Iruumi - Bebi - Tumblr Blog

he is definitely a red flag, but red is mah fav color so what it do baby

Bully!eren is the type to sneak up behind you while you're talking to someone and grope you for sure.

Tw == technically no consent is communicated.

Not proof read lol

You just couldn't ever help yourself could you?

Could never stand your ground - even against little old Armin. Although Eren loved when you were obedient, your pliable naive mind was his for the taking, you needed to learn when to say no.

Eren watched as Armin slowly but surely began to invade your personal space, books piled in both his arms and yours.

and you - you seemed to suck up to him, eyes shining as he continued to rain praise on you for helping him back to his dorm.

'Your a life saver ____!'

'What would I do without you huh?'

'Your always such a good little helper'

By the time you both arrived, you were shoulder to shoulder, giggles and laughs rolling down the hall and straight at Eren.

Like he said - You just couldn't help yourself.

His steps where silent as he made his ways towards you, hands in his pockets and his eyes trained on you both.

Like the good girl you were, you waited patiently as Armin began to unlock his dorm - books balanced on one hand as the other fished for his keys.

With you both distracted, neither of you noticed Eren until he pressed up against you, chin dipping into the crevice of your neck as you jumped - books wobbling in your hands from your sudden start.

Armin turned to you when he saw your movement and immediately locked eyes on Eren.

'Oh Eren - hey?' Armin's confused voice hung in the air and he looked between you and the mass of possessiveness behind you.

You turned you head away as Eren began to run his nose up along your jaw - cheeks turning hot as you felt his fingertips beginning to run up the back of your thigh.

'Hey'

His breath made you shiver and you looked anywhere but at Armin - who finally had his keys in his hand and was in the midst pf being put in the lock.

'_____ was just helping me to my dorm - incase you didn't hear me and Annie broke up...' His voice trailed off as he ventured into the dorm, the sound of the books being place on the bed evident.

You remained still - unsure if Eren wanted you to move or not as his hand closed around the back of your thigh.

'You helping him baby?' You could hear the smirk in his voice as you nodded gently.

'Yeah - felt bad about what happened with him and Annie.' Your voice was quiet as you waited for Armin to hurry back and take the books from your arms.

'Aren't you sweet?' His chest rumbled against you back as he made fun of you - his wrist now meeting the tip of your already short skirt.

Within a second, Armin appeared again - his hand on the back of his neck, rubbing gently.

'I didn't realise you guys where - you know..?' HIs voice was unsure as he watched Eren continue to nose around your neck - your sweet smell clouding his mind.

"We're not!"

Your abrupt answer made both you and Eren freeze, hand beginning to tighten on the fat flesh of you thigh. You knew you fucked up - face heating up even more as you stumbled over your words, trying to redeem yourself.

Armin could immediately tell the shift in atmosphere, eyes bouncing between you, Eren and his hand.

Eren noticed this and narrowed his eyes at him - moving his hand from the back of your thick thigh to the side, staking his claim.

'Erm, I'll take them from you.' You nodded gratefully and handed the books over.

What you didn't expect was the sudden sharp pinch! to your tender skin - making you yet almost lose your grip. Armin luckily had wicked reflexes and caught them.

"We'll be taking our leave now, see you Armin.' From Eren's tight grip alone he began to pull you back to him.

'Y-yeah see you? Thanks for the help again ____" Your body began to seize up from embarrassment as Armin's cheeks tinted red.

Eren momentarily stopped dragging you, making eye contact with dark eyes and jutted his chin towards Armin.

"What'd you say?"

'Your welcome Armin.." You didn't dare look up as humiliation flushed your skin, half grateful as Eren fully pulled you to him again and began walking you both down the hall.

"Oh Princess..you are so fucked."

urgh yes pls 🤰

Me: I could take him

Soap: in a fight right?

Me:

Soap: right???

Ctto!!! @/vhenan_virabelasan on instagram!

20 YEARS of NARUTO

I literally ignored all my responsibilities to make this today. I regret nothing.

⌕ hunter x hunter - illumi zoldyck.

like or reblog if you save/use.

yes yess this is so good! (⁠ʃ⁠ƪ⁠＾⁠3⁠＾⁠）

Long live the Emperor …

synopsis — he was a very jealous man and he would do anything to send his message. you were his and he would make sure everyone knew who you belonged to.

warning - nsfw, dubcon, arranged marriage, public sex, throne sex, cock warming

shameful. it’s a shameful display of power and greed and no one dares to say a word. the court has been in session for what felt like hours with many people passing through with important requests for the emperor.

their voices are low and some even stutter, scared to look away but even more afraid to anger their emperor if they dare look at his royal consort.

“you may speak” he says, his voice as steady as any other day only that he has his beautiful wife on his lap in a thin sheer robe that leaves little to the imagination despite how long it is. it’s a beautiful shade of green, see-through and no doubt only appropriate for your private quarters.

you’re beautiful with the finest jewellery fit for the royal consort and despite your obvious discomfort and embarrassment, you know you can’t move. his cock is buried deep inside you and if you were to move, it sends a shiver up your spine that you want to hate. your husband has no respect for you privacy at all, wanting to make a point to all the men who stare at you. you belonged to him and he didn’t care if you were young and new to this side of the world.

you had just turned 18 and your father had promised you to him and no matter how much you begged and pleaded with him, he forced you to marry the emperor and now you were being shown off like some prize in front of everyone.

“m-my king” the man below speaks, but his unable to look at the king in the eye so he keeps his eyes downcast, his cheeks are red and so are his ears. you want to feel sorry for the poor old man but you saw the way he looked at you when he first entered and he was no different than anyone else in the court.

“speak up!” ran shouts, “if you’re here to waste my time, then my guards can see you out”

“i’ve come to ask for h-help” the man clears his throat, “my people, we have been struggling with-”

the man can barely get his words out and it’s so obvious that the king is bored. he helps his people and his not a selfish man but he’s very different with you and it’s clear that the people have angered him enough to push him this far. he circles his hips and grips your waist.

you can’t hide the shame that fills you the moment you moan, your mouth falling open in surprise as he thrusts up into you. his cock is big and even though you had become well acquainted on your wedding night, it was still difficult to get used to something so thick.

there are whispers throughout the court and you don’t have to see the king’s face to know he’s smirking. the smug bastard knew exactly what he was doing and he would do it again to send the message across.

you belonged to him.

ughh seriously this bad for mah heart.. goodness i know there is still few chapters left so you better make them out alive author-chan pls 🥹

Never Let Me Go - Chapter 4

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Eren Jaeger X Female Reader

Genre: Zombie Apocalypse AU, Fluff, Smut, Angst, Strangers-to-Lovers, Slow Burn, Slight Horror & Action

Series Summary: A lethal virus has killed 90% of the world’s population and turns 9.8% into zombie-like, cannibalistic mutants who are extremely vulnerable to the ultraviolet rays in sunlight. You and Eren Jaeger are both survivors crossing paths in the cruel world, but together, you’re able to find some beauty in it.

Chapter Summary: As the sun sets below the horizon, the dead roam the earth once again. With only a few knives and guns in your hands, both you and Eren have no choice but to fight back the Darkseekers. You promised each other that you’d survive this, but Eren has already bid you his final goodbye.

Content Warnings: zombies, graphic descriptions of death and murder, explicit sex (cunnilingus, blow job, fingering, hand job, car sex, abs riding, dry humping, unprotected sex, corruption kink, praise kink, etc), use of weapons (guns, knives), substance abuse (use of drugs and alcohol), traumatic past, anxiety attacks, depression, crude words, dark humor, sexual assault.

Poster art by the most talented @rainbuniart on Twitter

The moon is pale and the woods are bone-chillingly quiet.

The trees cast unnerving shadows on the road, swaying from side to side, dancing eerily from the night breeze. There are no screeching owls, no buzzing insects, no yelping frogs. Everything is silent, as if someone has muted the sounds of nature, or turned your ears deaf. The absolute stillness raises the tiny hairs on your nape, causing your inner voice to turn clamorous in your head, louder than a lion’s roar. It reminds you of the death reaper waiting on your doorstep, maybe with flesh between its teeth and dark blood dripping down its chin. 

Ghosts whisper through the wind and Eren’s rapid heartbeat is the only gravity that keeps your thoughts together. You both cuddle close in the rear middle seats, lying down with your bodies facing each other, your temple almost brushing against his collarbones. You thought it would be better to hide in the backseat but Eren reminded you that the last thing you wanted to have was trapped inside a car with a zombie as it would leave you with barely any space to fight. At least this way, you can kick the door open and run if you need to.

Your machete sticks close to your spine while your fingers curl around one of the handguns Eren has lent you. He has placed the shotgun underneath the seat, where you can both easily retrieve it in case of emergency. It holds eight shells in the magazine tube, which is not much but it serves as a reassurance. Hopefully, you won’t need to use it.

None of you dares to speak, not even in sign language. The car windows are too wide but you’ve covered them with clothes and any fabric you can find so they won’t detect your movement from the other side. But the moonlight still seeps through the little holes, painting your skin white and making you feel even more vulnerable with every intake of breath. You don’t have the bravery to take a peek through the glass. All you can do right now is just stare at the same spot of Eren’s shirt, trying to breathe as quietly as possible.

In a desperate need to soothe yourself down, you close your eyes and rewind the moment you shared with him before you both climbed into the car.

“You sure you don’t want to take my magazine?” Eren asked as he offered his spare handgun to you. “I still have three left.”

“No, I’m better with knives anyway. You can make better use of them than me.” But when you held his gun in your hand, it added more comfort than you’d expected. “I really wish we don’t have to use this.”

“We’re not going to,” he consoled you with a smile. But no matter how sweet it was, it wasn’t enough to wash your anxiety away. The sunset was stunning, possibly the most beautiful one you’d ever seen. The sky was ablaze with its fire, streaks of orange painted across cerulean blue. Under different circumstances, watching the evening sun with your lover would’ve become one of your most cherished memories but you felt like you couldn’t breathe. A certain ominous feeling shrouded you like a thick fog, erasing whatever hope you had left. Your heart was thrumming in your ears, your stomach tied in knots.

What if… this is it? You gloomily mused. What if this is the part where we die?

“Hey,” Eren’s gentle call snapped you back. “Can you re-do my hair?”

You were stunned to hear such a mundane question during a moment like this. Searching his eyes, you wondered if he felt just as terrified as you were. But even if he was, on the outside, Eren was fearless—relaxed, even, unlike how he was when he first discovered the truck blocking your path. His boyish grin refreshed your memory of the time when you were about to enter the supermarket in search of food. You remembered how you had accidentally placed your lives on the line back then too, even almost losing him in the process. But you survived, didn’t you? Maybe you could survive this one too.

‘Maybe’ is such a terrifying word. No guarantee, no certainty, only false hope.

“Sure thing, Rapunzel.” You forced yourself to be at ease, even when the load in your chest only got ten times heavier. “Squat down.”

“Why don’t we do it like this?” Instead of lowering himself, Eren scooped you up in his arms, lifting your feet off the ground. A startled gasp escaped you before you tangled your legs around his waist in reflex, your hands circling his neck to maintain your balance. His grin broke wider on his face.

“You serious?” You asked, staring flatly at him. “Did Tom Cruise do this? Are you trying to re-enact his scene again?”

“Oh my God, shut up.” He covered his embarrassment with a roll of his eyes. “I was trying to be romantic.”

“Hmm, yes, I can tell from the way you have your hands plastered against my ass.” 

“I’m just supporting your body so you won’t fall.”

“And you can’t do that without grabbing my ass?”

“It’s just easier this way, Princess.” Shamelessly, he gave you a little squeeze, making you yelp in surprise. “That was cute,” he giggled. “I didn’t know you could squeal like that. So very girly of you.”

“Ugh, you’re so annoying.” But the smile you once feigned morphed into something real. For a moment, you could forget the situation you were in. No, not forget, pretend that everything was okay. Because what if this was your last time doing this with him? Touching his hair, feeling his warmth, exchanging laughter while being in his arms like you were meant to be together for eternity. What if everything was going to end in a matter of hours—minutes, even—and this was the only chance for you to be happy?

Taking a deep breath, you tried to savor every second left.

“Okay, hold still.” Unfastening his hair tie, you carded your fingers through his strands before you tied it up in his usual bun. You patted his shoulders once you were satisfied with your work. “There, all done.”

“Yaaay.” Eren brought you back to the ground, his hands resting a few seconds longer than necessary on your waist before he released you. “Thank you, milady.”

“You’re welcome.”

He had his hand stretched out, fingers stroking the side of your face before he, as predicted, tucked your hair behind your ear. Seeing you bite your lip to prevent your grin from breaking, he asked, “What?”

“Nothing,” you answered. “It’s just… You do that a lot.”

“Do what?”

It was adorable the way he was so oblivious about it. “This.” You gestured to his hand that still lingered on your strands.

You weren’t sure if it was the sunset that painted amber on his skin or if he was simply flustered at the realization. “I’m—I’m sorry.” He retracted his hand immediately, alternating to rubbing his nape to stop him from touching you again. “It’s just…” Landing his eyes anywhere else but yours, he watched his shadow on the ground stretching out underneath his feet. “I can see your face better that way and…” He paused, a few seconds longer than necessary. 

“And?”

“You just look…” His gaze slowly drifted back to you. “So beautiful to me.”

The way he vocalized the words, the sincerity and the softness of it, made your stomach flip in delight but you kept your grin impish. “Do I look beautiful enough to make you want to kiss me?”

He noticeably gulped. “You want me to kiss you?”

You shrugged. “If you want to.”

“God, I want to.” 

In the blink of an eye, his fingers held you firmly by the side of your jaw, lifting your face as he brought his head down. His mouth crashed against yours with enough force to make you stagger on your feet, stealing a gasp from between your lips. He was pushing you against the side of the van, your spine glued to the door, your chest to his. Circling your hands around his body, you raked your fingers down his back, nails scraping against the fabric of his red leather jacket as you separated your mouth to welcome him inside. Eren was an excellent kisser, not simply because of the way he moved his lips but the way he conveyed his feelings through it, pouring his passion, affection, and devotion all at once. You could feel his emotions every time he kissed you. When he was happy, when he felt lonely, when he was needy—you could always tell. But right now, you could feel none of those three.

There was only fear. Fear of the dark, fear of dying, and ultimately, his fear of losing you.

He ended the kiss just as sudden as he started it but he kept his face close enough for his breath to caress your cheek.

“Eren—” 

He kissed you again, effectively swallowing your words even if it was as light as a feather. The sudden change of vigor in the way he touched you made your chest constrict. It was the kind of kiss that you imagined Romeo had planted on Juliet’s lips when he kissed her for the last time before he took his own life in the name of their love. You felt your heart shrivel, sadness bubbling in your chest. 

This wasn’t a kiss. This was him bidding his final goodbye.

Eren gathered you in his arms when it was over, his lips brushing against your temple once before he placed his chin on top of your head. He turned pensive, letting the silence take the lead of the conversation for a moment before he rediscovered his voice. “We should go inside,” he murmured. “It’s time.”

“Just a few seconds more.” You tightened your arms around his waist, burying your face in his chest, breathing in his scent. With your eyes closed like this, it felt like you were at home—protected and safe, drowning in the bliss that only he could offer. “Hold me just a few seconds more, Ren…”

Eren shut his lids too, relishing in the strawberry scent of your hair. “I would hold you forever if I could…”

Your forever didn’t even last ten seconds. You broke away and he rewarded you with a smile. “How are you feeling?”

“So nervous I’m about to pass out, honestly,” you said, which he reciprocated with a small chuckle. “You?”

“Well, let’s say I’m glad I’m wearing my brown pants if you know what I mean.”

“I wish I didn’t.”

Humor vanished at once the second you both stepped inside the car. Eren locked the door, exhaling a deep breath before he faced you with his jaw set. “And now we wait.”

“And now we wait.”

Eren laid himself down on the seat, his legs bent on the knees before you joined him and cuddled close. Swatting the bangs out of your eyes, he whispered, “We’ll survive this.”

“I know.” And you both knew that you were lying to each other. Nothing was certain. It was strange how you felt much braver when you were on your own, as you only had to think about yourself. Only had to fear your own death. If everything fell apart, you just had to plant your own bullet in your head and case closed. But right now… 

“Please don’t die,” you pleaded, landing your forehead on his chest. I don’t know what I’m going to do without you.

As much as he wanted to promise you so, he couldn’t. “I promise you I will never let you go,” Eren said instead. “I’ll protect you with my life.”

“No.” You shook your head. “No, don’t say that. I want you to focus on saving yourself tonight.”

“But—”

“If I see you losing focus because of me and something happens to you—I will never be able to forgive myself.” You tilted your chin upward, meeting his gaze with your consuming one. “Do whatever it is necessary to survive. I know how to fight. I can protect myself. So if you want to promise me something, Eren, promise me that you’ll stay alive. Promise me that and I’ll promise you the same thing.”

You knew Eren could see the fear and uncertainty that were written in your eyes, but you didn’t care. You wouldn’t let him say otherwise.

“Okay,” he said, embracing you close but you stopped him before he could.

You raised your little finger in the air. “Promise me.”

His smile was frail but he hooked his finger around yours. “I promise.”

You’re not sure how many hours have passed since you both laid down in that position but it feels like years. Eren suggested you to sleep as he took the first watch, but you couldn’t catch a wink. You’re in the middle of running through your thoughts, going through multiple different scenarios to prepare yourself for the worst when your ears perk up at the slightest noise. The sound of leaves dancing in the wind. The creaking sounds of branches being stepped on. The footsteps on the ground.

Then the snarlings.

You lift your face at the same time Eren tucks his chin, locking his gaze with yours. They’re here. Stay alert. You nod in silence, all your muscles tautening at once as you feel the suspense choking you. The noises grow louder with each second passing by, driving you even more to the edge. You can feel your heart rising to your throat, the weight in your chest suffocating you. Eren shifts his hand from your waist to your ear, pressing his palm against it so he can muffle their eerie growls along with the sound of their feet being dragged across the concrete. You both keep your eyes on each other, communicating in silence and bated breath. 

Don’t move. Don’t make a sound. We’ll be okay.

He speaks with his eyes and you chant the words like prayers in your head, hoping your inner voice would sound louder than their wails. Your fingers tighten around your weapon, and Eren does the same with the handgun resting in his right palm. He’s taken the bandage off his hand, wearing both of his leather fingerless gloves just like you, as he can’t afford to have his gun slipping off his grip. None of you lift a muscle. None of you should, because by the sound of it, there are more than three of them outside. 

Their footsteps grow fainter, but you don’t let your heart rest easy. Not yet. Not until sunray can pierce through their decayed skin. How many minutes or hours are left till the break of dawn? You wonder anxiously. If they find out we’re here, we’ll—

A hand smashes against your window, hard enough that the sound rumbles through the night like a thunderclap. No matter how much you’ve prepared yourself for it, your body still jolts in reflex. Eren slaps one hand against your mouth, his eyes shaking in horror. 

Be still.

You let out a shuddering breath through your nose, eyes closing shut when the same hand slams again, repeating the motion. One of the shirts that you used as a curtain slips off the handgrip, leaving one window exposed. The moonlight drenches your bodies, your presence exposed.

They can see us. The terror in your eyes says it all. Eren, they can see us! What are we going to do?

You see him swallow, his bottom lip quivering. You both try to breathe as little as possible. Maybe if we play dead, they won’t notice we’re here. Three seconds pass by in silence with invisible hands strangling your necks. You wish you could hear their footsteps marching away but what you hear is another thunderous bang.

And the window starts to crack. 

The Darkseeker is now hammering its head against the glass, again and again, and again until your biggest fear transforms into reality. Lured by the noises, another Darkseeker appears on the other side of the car, slamming its entire body against the door, growling like a starving beast. The car is being rocked back and forth. They know.

You both sit upright at the same time, adrenaline pumping through your veins. With the ruckus they’re making, they’re only going to attract more of them to your spot. “We need to kill them fast!” Eren shouts, snatching the clothes away from the windows. “Aim for their heads. We can’t afford to waste bullets or we’ll—”

You both freeze in an instant, petrified to your bones.

There are five of them. Then six. Then seven. Then you stop counting.

They’re slamming heads and blood-stained hands against the windows. Without needing words to communicate, you aim the gun to your right while Eren aims to his left. Drawing a sharp breath, you both pull the trigger at the same time.

Two bullets pierce through the windows, tempered glasses shattering into tiny, blunt pieces at once. Eren’s lead makes a nest on its head but he already shoots another one before its body hits the ground, targeting another Darkseeker that tries to break inside through the opening. He’s always better with his aim than you are, and it’s easier to land a clean shot when these corpses are plastered against the window. Three bullets are shot and three corpses lay cold on the ground, cloudy white eyes staring vacantly at the moon. 

Though not as successful, you manage to shoot two right in the heads, wasting a couple more bullets than Eren did. But without the glass separating you, they can easily break through. A Darkseeker lunges toward you, its body leaning halfway inside the window before another one follows. The cracking sound of their bones can be heard as they try to fit through the frames, four hands stretching out, clawing against your chest. You shoot another bullet, the metal pierces through its brain, sending the first body to slide down the window. As if triggered, the other Darkseeker drives itself in with more force, its fingers clamp tightly around your wrist, making it impossible for you to point your gun. Opening the car handle with your free hand, you kick the door open with as much strength as you can muster, sending the corpse to fall on its back. You jump out of the car, aiming the gun at its head, and ending its life for good. You’re about to breathe in relief when a zombie jumps from the roof, tackling you down to the concrete.

Eren hears your surprised screech and his blood runs cold but he can’t afford to lose focus, not when a Darkseeker is close enough to spray saliva on his face. He takes a shot only to find that he’s run out of bullets. Cursing under his breath, Eren unlocks the door, pushing it open with brute force until the two of them topple to the ground. With hasty hands, he snatches a loaded magazine from his thigh harness, jamming it into the gun. But a Darkseeker grabs a hold of his leg, yanking him out of the car before he can take his aim.

You are separated, fighting your own battles, protecting your own lives. Eren is facing two Darkseekers at once, while you’re trapped underneath a zombie who’s twice your size. The corpse tries to bite your neck but you push your gun inside its mouth. You pull the trigger but there’s only a click that can be heard. The Darkseeker slaps the pistol out of your hand and you’re panicking. In this position, with your back pressed flat against the pavement, your machete is out of reach. You have a knife glued against the side of your thigh, but you need both of your hands to keep the zombie away. 

You can hear gunshots from the other side of the car, and for a split second, you feel relieved, knowing that Eren is still alive and fighting. You try to roll your opponent over to its back, using the same method you used to knock Eren off of you during your first encounter. But the zombie is much stronger, much bigger, and you’re losing your strength. The hands you land on its chest to keep its teeth away from your skin are growing weaker by the second. 

Eren, help!

You grind your jaw, teeth-gritting as you try to restrain yourself from saying it out loud. You don’t want him to lose focus, not when his life's on the line. But the Darkseeker’s weight is crushing your body, making it almost impossible for you to breathe. How much longer can you keep this up? 

Eren feels like his heart is about to break through his rib cages. He’s taking too long, and you haven’t made a sound. Please, he begs in his head. Please be okay. 

Another Darkseeker attacks from his blind spot, wrapping its arm around his neck from behind, getting ready to latch his teeth on his shoulder. Moving purely on instinct, Eren snatches another gun from his belt and shoves its barrel against the underside of its jaw. He pulls the trigger, the shot deafens him as his bullet makes a hole through its mouth before it punctures its brain.

Two more, he breathes out heavily, his ears ringing. Two more and I’ll be there to save you.

With two pistols in each hand, he aims them both toward the Darkseekers’ chests. Usually, he would remind himself not to spend more bullets than necessary but his desperation to save you dulls his ability to think straight. He can’t waste a second. He needs to know if you’re okay. Their movements are too fast and he knows better to aim at their chests instead of their heads as it would reduce the chances of him missing his shots. He pulls the triggers repeatedly, shooting two bullets at the same time, watching the way they drill holes in their bodies. He can’t kill them on his first try but he tries again and again until eventually, the bullets find home in their hearts and they collapse to the ground. Both handguns in his hands are now empty but he doesn’t stop to reload. He doesn’t have time. Eren doesn’t even let himself breathe. 

Pivoting on his heels, he dashes toward your spot, his eyes largening in dread when he sees a Darkseeker’s face hovering just a couple of inches from your neck. With that much adrenaline rushing to his head, his brain stops functioning. All he knows is that in a matter of seconds, that zombie will have your flesh between its teeth and it will be over for you both. Instead of jamming another magazine, Eren tosses his guns away and charges forward. He tackles the Darkseeker by its waist, their bodies rolling on the ground, his skull slammed against the hard concrete. 

You spin to your stomach, coughing and gasping loudly for air. Blood as dark as the night painted your faces and soaked your clothes but you don’t taste copper on your tongue. You’re safe.

But Eren is not. He’s pinned to the ground, his hands gripping tightly around the zombie’s wrists, trying to fend it off. His hold slips and the Darkseeker sinks its teeth into his shoulder. “Fuck!”

There’s no time for you to look for his gun. Dashing to his spot, you reach for your machete and you plunge it against its back, driving it straight to its heart. Within two seconds, the Darkseeker’s body falls limp above him and the night suddenly turns quiet again. That zombie was the last one of them. 

“Eren!” You sink to your knees, using both hands to push its body away from him. With frantic hands and shaky eyes, you hurriedly check on him, forcing him to sit on the ground with your hands fisting his shirt. He hisses, groaning lowly as he places a hand to cover his shoulder.

Your fear coils in your stomach, so much, that you can feel the world shaking before it narrows down to one thing: Eren’s face turning as pasty as the moon. You weren’t even trembling this hard when you nearly had your life taken away. 

“Let me—” You swallow thickly. “Let me take a look.” 

Eren releases his grip from his shoulder, letting you push back his leather jacket to examine the injury. You hold your breath, screaming prayers inside your head. Please. God, please, don’t let there be bite marks on him. I beg you.

With his jacket falling loose on his shoulders, you drag the collar of his white shirt to the side. Its teeth were sharp enough to tear his jacket apart, but they didn’t impale his skin, only leaving angry red marks on his shoulder. It takes you a couple of seconds to let it sink in before you can finally breathe again.

“Oh, thank God,” you whimper, wrapping your arms around his shoulders and cradling his head close. He’s not bitten. He’s not bitten. He’s okay. We’re okay. You can’t form a word no matter how ear-splitting your thoughts are. You just embrace him tightly with all the strength you can muster, teeth grinding as you prevent yourself from crying. Knowing that he’s safe—that he’s still here, warm and breathing in your arms—feels a million times more relieving than the fact that you’re still alive.

A bit baffled by how you act, Eren returns your hug and cards his fingers through your hair. “Princess..?”

“You’re okay,” you say, burying your face in the crook of his neck. “You’re not bitten.” We can still be together.

He smiles timidly to himself. “Still hurts like hell, though.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” you try to laugh through your tears. Quickly erasing them away with the pad of your thumb, you pull away, grabbing him firmly by his upper arms. “Why didn’t you use your gun?”

“I was—I didn’t think there would be enough time for me to reload—”

“So you just threw yourself at it?!” You almost bark, startling him with the sudden change in your attitude. “Eren, that was such a reckless thing to do! You’re lucky you’re not bitten!”

“I panicked.” He reaches out a hand to stroke your cheek. “I thought I was going to lose you.”

You can relate, of course. If the roles were reversed, you would’ve done the same thing but it doesn’t change the fact that he almost sacrificed his own life for your sake. “Thank you for saving my life,” you say. “But don’t you ever try to save me like that again, okay? If a situation like this happens again, I want you to run.”

“And live the rest of my life without you? Don’t be ridiculous.”

“At least you could live. You promised me that.”

“It only feels like living when I’m with you,” he says, fingers framing your face. “Princess—”

You stop him by gripping tightly around his wrist. “You’re saying you’d rather die?”

“What will you do then?” He challenges, peering deep into your eyes. “Will you abandon me if that’s the case?”

You tighten your jaw, releasing a harsh breath. Running away from the topic, you swat his hair away from his eyes, observing his features with your gaze turning tender. “How are you feeling?”

“Could’ve been better,” he replies, still a little bit out of breath, just like you. “My palm is bleeding again.” You notice a few trails of fresh blood running down his wrist, staining his jacket’s sleeve.

“Okay. I’ve got some bandages we can use. Right now, we just need…to…” Your words die on your tongue as you look past Eren’s shoulder. There, in the distance, perhaps a few hundred meters away from you, are Darkseekers. There are more than you’ve ever seen gathered in one place. Twenty, no—maybe thirty. And they’re running.

They’re running toward you.

Your adrenaline rush kicks back in, dilating your pupils, and heightening your senses. With your heart rate increasing rapidly, you yank Eren back to his feet. He’s paralyzed by the sight of the Darkseekers sprinting at such high speed he’s never seen humans do. 

“Focus!” You snap at him. “Grab your guns and get into the car!”

“How are we going to—”

“Now!”

Eren complies with cold sweat breaking on his temples. But the second he takes a step forward, pain shoots through his entire body like a knife tearing his skin apart. His heart drops as he looks down, eyes glued to his right ankle. Is it broken? Or is it just a sprain? He can’t tell. The only thing he knows is that he won’t be able to run fast. And when you can’t run… 

You’re just as good as dead. 

Fuck. He tries to fight through the stinging ache, focusing on gathering his guns from the ground and returning to the car. You don’t notice the way he limps as you hasten to the other side of the vehicle. Throwing himself at the passenger's seat, Eren jams the magazines into his handguns, preparing for the worst. You sit behind the steering wheels, shoving your car key inside the hole and the engine blares through the night. You’re going to attract even more of them, but you don’t care. This is the only way you can think of to survive.

“What are you going to do?” Eren asks, fighting the chaos of his fear.

“I’m gonna run them over.” Your voice, unlike his, is surprisingly calm. “Put on your seatbelt.”

“What?!” But despite his protest, he does as he’s told. “There’s like thirty of them—we can’t just—”

“I’m not gonna sit here and die!” 

You step on the gas, driving your foot all the way down. The sudden rise of velocity sends you both backward, bodies plastered against the seats, your heart racing just as fast. You’re getting closer to them, your headlights shining across their rotten flesh. With the distance provided, your speed manages to reach seventy miles per hour before— “Hold on!”

A moment of impact. In three. Two. 

One.

It’s shockingly jarring and loud when you crash against them, your fingers tightening around your steering wheel so you wouldn’t lose control. Most of the Darkseekers are thrown back, tossed to the side of the road while some of them are hurled forward to the hood of your car. “Shoot them!” you shout, but Eren already has his guns ready in both hands.

One bullet pierces through the glass and the windshield shatters. Shots after shots are taken repetitively, each one goes straight to their heads. Bodies are being smashed under the tires and you don’t slow down. Eren pulls his trigger again but it ends with a click. “Fuck, I’m out of bullets!”

“The shotgun!” You remind him and he unlocks his seatbelt, reaching over to the middle seat to retrieve it. 

A Darkseeker crawls over to your seat from the bonnet and you drive your spear point knife through its face. It’s enough to blind its vision but not deep enough to tear through its brain. Its hand latches around your wrist, almost causing you to swerve the vehicle abruptly. “Eren!”

It’s your luck that he’s returned to his seat just in time. Raising the gun in firing position, he takes a shot and its brain scatters apart. Now lifeless, the body rolls off the hood before it falls and meets the earth.

“Thank you,” you vocalize, your body still trembling in fright. “That was a close one.”

“Don’t mention it.”

You are now ahead of them. Those Darkseekers you ran over, they’re not dead, not until they have their heads smashed to pieces. Some of their limbs are crushed, bones fractured, necks bent in the wrong direction, but it does nothing to them as they no longer have the ability to feel pain. They rise back to their feet, chasing after you.

“We’re just gonna have to drive until the sun comes out,” you utter. “How many bullets do you have left?”

Pumping his shotgun, Eren heavily answers with, “Seven.”

“Fuck.” There are no Darkseekers ahead of you but there are more than fifty behind, chasing after your trail, sprinting out of the woods. “How much longer till sunrise?”

He checks on his phone. “Fifty-two minutes.”

Your eyes automatically drift down to check on the lines on the gas gauge. Eren, watching you from the side, notices the way you’re swallowing your breath. “How much fuel do we have left?”

“We have enough,” you say, though the shiver in your voice betrays you. 

Eren returns his gaze to the road, his jaws clenched tight. He tries to think of ways, not to save his life but yours. “Okay, listen. If the car stops before then, I’ll go out and distract them—”

“We have enough fuel.”

