow louder from Eddie. 

“Fuck, baby, yes,” he groans out, head thrown back, mouth open in gratification, “Just like that. Keep- keep going just,” he thrusts up, “Like,” another thrust, “That.” 

You nearly lose balance, falling forward a bit, too stubborn to let go of the hat. There’s a grin glimmering at the corners of your mouth, and it fully blooms when Eddie throws up a hand to catch you .

A hand on your throat. 

He doesn’t squeeze, doesn’t cut off blood flow or breathing. He keeps that warm palm there at the base of your neck, cradling you, holding you. A reminder that he could squeeze if he wanted, that he held you in the palm of his hands currently, but he won’t. 

“You like that?” his eyes shine as he looks up at you, the sight of his rings decorating your neck. 

You nod.

“Tell me with your words,” he commands.

“I like it,” you whimper, looking up further, stretching more of your neck to be vulnerable to Eddie. “I like it so much, baby.” 

When the pet name falls from your lips, you can feel him twitch inside of you. The sudden jut of his hips, the sharp intake of breath. 

“You like that,” you laugh breathlessly, your hand atop the hat the only thing keeping it from falling as you lean your head fully back, eyes beginning to roll back into your head. “Wanna be my baby, Munson?” 

“Always have,” he grunts, the hand on your throat slipping up to cup your face to drag you towards him, “Since the fucking moment I met you, sweetheart.”

When he kisses you, it tastes like the closest to Heaven you might ever get. Soft, plump lips, and an eager tongue. All the wasted time hiding behind jokes and teasing, playing pretend like the flirting was never serious.

It was serious. And if you’d just come clean sooner, you would have had this long ago. 

Your hips are still rolling as your hands begin to roam. You’ve found your balance again, lips pressed to Eddie, and it’s your turn to explore all he has to give you. Your nails graze his stomach when your clit catches once more on that rough thatch of hair against the base of his cock. Your fingers dig into flesh wherever they can find it – his chest, his arms, his hips. At some point, you throw a hand out behind you, grasping for his knee. Learning every curve and every point of his body as he had done for you. 

You wanna memorize the roadmap of him. Take a snapshot in your mind so that next time, none of it is unfamiliar territory. 

Your touch is driving him insane; it doesn’t take a genius to pick up on the way his hips falter to meet your movements, or how he keeps breaking the kiss to gasp, letting his jaw fall slack when he hits a particular deep spot within you. 

It’s when your lips finally trail down the stubble sprouting across his jawline, mouth sucking on the soft skin below his ear, that he’s finally a goner. 

“‘M close,” he gasps out, almost sounding drunk as he slurs through his pants, “Ah, fuck, I’m gonna-”

“Cum for me, Eddie.” 

Maybe it’s the way you had been touching him, or the way your cunt had been fluttering around him, or the persistent rolling of your hips that had become so focused on his pleasure. Maybe it was the sight of you in his hat, looking at him like that. Maybe it was the way his name sounded on your tongue. 

Either way, when Eddie Munson comes undone, he’s beautiful. 

Your own movements slow involuntarily as you gaze starry eyed, watching the way his face scrunches and feeling his grip on you tighten impossibly. Leaving their mark, making you his in yet another way. Warmth fills your cunt and every curse word under the summer sun is falling from his lips. 

Your name, curses, prayers, gratitude – a jumbled mess, and it sounds fucking fantastic when it’s said in Eddie’s desperate tone. 

“Shit,” he gasps out, finally coming back down to Earth, “Shit.”

You sit still on his lap, skin sticky with sweat, lips spread thin in a cheeky grin, “Sounds like I get to keep your hat, cowboy.” 

His eyes shoot open, and for a second, you’re terrified.

Those aren’t the eyes of someone satisfied. 

“You didn’t cum.”

“What?”

“You,” he says, stressing the word as he shifts you off his lap. You don’t miss the way he winces, clearly a bit sensitive, “Did not cum.” 

You hadn’t really noticed, too wrapped up in him to notice your high slipping away from you. You’d been too focused on Eddie: on feeling him cum inside you, on watching him break apart, on tracing the outline of the blood rushing to his cheeks with your eyes and that fresh burst of violet on his neck in the shape of your lips. 

“It’s fine,” you start to argue, feeling the warmth of him leaking down your thighs. You should be a lot more worried about making a mess all over your sofa. You should be, but you aren’t. “I can-”

“You’re not keeping that fucking hat until you cum for me, sweetheart.” 

And, oh, maybe your own orgasm wasn’t racing as far away from you as you’d believed, because those words nearly push you over the edge for him. 

“Get on all fours for me, baby.” 

Yeah. You definitely could still be close. For him.

When you don’t move to follow his command immediately, he’s using those gentle hands to guide you. Encouraging a twist of your hips from how you’re reclining back across the couch, letting you press your cheek down against the cushion.

You open your mouth to argue, to insist it was fine, to say anything, but you’re cut silent when a sudden slap lands on your ass. 

A silent command this time, and you’re finally listening. 

You lift your ass up for him on shaky knees, elbows digging into the cushion now instead of your face. The hat on your head is lopsided, and you almost reach up to fix it when- 

“I’ll be taking that,” For the first time since you’d stolen his hat, Eddie takes it back. Right off your head, too fast for you to protest. When you dig your chin into your shoulder to look back at him, he’s smiling, hat back in its rightful place atop his curls, “You can have it back after you cum for me, at least once.”

“At least once?” you mean to laugh, to sound cocky, but it comes out as more of a squeak. 

He shrugs, leaning forward, his bare chest pressing against the skin of your bare ass – right where an imprint of his hand still sings, “At least. By all means, if you feel the need, don’t hesitate to give me a few. God knows you’ve earned it.” 

You don’t have time to banter back; he retracts before bring his mouth down to your cunt, and your elbows quickly give out at the first long stride of his tongue. 

“Gotta get you cleaned up,” he murmurs, a bit muffled, against your cunt. 

Another stride, and this time, his tongue spends an extra second at your clit, circling it salaciously. 

“Oh, God,” you moan out into a mouthful of couch cushion, tempted to bite down to hide all the noises creeping up your throat when his tongue draws yet another circle, tip of his nose pressed to your sensitive hole.

He brings his tongue back to that space, that hole that feels gaping without him filling you now, and you try to bury your cheek only to earn another slap on the ass.

“Don’t be shy now, kitty. Let me hear you.” 

And let him hear you, you do. 

Each lick, short and timid or long and confident, is dredging up obscene mewls from you. When he enters you with it, curling it and pressing as deep as he can, truly cleaning you up as he had said, you’re chanting his name. 

“Fuck, Eddie,” you cry softly, rocking your body back against his mouth, “Your fingers. P-Please, use your fingers.” 

Your wish is his command as he brings his hand up between your legs, breaking from having his tongue buried inside of you and using a calloused pad of his finger to trace over your clit before he begs, “Say my name again.” 

You do. Over, and over, and over as his mouth and his fingers begin to work against you. Careful focus is placed on your clit, and his mouth runs amok between your cunt and thighs. You feel what will no doubt be hickies along the curve of your ass, nips of teeth against the sensitive skin of your inner thigh as he presses two fingers into you. With every thrust of his hand, your hips are rocking back to match his rhythm, wanting more. 

More, more, more. 

There’s nothing nice and slow about this. You’re chasing after a high, and Eddie is listening to you every step of the way. 

Your thighs begin to shake terribly right around the time your vision blurs, unable to contain the whines that have grown to echoing volumes. Surely, your neighbors can hear. Probably confused as to who Eddie is, probably considering how embarrassing it would be to knock down your door and complain about the noises. 

You really, really don’t give a fuck when white speckles flood your vision, even with your eyes screwed shut, and that tension between your hips threatens to snap. 

Right before your knees give out, your entire body trembling, Eddie pulls back and grabs your hips. You cry out, so close yet so far, until he’s flipping you back over. 

You get one glimpse of him before he goes to work to bring you over that edge – lips and chin slick with you, hair frizzing beneath his hat, a determined glint in his eyes that have your thighs clenching around his ears. 

You were right. Eddie Munson looks damn good between your thighs. 

He quickly returns to his mitigations, and this time, it’s all a bit more strategic. Lips suctioned around your clit and three fingers curling deep within you, a beckoning motion as he urges you to let go for him. 

The white returns behind your eyelids. Your back arches up off the sofa. Your ankles lock as they cross behind Eddie’s back, almost effectively trapping him in place.

You cum hard for him. 

You’re entirely unaware if you scream his name in the process, but you hope you do. As that relief, that ecstasy, floods your system, you hope you make sure everyone within a five mile radius knows who’s responsible. Your entire body continues to shake for far longer than you believe it ever has before. Your hips had lifted, begging for Eddie to keep going even as it all grew painful.

He does. He keeps going, sucking you dry for every drop you have to give him, until you’re physically having to shove him away. 

Your hands are weak as you sink down into the cushion, eyes still closed as you hear him chuckle before you feel him crawl his way back up your body. 

“There,” you don’t even need to see his face to see that smug satisfaction – his voice is dripping in it. “Now you can keep the hat.” 

One of your hands blindly throws itself through the air to smack him, missing entirely as you drift through the afterglow of it all. 

“I’m not sure I’ve earned it,” you mumble as he catches your wrist, limp in the air, “Pretty sure I didn’t break you when I made you cum.”

“Oh, you did,” he notes, hand curling around your wrist. You watch as he slowly brings it to his lips, peppering a few chaste kisses on the soft skin, “Just in a different way.” 

You raise your eyebrows, smiling at the tingling feeling left behind on your skin in the wake of his mouth, “Yeah?” 

“Yeah.” 

He tugs you to sit up despite your groan of protest, somehow smoothly maneuvering the two of you so that he’s now the one beneath you, letting the full weight of you bear down on his chest as you lay on top of him. The hand wrapped around your wrist brings it back up for more kisses, more repetitive gentle pecks of affection, as his other arm is quick to wrap around you. Holding you in place, as though he’s scared you might disappear. 

“Well,” you whisper against the bare skin of his chest, nearly shivering when his free hand starts to trail slowly up and down your spine, “Good.” 

Your cheek feels the vibrations of his chuckle, “That’s all you have to say?” 

“Give me a few minutes to recover,” you insist, all but nuzzling into him, “I’m sure I’ll have a smartass comeback for you once I’m…” you trail off, heavy eyes looking up at him, the words lost on your tongue and in the air. 

The gentle curve of his cupid’s bow. The roundness at the end of his nose, still a fading hue of pink. The freckle beneath his right eye. The way the phantom of the dimple of his left cheek never quite leaves his face.

All the things you’ve dreamt of seeing so up close, never knowing it could have been a reality. 

He lets go of your wrist, smiling softly with a shake of his head, “Can’t believe you’re gonna fall asleep on me.”

“Am not,” you nearly say under your breath, sighing in content. 

“Am too,” he mocks, a certain docility to all his teasing before he sighs as well, “It’s okay. You can. I’ll still be here when you wake up.”

You hum, eyes fluttering shut as you hear some rustling, “Promise, cowboy?” 

“Absolutely, kitty. You said something about tomorrow, remember?” 

You both laugh in sync as your couch suddenly becomes the most comfortable place in the world. 

Just before losing consciousness, right as you feel Eddie’s breathing even out along with your own, you decide to open your eyes one last time to catch sight of the cowboy hat perched carefully on your coffee table. 

Tomorrow. You hope for a thousand tomorrows as you decide that that hat is definitely yours now.

I love the idea of Eddie having an especially grueling day at work his friend (they have mutual feelings but nothing has been said) offers to give him a massage. Eddie is genuinely grateful but also vv flustered by the end!!

listen. LISTEN. i know this got out of hand. i know i said these were going to stay short n sweet. i know what i said and promised. but. listen. you can't hand me a prompt that is just so delicious, with so much potential to sprinkle in a light dusting of angst, and to give me the chance to garnish with a beautiful open ending full of promise, and not expect a monster of a product to come from it. you just can't. i'm sorry. i hope you enjoy this, regardless. even if it's not quite bite-sized.

warnings: seemingly unrequited love that turns into clearly idiots in love. eddie gets shirtless. that's all.

wc: 4.4k+ yikes

It had started off as an innocent, well-intentioned offer. You swear it did. 

When Eddie had called you right after pulling a double at the garage, begging to come over and simply relax at your apartment, you’d set up to allow him to do just that. You’d cleaned up a little bit, lit a candle that normally gave you a headache if it burned too long but that Eddie loved, prepped a selection of movies for him to choose from, pulled out the menu for your favorite take-out – you’d gone the whole nine yards for your best friend. 

Someone might even point out it wasn’t just best friend behavior at this point. Steve and Robin alike had certainly called out your behavior at times, coining it as “girlfriend behavior on a best friend salary”.

You didn’t care. You were well aware of what you were doing, and you didn’t care. 

You’d spend the rest of your life on the best friend salary, as the two dinguses had so lovingly called it, for the look of sheer peace on Eddie’s face right now. 

He’s leaning back on the opposite end of your couch from you, knees spread and chin facing the ceiling as he sighs in bliss. Take-out containers are scattered about the coffee table, and his movie of choice of Return of the Jedi is about halfway over on your TV. 

You both had already chosen a second movie – The Lost Boys. The plans for the night were set in stone.

You tuck both knees up beneath your chin, side-glancing your best friend for a second and ignoring the flutter of your chest as you watch him sink deeper into the cushions, “We can talk about it, y’know.” 

“Hm?” 

“Your day,” you adjust a bit, turning your body to face him fully, “If you wanna talk about it, I’m all ears. We’ve already seen enough Jabba the Hutt to last a lifetime.”

That earns a smile from him, slowly crackling over his cheeks as he rolls his head towards you, “I dunno. Is there such thing as enough Jabba the Hutt?” 

You toss a piece of your sour watermelon candy at him, and despite it landing on his shirt, he still grabs it to pop it into his mouth. 

You try not to think too hard about how that shirt had been sitting in your drawers, clean and neatly folded, occupying space as if that might be normal. As if everyone has some of their best friend’s clothes at their apartment that they can change into after a long day at work. 

As if everyone has occasionally used said shirt as pajamas on nights they particularly miss the scent of their best friend’s cologne.

“Shut up,” you finally snicker, dropping your knees from your chin, sitting criss-cross now, “We don’t have to talk about your day if you don’t feel like it. By all means, if you wanna keep drooling over an alien slug, be my guest-”

At your teasing, Eddie moves quickly to grab one of your ankles, pulling your feet towards his lap before you can register what he’s doing. You gasp a little, and it’s definitely not because of the feeling of his warm palms wrapped around your bare skin. Totally not at the rush of warmth that travels up your body, head to toe, when you feel his rings pressing into you so eagerly. 

Absolutely not. You gasp, because anybody would gasp in this scenario. Because you’re just best friends. And best friends do stuff like that. 

“I am not drooling over a slug,” he chastises, grinning recklessly as he wiggles his fingers menacingly, mere inches from the bottom of your foot, “Take it back, or pay the price, baby.” 

Has he ever called you baby before? 

Certainly not, if your roaring heart has anything to say about it. 

“Don’t you dare,” you squeal – genuinely squeal – as you try and tug your legs out of his grasp. It’s a useless effort; he’s too strong, even after his long day, and your body isn’t even sure if it approves of taking his hands off of you. “Edward Munson, I swear to God-” 

It’s a mess of flailing limbs, painful laughter, and high-pitched screams from there. Squeaks from your own mouth, and a few from Eddie, mocking you all in good fun as he continues to persist for you to take it back. For just a moment, it feels like this is the normal – you’re living in a space where Eddie comes home from every day, grueling or effortless, to you. Where the two of you always end up on the couch together, bodies touching in any way they can. Where there’s always background noise on the TV as his focus is solely on you, smiling foolishly at his antics that were really just a simple effort to hear your laughter. Where your laughter is the only thing he really wants to hear at the end of the night, and it’s the greatest thing he’s ever heard. 

A world where he tells you as much. 

A world where after this, he’s reaching the knob of your shared bedroom door rather than the front door of your lonesome apartment. 

A world where you aren’t existing on a best friend salary.

“Had enough yet, sweetheart?” he quips, just as breathless as you are from the struggle. This time, the nickname he uses is normal. It took you off guard during the first few months of friendship, but now? Your weary heart could handle it, cherish it even, and not let your stupid little crush get in the way of appreciating it. “All you have to say are the magic words.” 

“Are the magic words, you’re a dickhead?”

“Hm,” he pretends to ponder thoughtfully for just a second before shaking his hand, “‘Fraid not. Try again?” 

Instead of verbally replying, you give him a gentle kick in the stomach. Not the magic words he had in mind, but they sure do the trick. 

He lets out a soft oomph, one arm cradling his midsection as though you actually hurt him. You take it as your cue to remove your legs – his dramatics quickly come to a halt to prevent just that.

It’s probably meant to be subtle, the way both his arms fall down over your calves and keep your feet in his lap, but it has the capability to implode your entire world. 

“I can’t believe you’re being mean to me after the day I’ve had,” he whines, and all you can focus on is the way his thumb is rhythmically stroking the ball of your ankle now, “Me, your best friend, has had the most awful day and you-”

“Now you wanna talk about it?” you laugh a little, rolling your eyes at him.

“Absolutely.” 

“After you’ve just tortured me?” 

“Well, yeah. When else would I talk about it?” 

“I’m rescinding my offer to listen,” you continue to joke, making one more good faith offer to slip your legs from his lap. And, once more, he won’t allow it. 

He whines out a long, drawn out no, starting to lay his entire body across your legs this time. More direct, more to the point. Subtleties have been forgotten, you suppose. 

You don’t know if it’s more for you, or for him. You just know you like it. You like existing within a sneak preview of a girlfriend salary.

“You never answered me, drama queen,” you murmur as the joking lean across your legs becomes a bit more heavy, and Eddie is more genuinely collapsing his figure into your lap. He doesn’t even have to ask, or gesture – your fingers find home within his hair, and you can feel his hum of content against your thigh as you scratch along his scalp, “Do you wanna talk about it?”

All joking pretenses slip away from him as he mumbles out a muffled, “Not really.”

And you can work with that. You swear, you can. 

If you’d been so ready to lend a listening ear, then you can offer him this peace and quiet. A simple head massage as he leans into you, cheeks pressed to the top of your thigh as you think he returns to watching Return of the Jedi. 

His eyes might be closed, if his heavy breaths are anything to go off of. You’re just not sure. 

You just keep up your massage, sluggish strokes, clement scratches, deep breaths to match his own- 

And then, an idea hits you.

“Eds,” you whisper, your hand in his hair traveling to his shoulders, shaking him a bit, “Eddie.”

Only a grunt in response.

“Eddie, seriously, get up,” you stress, overeager, “I have an idea.”

“The apartment better be on fire,” he grumbles as he finally raises his head, face imprinted with the lines of your shorts in rolling hills of soft indents. 

Definitely was sleeping. Definitely wasn’t watching Star Wars. 

But even with his shoulders wrapped with dreary slumber, you’re still excited about your idea, motioning him to sit up fully. You let him take his time, of course, only after he swats your hands away sluggishly a few times. 

Once his back is straight, you lift one finger in the air, and draw a circle – motioning for him to turn his back to you without saying a word. 

His eyes narrow to slits at you, “Are you about to pull a prank on me? Because-”

“I’m not,” you assure him, reaching for his shoulders, nearly turning him yourself, “Scout’s honor.” 

He listens to you. Despite it all, despite his seeming mistrust, he turns his back to you. More specifically, he turns his shoulders to you. 

He’s still mumbling on about how you better not make his day worse, getting a little bit snappier when you gather his hair up to lay out of your way and claiming his scalp was extra sensitive today.

You pay his attitude no mind. He’s just grumpy. It doesn’t particularly phase you after years of close friendship.

“Listen, I know you like braiding my hair, but-” he continues with his protests as you grin behind him, shaking your head as you settle yourself closer to him. Knees bumping his hips, back straight for the time being. “I’d rather just nap right now. And I was really comfy, and really getting my rocks off to that damn alien slug-” 

All his words cut off when you finally put your plan into action. Your palms fall atop his shoulders, fingers curling around the tense skin, and he’s melting before you’ve even begun. 

“I- Oh,” he jumps a little at the first squeeze, but quickly returns to being pliant in your hold, “Oh… That’s…. That’s nice.” 