“—in the meantime, you can run toward the woods and hide—”

“Eren—”

“—I won’t be able to fend them off for too long, but I can at least give you a few minutes to—”

“Eren!” Your scream is blood-curdling, silencing him at once. “We’re not going to die, you hear me?” You keep your eyes on the path before you, forced to reduce your speed to forty miles per hour as it would be risky to go faster than that on a serpentine road. “We’ve got enough fuel until sunrise. And even if we don’t, I won’t leave you.”

“Princess—”

“Damn it, you said you wouldn’t let me go!”

“What I meant was I wouldn’t abandon you!” He shouts back, sounding as desperate and as frustrated as you are. “And that’s what I’m doing now! I’m trying to save your life—”

“Well, I’m not leaving you!” It’s almost a sob that comes out of your mouth, startling you both. You don’t expect yourself to break down to tears, but you’ve only ever felt this scared one time in your life before, and that was on the day you decided to drive your knife through your sister’s heart. “I’m not going to leave anyone again!” Hot tears line down your cheeks, running over the dry blood that coats your skin. “I’m not leaving. I’m not letting you go. I’d rather die than—” You choke, your throat constricting. “I will never…” Losing strength, your voice wavers like something seen through water. “I’ll never let you go, Eren… Please don't do this to me, I beg you…”

Eren’s heart thrums painfully in his chest. Only now does he realize that you see him in the same way he sees you. You both value each other’s life more than your own. It’s better to die together than to live by yourself, shrouded in guilt, drowning in regrets. It’s just not an option you can choose.

“Okay…” he says, wetting his lips. “Okay, we’ll stick together.”

You harshly wipe the rest of your tears away with the back of your hand. “We’ll survive this.”

He nods, chanting the same prayer in his head. “We’ll survive this.”

***

The car’s engine starts to sputter, yet the sun remains still in its slumber.

A wave of panic crashes through you but you don’t let it be seen on your face. You’re not fooling anyone else, however, as Eren takes a deep breath and says, “We need to pull over.”

“No.” To your luck, the narrow, winding road has ended, leaving you with only a straight path to take where you can accelerate your car to the maximum speed. 

“Don’t,” he reminds you as you step further on the gas. “If the engine dies—” 

Hydraulic power to the brakes and steering die with it. “I know, but it’s not like I’m planning to stop anyway.”

Funny how you criticize him for being reckless when you’re doing exactly the same thing, probably ten times more dangerous. How laughable would it be if you survived the zombie apocalypse just to die in a car crash? 

You take a glance through the rear-view mirror, trying to see if the corpses are still chasing after you. They’re far behind now, their presence invisible to your eyes. But it will only take less than twenty minutes for them to catch up, you assume. And what if other Darkseekers are lurking ahead of you? What are you going to do when the car stops?

You’ve only begun to think of a solution when you notice a loss in power. No, you beg internally. No. No. No. Please, the sun isn’t out yet.

Eren inspects your expression closely from the side, not saying a word as he can feel his own dread rising to his throat, but he has expected the worst outcome. Unlike you who’s been drenching yourself with hope, he’s given up a long time ago. Right now, he just wishes he could find a way to save you.

The engine dies and it takes a few minutes more before the car finally puts into a complete stop. With tremors in your hands, you unfasten your seatbelt. “We need to run,” you say through chattering teeth, leaning over to the middle seat to snatch your backpack. “If we’re lucky, we can find another car that works. If not, we can hide in the woods. We can climb a tree or something.” You’re not sure if it would work, but zombies are unable to use common sense as humans do as their brains no longer function. They have fast reflexes, strong instincts but you just need to outsmart them to survive. If you can get to a higher ground where they can’t reach, perhaps you can wait until the sun comes out. And you’ll be okay.

We will be okay.

You jump off your seat, placing back your machete to the back of your shirt before you hurriedly march to his side of the van. Eren steps down with his left foot, supporting himself with one hand on the door before he swings his other leg. As expected, he cannot bear his weight on his ankle. He tries to keep a straight face but you notice the pain that crosses his eyes. 

“What?” you ask him, your eyes boring into his. “What happened?”

“I think I broke my ankle,” he utters, stiffening you with his answer. 

“How bad is it?”

“Bad enough for me to be a burden to you.”

You clench your fists. “It’s okay. I won’t abandon you.”

He feebly smiles. “I know.” Which is why this feels ten times worse for me, he adds with regret.

Eren has given up on arguing about it with you. If this is your last moment together, he wouldn’t want to spend it by painting tears in your eyes. He wouldn’t want his name to be spoken through gritted teeth. So he lets you wrap an arm around his waist while he lands his right one across your shoulders. He leaves his bag but he carries his shotgun with him, slinging it securely on his left shoulder. With your lead, he takes a step forward and he stumbles, almost falling to one knee if you weren’t there to catch him. “Sorry,” he says, ashamed for being so powerless. He wanted to protect you and here he is, being nothing more than a liability.

Except you don’t think of him that way, and you never will. He’s your life savior, in more ways than one. He’s the glue that keeps your sanity intact, the gravity that keeps you standing on the ground. Here, being shrouded in his arms, is exactly where you want to be. “It’s alright. Just match your stride with mine,” you advise gently. “One step at a time, okay? No need to rush.”

No need to rush. If only he could find the strength to laugh. Eren nods and he does as he’s told, trying to sync his movements with yours. It’s awkward at first, but once you’ve managed to pass it, you start picking up your pace and maintain it when you both have found your rhythm.  

The first sight of lightness comes into view. A small portion of the sun's rays illuminate the sky and the fainter stars begin to disappear. “Twilight,” you sigh in relief. “It won’t take long until sunrise. We can survive this.”

“Yeah.”

Eren’s palm still bleeds, dripping fresh blood all over the pavement. You wish you could stop for a moment and treat it with care, but you have to keep yourself moving. If you can survive for another twenty minutes, you will be safe. Anything else can come after that.

You’re counting the minutes that pass by in your head. Six, seven—twelve minutes have passed. “Just a little bit more,” you keep saying the words to keep yourself sane. Not sure why, but the panic that once has receded comes crashing back in like waves under a heavy storm, submerging you with it. “Just a little bit more, Ren.”

He keeps himself mute, cold sweat sliding down to his chin. Anything can happen in a matter of seconds, let alone minutes. He wishes he could feel safe, but he can’t. He’s terrified.

And when you stop dead on your tracks, your body frozen as if you were icebound to the ground, the fear in his chest doubled by tenfolds.

You can hear their rapid footsteps. They’re closing in.

And they’re closing in fast.

As your breathing turns labored, you take a look at your side. There are pine trees you can climb, but how can you get him up there? You’re not strong enough to pull him up, and he can barely stand on his own feet.

Fuck, what am I going to do?

Eren’s heart breaks at the sight of you biting hard on your lip to the point it almost bleeds as you switch from one scenario to another. “Princess—”

“Shut up,” you snap back, already figuring out what he’s going to say. “I’m not abandoning you.” You spin your head around, facing him. “But we have to run. Can you endure the pain for a moment?”

He gives you two firm nods and you both race as fast as you can. Eren feels like his ankle is about to snap like a twig, crushed underneath the pressure. It’s fucking painful, every step he takes feels like he’s walking on daggers. He groans in agony, and you hold him closer to your body. “I’m sorry, just a bit more.” Their growlings reach your ears, just as strident as your increasing heartbeat but you keep yourself focused. 

“Princess!” Eren shouts, terror in his voice. “We can’t outrun them!” 

He’s right. There is no other way. Stopping abruptly, you spin on your heels, snatching your machete from your belt. “Then, we’ll fight back,” you say, jaw clenching at the sight of Darkseekers sprinting towards you. They are not as many as they were before, probably ten or twelve, chasing after you at different speeds. But you only have seven bullets and a few knives. Eren can no longer fight and your legs are shaking underneath your weight due to exhaustion. There’s no way you can win this. This is it. This is the end. 

You think your body will start trembling in fear, but it doesn’t.

You think that when the grim reaper stands before you, his scythe ready to swing right through your neck, you’ll start pleading for him to spare your life. But you don’t. You’re not afraid of him. You welcome him like an old friend.

Because you’re not alone anymore, are you? Eren is here. And maybe just like him, it’s not death that you’re terrified of. It’s loneliness. It’s the feeling of surviving just to exist, without any purpose, without any emotions. When you met him, everything changed. With him, you’ve found everything you wanted to make your life worth living. 

It was a good life, these last five months you’ve shared with him. You were happy, weren’t you?

I was, you smile to yourself. I truly am happy.

So, there you are, standing with your hands steady. You take a step forward, bracing yourself as you shield him with your body. He’s shouting something at you, perhaps telling you to escape or stay behind him like always. His voice rings clamorously through the air, but to you, he sounds like he’s underwater, trying to mouth the words that you can’t hear. Your thoughts are louder, and they don’t speak a word of fear. They only speak of regret.

You wish you could say a word or two, maybe bid him goodbye, or tell him how grateful you are for his presence. For giving you so much joy, more than you deserve. For taking care of you. For loving you. But you’re running out of time.

Ah, you realize, as a Darkseeker, one that runs the fastest among others, lunges himself toward you. I haven’t told him I loved him yet.

Eren’s gunshot blares through the sky as you fall onto your back. The corpse hovers above you, its teeth dripping saliva but you slice its throat with your knife and kick its body away with your knee. Eren takes a few more shots, shooting each one right on the head as you prepare yourself for another. Two more zombies hurl themselves toward you, sending you both to the ground almost at the same time, his shotgun trapped between its teeth, your machete plunged deep into its chest but not quite hitting its heart.

They said during a near-death event, your life would flash before your eyes but now you see that it’s not true. You don’t see your entire past spooling out before you. You don’t see a replay of all the most significant moments in your life. You only see him.

Eren.

You see his smile and his adorable crooked teeth that peek behind his impish grin whenever he leaves you baffled with his witty retort. You see his eyes, emerald with flecks of strength—the kind of green that comes only as summer advances. You see his kindness, his adoration, and the love he holds for you, the fire of his passion that almost burned him whole—the same passion that consumed you just as much only a night ago.

And you wish you could turn back time and respond to his confession with honesty. Because the truth is, all those words he said to you—about how he missed you every second of the day, how he thought about you both in his wake and his dreams—you feel that too. When the words “There’s no life without you,” slipped out of his mouth, you heard them well and you felt it so much within your heart that you wondered if it was you who spoke the words. 

Eren gives your life meaning. He gives you more happiness than you could take.

I should’ve told him, is the only thing you can think of when you feel your stamina decreasing fast. I should’ve told him that I’d been in love with him too. 

God, I wish I could tell him now.

The zombie is clawing its nails against the front of your throat, your machete stuck between rotten flesh. Maybe it’s time to give up. You’ve fought long enough. Maybe you can use yourself as a distraction. You’re not sure how, but if you can at least give Eren a chance to escape, then it would be worth it. You just need to—

Time stands still. Suddenly, all you can hear is your ragged breathing.

The Darkseekers stop moving. They raise their heads, their white eyes staring straight at the horizon, their jaws hanging low on their faces, black saliva dribbling down their chins. They begin to wail then they run away abruptly, scattering into the woods, desperate to find shades to protect themselves from sunlight. It happens so fast that it leaves you both stunned. 

What just happened?

You and Eren are left panting on the ground. The rising sun casts a rosy hue across the morning sky, its first rays lighting up your skin. 

Sunrise.

You tilt your head to the side, catching Eren doing the same thing at the same time. Locking gazes, he mumbles out, “We’re alive…” He sounds like he’s in disbelief, his body is still in shock like he’s been trapped in a nightmare for so long and he’s woken up by a slap.

You’re not any better. Perhaps it’s because your heartbeat is slowing down significantly that you start to feel delirious. Or maybe it’s because your adrenaline rush is dissipating so fast from your veins, that it leaves you incapable of thinking straight. Because out of all the words you can say, you find your lips forming the three words you didn’t think you were allowed to state.

“I love you.”

Eren’s eyes widen at once, his breath leaving him as his lips part in a silent gasp. For the first three seconds, that’s all he can do. His eyes shake as they peer deep into yours, trying to unravel your every secret but he realizes he doesn’t have to. You’ve laid everything out in the open. For once, you let yourself be as transparent as the dew that kisses the leaves in the morning. You let him peer into your soul, let him understand that you're saying the words not simply because you almost died with regret for not saying them out loud. You say it because you feel it in your bones. You say it because you love him. 

And once he understands that, his expression changes. “I love you.”

You both meet each other halfway, bodies lying on your sides, faces trapped between eager hands as you capture each other’s lips. “I love you.” Tears dampen your eyelashes as you whimper the words, your lips moving against his smile. “I love you.” You sound like a broken record to your ears, but it’s a lullaby that he’ll remember until his last dying breath. 

I really love you, Eren.

He responds to each one with the same words followed by a whisper of your name, and you can feel it. This joy, this sense of completion as if you have finally achieved what you’ve been searching for your whole life. For the first time, you allow yourself to feel the happiness that he paints on your lips. You receive the affection that he carves into your heart, and you accept the love he gives you.

You accept the love that you deserve.

***

Eren has survived more near-death experiences than a person could have in a lifetime. Every time he did, he always questioned himself: Why do I have to try so hard to live? Why can’t I just let myself die? What’s the point of surviving when the whole world burns to ashes?

Will it have any meaning if I live through another day?

Today, he finally can answer his questions with yes, I’m glad that I’m alive. I’m glad that I can still bask under the sun, to have air in my lungs, to feel like I still have a soul inside me. To feel like I’m human.

And if he closes his eyes, all he can see is you. You make me feel human again.

You’ve brought him hope, his sense of purpose. Eren no longer lives to survive. He lives to spend every second of every hour he has left with you, creating memories, exchanging love and passion, and neverending bliss. He wants to embrace these feelings for the rest of his life—engulfed with joy, a sense of relief, and endless gratitude. He doesn’t feel like he just escaped death. He feels like he’s being reborn.

And God, it has never felt this good to be alive.

Eren looks to his side, blatantly staring at you with a goofy smile on his face. He’s dumbstruck—no, lovestruck at the sight of you. You’re the woman who stayed with him till the end, the woman who fought till her last breath, protecting him with no fear written in your eyes. You’re the woman that he loves, and the woman that loves him back. The woman that nurtures the flickering spark of hope inside his chest into a blazing flame. The woman that allows him to do the same to you.

“What?” You ask him with your cheeks burning bright, knowing that he’s watching you closely. You keep your eyes on the road with both hands on the steering wheels of your newly discovered SUV. It’s an old Chevrolet with dents all over the car but you consider yourself lucky enough to even be able to find one. It has enough fuel for you both to reach Aspen Pine before noon. You can find another car in the city if you need to. 

“Nothing,” Eren replies, still smiling sheepishly to himself. “I’m just, uh… Hoping you’ll say it again.”

“Say what again?”

“You know…” He scratches his nose, the blush that blooms on his face matches the pinkish glow of sunrise bursting through the clouds. “The three words you said to me earlier.”

Your ears are buzzing from how much blood is pooling on your face. An hour has passed since you both confessed your feelings to each other and yet, it feels like a decade has gone by where it becomes awkward for you to restate the words. Funny how you have all the bravery to face flesh-eating monsters, but when it comes to showing affection, you’re curling yourself into a ball of shame. 

“What three words?” You switch gears. “Any three words? Like, ‘Shut up, stupid?’ Or ‘You’re so annoying?’ Or maybe ‘Keep saying that and I’m gonna kick you out of my car?’”

He pouts—actually pouts like a child. “The last line isn’t even three words.”

“It is if you split them into four parts.”

“Ugh,” he groans, rolling his eyes. “Princess, you said it, like, ten times in a row an hour ago.”

Your cheeks are replaced by fire at this point. “Well, then you’ve heard enough to keep yourself satisfied for a lifetime.”

“I want to hear it!” You thought it would be impossible for a 193-cm tall brawny man to whine like a three-year-old, but there he is. “Can’t you just say it one more time?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“‘Cause, it’s embarrassing.”

“Then I’ll say it first. You can just reply to me right after.” He said that but you can see him releasing a shaky breath from the corner of your eye, trying to mentally prepare himself. Although he has thought about them for months, the words still feel foreign in his head, let alone on his tongue. But Eren turns his body to face you, his gaze intense enough to burn holes. “I love you,” he says, sounding too formal and rigid to be romantic. It even feels a bit ridiculous, but you’re too nervous to laugh.

You tighten your jaw, your lips are pressed tight into a white line. You can’t. No matter how much you try, you can’t just say the line like that. It’s just so uncharacteristic of you to do so.

Eren waits with a palpitating heart. He feels like he just confessed to you all over again, not knowing whether you’d reject or accept his feelings. When three seconds pass by in silence, his blush smears right to his ears. “W-why are you not saying anything?!”

“Because it’s embarrassing!”

“But now I look like an idiot!”

“You are an idiot,” you retort, holding back the laughter that bubbles inside your chest.

His face matches the color of his red leather jacket. “Stop laughing!”

“I’m—” You clasp your lips tightly when you feel a giggle threatening to break free. “I’m not laughing.”

“Fine, you know what? I’m not gonna say it again until you say it first,” Eren says with a loud huff, throwing his face to the side and grousing like a child with his arms folded on his chest. 

“Fine by me.”

A muscle in his jaw twitches. Glaring at the scenery outside his window, he grumbles under his breath. “Whatever. You’re an idiot.”

“I’m an idiot?” You blurt out, your tone full of mirth. “For what, for not saying I love you?”

You fall into his trap. Without knowing, you say the words he wants to hear, even if the rest of your sentence contradicts its meaning. “I love you too,” Eren says within a split second, beaming at you with a boyish grin. “See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“I wasn’t—oh, shut up.” You spit back, tossing him a bar of Snickers to refill the calories he’d burned. You couldn’t carry much stuff in your backpack during your move, only a bottle of antibiotic ointment, some bandages to treat your wounds, a few bottles of water, some carbohydrate bars, and Eren’s favorite snack: Snickers. “Go get some sleep. Aspen Pine is still an hour away.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll stop by at a gas station to get us something better to eat, then we’ll find a house to stay in.”

“Okay.”

“And maybe by then,” you sigh, noticing that he’s still looking at you with the same dopey look on his face. “You can stop staring at me.”

Eren isn’t listening to you. He hasn’t been for a while. “Okay.”

“Ren.”

“Hmm?”

“Stop staring at me!”

“I’m not staring at you,” he tries to argue. “I’m trying to sleep by staring at you.”

“That’s it.” You snatch back his snickers bar with one hand—which he only took a bite from—and wolf everything down in one try. “There. Now, you can eat air for the rest of the day.”

“Wha—Princessssss!”

***

“I thought we were going to the lake?” Eren asks one and a half hours later as you drive past the final exit sign, indicating that you’re now at the border of Aspen Pine. But instead of taking the right turn as you’re supposed to, you’re taking left, changing lanes, and heading toward a new direction.

“There’s a small town nearby,” you answer, taking a gulp of water. Both you and Eren have finished your first bottles, leaving you only with one more each. You need to make a stop soon. “It’s only half an hour away from here. We need to find some weapons. Going through people’s houses will take too much time. I’m sure they have some guns and spare magazines we can steal at the police station.”

“Ah, yeah, that’s a good idea.”

Rather than being a good idea, it’s more likely to be the only option you can choose. Knowing that he can barely walk, it would be suicide for both of you to enter uncharted territories without a gun in his hands. You’re not sure you can protect him with your stomach growling and your muscles begging for some rest either. 

No houses are in sight as you steer through an empty road, only woods surrounding you, with the sharp, sweet, refreshing scent of pine trees and conifers tickling your nostrils. Combined with Eren’s soft breathing as he falls asleep with his arms crossed and his skull resting against the headrest, you can finally have a moment of serenity to yourself. 

That is until you can sense the smell of rotting flesh in the air.

“Eren,” you wake him up with a gentle call. “We’re here.”

The brunette male rubs his eyes away from sleep, squinting them to adjust to the morning light. His body tenses the second his nose picks up the smell. “Darkseekers?” He questions with a frown. “Can’t be. The sun is out.”

You don’t answer him. Slowing down the vehicle, you keep yourself alert to your surroundings, eyes scanning every part your vision can reach.

 Welcome to Ash Ville, a road sign says. We hope you’ll enjoy your stay.

You prepare yourself, inhaling and exhaling. You’re about to march into a town you’ve never stepped a foot in, and as much as it is nice to travel to someplace new, you’re shrouded in nothing but dread. If there’s one thing you’re certain of, not every town stays the same as it was before the outbreak. And within a few minutes, you’re about to find out you're right.

Blockades surround the town, made from barbed wires with thorns and spikes, stained with blood and pieces of rotting, human flesh. “They must have taken their own measures to contain the outbreak the second they heard about what happened in other countries,” Eren says, with which you silently agree. “It was smart of them to think that fast.”

The people in this town had built security perimeters, blocking every entrance to get to the city hall except the main gate. One that you assume used to have local officers identifying each person entering the town. The stone walls are certainly strong enough to keep the Darkseekers away, but the black wrought iron fences, which you thought would’ve been impenetrable, are destroyed, pushed with hard enough forces that they tore open the doors.

You decrease your velocity to twenty miles per hour, trying to find a police station or a supermarket nearby as you drive past the gate. A few meters in, you notice something. 

The people in this town didn’t die from the outbreak. The virus had never gotten to them.

They were massacred.

Shivers run down your body as you see corpses after corpses lying down on the street. It’s not the first time you’ve seen something like this. The virus used to be airborne. Once it was inhaled into your lungs, it would attack your body from the inside, and if you were weak, you’d explode, almost quite literally, within minutes after infection. Blood would seep through your pores and your body would decompose so fast, that it would only take less than 24 hours for your skeleton to show. The blood would turn black and it would stain the pavements as if the night had melted and drenched the earth.  

But that is not what happened here. The ground that stands before your eyes right now is painted crimson.

“The Darkseekers must have managed to break through the gate.” Eren’s voice turns deep with regret, his striking viridescent eyes turn dark as they’re painted over by anguish. “To think that they managed to slaughter the whole town in one night…”

A string of questions pops up inside his mind and it shows vividly on his face. What if the Darkseekers never left? What if they’re still here, watching our movements, waiting until the sun goes down before they rip our throats apart?

“Stay within the light,” you assure him, even though your fingers are gripping tightly enough around your steering wheels, enough to turn your nails white. “As long as we stay within the light, we’ll be okay.”

You try to swerve the vehicle to avoid the corpses. You’re not sure how much time has passed ever since the incident, but by the stench of their decaying skin, bodies start liquifying, teeth and nails falling out, maybe it’s been a few weeks. You don’t linger too long to find out.

“Just focus on finding the police station.” You wonder if you sound cold, or seem apathetic to his eyes but Eren doesn’t say a word. The world is cruel but you both have known it since the day you and Eren drove your knives through your loved ones’ hearts. This is nothing new.

It’s a small town that’s brimming with brick storefront housings, chock full of quirky gift shops specializing in crystals and moonstone pendants. The colors are vibrant and warm, and if the world wasn’t ending, this would’ve been a lovely town for you to travel to. But not anymore.

You spot a police station down the road and Eren tightens his grip around his shotgun.

“How many bullets do you have left?”

“One,” he answers. One bullet may seem like it offers nothing but a small reassurance, but knowing how good he is with his shots, one bullet can save a life, whether it's yours or his. Little do you know that Eren only intends to use it to save yours.

“Then wait here,” you order him to stay put as you pull on the handbrake, parking your car recklessly without a care in the middle of the road. There are no bodies around, no corpses lying nearby, and no signs of life. “I’m gonna go inside and check.”

“I’m going with you,” Eren insists almost immediately, his hand ready to lurch forward and seize your wrist if he needs to. It’s to be expected of him, knowing how chivalrous he’s been from day one. 

You don’t want to sound harsh by reminding him that with a broken ankle, he will only become a liability to you but he can be just as stubborn as you are, if not more, when he wants to. “Eren, you can’t walk.”

“I’m not letting you go inside alone.”

You turn your face to the side, watching him with weary eyes. You can see the determination on his face, how he’s not going to change his mind as long as you have your life on the line. Of course, it makes you happy to have someone who cares this much about you but still, it would be a terrible decision to bring him along. “Well, I’m not letting you step down from this car with a broken ankle.”

“Do you think I can just sit here and watch you risk your life for us?”

“Do you think I can just allow you to come with me when you can’t even run?”

He clenches his jaw, hating that he doesn’t have any better argument to fight you on it. “I know I’m no use to you right now, but…” It’s heartbroken to see him this way, to see how much he hates himself for being so powerless, for being such a burden, when all he wants to do is to protect you. “Princess, if something happens to you…” he speaks softly, his eyes losing the bravery and determination that filled them a moment ago. “And I’m not there to protect you as best as I can, I will never be able to forgive myself. I’d rather die trying to protect you than to live on my own.”

Although deep in your heart you feel the same way, you answer with a scoff, “That’s stupid.”

“That’s what I want,” he corrects, staggering you for a second from how solemn he looks. “I don’t want to live with regret. Not anymore.”

There’s a pregnant silence with thick tension stretching between you. Eventually, you release a defeated sigh, folding your arms above the steering wheel before you use them as a pillow to rest your forehead on. “Why do you never listen to me?” You ask, sounding much more exhausted than intended. “I’m trying to do what’s best to keep us alive.”

“We’re stronger in numbers,” Eren says, a sudden juvenile grin breaks on his lips, and you’re reminded of the words he said to you when you first met. “Besides, Princess, if we can survive last night, I’m sure we can survive this one too.”

“You’re weirdly optimistic.”

“You’re just too pessimistic.”

The little laughter that you try to suppress sounds more like a snort than anything else, but Eren can see a hint of amusement on your face. “Fine,” you say. “You’re coming with me. But if a Darkseeker shows up and you miss your shot, Jaeger, I swear to God, I’m gonna shave your head. Let’s see if you can still do your cursed Tom Cruise impressions with a bald head.”

Eren shrugs. “He was bald in Tropic Thunder.”

“Oh, shut up.” You land a small punch on his shoulder before you both trade demure smiles. “Well then, should we come up with a plan?”

The plan isn’t much of a plan to begin with, but it’s the best you got. Sticking your machete in the back of your shirt, you jump out of your car and move to his door. 

Eren blushes when he sees you stretching out both hands to help him step down from the car. With one hand supporting himself against the railing, he swings out one leg. “I can do it myself,” he says, but right after he finished his sentence, he slips his footing, his body stumbling forward, crashing against yours. You both topple over to the ground, your back hitting the earth with a thud and a painful groan is snatched away from your mouth. Eren has his face buried in your chest before he props himself up with both palms on the concrete. “I’m—I’m sorry!”

“For falling on me like an idiot or for almost motorboating my tits like a pervert?”

His jaw is seconds away from dislocating from his face. “I– I’m not–”

“You’re both,” you answer it for him. There’s a painful throb at the back of your skull that makes your vision slightly unfocused.

“I’m sorry,” he winces. “Are you okay?”

“I’m okay. I’m this close at kicking you in the balls right now, but I’m okay.”

Eren laughs as he’s reminded of the earlier days when you spent ninety percent of your time together throwing playful banter like this. His smile is so contagious that you find your own lips curving up. It falters once he lays a hand on your face, thumb stroking your cheekbone. His palm, just like his ankle, has been treated with antiseptic and bandage. His blood has stopped gushing out from his wound.

“What?” You ask him, time seems to slow down as you focus your gaze solely on him. You watch his eyes drift down to your lips, his gaze lingering as if they are entranced by the sight. You know that look. “Don’t do it.”

Eren wets his lower lip, whether it’s a sign of nervousness or him just aching to have a taste, you’re not sure. “Why not?”

“Because it’s the most cliche thing ever.” 

“To kiss you when we’re in this position? I think it’s understandable.” 

It’s harder to stay unfazed under his coy, little coquettish smile, and his seductive whisper than to take a clear shot of your target, but fortunately for you, you manage. “There’s a correct time and place to do this, Er—”

He dives and brushes his lips tenderly against yours—a questioning kiss, brief and timid. Yet, you find yourself holding your breath when he releases you.

“It always feels right to me,” he says, smiling more with his eyes than his lips, a pair of beautiful crescents. “Anywhere with you feels like Paris in the rain.”

“Seriously?” You stare flatly at him. “Trying to woo me over by quoting a line from a mainstream song? Really?”

He knits his eyebrows together, puzzled. “What song?”

“Oh my God,” you groan. “So you’re naturally this corny? I mean I know you are but I didn’t think you were this bad.”

“Is it really a bad thing, though?” He murmurs, lowering his head for another kiss, slightly longer, slightly deeper that you could feel how despite they still feel soft against yours, his lips are a bit chapped from the cold. The saccharine smile turns into a devilish smirk. “Seems like you like it just fine, Princess.”

You knee him right on his crotch, not hard enough to make him cry in agony, but enough to serve as a warning. He grunts with his elbows supporting him on the ground, while you return to your feet and fix your leather jacket. “Stop wasting time and let’s go.”

“You’re not cute at all,” he pouts. He allows you to circle one arm around his waist as he lands his around your shoulder. You both make your way to the station, stopping right before the door where the sun can douse you with its light.

“Ready?” You ask him, grabbing your machete with one hand.

Eren releases you, standing with his shotgun in firing position. He gives you a nod.

Taking a deep breath, you kick the front door open. The wood creaks underneath the pressure, and by your third attempt, it swings open and slams against the wall. You’ve made enough noise to attract whatever is lurking in the dark. All you have to do is wait.

It’s only three seconds in, and a Darkseeker, dressed in a police uniform with black strings of saliva coating its bared teeth, advances toward you. You can hear Eren releasing his breath slowly as he prepares to take his shot. He pulls the trigger, the sound rings like thunder in your ears. The bottom half of its face is blown away, its body pushed back a few steps. But then it stares back at you, its snarl turning into a raging cry before it runs toward you with both hands stretched out. Eren didn’t miss his shot, but he missed its brain.

“Fuck,” he curses, stepping in front of you in reflex. He knows the sun will burn its flesh the second it walks past the door but he still tries to shield you just in case. 

“Move,” you tell him, pushing him away to the side with one hand while you snatch a spear point knife from the harness that tightly hugs your thigh with the other. You cast your blade forward, letting it pierce through the air before it lands right on the Darkseeker’s forehead, penetrating deeply enough to rupture its brain. The corpse tumbles back at once, body crashing against the wooden floor.

Eren stares in awe before he gulps. “Remind me not to get on your bad side.”

You don’t answer him, focusing on finishing your job first. Stepping into the room, you approach the spot where the Darkseeker is now oozing black blood to the ground. You go down to one knee, plunging your knife harder inside its brain before you drive it upward, splitting its head in the middle. You pull it away, wipe the blood on its tattered uniform, and place back the blade in its sheath.

Eren watches you from behind, completely enthralled. “Is it weird if I find you so hot right now?”

“Stop messing around and help me find some guns.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

***

Last night might be the worst night of your life but today? Today feels like God is trying to make it up to you.

You’ve managed to obtain yourself three shotguns, two handguns, and five extra magazines from the station. As the cartridges you found didn’t match the ones he owned, Eren tossed his old pistols away and decided to use the new ones instead. “These are lighter, I like them,” he commented with a satisfied grin, tucking his new handguns around his belt.

Your forage for food went well too. There was a minimart nearby that offered bottles of water and a selection of canned foods—which were still gross, in your opinion, but Eren was having a feast. You got your hands on a few bags of chips, a few cans of beer, and coffee–Eren was immensely pleased when he found Corona Extra on the counter that you swore you saw him rubbing his tears away with his hand. With your heart feeling ten times more at ease, you continued with your journey.

You’ve decided not to switch cars, only stopped at a gas station to refill the tank. You drive twelve miles west, heading toward the lake. It’s only one in the afternoon, so there will be plenty of time for you to find a new house and get familiar with your surroundings before the sun sets.

“I’m so excited,” Eren giddily says, munching on a Twinkie. It’s two weeks past its expiration date but he doesn’t care. “Feels like we’re going camping.”

You snort. “Want me to set up a bonfire for you? I’m sure they would love to have a little Jaeger barbecue party.”

“Your sense of humor is disturbing, Princess.”

An hour later, you’re driving down a familiar lane, going through the small neighborhood framed by steep hills and majestic lake views. Tucked into its cozy tree-lined streets are some of the prettiest homes you’ve ever seen—a conglomeration of architectural styles that, while unique, are unified in charm. As much as you are itching to visit the varnish-clear lake to revive your dearest memories, you focus more on finding a place to stay for the night. But then—

“Hey, why don’t we stop by the lake first?” Eren suggests as he rolls his window down, his head peeking out like an excited dog. His hair, tied up with a few baby hairs sprouting out of his bun, is caressed by the wind. “You want to see it, right?”

It’s as if he reads your mind. “I guess we can if it’s just for a few minutes.”

“Yeah, just for a few minutes.”

So you follow his request and fulfill your wish, keeping your engine running until you can witness the glorious luster of the water before you. It’s the same skyline-silver lake where you used to spend every summer making cherished memories and endless laughter with your family. It feels nostalgic, the way the atmosphere is convent quiet, soothing, and yogi still. It’s lined with pine trees and the sky’s magnificence seemed to be emblazoned on the lake, making it look like nothing but a painting. The whiff of mint and the cedar-sweet smell wafts up to you the second you stop and open your door to breathe the fresh air. Feels so good to be home, your lips almost form the words. The idyllic scene still takes your breath away just the same, and when you spin your head around to see him, Eren has his lips parted in awe, looking just as enraptured by the scenery, if not more.

“You want to go out?” you offer him. “Just for a few minutes.”

He mirrors your smile. “Just for a few minutes.”

Climbing out of the car, you help him support his balance by holding him around his waist like before. Eren has his arm resting on your shoulders, the visage of the lake is reflected in his eyes. Sunray adds a golden tint to the face of the lake, and Eren thinks this is what paradise looks like. Untouched by the cruelty of the world. It’s a place with the kind of beauty that is unmatched, except maybe…

His eyes shift to your face again, only to be answered instantly by a gentle smile on your face. “Do you like it?” You ask him. 

Eren casts his gaze down when he feels you removing your hand from his waist, only to interlace your fingers together. You squeeze his hand lightly before your warmth seeps through his pores, and he wonders if you’re thinking the same thing. That this is a new beginning, for you and him. That this is finally the place that you both can call home.

“I love it,” he says, almost in a content sigh. He shifts his arm away from your shoulder, his hand doing the same habit of tucking your hair behind your ear. But maybe it’s not a habit. It’s just his favorite thing to do in the world. 

And he wants to say something. Wants to describe that even all of this scenery—everything that took his breath away—they’re nothing compared to you. But you’ve called him corny so many times and Eren’s knowledge of romantic phrases is close to none. All he can offer you is his honesty. 

“I’m in love with you,” he breathes out while your breathing stops. “I find endless joy when I’m with you, Princess. Loving you feels right as if it’s the reason why I’m here. I feel like I’ve loved you in my previous life, I love you in this one, and I’ll love you again in the next one.”

How can he say something like this? You wonder, turning bashful. So beautifully, so genuinely, so passionately. You could feel the attraction that pulses between you, a magnetic pull drawing you to him. For a moment, he renders you speechless. 

“This is the right moment,” you tell him.

He blinks. “Huh?”

Ah, damn it. With your face aflame, you speak through gritted teeth. “For you to kiss me, you idiot.”

“Oh!” The realization only overtakes his features for a second before it quickly turns to regret. “Oh, no, I just ruined it, didn’t I? I’m sorry, I should’ve—”

You pull him down by the collar of his jacket, standing on your toes as you plant your lips against his. It’s a bit more forceful than intended, but it delivers the message well. You break away only to whisper, “Stop talking and just… kiss me harder.”

And he does, kissing you with all the passion he feels. The need. The hunger. But Eren keeps his control. He just wants your taste on his lips. At least, for now. 

The kiss is different than what you shared with him a moment ago. There’s no elfin grin on his mouth, only parted lips and eager tongue—shy enough to penetrate deep into your cavern but bold enough to glide against your lower lip. There’s no giggle erupting from the back of his throat, only a deep moan and breathy sigh when he feels your fingers dancing across his nape. His right hand slithers around your waist, his other one cups you by your jaw, the leather of his fingerless glove rubs against your skin.

“Be with me.” He maps his way down to your jaw and the side of your neck to murmur the words before he returns home to your lips. “Stay with me.” It’s followed by your name, spoken like praise from a love poem. “Hold me like this and never let me go.”

I need you to promise me this, Princess. I don’t want this to be the last time I can kiss you. I don’t want tomorrow to be the last time I can see your smile. I’m scared. Deep down, I’m always terrified because…

What if death comes to take you but not me?

Eren had hopes before. He hoped for a better life, and he thought if he wished for it hard enough, he could have it. After all, things were really turning for the better, for both of you. But after what happened last night, he realized that his hopes were nothing more but a fantasy he could never achieve. Yes, you won the battle of your life, but how much longer until your luck runs out? It feels harder than ever now to keep on hoping.

Your legs feel weak, and you try to blame it on all the running you did trying to survive. You want to say it. You want to say it back. I love you. I’m so in love with you too. I’ve never felt like this before and it scares me because what am I going to do when you’re gone?

You land a hand on his chest, gently pushing him away just to get a few seconds to collect your courage. “I…” You lick your bottom lip as a way for your body to suppress your jitters. You taste like him. “Eren, I…”

Say it, you idiot! What is so hard about it?! Just tell him you love him!

Your heart is in your ears, and blood rushes to your face so fast that you know it’s going to change the color of your cheeks. “I, umm…”

Eren watches in silence, patiently waiting for the words to come out and it only makes it ten times harder for you to say it. Then his mouth twitches into a smile a second before a tiny peal of laughter escapes him. Flustered, you give him a little punch on his chest. “Why are you laughing?!”

“Because you’re so cute.” He gathers you in his arms, granting you a small kiss on your temple before he rests his chin on your head. “And you’re so transparent. I can literally see whatever thought crosses your mind.”

“Shut up.”

“You want to tell me you love me too, right?”

“Shut up.”

He chortles again and it's the most beautiful sound you’ve ever heard. Eren kisses you one last time before you break away. He feels it. Even if you don’t say the words, he feels your devotion for him in every fiber of your soul. Elation leaps through him and for a moment, all you can think of is the feel of his body against yours, the passion and the ferocity of his kiss.

When it’s over, he leaves you a bit disoriented. “Let’s go find our home, shall we?” He suggests, intertwining your fingers together.

With you, I’m already home. A thought crosses your mind and your chest is suffused with warmth. It’s until you can feel the way Eren’s hold around your hand turns rigid, that you realize you just said the words out loud, your mouth forming the sentence before your brain could tell you to stop. It came out in a whisper like you were mumbling in your sleep, but Eren felt it to his bones.

“I—” You panic, ashamed. “I meant—I don’t—”

Eren pivots on his heels, staggering quite a bit as he takes you by the hand and leads you back to the car. He rubs his nose, visibly abashed, where the color of his tip matches the crimson in his cheeks. “I didn’t hear anything.”

But he’s always been a terrible liar, hasn’t he?

***

Perched on the edge of the lake, there’s a Craftsman-style shingle lake house that peeks out from the towering pine trees that surround it. Even from the outside, the home is striking, designed to merge with the natural world with wood exterior, as well as the landscaping with native plants, blending into the six acres of surrounding forest. It has unfettered lakefront access, with multiple decks made of wood just feet from the shoreline, one of which has a hot tub.

“I think we just hit a jackpot,” Eren mumbles in awe. “This is literally the most beautiful house I’ve ever seen.”

You can’t argue with that. It looks like it’s taken straight from an architectural magazine. “Well then, let’s go check it out.”

Knowing how he’s going to be stubborn about not letting you go inside alone, you don’t bother to bicker with him this time. It is your luck that one side of the house is enclosed by a 30-foot-tall wall of windows rising above the lake. It aims to give you a gorgeous view of the waterfront, but you’re thankful for the sunlight that bathes almost every corner of the house. 

You enter the residence side-by-side, slowing down your pace to match his steps. Both of you have your handguns ready, scouring your surroundings with alert eyes and taut muscles. Albeit looking a bit abandoned with thick piles of dust coating every piece of furniture and untended plants growing in disorder, the house seems cozy and warm. There’s even a wood fireplace in the living room, and while it’s easy to imagine spending summers here, Eren can’t wait to enjoy a cozy winter night snuggled up with you as you watch the snow fall on the frozen lake. It reminds him of the dream house he often fantasized of sharing with his future wife and two, maybe even three children, where he would—

“What?” You ask him with a raised eyebrow, interrupting his thoughts. “Why are you staring at me like that?”

“N-nothing,” he blushes.

“Are you thinking dirty thoughts again? Really? Zombies can literally be hiding in one of the rooms right now, and you’re thinking about what, getting handsy with me in the hot tub?”

He nearly faints. “No, I was just—” He clears his throat, averting his gaze away. “I was just thinking about growing old here with my wife and kids. The house—it’s—it’s really, umm, nice.”

He’s an idiot. And you are the bigger idiot here because he didn’t even specifically state that he was thinking about you as his wife, and here you are, feeling like your head is about to explode from the thoughts of dancing with him in the kitchen as you make breakfasts together, or snuggling close on the couch with books in your hands and a guitar on his lap, and maybe when the kids are asleep, he’ll even trap your body against the window glass, his lips forming filthy words to describe how much he wants to make love to—I need to stop. 

“Go check the kitchen,” you tell him in a desperate attempt to distract yourself. “Find if we have food for the rest of the week.”

“What about you? Where are you going?”

Away from you. “I’m just going down the hall.”

“Stay within the light.”

“Stay within the light,” you mock him back, your cheeks still sizzle hot as you make your way to another hallway. You feel safe as you can still feel sunlight kissing your skin everywhere you go but your fingers remain tight around your handgun. 

Eren enters the kitchen as ordered, amazed by the sight of maple woodwork, a granite island, and a wine refrigerator that is stacked with top-class brands, ones that he could only dream of having. But that’s exactly what it is, isn’t it? This is a dream and he’s living in it with his eyes wide open.

He’s in the middle of rummaging through the top drawers, mumbling a little, “Lucky,” when he locates a numerous amounts of expensive canned foods, and jars filled with cookies and candies. 

The joy that sparkles inside him turns instantly into chaos when he hears your scream.

Eren spins on his heels so fast, he might have broken his other ankle but he doesn’t care. Mustering every strength in his body to run to your spot, he ignores the pain that burns his every nerve. “Princess!” He shouts out, his balance unsteady. “Princess, are you—”

“REINER!” 

Your scream is loud enough to deafen his ears. “Uhh… It’s Eren, actually.”

“No, I mean, it’s Reiner Braun!” Never has your voice sounded so high-pitched before. Your eyes are so wide open, that he wonders how they are not falling out of their sockets yet.  

Eren, still limping, walks closer to your spot with a frown. He looks over your shoulder, following the finger you’re pointing at one of the photo frames that decorate the wall. “Who’s Reiner Braun?” His gaze lands on a muscular man, probably in his early fifty, staring into the camera with a grin warm and kind enough to look unnatural on his bearded face. The man called Reiner is sitting on the couch with two teenagers hugging his sides—Eren assumes they’re his children as they bear striking resemblance to him. His wife, standing behind the couch, has her cheek pressed against the side of his head, smiling beautifully with her arms embracing her husband’s shoulders from behind. The amount of love and happiness they showcase through the picture is enough to warm your hearts, and Eren wonders if someday, he can take a picture with you like this too.

“The guy from Empire!” Your shout slaps him back to reality—a reality where you are now fangirling over another man. “Eren, this is his house! We’re staying in Reiner’s house right now, oh my God—I can’t believe this—”

“All right, chill.” But he can’t help but laugh at the way you’re practically jumping on your feet, drowning in your excitement. “What’s Empire? A boy band? That dude looks too buff to be wearing skimpy clothes on stage.”

You restrain the urge to slap the photo frame against his face, only because you care too much about the picture. “A rock band. He’s the drummer. They were pretty cool, my dad was obsessed with them. Instead of letting me listen to Justin Bieber, he kept shoving their albums down my throat. Thank God, though. Justin Bieber’s music is shit.”

“Hey!” Eren raises a finger in the air, stopping you. “Do not insult my man.”

“You were a Belieber?”

“I am a Belieber,” he corrects with a proud look on his face. 

“Please tell me you’re joking.”

“Why would I? He’s my pride and joy. I used to spend hours, just… You know, biebing.”

“Oh my God, don’t talk to me.” 

Taking the picture off the wall, your gaze softens as you recall your old days, reminiscing the time. “We used to jam to their songs every morning as Dad drove me to school. I think they’re in their seventies now, so they’ve retired for a while. Too old to be playing on the stage, I guess.” You place back the frame, shoulders sagging forward. “I wonder where they are now.” Are they still alive somewhere? Are they dead? Or worse, have they turned into one of them?

Eren, noticing the sadness that radiates off of you, lands a hand on your head. “Was Reiner your favorite member?”

“I like all of them. Their frontman was, like, the younger version of Kurt Cobain. Too bad he died in a car crash. Poor guy, he was so young too. So talented. And hot.”

The hand that’s been lightly stroking your hair stops. “Hotter than me? I doubt it.”

“Well, obviously—” You stop when realization dawns over you, whirling your head toward him so fast, it leaves you a bit dizzy. 

Eren blinks uncomfortably at the sight of you scrutinizing his features. “W-what?”

“Now that I think about it, you kinda look like him.” The second the words break free from your mouth, you feel like you need to wash the filth off your tongue. “But ugh, that is so gross. I can’t believe I just said that.”

Eren just casually takes in what he wants to hear and ignores what he doesn’t want to hear. “Wait, so you’re saying I’m hot? Like rockstar level hot?”

You kick him in the shin and walk away.

The more you tour around the house, the more surprised you are by its grandeur. There are five bedrooms and six bathrooms inside–one of them even has a Japanese bathtub where you can spend your time relaxing while indulging yourself in the scenery of the lake. There’s also a spa and sauna, a fully-equipped gym, and a game room with an endless collection of comic books and action figures, a massive billiard table, and an old Pac-man arcade machine. With all that, you might never want to actually go out on the lake, opting instead to take advantage of all these luxe features.

Checking the room one by one, you notice one thing. The linens on the bed used to be crisp white but they’re painted with yellow stains as they haven’t been used for months. But judging from the way the room is very organized–no pencils on the table, no creases on the sheets, no sweaters hanging in the standing coat rack–maybe the room hasn’t been occupied in years. In one of the photo frames you find on the table, you see the happy family attending their younger child’s college graduation, celebrating it with hugs and kisses. Maybe she’s moved out of the house?

The next room has a more masculine vibe to it. Instead of salmon pink, the walls are painted gray. His son seems to be taking after his father’s hobby, with drumsticks signed by popular musicians decorating his shelf. There’s an entire wall dedicated to the Gods of Metal, with posters of Iron Maiden and Black Sabbath plastered against it. But just like the previous room, this one seems like it’s been abandoned for a while.

“Seems like it was only Reiner and his wife who stayed here,” Eren comments as you head toward the last room–the master suite. “Or maybe this is just their vacation house or something.”

“Why would the front door be unlocked if they weren’t here?”

Eren is still musing to find the answer when you curl your hand around the doorknob and push it open. You’ve prepared yourself for the worst, maybe one or two Darkseekers turning their heads toward you, but what you see is even worse.

Eren, who’s following close after you, lowers his gun. “Well, I guess we found our answer.” 

Reiner and his wife—what’s left of them anyway—are lying down on the bed, their bodies are now dry, but still decaying very slowly. Bile rises to your throat as your nose picks up quickly on their stench, and if it was your first time encountering dead bodies, you must have vomited your insides. 

Seeing you turn pasty, Eren clamps his fingers around your wrist and leads you outside, closing the door behind him. “You okay there?” 

“I’m fine,” you say, inhaling as much fresh air as you can into your lungs. You loosen up your collar and hurriedly make your conclusion. “I think we can stay here. We’ll have to do something with the corpses later but… For now, we can rest.”

Eren nods. “I think I saw a door leading to the basement. Should we check it now or…” He stretches out a hand, caressing the side of your face with delicate fingers as his eyes droop in concern. “Do you want to take a break? I can do it on my own if you want to.”

He sees right through me, doesn’t he? You're trying your best to appear nonchalant but Eren always picks up every hint of distraught that bubbles inside your chest. “No, it’s—” You clear your throat. “Let's go.”

What Eren doesn't know is that you’re not saddened by the fact that the man who inspired you, who you so deeply admired as a kid, has passed away.

You’re crushed by the fact that it wasn't the virus that took him. It was the pills, taken from the packer bottle that sat on his nightstand, its lid still open as they didn’t find any reason to close it. They didn’t find any reason to do anything at all instead of swallowing down the pills and plastering a smile on their faces as they drifted away to sleep only to never wake up again. It’s acetaminophen, you know for certain, even without reading the label, as it was the same one that took your aunt’s life to free her from depression. It was also the one you considered taking, as a way to escape your fear of reality. Ten pills of those and death would take you on a journey.

Reiner and his wife didn’t die with black blood staining the sheets. 

They died holding hands.

***

The basement, it turns out, is not a fucking basement. 

It’s a soundproof media room with a Bang and Olufsen sound system, a wine cellar, a shelf full of Blu-ray DVDs, a karaoke player, and a music studio where you can locate the same set of drums Reiner used to play a few times in his concert decades ago. They have placed carpeted floors over wooden flooring, the walls are covered by textiles and porous materials to absorb the sound. The cabin-style basement is even completed with another fireplace plugged directly into the wall. It’s the electric kind that doesn’t need a ventilation system but still mimics a traditional wood-burning fireplace. The dancing flames might not be real but they can exude just as much warmth as the usual ones do. The rustic wood furniture is aesthetically pleasing to look at, providing a much more comfortable, warm atmosphere compared to the living room you saw upstairs. 

“Look at this couch.” Eren, completely forgetting that he has a broken ankle, throws himself carelessly on the L-shaped sofa. As expected, he winces from the pain but it’s soon replaced by a long, drawled-out moan the second he feels how soft it is. He shifts around, trying down several positions until he lies down on his stomach. “Oh my God,” he sighs in bliss with one cheek pressed against the leather, his hand sliding up and down in a way that is almost similar to the way he caressed your legs two nights before—not that you should think about it. You’re sure by the size of it, the couch can fit more than eight people. Hell, you can even have three Erens lounging with their legs stretched out and you will still have room to sit. 

“I don’t ever want to move out again,” he mumbles deliriously.

“From this house?” You can’t help but smile, folding your arms in front of your chest as you lean your back against the wall. 

“From this couch. I’ll eat over here, cry over here. I’ll pee all over it if I have to, I don’t care. You’re my baby now.” He’s actually talking to the couch, nuzzling his face against it. “I’m never gonna walk away from you, Sofi.”

“Sofi?”

“Sofi the sofa.”

“Hmm, figured.”

“I was going to name it Coochie the Couch but then I remembered that it’s like slang for something completely different.”

You snort. “You’re probably gonna name our child the most basic name like Jack, or Bobby, or something.”

Wait.

Did you say your or our?

Your eyes quickly dart back to his face, and it doesn’t take long for you to know that yes, you clearly said our, you giant idiot. 

“Your,” you correct hastily even though you know it’s no use now. Eren heard it well and now he looks like he’s about to burst with joy. The only choice you have right now is to disappear from the face of the earth. “I’m—” You scurry away. “I’m gonna go take a shower.”

You take hasty steps toward the stairs, shouting stupid, stupid, you’re so stupid, inside your head as you do. A moment before you close the door behind you, Eren’s voice rings in your ear.

“Irene if it’s a girl.” You stop at once, feet shackled to the ground. You don’t allow yourself to throw a look over your shoulder no matter how much you want to. “And Jace if it’s a boy.”

Your fingers are curling tight against the side of your jeans, your face catching on fire. Irene and Jace… Fuck, those names are actually cute. And now you can’t help but put faces to their names, a little girl with the same brown hair and green eyes, and a tiny, tiny boy who looks like a spitting image of him. They might have your smile, but that’s it. The thought of it is so fucking cute, you can feel your heart clawing its way to jump out of your chest. 

“Go take a shower, you stink,” is the only thing you can say with a dysfunctioning brain. Exiting the basement, you press your backside against the closed door. Your palm drifts up to conceal the bottom half of your face. You can almost quite literally feel your skin burning. 

Fuck, this is so bad.

It’s bad that I want it too.

***

Your house is the only one that’s located near the lake. You’re separated by a few miles from the other houses, where you can only hear the sounds of rippling water and swaying branches that are kissed by the autumn breeze, and the anthems that the frogs sing. Once the sky is ablaze with the fire of the setting sun, you close all the curtains, turn off all the lights, lock all the doors and windows. You can barely do anything with the 30-foot-tall wall of windows, but as long as you remain within your room, they won’t detect any movements from the other side. The windows are made from tempered glass, highly durable and resilient to impact, which adds to your reassurance even though you knew, they wouldn’t hold them back for long if they used all their strength to tear them down. But as long as they don’t notice you’re there, you should be safe.

“I think we should both stay in the basement,” you suggest, “It’s a perfect place to hide, soundproof and all.”

Eren’s heart jolted at the offer but he affirms with a steady nod. He’s not sure what he is so nervous about—it’s not like this is going to be the first time you share the room with him. Is it because you’ve told him you loved him too? Is it because he can tell you’ve been secretly visualizing yourself growing old with him in this house, just as much as he has? Or is it really something as simple as the way he can smell that addicting strawberry scent from your hair, your body fresh and warm from the shower you just took; or the way you look so cuddly wearing an oversized sweater with sleeves too long for your arms?

“Can you please, umm…” You scratch your cheek, avoiding his gaze. “Stop staring at me like that?”

A flush creeps up his cheek. “S-sorry.” 

Eren walks past you, still hobbling on his feet as he takes a seat on the couch. Just like you, he just finished taking his shower, rubbing off all the dirt and blood that coated his skin. He wears his hair loose, seemingly a bit longer now with the end of his strands stopping an inch below his collarbones.  

Trying to shake off whatever this awkward tension that surrounds you, you decide to treat his injury, just like you did a moment after the fight ended. Grabbing the emergency kit, you go down to your knees before him, carefully checking on his ankle. “Does it still hurt?” You ask as you unfasten his bandage, wanting to change it to a new one as it is damp after the shower.

He winces at the touch, even when you’ve tried your best to be gentle. “A little.”

Swelling and bruising around the joint, there are splotches of black and blue sketched upon his sun-kissed skin, tracking down toward the sole of his foot. You apply cold packs to the injured area, hoping it will decrease swelling and pain. Eren watches you with unblinking eyes, entranced with the way you seem almost motherly as you treat his wound. The flames from the electric fireplace cast amber on your skin, and you seem so pretty, glowing underneath the dim light. And when you raise a hand to push a lock of stray hair behind your ear, Eren almost groans, feeling utterly disappointed that he’s not fast enough to do it himself.

“I’m sorry.” Your voice, even if it’s softer than usual, still startles him as he’s been daydreaming again. “It must have been painful to move around the whole day. When did this happen exactly?”

“Umm… I’m not sure. Probably when I tackled that Darkseeker away from you.”

“Probably? Did you not feel pain when it broke?”

“I only noticed I broke it after I was sure you were safe,” he mumbles out sheepishly. “I was… too busy thinking about you, I guess.” 

Ah, damn it. You rise to stand on your knees only to flick him right on his forehead. 

“Aaw!” he hisses. “What was that for?”

“For being embarrassing like always.” You return to your kit, rummaging through the box to find a new roll of bandage. “You should take some ibuprofen,” you suggest, wrapping it around his ankle to restrict him from moving it too much. “It’s a painkiller, but it will also keep inflammation down. Lie down on the couch.”

Eren, noticing that you turned bashful by his words, follows your command with a little smile breaking on his lips. It turns out that the couch has a metal frame and a memory foam mattress underneath its seating cushions, and it feels even comfier than the actual couch itself. You’ve brought more blankets and pillows with you, transforming the couch into your prime sleep spot, hopefully for the next few weeks. Months, if you’re lucky. 

You place a pillow underneath his leg, elevating his ankle, and two more on each side to keep it trapped. “Try not to move too much,” you say, draping a blanket over his body and pulling it up until he has his shoulders covered. He already looks funny this way, a 6.3-feet tall muscly man, shrouded by a quilt like a child, but you decide to tuck the blanket underneath his body, transforming him into a cocoon. You beam at him with a cheeky grin which he reciprocates with a pout. 

“Happy now?” He asks, jutting out his lower lip as if he didn’t look childish enough before.

“Immensely.”

“How can I cuddle with you if I’m like this?”

“Who said we were going to cuddle?”

His jaw drops, nothing but disappointment gleams in his eyes. “We weren’t?”

You slam your pillow once against his face, muttering, “Go to sleep. The sun’s down in ten minutes,” before you move to your other side of the bed, sighing in bliss once you feel just how comfortable the mattress is. You let your muscles unwind, closing your eyes and taking a moment to thank whatever supernatural forces it is that have kept you breathing to this point. 

You can’t hear anything from inside the basement. Not the wind that caresses your windows, not the pit patter of raindrops, not the snarling or the sound of branches cracking under their feet. The tranquility of it all seems eerie at first, but once you focus on the steady sound of Eren’s breathing, you finally can believe that you are safe. 

“Princess,” Eren whispers, breaking the silence.

“Hmm?”

“It’s hot,” he says, struggling to break free. “Can you help me get out of this? My balls are literally sweating right now.” 

You restrain the urge to laugh only because you have to stay quiet. Rolling to your side, you help him loosen the fabric around him. “There. Now, you can—“ Eren pulls you into his arms without warning, using more strength than necessary that you end up with a little “Oof!” breaking past your lips once you land your face on his chest. He lays on his side, his strong, long arms wrapping themselves around your shoulders.

“I thought you said you were sweating,” your voice is muffled by the thin layer of his black sleeveless shirt that does absolutely nothing to hide the muscles of his chest and abdomen. 

“Yeah, but now I’m cold and you’re so warm.” He buries his nose in your strands, not so secretly inhaling your scent as he embraces you tighter. 

Back when you were a kid, you used to have a huge teddy bear plush sitting on your bed. You called it Mr. Cuddlesworth, and you talked to it every night, tangled your limbs around it, and stayed like that until morning. Your mother used to wash it often as you tended to drool all over it, and every time she took it away, you would find yourself staring vacantly at the ceiling, unable to sleep. You only managed to stop being attached to it when your dad accidentally gave it away to your cousin one summer, thinking that you didn’t need it any longer. You were devastated. It almost felt like you lost a family member. You even bought a new one to replace it, the same kind, the same brand, the same color, and size, but it didn’t feel the same. 

Until now. “Mr. Cuddlesworth,” you accidentally mumble out loud, sighing against the fabric of his shirt. 

“Mr. Cuddlesworth?”

In a desperate attempt to conceal your shame, you bury your face deeper in his chest. Eren’s chuckle reverberates deep where you can feel its vibration directly on your skin. “Who’s Mr. Cuddlesworth? Your ex-boyfriend?”

“My teddy bear. But yeah, my ex-boyfriend too, I guess.”

“What, I’m your teddy bear now?”

“Well, you’re big and you’re warm and you’re so cuddly and–” You catch yourself, ending your line abruptly with a pout. “I don’t need to explain myself to you.”

“Holy shit, you need to stop, Princess.” He hugs you in a way a child would hug his favorite doll. “You’re literally the cutest person I’ve ever met. But you’re also so strong and badass at the same time. How is that possible?”

“S-shut up.”

“See? You just got ten times cuter now–ouch, stop punching me! Show Mr. Cuddlesworth some love!”

“Ugh, I actually hate you.”

“And I love you too.” He catches your hand, filling the spaces between your fingers with his. That gentle brush of his lips against your forehead, the way his voice turns delicate, calms you down until you’re back to your previous position. “Wish we could stay like this forever,” he murmurs with his eyes closed, sounding more like a confession than a mere wish. “Just you and me.”

In different circumstances, you might pinch his nose and reprimand him for spouting out corny lines like usual, but right now, especially after what happened the night before, you feel like he’s saying the words you’ve been chanting in your head. So, instead of pushing him away, you rest your forehead on his chest, fingers curling against the front of his shirt as you breathe out, “Me too.”

And that makes him think. “Princess… Did you see the way Reiner…” His voice falters, unsure if it’s okay to continue but he feels you giving him a timid nod.

“They were holding hands,” you echo his thoughts. “They killed themselves.”

“Why do you think that’s the case?”

“Maybe they were too afraid. Maybe they felt it was better to die in their sleep than to have the virus rupture their organs from the inside. Or worse, be turned into one of them.”

Eren grows exceptionally quiet. It takes him almost a minute before he can form a response. “Do you think it’s right for them to do it?”

“No,” you say, and you feel guilt residing within you from telling such lies, as it was the same option you had considered taking months ago. “I think it’s wrong that they gave up before they tried to fight back.”

“Maybe the reason why they didn’t fight back is that they couldn’t afford to lose one another.”

“You think it’s better to die with your loved one instead of trying to survive for yourself?”

“I think it’s an understandable choice,” he answers. “It’s a nice way to die.”

A nice way to die? You feel your heart plummet to your stomach. Exhaling heavily, you rest your palm on his cheek. “Why don’t we just focus on living for now?”

“You’re right.” Eren naturally leans into your touch, lips curving up into a soft smile. “I’m sorry. Shit got depressing real quick, huh?”

For a moment, you consider stopping the conversation there, but there’s this fear that builds up quickly inside your chest, that you need to let out before it starts smothering you. “Eren… You remember what I told you, right?” You question him with your voice and your heart close to breaking. “Do whatever it takes for you to survive. With or without me. You promised me that once, and I want you to promise me that again.”

You can still see it, see the way his whole body is on the verge of screaming, “I would stay with you until the end, no matter what happens,” but his lips are pressed in a tight line, mustering all his willpower to contain the words from breaking free. 

Because you are crying on his chest. Softly, weakly, like a little child trembling in fear. It all comes so suddenly too, startling you both. “Why are you crying?” He strokes your hair a moment before he brushes his thumb against your cheekbone, wiping away the stain. 

The more you feel alive, the more you fear death. The more happiness he gives you, the bigger the pain he’ll inflict when fate cuts your bond for good. And with him sounding like he’d rather die with you than survive on his own, you fear death more than ever. But instead of telling him these words, you fist his shirt and lock your lips together.

Eren, stunned by the action, still has his eyes opened until you part away from him two seconds later. “Princess?”

“Hold me,” you whisper, hand sliding past his shoulder before it rests on his nape. Make me forget about everything. Remind me that at this moment, we’re still alive. That you’re breathing my breath and I’m breathing yours. Drown me with whatever you have until I can escape my fear, just for tonight. “Just… hold me close, Ren…”

Eren lowers his head until the tip of his nose brushes against yours. His hand slips through your strands, fingers tangled and pressed against the back of your skull. You have your eyes closed and so does he, and for a few seconds, you stay in that position with your foreheads glued to each other. Then he kisses you softly on the lips, pouring all his love into that one kiss until he burns you with it. And just like that, he fulfills your wish.

He’s alive. You both are. And you stop thinking about the number of days you have left. Even before the outbreak, everybody has their days numbered, so why should this be any different? All that matters now is that you’re living this exact moment with him where your heart feels so full and your body invincible from the amount of joy that surges through you. 

This. This moment right here. This is what matters the most.

***

AN: Hey, everyone! Thank you so much for reading! Sorry it took me a while to update this, but I hope it's worth the wait 😭 There will be a bonus chapter where Eren's gonna take you out on a date hehe please look forward to it!

Thank you so much Aleks, Coi and Ben for beta-reading this ❤️

Tagging:

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HOTT HOT HOTT HOOOOTTTT!!!

This time, it's a big Itachi ᕙ( ¤ 〰 ¤ )ᕗ

moonlight sonata.

★ pairing: toji x reader

☽ summary: you’re not one of toji’s regrets.

★ genre: pure fucking fluff

☽ warnings: some curse words but thats it

★ a/n: another blurb until i finally finish the geto fic i’m writing. this is like totally self indulgent but i’m sharing anyway hehe. as always, ur likes, comments, and reblogs are greatly appreciated. enjoy.

“can you tell me a secret?” you ask, your hand smoothing back and forth across his chest as you lay alongside him.

the night is thick and you can’t see anything around you, but you can feel the steady rise and fall of his chest beneath your cheek. you know it’s definitely ridiculous just how much you bug him, knowing that he’s an old man with a rotting conscience, but you can’t help it. especially when he gives you a look that says: “i’m too fucking old for this.” it’s your favorite past-time now and you don’t feel guilty about it. not even a little bit.

“secret?” he groans, nudging his chin against the top of your head. “what kinda secret?”

“any kind, toji, i don’t care.”

“i don’t have any secrets, y/n,” he states. “unless we’re talkin’ about you.”

you laugh, slapping his torso. “don’t humor me, toji. you’re an open book when it comes to me.”

“you’re actually a pain in my fuckin’ ass.”