You continue your massage, gently squeezing, thumbs and fingers digging into any knots you find to work them away as you jeer, “Is it now?”

He nods, the smallest of movements as to not interrupt your work, “It is. ‘S real nice.” 

His head rolls with each pinch of your fingers, posture loosening as he leans back into your touch further. 

You take it a step further, biting back nerves when you slip your hands beneath the collar of his old t-shirt. You feel the shiver begin before it races down his spine at the press of your skin directly on his now. 

Your warm hands work dutifully, determined to bring as much relaxation to your best friend as possible. Definitely not enjoying yourself a bit too much at his smooth skin under your palms. Definitely not enjoying yourself just as much as he is. Certainly not. 

The shirt constricts you, though. Prevents your hands from traveling fully over sore spots you can feel the edges of. Catching your wrists, limiting the full potential of your movements. 

You’re glad he can’t see you as you suddenly request, “Take your shirt off.” 

“Hm?” he can’t form a proper word at first, not startled but simply sunken too deep in his relaxation, “What was that?” 

“I need your shirt off, Munson.” 

You try to sound brave, nonchalant, as you repeat yourself. You don’t want him to hear the fluttering of your heart – you don’t want him to hear the shake of your hands as you remove them from him.

You only want him to hear the totally reasonable request from a friend, who is simply trying to offer the best massage possible to their best friend who’s had a bad day. 

“Oh?” he looks over his shoulder, and you can see the edges of his raised brows through messy bangs, “Damn, sweetheart. If you wanted me naked, you just had to ask.” 

Can ribs break from a heart beating too fast? Is that even possible? 

“I did ask,” your voice is flat as a trade off to avoid any quivering to filtrate it, lips pressing tightly together as you swallow your heart, “So get to it.”

He leans forward, putting a bit of distance between you two before he reaches back to grab the center of his shirt. The fabric comes off with a flourish, and all you’re left face to face with is the bare expanse of his back.

You silently beg him not to look back over his shoulder, if only for just a second. 

You’ve seen Eddie shirtless plenty of times. At pool parties with the entire group, on rare lake days that always ended sun drunk and giddy, that one time he’d answered his door right after a quick shower and you’d seen a lot more than you’d bargained for. He was your friend. After a while, it would have been weirder to not have seen Eddie shirtless at least once. 

Something about this time feels different. 

He has freckles – not nearly as much as Steve or Robin, but they still exist. Small markings across skin glowing warmly in the dim light of your living room lamp, spattered without rhyme or reason. One on the back of his left shoulder, another slightly off-centered at the base of his neck. He has a light scar towards the bottom of his right shoulder blade – a memory from his childhood he told you once when you’d first seen it at the lake. Everyone else was out splashing about the ten-degrees-too-cool water, and he’d joined your side on the shore. Laid on his stomach as you laid on your back, offering you conversation in the form of stories about every blemish across his skin. The intentional tattoos, the unintentional scars. Everything. 

Even that day doesn’t quite compare to the intimacy of him being here now, being shirtless in your apartment, just the two of you. 

Maybe there was something extra in your coffee this morning, making you feel so delusional. 

“I don’t have any lotion or oils,” you finally clear your throat, trying to joke about as the two of you had been before, “But that doesn’t matter. You ready for the best damn massage of your life, Munson?” 

“Yes, please,” he groans, and something deep in your stomach clenches at the sound, “Want me to lay down or something?” 

Your brain short-circuits for a second, because you know where that leads. 

If he lays down, there’s only one way to continue to comfortably give him the massage. If he lays down, you’re about to bite off more than you could chew on a best friend salary. 

“Sure,” you choke out, damning yourself in the process. 

It’s all robotic mechanics as you two shift to assume the position; you stand up, and he sprawls out. And you swear, in the process, you catch a smothering of pink slow creeping across his chest and neck. 

“Can I…” you start to question, finally growing a bit shy as you stare down at the dip of his lower back. Two dimples on either side of his spine, looking so inviting and yet daunting. 

He finishes the sentence for you, saving you the embarrassment, “Sit on me? Yeah, go for it, babe.” 

There it is again. An unfamiliar nickname that falls so effortlessly off the lips for him. Another pet name to send you into a tailspin as your breath catches and your heart races, as though needing to catch up after the fleeting endearment.

“Thanks,” you whisper out. 

You’re starting to regret all your choices, but it’s too late to back down now. You just want to help him relax – that’s all this is. 

Stop making this more than it is. 

You’re exceptionally careful as you crawl over Eddie, placing a knee on either side of him, hovering for just a second as you take deep breaths to hype yourself up to do the inevitable. 

He twists a bit, startling you enough for you to balance yourself with a palm on each shoulder blade, “C’mon now, you’re not going to crush me. You should know this by now,” his eyes glitter, and you know he’s referring to that time you two made a bet he couldn’t carry you bridal style while drunk. He could, “Sit your pretty ass down and get to work, Masseuse.” 

You weren’t imagining the pink across his chest and neck. It’s climbed up now, tendrils tickling his cheeks. The bridge of his nose nearly looks sunburnt from this angle. 

It’s a good look on him. 

“Masseuse?” you snort as you shove him to be fully laying down once more, needing to get his eyes off of you for just a second, “That’s an awfully big word. You been reading without me or something? Becoming a secret genius?” 

Fall back into the normal flow of things. Try not to think about the heat of him between your legs as you sit half your weight down. 

“That is not a big word,” he chides. 

“Spell it, then.” 

“I-” he cuts off as your hands smooth back over his skin, no more restrictions. 

He never finishes his sentence, never complies with your request. All that falls from his lips are soft sighs as you begin the massage again. 

There’s an occasional twitch below his muscles as you knead away, slowly but surely becoming more comfortable with it all. Becoming more mesmerized as you can now see his skin moving with you, occasionally letting up when you skirt past freckles and scars alike, fingertips merely tracing them as he shivers under your delicate touch. 

You do exactly as you set out to do – you relax him. And then some.

You’ve never really gotten into the art of massages, something about it always feeling a bit too intimate. You’d never consider yourself a professional at it by any means – if anything, you’ve been on the receiving end rather than the giving end more often than not. And even those occurrences were rare. 

But when it came to Eddie, it seemingly came naturally. 

Not all of your movements are conventional. You pass back and forth between the usual squeezes of skin you’ve witnessed on TV and from others, and gentle tracing of your fingertips. Drawing shapes, painting pictures that vanish without ever having existed in the first place. Words, sentences, secret messages for just you two. 

When you trace out the endearment of idiot, Eddie seems to catch on, lazy grin peeking up past his curtain of hair covering the cheek almost facing you. 

In another place, where you make that coveted girlfriend salary, you’d trace out three little words on the tip of your tongue. 

You almost do it, too. It’s when you trace out idiot, in fact. You start, entirely subconsciously, with the i. A long pause, a space between words. 

And then you trace an l. One long line down the center of his spine. 

Your finger is already rotating for the o, ready to trace it in the center as the other two letters had been, a signalling it wasn’t a part of that last simple line. 

And then you divert. And you rush to finish out with the i, the o, the t. He laughs a little, the rush of air felt below you as he lets it out soundlessly, and you catch sight of his smile.

A seeming endearment to Eddie, a hidden scolding for yourself. 

Maybe one day you can find the nerve to properly trace it out – or better yet, say it. Speak your truth outloud and handle whatever consequences come from it. Because you do – you really, really do mean it – and those feelings for Eddie can’t seem to change. Something carved into your very soul, unchanging as the years pass. If anything, the carving only digs deeper into you with each month you spend with him. 

One day. But not today, not when Eddie’s had a bad day. It should be a good day when you say it, lessening the blow of rejection, hopefully. 

You almost lose your balance a few times. Each time having to adjust your position of sitting on him, shifting his hips right along with yours. And each time, you notice the catch in his sighs. The way they almost transform into moans, tense noises that seemingly tear from his throat, only dampened by poor attempts to conceal them. Even the back of his neck has grown flushed now, the tips of his ears vibrant when you see them poke through his hair. 

Sometimes, you lose your balance from his shifting, even. 

The air is sticky with tension as you finally finish up. It could have been ten minutes, it could have been an hour – you weren’t keeping score, more focused on continuing on until Eddie’s entire body has gone boneless beneath you. 

Pretty, and pink, and pliant. Entirely slackened beneath your touches. 

It takes more to encourage yourself to climb off of him than it did to climb on originally. Your body protests entirely, knees not caring for the ache forming, inner thighs happy to be bracketing his hips. But you do it. Because you’re just a friend, a best friend, helping your friend relax. 

You stand, towering over him, looking down to find him hiding his face just a bit. “Well?” 

“Well, what?” his voice is entirely muffled by his mouthful of couch cushion, and you furrow your brows. 

“How was it?” 

He lifts his face strategically. He probably hopes you don’t notice, but you do, “Oh! Oh, it was, uh- It was fucking great, sweetheart. I… I swear, your hands are fucking magic.” 

Why is he tripping over his words like that? 

He can’t even look you in the eyes, line of sight darting anywhere but you.

Why is he flushed, head to toe? 

“Yeah?” you cross your arms, and subtly lean to block the TV now displaying credits that Eddie found terribly interesting, “Would you consider it the best massage you’ve ever had?” 

He nods, and you catch the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallows before squeaking out, “Oh, yeah! The absolute best I’ve ever had,” his eyes widen at his words, as if he’s made a terrible choice that you’re unaware of, “I mean, you know, I just- you should really consider becoming an actual masseuse.”

That’s when it hits you; Eddie is absolutely refusing to sit up. To remove his hips from your couch. 

He’s blushing, and he’s stuttering, and he’s definitely hiding something. 

There’s a twist in your gut that you can’t reveal. A satisfaction you know better than to celebrate right now. 

Instead, you decide to play with him just a little bit more. 

“Good,” you nod, stepping towards the end of the couch you’d originally occupied. Where Eddie’s knees are stiff against. “Maybe I will consider a career change. But for now – move, Munson. I’m just exhausted.” 

“What?” he looks at you, frightened, only moving his neck to keep his hips flush and hidden away. 

“Get your legs out of my seat,” you laugh a little, leveling him with a daring stare. 

You know what he’s hiding. You’re a bit proud of it, too. 

“Oh, yeah,” he says slowly, and you can see him going over his options in his head. A million excuses he’s probably conjuring, a hundred different escape plans he’s grasping at. “Yeah, of course.” 

And, just as you’d suspected, he doesn’t go with a single one to save his dignity. 

He moves quickly. Tucking his legs up and twisting himself into an upright position in the blink of an eye, and immediately grabbing one of your throw pillows that two of you had tossed off into the floor amidst the original movie night plans. 

He’s fast, you’ll give him that. But not fast enough for you to not catch sight of the tent in his pants. 

You don’t let your eyes linger too long. Swallow down any drooling threatening to begin. Tamper down any desire flaring in your chest and between your hips. 

Best friend salary, you remind yourself even as you grin a tad bit too salaciously for your current cover. Best friend salary, not girlfriend salary. 

You plop down on the seat still warm from Eddie’s legs, sinking back in self-satisfaction. Maybe you had been wrong. Maybe it doesn’t have to be another time, or place, or Universe to get what you want. Maybe all your delusion, that wild imagination of yours, wasn’t so misplaced after all. 

Best friend salary, your mind whispers. For now.

Eddie makes himself comfortable right along with you, still seeming in a much better condition than when he’d first arrived, even if his cheeks had bloomed into a rose garden. He presses that throw pillow of yours protectively over his crotch, and once more focuses on the screen in front of you two. 

“Say, Eddie,” you drawl, almost radiant with your grin. A fire now lit inside both of you. “Think you could be a doll and pop in the next movie for me?” 

It’s a little evil, you’ll admit. But he kind of deserves it for underpaying you over the years, when it’s so clear you’re due for a promotion. Sometime soon, you hope. 

Both your heads turn to each other at the same time, wildly different speeds. Eddie’s neck snaps in disbelief, while you take your time to make eye contact.

All it takes is one knowing look exchanged, and the illusion fumbles on its stilts. 

“I…” his embarrassment, all that flush, slowly morphs as he catches the truth behind your intentions. The hand pressing down on the throw pillow alleviates just a bit, stiff shoulders relaxing as they should have been after your massage as he reflects back just as evil of a glint in his eyes as you had, “Sure thing, baby.”

It’s probably going to be a long night. Surely, the promotion of best friend to girlfriend is going to involve some paperwork. Or an interview, to prove your capability and experience first hand, of course.

But, well, he never did put his shirt back on, did he?

GHOOOST i saw your valentine blurb event and thought i’d drop in something! 🥹

24 hours eddie has been living in my mind rent free and i can’t help but feel like he’s the type to act tough and all that, but instantly melts into a gooey simpy lovesick puddle the second you call him “baby” ❤️ like yeah he likes to be called nicknames like ed or eds, but petnames??? he’s done for. just turns into a blushing blubbering mess. especially with the way he has repressed all his emotions for so long, it’s fun to kind of tease him and call him “handsome” “pretty boy” “baby boy” just to see him break his facade and just unapologetically be the golden retriever that he really is ❤️❤️❤️

i think my favorite thing about this vision is the way he would try to fight it so bad. hiding his face in your neck and blushing all terrible and gaaaaaaaahh. i hope this does it justice <3

warnings: fem!reader. reader is described to be wearing a dress, makeup, earrings, and heels. not edited. set in twenty four hours universe, after the story!

“Eddie!” 

No answer.

“Eds!” 

No answer.

“Edward Munson!” 

Your patience is wearing thin as you finally pop on the back of the earring you had been struggling with. The studs weren’t even anything fancy, hardly worth all the time you’d just spent fighting with it, but you were determined to look nice. 

Valentine’s Day. A day meant to be filled with blissful serenity and endless heart eyes, that was really only becoming the bane of your existence. 

“I swear to God,” you mumble to yourself, huffing a bit as you try to clean up the mess you’ve made of the bathroom sink. Makeup everywhere, various pieces of jewelry scattered, your curling iron still warm on the edge of porcelain. You decide rather quickly it’s a mess to be dealt with later tonight. Or tomorrow. Or next week. “If he’s still fucking with that bike.” 

The sharp clicks of your heels transform as you walk from tile to laminate-wood flooring, becoming a bit more dull and less obnoxious as you take the hallway by storm. 

Next year, you’re telling Steve to go fuck himself if he tries to lure you and Eddie into another double date. 

“Eddie, we only have thirty minutes until we nee-” you stress as you reach the end of the hall, cutting off entirely as you catch sight of the living room. 

Of the living room, and your boyfriend. 

“What is that?” 

You think you might actually kill him. 

“What?” Eddie doesn’t even look up at you, and you make a mental strike against him, “I told you, I’m working on the bi-”

“Yes,” you cut him off, taking a few harsh steps into the very crowded living room, “You were supposed to bring up a part of the bike. Why is the entire bike in our living room, Munson?” 

You mean it – you’re going to kick his ass by the end of today. 

His bike is propped up there, right in front of the TV, entirely blocking the pathway to the balcony. The bike that should be outside. The bike that certainly has God knows what all over the tires, and is sitting right on your rug you just bought for the living room. 

Eddie stops his tinkering with whatever piece he’d removed from the bike to work on on the coffee table, abiding by your rule of having a towel down below it to avoid getting grease everywhere, “What do you mean?” 

He’s playing dumb. And he probably thinks he looks cute as he does it, but no amount of fluttering lashes or boyish grins can soothe your irritation. 

“You’re an idiot, but you’re not stupid,” you hiss as you cross the room and stand right in front of him, only seeing the crown of his head as he keeps his eyes dipped low in shame, “When did you… How did you…. When the fuck did you bring the bike up?” 

You can hardly manage a fluent sentence as you look between Eddie and the bike, mind blown in the truest sense. 

His voice is a mere murmur as he fiddles with one of his wrenches, flipping it over a few times before he answers, “While you were in the shower.” 

“How?” 

“The frat boys downstairs,” he rushes out in one breath, eyes still locked on the ground rather than you. “I, uh, paid a few of them to help me lug it up.”

You sigh heavily, throwing your head back before you move to the couch and dramatically throw yourself down with defeat, “You’re a real pain in my ass, you know that, Munson?” 

“You say that like it’s new news,” he says as he twists to finally look at you, eyebrow quirked and the shadow of his dimple making an appearance while he fights a smug smile, “I think you’d be more worried if I wasn’t being a pain in your ass.” 

He’s right. It doesn’t slow the roll of your eyes, though. 

“You know I love you, right?” you say, suddenly using a sickeningly sweet tone as you lean in closer to where he sits on the ground. His face falls a bit, confusion lacing his brows together, “But, baby, if you keep this up… I’m going to kick your ass.” 

He should look a whole lot more scared than he currently does as you deliver the threat, but he entirely throws you off when he grins. 

An ear splitting grin, spreading cheek from cheek, radiating with anything but trepidation. He lights up, posture perking up as he looks at you with soft eyes. It looks as though you might have told him you loved him for the first time all over again, as though you’ve just reminded him of how you wanted to spend your life with him rather than said you were going to kick his ass. 

The fight and issue at hand is momentarily forgotten as he whispers, “What did you just call me?” 

“What did I just call you?” you question incredulously, leaning back fully, wholly concerned now. Maybe you should call Steve and cancel the date, “I- I just threatened to kick your ass, and you’re making heart eyes at me, asking me what I just called you?”

You rewind a bit in your brain, going over the moment again, trying to figure out if you’d let something unusual slip. Deciphering any moment that might have pulled this reaction from him. 

You come up empty. Nothing. 

“Did you just…” he trails off, cheeks surely aching as they shine with a bit of natural blush, “Did you just call me baby?” 

Oh. That. 

You look about the room for a second, taking in this predicament you’d gotten yourself into, “Do you not want me to call you that? I just-”

“No!” he rushes to stop you before you can take it back, “I mean, it’s fine. That’s not the issue, I just-” 

He cuts off, and you realize just how flustered he is. 

Now you’re smiling, right along with him, “You like it?” 

“Sort of,” he shrugs, going a bit shy on you now, “It… I mean, if you want to start calling me stuff like that, I don’t mind. It’s fine. It’s cool.” 

“Baby,” you say in place of his name, so naturally, like honey. You’re leaning forward once more, entering his orbit as you softly tease, “You’re blushing.” 

The words turn him even more scarlet, “Fuck off.”

“What?” it’s your turn to act innocent, rearranging yourself on the couch to be more comfortable, “I thought you said you liked it when I called you stuff like that-”

Eddie movies quickly from the floor, gathering himself up in record time that would have had him groaning in protest on any other occasion. You’ve hardly leaned an elbow back on the couch’s arm when he gets on top of you.

Even if he’s trying to stop you from all your taunting with his words, his kiss says otherwise.

It’s hot, heavy, desperate – like alarm bells might be ringing in his head and telling him to run to the nearest safety of your lips. You welcome him in, of course. Take his lips right between yours with an eagerness to match, forgetting all about the lipstick you’d just applied moments before. Thighs spreading to bring him home to you, arms quickly searching out solace of all the skin below his Deftones t-shirt. Straining biceps as he holds himself over you, squared shoulders as he balances to stay right where he belongs. His chest even heaves ever so slightly with little gasps between kisses, both your lungs needing air despite the magnetic protest between you two. 

“God,” you gasp out during one of those short breaks, making him divert a kiss to the corner of your mouth instead, “If you’re gonna kiss me like this every time I call you baby, I should do it more often,” he grunts, and tries to reignite a kiss, probably just to shut you up. You don’t let him, turning a cheek and forcing his searching mouth to plant a peck there instead, laughing a little, “Maybe I should be sure to use the nickname during dinner with Steve, hm?” 

“Don’t you dare,” he groans as his lips seek out your jaw and neck next, peppering kisses between words. For each syllable, there’s a smack of his lips against your skin. 

You ponder back to the time before you saw this side of Eddie; before someone so soft, so caring, so affectionate existed for you. It’s hard to even recall all those times now with the puddle of a man hovering over you. 

“No?” you hum, head thrown back, letting him have his way as your fingers toy with the band around his bun, “What about pretty boy instead?” 

Another groan, vibrating against your skin. 

“Or handsome?” 

This time, he nips the sensitive spot below your ear with his teeth in response.