“yeah well,” you smile, patting him. “you should’ve killed me when you had the chance. now you’re stuck with an uppity bitch that fixes you oatmeal for breakfast. cinnamon oatmeal.”

he makes a gruff sound. “dear god, don’t remind me of that shit again. you tried to poison me.”

“i sure did. and now you’re stuck with me.”

“i have regrets,” he sighs a minute later but his arms squeeze you closer to him, nevertheless. “seriously. i got no secrets, baby. just regrets and mistakes.”

“and i’m one of them?” you joke, even though your heart clenches.

he presses a fleeting kiss to your forehead before he’s tilting your chin up towards him. he can’t see you but he doesn’t need to to know that your eyes are still looking up at him like they always are.

“never,” he whispers, lips hovering above yours. “you could never be one of ‘em.”

© cacophonies 2022

Chaing your wallpaper to an ugly pic of them and not telling <3

𝐉𝐔𝐉𝐔𝐓𝐒𝐔 𝐊𝐀𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐍 + 𝐒𝐄𝐓𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐏𝐀𝐏𝐄𝐑 𝐀𝐒 𝐀𝐍 𝐔𝐆𝐋𝐘 𝐏𝐇𝐎𝐓𝐎 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐌

☰ CHARACTERS ⋮ gojo satoru, geto suguru, fushiguro toji, itadori yuji, fushiguro megumi

— contents ⋮ fluff + sfw, slightly suggestive at toji’s — minors do not follow me though i’m an 18+ blog

— notes ⋮ THIS IS SUCH A CUTE IDEA

𖧷 𝐆𝐎𝐉𝐎 

gojo has never seen a bad picture of himself before—not until now, at least. he stares at the picture on your lock screen in pure shock, grimacing slightly at how his lips are parted and his cheek is smooshed against your chest. he even thinks that’s a tiny bit of drool on his lips, and he stares at you with narrowed eyes and a pout. 

“sweetheart, you have to change this picture,” he whines, “if megumi sees this he’ll be so mean—you have no idea how mean kids his age can be, it’s ridiculous!”

“what’s ridiculous is you getting hurt over a kid in the first place,” you snort, smiling fondly at the image on your phone. gojo looks relaxed for once, nestled comfortably against your chest as his body drapes over yours—you’d snapped the picture as blackmail at first, but the soft flush of his cheeks and the slight crinkle on his nose makes you rethink if it was ever ugly to be blackmail in the first place. 

“hey! you’re just as rude,” he huffs, “are you hanging out with him more? he’ll be mean to you too, just watch. and then i’ll—”

“you look cute, toru,” you hum, smiling gently as you stare at the photo. he blinks at the way your eyes soften as they fix on him through the screen, and he thinks for a moment that maybe there’s not one bad photo of him after all. 

“yeah, you’re right. only i could make drooling adorable,” he grins smugly, plopping himself to lay on your chest, sighing quietly when your fingers thread through his hair. 

“besides, megumi already has the photo.”

𖧷 𝐆𝐄𝐓𝐎

“what is this?” geto demands, showing you your lock screen. he’d only went to check the time, but the sight waiting for him was almost a jumpscare if he’s ever seen one—and of his own face, no less. giggling, you take the phone from him, admiring your handy work. 

“it’s a picture,” you grin cheekily, making him roll his eyes as he glares at you. it’s a horrendous picture, and he wants you to change it. immediately. his hair is a mess—and geto suguru takes his hair rather seriously. 

“i can see that, genius,” he says flatly, “but why is it your lock screen? change it,” he demands, crossing his arms and pulling away when you try to wrap your arms around his neck. whining, you tug at his bicep, pouting at him to let you cling against his body, but he only pulls away as he narrows his eyes at you.

“but suguru, it’s so cute!”

“it’s hideous,” he grunts, lips curling in disgust.

“yeah and oddly cute,” you argue, poking his cheek. you giggle once more, grinning in victory when he caves and wraps his arms around your waist. he gives your ass a slight squeeze, chuckling when you gasp and swat at his shoulder. 

“wait till i get a bad picture of you,” he grumbles, “see if you think it’s cute then.”

𖧷 𝐓𝐎𝐉𝐈

“the fuck is this?” toji demands gruffly, eyebrow raised as he waits for your answer. turning your face away from him with a hmph, you promptly ignore him, which makes his eyes narrow. 

every time you and toji have a slight disagreement, it becomes your mission to become the bane of his existence—like right now, for example. last night’s argument has been your excuse to slowly drive him insane, and this picture is your new attempt. 

and so is the silent treatment. 

“think i asked a question, doll,” he scowls, “what is up with this photo? it’s hideous. ”

“would you rather i use another man’s photo for my lock screen then?” you raise a brow, crossing your arms as you finally turn to look at him. he glares at you, as though even just the idea is an insult. “you’re lucky the picture’s still you after last night,” you say flatly. 

toji is as stubborn as you, however, so he blinks for a moment before a lopsided smirk tugs at his scarred lips, a casual shrug falling off his shoulders as he hums. 

“alright,” he says smoothly, “i’ll just have to use a picture from the other night to settle the score,” he grins, watching as your eyes widen when you register his words. scowling, you poke a finger at his chest as you glare at him. 

“you’d better not! don’t you dare even think about using such obscene—”

“then i think you should start bein’ a bit nicer to me, doll,” he says, voice husky as his lips hover over your mouth, “cause i got plenty of pictures i’m dyin’ to use,” he grins before pressing his lips to yours as your breath hitches in your throat. 

𖧷 𝐈𝐓𝐀𝐃𝐎𝐑𝐈

itadori glances at your phone screen as you unlock it, flinching a little to himself when he sees that it’s been changed to such an unflattering photo. pouting, he nudges his head onto your chest as your hand buries into his hair immediately, threading through the soft locks. 

“baby, why’d you have to use that picture?” he whines, huffing into your shirt. you chuckle, pressing a kiss to his forehead as you lock your phone to admire the lock screen you’ve set. 

“what do you mean? it’s so cute, yuji! you look adorable,” you insist, turning the screen to him so he can get a better look. he shields his eyes dramatically, making your head fall back against the pillow as you giggle. 

“i look like i need a trigger warning,” he groans, but you only hum, turning the phone back to yourself and staring at the picture in awe—he doesn’t quite remember when you snapped it, or how for that matter, but you stare at the picture like it’s special. a small part of his heart races at how your gaze softens when it falls on him through the screen.

“that’s so rude, i’m a good photographer,” you insist, “and plus you always look cute.”

“well, if you say so,” he mumbles, blush dusting across his cheeks as you lean and kiss them sweetly. 

𖧷 𝐌𝐄𝐆𝐔𝐌𝐈

megumi raises a brow when you set your phone down, staring at the picture you’ve set of him—it’s not the best picture, but he watches as you smile slightly and stare at the photo for a moment before turning to him. 

“i uh…didn’t realize i was your lock screen,” he mumbles, blushing as you giggle and cup his cheeks. he leans into your palms, relaxing slightly while your thumb traces over the warm skin. 

“i had to, that picture is so cute,” you beam, “you’re so cute, gumi,” you hum before planting a scatter of soft pecks along his cheeks, pressing one last one over the tip of his nose. he grunts, blushing deeper as he rolls his eyes. 

“of course, you’d pick the worst picture ever,” he grumbles, but his hands grip your waist tightly, bringing you flush against his chest as you gasp. 

“i picked the best one! you’re just a hater,” you pout, “and you’re actually smiling for once, too! try being less of a grump, sometimes,” you poke at his cheek, making him throw you a glare—but it’s soft, doesn’t quite match the soft gaze in his eyes. 

“i picked a better picture of you for mine,” he raises a brow. you wriggle yours, pinching his cheek as you giggle. 

“aw, i’m your wallpaper too? how romantic of you,” you tease, laughing when his blush rises to the tip of his ears before he scowls and pulls away, only for you to bring him into a sweet kiss. 

© hanmas do not plagiarize, repost, translate to other sites, or recommend on platforms outside tumblr such as tik tok

Part III

Nymphetamine: marriage of the words nymphomania and amphetamine; an unhealthy, beast-like addiction to one female in particular.

║Part I ║Part II║Masterlist║

↣ pairing: alpha!katuski x omega!reader

↣ word count: 9.5k

↣ notes: final chapter

↣ warnings: a/b/o dynamics, prime dynamics (prime alphas/omegas; stronger, more dangerous variants), enemies to lovers, villain!katsuki, some yandere tones, captivity, corruption, breeding, mention of having babies, heats, ruts, knots, mating, claiming, bonding, possessive actions, clawing, biting, choking, belly-bulges, bruising, blood, too much fucking purring, a lot of praise, some degradation, hair pulling, size difference, creampies and cum galore

↣ summary: As you look at yourself in the mirror, it’s as if you’re staring at a stranger. Same pretty face, same makeup you’ve perfected over the years. But it’s not just you anymore in the reflection. It’s him, your alpha, what he’s made you into, looking right through you.

Katsuki’s been working at you, washing away any and every thought of being a hero. Instead he’s been filling the cracks with him, with ideas of babies, of a future with him and only him, right by his side, open and proud, despite his brutality. Tonight is just the first step, a test to show just how perfect you are on his arm. A hero turned villain, all in the name of love.

Falling in love is a slippery slope. You’re teetering on the edge, though, wondering if you should just jump and let him catch you.

Because what Alpha wants, Alpha gets.

Keep reading

Pairing: Step-Dad!Katsuki x Reader

Warnings: Step-cest, age-gap, daddy kink, quirk-play, spanking, implied power/authority dynamics, implied cheating, rough sex, bruising, biting, marking, possessive actions, light degradation, lots of praise, creampie, aftercare

Word Count: 4k

A/N: Here I am again, back on my daddy Katsuki bullshit; 4k of smut with a dash of plot. Thank you so much to @mindninjax​ for beta-reading this and encouraging me to finish it ❤️ 

“Does your stupid boyfriend fuck you like this?”

Katsuki knows you’re too full to answer, cunt stuffed so snugly around his cock he can feel every pull of your inner muscles. Keen eyes admire how your flesh parts for him, drags along his length, coats his heavy cock with fresh cream.

He loves you like this: on your back, nipples swollen, puffy, glistening with remnants of spit, your legs curled back, lashes thick with tears. Prettiest fucking thing he ever did see. It’s just a damn shame you’re supposed to be off-limits, that every time you cum at home he has to smother your screams with the palm of his hand.

Capturing both your wrists between mean fingers, he starts pulling you down onto his cock; hard, deep thrusts that make your body bounce and the sheets wrinkle.

“Best little step-kid I could ever ask for, aren’t cha? Always so needy for daddy’s cock.”

You were tempting from the beginning, the pretty college girl he only saw glimpses of on holidays, flirty and smiley and clearly into him. He supposes you’ve got some kind of fucked up daddy issues, and that he only makes them worse every time he finds his way inside of you. Not that he cares. You’re too sweet to pass up, cunt too tight and lips so soft against his and around his dick.

Keep reading

and this is how i met your mother kids..

𝐀𝐃𝐎𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 — college football player!eren.

୨୧ ꒰ warnings ꒱ smut (mdni), virginity loss (fem), eren has a big dick (but we knew that), college!au, mentions of playboy eren (but he falls head over heels for you), pet names (baby), f!reader, fingering, cursing

୨୧ ꒰ word count ꒱ 1.2k 

college football player!eren who’s known to be a bit of a playboy - but how could he not be? the most popular guy at paradis university and the star quarterback of the football team. eren had girls at his beck and call, his confidence and charisma radiating off of him in waves. he naturally drew people to him; one lopsided grin shot in their direction, and people would be flocking to him, completely enamored with his carefree and easygoing personality. eren jaeger was the university sweetheart, jumping from girl to girl but still managing to be so kind and sweet. it has girls’ hearts fluttering and their panties soaked. so imagine his surprise when the flirtatious eren jaeger, known playboy of the school, fell for you.

college football player!eren who’d recognized you as soon as he laid eyes on you in class one morning; they were mundane interactions, that he’d recognized you from: passing by in the hallway, seeing you laugh with your friends at the outdoor quad, sitting two rows in front of him in your chemistry class. however, somewhere along the line, eren had found himself hopelessly pining after you, desperate for those small interactions where you dropped your pencil and he just so happened to graciously pick it up for you. somewhere along the line, eren jaeger fell for you, and he fell for you hard.

Keep reading

You Are Made of Stardust

Though the billions of people on Earth may come from different areas, we share a common heritage: we are all made of stardust! From the carbon in our DNA to the calcium in our bones, nearly all of the elements in our bodies were forged in the fiery hearts and death throes of stars.

The building blocks for humans, and even our planet, wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for stars. If we could rewind the universe back almost to the very beginning, we would just see a sea of hydrogen, helium, and a tiny bit of lithium.

The first generation of stars formed from this material. There’s so much heat and pressure in a star’s core that they can fuse atoms together, forming new elements. Our DNA is made up of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and phosphorus. All those elements (except hydrogen, which has existed since shortly after the big bang) are made by stars and released into the cosmos when the stars die.

Each star comes with a limited fuel supply. When a medium-mass star runs out of fuel, it will swell up and shrug off its outer layers. Only a small, hot core called a white dwarf is left behind. The star’s cast-off debris includes elements like carbon and nitrogen. It expands out into the cosmos, possibly destined to be recycled into later generations of stars and planets. New life may be born from the ashes of stars.

Massive stars are doomed to a more violent fate. For most of their lives, stars are balanced between the outward pressure created by nuclear fusion and the inward pull of gravity. When a massive star runs out of fuel and its nuclear processes die down, it completely throws the star out of balance. The result? An explosion!

Supernova explosions create such intense conditions that even more elements can form. The oxygen we breathe and essential minerals like magnesium and potassium are flung into space by these supernovas.

Supernovas can also occur another way in binary, or double-star, systems. When a white dwarf steals material from its companion, it can throw everything off balance too and lead to another kind of cataclysmic supernova. Our Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will study these stellar explosions to figure out what’s speeding up the universe’s expansion. 

This kind of explosion creates calcium – the mineral we need most in our bodies – and trace minerals that we only need a little of, like zinc and manganese. It also produces iron, which is found in our blood and also makes up the bulk of our planet’s mass!

A supernova will either leave behind a black hole or a neutron star – the superdense core of an exploded star. When two neutron stars collide, it showers the cosmos in elements like silver, gold, iodine, uranium, and plutonium.

Some elements only come from stars indirectly. Cosmic rays are nuclei (the central parts of atoms) that have been boosted to high speed by the most energetic events in the universe. When they collide with atoms, the impact can break them apart, forming simpler elements. That’s how we get boron and beryllium – from breaking star-made atoms into smaller ones.

Half a dozen other elements are created by radioactive decay. Some elements are radioactive, which means their nuclei are unstable. They naturally break down to form simpler elements by emitting radiation and particles. That’s how we get elements like radium. The rest are made by humans in labs by slamming atoms of lighter elements together at super high speeds to form heavier ones. We can fuse together elements made by stars to create exotic, short-lived elements like seaborgium and einsteinium.

From some of the most cataclysmic events in the cosmos comes all of the beauty we see here on Earth. Life, and even our planet, wouldn’t have formed without them! But we still have lots of questions about these stellar factories. 

In 2006, our Stardust spacecraft returned to Earth containing tiny particles of interstellar dust that originated in distant stars, light-years away – the first star dust to ever be collected from space and returned for study. You can help us identify and study the composition of these tiny, elusive particles through our Stardust@Home Citizen Science project.

Our upcoming Roman Space Telescope will help us learn more about how elements were created and distributed throughout galaxies, all while exploring many other cosmic questions. Learn more about the exciting science this mission will investigate on Twitter and Facebook.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

i am not okay wtf

LITTLE DARK AGE

haitani ran x fem!reader x haitani rindou

summary: eight years later, you finally return to tokyo and find yourself caught in the middle of a violent gang war between the two most ruthless criminal organizations of tokyo’s underworld, forced to choose between blood and love.

genre: bonten timeskip, angst, forbidden romance, childhood friends -> strangers -> lovers, 18+ MDNI

warnings: fem!reader, gang violence, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, explicit smut, polyamory, profanity, MCD, unedited, MTBA

previous chapter -> masterlist -> next chapter

CHAPTER Ⅹ. OH, HOME, LET ME COME HOME...

TWELVE YEARS EARLIER. 

Rindou felt anxious. Rindou felt anxious and he hated it--he did not ordinarily feel anxious, it was an uncommon and unwelcome feeling, and no matter how hard he tried, he could not push it away. His throat was tight and his eyes flickered back and forth between the elevator that led into the penthouse and Ran, who was sitting next to Rindou, stiff and unamused as he glared at the elevator. 

There was something wrong with you. Okay, that sounded bad, he acknowledged. There wasn’t something wrong, wrong with you, but you were acting different and Rindou didn’t like it, Ran even less so even though he was trying to hide how much it was bothering him.

You asked them to stop picking you up from school two weeks ago. And they had tried to convince you otherwise but you had gotten angry at them--genuinely angry at them for the first time since they met you five years earlier. Rindou had never heard you yell before until you were shouting at them for being overbearing and smothering and ‘never giving you a fucking break.’

It had hurt. It had really fucking hurt. Ran had lost his temper right back at you, and the whole situation had only spiraled from there. Miss Yua offered to talk to you on their behalf, mentioning that it was probably just a phase, ‘girls get quite difficult in high school,’ she claimed, but evidently she had not gotten through to you. 

You had not spoken to them since the argument. 

And Rindou tried, he really, really did. He pushed away the hurtful words you had spat at them to try to make amends--even though he really had no reason to be apologizing. You ignored him. You ignored him every single time, brushing him off and walking to your room without a word, locking the door behind you.

Rindou was tired. You were acting like Ran did whenever Ran got all in his head about something and Rindou hated it when Ran did it and he hated it even more when you did it. He wasn’t sure what had even caused the change and it made him sick to his stomach.

Maybe you didn’t want them around at all anymore, the thought that had been eating at him for the past week rang loudly in his head. No, he tried to convince himself, that couldn’t be true because you would never think something like that. 

But he couldn’t help but remember the genuine anger in your eyes when you yelled at the two of them that day, how you refused to even look at them for nearly two weeks now. 

He bit down on his bottom lip, trying to stop it from trembling, and he let his gaze flick back up the elevator, anxiety growing as the numbers began rising higher and higher, closer and closer to the floor of the penthouse.

“Ran,” Rindou began, worry seeping into his tone.

Ran clicked his tongue as the elevator stopped on the floor, “Relax, I’ll handle it,” he said, but that only made his nerves grow worse because that was exactly what Rindou was fucking worried about.

The doors to the elevator slid open, Ran rose to his feet, Rindou briefly shut his eyes, throwing up a short prayer to whatever god would listen to him as you stepped into the penthouse, a frown on your lips and brows furrowed.

You were already irritated about something. This would not go over well. 

Rindou wanted to cry. 

Ran called your name. 

You ignored him. 

Ran called your name again, sharper this time. Rindou could see the way Ran’s fists tightened at his sides, and he could see the way his nostrils flared as he inhaled sharply, trying to contain his temper. 

“I’m talking to you,” Ran said sharply, “Look at me.”

You ignored him. 

“Hey!” Ran said loudly. You jumped at how he raised his voice, the only sign of acknowledgment of the two of them that they had received from you in nearly two weeks. “Stop acting like a fuckin’ child.”

“Why won’t you just leave me alone?” you spat out so viciously that Rindou physically drew back at your words. His lips parted to speak, to say something, but he didn’t even know what to say, and any word he thought up died on his tongue before he could force it out.

They were losing you. 

No, he told himself immediately, trying to convince himself of the matter. There was no way. Something else had to be going on. 

“Leave you alone?” Ran hissed, “We’ve left you alone for two weeks, what the fuck is going on? Why won’t you talk to us?”

“‘Cause it’s none of your business,” you shouted, shoving at Ran’s chest when he got too close to you. Ran didn’t budge, of course, it would take a lot more than a shove from you to push him off-balance. You went to push him again, brows furrowed, tears pooling in your eyes, and Rindou’s chest felt like it was caving in, “Leave me alone, leave me alone! Why won’t you just leave me the fuck alone?”

His lips parted in shock as he stared at you, as he watched your lips tremble and your hands shake from where they were slamming against Ran’s chest over and over again. 

Okay, he thought to himself, this is more than just them pissing you off somehow. Something else is definitely going on. 

Ran seemed to realize it too from how his anger seemed to wash away and his lips turned down. And Rindou truly did feel ill because he had never seen you this distressed before and it really didn’t sit well with him. 

Ran murmured your name quietly, grabbing your wrists, stopping you from hitting him again and Rindou’s breath caught in his throat, one of his hands reached out toward you, eyes narrowing in on your arms, or more specifically, the discolored purple bruises lining up your arms--fingerprints embedded deep into your skin. 

“What happened?” Rindou asked, his voice was low, steadier than he expected and you looked thrown off, following his gaze down to your arms. He watched the panic shoot across your face. You looked at your shoulders, as if you were looking for something… oh. The jacket you started wearing nonstop a few weeks ago.

Have you been…

“Nothing,” you snapped, “It’s none of your business.”

“None of our-” Rindou hissed, eyes ablaze but he cut himself out, desperately trying to calm himself down--the sight of the bruises marring your skin awakening a sort of primal rage that he didn’t know he had in him. “Don’t try to brush this off, tell us what happened.”

“You and Ran come home with bruises all the time,” you said loudly, your voice was shrill, your eyes were wild. You were panicking and Rindou was getting angrier because he didn’t know what you were hiding from them, and he didn’t know why you were hiding it from them. 

“We come home with bruises so you don’t fucking have to!” Ran shouted, stepping closer to you, but you only stepped back, breath quick as your eyes darted around like a cornered animal. “Tell us what the fuck’s going on.”

He should have expected it but Rindou did not react fast enough when you darted between them, taking off down the hall. Rindou moved to chase after you but Ran grabbed his arm, stopping him. 

“Ran, what-” he began angrily but Rindou faltered when he caught the distressed look on Ran’s face. “Ran-”

“Don’t chase after her, you’ll only push her further away,” he said quietly. “She’s not gonna say anything now. We’re gonna have to figure this out ourselves.”

---

“The fuck is your guys’ deal?” Shion complained, wiping the blood off of his cheek as he looked over his shoulder at Rindou and Ran. Rindou rolled his eyes, lips turned down as he looked away, “You guys aren’t usually this boring.”

“Fuck off, Shion,” Ran said sharply, exhaling a puff of smoke as he shot a withering glare at the younger boy, “Not in the mood today.”

Honestly, they hadn’t been in the mood for a while now. Rindou and Ran both have had severely shortened tempers ever since you started with your bullshit a few weeks ago, and he was sure that they had noticed it from the way they started holding Rindou and Ran at arm’s length 

“You haven’t been in the mood for two weeks now,” Shion countered, voicing Rindou’s thoughts, turning around and leaning back on his heels, “What crawled up your ass, huh?”

“I said fuck off,” Ran said and Rindou did not like the tone that edged at his brother’s voice--it was dark, threatening, and from Shion’s narrowed eyes, he caught the implications of it too. Ran, Rindou wanted to plead, let’s not do this right now. 

Rindou had no issue fighting if it came down to it--he had thrown hands with Shion before and would do it again--but right now… His eyes darted to Mochi and Mucho lingering by Shion, gaze shifting between them, and then to Izana, who was lounging on a nearby box watching the scene with interest.

“Somethin’ up with your girl?” Mucho, ever the calm one of the group of them, asked curiously, blue eyes flicking between him and Ran, waiting for a response. 

Ran bristled but Rindou spoke up before Ran could snap something at Mucho, which would undoubtedly go over poorly. Shrugging, he said, “She won’t tell us shit. Asked us to stop pickin’ her up from school ‘n we figured she’s talkin’ to some guy and doesn’t was us to scare him off. Now she’s comin’ home with fuckin bruises all over her arms.”

And Rindou genuinely would have preferred that you were talking to some rich boy that spent his weekends on yachts over this--no matter how much the thought of you getting close with another guy made his stomach turn and his head hurt. Because at least then you weren’t getting hurt for whatever reason, and at least then they weren’t worried sick over what was going on.

“Bruises?” Mucho’s brow furrowed and Rindou noticed that Ran’s rising temper seemed to dim a bit at the genuine concern in Mucho’s voice. “What you mean bruises?”

Rindou motioned helplessly to his arm, “Fingerprints ‘n stuff, up ‘n down her arms, we tried to ask her but she started yelling, getting defensive, then she ran off,” he said.

“You couldn’t chase her down? Let the girl juke you out like that?” Mochi snorted, mocking them and Rindou scowled. 

“It’s not that simple,” Rindou snapped, talking down on him as if he wouldn’t have made that very mistake had Ran not stopped him, “You would know if you ever spoke to a girl before. They get all riled up and angry and then they get silent. We wouldn’t’ve gotten anything outta her.”

Mochi scowled at the dig, opening his mouth to retort, but Mucho was speaking again, “And she’s coming home from school with it?” Mucho asked.

“Yeah, think so. Doubt she’d be getting jumped on the way home from school, we own those streets. No one would dare, not to her,” Rindou muttered.

Shion stretched, fastening his brass knuckles back onto his fist, “Let’s go check it out then, we already fucked up these guys anyway. They’re no fun anymore. I’d like to get my hands on one of those prissy little trust fund babies. Bet they’ll squeal just like their pig parents,” Shion jeered, snickering to himself before looking back at Izana, “What’dya say?”

Rindou followed Shion’s gaze to where Izana was still sitting on the box, watching them all curiously.

Izana’s eyes focused on Ran, seemingly uninterested with the topic, “She goes to that prep school by the National Art Center?” Izana asked, and Rindou and Ran shared a look, unsure of how he knew that because they were pretty sure they had never mentioned it.

“Yeah,” Ran agreed.

Izana’s eyes lit up oddly, a sort of interest swimming in them that had Rindou on edge because he had never seen Izana look so… excited for something before.

“Let’s go then.”

—-

“This is completely unnecessary,” you repeated for what seemed like the millionth time as your eyes darted around the side alley right next to your school, trying to figure out what the fuck you were supposed to do. “Please just get out of my way.”

It was your own fault, really, for prioritizing time over safety. You had thought cutting through the side streets to get home faster would be better than taking the long route and risking them catching up to you but you hadn’t even considered the fact that they’d have set up around the side streets to corner you there. 

It was your own fault, and you were sure you were going to pay for it. 

“Shut the fuck up,” a sharp voice snapped back immediately and you felt ill, breath shaky and trembling fingers shoved in your pocket to try to hide your growing anxiety.

It wasn’t your fault, you tried to convince yourself, it was your fucking uncle’s. 

And it was--anger brewed in you as you remembered how quickly your already shitty social life had fallen apart after your uncle had started his relentless pursuit of Izanagi’s expansion a few weeks back, tearing down some of the other major businesses run by the parents of the kids in your school just so Izanagi could get a few steps ahead. It had been ruthless, and it had annihilated the wealth of even some of the objectively powerful, old money families of Tokyo, including some of whom had kids that went to your school.

And there was no way for them to get back at your uncle. Their parents were stuck trying to manage the fallout of what he had done and the kids were suffering the repercussions--the attention of the tabloids and all of the mocking articles, the shame of having lost the majority of their wealth, paparazzi and reporters had been outside the school for days now--and the only way to ‘get back’ at your uncle, in the eyes of the other kids, was through you.

Two weeks of nonstop harassment and you had no one but your uncle to blame. He had to have known what targeting the parents of kids that went to your school would do to you but he had gone through with it anyway.

Selfish. So fucking selfish, you felt tears prick your eyes as you took another step back and Sato stepped forward, closer to you. His parents had been the most affected by your uncle and he, in turn, has been the most aggressive with you. 

And it wasn’t fair, it wasn’t like you told your uncle to do this, and it wasn’t like you supported it. You barely even fucking spoke to him. And now you were the one getting punished?

“Sato, this isn’t going to do anything,” you pleaded, giving it one more shot, “I’m not-I didn’t-Just let me get home-”

“Fuck you,” Sato spat, “Fuck you and fuck your douchebag uncle too.”

You grimaced, swallowing thickly as you tried to figure out what you should do. Maybe you should have told Ran and Rindou what was going on, you thought weakly as your eyes darted around the group of kids whose families had been ruined by your uncle. But you dismissed the thought immediately. 

If you had told them what was going on, even before this started getting physical…

They would fucking kill them. You knew that. Ran and Rindou were protective over you, Ran had already killed someone for threatening you before. Knowing you were getting harassed at a place that was supposed to be safe--the one place they couldn’t make safe for you… They would lose their minds and they’d be sent to juvie again, except this time they would have a target on their backs because even though these kids’ parents lost the majority of their wealth and power, they still had powerful friends and those powerful friends had a lot of influence and they could spell trouble for Ran and Rindou, both in juvie and out of juvie. 

And it wasn’t fair for you to rely on them for everything--and yeah, you knew they didn’t care, if anything they preferred it but… you didn’t like it. All your life you had been relying on other people for help--your parents, your uncle, Miss Yua and Mister Ayato, and now them--you wanted to handle one thing on your own and you wanted to cry because you knew you failed.

You always fucking fail unless someone else steps in. 

Your eyes blurred, you pressed your lips together tight to try to hide the way they wobbled. 

“Sato,” your voice came out weaker than you would have hoped, pleading, and you were embarrassed because the older boy immediately mocked you, taking another step closer. You matched him with a step back, and in your panic, you didn’t notice how Sato had paused in his movements toward you, and you didn’t notice the way some of the other kids started going wide-eyed.

You stiffened when you felt someone’s chest pressed against your back, fear taking over just for a moment until their right arm wrapped around your waist and you caught sight of the tattoos decorating it.

Rindou.

You were relieved. 

For a second. 

Then realization dawned on you and the fear returned for another reason. 

Rindou.

You looked up at him, eyes wide, but his eyes were narrowed and trained ahead, jaw clenched tight.

“Rin,” you said quietly, and he finally looked down at you, lavender eyes sharp and searching yours just for a moment before he shook his head and shifted you behind him, taking a step forward. 

Your heart sank, “Rin!” you called louder, but he ignored you as he took a step forward, body tense. You tried to take a step after him to grab his arm but a hand curled around your shoulder before you could. You froze, gaze darting to the side and your mouth went dry when your eyes met vacant purple ones, bright in contrast to tanned skin.

“Who are…”

Your voice trailed off when you noticed that Rindou had not come alone. Ran, the boy who grabbed you, and three other vaguely familiar boys had all entered the side street you had gotten cornered in with him. Your brows furrowed as you tried to remember where you had seen them before until your mind was drawn back to the day at the car shop when you had found Rindou and Ran hanging with that group of boys.

The white-haired boy watched you curiously, “Kurokawa Izana, you must be y/n.”

You didn’t get the chance to respond as Ran was moving forward in an instant, face twisted in a sort of fury that you’d never seen on him before. “Ran!” you called after him, voice pleading but Izana’s grip on your shoulder tightened, holding you in place as Ran swung forward hard with his baton before Sato could react.

You flinched at the sickening crack that rang through the air as Ran’s baton connected with his jaw and your breath caught when Sato crumpled immediately.

No, nononono, “Ran, stop!” you cried out but Ran ignored you, reeling his arm back before driving the baton right against the back of his head, “Ran!”

“Fuckin’ piece of shit,” one of the other older boys from your high school spat, moving forward quickly, leaning down to swipe a scrapped pipe on the side street, aiming right for Ran, who was still preoccupied with Sato, who was trying to push himself off the ground.

“Stop it” you shouted, eyes wide, “Ran, look out!”

Rindou was on the other boy in a second, grabbing the pipe mid-swing with one hand and driving his fist into his face with the other. 

Your heart felt like it was in your throat as the rest of them moved forward once Rindou got involved too. 

“Ahh, this gonna be fun,” a boy with a tattoo on the side of his head crooned, “Wonder if blue blood tastes any different from ours.”

Madarame Shion--you recognized that one from Rindou, other than Ran, he was the one that Rindou was closest to in that little group, he was also the one that Rindou bitched about the most. The grin on his face was half-feral as he played with the brass knuckles adorning his left hand. 

Fuck, you thought, eyes wild as you tried to figure out what to do. If it escalated, it wouldn’t be good for them. They’d run home and tell their parents, their parents would get the cops on the case and-

“Guys, stop,” you called louder but you knew it was futile, Ran was too far gone and Rindou wouldn’t listen while Ran was in danger and there was no way their friends would listen to you. You knew enough from Ran and Rindou that all they cared about was violence and bloodshed. 

“They’re not gonna stop,” Kurokawa Izana confirmed your fears, “Let them do their thing.”

“If they kill them, they’ll-” your voice was panicked, your breath was quick.

“They won’t,” a new voice said firmly and your eyes caught sight of a tall boy with blonde hair and an even taller, broader boy with black hair. “We’ll stop ‘em before it gets that far.”

They didn’t wait for you to respond, only following after the three brasher members of their group--the Haitanis and Madarame Shion. Your jaw was slack as you watched the blonde haul one of the boys on Shion off like a garbage bag, flinging him hard into the brick wall on the side street. There was another disgusting crack as his head hit the wall and he fell limp to the ground. 

What the…

Izana did not join them and your hands shook as you watched the fight continue to escalate. Ran was still beating the shit out of Sato while Rindou took care of anyone that tried to approach the two of them.

Your lips parted to call out to them again, they were outnumbered but… 

But you knew the boys from your high school didn’t stand a chance. You physically flinched as you watched blood splatter against the ground when Shion’s brass knuckles drove into one of the boy’s faces and he dropped limp against the concrete.

You glanced up at Izana and you swallowed thickly at the thin smile that tugged at his lips and the cold look in his eyes as he watched Ran and Sato. 

“Stop him,” you said, and you thanked god that your voice was firm and steady. Izana’s eyes flickered down to you, surprise visible in them for a split second before the cold, calculating look returned. He was evaluating you, for something, you just didn’t know what.

Finally, he let out a quiet hum of agreement, “Ran,” he called, voice sharp and demanding. Instantly, Rindou and the three others drew off who they were fighting.

Ran did not.

Izana’s lips twisted down, an unpleasant expression on his face as he let go of your arm to move to Ran.

Rindou was in front of you, taking his place in an instant. His hands curled around your forearms, lavender eyes meeting yours—he was angry, you could tell, but his lips twitched down in concern as he looked over you.

“Why-“ his voice was loud, heated. He took in a shaky breath, forcing himself to calm down. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Can’t we talk about this later?” you said, “I don’t-“

Your voice faltered as you caught sight of Shion licking at the blood on his brass knuckles, a bored sigh escaping his lips as he stretched, “No different.”

“I don’t want to do this here,” your voice was quieter, so only he could overhear, “And I don’t wanna say it more than once.”

Rindou’s lips parted to respond but he was interrupted.

“Oi, you,” Shion called and your gaze drifted to the side, frowning when you noticed he was staring directly at you. “I wanna see the fancy place where Rindou ‘n Ran are always staying at.”

“Absolutely fucking not,” Rindou said, turning his attention to Shion. 

“I’m not asking you, shuddup,” Shion said, keeping his attention on you. “C’mon, we just came all the way out here to beat the shit outta your pathetic bullies. Least you can do is offer us some food.”

“I didn’t ask for your help,” you said pointedly, but frowned when Shion only raised his eyebrows. Your shoulders slumped, and you glanced at Rindou, catching the warning glare he directed at you. At least you’d be able to delay the inevitable argument for a little while longer, “Fine,” you said.

Rindou scoffed in frustration, Shion looked absolutely delighted, tossing an arm around your shoulders and tugging you toward him, “Knew you were better then them fuckin’ lame asses,” he grinned.

Rindou called your name sharply, you looked at him from the corner of your eye, “You’re not getting out of this conversation,” he said.

“Yeah,” you said quietly, “I know.”

—-

PRESENT. 

“Can’t you drive any faster?” you demanded, voice panicked, breath quick as you looked up at the front of the van. Mina glared back at you through the rearview mirror and you glared right back, although you were pretty sure that the glare came off as rather pathetic considering your vision was blurry with tears.

“If I drive any faster, we’re gonna fuckin’ get pulled over, and I’d like to see you try to talk your way out of that one. How you gonna explain to them why we’ve gotta Bonten executive in the back of our van? Not to mention it’s fuckin’ pouring.”

His words didn’t even register as Ran let out another low groan, shifting in your lap. Your attention was drawn back to him, heart in your throat as you brought your hand to his face, cupping his cheek. He instinctually leaned into your touch and a whimper built in your throat as his long lashes fluttered back open, unfocused lavender eyes searching your face.

His bloody lips parted, as if to say something, but before he could try to push out whatever words were on his tongue, his head lolled back again, passing back out. A cry of frustration bubbled at your lips as you cradled Ran’s head to your chest, arms tightening around him. 

He’d been like this since you broke him out of there, fading in and out of consciousness, skin getting paler and breath getting shallower. 

“Mina, drive fucking faster,” you shouted, voice cracking as your words split into a sob, “Fuck, fuck, drive faster!” 

“Y/n, I can’t fuckin’ drive any faster,” Mina boomed, “Getting pulled over by the cops is as good a death warrant for him.”

The cops…? But-

“The fuck you mean?” you asked, “The cops? Wha-How would they even know-”

“Bonten got outed,” Takuya said quietly from the passenger seat, “All of its executives, some time between right after the explosion and now. I saw it on one of the headlines before we got him out of there.”

The world stilled around you, breath catching as you stared down at Ran, slowly processing Takuya’s words. “What?” you breathed out, “Outed? But how?”

“Don’t know,” Takuya admitted, “It’s not looking too good though. Yamagishi still keeps tabs on what goes on regarding this stuff. He says Bonten’s being forced underground. Half of their warehouses have been raided by the PSIA and TMPD.”

Fuck, you wanted to scream, fuck, fuckfuckfuckfuck why were you just receiving bad news after bad news? Why couldn’t you get a break?

Why couldn’t you get a fucking break?

You were having trouble breathing. Control yourself, you pleaded with yourself desperately, Ran’s labored breaths and the sound of the rain beating against the top of the van was causing you to spiral, breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out.

But it was hard. God, it was so fucking hard with Ran slowly dying in your arms and Rindou out there alone, hunted by the cops and feds and… reckless, Rindou was always so fucking reckless when it came to Ran and-

You couldn’t even finish the thought. You felt sick and exhausted and guilty, so fucking guilty. Every time you looked down at Ran you swore that your chest was tearing apart, that the anchor on your ankle dragged you down even deeper into the murky depths of the sea. This was all your fault.

All your fucking fault.

Your regrets were endless. You’d been recounting every single moment you went wrong in your life since you woke up from the explosion--every little lie, every time you distanced yourself from them, every time you snapped. You regretted leaving. You regretted losing contact with them. You regretted coming back to Tokyo and you regretted not staying with them the night you had met them at the club. You regretted driving them away at the auction. You regretted everything.

Everything. 

No. Not everything. You did not regret stopping to help them that night all those years ago. You didn’t regret meeting them, you never would. You were sure of that. 

Weren’t you?

Tears of frustration built in your eyes as Ran’s body shuddered in your arms, his breath was ragged and his body was limp and shaky, his weight heavy on your lap. You buried your face into his hair, rocking him back and forth as you tried to muffle the sob that fell from your lips against the top of his head. 

I’m sorry, you wanted to scream, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry.

“We’re almost there,” Takuya said quietly--his words didn’t register but the streets around you did. You felt ill as you caught sight of the old playground that you and Rindou used to visit all the time, the streets that the two of you had chased Ran down when he had dumped a bucket of water on you and Rindou’s head while the two of you were plotting a prank on him, the alley that you had met them in.

You felt sick and dizzy.

You could see the building the penthouse was located in the distance, vision blurry, breath coming out as near wheezes as you tried to calm yourself down. And you were grateful for Takuya and Mina because neither of them acknowledged your ongoing breakdown, you knew if they did, it would only get worse.

“You should let one of us go in with you,” Mina’s voice was as tense as his hands were around the steering wheel, “You won’t be able to get him in on your own.”

“No,” you forced out, “No, you have to get Takuya to a safehouse, they’ll be coming after us as soon as they realize what’s happened. Staying in Tokyo right now is too risky, this is too risky but I have nowhere else and no one else that can help him. I’ll get in contact with you after. I promise.”

“Y/n,” Mina began but you shook your head.

“No, Mina,” you snapped, “I said no. Get yourself and Takuya out of here. If one of us doesn’t…” your voice broke and you squeezed your eyes shut. Calm down. Breathe in, breathe out. “If one of us doesn’t make it out of here, we lose. I’m not losing anyone, not again. You guys are-you’re my family.”

“You shouldn’t be alone,” Mina insisted, “If any of Sugawara’s guys catch up to you, how the fuck are you going to defend both of you and get out of there at the same time?”

“I won’t be alone,” you said firmly, “I-”

“You don’t know if he’ll show up,” Takuya said quietly, “Bonten’s gonna need all hands on deck, they’re-”

“He’ll come,” you said firmly and Takuya quieted down immediately. “I know he will.”

He had to.

You shut your eyes again as Mina began to pull up to the building, letting out another shaky breath as you pressed your lips to the top of Ran’s head, “I’ve got you,” you whispered for the millionth time that night even though you knew he couldn’t hear you, “You’re gonna be okay.”

Pulling back, you tapped his cheeks several times, watching as his eyes fluttered open, dazed and confused, “Ran, you gotta work with me for the next few minutes, okay?”

He wasn’t registering what you were saying. You could see it from how his eyes didn’t acknowledge your words, from how his brows just barely furrowed. Your throat tightened, “Ran,” you repeated, “We gotta get inside, okay, we’re gonna stand you up.”

After a few moments, he nodded, and you let out a relieved exhale, shifting on the seat to help him to his feet, kicking open the back doors of the van, helping him down off the back as best as you could, grimacing when you steadied him as he swayed on his feet, gasping in pain. 

Takuya climbed over the console into the back of the van, crouching at the edge. He called your name and you turned back to look at him. Concern was etched on his face and guilt ate at you when you noticed the heavy bags beneath his eyes--realizing that he probably hasn’t slept in almost a week now.

“Be careful,” he murmured, “please.”

“I will,” you promised, “I’ll see you guys soon.”

Takuya let out a short breath as he nodded, shutting the van doors. You wrapped an arm around Ran’s waist, letting him lean his weight onto you as you helped him to the main entrance of the building. 

You winced as the rain beat against your skin, angled under the overhang, pricking your skin, “I’ve got you,” you repeated again, vision blurring with tears and because of the rain as Ran let out a low groan, nearly crumpling under the pain, “I’ve got you.”

“L/n-san! Where have you-oh god,” a familiar voice called. Mister Botan’s name was on the tip of your tongue, and it hurt having to bite it back. The new doorman’s face was ashen as he caught sight of Ran’s state. 

“Call up to Miss Yua and tell her we need her assistance,” you said sharply, grateful that your shakiness didn’t show in your tone. The doorman only stared at the two of you and anger hit you so hard and so suddenly that you couldn’t even control it, “Now!” you roared and that started him out of his shocked state as he nodded, bowing hastily.

“Of course, l/n-san, I’ll call up immediately.”

And your heart hurt, you barely were able to stop the sob that was rising to your lips as your mind drew you back to the first night you met them. Rushing ahead to the elevator as Ran carried Rindou, Ran’s aggression and defensiveness, everything had been simpler then, even if at the time it felt like the world was ending. 

“I’ve got you,” you told Ran again, and you weren’t sure if you were trying to reassure him or yourself as you pressed your face into the side of his shoulder as you waited for the elevator, “I’ve got you.”

The elevator dinged and you helped him in, pressing the button to the top floor, and it took all you had in you from losing control as Ran leaned onto you, face pressed against the top of your head, breath weak and unsteady, one arm draped around you. The arm you had around his waist tightened, and you grabbed his hand with the other, holding it in yours, trying to breathe in and out slowly to keep yourself calm.

“I’ve got you, I promise,” you said again, desperately trying to blink away the tears, “I promise.”

“I know,” his voice was hoarse, barely audible and this time you couldn’t hold back the sob and Ran’s hand tightened around yours, if only barely--just enough to show he was still with you. 

“I’m sorry,” the words spilled from your lips before you could stop them, “Ran, I’m so sorry.”

And you weren’t even sure what you were apologizing for at the moment--maybe everything, you realized dully. 

You swore it felt like eternity until the elevator binged again, signaling that you had reached the top floor--you were at the penthouse. You couldn’t tear your eyes from Ran’s lidded, barely conscious expression as you half-dragged him forward.

“Miss Yua!” you called, voice shrill and panicked, “Miss Yua!”

“Relax, child,” Miss Yua said sharply, her face was tight as her eyes landed on Ran, gaze worried, “Bring him to my office and then go get changed out of that mess. Understood?”

You opened your lips to protest--there was no way in hell you were leaving Ran’s side yet--but Miss Yua’s gaze narrowed and you swallowed thickly nodding as you helped Ran to the backroom. 

Miss Yua grabbed your arm, eyes softening, “He’ll be okay,” she said firmly, “I’ll make sure of it.”

---

Sixty-five. Eighty. Ninety-five. One fifteen. One thirty.

The speedometer kept ticking up. Rindou’s grip was tight on the handlebars of his bike as he tore down the empty streets of Tokyo. How he hadn’t gotten pulled over yet was a mystery that baffled him--or well, maybe it didn’t. He supposed the cops were too busy raiding all of Bonten’s warehouses to care for someone speeding down the streets.

One forty. One fifty-five. One seventy.

The rain started falling faster and Rindou knew he should slow down, that it was dangerous for him to keep up at this speed in this type of weather but instead, he leaned forward on the bike, speeding up. His breath was shaky and his arms were tense as he turned down another street, closer and closer to the building he had considered home for years, and as he drew closer, the anxiety he had felt upon receiving your message only amplified. 

“If it’s a fuckin’ trap, we’re not getting you outta there, you or your brother. We can’t spare the resources right now. Be fuckin’ smart, Rindou.”

His chest tightened, his lips pressed together tight as Sanzu’s words rang through his ears. And he knew that he was right--he was being dumb, rushing head first into what could be his death because of a shady message from you that he didn’t even know was legit or not. 

02:34 Penthouse. Ran. 

No explanation, no telling him if Ran was okay or not, no anything. Just those two words and when he had tried to respond, the message hadn’t gone through. That was all you had sent. 

Or, well, he assumed it was from you. 

It was from an unknown number that he assumed was you.

That he had no reason to think was you. 

He could be driving to his fucking death. It could so easily be a trap set up by their enemies--it was more likely a trap set up by their enemies than it was you fucking coming through for them. You had given them zero reason to believe in you, zero reason to trust you so then why the fuck was he-

He cut his own thoughts off, pushing away the doubt and steeling himself as the building of the penthouse came into sight, he slowed down the motorcycle, stopping at the front entrance hastily, not even bothering to turn off the motorcycle as he ripped off his helmet and sprinted inside of the building, hand curled around the grip of his gun, safety off, finger ready on the trigger.

He went right for the elevator, grateful that it didn’t take as long as it usually did to get to the bottom floor. He tossed Miss Sara a silent apology when he heard her call out after him in surprise, pressing the doors closed and the button for the top floor.

It was slow. Just as it always had been. And Rindou wanted to punch the fucking wall as doubt began to creep in again. Bonten was falling apart. All of their warehouses had been fucking searched and raided, their faces were all over the news. Sanzu and Kakucho were scrambling trying to protect what little resources they had left and Rindou was here, risking himself for something he had no reason to trust.

He let out a heavy breath, leaning forward as his eyes darted back up to where the floors were binging upward. His clothes were drenched, his hair wet and hanging in his face. His body burned with stress and nerves. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to push it away. 

What if it’s a trap?

His grip tightened around the gun, finger locked on the trigger. 

He knew the answer to that question. 

A sick feeling stirred in his stomach, his throat felt tight, his eyes felt wet.

Please don’t be a fucking trap. 

He readied the gun in front of him as the elevator doors slid open to an empty room. The lights were on and the television was running in the background on the news station. Rindou grimaced as Sanzu’s face flashed on the screen, as live footage from one of their warehouses played in the background. 

Fuck.

“Rin.”

Rindou’s gaze snapped to the side, eyes wild as he shifted on his feet, gun raised in the direction of where your voice had come from--at the entrance of the hall where your bedroom was located, and where theirs used to be. You didn’t flinch, even as his arms trembled and his finger twitched on the trigger.

A part of him told himself to pull it. Bile rose to his throat as soon as the thought crossed his mind.

“Where’s Ran?” he forced out, and he hated how his voice cracked, how he choked over his own words. He pointed the gun at you more insistently, “Where the fuck is he, y/n?” 

“Miss Yua is patching him up,” you said, and he hated how steady your voice was compared to his, even with a gun aimed at your head. “You know how she gets when we interrupt her, I-”

“I don’t care,” Rindou hissed, stepping closer, he pressed the barrel of the gun to your forehead. You didn’t flinch. Your eyes met his. “Turn the fuck around and bring me to him or I’ll blow your fuckin’ head off. For all I know this is a fuckin’ trap, just like the fuckin’ auction.”

“Rindou, look at me,” your voice was tight, “Does it look like I am dressed to fucking set you up for a trap right now?”

Rindou’s eyes dropped at your words, lips tightening when he realized you were dressed in a simple cotton tank-top and loose shorts. Pajamas, you would always wear something like that to sleep. And for a moment, just a moment, he could picture you standing in front of him as you argued for a horror movie over one of his ‘dumb action movies.’ Except instead of a gun pressed to your forehead, it was his hand as he forcibly shoved you back down onto the couch before you could change the channel. 

What the fuck was he doing?

He felt sick.

“Boy, put that gun down before I shove it up your ass,” a familiar, rough voice demanded and Rindou’s eyes widened, gaze flicking up to where Mister Ayato was standing at the other end of the hall, eyes cold, lips twisted down. 

Rindou’s hand dropped limp to his side. 

You turned your head to the side, “You shouldn’t be out of bed,” you told Mister Ayato, “You’re still ill. Go lay back down.”

Mister Ayato looked disgruntled, shooting a suspicious look between you and Rindou, and Rindou felt guilt eat at him as Mister Ayato’s eyes narrowed back in on the gun at his side. Rindou’s fingers were shaky as he holstered the gun back at his side, turning the safety back on. 

Satisfied, Mister Ayato turned back into his room, but not before tossing Rindou one last dark look. 

Your name left his lips, little more than a whisper, and he hated how weak he sounded.

“It’s okay,” you said, and he was grateful for the fact that he didn’t need to verbally apologize for you to understand what he was trying to say. “I get it.”

Rindou’s lips tightened and he looked away, “Is he okay?” he finally asked after a few moments. 

“Miss Yua said he would be fine,” you responded and Rindou’s tense shoulders slumped, relief hitting him like a truck because…

“She never says anything she doesn’t mean,” he murmured, and a soft, amused puff of air escaped your lips.

“No,” you agreed, “She doesn’t.”

There was another pause where neither of you spoke. Rindou grit his teeth as he braced himself to speak again, “I want to know the truth,” he said, and next to him, you tense. “The whole truth. From the beginning. You’re not fucking running away this time.”

You didn’t respond, Rindou looked back over at you, catching the way your lips were just barely wobbling, the sheen on your eyes. 

“Promise me,” he insisted. “I want you to-”

“I promise,” you said. Your voice cracked, and Rindou’s eyes darted down, noticing how your fingers were trembling like a leaf in the wind. He let out a long breath, anxiety pooling in his stomach as he wondered what could possibly have you this fucking spooked to tell them. Without thinking, he reached out, taking one of your hands into his, fingers curling around your shaky ones. You tensed for a moment and Rindou’s jaw clenched, waiting for you to pull away, but instead your grip on his hand tightened, and a warm feeling passed over him that he hadn’t felt in a long, long time. “I promise, can we just… I don’t want to say it twice, Rin.”

His eyes met yours again, a pleading expression on your face that he had never quite seen you wear before, and he relented, shutting his eyes briefly as he looked away. 

“Fine,” he said quietly. “We’ll wait for Ran.”

—-

wordcount: 8k

REBLOGS N FEEDBACK GREATLY APPRECIATED

thighs clenched 💦

strange what desire will make foolish people do

word count: 12.8 k

pairing: aizawa shouta x reader

description: your dad dies suddenly and you've never gotten along with your mother. when she announces that she's marrying shouta aizawa, you come up with a plan to ruin their marriage and fall for him in the process.

content warnings: stepdad!aizawa, adult stepdaughter!reader, cheating/infidelity, age gap, jealousy, emotional manipulation, parental loss, grief, descriptions of anxiety attack, mentions of vomit/bile (non-sexual), unprotected sex, spit, oral sex (f!receiving), use of petnames (baby girl), alcohol consumption, recreational drug use, "pranks" that a health department definitely wouldn't approve of, nobody in this is a morally good person. dark content. 18+ mdni (and no blank blogs) or you will get blocked.

authors note: i ended up going balls to the wall and this was 30 pages in google docs :) anyways this is like a series of stepdad!aizawa and angst and it's not the best but it's my favorite thing that i've posted so far

title is from wicked game by chris isaak

songs important for the plot/vibes: wicked game by chris isaak, i don't wanna be an asshole anymore by the menzingers, derailed by the menzingers, karma police by radiohead, you've got to hide your love away by eddie vedder (this is a beatles anti account no i will not be engaging in discourse about it at this time)

You had never experienced a fall from grace. You had always been the pretty little girl-smart, sweet, happy-go-lucky, and the apple of her daddy’s eye. You were convinced you were an angel right here on earth. To your dear dad, there was nothing wrong that you could ever do. Any time you broke one of his loosely defined rules like “no staying out past nine” or “no bickering with your mother while I'm gone on this work trip,” all it took was batting your eyelashes and a noncommittal apology before you were back in his good graces. You were your daddy’s girl, through and through. It didn’t matter to either of you that you were spoiled rotten.

It was probably why your own mother never liked you much.

It started like any other growing pains-your mother and you would squabble over little things, like not wanting to hold her hand when she took you grocery shopping or preferring your dad giving you piggyback rides over her. Then, as you grew up, it morphed into crying in fitting rooms while your mom found new things about you to criticize which eventually led you to shutting her out as much as you could both physically and emotionally.

It was, and you entertained this thought quite frequently, why your darling father died. For three days straight, he complained of chest pains that wouldn’t let up and all your mother would offer to him was over-the-counter painkillers and only cursory words of comfort. She was too busy, or spiteful, to encourage him to go to the hospital. On the fourth morning of that fateful week, you woke up to your mother screaming and your dad not waking up no matter how you shook him. You barely remembered that day-it passed in a blur of paramedics and flowers and tears.

You could remember feeling anger. Anger that would probably last the rest of your life. Anger that would be known across the centuries. There was nothing else quite like it.

You losing your father so suddenly was the beginning of you having to learn how to fall from grace and clip your wings back. You had to learn how to be alone. You had done your research on the grieving process and no matter how long it had been, there came a point where you were bitter and angry and just stagnated there. In a moment of pure hopelessness, you rejected your offer of admission from the university your father had dreamed of you attending since you were a baby. Your mother blanched when you told her, no doubt angered by the fact that you’d be hanging around the house like a black cloud full time now instead of halfway across the country and out of her hair. So she gave you an ultimatum. Either attend classes at the local college or get a job. If you were going to stay at home, the least you could do was be productive. It was how she reasoned with you. You had half expected her to kick you out when she called you into the kitchen to talk but then you remembered-she had an image to uphold. How would it look to the other executives of her firm if she kicked her only daughter out onto the streets so soon after her father died?

Begrudgingly, you enrolled in classes at the local college. You only took just enough credit hours to be considered a full-time student and even then, you never put much effort into your work. It was a rarity if you ever turned any assignments in on time and even rarer still was your actually showing up to your classes. It was a joke to you when you would proudly display your essays with failing grades on the refrigerator. What was the point in trying anymore? Your hero-your real hero was dead and buried. There was no one around to appreciate your efforts anymore.

Halfway into your first semester of your laughable college career, your mother met Mr. Aizawa. Part-time teacher and hero. You didn’t really know how they had met and you didn’t care to know. You had scrunched up your nose in disgust when your mom waltzed into the living room on a Friday afternoon and announced that he would be coming over for dinner that same night. The thought of some man intruding in your father’s house and sitting where he had sat made your blood boil with rage but you kept a calm demeanor for the time being if only for your own sake.

It was a short time later that night that the doorbell rang and you resentfully went to answer it. For some reason, you expected the spitting image of your father to be standing there. Instead, you found a tall, slight man with black hair and a scar underneath his eye. From the way your mother described him, you expected someone more exceptional. You huffed and leaned against the front door, not moving to let him in. You both stood and appraised each other like two gunfighters getting ready for a duel. He broke first and shifted slightly and that was when you noticed the flowers in his hand.

“If you’re at the point where you’re coming over for dinner, you should know that my mom hates that type of flower.” You were nonchalant as you crossed your arms over your chest.

“They’re for you, actually.” Mr. Aizawa extended his arm out towards you and you regarded the small bouquet of daisies with disinterest. You didn’t want him to know that they were your favorite. Still, you took it. There was something strangely endearing about him already-but he didn’t have to know that.

“Wasting money on flowers for me isn’t gonna make me forget that you’re fucking my mom.” You were just trying to get a rise out of him. All you succeeded in making him do was quirk an eyebrow up at you and shove his hands deep in the pockets of his slacks. Mr. Aizawa was so…un-heroic. It almost made you laugh.

Your mother’s voice calling you from the kitchen interrupted your appraisal of the man before you. You opened the door wider and silently invited him in. You led him to the dining room where your mother was making up three plates for dinner. Something about seeing three plates at the table again made bile rise in your throat. You watched as your mother greeted Mr. Aizawa with a kiss on the cheek and a light hug. “Shouta,” she had called him warmly. The bile still swam in your throat.

You barely made it through dinner and the small talk without vomiting. You pushed your food around your plate without committing to eating a single bite. There was anxious energy in the air and you couldn’t quite put your finger on why until both your mother and Shouta stopped eating and kept glancing back and forth at each other. You tried to gauge what was going on from the corner of your eye, but it was your mother calling your name that finally pulled you into the fray.

“We have some news to share with you,” Your mother and Shouta were holding hands lightly across the table and you could tell that whatever was next to come out of your mother’s mouth would be far from good. “We’re getting married!” 

The world fell out from underneath you. You had the edge of the chair that you sat on in a vice grip. Surely you hadn’t heard her correctly.

“What did you just say?” You couldn’t recognize your own voice and Shouta simply watched the scene unfold from his place at the table. He toyed with the handle of his fork.

“I said that we’re getting married! Isn’t that great news, angel?” Your mother was using the voice that she reserved for when strangers were around but she really wanted to scream at you. You grit your back molars together so hard that you could practically hear them squeaking.

“Don’t you ever, ever, call me that again. You know that dad was the only one that could use that name with me. Speaking of dad, couldn’t you wait until he was dead and buried for at least a few months longer before bringing another man into his house?” Shouta held his composure like a statue as you growled across the table at your mother. Something in you was satisfied that he wasn’t running to her aid. Still, static churned loudly in your ears as you waited for her response.

“Don’t I deserve to be happy?” She was embarrassed by the way you were acting.

“No.” The admission damned you.

You got up from where you sat and your mother followed suit. Shouta was the last to rise. You looked between the two of them and barked out a laugh to hide the sweltering tears that wanted to fall. 

“You’re pathetic,” You whispered coolly into your mother’s ear as you pushed your way in between the couple on your way to the front door. You had to get out before the walls closed in on you, and they were closing in fast. 

You were in such a rush to escape the scene that it wasn’t until you were outside stumbling down the sidewalk and sucking in air that you didn’t know you had been deprived of that you realized you weren’t wearing any shoes. You stopped and rubbed the bare skin of your feet against the cement and shivered at the way it tickled. At least it was something to focus on other than the betrayal. You weren’t really surprised that your mom pulled something like this, but it still stung. You didn’t buy into the whole “your dad would want your mom to be happy” sentiment that family friends poured into your ears in the weeks after your father’s death. What your father deserved was happiness. Not your mother and the stray cat she probably found at the train station. You chuckled out loud as you thought of Mr. Aizawa like that. 

In all honesty, he didn’t look like he belonged anywhere and it was hard for you to believe that he split his time between being a teacher and a hero. Still, throughout dinner, there was something about his eyes that kept entrancing you. Maybe your mother was onto something with him.

“You’re gonna get a splinter in your foot if you keep it up.” The monotone voice came from behind you and you slowly turned to see your mother’s suitor situated against the darkness of the night. You glared at him.

“What do you care?” You had to remember that while Shouta wasn’t the enemy, he was still on the opposing team.

“I don’t care, but it seems kind of silly to go and get hurt just for the hell of it.” You lifted an eyebrow at his statement.

“That’s funny coming from a hero,” You stop to look him up and down. “Especially one with as many scars as you have.”

“With my work, at least there’s usually some kind of outcome at the end.” He steps over to perch on a bench underneath a short tree. You cross your arms over your chest and try not to shiver in the cool night air.

“Who’s to say I wasn’t headed towards my own outcome?” Shouta just stares at you. You can tell he’s willing to let you talk yourself in circles and you take the bait. “What outcome do you think you’re gonna have with my mother?”

“I think I’m gonna marry your mom and get a stepdaughter with a horrible attitude problem out of the deal.” Shouta smirks over at you after a second and it’s the first time in a while that you feel yourself crack a genuine smile. 

“You think you’re funny.” You say, trying to fight the edges of your lips back down into a frown.

“Not funny, just observant.” His smile is wider now and it’s almost enough to make the weight on your heart not so heavy.

“Why did you ask my mom to marry you in the first place?”

“I didn’t ask her.” His eyes shift down to the ground and then back up to you.

“What do you mean?”

“She asked me on one of our dates. I thought it was respectable. I think your mother would be good to settle down with before I get too old.” You snort at his answer.

“You think it’s respectable to marry a widow whose husband has been dead less than a year with a maladjusted daughter thrown in the mix?”

“I could do without the maladjusted daughter.” There’s that mischievous grin again and you can feel something inside of you start to crack that you hadn’t felt at all since your father died. It makes you woozy.

“I could do without her too.”

The wedding is planned relatively quickly. It’s a small enough affair to be held in a backyard garden and the day is sunny despite the turmoil you feel raging inside of you. You had been awake since the early hours of the morning, switching between fuming that your mother was actually going through with getting married to someone you both hardly knew and twirling around in front of your bathroom mirror in the dress that you had picked out for the ceremony. 

With your hair and makeup done for the first time in an eternity, you felt quite stunning. It was your vanity that led you to being more cruel than usual to your mom.

It wasn’t like she didn’t deserve it, but even the words slipping off of your tongue felt like they sliced right through the muscle. Your mother called your name harshly as you held her gaze in the big mirror in her bathroom but still, Shouta failed to truly come to her defense. You were satisfied with that. You thought momentarily that maybe he might have agreed with your statement that, “Oh mom, you look beautiful. It’s just a shame that you’re a cunt on the inside.”

You left your mother’s room to the sound of Shouta offering warm words of consolation, could have sworn you heard him offer, “It makes sense that she’s still angry.” You bit your tongue to hide your grin when you heard him fail to refute what you had said. 

You made your way out into the garden covered in lavender and honeysuckle to mingle among the few guests who had shown up. You kept a crystal champagne glass in your hand as you greeted your cousins and extended family. You relished in introducing yourself as “Shouta’s stepdaughter” to the few of his work colleagues that were in attendance. The fleeting appreciative glances that they gave weren’t lost on you and slowly, the cogs of your mind started to mingle with the champagne you drank and as the ceremony started, you started to formulate a plan to ruin your mother’s new marriage. Set it on fire and watch it burn to ash. All it would take was breaking Shouta down and stealing him from her and if there was one thing you knew how to do, it was how to get your way.

After the ceremony came the reception and chairs were cleared away and tables were moved around to allow guests to dance and mingle with each other. You sat by yourself with a sour feeling hanging over your heart. Your mother had actually been cruel enough to get remarried. Their vows and the kiss they shared played over and over again as you sipped on your champagne. The anger was exhausting. Nothing would have been better in that moment than being able to run into the arms of your father and cry to him about everything that was going wrong.

There came a light tap on your shoulder. Slowly, you angled your head to see who was intruding on your bubble of misery. Shouta. He was well put-together, all slicked back hair and an uncharacteristic happy grin. You remembered your own vow from earlier and painted a matching toothy grin on your face. Your eyes flicked down to the hand that he held out towards you.

“Would you like to dance?” You looked at him in confusion.

“What, you know how to dance?”

“There are lots of things you don’t know about me.” Oh, you hoped there were. Still, he smiled pleasantly at you.

“Okay, one dance and you can list off all the things I don’t know about you. For vetting purposes.” Being sweet to him was all part of the plan.

“I think it’s a little too late for vetting now.” He replied as you placed your hand in his and stood up. His hand was large and warm compared to your own. You toyed with the urge to fully lace your fingers through his as he led you to the impromptu dance floor. The song playing was nice and mid-tempo and the lyrics were saying something schmaltzy about love. Shouta held you at a respectable arms distance as the two of you swayed to the music. You could hear little coos of adoration from the couples dancing around the two of you. It fuelled you as you looked up, wide-eyed, at Shouta. He opened his mouth for a second too long before closing it quickly and you cocked your head to the side before running a hand up his bicep. His forehead creased almost imperceptibly.