You gasp, half from the bite and half with faux enthusiasm, “Oh! I know! I’ll take one out of your books and call you sweetheart.” 

He finally moans in annoyance, and you know it’s all an act as he faceplants into your chest. You can feel his smile, radiant as ever, muffled by your skin and dress. 

“You’re such a pain in my ass,” his echo of your earlier words come out around the cotton neckline, “You know that?” 

You ruffle the kinks of his curls at his scalp a little, giving a scratch for good measure, “Yeah. Tell me something I don’t know, handsome.” 

The full weight of him falls along your body finally, and he has a boyish glint when he raises his head. Seeking hands find promise along your hips, bunching the fabric of your black dress up into his fists before he’s kissing you again. 

A little less hot, a little less heavy, a little less desperate. Just as rewarding as before, though. 

Somewhere between simply nice and deathly devoted, you two let your mouths explore at a leisure pace. His lips, the apples of his cheeks, the line of his jaw down to his chin – no space is left unkissed, and you finally notice the smear of red lipstick. 

“Oh, shit,” you laugh out, not sounding the least bit sorry as you look at the fading marks left behind, “I got my lipstick all over you.” 

When he lifts from the crook of your neck, you catch the stain feathering out around his own lips, a bit smeared along his chin, “And you. I dunno if we can go to dinner lookin’ like this, doll.” 

You get it. His reaction to your slip of a pet name. 

You have the same reaction as he does it to you, gut fluttering and chest buzzing with tenderness at the sentiments. It’s a simple thing, probably a bit cheesy and cringey to outsiders, but it works between the two of you. You like hearing him grant you the pleasure of a nickname, whether it be sweetheart or doll. You love the hidden devotion beneath the delivery, whether it be idiot or fool. 

There’s always an unspoken my in the mix. A certain sense of belonging to him that you can’t really explain to others without being looked at as if you’ve grown a second head. 

Why would you want to belong to another person, in any sense of the word? 

The answer feels simple enough when you look up at your boy, covered and pretty in Maybelline’s “Ruby for Me”.

“You’re not getting out of this double date,” you whisper back, still toying with his hair, still looking up at him with all the love you’re capable of growing within this chest of yours. It’s a bit more than yesterday, that much you’re sure. Each day, he finds a way to push the limits just a bit more, make a little bit more room behind your ribs for all the affection you hold for him, “If I’m stuck in this impending disaster, so are you.” 

He sighs, head slipping into the crook of your neck, “Yeah… Yeah, that sounds about right.” 

“Don’t sound so disappointed.” 

“Me? Disappointed with you?” he gasps, breath hot on your skin still as he snuggles in a little closer, grips the soft fabric of your dress a little tighter, “Oh, never.”

“Oh, so you decide to sound sarcastic instead?” you’re fighting a grin, trying to find a reason to be mad at him again. Hell, you even glance at the motorcycle in your damn living room to reignite the smallest of sparks – nothing, “You wound me, pretty boy.” 

“You’re all about stealing my lines tonight, I see,” he teases as he finally begins to peel himself away from you. He’s all soft – soft eyes, soft smile, soft cheeks, soft flush. Soft, soft, soft. “I guess if there’s no way to convince you to stay home instead of going to this stupid double date, we both gotta get cleaned up now.” 

You adore him. If you could bottle up all that softness you’re witnessing with your own two eyes just for a rainy day, you would. 

He starts to stand on his knees, moving to leave you entirely and take all that mellow delight away from you too soon, when you lock your heels against his lower back. 

Wrapping your legs a little too tightly around his waist, you raise a brow, “You may not be able to convince me to stay home entirely, but… no one ever said you couldn’t convince me to be about, let’s say, ten minutes late.” 

He tilts his head at you, eyes wide, “Only ten minutes?” 

“Okay, you’ve twisted my arm. Let’s make it fifteen.” 

He crashes back into you in an instant, both of you giggling in the process. 

With the weight of your pretty boy between your hips, and the caress of his lips against your chest, you accidentally make it nearly thirty minutes late. You don’t really care – not when it comes to Eddie.

Okay hear me out, Eddie nervous on your first valentines day together wanting to make it special and only knowing how to valentines from what he's seen at school and he panics and is very eddie about the whole thing 👀

please my heart almost couldn't take this. i swore nothing over 1k but nervous and panicking eddie being all cute?? yeah i couldn't help myself. this isn't edited, sorry in advance. no warnings, just fluff.

wc: 2.2k

He feels stupid.

It's the only thought ringing through his head as he sits at the Munson's dining table, scraps of construction paper strewn over the worn wood, glue stick drying out to the side and scissors digging into his knuckles. 

It had started as a prophetic vision after a few hits from his blunt; it was quickly souring into the most ridiculous thing he’s ever done. 

The high had worn off, Eddie had glued his fingers together thrice now (seriously, how was this glue stick approved for children?), and the end product…. Well, he hated it. 

The card was tacky. The flowers were uneven. He didn’t even have the willpower nor time to make a full bouquet as he had originally wanted to while under the influence. Pink glitter was now overtaking the trailer, and he’s never seen his uncle look so damn entertained. 

“Boy, what on God’s green Earth are you going?” 

Normally, the twang of Wayne’s accent would be comforting. But right now, all Eddie could hear was held back laughter choking up his old man’s throat, and a glint in his eye that felt a lot like a taunt, and he felt the farthest from comforted in a very long time. 

“Mind your business, old man,” Eddie grumbles, tongue sticking out as he tries to reglue a corner of a paper heart he had cut out, needing it to stick down properly. He probably should have purchased glue, in hindsight. 

“Where did you get all this paper?”

“I said mind your business.”

“Is that pink glitter?” 

“Don’t you have work?” Eddie huffs, grabbing at the Valentine card he was attempting to salvage, cheeks blushing more vibrant than any of the arts and crafts supplies spread about. 

He didn’t want to admit how embarrassed he was. He didn’t want to give anyone else the satisfaction. It was his own damn fault, really – he had offered for your nightly diner dates to be on him one too many times this last month, and entirely forgotten to put away any extra cash to get you a proper Valentine. And this was his last resort. 

He’d tried to convince the local florist to discount the flowers missing one too many petals for him, he’d tried to scope out the cheapest cards available at Melvald’s. He’d begged and bartered with every option in town to simply get you something for the day of love, and in the end, he’d simply fallen short.

So now, all he had was a palm full of gritty glitter and homemade items that looked worse for wear. 

One of the kinder ladies that lived two trailers down had been happy to offer Eddie some of her scrapbooking papers, throwing in the glitter for good measure, and he still had an old glue stick from when he’d built one of his custom tabletop maps for a D&D campaign. With five hours and a dream, he was now the not-so-proud creator of three handmade paper roses, and a card hardly large enough to fit in his palm. 

When he took a step back to look at it all, Wayne was right to be snickering on the couch over it all. 

“They’re going to hate it,” Eddie laments, glaring down at his creations, “They’re going to hate it, and I’m going to get dumped on our first Valentine’s day together.”

“Don’t be so harsh on yourself, son,” Wayne tries to genuinely comfort Eddie now, leaning forward to get a better look at his last five hours of work, “I’m sure they’re gon’ be happy that you just thought of the-”

“My life is over,” Eddie interrupts, walking over to the couch to collapse dramatically.

Wayne stops him, however, throwing up a hand, “Nope. You’re not gettin’ that damn pink glitter all over my couch. Go mope in your room.”

After a brief stare-off, a whole ten seconds wasted when Eddie could be wallowing in his self-pity, Eddie does exactly that.

He hopes Wayne is right, for all their sakes. There’ll be bigger things to worry about than just glitter if you really do hate Eddie’s attempt at a sincere Valentine. 

—

It takes nearly a full minute of knocking on the Munson’s trailer’s front door before Eddie opens it for you – that’s your first sign that something is terribly wrong. 

Your next sign is when Eddie hardly adds any enthusiasm into your welcome kiss, so reserved, as though he might be in a constant state of cringing; a constant state of preparing for the worst. 

“Is something the matter?” you ask innocently enough, toeing off your shoes and shifting your bag in hand. You’d picked up a few movies for the night, a variety of cheesy rom-coms Eddie expressed a slightest bit of interest in along with a few more up his alley. A horror film that neither of you had seen that looked to have a budget of $10 and a dream, and Labyrinth. 

The latter, you’d both already seen. Neither of you would pass up seeing David Bowie in his full glory, though. 

“It’s fine,” Eddie huffs out, still refusing to meet your gaze, “Want me to put on some popcorn?” 

You can’t help but light up as you follow him in his rush to the kitchen, “God – yes, please. I also got some sour patch kids, your favorite, and-”

You cut off when you catch sight of the dining room table. 

Eddie doesn’t glance back as he reaches up to the cabinet holding the stash of popcorn he keeps around for your movie nights, “And?” 

“Eddie…” you slowly draw out in a questioning tone, looking at the mess before you, “What, uh, happened here?” 

It’s an explosion of quintessential Valentine’s day. Pink paper hearts, strips of deep reds discarded messily. A shimmering glitter covers the table, and you can’t recall any DIY projects of Eddie’s for Hellfire that might involve that. 

“What?” He’s quick to turn around at that, and you watch as all the blood drains from his face, “Oh, fuck, I-” he launches himself back around the kitchen counter frantically, grabbing at any piece of paper he can find, “Shit, I meant to clean this up earlier, I’m sorr-”

“What were you making?” 

Eddie pauses all movement, glancing up at you in fear. 

You’re not even sure what he’s afraid of. All you can do is furrow your brows, twist your lips, scrunch your nose. 

Was it meant to be a surprise of some sort?

He swallows hard, standing up straight as he shifts uncomfortably on his feet, “I….”

When no words follow, you raise a brow, trying to silently encourage him to continue on. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

And oh, he’s such a bad liar. A pretty one, but a terrible one. 

There’s no sign of the stellar poker face you’ve seen him wear during Hellfire sessions, no impeccable cockiness to cover up the obvious. His wringing hands draw your attention to his knuckles, all the drying glue and glitter peeling off bit by bit.  

“You sure about that?” you press, grin slow spreading as you take a step closer to him, eyeing the mess he tries to shift in front of to block from your sights.

“Positive.”

“Has anyone told you you’re an awful liar, Munson?”