“What were you gonna say?” You used your most innocent voice, the one that always worked on your dad.

“I know you don’t like when it gets brought up, but uh, I feel really fortunate that your mom came into my life and I’m gonna try my best to be a good role model for you.” The soft smile on your face stuttered as you thought of him trying to replace your father. You managed to stay strong and fight through the feeling. You weren’t mad at Shouta, not really. Just cautious. You needed him on your side to get back at your mom. However, there was something saccharine and sugary and enthralling about the man that stood in front of you. He seemed like someone who could take all of your troubles away if you would let him. As Shouta spun you around to hide his own bashfulness, you decided that he was something you had to have regardless of the ruination of your mother’s relationship.

It was okay if you had a little crush on him as you went about your plan.

You had seven days to yourself; one hundred and sixty-eight hours to be exact. Time seemed to eke by as you split your time between decaying on the couch and finding inconsequential things around the house to make your mom’s life just a bit harder when she returned from her honeymoon. Hair removal cream found its way into her shampoo. Gently used mouthwash found its way back into the bottle. Files in her home office subtly found their way to new homes. All of your pranks were plausibly deniable, of course, and something told you that Shouta would come to your defense.

You were angry after all and you planned to play into that as much as you could with him. He wouldn’t want to rock the boat and get on your bad side so soon after getting married, would he? He didn’t seem like the type of person to want to stick his nose somewhere that it didn’t belong.

As you milled about the empty house on your vacation from your mother, you did more research on your new stepfather. Eraserhead. There wasn’t much to be found on him aside from some news clips with him in the background, long hair floating wildly around his head. At first, you couldn’t believe that the same man holding off hordes of villains was the same man who asked you to dance and vowed to be a good man only days prior. He didn’t seem all that remarkable in his everyday life, but perhaps that was how he wanted it. You kept thinking back to the way he bashfully smiled at you and even though you were alone, you felt blood rush to your cheeks.

Last night as you laid in bed, your mind drifted to what it might be like if he laid on top of you, in between your legs-taking care of you in a different way than what he had meant when you danced together. Your mind had raced as you imagined what his kisses must be like, what it might be like for him to hold you down and make you squirm. It was enough for you to get off, lips parted in a delicious whine as your own fingers pushed in and out of you. You didn’t feel any kind of shame. Shouta deserved better than your mother and even if he might not ever fully grasp that, the least that you could do was sow the seeds of discontent in his mind.

Your musings were interrupted by the sound of the front door unlocking and suitcases scraping past the threshold. You finished gathering a spoonful of peanut butter from the jar and turned to lean against the counter. So, your time alone has finally come to a close. Your mother would ascertain that there would be no more walking around half-naked in front of her new husband, but there was time for one last performance at least.

You brushed one edge of your oversized sweater off of your shoulder, leaving you clad in only your underwear and the cardigan that hung from your frame. You patiently listened to the scuffle of luggage being moved around as you popped the spoon of peanut butter into your mouth. Shouta appeared around the corner and threw his jacket over one of the dining room chairs. He took notice of you immediately.

“We made it back safely!” His words sounded incredibly lame and he never broke his gaze from your eyes. You batted your eyelashes prettily at him as you pulled the spoon from your mouth.

“I can see that.” You were amused at him attempting to make small talk as you deadpanned back at him.

“Our trip was actually really neat. I think your mom took some pictures if you wanna look at them sometime.” Shouta had barely gotten the sentence out of his mouth before your mother was entering the kitchen and her eyes had gone just about the size of Pluto. Your full name sprung from her lips in a shriek.

“You know better than that! Go put some clothes on!” Her words echoed in the now abject silence of the kitchen before you broke out in spiteful laughter and put your dirty spoon in the sink. As you went to leave, still laughing ruefully, you could see an embarrassed blush rising up Shouta’s neck and that had made it all worth it. Your laughter wound down to breathless chuckles as you made it to the hallway and as you paused for a minute to catch your breath, you listened as Shouta once again came to your defense to the tune of, “Honey, it’s okay. She just has to get used to a man being in the house again.”

It’s a relatively easy decision for you to start working out to have more in common with Shouta, even though you’re not very good at it. It made sense that he’d work out. He was a hero and surely the job would be made all the harder if he didn’t have the physique to back it up. At the very least, Shouta seemed like he worked out just enough to be strong for the job. 

His morning schedule is still a mystery to you, so you start to wake up early religiously each morning to work out in the living room within full view of the kitchen. It just so happens that you’re there on your little yoga mat in your sports bra and athletic shorts struggling your way through your second set of squats, when you hear someone moving around in the kitchen. You move your head to the side just enough to see Aizawa appraising you from the counter. You keep up with your routine and try to fight the smirk on your face. You really give an earnest effort to your workout now but you stop when you hear his gruff morning voice. 

“Your form is wrong.” You look over to where he stands, shirtless, pouring a cup of coffee. You’re out of breath and the sight doesn’t help. You stand up to your full height and face him.

“How is it wrong?” You try to hide your breathlessness and the way your tongue wants to stick to the roof of your mouth. He sets his mug on the edge of the counter and crosses over to you. His fingertips airily trace over your spine first. You almost jolt forward at the unexpected touch.

“Your back is too curved. Keep your shoulders back like this,” He tugs your shoulders back until you can feel your spine straighten out. “and your feet are too far apart.” He nudges your feet closer together by a few inches. You let him move you around like a ragdoll for a few moments more. Finally, he steps in front of you and considers your new form. 

“Try it now and see how it feels.” He instructs and you feel incredibly goofy as you go through the motions, his measured gaze never leaving you. You have to admit, the squats feel better now and less like you’re fighting your own body. When you rise to your full height again, you stand with your legs together and cross your arms across your chest.

“That was better.” You confirm, trying to catch your breath. Shouta smiles gently at you and you want to scratch at your skin for the way it makes you feel.

“I’m going on a run in a little bit, you should come with me.” He invites and all you want to do is glug down a gallon of water and collapse onto the floor, but then you remember your solemn vow to yourself and you accept his invitation. It’s all in the name of ruining your mother’s happiness after all.

There wasn’t a lot you knew about heroes. When you were younger, you had a passionate interest in All Might, but so did every other kid in the country. There wasn’t anything special about that.

You were content enough to leave the life-saving to the specially trained heroes. You knew you didn’t have the resolve or compassion to make it as a hero yourself. Still, it was an occupation that you respected from afar. Now, it was something that you got to observe up close every time Shouta came wandering home. Most of his shifts were at night, after everyone was in bed. It was when the real villains could play. Regardless of everything, you admired his ability to train a new generation of heroes during the day and still go out to patrol the streets and rooftops most nights.

You wouldn’t admit it cognizantly to yourself, but you found yourself adapting to wake up whenever you would hear the front door click shut in the small hours of the morning. You would peel yourself out of bed and wrap a blanket around your shoulders as you crept to the end of your hallway to watch Shouta. His goggles would always be pushed up around his forehead. His stubble would always be more prominent than usual. The dim light from the stove in the kitchen always made his eyes look more exhausted than they probably were. From your hiding spot, you would watch him pour a glass of water and sip on it at the kitchen table until his head got too heavy for him to hold up. You would wait until you could hear his gentle snores wafting over to your ears and then you would tiptoe over like you were in church and wrap your blanket around his shoulders. You would work his goggles off of the crown of his head and sit them gently on the table next to him before running your fingers through his silky hair. Your stomach always tingled. You always wanted to duck your head down and place warm kisses on his hairline.

You never noticed his eyes, very much awake, on you as you retreated back to your room.

The thing with time is that it was supposed to heal wounds. Except for you it didn’t. You kept hoping every day that you would wake up and find that you would care a little bit less about the loss of your dad. Maybe even be able to compartmentalize it and get on with your life, get your grades up and transfer schools and move out on your own. Still, you woke up every morning with a deep seated hole in your chest. It was assuaged in little pieces by the family portraits hung around the house. A family picture of your first birthday here. A picture of you and your dad at an awards ceremony there. The little remnants of your dad around the house helped to serve as a reminder that you were still human, as hard as it was some days.

Until one day the pictures weren’t there anymore.

You tore into a blind rage, your mom and Shouta watching from the kitchen as you threw the television remote at the wall. A novel was flung all the way against the refrigerator in the kitchen. You screamed like your head was being torn off. It went on and on until you tired yourself out and sat on the couch to sob embarrassedly, face hidden in your hands. 

You tuned into the whispers emanating from the kitchen. You caught onto your mother telling Shouta that it was time for you to move on, that you were an adult and needed to stop relying on your emotions to guide you. Your hands balled into fists. What did she know? Your head cleared only by a fraction when you heard Shouta answer that maybe taking down the pictures wasn’t the right way to go about things.

You sat on the couch crying for so long that you didn’t realize when the two of them left. You stood, as if on autopilot, and gathered your materials for the classes that you had that day and departed, not caring how you looked, but just needing to get out of the house. 

When you returned that afternoon, the pictures of you and your dad sat in brand new frames on your bed.

It was no secret that you had more friends in high school. You were near the top of your class and always managed to stay on top of gossip and the happenings around school. You missed hanging out with your girlfriends when you were happy, before they all went off to the schools they had been dreaming of for years. You were jealous of them and felt spiteful anytime they would post pictures of the great times they were having on their social media. It didn’t matter that you self-imposed your own exile to wallow in your bitterness. You were envious that your friends were able to fool around with frat boys when all you seemed to attract were the bottom-of-the-barrell burnouts from your college. Not that you were much better than them these days. 

You spent too many weekends holed up in the apartments of your new friends, smoking weed and watching them play video games just for something interesting to do. It almost made you want to turn your life back around and get back on track. Almost, but not quite.

So when you heard of a party happening one weekend, you jumped at the chance to go and rallied your friend group to go with you so you wouldn’t look like so much of a loser.

When you are ready to leave, Shouta and your mother are having an intimate date night in the dimly lit kitchen, sharing wine and giggling at each other over things you can’t make sense of. You wonder what they have in common. Your mother makes you sick to your stomach but a green claw of unbridled jealousy seizes at your chest when you hear the subtle bedroom lilt to Shouta’s voice and when you see how his hand reaches up to push a lock of hair off your mother’s shoulder. You shake off the feeling and enter the kitchen in earnest, dressed in a skimpy outfit that makes your mother’s eyes pop out of her head. You can tell without even looking at her from years of professionally annoying her. You completely ignore Shouta-don’t even give him a spare glance as you walk by the two on your way to the front door.

“Where are you going?” You hear your mother call as you reach for the door handle.

“Out with my friends,” Is all you offer up before you’re gone.

And the party isn’t bad, the music is loud and there’s enough alcohol to placate you for the evening. Even your friends seem like they’re having a good time as they mill about in the crowd. There are just enough people that you don’t know there for you to get comfortably drunk. It’s a good way for you to finally unwind, you think, as you step unsteadily into the messy kitchen. You’re trying to pour yourself another drink when a spindly hand comes out of nowhere and takes your cup from you and finishes preparing your drink.

“I was doing just fine pouring my own drink.” You pout at your friend that you arrived with from the opposite side of the counter and he circles around to stand next to you, too close for what you were comfortable with.

“Nice girls shouldn’t be pouring their own drinks.” He drawls and it was smooth, but you clench your teeth and take the cup from his hand.

“‘m not a nice girl.”

“Sure you are. You just spend a lot of time pretending that you aren’t.” His cool breath is ghosting next to your ear and you’re just the perfect amount out of your right mind to let your eyes close and let your head lean into the feeling. Your mind is a television screen and it’s flickering through what it would feel like to have Aizawa in the same position, doing the exact same thing. 

“If I was such a nice girl, I wouldn’t be hanging out with you, huh?” You lower your voice just enough for only him to hear and then he’s laughing in your ear and his slight torso is pressing against your back and it’s all too easy for you to envision Shouta in his place. Your heart is thumping in your chest, probably so heavily that he can feel it clear through to his chest. Then his nose is pressing against the smooth skin of your neck and his lips are ghosting against you and you can’t help but grip the edge of the counter with your hand that isn’t holding your drink. “Fuck, do that again,” you whisper and press more into his hold, grinding back against the man as his tongue licks a stripe up your neck, hand cradling the opposite side of your head to give him more room. His teeth bite against your skin roughly and you can’t stop the sound that escapes your mouth. It only serves to egg him on, encouraging him to bite and suck at your neck more fervently. Your eyes are shut tight with images of Shouta absolutely ruining you running through your head. It’s not fair to your friend, not in the least, but you warned him that you weren’t a nice girl in the first place. You can feel him hard against your back and that’s enough to startle you out of your reverie. You push him off of you and you can’t turn to look him in the eye. 

“I gotta go…find something else to do,” You parse out and walk on unsteady legs out of the kitchen and back into the music-filled living room. The dancing and drinking is still going heavy but your mood is somber now. You want to be home and you don’t care what it takes to get there as you finish your final drink in only a few sips and set it on the porch steps as you leave the house. 

You weren’t very far from home and despite your level of intoxication, you knew you could get home without forgetting the way. You pulled off the heels that you wore and dangled them from your fingers as you trekked home in the dark. It was hard to keep your mind from your stepfather-the gentle way he cradled your mother’s face in his large palm while he smiled at her and the way he poured more wine for her without her having to ask. You clenched your jaw. That should have been you. Your mother didn’t deserve such a good thing-such a handsome thing. If you had any say in the matter, and by heaven, you would weasel your way in any way you could, Aizawa would be yours and her heart would be broken. It was only fair, he seemed to be the only thing capable of mending the shattered and torn pieces of your angry little heart. You were so fucked.

You were so fucked and lovesick thinking about him as you walked back into your house that you didn’t even register all the noise you were making as you bumped from wall to wall trying to get back to your bedroom. Maybe you were more drunk than you originally thought. You heard Shouta’s voice calling your name from just outside of your cracked bedroom door what felt like seconds after you entered. All you could do was stand there and sway as he watched you from the doorway.

He was clad in flannel pajama pants and nothing else and his hair was messier than usual and you frowned at the sight. It was obvious. He was too relaxed. He had fucked your mother at some point after you left and that made dread settle into your stomach. You wanted to vomit. Shouta was your territory, didn’t she know? Still, you grinned at him like a child trying to get out of trouble. He appraised you, looking you up and down, and you wanted there to be more to his gaze than there was.

“You’re drunk.” It was a statement of fact and it rolled off his tongue weightlessly. You weren’t in trouble.

“I don’t think I am,” You licked your lips and over pronounced every syllable. Your tongue was liquid in your mouth. He barked out an amiable laugh and stepped into your room proper. You were glued to the spot as your heart started to race not for the first time that night.

“Sit down, I’ll get your pajamas.” Aizawa’s warm hand was on your upper arm and guided you to sit down on the edge of your bed. Your skin prickled in his grasp as you let him guide you. Your entire body felt like you were a past-done spaghetti noodle.

“They’re in the top drawer,” You offered up as he looked, a little lost, around your room. You bit the tip of your tongue in between your front teeth to stop from grinning too hard. You liked him taking care of you.

You watched as he dug through your dresser and grabbed a big t-shirt and pair of shorts. He folded the articles neatly in his hands and crossed the room back to your bedside where he placed the pajamas in your lap. You were about to open your mouth to thank him when he took your chin into two of his fingers and pulled your head to the side gently. Your skin buzzed underneath his touch as he ran the tip of his rough pointer finger over the bruise on your neck that you had pretended Shouta had left there in the first place. 

“You’ve been lettin’ boys kiss on you?” He questions teasingly and your stomach clenches so hard you almost can’t reply. 

“Uh, not here,” you swipe your thumb across your bottom lip, “just there.” The reply made sense in your head. You nod your head against the finger on your neck. 

“Well, at least you’re having fun.” Aizawa laughs in earnest, if a little awkwardly, and then his touch is gone from your skin. 

“Not really,” You admit and start to take note of how the room is spinning but you take pains to keep from slurring your words. Shouta raises up an eyebrow at you. 

“Would rather be kissing boys properly, y’know?” There’s a nervous titter between the two of you. 

“Okay,” he chuckles out, hand rubbing awkwardly at the back of his neck. “Just don’t let your mom see.” You feel compelled by some force of nature to keep talking despite the voice in the back of your head screaming at you to just shut up and go to sleep. 

“Would you kiss me?” The words slither out of your mouth as if they were lava and the room isn’t spinning anymore, but upending itself over and over again in the corner of your vision as you watch a stricken look cross over Aizawa’s face. 

“I’m your stepdad and I think you need to remember that, baby girl.” He instructs and you hate the way that he sounds like he’s talking to a wounded animal that’s been stuck in a trap. 

“But if you weren’t? What if I was just…somebody that you knew?” 

“I think you need to put on your pajamas and go to sleep before you talk yourself into hurting your own feelings.” Your eyes felt watery and weak. You felt bile rising in your throat and started to panic.

“Fuck, you’re gonna throw up, aren’t you?” Aizawa registered the seasick look on your face and was hoisting you up by your arms and hauling you into the bathroom before you could even nod your head in confirmation. It was a good thing, at least, that he was in his right mind, because you unleashed the contents of your stomach into the toilet not even a second after your knees connected sharply with the tile of the floor. For once, you were thankful for throwing up, because then you could blame the tears welling out of the corners of your eyes on that.

The shit-faced debacle passed blessedly without much mention. You and Shouta went about your daily lives without bringing up how he held your hair back for you and sat next to you while you cried about missing your dad into the toilet seat. Somehow, even through you blubbering mindlessly about how much your dead dad meant to you, you didn’t let anything slip about your plan to ruin your mother’s marriage or your stupid infatuation with the man himself. 

For the past week, you had regarded each other cordially from opposite sides of whatever room you were in together. You would nod in acknowledgement of each other when you poured coffee at the same time in the morning or when you were coming back from studying and he was headed out on some hero’s errand that you really didn’t care about enough to understand. But now, it was the weekend and you were holed up in your room with a joint and a half-done essay to prevent a repeat of last Friday night. 

Loud music and smoke filled your room as you sat on the floor with your laptop and tried to make sense of the argument you were making on paper. For the first time in your college career, you were trying to apply yourself. Secretly, you enjoyed the warm smile that Shouta had given you earlier in the week when you had hung a paper with a passing grade scribbled at the top on the refrigerator. You wanted a repeat performance.

The steady clacking of your nails against laptop keys was interrupted by a knock at your door. You turned your music down slightly and tapped the ash off of your joint as you called for whoever was knocking to come in. Your door swung open quickly and Shouta propped himself against the door frame. You turned your music down lower.

“What are you doing at home on a Saturday night listening to “Karma Police” all by yourself?” He questioned and you rubbed your dry eyes.

“I have a dead dad. I’m entitled to my sadness.” You deadpanned and laughed after a second. The melodrama hadn’t started to get old yet.

“I mean…that’ll do it.” You raised your eyebrows up at him, wondering why he had come to your room in the first place. Shouta cleared his throat and stepped into your room before sitting down on the floor like you were. “You sure you don’t wanna go out and hang out with people your own age?” He crosses his legs as you take one last pull off of your joint before squishing it out on the ashtray next to your knee.

“I was trying to finish this paper, actually.”

“Oh yeah? What’s it on?” You half expected Shouta to say something about the smoke.

“Heroes and ethics or something like that.”

“And you didn’t want my opinion?”

“I like doing things on my own.”

“So you don’t wanna watch a movie with me, then?” There’s that mischievous smile on his face again that makes your heart feel like a galloping horse.

“You could ask my mom.”

“She’s out at a dinner.” You type up one last sentence and hum in acknowledgement of his statement.

“What kind of old man movie do you want me to watch with you?”

“Terminator.”

“Properly retro.” You affirm, closing the lid of your laptop and standing up. “Let’s go, then.” You hold out your hand to Shouta and help him up from the floor. You half expect to hear his knees pop in their sockets as he stands. You lead the way into the living room and sit down on the couch while he pulls up the movie with the television remote. He settles on the couch opposite from you. You’re startled by the overwhelming want to lean your head against his t-shirt clad chest.

“Have you ever thought about getting a cat?” He asks casually as the opening credits roll, remote clinking down onto the coffee table.

“Mom’s not a big cat person.” There’s a quick pause. “I used to have one a long time ago. Dad and I found it behind a trash can. I named it All Might.” Shouta snorted a laugh at your admission. 

“Why’d you name that poor cat All Might?” He pulled a throw blanket down from the back of the couch and fluffed it over his legs. You stared at the simple action. Shouta clocks you from the corner of his eye but you don’t realize.

“I had a crush on All Might when I was little.” You were very serious.

“That’s horrific.”

“Hey, there are lots of things you don’t know about me.” You recalled the conversation the two of you had while you danced at the wedding.

“I know a little bit more about you after peeling you off the bathroom floor last weekend.” Your gaze breaks from his in embarrassment. “You know you can talk to me about missing your dad, right? I can try my best to understand even though I’m not really too good at this whole bonding thing.” He wiggles his eyebrows at you in an attempt to lighten the mood back up. “I want to be a good person for you.” You give him an appreciative glance but can’t figure out how to reply due to the raw emotion seizing your chest. “One good thing did come out of the whole ordeal though.” Shouta continued on and you focused on the deep timbre of his voice to ground yourself.

“What’s that?” It came out in a whisper.

“I don’t have to worry about you getting kidnapped because when you don’t want to move, you don’t. I had the worst time trying to get you into bed.” As you felt your face heat up, you wondered if he caught onto the double meaning as well.

“I’m sorry about all of that.”

“It’s okay, baby girl. It’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened to me.” He lifted up the corner of the throw blanket that was closest to you and motioned you over with a tilt of his head. Surely, he just saw you shivering. He had no ulterior motives. You were the only one with those.

You scooted over apprehensively against the material of the couch until your side rested gently against Shouta’s and he let the blanket float down over the two of you. “It’s cold in here, isn’t it?” You could only nod your head in agreement as the right side of your body felt like it was being engulfed in blue flames. 

Your favorite times lately were spent getting to know Shouta better. Getting to know the person he was away from the house, when he was Aizawa-sensei or Eraserhead. You were realizing that he had many different faces, but at the heart of it all, Shouta was really just a person who tried hard to do the right thing. If you were a person that tried to do the right thing like he did, you wouldn’t still be trying to ruin your mother’s marriage. If you were smart, you would have realized that your plan would hurt Shouta as well.

But you weren’t really a common sense girl. Or a nice girl. You just wanted revenge for your devastated heart.

And certainly, Shouta falling in love with you the way you were starting to fall for him wouldn’t hurt either.

He offered to take you to dinner and show you some of his patrol routes since you had been peppering your interest about his job into conversation more fervently lately. He called it important bonding. Your mother was out on work business again and you thought Shouta might have just been lonely. 

You had a fantastic time walking through the brightly lit streets with him. He was still dressed in all black and his back was hunched forward like he was unimpressed, but something told you Shouta was having a good time. Every now and then, he would point out an alleyway or a building where he apprehended a villain. It filled you with a weird sort of pride to know that he did his job so well. He seemed so fucking…morally upstanding that it made you want to scream.

“You gettin’ hungry?” His measured tone broke you out of your thoughts. You nodded up at him and hoped that the smile you gave him was pretty enough, better than your mother’s at least. “I’ll show you this cool place I eat at sometimes.” Shouta grins. You dig your fingernails into your palm.

You follow him to a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant. It’s run by an older couple that seem to know him well. You end up ordering the same thing he does and you watch as Shouta plays with his wedding ring absent-mindedly while he takes in his surroundings. You can’t figure out how to start a conversation. You tap the bottoms of your shoes against the linoleum floor and he looks at you like he’s about to say something but is interrupted by the little old lady bringing over your food. 

“Is this your new wife, Eraser?” The lady asks as she places his plate in front of him. Her question is innocent but you choke on your spit and watch as vermillion creeps up Shouta’s neck.

“This is my stepdaughter,” he corrects, recovering easily enough and you smile politely at the lady. She smiles back warmly, ducking her head a little bit in consolation for her mistake.

“Forgive me. She’s absolutely beautiful though.”

“Thank you, I know.” It’s your turn for blood to rush to your head. You have to tell yourself over and over again not to read anything into it as the old lady walks away. There’s a charged silence over the table as the two of you focus too hard on your food. You’re the first to break the awkward air.

“I’m thinking about moving out.” It’s abrupt and you don’t realize at first what you’ve really said. Shouta’s eyes widened.

“What do you mean?” He takes a bite of his food.

“I mean, if I keep my grades up, I can still transfer into the university I was originally supposed to go to. I’m planning on summer classes too.” You watch him chew his food as you move your own around the plate.

“I think that’s a great goal to have if you can keep your grades up. I can help you study for your exams if you’d like.” He smiles warmly at you and you feel okay again.

“I’d really like that, Shouta.” You feel the urge to stuff your mouth with food so you aren’t encumbered by the emotions that you’re feeling. Silence settles again over the table. You’re taking a sip of water as you notice his mouth open and close a few times, like he can’t figure out what it is that he wants to say.

“What is it?”

“Nothing, it’s just…adult stuff.” He fiddles with his wedding ring again.

“I’m an adult.”

“I know but I…I shouldn’t talk to you about it.” Shouta looks down at his plate. You nudge his foot with your own underneath the table.

“Come on…we’re bonding, right?” You’re being too sweet, too calculated, but you really do want to know what’s bothering him.

“Your mom is just really difficult sometimes.” He blurts out and you almost laugh out loud but keep up your supportive front for his sake.

“She can definitely be a handful. I was just lucky to have my dad around to help soften the edges for a while.” Your food stands all but forgotten now. You watch as Shouta’s fingers drum on the table just centimeters away from your own. Gently, you slide your hand closer so that your fingertips are touching but you play it off like you don’t notice.

“I think maybe I’m just not used to relationships like this one. Or maybe I just need to finish adjusting. I don’t know.”

“Do you still love my mom?” Your senses are heightened as you speak, but you’re interrupted by the old woman bringing over the bill. Shouta hands over his card and pretends like he never heard your question. He puts his card back in his wallet and slides out of the booth. You still look at him expectantly but he maintains his innocence.

“C’mon, there’s an old record store on this side of town that I want to show you.” He smiles, tight-lipped, and you scoot out of the booth. You wonder why he ignores the question. You want a solid answer why he always runs to your defense (aside from the answer you’ve deluded yourself into thinking is the truth) but you don’t think you’ll be privy to that information tonight. You follow him out onto the sidewalk. You like how you and Shouta are absorbed into the nighttime crowd like any other couple. You don’t talk to each other for fear that your conversation will be lost among the bustle of the people.

Shouta walks with purpose, but never so quickly that you can’t keep up with him. In any case, it would be hard for you to lose him due to his stature. Sometimes you forget how tall he is with the way he hunches over and the way he carries himself. You like the way the neon of the street signs illuminates the sharp edge of his nose. You find yourself staring at the wisps of long, inky hair that frame his face. He was so, so beautiful in a meek way and it’s extremely easy for you to get lost in it. It’s what leads you to almost bumping into his shoulder as he comes to a stop. A giggle, a real giggle bubbles out of his mouth and you feel the final nail being driven into your coffin. You needed him. Like air, like water. He was more necessary to you than he was to your mother. All it would take was a single move. A single move. You could persuade him easily enough that you were a better answer to his question.

“You ready to check it out?” He nods toward the door and starts to push inside without truly waiting for your answer. You try to shake off the millions of emotions that are running through your body.

Inside the record store is warm and smells like old books. You break away from Shouta for the moment and start to paw through the racks of records by yourself. You pick up some of the titles and flip them around to the back, trying to read the writing on the back. It’s hard to concentrate. Your mind keeps stagnating on Shouta’s words and his proximity to you. He’s flipping through the old records the same as you are and you wonder if he can feel your eyes flicking over to him every so often.

He holds one record in his hand but you can’t quite make out what it is. You watch as he looks through one more rack of records before going to the cashier and making his purchase. It gets slid into a brown paper bag with the name of the store stamped on the front. You make your way over to Shouta.

“I’m ready if you are,” He smiles warmly at you and you nod your head, in so very deep. You follow him back out onto the street. He turns to face you quickly. “Here. It’s something to keep you entitled to your sadness.” There’s a barely concealed twinkle in his eye. You take what he holds out with a grin. You pull the record out of the bag.

“You’re so corny.” You laugh, but are touched that he remembered that you listen to Radiohead as he places OK Computer in your hands.

“It comes with the territory.” He speaks easily but nothing gets said on the walk back home. 

Your heart is in danger of pounding out of your chest by the time that you reach the front door. You want to kiss him, to make a move so badly that it’s the only thing that you can think about. Everything that he’s done has to mean something, right? Desperately, you hoped that it did as your fingers fiddled anxiously in front of you. You follow Shouta inside and he walks you to your room like a gentleman.

“Don’t forget this.” Shouta places the record he bought for you into your hands as you moved to open the door to your bedroom. There’s harsh electricity running through your veins that’s bordering on catastrophic. You smile at him as gratefully as you can, nodding your head in thanks as you turn back towards your door. This time, you’re able to get the door completely open and take a few steps before you hear him call your name and apologize in a stage whisper. You fight the desperate feeling in your chest as you feel him tug on your arm roughly and pull you into his hard chest. OK Computer clatters to the floor. It doesn’t matter.

Calloused hands are on the side of your face and then his lips are melting against yours needily. Shouta pulls back just as quickly as he leaned forward but his palms are still on your cheeks. He’s looking at you levelly, letting you make the next decision like it’s a game of chess. Your head feels like it’s full of helium. You watch your hands move from outside of your body as they come to tangle around his neck. You make your play and kiss him back on your tiptoes. The surprise he feels is tangible. The new kiss holds the same probing energy but then expands into something wetter and needier-yet still remains sickeningly sweet. You suck his lower lip into your mouth and sigh in the back of your throat when his hands wander down the curves of your torso to your hips. Shouta breaks the kiss, a string of saliva briefly connecting you for a moment longer and he exhales hard as he lays his forehead against yours. You can’t help but get lost in his permanently bloodshot eyes.

“I-i crossed a line. I’m going to cross a line.” Despite his words, he tugs you closer to him until your bodies are flush with each other. Shame clouds his features and you can’t stand that. Not when you created the perfect storm for this to happen. You play with the shorter hairs at the base of his neck.

“You’re not alone, okay? We’ll cross the line together.” You whisper so reverently that at first you think Shouta might not have heard you, but then you hear a strangled groan come out of his mouth and he’s pushing you backwards until you’re sitting on your bed, surrounded by soft blankets and engulfed in the scent of his mellow cologne. He starts to lean over you and you crane your neck to look over his shoulder dubiously at the door that’s standing almost wide open. It’s the only thing stopping your room from being a sanctuary. He follows your line of sight and turns back around with fiery eyes as if to say, “just be quiet.” You swallow thickly and lean back on your elbows. Shouta crawls up your body, blanketing you nimbly, and then he’s kissing you breathlessly again. You do your best to keep up with him but there isn’t a sense of yours that he isn’t absolutely steamrolling right over. His overwhelmingly hot hands travel up between your soft thighs and push your skirt up around your hips. You can’t stop the pleased sound that escapes from your mouth.

“Fuck, you sound even prettier than I imagined.” He starts kissing down your jaw and sucking at your neck. You hold his head against you and bite on your tongue to stop the salacious moans that are fighting hard to make their way into the heavy air.

“You imagined me?” You whispered, shocked, into his ear. He grins up at you devilishly.

“What the hell did you think I was gonna do, baby girl?” He’s quiet, oh so quiet, but you want to scream so loud that it breaks glass. He kisses you again and you rub your thighs together. His kisses feel better than anything you’ve ever had before. You’re drunk on it. Shouta’s long index finger pulls your bottom lip down. You follow his lead and your mouth hangs open. You watch through hazy eyes as his face hovers over yours and his lips purse. A thick glob of spit falls from between his lips and lands on yours. You feel slick gathering between your legs. His spit is licked off of your lips slowly and you open your mouth again. More. You’ve never seen his eyes so dark as he repeats the action and grinds his rock-hard cock against you.

Your legs wrap around his waist and with your free hand, you guide one of his hands down between your legs. His fingers run over the cotton that covers your slit and you can feel it starting to stick to you uncomfortably. At this point, you don’t care that this is something that neither of you should be encouraging. You’ve already got the feeling that you’ve won, you’re finally getting the vengeance you seek against your mother.

Shouta starts to pull your panties down and doesn’t stop until you’re completely free of them. He kneels on the floor and pulls you closer to his face by your thighs. His fingers knead into the skin there and you can feel his breath against your wet core. An obscene moan gets lost in the air and Shouta shoots a stern glance at you. Sorry, you mouth from where you watch perched on your elbows but you don’t really mean it.

He rubs two of his fingers against your core and you keen against the touch, not expecting it to feel as good as it did. Your mouth lolls open and you try not to squirm underneath the intensity of Shouta’s gaze. He focuses against your clit, slowly rubbing circles around it. You grind your hips down into the feeling and he bites gently into the soft skin of your thighs as you fall apart too quickly on his fingers. Your arms turn to jelly and you slide down until your back is against the comforter. Eyes flutter shut as you get lost in ecstasy.

You jolt back up again when you feel Shouta’s fingers get replaced with his mouth. He laps at your wet cunt like he’s not good for anything else and you feel him pull away just long enough to let another glob of spit fall onto your already soaked entrance. Heat rises through your body when you feel him push a finger inside of you with ease because of how worked up he has you. He curls his finger and watches with a silent chuckle how you have to slap your hand over your mouth to keep your sounds inside.

“Cute,” he mumbles against your thigh and then you’re tugging at the roots of his hair, beckoning him on top of you again. You’re so blindsided by pleasure that you don’t care how you look as you paw his shirt off and rake your fingers through the dark hair on his chest. You babble mindlessly against his ear. It makes no matter to you how you sound.

You start trying to undo the button of his pants.

“So fuckin’ needy for me, huh? My needy girl.” He whispers hotly against the side of your neck and all you can do is nod your head at him and kiss him timidly. The tip of his cock rubbed through your folds and there really was no chance of ever going back. 

“Please,” the request rolls off of your tongue and knocks against Shouta’s lips. He covers your lips with his own again and slowly presses into you. You squeeze your eyes shut at the uncomfortable feeling to begin with. He’s so big and all-encompassing that it’s almost hard to breathe. Shouta pants into the saliva-soaked kiss and bites at your bottom lip as his hips rock slowly against yours. Your fingernails dig into his shoulders at the sensation and you tighten your legs around his waist. 

He grinds his hips against yours until he’s fully seated inside of you. He breaks away from the kiss momentarily to look at you, the tiny little tears pooling at the corners of your eyes from the overwhelming emotion. He runs his thumb through the tears and you bury your nose into the crook of his neck.

“Please,” you mutter again, embarrassed, into the fine sheen of sweat that coats his neck. Shouta rocks into you again and again slowly and deeply and you swear you can see galaxies forming in your field of vision. The heavy feeling of his cock inside of you is enough to have you arching your back into his chest and he fucks your harder and rougher until your grip on him is just at the point of leaving marks. You feel the muscles in your stomach turn to jelly and Shouta focuses his thrusts upward, right into your tummy. You whine against his neck. Your pussy clenches hard around him. He pulls your head away from his neck and you flop back against the mattress.

“Are you gonna cum for me?” He whispers lowly and through hazy eyes, you see a look in his eyes that you’ve seen mirrored in your own. It tips you closer to the edge. You nod your head. “Look at me, baby girl.” He requests and then he’s slapping his hand quickly over your mouth to stop you from being too loud as you reach ecstasy. You don’t know how many more times he rocks his hips into yours before he’s spilling inside of you and you can’t stop your eyes from rolling back into your head. His forehead slumps against your own and there’s a drunken grin on both of your faces as he pulls his softening cock out of you.

He maneuvers the both of you around until you’re both laying on your sides, his chest pressed against your back. You drift off to sleep with Shouta’s fingers running through your hair and feeling like you have just won a long battle.

It had been two weeks since you slept with Shouta. The next morning, in the wee hours, you had woken up in your bed alone but snuck around to give him a quick kiss before he left. He had held you by the waist and cradled your head against his when you kissed him by the front door. He had smiled at you and kissed your forehead, too.

It had been a full week since when he pushed you away in the kitchen and had hissed about how what the two of you had done was wrong. Your mother came in the kitchen while you were speechless and attempting to wipe the stricken look off of your face. You glared at Shouta from across the room while she announced a long work trip that she would be taking at the end of the week.

The night before her trip came and your mother organized an elaborate “family” dinner. You invited the boy that had left hickies on your neck over and after dinner, fucked him loud enough in your bedroom for Shouta and your mother to hear on their end of the house. Being a nuisance and vengeance were what you were good at.

The morning after, your mother left wordlessly on her week-and-a-half work trip. When you did leave your room, you and Shouta avoided each other like two black clouds caught up in a windstorm. You couldn’t focus on anything. Not homework, not shows, not the music coming through your headphones. Silently, you had resolved to curl up in a ball on your bed and let tears run from your eyes freely over the predicament you were in. At this point, even if your dad were still alive, you weren’t sure if he would have good enough advice to help you through this.

It hurt.

It hurt listening through the thin walls to Shouta cluttering around the house like nothing was wrong. It hurt how he only looked at you in passing as he put the leftovers from dinner away as you walked your hookup to the door the previous night. Didn’t he know that he was the reason you were tearing yourself apart? No, that wasn’t exactly fair. 

A violent sob leapt out of your throat and you slapped your hand over your mouth to cover up your residual noises. You were the reason things had gotten so out of hand. You were almost completely blinded by your need to ruin your mother’s relationship that you hadn’t realized that you were sliding down a slippery slope for Shouta. Maybe you were as bad as your mother thought you were.

Your head was clogging up with the frequency of your tears now and it was hard for you to breathe. You couldn’t slow your mind down enough to regulate your breathing and your breaths kept coming out in ragged little pants. You sat up in a frenzy, unable to catch your breath. The disappointed look on Shouta’s face the previous night kept flashing though your head. You were lightheaded as you stood and stumbled on wobbly knees through your bedroom door and out into the living room. Tears coated your eyelashes together but through the blurriness, you could see Shouta sitting on the couch. He sat up slowly, on guard, unsure of where the line was anymore.

“What’s wrong?” His tone was neutral and that was enough to send you into a fresh wave of sobs and panic as your nose was so stuffy now that you couldn’t get a proper breath. You wanted to yell but it came out strangled. You wiped brashly at your face with the sleeve of your shirt and started to wring your hands together anxiously.

“C’mon, what’s wrong?” Shouta had stood and was standing a polite distance away from you now. There was no arm held out to you in consolation but his voice had taken on a tone that was more suited for talking to a dying animal. You felt like one just then.

“I’m-I’m sorry,” You managed to get out through hiccups. Pitifully, you watched the way that Shouta’s shoulders slumped. Still, you sobbed as he stayed quiet. Your knees wobbled perilously and before you could unceremoniously fall to the ground, you lowered yourself to the hardwood in a heap of limbs with your face buried in your hands. For a fleeting second, you wondered if you could die from crying too hard. 

You felt a warm hand on your shoulder. Shouta’s hand. You couldn’t bring yourself to look at him.

“You’re gonna make yourself throw up if you keep crying this hard.” It was nothing but the obvious. His hand squeezed down soothingly on your skin.

“Don’t care,” You muttered stuffily against your palms and curled tighter against yourself. “‘I think I’m gonna die.” Shouta’s fingers worked their way under your chin and yanked your head up more roughly than he had intended and through your puffy eyes, you saw the face of a man wracking his brain to try and remember if there was ever a time in his thirty-odd years where he had successfully used his Erasure to stop a panic-induced crying fit.

“You’re not gonna die.” There’s an annoyed edge to his voice. It makes you cry harder. He heaves out a world-weary sigh and pulls you into his chest. You don’t want his scent to be comforting but it’s exactly what you need at that moment.

“‘m sorry. ‘m just so sorry, Shouta. I didn’t wan-wanna fuck him. Just wanted to make you mad.” Getting the words out feels like running a marathon.

“I know, baby girl. I know.” There’s a pause before he speaks and he warms a little, melting into the sad jumble of your body. You close your eyes and try to focus on that, as if there was any way to repair this.

“Do you know how miserable it is being in love with you?” You look at him with puffy eyes. If your words affect him, he gives nothing away. But your words are the truth. There was only one thing in your life that hurt more than his rejection. His arms around you tighten and then fall away. You wipe your eyes again but it still does no good.

“It doesn’t make sense for you to be in love with me.” He picks at his nails.

“I don’t care. I am.”

“I treated you badly.”

“If everyone stopped loving the people that mistreated them, then the world would be an awfully loveless place.” It’s almost comical how your voice sounds with your nose stopped up.

“That’s not a logical…that’s a childish way of looking at things.” 

“Tell me you don’t love me back.” Your fingers drum on the floor and Shouta’s eyes narrow at you.

“You know I can’t do that.”

“Why can’t you do that?”

“Because you know I fell for the wrong woman. You know I married the wrong one.” Your heart stops.

“I don’t know that,” there’s a pause. “You’re saying that you love me too.”

“I’m saying that I married your mom and fell for you and it’s the most illogical thing I’ve ever done.”

“Tell me that you love me and that I’m better than her and I’ll be okay.” You know you’re pushing him and you should just be grateful that he’s speaking to you again. He sighs deeply, guiltily.

“I love you too. More than your mother. I’ll have a talk with her when she gets back from her trip.”

You grin pitifully at him. You always, always, got what you wanted.

what ep is this again?! i need to re-watch this 😭

you’re finally awake, sasuke.

━━━ ❝ if you let me, I'm yours...❞

↳ ; ༄ gojou s. x f!reader

"he was the strongest when he walked out of that door but inside of those four walls you called home — he was just a man. a man that only wanted to be loved and wanted it from no one but you."

content ; ༄ sexual content, soft!dom gojo, sickeningly passionate sex, he’s a little clingy in this but it’s bc he’s in love with you, dirty talk, riding, pussyjob, breeding, mentions of pregnancy, loving aftercare, slightly clingy reader, just a lovestruck gojo that wants you & only you

w.c ; ༄ 12.2k

↳ note from syn ; ༄ i haven’t been super active but i’m always writing behind the scenes and this is something i’ve been working on for almost two months so this past week, i finally managed to scrape up enough inspo to birth an ending and here we are 🪷 hope you enjoy & if you reblog, you’ll get a kiss from yours truly hehe ୧

↳ p.s. this lovely little human @arcanedevil here helped me by editing this entire thing :”) cleaned up behind me perfectly & needed to make sure i gave her the proper credit otherwise y’all would’ve been sooo mad at me for the thousand of mistakes i couldn’t catch LOL luv ya babe ᰔ

“Fuck, you’re tight.”

The headboard weeped under Satoru’s strong grasp, threatening to break under the pressure.

His other hand was preoccupied, loosely curled around the length of his cock as he watched with a focused gaze, sinking further into you inch by inch.

Your face was hot like an iron, clearly out of the norm for you to have a man you’ve claimed to dislike so much on top of you with one of your legs thrown over his shoulder. This was a man you cursed at while you two could be seen working together but during the nights… It was obvious you couldn’t leave him alone and neither could he with you. You needed each other, but he could be such a piece of work.

Gojou Satoru knew nothing of boundaries or pleasantries. He saw no need to announce his presence nor did he care about being even the slightest bit polite towards you. He treated you as if you were a longtime friend of his. Arm over your shoulder, tugging you places when there was clearly a job to do and buying you unnecessary gifts because he believed in surprises when you hated surprises. There wasn’t particularly anything you liked about him unless he was quiet — which was almost never.

Satoru was annoying, but he always meant well.

As a fellow sorcerer, you couldn’t deny how caring he was. Deep down, there was more to him that many people didn’t know. Only those in his very tight-knit circle knew what he was really like when he turned off the bright smiles and obnoxious laughter. Deep down was a man in constant pain that only wanted to quiet the haunting voices from his past.

That was how he ended up in your bed almost every night.

He’d come knocking on your door bearing gifts. Those gifts contained a bottle of wine and your favorite takeout.

It worked every time.

The two of you would sit, eat and talk about each of your days, how it went and such before pulling out the wine. Greasy food plus the dull ache of alcohol only ended up creating an atmosphere that quickly filled up with heavy sexual tension. Satoru wasn’t a shy man. When he wanted something, he went after it. Often, that was you and you never saw a reason to tell him no.

“Ah, ‘toru,” you planted a hand against his abdomen, feeling him finally bury himself full, your walls tighten around him with a grip unlike anything he’d ever felt before. “Hold on.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he teased, a half smirk on his face that made you roll your eyes. As you focused on catching your breath, you also watched the way his abs would tense up with each breath he took.

It was no secret that Satoru chose you to be his regular sleeping partner because of the mind blowing sex you two had. Not to mention, you were undeniably gorgeous in his eyes and there was nothing about his lifestyle that he felt the need to hide because you were also a sorcerer. You were aware of the small amount of extra time he barely had on his hands, and never pestered to see him more than he was able. Though, you two were only fuck buddies and nothing more — he’d been with plenty of women that just didn’t get it. He was a busy man. Always saving the world and all. When he came over, he left all of that pressure at the door and fell into his security blanket in the form of you.

You and your plush thighs and cute little body. He couldn’t get enough of it. Although you weren’t all that insecure about your body, it still felt a bit strange that a man as attractive as him would choose to lay in your bed rather than someone more of what you felt was his type. At first, you looked at it as a one time thing and that maybe he was just curious of what sex was like with someone like you until he kept coming back. Several nights in a row he’d show up and nothing you said or did turned him away.

At the beginning, you had a thought that maybe he was put up to it. To talk and get to know you with the purpose of getting in bed with you. All because you didn’t trust Suguru, his best friend, at all.. The man tried hitting on you once before but you were kind when you politely told him that you weren’t interested. He wasn’t your type and it was because of his personality. You didn’t have a long list of men you dated, but it was enough to make you realize what you did and didn’t want in someone.

It turned out that Satoru talked to you of his own volition. He wasn’t dared, wasn’t involved with any sort of bet between him and someone else — just wanted to genuinely get to know you because he claimed to see something in you that no one else did. Curious, you agreed to becoming friends and it was like getting on the bullet train and never getting off from there.

One of Satoru’s guilty pleasures was taking you shopping and letting you spend his money however you wanted. Except…you never wanted to do that. He was the one buying you gifts and pretending you were the one using his card to treat yourself. Instead, you used your own money and whenever you two went out, mostly on downtime between the missions you had, it was your card you swiped with each purchase. With each dollar sign he saw, the bigger the crack in his obnoxious little heart got. You figured it was just him overreacting but he had this unshakable need to take care of you.

You lived in a nice one bedroom apartment close to downtown Tokyo that wasn’t too expensive for you to keep up but he owned a penthouse in central Tokyo. You were happy with what you were able to afford and he knew you two were just friends but sometimes…

Sometimes Satoru could see you two being more and maybe that was why you felt he’d begun acting differently around you recently.

Less texts, less calls, less random appearances knowing it always annoyed you and he’d gotten a bit quieter when near you. It was like he’d set up an invisible wall between you and him, much like how his infinity seemed to work. It was as if he was keeping you at a safe distance and you were perceptive enough to figure that out. The question was, why did that bother you so much? You were just friends. With…benefits, but friends no less. Hadn’t it always been about the sex though? There was never really more to it than that, yet you still felt some sort of way about how he moved around you.

There were a few instances where you texted him just to be nosy and see what he was up to. He texted you and told you that he was out with Suguru. That was it. No extra details, just out with his best friend. Usually, he was all under and over you. Times where it was physically impossible to remove him from your body. Where he and you would be cozied up on the living room couch like a couple, watching some romcom. He’d fall asleep on your stomach and you’d be in and out for about two hours until you’d suggest moving to the bedroom to sleep properly.

Satoru was the only man to sleep in the same bed as you since your ex boyfriend you left two years ago. No one else has had the same luxury since then, other than Satoru.

You inquired about his strange behavior around you but he tried settling your worries with a simple, “It’s nothing,” and carried on like it was just that. Nothing. You couldn’t look at his new attitude towards you as nothing but you were already suspicious enough. It wasn’t normal how much Satoru liked being around you. Well, before he got all weird on you. You were questioning things back then too, and it would seem it was for good reason.

Right now, however, he was on top of you. Seconds away from splitting the wood of your headboard in half or fucking you brainless with furrowed brows and his bottom lip tucked between his teeth. Both of you gave it another second, eyes stuck on how flushed his pelvis was against yours. After you were sure it was okay for him to move, you pulled your hand back and his sterling blue eyes connected with yours.

“Now?“ he muttered.

“Please?” you pleaded.

If having sex was the only way you could have him close to you again, you weren’t going to think twice about it. He’d become such a big part of your daily routine that it pained you to think about him never showing up again. He was like oxygen for you now. Needing him to breathe and it was definitely a bad sign. He couldn’t know how you felt about him. It wasn’t like it was easily explainable at the moment, but knowing that you now wanted him around more than usual, it was going to only ruin things even further.

You couldn’t allow yourself to care too much. He wasn’t worth putting all of yourself into. He was a friend that you sometimes fucked. Why did it have to get any more complicated than that? It was simple. There were no attachments on either end. No pressure to be more. Not only could he be a little too much for you at times but his job as a sorcerer prevented him from even getting into a relationship. Although, a relationship was the last thing you wanted.

“Are you comfortable?” He asked, stirring you out of your thoughts.

The way his eyes seemed to gleam underneath the lamp’s faint tinted glow, it almost made you want to look away. Whenever he came over, he didn’t bother to wear his shades. You kept your place a bit dark so it helped the strain on his eyes, but it didn’t help keep you from staring back sometimes. It was like looking into a diamond. So many different shades of blue with crystallized touches in them. You knew that he was able to see more than anyone on earth could but you wondered if he truly knew what his eyes looked like from someone else’s perspective. They were too captivating to look away from and oftentimes he teased people for staring, being cheeky about it but to you — they were the most beautiful set of eyes you’d ever seen.

“Mhm.”

The short response only made the smile on his face bigger as he glanced back down to the way your pretty pussy lips hugged his cock, keeping his strokes slow for the moment.

“You’re in your head again,” He muttered, almost low enough for you to miss. “How do you do that?”

“Huh?” You blinked, unable to ignore the way his length dragged itself back and forth, against your soft sensitive walls. “Do what?“

“Think this much while I’m fucking you.”

“Oh. S’nothing,” you quipped, then turned your head to the side, biting your lip.

Satoru stared at you for a moment, believing that if he looked hard enough — he’d see every single one of your thoughts. He’d know what you were thinking about.

He remembered that at the beginning of all this, your mind had been on one thing. Him in between your legs, invading your little cunt, watching the way his name fell from those pretty lips of yours. No talking. Just the sound of yours and his moans intermingling together. But it was because of his loud moaning and the headboard hitting the wall persistently that caused the neighbor to come out and warn you two about filing a complaint recently. Since then, Satoru started to just hold the stupid headboard while he fucked you, but you began seeing that maybe that wasn’t such a good idea either. It was close to breaking in half. It definitely wasn’t going to last much longer.

Deciding to force your attention back on the present — him rather — he leaned down and joined your chests together, hips creating long rolls that had your hands instantly gripping at his arms. A small gasp escaped your lips, feeling him slowly pull out only to slam back in with a smack against your thighs.

“‘Toru!” You mewled out, moving your head back to look at him. He smirked and dived down to your neck, giving it open mouthed kisses, fucking you again. His thrusts were desperate this time. He still had a hand on the headboard but his other hand was now at your plush waist, gripping it tightly to keep you in place. So you wouldn’t try and crawl away. Truthfully, if he didn’t keep at least a hand on you at all times, he was afraid you were going to disappear. Fall from his grasp — never to be seen again.

In some ways, you were like his anchor to this world. As if you were keeping him from becoming nothing. Mere particles in the air until he fizzled out into pure nothingness. He even hated to close his eyes because that meant he couldn’t see you and he needed to see you. To hear your laugh that sounded like pretty bells chiming into the air. To feel the warmth of your touch against his cold one.

And you were always so warm. He usually had to wear layers where you typically settled for a single sweater or turtleneck. It was why he liked being on or under you. He was always so very cold, but not when he was near you. You were his own personal furnace that kept him shielded from the harsh winters of his tormenting thoughts. When he was with you, nothing else mattered. It was just you and him. He was the strongest, but you made him weak.

His savior, and tragically — his kryptonite.

If he had to be honest, you’d become someone he would die for.

Never in his life had he felt this way about anyone else. Too many times he’d escaped the clutches of desperate women after a good lay, and barely made it out. They always wanted something from him, even when he went the extra mile to tell them beforehand that he wasn’t a commitment sort of guy. He was tall, criminally attractive, and rich. They did their best to sell their worth to him, but he just wasn’t buying any of it.

When it came to you, he found himself seeking you out instead. You hardly texted him the day after a night together, and he was always the one reaching out to you. Instead of feeling frustrated by this, he was intrigued. He didn’t mind the chase, the person just needed to be worth it — and you were fucking worth it, that was for sure.

His movements were deep and long, the two prominent veins on his cock rubbing against your tight wet walls so good, you could hardly think straight.

Satoru skimmed his nose up your neck, and pressed it against your soft cheek, “You’re so quiet, baby,” he muttered, lips ghosting your warm skin. “Let me hear you. Please.”

Your sweet moans were a sense of validation for his self esteem. He was confident that he still knew how to make you feel good but when you got quiet, it bothered him. Then again, it was probably just you in your thoughts again but the thought of your mind being elsewhere for the second time in a row while he was several inches deep within you — it was enough to kill his hard on.

“Satoru,” you whispered and he didn’t waste any time connecting his eyes with yours. You gave him a small smile and placed a hand on his cheek, “Stay with me tonight, won’t you?”

“S…stay?” He asked, dumbfounded. You’d never asked him that before. What was the special occasion? “You want me to stay after this?” He decreased to slow rolls, taken aback.

You nodded. “If it’s not too much to ask?”

“Baby,” he breathed and you bit into your lip, feeling him press several tiny kisses against your cheek until you cracked, and gave him the smile that he’d been looking for. He grinned. “Of course I can. As friends though, right?”

He wasn’t sure who he was asking that for.

Himself?

You?

What answer did he even anticipate? It was agreed by the both of you that things would stay neutral. That the sex was just that. Nothing more, nothing less. Thankfully you were on the same page but he feared that he, himself, was trying to turn it. Trying to make this mean so much more than it was originally ever supposed to.

What were you doing to him?

Your little nod made him visibly frown but concealed it by hiding his face in your neck again, mentally berating himself for letting things get so out of hand. You were such a good friend to him. A reprieve from always being around Suguru. Someone that loved taking him out to different party scenes and hooking him up with different pretty women. Since Satoru met you, he hadn’t brought anyone else home. You hadn’t seen the inside of his four walls either, but he didn’t feel the need to bring some woman home to fuck when he now had you. Always ready. Always willing. Each time he knocked at your door, you were there, promptly — like you’d been waiting for him to come by.

Maybe things were perfect as they were. If they were slightly different now, then the lack of labels should’ve been relieving. And yet…that didn’t seem like the case. He was growing frustrated with the way things have become. Frustrated with his own feelings and frustrated with not knowing yours. You were so good at hiding away your real thoughts while he remained outspoken about his. He didn’t mind confronting what confused him, but you weren’t as willing. He understood but that didn’t make it hurt any less.

“Satoru…”

“Mm.”

“Why did you stop?”

He opened his eyes and breathed in the intoxicating floral scent stuck to your skin from using your favorite body wash earlier. For several moments, he stayed that way until you brought his face back in front of yours. A cute unsettled look on your face that he almost melted from.

“Is there more to this?” He outwardly asked, finally letting go of the headboard. He dipped a hand into the sheets near your head, grabbing a fistful as he awaited your answer.

Tilting your head to the side in wonder, you asked, “More…to this?”

“Yeah. Between us.”

“Oh.”

It should’ve made you jump out of the bed and run straight out of the apartment. Just run until your feet blistered. Far, far away from a man that you now saw for who he really was. Broken and only wanting to feel wanted.

What did you provide that he wasn’t able to get from anyone else? You cared for him like you cared for yourself. Sure, he was a bit annoying and over the top with everything but he was a good man. He deserved nothing shy of the best, and you were desperate to give that to him. Nothing less than you’ve given yourself, but you had to be honest. There was more to it.

Nanami was evidence of that.

— flashback.

“He’s coming over? Again? Tsk, that’s three nights in a row. I’m surprised.”

You were seated right across from him, thighs pressed together with a small cup of coffee tucked in between your delicate fingers. You took a slow slip, staring at the table in front of you.

Nanami had a leg crossed over the other, comfortably sitting back against his chair with tea in one hand and a piece of the cake he ordered in the other. He looked at you for a moment, wondering why you were still entertaining Satoru in this manner if you were a woman of class. Always claiming that you wouldn’t fall victim to Satoru’s charming ways and yet there you sat — another meeting with him tonight hanging over your head.

What was so special about Gojou Satoru? A man to be vehemently complexed and dangerously damaging to the mind, body and soul. Someone with a heart like yours did not need to be with a man like that. Someone unstable and unsure of what he wanted from life itself.

Nanami could see it. You were on such a narrow path that it couldn’t fit anyone else. It was one that you clearly needed to walk alone but Satoru found a way to make it a two person journey. He was someone that defeated all odds at all costs. Someone that, if he lost the game, he’d simply change it. He was the strongest sorcerer alive and yet…

You only saw weakness when you stood in front of him.

Satoru was a man that exercised all things of control and yet, he found you on top of him on multiple nights. Letting you do whatever it was you wanted because he was now under your control whether you’d realized that yet or not. Moments where you’d stare down at him like he was the only man you saw in your eyes. Staring back as if you were the only woman in his.

No one ever saw him like that. So vulnerably and miserably open the way he was with you. When he was around you, alone, his guard was down. He was sure that if you chose to attempt it, you had the power to destroy him once and for all. He was the strongest when he walked out of your door but inside of those four walls you called home — he was just a man. When he walked through your door, he kept his infinity down because there was no need to fear you. In that, when he fell asleep in your lap or on your couch while you cooked, it would’ve been easy to sink a blade through his neck or through his heart. Easy to end his life where he laid.

You had more power over him than anyone alive. It scared him but not more than his fear of you not feeling the same way as him.

And what feeling was that?

“I can’t explain it,” you mumbled, and set your cup down to lean back in your chair as well. “I want to leave him alone. I should leave him alone…so why can’t I?” Your eyes fell on customers that began walking in, a few couples that were holding hands. You felt a faint smile tug at the corner of your lips. “I just can’t seem to say no.” You scoffed, looking back at your friend. “As if I’d want to. When he comes to my door with that stupid grin on his face holding takeout and wine, the last thing I want to do is close the door in his face. I don’t ever plan on having sex with him. It just happens. We talk, we laugh and then by the time we’ve both finished our third glasses of wine, we’re already shoulder to shoulder. I don’t know…” You looked down at your lap, blinking in curiosity. “There’s something about him… Something I’m so drawn to…”

“The ability to share your pain with one another can become addicting,” Nanami commented, sighing. “It’s a beautiful thing at first. It feels similar to buying new clothes or getting a new phone. A new love interest, if you will. Overtime, that feeling gets lost in the shrouding mist of redundancy.” The confused look on your face made him smile as he sat his own drink down to give you a better explanation. “Two things end up happening. One, you’d end up getting bored of it. Bored of the feeling you’d become so attached to. And Two? Well…that addicting feeling goes away and gets stripped down to its real components. It becomes toxic; poisonous. If you have the guts to leave the person, you’d be able to see it for what it was when you were in it. It’s hard to see through a glass you’re on the other side of. Does that make sense?”

“Entirely.”

You understood what he was saying but that wasn’t how things were for you and Satoru. He didn’t run his mouth about his childhood days or anything but you recognized that it was bad enough to remain unspoken of. You knew that he had several responsibilities from being the strongest sorcerer in the world, and knew the pressures of keeping people safe because of it. His spunky personality was more for show than anything else. That wasn’t to say that he walked around in pain because he looked happy whenever he was around friends but you couldn’t imagine how he felt going home afterwards. Alone with his thoughts with no means to escape them.

He’d once told you that he didn’t sleep well when he stayed at his apartment. He’d stand in front of his bedroom window, staring out at the nightlife below with a glass of alcohol in hand. He said that it was to drown out the voices. To dull the numbing ache of reality that he was forced to wake up to every morning, if he was graced with any sleep at all.

Being a sorcerer meant that you had to understand that people could die. That you weren’t going to be able to save everyone. It was impossible but Satoru didn’t believe that. He believed he held the power to protect and save all innocent life, and whenever he failed at saving another — it ate away at him.

The higher ups only wanted to see him succeed. His clan made it their life’s mission to breathe down his neck in order to make sure that he did his job right, and it was a lot to carry on such narrow shoulders. Too much to expect out of just one man out of the entire world before him. Most of his time was spent in front of curses. It was a wonder how he hadn’t gone insane yet.

Maybe that was due to having good friends that he could trust around him. Without you and everyone else — there was no telling who he’d be by now.

In a way, you felt a sense of responsibility for him. Nothing unwanted, but something you voluntarily wanted to bear. A position that no one else had the ability to fulfill. Not the way you could.

The way you accepted him, and treated him with care. All things he’d missed out on as a child. Naturally, with his childhood stolen from him, he often appeared child-like. He knew when to be an adult but most of the time he was jokes and laughter. Sometimes he pulled a few pranks on Nanami for the hell of it. Throughout all of that, there was still a man in pain inside. A man that needed those things to get through the blurred days without losing his sanity in the midst of it all.

You were there for him. No matter what.

He couldn’t have been more grateful to have you in his life.

— present.

“I think…” What did you think? Was there more to what you had with him? There couldn’t be…but unexpectedly, was there?

“You don’t have to answer that,” he quickly intervened, which was followed by a low sigh, hoping to trash the topic as soon as it came. “Forget I said anything.”

“No,” your eyes held his, determined to talk about whatever was bothering him because it was clearly distracting him. “Let’s talk about it. I just don’t think it would be smart of us to start something from this. We’re supposed to be friends that sometimes fuck. Are you really starting to have real feelings for me, Satoru?”

“Are you?” He repeated, almost holding his breath for an answer he felt was going to be exactly what he didn’t want to hear.

You blinked, sitting in silence, trying to collect your thoughts because were you developing feelings for him? It was beginning to become clear as day that he held some for you and wanted to feel like you were also feeling something for him. That he wasn’t alone or delusional to think that liking you more than a friend was unwise. In order for things to work itself out, you had to be honest.

“I…I don’t know. Maybe?”

Was it idiotic to let yourself open up the way you were? He already found himself sleeping in your bed, bringing you food, calling and texting you almost every minute of each day, acting like your boyfriend. Would it have been wrong to allow him to stay? Make a home in your heart, entrusting your very soul to another man that had the ability to crush it at any given moment? If you didn’t allow yourself to be vulnerable enough to let someone else in, how were you ever going to be happy?

Without even knowing it, you were like a hamster on a wheel. Constantly running, believing you’re getting somewhere when you’re only going in circles. Always on a moving train, regrettably missing your stop every single time. You were afraid. Too apprehensive to put your trust into another man. Especially someone so broken like you. What if he hurt you? Led you to believe his love was true only to catch you when you got down, and break your heart all over again?

In truth, if something did start between you and him, you had hopes of it working out. Even though there was a major part in you that didn’t want to let him in, you could see a future with him. Something solid and true. You couldn’t trick yourself into believing that you weren’t deserving of real love anymore. Not when you knew, deep down, that you were more than deserving of it. You were owed it for all the heartbreaking years of being with a man that never saw you for more than what he felt you were worth. There was more to you than meets the eye and Satoru saw it. He saw you, and maybe that was what scared you the most.

That he was able to see into the very essence of what made you who you were, and wasn’t scared. Wasn’t too afraid to reach you and take that part of you into his arms, telling you that it was okay. He made you feel warm. That it was safe to fall for him, and maybe it was. Maybe you’d been deluding yourself to believe that he wasn’t made for you. That you were in his life to help him heal and move on. To find a way to live his life authentically and happily. A pawn in his success to happiness. Were you? Or were you meant to remain a part of his life but as something more than just his supportive friend? There was only one way you were going to be able to find out, and that was through trusting him.

To trust him to not let you fall.

“Maybe, huh…” he said under his breath, looking off to the side with a deep look on his face. As if the wheels were turning in his head, trying to make sense of your response. “Wanna know what I think?”

“I do, actually.”

“I think,” he looked back at you, smiling. “I think that you do have feelings for me. Maybe it’s safer for you to pretend as if you don’t or that you’re still figuring things out for yourself but I can see it. You’re scared of being vulnerable but, can I tell you that I was too?” He pushed some of your hair back from your face, sighing. “I’ve always been too scared to let someone in and it’s made me unhappy. It made me realize what I’m missing out on. I don’t want to go much longer without it, so that’s why I’m telling you how I feel now. If not, I’d only regret it.”