“I’m not ly-” 

You scooch around him effortless, dropping your bag in the process and making him yelp out as he tries to catch you. His arms are quick to wrap around your waist as you try to get a clearer view of what he had been so desperate to conceal, but even his best efforts can’t stop you. 

It’s all a bit childish from the outside. Reckless giggles, flailing limbs – even Eddie is smiling in his panic. 

“Let go of me!” 

“Then leave it alone!”

“I wanna see what you made!” 

Each screech between the two of you is overcome with laughter as he pulls you flush to his chest, caging you in and yet failing to cover your eyes. 

You spot what he was trying to hide, and all attempts to escape his hold cease. 

“Are those…” you start, a little breathless as you stare in awe. You swear, you could burn up from the warmth blooming in your chest. When his arms go the slightest bit limp, you have your answer before finishing the question, “Are those for me?” 

A small jar, one that had once held some of Eddie’s pick collection, now holds three handmade paper roses. Mingling petals of two different shades of red, with tightly rolled pieces of green paper servings at their stems. Two even have leaves, cut jagged and true to nature. 

Leaning against the small paper flower display is a card.

It’s a messier ordeal than the flowers, but you’re still prying Eddie’s forearms from your stomach in a rush to grab it. 

“Hold on,” he rushes out, no longer laughing as you get a hold of the card, “Wait, listen, I can explain. I just- I spent most of my money when we went to Benny’s for shakes last week, and I forgot I wouldn’t get any more cash before today, and I just-” he’s stumbling over his words, a mess of flying hands and wide eyes as you turn to face him, “I… I’m sorry, okay? I swear, they’re just placeholders until I get you a real gift for Valentine’s Day.” 

You’re hardly listening to him as you look down at the small paper, folded over fairly impressively to mimic one of the fancy cards from Melvard’s. It’s thinner, sure, but you’re mesmerized as you trace over the heart cut out of the center. It’s filled with pink glitter that clings to your fingertip as it passes, and you can’t help but let out a small laugh. 

And then you open the card. 

The outside was plain white save for the heart, but the inside is gorgeous. Hand drawn vines and flowers fill the empty space inside. Roses, mums, lillies – every flower you can think of is amongst the bunch. All etched out in ink, an ink you recognize from Eddie’s favorite pen, and every gentle line sketched out to make the larger picture sends your heart racing a few beats faster.

Underneath the glitter heart is a large bee, made with a speech bubble. 

“Placeholder?” you laugh breathlessly, biting your lip to stop from smiling like a fool. “You call all this a placeholder?” 

Bee mine? 

It’s so cheesy, it aches. 

Written in makeshift cursive, not quite as neat as it could have been, but clearly a valiant effort from the shy man standing before you. You can’t fathom how he’s embarrassed about this when you look up at him with fluttering lashes and a chest full of fizzling love. 

“I thought you were going to hate them,” he hoarsely whispers as he reaches a hand to the nape of his neck. 

“Hate them?” you repeat in disbelief, turning your attention back to the handmade flowers. “In what fuckin’ world would I hate these?”

You lift one of the roses from the mini jar, and sniff it on instinct. It should only smell like paper and glue, but it doesn’t – Eddie’s obviously spritzed his cologne onto the flowers.

The miniscule detail has your heart bursting. 

He’s still petrified as he stares at you, shrugging hopelessly, “I just know it’s our first Valentine’s together, and people usually go all out-”

“This is going all out, Eddie.”

You can’t imagine being capable of any more love for the boy in front of you. Genuinely – you don’t believe your bones could handle the weight of it, that your heart could take it. You’re filled to the brim with it, buzzing like summertime cicadas beneath your skin from all the vibrant emotions you have for him. For every blemish across his skin and every kink in his curls, for those big brown eyes simply staring at you now. Those knuckles covered in glue and glitter. Those lips that you can’t handle another second not kissing. 

And so you don’t. Not another second is wasted as you fling yourself forward, nearly dropping the paper flower in hand as you grab each side of his face, bringing him to you in a hard kiss. 

You hope he feels all that love. You hope the weight of it presses down on his shoulders, even if just a little, so he gets it. 

“I fucking love it, Eds,” you laugh into the kiss, pressing your forehead, “I- Honestly? I think this is the nicest Valentine I’ve ever gotten.” 

“Really?” his eyes pop open, pulling back from you slightly until you simply won’t allow it. You want him close – you need him pressed against you. “Well, shit. I thought you were going to hate them and break up with me.” 

“Me, breaking up with you? After this?” you parrot back in disbelief, shaking your head, tip of your nose rubbing against his through the action, “God, you’re an idiot, Eddie Munson. My idiot, but still.” 

He finally cracks a smile, and you lose yourself in the dimples that appear as he asks, “Does this mean you’ll be my Valentine?”

“Absolutely.”

For your Valentine’s Day Event what about a mini-blurb about spending your first V-Day as Eddie’s partner

❤️❤️❤️❤️

the image of your first v-day with eddie and both of you being such nervous messes is so endearing to me i love him your honor. i need to be a nervous wreck with him please.

wc: 2k+

When the day had first started, you were determined that it had to be perfect. 

You thought that your outfit needed to be faultless, and destroyed your room in the process of rummaging your closet for a specific shirt you just had to wear. You thought your makeup had to be flawless, and you’d redone it nearly three times, leaving your skin raw and irritated after the third removal of eyeliner. You were convinced your plans for the night had to be exemplary, and you and Eddie had changed your minds too many times to count in the weeks leading up to the day. 

Nerves. And stress. And picking at the beds of your nails until you’d made one bleed and took it as the Universe’s sign to cut it out. 

The day of love had morphed into something twisted, a terrible buzzing beneath your skin that was less than comfortable rather than the warmth in your chest that you had come to associate with adoration. 

“You should have seen his face, sweetheart,” Eddie cackles as he continues to recount a story from the latest Hellfire session, one hand clinging to yours as they swung between your walking bodies and the other holding up a cone of ice cream to match your own, “I told him to leave that damn NPC alone, and he just wouldn’t listen.” 

“Serves him right,” you mumble, feeling miles away and hating it. 

Normally, you’d be entirely enthralled by Eddie’s stories. Latching onto every last word, waiting with bated breath for every turn of his tales. And yet, right now, all you could focus on were your nerves. 

Is he having a good time? Is he enjoying himself? Is the night perfect for him, at least? Is he sorely disappointed about me, and realizing that this is all a mistake? Not just this date night, but everything-

“Hey, are you feelin’ alright?” 

Eddie stops in the middle of the sidewalk suddenly, and you only notice by the tug of his hand halting you in the process as well. 

“Hm?” you hum, trying to drag yourself back down to Earth. Trying to quiet all the voices in your head panicking at full volume. “Me? Oh, yeah, I’m fi-”

“Don’t say you’re fine,” he rushes to interrupt, quirking a brow, “You’ve hardly said shit the last hour. Did I... Is something wrong?” 

This is the part where he lets me down gently. This is the part where he admits he’s having the worst time of his life, and that we should break up. 

You force out a laugh, giving his palm a pathetic squeeze, “I am fine, Eddie. Just… just…”

This is the part where he realizes what a terrible partner I am, because I can’t even make Valentine’s Day fun. 

Except, he doesn’t. 

His entire face softens, and he takes a step closer before his voice drops to just shy of a whisper, “Just in your head?” 

Your stomach sinks. He had noticed – he had noticed, and probably stopped having any fun because of it. 

On instinct, you start to shake your head, but he only gives you a knowing look. 

“Look, I know I’m kind of a dumb ass half the time, and I know I can be a little oblivious, but…” he motions vaguely at you with the hand holding a melting scoop of rocky road, “I can tell what’s something up. With you, at least. So… what’s up?”

You want to correct him. Either tell him how even on his worst days, the days where he’s been the most annoying pain in your ass, you’d take him over someone else on their best days – or make a joke about how he’s definitely a dumb ass more than half the time. Jest how it’s okay, because you’re a full-blooded idiot almost all of the time with him. You want to reassure him, staring at you with puppy dog eyes, how it has nothing to do with him and everything to do with you. 

It’s only been one month. A measly month of dating Eddie, adoring Eddie, getting to know the endless labyrinth that is him inside and out. 

It’s only been a month, and you’re still sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Insecurity is a bitch to kick. 

“It’s not you, it’s m-” you begin before realizing your mistake in an instant. His face breaks so solemnly, and heartbreak is painted across the heights of his cheeks and dark brown pupils clear as day. He thinks you’re breaking up with him. “Wait! No, okay, no, I- That sounds like I’m breaking up with you. I am not breaking up with you.”

He sighs out in relief, a breath you hadn’t noticed him holding, as his shoulders relax, “Jesus H. Christ, you scared the shit out of me-”

“I’m scared you’re going to break up with me,” you blurt out before he can simmer too long in the relief. “I’m just- I’m terrified that this date night is going to shit, and I’m so fucking nervous, and I… I don’t know,” your voice trails off, dropping in volume with each word before you slowly blink up at him, bracing yourself for impact, “I’m scared that I’m fucking up our first Valentine’s day together.”

You wait for him to confirm all your fears, or to make fun of you, or to burst with relief at finally being able to agree that you were ruining the night. 

No such thing when it comes to Eddie Munson. 

“What?” he laughs a little breathlessly, dulcet eyes locked in on you, “I’m sorry, you think you’re ruining the night with your nerves?” 

All you can do is nod. 

Because it’s true. It’s why he hadn’t kissed you the entire night, scared you might jump at the press of his lips surely. It’s why you had to be the one to grab his hand initially, probably so jumpy that he was convinced you’d run like a scared animal if he moved too close. 

“Baby,” he’s smiling ear to ear now, smooth like honey as he sighs out in more relief. The pet name sounds nice on his lips; if you weren’t so in your head, you might go dumb in the head at the way it tumbles off his tongue, “Oh my God. Are we both idiots?” 

What? 

“I never said you were-” 

“I’ve been rambling for the past hour, non-stop,” he cuts you off, taking a step closer to you, “I spent nearly three hours getting ready when I’d usually take an hour tops, freaking out over what you’d think about my goddamn t-shirt. Wayne nearly kicked me out of the trailer when I started pacing about whether I got you the right kind of flowers,” as the confessions spill out into the air between you, you notice some of the buzz beneath your skull dulling. The voices in your head turning down the volume, notch by notch, “I haven’t even kissed you yet tonight because I’m so fucking nervous – you had to grab my hand first, for fucks sake. If anyone is fucking up this date by being a mess, it’s me.” 

Little, by little, by little. The voices go silent. The buzz leaves, and the warmth tickles at the back of your throat. 

He was just as nervous as you were. 

All you can do is laugh.

It starts small, the teeniest of bubbles bursting from your chest, but it quickly descends into something borderline concerning. Giggles overflowing from you, making you bend at the waist just a bit from the force of them, eyes tearing up at the ridiculousness of it all. 

“I-” you gasp out, and Eddie just beams at you. Heart eyes and all as he watches you finally unravel from all your stress that’s strangled you the entire night, “Oh my God-” another little hiccup of a laugh, and he joins in a bit, “We’re so…. So…. dumb.”

There’s not a better word for it. Only the plain ones, simple ones.

Dumb, stupid. Idiots. The two of you were such idiots. 

“Wanna know a secret?” you’re finally able to hoarsely whisper once you get control of yourself once more, Eddie leaning in eagerly, vibrant eyes locked on yours, “I thought you weren’t kissing me because I’ve been all jumpy, so nervous and shit. I… I thought it was because of me.” 

Something melts. Slowly, warmly. Frigid and icy nerves between the two of you run away in rivers as he looks at you, so soft and so enamored, half his lips twitching up in a barely-there grin. 

“Well…. We can’t have that, can we?” 

Each movement is intentional. A little sure, but you can still taste the hesitancy when his lips first meet yours so feather light. Just a taste, a quick test of the waters. 

And immediately, whatever hesitancy lived within both your bones, leaves along with the nerves. 

He starts to pull away from the peck, but you’re quick to drop your ice cream cone of cookies and cream just to bring both hands up to the nape of his neck properly, racing to press him back into your space. A sharp chuckle falls from him at first, trying to get a look at your discarded cone, but you won’t let him get too far – you need his lips back on yours, and you need to just… laugh. 

Laugh about how stupid you two had been. Laugh because neither of you ever had any reason to be nervous. 

“Your cone!” he gasps into the kiss, and teeth clash a bit as you smile widely and shake your head.

“Forget the cone. We can get new ones.” 

He drops his cone as well, right on queue, as he pulls you hard into him. Lets your chest meet his, your hips melting against his. One cold and sticky hand, one warm and sweaty palm, and a whole lot of skin he’s been restraining himself from exploring the entire night. 

Eddie Munson kisses you in the middle of the sidewalk until your knees are about ready to give out. Until your lungs have shrunk a few sizes with all the air he’s stolen from you. Until you can’t even remember why you had been so nervous to begin with. 

This? This is nice. This is what you’d expected of your first Valentine’s day with the fool kissing you like his life depends upon it. 

“Hey, Eddie?” you finally break the ongoing kiss a bit, his forehead chasing yours to stay pressed up against you. 

His arms circle around your lower back to hold you tightly as he hums in response, eyes still shut and a goofy grin overtaking his aching cheeks. 

“Wanna just… have a redo of our first Valentine’s day?” you offer, making his eyes flutter wide open, “No nerves fucking things up this time?” 

Is a month long enough to fall in love with someone? 

It sure feels like it as you trace over the dimples, all the creases beside his eyes. It feels a lot like love, when you’re being honest with yourself. 

“Thought you’d never ask,” he teases so gently, thumb tracing arcs against your spine, “Where do we start, sweetheart?” 

“Well, I think we need to get some ice cream…”

You trail off and look to the ground where broken cones are scattered amongst melting sweet treats. 

One might argue that that’s the true mess of the night, but you hardly care. It’ll clear away with the rain due next week according to the weather forecast. 

Whatever is happening between you and Eddie, though? That’s going to take a bit more than one stormy night inside both your heads. 

“Absolutely,” he quickly presses a chaste kiss to the tip of your nose, and you let out a snort – something that a few moments ago, might have embarrassed you straight to your grave. Not now, though. “Say… I know this killer ice cream shop that we’ve just got to try. One you’ve totally never been to before.” 

“Really?” you play along, leaning further back against his arms. He still refuses to let you go as he nods so assuredly, “And I’ve never been there before? Not even in the, let’s say, last thirty minutes?” 

He bites his lip to stop his smile from growing any larger, but it’s a hopeless effort, “Definitely not. Trust me, sweetheart. Best rocky road and cookies ‘n cream in town. Swear it.”

Maybe perfect looks a little different than you’d imagined in your head, and maybe that’s alright. 

“Lead the way, Munson.”

FEED ME!

EPILOGUE: BABY FOOD ↬ sevika x pregnant!reader | 3.3k words

SUMMARY: Snippets from a less lonely life.

TAGS: mentions of postpartum depression, PTSD recovery, hurt/comfort, domestic sevika, a LOT of fluff

NOTES: my knowledge of children boils down to babysitting my niece her whole life so blame her if i got anything wrong. also thank yall SO MUCH for the love on this story it's been absolutely insane and i still cannot believe it :'3

-> READ ON AO3 | SERIES MASTERLIST

I. THREE MONTHS

Parenting is hard work.

A fact of life that just about everyone knows, but it’s different actually living it. Days are long and nights are even longer, and Sevika can’t remember the last time she’s gotten a proper sleep. But you have it worse. As soon as she closes her eyes for the night, the kid starts crying, and you sit up with a tired groan to turn on the bedside lamp. Every three hours like clockwork, the same routine: remove Stella from her crib (that Sevika commissioned from a local wood worker) beside the bed, sit a pillow in your lap, pull up your shirt, and feed her.

Sevika tries to stay up with you, to keep you company, but you tell her over and over again that there’s no sense in both of you being useless come tomorrow. You have a good point.

But she does her part in other ways. Changes cloth diapers like a professional, spends more time cleaning up water messes around the tub than actually bathing the kid, rocks her to sleep then puts her in the crib.

It’s all routine now, in the strangest change of fate. Being in love, receiving love, waking up in an actual home and a soft bed—not alone anymore. She has two people now that she would go to the end of the world and back for, and she still can’t believe that the circumstances are real.

Stella always smiles at the sight of her, and Sevika always smiles back.

Weird. Terrifying. Perfect.

“We're going to Lyra’s tomorrow,” you say, adjusting Stella’s weight in your arms as she feeds, tiny hand curled against your chest. “Don’t forget that.”

Sevika cracks open an eye, head lolling on your outstretched leg to look up at you. Naked beneath your red robe, all dips and curves from the pregnancy weight you gained, fresh marks stretching over your belly and hips and inner thighs. Motherhood is a good look you.

But that’s her hindbrain talking. The part of her that would still love you no matter what form you took (but she likes this one a lot).

“The check-up, right?” she asks, turning away from Stella’s kicking foot that connects instead with her temple. “Ow.”

You bite back a laugh, smooth a hand over her hair, then tuck the baby’s legs under your arm. “Yeah. She just wants to make sure everything’s okay.”

“That’s good.”

Tomorrow comes and Stella is less than thrilled about being handled by a stranger. Lyra’s gentle with her exam, but the kid still fusses and wriggles around on the blanket-covered table. When Lyra turns her over onto her stomach, she wails, and you take a step forward before Sevika curls an arm over your chest, gently coaxing you back.

“She's fine, Mama.”

Your head thumps against her shoulder, hand curling over her wrist for comfort. Voice wavering and watery as you mutter, “I know, but I can’t stand to hear her cry.”

Lyra turns to you with a soft smile, cradling a babbling Stella in her arms. “It’s part of your new instincts, dear. But baby’s alright.” A soft pat to said baby's back. “Just fussy.”

With a sigh, you step over to the pair. “She probably needs fed.”

A quick exchange, and Stella’s back to her old self, cooing and smiling in her mama’s arms. Over your shoulder, Sevika catches her eye. Twists up her face in a way that always makes her giggle, and this time’s no different.

She still can’t believe that this is her life now. Too used to inciting fear in the heart of the Undercity, and now a three month old baby looks at her like she’s her world. A big part of her doesn’t believe she deserves it after all the bad she’s done—the people she’s killed, the strife she helped sew throughout the city.

But the kid in your arms doesn’t know that part of her, can’t comprehend it even if she did. Maybe that’s a good thing. At least you saw something inside her worth investing in. Sticking around for.

Still can’t believe it.

When you arrive home, though, the air thickens in a way that leaves her hackles raising. You set Stella's bag on the floor beside the couch and flee to the bedroom, the girl gasping and gurgling in preparation for a crying spell.

“I know, my love. You've had such a long day, huh?” you coo, voice muffled by the wall separating you.

Sevika waits on the couch as you put her down for a nap (she’s always been difficult to get to sleep, her growing brain just too active to shut down). You sneak back into the living room a while later, shutting off the overhead light as you pass, and she scoots over to give you room to sit. You exhale a breath, head thumping against the cushion at your back.

For a long moment, the two of you sit in silence. You need to decompress, and she waits for you to tell her what's wrong.

“Why are you doing all this?” you whisper, gaze trained on the ceiling.

There it is. The reason behind the sudden chill to the room, a tangible shift in your mindset.

“What do you mean?” She doesn't touch you no matter how badly her fingers itch to cradle your hand in hers. Wants to give you space to process whatever it is you're feeling.

“Nothing's keeping you here. Stella isn't even yours, and you still–” you scoff, tears pooling in the corner of your eye, “you take care of her like she is.”

“I don't understand, honey.”

With a quiet groan, you scrub at your face. “Fuck, I—I'm so sorry for involving you in this. We're not your problem, and I just… gods, it's not fair to you.”

“Isn't that for me to decide?”

“But you're already dealing with too much.” The tears fall when you squeeze your eyes shut, disappearing into your hairline. “I feel like such a burden, and I feel even worse for telling you about it.”

Your crying brings her back to that night, to the aftermath when you sat in a chair in the back of Silco's club, covered head-to-toe in blood, sobbing into your hands. She felt helpless then, and she feels helpless now. Doesn’t know how to make the pain go away.

So she does the only thing she can think of to help ease the ache. Wraps an arm around your shoulders and pulls you into her side. Rests her cheek on the top of your head as your chest racks with quiet sobs. She lets you cry until your eyes dry up with an empty ache to her chest.

“If I didn't want to be here, I wouldn't be,” she whispers, squeezing at your arm. “I can make my own decisions, alright?”

“But you said we're your responsibility—”

“I also said I didn't mean it that way. You're a lot more than that. Both of you.”

If only she had the words to tell you, to explain how much the two of you mean to her. The love that swells her chest to the point of bloating, so overwhelming she chokes on it at times.

You sniff, wipe your nose on your shirt. “You promise?”

“I swear.”

You look up at her, puffy-eyed and pitiful, lips twitching into a weak smile. “I'm choosing to believe you.”

She presses a wet kiss to your cheek. And another, and another, and another. Doesn't stop until you're giggling and fidgeting and turning your face away.

II. SIX MONTHS

Sevika might go insane.

The kid finally learned to crawl a week ago, and she hasn't stopped moving since. Wakes the both of you up late into the night by climbing over your heads to attempt an escape off the mattress. Crawls after you as you walk to and from the kitchen, shouting and gurgling for attention. Pulls herself up onto shaky legs as Sevika sits on the couch, little fingers fisting the fabric of her pants to steady herself. So active and curious that the two of you run yourselves to death just trying to keep up with her.

Sevika would never tell anybody this, but the first time she had to raise her voice at her to keep away from the heavy cabinets, she hid in the closet nearby and cried as Stella napped in her crib. You had come home from the market, seen her puffy eyes, and pulled her into a reassuring hug.

She just doesn't want to be her father's daughter. The parent her parents were. It's a fine line to walk. Terrifying at times.

Over the last few months, Sevika's pulled away a bit from the danger of the Lanes, and in turn, Silco. A shift in priorities tends to alter the brain, and her little family is now at the top of the list. Always at the back of her mind. When she leaves on jobs that she can’t put off on some grunt, she always brings gifts home. Your favorite food, a new onesie, little figurines that remind her of either of you (always the poorly-made ones that make you laugh yourself to tears, but the one she bought featuring a very smashed-up mother and baby cat proudly sits on the table in the entryway).

You’ve got a good part-time job going, cleaning houses for the elderly either too sick or too feeble to do it themselves. It pays in cogs, but you’ve found purpose again. Lyra insisted at your last check-up that you consider activities outside of being a mother. A new hobby, giving back to the community, meeting new people.

Well, you don't really have time for new hobbies and you're still wary of people after the whole Joker thing, so the logical next step was looking for a job. A way to build up a bit of money so you aren’t relying on Sevika all the time—at least, that’s what you told her.

But today, both of you are free to explore the Undercity with Stella in tow. It's the first time you've expressed interest in visiting your favorite bakery since that night with Joker.

A big, important step for you. Your hands shake the whole way as you follow the familiar path of the street, Stella swaddled against your chest. Sevika offered to carry her, but you probably need the comfort. Her point proven when you rub your nose against the wispy hairs on her tiny head as the shop comes into view.

Behind the counter, Tayla gasps when you step inside, squealing at the sight of the baby cradled to your chest. “Oh, I missed you so much!” She strolls up to you then grasps your hands with a beaming smile. “I was so worried after you left that day and I hadn't seen you around. Gods, how are you?”

Ever curious, Stella turns her head at the sound of a new voice then cries out in frustration when she can't see Tayla’s face. The woman in question steps up to your side and takes the baby's hand.

“Hi, baby. It's nice to meet you.” Then she turns to you. “What's her name?”

“Stella,” you say, voice dripping with pride. “Sevika picked it out.”

“What a beautiful name for a beautiful girl.”

Sevika stands off to the side to let the two of you catch up, meandering along the displays of bread and cakes and cookies. The whole shop smells amazing, fresh and sweet, and the handmade furniture and soft lighting give off a coziness uncommon to the Undercity. No wonder you spent so much time here.

When she turns around, Stella is balanced on your hip, grabbing the bits of fresh bread you offer from your palm with thumb and forefinger. Tayla celebrates after each bite with words of praise and a soft clap, and Stella beams. Sevika doesn't want to interrupt the sweet scene, too afraid that her presence would break whatever blissful bubble surrounds your little group. She has nothing to say to Tayla, and this is a big moment for you. One of reunion and reclamation.

Where does she fit in?

You answer her question when you turn around, eyes searching for a split second, and panic gives way to warmth when you spot her. You invite her over with a coaxing nod of your head, lips stretching into a smile.

“She loves the bread,” you say upon her approach, and the baby reaches for her with a scrunched nose and a big smile—her two bottom teeth an adorable contrast against her gums that leaves Sevika's lips twitching upward.

(She remembers when the kid first started teething. A lot of sleepless nights and tears and chewing on wet washcloths. Fingers indented with marks, pricked with blood. You cried more than Stella did, utterly helpless against curing your baby's pain.)

She holds the baby in the crook of her metal arm and wipes the crumbs from her mouth. “Mama's made a mess of you, hasn't she?”

You giggle, squeezing Stella's chubby leg as she babbles away. “She eats like somebody else I know.”

Sevika chooses to ignore the very pointed glare aimed her away.

III. ONE YEAR

Her bubble of happiness shatters shortly after Stella's first birthday, when the gates are knocked down between the Undercity and Piltover, and war is declared. A fight for the world and the two people she loves most in it.

You cry the entire way to the trolley, holding two packed suitcases and the remnants of a broken heart. Stella wriggles in the bend of Sevika's arm—old enough to pick up on the doom in the air, but too young to understand why.

You round on her when you finally reach the door of the car. “I swear to Janna, if you die, I'll track down a mage and revive you so I can kill you myself.”

She holds you close, presses a goodbye kiss to your forehead. “I don't plan on dying.”

“That's what my dad said, and look what happened to him.”

“Good thing I'm not him.”

Your frown deepens as she passes Stella to you, gaze locked onto the cloak hiding her missing arm. “You aren't even able to fight.”

She exhales a breath through her teeth. “You underestimate me.”

“I worry about you. Is that so awful?”

Yes. It's irrational, and the image of your wet cheeks—tear tracks caused by her—sits wrong in her gut. A kind of guilt she's never really experienced. But before you, she never had something important to lose, nobody sitting at home waiting for her to come back safe. Now she has two.

Which is why she has to do this.

"I'll be fine."

You resort to begging, arms wound tight around the baby. Please don't go. I'll do anything. I can't lose you. Please. Please.

She can't let the heartbreak in your voice affect her, not when everything is at stake, no matter how badly she wants to cradle you both in her arms and take you home and damn the world to its fate.

It's the first time she says I love you. A phrase that burns acidic on her tongue, that rushes out in a whisper as you accept one final hug before climbing into the car.

IV. TWO YEARS

The kid's a damn menace. Two years old now, yanking the leash of the world in her chubby little fist. Can barely talk yet (you understand her better than Sevika does), but she always has something to say. Always running around the house.

Like now.

Sevika steps out of the kitchen and intercepts the girl with her lone arm. Pulls her to her chest as she squeals and laughs and kicks her feet.

She can’t help but smile. Says, “I don’t think so, kiddo. You have to put your clothes on.”

You walk from the bedroom with a shake of your head, a pair of matching pajamas in hand, eyes sunken from the long day finally behind you. “I have no idea where she’s gotten this energy from. You, apparently.”

“…Me.”

“I've known you three years and I've never seen you sit still.”

She doesn't know how to tell you that she's not, in fact, the dad (no matter how much she wishes to be), and has no bearing on the kid's genes. So she just nods along and agrees.

Watching this girl grow into herself—become a person with interests, likes and dislikes, a personality that gets stronger with each passing day—has been nothing short of amazing. Already, she's grown an attitude. Talks with the cadence of someone who's dealt with a lifetime of bullshit (Sevika's influence, no doubt). Morphs her face into a direct mirror of your scowls and glares and grins (she looks so much like you sometimes that it's almost uncanny).

The three of you had spent the entire day at a ceremony celebrating Sevika's seat on Piltover's council. Nothing more than a shallow show of solidarity and hospitality that she would rather not subject you to, but you had insisted. I won’t let you do this alone. It’s a sweet sentiment, but she doesn’t expect anything to come of her new status—as if she’d actually take them up on their offer to move her family out of the Undercity.

She’s just putting up with this shit for the confidential information anyway.

You had been excited, more optimistic about the future than her. A chance for change, for progress, to give Stella a better world to grow up in. But the kid will reach the stars one day, with or without her influence. She can feel it.

Sevika sits down on the couch with Stella in her lap, keeping her still so you can finally dress the kid after her bath. But she can't blame her. Who the hell actually likes wearing clothes?

"You can go on to bed," you say, sidestepping the giggling toddler when she runs past. "I'm gonna get her a quick snack."

When the two of you return from the kitchen, Stella that Sevika reads her a story. Climbs into bed with the same pop-up book you've read so many times the pages started cracking, and plants it on her lap.

Sevika shakes her head, mouth twitching into a frown. “I'm not good at telling stories. Not like Mama is.”

Really, she just… can't. A sacred line she hasn't yet dared to cross. She thinks of her mom flipping through those picture books, how animated and enthralling she made each story, and knows she could never do it justice.

(Shit, she's forgotten the sound of her mom's voice.)

You stroll in a moment later, feet dragging along the ground, before collapsing into bed with a relieved groan. "What are you two talking about?"

Sevika sighs, thumbing the edge of the worn book. "She wants me to read to her."

"Mommy, book," Stella says again, patting the cover to get her attention.

The look you give her is one of understanding, reassurance. "I think it would be nice."

"I can't do it like you." Like her mom used to.

"You don't have to."

With a huffing breath, she opens the first page, and Stella curls up against her side, tiny arm slung over her chest. Sevika reads along in a low, calm voice, adjusting her tone for different characters and asking questions about each picture. Halfway through the book, she gets no response, and when she looks over, both you and Stella are fast asleep, curled up beneath the sheets.

She sets the book on the nightstand, turns off the lamp, and shifts Stella around to carve out a spot for herself on the bed. Smiles soft and sleepy when your hand finds hers in the darkness.

Hexteam Modern au part 3

WHY IS MY TUMBLR LAGGING BRO

Just me, him, some aphrodisiac and a whole abandoned RDA building all to ourselves 😫😫