You understood what he was saying and it was a slight shock because you’d once believed that he wasn’t capable of feeling something strong for anyone else but himself. Not in an egotistical way but as a coping mechanism. To protect himself from anyone meant to do him harm. It would’ve been well within his rights to do so but it would’ve been damaging to himself. Finding out that he was willing to put himself out there, becoming more vulnerable around you than he already was — it meant something and maybe it was time you stopped ignoring it.

This entire time, he was the one making the obvious efforts in an attempt to get you to see his feelings for you. The sudden lack of calling and texting were sure signs of it. He’d been trying to distance himself from you to save his own feelings, but here he was, letting that all go. Risking his heart in hopes that you’d return the feelings.

What were you going to do?

“Satoru, I’m afraid,” you told him in a shaky whisper, trying to hold back the tears. “I’m afraid that you’re going to hurt me.”

He quickly took your face into his warm hands, looking into your sorrowful eyes, “I know, baby, I know, but you’re gonna have to trust me. I’m willing to trust you. We’ve both got a past. We just have to overcome it and I’d rather do it with than without you.” He pressed his forehead against yours, closing his eyes. “I just need you to let me in. Let me show you that I can take care of you. Please.”

There were reasons to believe that he wasn’t going to make good on his foreshadowed promises, but there were also reasons to believe that he was going to do just that. Take care of you and your fragile heart. That he wasn’t going to be like the last guy and treat you worse than dirt, but love you like you were always meant to be loved. He had just as much to lose as you and maybe that was why you chose to give it a shot.

“Okay.”

With a small gasp, he pulled back and stared at you with wide eyes. “Okay?” The excited tone to his voice made you smile as you rolled your eyes, nodding. He bit his lip to keep from smiling back, but he couldn’t help it. He kissed you and laughed, “So you’re my girlfriend now?”

You giggled, wanting nothing more than to hide your face. “I mean…yeah?”

Satoru cupped your face into his hands again, your skin melting against his gentle touch. His beautiful eyes held yours captive, face visibly flushed from the rush of emotions within him. His heart rattled against the cage of his chest, desperate to jump over the ledge and fall into the depths of your awaiting hands.

It felt like a millennia waiting for you to give him a yes, but an eternity for you to realize that he deserved a chance just like everyone else. You needed to be open to the possibility that maybe he didn’t waltz into your life to hurt you. Maybe he came to show you that good people still existed. He wasn’t perfect by any means but who was? Satoru came into your life for a reason and it was imperative that you gave him the chance to show you why he was there. Even if a relationship ended up not working out between you two, it was best to try and see what did. If a friendship awaited you two at the end, then didn’t you want to stay and find out?

In his eyes, you saw a man that longed to be loved, understood, cared for and given a chance. He wasn’t looked at as a human being by most in the jujutsu society. They saw him as the chosen one; powerful and born to stop all evil that flooded the streets of Japan. He was raised as a weapon. Never knew what a proper childhood was like. His life was stolen from him; it was no wonder he’d lost hope.

Until he met you.

You gave him reason. Gave him hope. Hope that his story is still unwritten. That there was more to come. That at the end, there weren't any credits but a sequel.

Gojou Satoru met you and found his new purpose. A reason to keep going because he wasn’t done living. He needed to stay because you existed, and became his world. He found you, and he wasn’t going to let you go. He needed to protect you, protect his treasure; protect his purpose because without you…he was no one. As much as you were his kryptonite, you were also his heroine.

He was drawn to you like a magnet. Your touch, your smell, your lingering perfume that clung to his clothing after a night of just holding you — those were the things that he held onto whenever he went back to his place. However, they faded after a day or so. He was forced to find you again, repeating the process because you helped him stay sane in this insane world of his. When you weren’t around, he needed to have a piece of you to anchor himself because he’d lose sight of his purpose.

The days could drag on, agonizing him to his limits but seeing you—seeing you made it all better. He was himself again and hated it when he had to go back home and look in the bathroom mirror after a long hot shower, watching his tormented expression stare back at him.

But now that you were officially his, there was nothing standing in his way. He could stop holding his breath and breathe. Take in your intoxicating fragrance again and again, and memorize it. Keep it with him at all times by not letting you out of his sight unless he truly had to. Not for too long or he’d come and find you again because you were his drug, so very addicting. Too painfully aware that one day, you might not be good for him anymore. That his possessive need to keep you close to him would become an obsession. If he wasn’t careful, he’d watch you slip through his fingers, but no. He couldn’t think about those things right now. Absolutely not.

You agreed to become his girlfriend. You were his now.

That was all that mattered.

“Thank you,” he whispered, eyes glistening with tears as he tried holding them back.

Your face softened immediately, holding his wrists gently, “What are you thanking me for?”

The air was still.

You blinked and watched as he dropped the last wall he still had up, ultimately letting you in, completely.

“Loving me.”

You were sure that nothing in this godforsaken world was better than kissing Satoru, the strongest man alive. How he made a simple kiss feel like your one and only hope to true salvation. How he enveloped not just your mouth but your body, your entire being into himself, shrouding your soul with warmth and a promise to keep you safe. That you could depend on him like he was going to learn to trust and depend on you. How he cradled your face like delicate porcelain, sliding his tongue over yours, sighing into the kiss that he never wanted to end.

Unfortunately, you had to breathe and pulled back, but he wasn’t done with you.

Not even close.

He wrapped his arms around you and turned over, switching your positions so that you were now on top of him, his hands at your hips, dangerously close to your thighs that begged to be touched; held.

Through his pale lashes, he stared at you, sweeping his eyes across your naked form that sat deliciously in front of him, waiting for his next move. Devouring the sight of you in silence made you feel anxious, pressing the plush tips of your fingers against his chest as you sat, staring back at him. Your breath hitched in your throat when you felt one of his hands move inward, between your thighs, towards the source of heat he could feel.

He wore a growing smirk, intently focused on your twitching thighs, ears not missing the diminutive shy sounds that tried to sneak through your shaky breaths. Once he reached his destination, he couldn’t help but soak in the pleasurable look on your face as he pressed two of his slender fingers against the spot you needed him most.

“Satoru,” you moaned quietly under your breath, pleading him with your eyes not to tease you this way.

He chuckled with casual raised brows, head tilted a bit to the side, “Awh, come on. You always have so much to say. What happened to all of that?”

He was clearly torturing you. How mean he could be.

The pulsing at your core felt unbearable. If he was going to treat you with a bit of disrespect, then he’d need to remember that when you got on top — he didn’t have control anymore.

You did.

“You’re not being very nice.”

The steady tone of your voice wiped away the smile on his face as you wrapped a hand around his throat, pulling his attention away from your clit.

His eyes fluttered with surprise, hands gripping onto your legs to steady himself as he felt you slide back, brushing against his length that was now in between your wet folds. He groaned deeply, squeezing his eyes shut, holding himself back from embarrassing himself by creaming the outside of your pretty cunt. It was like sprinting towards the edge of a cliff and being forced to stop just before soaring to his death.

His dick twitched. With your weight on him, moving your hips agonizingly slowly, up, down and over the head of his cock like that — he was bound to lose his mind. He wanted nothing more than to impale you on his length and fuck you with nothing on his mind than showing you who was really in control here, no matter that you were now on top. However, with your hand on his throat, bullying his cock with your teasing hip rolls, he was completely at your mercy.

Good.

Because he was.

You leaned down, lips brushing his with a taunting smile, “Ohh, come now ‘Toru. You always have so much to say,” his breathing picked up, eyeing you down with nothing but want in his eyes. “What happened to all of that?”

“Please,” he begged, voice cracking in the process as his fingers dipped into your skin with desperation. “I’ll do whatever you want, just fuck me please.”

“Mmm,” you cooed teasingly, grinding down harder against his pathetic cock that laid against his lower abdomen, pretty tip an angry red from the lack of real attention. “But do you deserve it?”

Of course he didn’t but that didn’t mean he was going to say that out loud. He was willing to say whatever you wanted him to just to get his dick wet and either way — you were going to give it to him because seeing him whine and beg was one thing, but actually giving him what he wanted was what you found to be the most fun.

His feet were planted into the mattress, hips daring to move up just to get more of that friction that you were unfairly denying him of. Oh how he wanted to just use your body until he was satisfied, filling your pretty pussy up again and again, ignoring your wants and needs just as you were ignoring his own. Did you deserve it? That question applied just as much to you as it did him. And did it matter?

His cock slid in between your puffy folds, willing to cum just from grinding up against you. Your eyes bored into his, curiously watching your boyfriend surrender to the desperate struggle that was now forced upon him. His hands flew to your hips, tugging you down each time the head of his cock disappeared into the warmth of your cunt. The low grunts that spilled from his lips made your body tingle, but you didn’t make a move to stop him.

Not yet.

“I’m g-gonna cum just like this,” he groaned out, forcing himself to stare down at the way your pretty pussy was now shiny with his pre and your arousal, a dangerous mix. “Fuck.”

“Satoruuu,” you sang in a light tone, quickly grabbing his attention again. “You would rather cum like this than inside of me?” Your face pulled into a fake pout, one he only saw as real through his lust blinded eyes. “That makes me a bit sad.”

If you’d stayed silent any longer, he would’ve thought about using your thighs or your tits to cum. You were being so rude a moment ago, he would’ve had no choice. Now you were offering him what he’d wanted the entire time. Your generosity always did come with a price. He couldn’t think of what that was going to be. Like he was really able to think at all at this point.

When you moved to hover over his twitching dick, blue irises flickered up between himself and you, skin itching and fingers prickling with anticipation.

“Please,” he looked at you again, obediently lying there awaiting your next move.

A smile found its way to your lips as you wrapped a soft hand around his length, directing the slick covered tip towards your sweet cunt, teasing him a few times by purposely missing the mark just to hear his breath hitch between attempts. His fingers curled around the sheets of the bed underneath him, eyes almost glossy with frustrated tears until he felt the kiss of warmth that came from you finally sinking down, little by little, onto him.

His moan was louder than yours, face twisted up in such a mesmerizing sight. Now that you didn’t need to hold him while letting him stretch you open, you chose to witness the way he tucked his bottom lip between his teeth, letting the blood rush to his neck and covering the skin in blots of red. His skin was beginning to glint with sweat, face flushing and chest heaving with long low breaths. He looked so pretty underneath you.

You couldn’t wait to ruin him.

Once he was fully swallowed whole, you slid your hands up his abdomen to his chest, lightly tweaking at his neglected pink nipples, giggling at the way he shook under your touch. His eyes were closed now, deciding to let his other senses take over. He felt you move up, pitifully slow, before you dropped back down, causing him to cough out a broken moan.

Now you were just torturing him.

“Before you say ‘please’ again, know that I’m still in control. Therefore, I’m allowed to do whatever I please,” your cheeky smile made him sigh, hands taking refuge back at your hips to ground his shattering existence from sinking right into the mattress from the feel of your tight, beautifully silk, walls wrapped so deliciously around him. He’d give up just about anything to keep you right where you were. It was a feeling he’d die for.

“Then I won’t say anything,” Satoru replied, hazy blue eyes focusing on you, “I’ll take whatever you give me.”

Your heart was likely to jump out of your chest from the way he was looking at you. Like you were his diamond in the midst of endless fields of sand. The brightest star in the sky and the warmest sun in the galaxy. His gaze was unwavering, and it almost made you want to look away. He was probably unaware of the amount of power that he held over you. You were never someone to be too vocal about your affection for him. Not for any particular reason other than being too scared to love another man. Especially him.

You knew how busy he could get. What his schedule was like. How dangerous his job was, and how willing he was to risk his life doing it. How, if he left one morning, there was no guarantee he’d come back the following evening. There was no doubt that he was strong enough to hold his own and protect other people but he could also be a bit reckless when he fought and sometimes, that scared you. Sometimes you couldn’t go with him on some missions, so he had to go alone and you were left wondering if he’d even come back.

Worrying about such things would’ve only drove you up a wall so you tried to force those thoughts back down from where they came. Focusing back on the task at hand.

He was your boyfriend now. It wasn’t weird to worry or scold him for things. You now had the right to tell him what was on your mind, no matter what it was about. It was strange, though. Calling him your boyfriend. You two worked so well as friends that now being a couple, you wondered how you were supposed to act around him. What was meant to change or not change?

Suddenly, you felt a slap across your bottom and you blinked, looking back down at him. Satoru had a frown on his face and you knew what he was going to say next.

“Are you overthinking again?”

You were forced to tell the truth. Wasn’t that the key to a successful relationship?

Another blink and you began to smile, dropping your eyes down to your hands on his chest. “Maybe…but I was just thinking about a few things. Nothing to talk about, really.”

“I would love to sit and talk about whatever it is that keeps grabbing at your attention, but can we do that after this?” There was a faint lopsided smile on his face now, hands already moving up your sides, thumbing at your soft skin. “I just really need you to be focused and here with me. Can you do that?”

“Can I do that?” You mused, playing with his nipples again. He twitched under your touch in response, eyes almost closing. “Of course I can. You’re so needy, you know that?”

You didn’t give him a chance to answer when you began rocking your hips again, stalling it right on his tongue as he watched your tits bounce from the motion in front of him. Ultimately became distracted, attaching his lips around one of your neglected nipples. Your hands moved into his soft hair and gripped a handful of it, pushing your chest into his face to let him know to not stop.

Satoru’s thighs twitched against the curve of your ass until they began to shake when you shifted to leaning back, bringing your legs up. You planted your hands on his legs and used them for leverage, lifting yourself up and down on his cock, keeping your eyes on him. His eyebrows were pressed together, chest heaving and eyes fixated on the way your cunt slid along his length with ease. The only sounds that filled the room were your breathy moans and his whiny pleas that fell upon deaf ears as you kept at it until you began to feel your thighs burn.

“Can’t cum like this,” he mumbled, almost missing it over the sound of skin slapping against skin, from each time you sunk down on his cock. “Wanna see you. We need…ah…to switch.”

When you slid back down, you stilled and tried catching your breath. Pushing your body forward again and falling flat against his chest, you felt his upper body vibrate, getting your attention.

He was laughing.

You rose your head at him in curiosity to find a curve at his lips. As drowsy as he looked, you knew that he wasn’t there yet and neither were you.

“Tired?“ he asked, and you graced him with a small nod, eyes falling shut when you felt his lips against the middle of your forehead. A squeak slipped past yours when you felt his hand move across your ass. “Good,” he smirked, “Now it’s my turn.”

Your positions were once again flipped but this time, he settled for turning you on your side, your back meeting his chest. One of his arms snaked across your middle to settle a hand around your waist.

“You always choose the more intimate positions don’t you?”

His deep chuckle against the shell of your ear sent chills down your spine, feeling his lips move against your warm skin.

“You know me so well.”

He didn’t have to spread you open to push himself back in because you did it for him. You tossed a leg over his bent one, parting yourself with nothing but impatience to feel him back inside. He didn’t waste any time pressing the head of his cock past your pretty folds, groaning out into your neck, wanting nothing more than to be back in you as well. Clenching onto him the minute he invaded your cunt, it almost sent him over the edge.

“If you knew what you felt like being wrapped around me like this,” he breathed near your ear again, smirking lazily. “You’d lose your mind too.”

Slightly, you turned your head so that you were able to see him, meeting his hazy blues. “Are you gonna fuck me or would you rather talk for the next 10 minutes?”

His frown made the butterflies in your stomach stir because you knew what provoking him entailed. There was going to be no more talking. Just the sounds of him fucking you to completion and your gratifying moans to translate how good it felt and how close you were getting.

He snapped his hips forward, jolting yours in the process. He repeated that until he met a comfortable pace, burying his face into your neck once more and letting himself get lost in everything that made you, you. The way you tried to conceal your shaky moans, too afraid of being too loud for the neighbors to hear and how your plump ass bounced against him with each thrust he made. The way your curves fit against him just right, like your body was made for him. How you curled a hand around the arm he had around your midsection, desperately wanting to use him to keep yourself anchored to this world. To him.

Everything about you drove him insane and even when you’d finally given yourself to him — every single part of you — he still couldn’t get enough. He needed more of you. He wanted to push his body into yours until he was able to combine your souls into one. Claim your entire essence and being as his, marked forever as the one that saved him from himself. You were his beaming light amongst the black ocean of his heart. Where he was drowning in his inescapable hell, you saw him and pulled him out of it all. How else could he thank you? Being your perfect imperfect boyfriend didn’t seem like enough. He wished to pull the stars down from the night sky and hand them all to you because you deserve something no one on earth could give you. Something only he was capable of giving you.

What was that? What was the very thing he could give you that no one else could? Something he hadn’t already given you?

It had to be a proclamation. He knew of your past with the other men you tried dating and knew none ever worked out because he was in your life now. You were never appreciated the way you should’ve been nor were you given the time that you deserved. You were unlike anyone on earth and yet — you were never treated as such. You deserved more than the petty “i like you’s” and “maybe you’re the one for me” because Satoru was there, desperate to show you that he felt more than that. He was a real man that knew what he wanted, and he wanted you.

Satoru couldn’t stomach the thought of you moving on to someone else. He hated the thought of leaving you behind for an assignment without a way for you to let people know that you were no longer available in any sort of way. Granted, nothing could stop someone from hitting on you no matter how apparent your relationship status was, but you’d best believe he was going to do his best.

And he knew exactly how to do it.

“Marry me.”

Unconditional love from a man that was oh so clearly written in the stars for you. A man that finally found his way to you and wanted nothing more than to make you completely his.

Your breath quickly got caught in your throat, trying to stop your head from spinning to make sure you’d heard him right.

“Satoru…” your eyes landed on him again, but his face was still hidden within the depths of your cozy neck. He kissed your skin with gentleness but continued to fuck you like he was on a mission. A possessive one. You held your moans back to fully connect with the sudden sprout of conversation. “What are you on about? Marry you? Is that what you said?“

His eyebrows furrowed, arm pulling you infinitely closer to his own body, ears blooming red. “Yeah…Marry me.“

“Hey,” you maneuvered to where he was forced to look at you, clearly embarrassed by what he feared your answer was going to be. It didn’t seem like it was going to be good. “What’s the matter? Why are you springing this up right…right now?” You stuttered out, wishing he’d stop for just a second so you could understand what this was all about.

“Nothing’s wrong. I just…” he looked into your eyes and felt like he was nearing a sharp cliff except, instead of being scared like he usually would’ve been, he was ready to leap right off of it. Arms out and ready to fall into yours. Ready to give you what no one else ever did. “I love you. Like…I’m in love with you.” Your eyes widened. “I just need you to be mine in every way possible.” His head dipped back down, trying to shy away from the shocked look you were giving him. “Wanna skip this boyfriend-girlfriend bullshit and just put a ring on your finger already.” He finally stopped moving his hips and smiled, pressing his cheek against your shoulder. “Just marry me, will ya’? We’ve known each other for a really long time. What’s skipping a few more chapters gonna do?”

“I…” You’d only just gotten used to being in an official relationship with him and now he was proposing to you? It was fast. Too fast, in fact, and again — you were the logical thinker between the two of you. He clearly didn’t like using his head. Was more fond of letting his heart do the deciding instead. Making such a lifelong decision wasn’t an easy one. Boyfriends in the past were merely flings on a flimsy promise of there one day being something more. You’d never met anyone that loved you the way Satoru was prepared to. A ring was materialistic but a promise to love you and only you for a lifetime — it was forever. The kind of promise that you couldn’t break no matter what. You viewed marriage as something sacred and long lasting. Not something done from a whim but because you’d fallen in love, and needed a bigger more real promise to keep that love alive.

You were prepared to deal with the fact that, one day, Satoru wouldn’t come home from a mission. As his girlfriend, it would’ve made things easier to handle but as his wife — that was asking for a little bit more. You were meant to love him above all else and place him in the most special part of your heart. A part so fragile, so small, so naked and vulnerable — a place not even seen by the bare eye or the best microscope in the world. A place reserved for that lifelong partner you were meant to die alongside with. You weren’t sure if you were ready to open that place inside of you just yet but truth is, were you ever going to be ready?

Falling in love was risky. It wasn’t about being ready. It was about everything that came with loving someone completely. Till death do you part.

But like a logical thinker, you tried to balance the stakes and whims that came from making such an important decision when that was exactly where you kept failing. Love…was risky. It wasn’t something you could predict or follow. Love was reckless; perilous even. You’d fallen into its trap and now you were finally being put to the test.

What was your answer?

“I…”

“Don’t worry about it,” he quickly said, feeling regretful. “It’s fine. I shouldn’t have put you on the spot like that. I mean,” he sighed, “it’s too fast anyway. I asked you to be my girlfriend and now I’ve asked you to be my wife.” He dryly laughed, wanting to just disappear from the room altogether. “I can’t help but make a fool of myself I guess.“

“Yes.“

He stopped rambling and stared at you, almost feeling the air still around him. “Yes…what?”

When you started to move around, Satoru pulled out of you and let you turn to face him, his breath hitching at finally being able to see your face the right way. Your hand fell softly onto his cheek giving him a reassuring smile, heart racing within your chest.

What was your answer?

“Yes. I’ll marry you.”

His bottom lip quivered and you couldn’t fight back a giggle watching a tear gather in one of his eyes, wasting no time tumbling across his cheek and onto the pillow he was laying on.

“You…you mean it? You’re saying yes? You wanna marry me?”

“Yes silly,” you pecked his lips, pulling at the fat of his cheek. “I will marry you…on one condition.”

His crystal blue eyes sparkled with excitement, arms already finding their places around you, pulling you against him.

“Anything, baby. Anything you want.”

You licked your lips before releasing a small breath, “You have to sell your penthouse. As your wife, I would like for us to live in a real home. A home that we can call ours with enough rooms…for our future…kids?” You let the question hang in the air, hoping it was something he wanted too. For as long as you’d known him, he always seemed to stay in very luxurious apartments. With him also being a sorcerer, he barely lived in any of them. You knew that part wasn’t going to change much if any, but a home was something you weren’t really willing to compromise on. His penthouse was surely nice, even though you hadn’t seen it, but as a married couple — it made more sense to build a life together in a bigger home with a nice yard. Maybe with a dog too. Or a cat.

Satoru gave you a flat look, almost surprised by your response.

“Is that it?”

Your face flushed with heat, fidgeting in his arms, “I mean yeah, uh… I was thinking that was going to be something I’d have to fight for since you’ve only lived in apartments. Sure it’s a pretty big change for you, right?”

He hummed and kissed your nose, eyes capturing yours, “Mmm, you’re right. It will be. I mean, having a real girlfriend was a major change but now a fiancé, future wife? With a nice big house? Kids? Hmm,” you giggled again as he looked thoughtful, holding you close to him. “I think it’ll feel like a new life, honestly. So yeah. Pretty big change but I’m ready for it. Ready to be your husband. God, I just realized something.”

You wrapped your arms around his neck, smiling warmly, “Uh oh. That’s never good.“

His broad shoulders shook with laughter, “Relax,” he whined. “I realized that I’ll get to make sweet love to you all the time now.” He smirked, pecking your lips once, twice and another. “Feel like the luckiest man alive.”

“Maybe,” you bit into your lip, letting your nails scratch along the upper part of his back, feeling his hands circle at yours. “-–we should start that lifelong journey right now. Let tonight be our first of many, yeah?”

“Your brain is just so sexy,” he dove down to your neck, biting and nipping at a few places he knew were your weak spots. Your back arched against his hands, letting out a small moan. “Kinda like the way you think, pretty.” He moved his lips to your ear, grinning devilishly. “Maybe I’ll do you one better and put a baby in you right now.”

You gasped but before you would have responded, you were turned back over onto your back just like you two started the night out, and watched your hungry fiancé hover on top of you. He used one of his hands to grip at the headboard once more, and peered down at you with dark blues and a conniving smile.

“Ready to be a mommy, baby? Because quite frankly, with how hard I’ve been for the past 20 minutes,” he used his free hand to lift one of your legs up and on his shoulder, kissing at your calf without cutting eye contact. “I definitely won’t be able to pull out.“

You let your hands travel up his toned abdomen, up and over his chest and back down, fingertips teasing the head of his cock. His eyebrows creased together as he tucked his bottom lip between his teeth. His face was once again flushed and so was his tip, glistening and aching to be touched or inside of you again.

“Then how about you don’t,” you replied and his eyes were instantly back on you.

“You mean…”

You smiled, “We’re going to be married soon anyway, and I have faith you’d make a pretty decent dad. Wouldn’t you agree?“

His dick twitched against the palm of your hand. To you, it almost looked like he was salivating and touched at the same time. It was cute.

“God, I love you so fucking much,” Satoru mumbled before he bent down and closed his mouth on yours, groaning as he lined himself back up to your cunt, wasting no time pushing himself back in.

And like a missing puzzle piece, he fit perfectly.

With your nails dug deep into his muscled back and his lips on yours, cock so deep it was like he was bullying your pretty pussy to open back up for him — you felt like you were floating on cloud nine. Even though he held the headboard tight in his hand, it kept slipping and hitting the wall each time he slammed his hips into yours. Neither of you paid any mind to it and eventually, somewhere in the midst of it all, he ditched the effort and focused on you. He chased his high and snuck a hand down to your sensitive nub, giving it quick circles that had you moaning so loud, you were almost positive you were going to get an eviction notice this time from the noise.

“Gettin’ close pretty girl?” Satoru said against your lips, smirking at the way you couldn’t keep your mouth closed even when it counted the most.

“Uhuh–,” you indulged him, unable to form any actual words at the moment.

The headboard thudded loudly against the wall the faster he went and soon, he felt his balls tighten up, finally releasing his load into your fertile cunt, feeling you squeeze around him with a grip as tight as a rope. Burying your face in his neck as he did with you, you kept yours legs wrapped tightly around him as you panted and whimpered. You shook in his arms, walls fluttering around his cock. He held you tightly, kissing at your slightly damp skin, rocking his hips slowly to ride out both of your orgasms.

After a few quiet moments, he pulled out of you and kissed your thighs before moving off of the bed, telling you that he’d be right back. You didn’t miss him for long when he padded back into the room with a warm, clean towel.

“Not like I wanna do anything but push all of this back into you but I don’t want to make you uncomfortable so let’s get you cleaned up shall we?”

Your little smile made his heart skip a tiny beat as he moved the cloth across your inner thighs towards puffy folds. He chuckled, watching your legs twitch with each soft touch.

He continued to clean you up in a quiet atmosphere, listening to just your breathing and the way the wind outside howled against the tall windows. The silence almost lulled you to sleep until you felt a pat against one of your legs, causing your eyes to fully open again.

Satoru greeted you with a small smile, “Done.” He shifted back off of bed and pointed a finger at you as he walked away. “Don’t go fallin’ asleep on me. Not until I come back to join you, yeah?”

Your lips formed into a cute pout, bringing a pillow over to hug against your chest as you moved to lay on your side.

“Yeah, yeah. Hurry and come back or you will find me asleep.”

“Ughhh. Alright, alright,” he groaned out like a child as he sulked out of the room, borderline speed walking to hurry back like you told him to.

The bed was so cozy and the sheets felt so warm. It was almost enough to force you to sleep, but you tried your best to stay conscious long enough to hear his footsteps come down the hall. Your face was pushed into the pillow that you were still hugging, so you didn’t see him walk in but heard him. Then you felt the bed dip down in a few places until you felt the heat from his body against your back, and muscled arms encircling you. He pulled you back until you were flush against his chest, his nose finding purchase against the nape of your neck.

His warm breath fanned across your skin creating little goosebumps.

“Still awake?”

“Mm.”

You felt his lips stretch into a smile. “Good.” He tightened his hold on you and closed his eyes. “I really meant it by the way.”

“Meant what?”

He was quiet for a moment. You almost wondered if he had actually fallen asleep on you when you heard him inhale softly.

“That I’m in love with you.”

A smile tried to form but you bit it back, squeezing the pillow in your arms. You could feel your heart begin to race and tried to calm it down enough to give him a decent response back.

“Well…I think you’ll find it a little surprising that I also feel the same way.”

“You’d better,” he grunted, kissing your neck. “I’d be pretty sad if you didn’t. Kinda proposed to you and everything. Would’ve sucked.”

You giggled. “Yeah, it would’ve.”

“My wife…” he said under his breath but you heard him nonetheless. “Now that’s got a ring to it. No pun intended.”

Your silvery laugh made him cough out a chuckle, hiding his face in your back, spreading small kisses along your shoulder.

“You’re so annoying, you know that?”

He smirked before humming, “Mmm, think I’ve been told that once or twice by a pretty lady before. Wait a second…I think I know this pretty lady.”

“Satoruuuu,” you whined, pushing your face further into the pillow, smiling like a schoolgirl.

“Babyyy,” he drew out, clearly teasing you.

Then the two of you heard a faint knocking at the door. Your head popped up, trying to make sure it was a knock you heard. Then it happened again and you looked over your shoulder at Satoru who was already looking at the bedroom doorway, an eyebrow raised.

“Who is that?” You asked, but before Satoru had the chance to say anything, you heard a familiar voice yelling outside your door.

“I know you two are still in there! Just know I’m going to the office tomorrow to file my final complaint on you two horny fuckers! Pack your bags because I am making damn sure you’re out of here by next month! Better fuckin’ believe it!”

After a few very quiet moments, you heard your neighbors front door slam closed and when you made eye contact with Satoru again, both of you bursted out into a fit of giggles.

It was a good thing you and him were going to be looking for houses soon. There was no way you were going to be able to fight to keep your lease after tonight.

Satoru pulled you into his arms so that you were now facing him and kissed all over your face, not missing a single spot.

“Love you.”

You smiled and breathed in the faint hint of cologne that was still stuck to his skin, “Love you more.”

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i cant believe i missed this

LITTLE DARK AGE

haitani ran x fem!reader x haitani rindou

summary: eight years later, you finally return to tokyo and find yourself caught in the middle of a violent gang war between the two most ruthless criminal organizations of tokyo’s underworld, forced to choose between blood and love.

genre: bonten timeskip, angst, forbidden romance, childhood friends -> strangers -> lovers, 18+ MDNI

taglist closed — but if ur someone who actively reblogs n leaves feedback i might just find a spot for u

previous chapter -> masterlist -> next chapter

CHAPTER Ⅷ. CAUSE I KNOW YOU GET DEJA VU

FOURTEEN YEARS EARLIER. 

“Ran is acting distant again,” you murmured to Rindou as the two of you sat at a park near the penthouse, your feet kicked in the air lazily, swaying you back and forth on the swing, Rindou leaned on the pole next to the swing, pulling his gaze from the sky to look down at you, hair falling loose on either side of his face, “and why’d you get blue streaks in your hair? I swear you and Ran try to piss off Miss Yua with these weird dye jobs.”

Rindou grinned down at you, “Yeah, that’s cause we are,” he said and you rolled your eyes.

“She’s gonna kill you guys,” you nodded, “She nearly had a heart attack when she saw your half-dyed mop heads last time.”

Rindou’s mouth dropped, “Mop heads?!” he asked offended, “You said you didn’t think they were dumb!” 

“They weren’t dumb, they just weren’t stylish,” you said and Rindou gaped.

“Yes they were!” he argued, “They definitely were.”

“Were not,” you said.

“Were to!” he responded, reaching forward to yank at the chain of your swing hard. You shrieked as you started swinging side to side toward the opposite pole.

“Rindou, I’m gonna hit the pole!” you cried out as the metal pole drew closer but before you could either slam into it or jump off the swing, Rindou’s grip tightened on the chain, tugging you back in his direction. He pulled you off of the swing as flailed back and forth and you scowled, stumbling into his chest.

You steadied yourself, glaring up at him, but he only grinned down at you, looking entirely too pleased with himself.

“You didn’t acknowledge my first statement,” you pointed out and Rindou’s grin fell momentarily, he sighed and looked away.

“Cause I don’t know what’s going on with him,” he shrugged, his hands dropped from your waist, “He gets like this sometimes, I guess. It happened a couple times while we were on our own. And then again after… y’know, when Shimada’s guys stabbed me and after we left the penthouse, he got real distant with me. He felt guilty that time, and it didn’t matter what I said to him.”

Your brows furrowed as you leaned on the pole next to Rindou, watching the swing thrash from side to side, slowly settling down, your arm brushed his and you tilted your head back up toward the sky, “You think he feels guilty over something?” you frowned deeply. 

“I dunno what he’d be feeling guilty about,” Rindou said and you could hear the genuine confusion in his voice. Rindou finally shook his head, “Let’s just go back, Miss Yua wanted us back early tonight.”

---

You did not go back to the penthouse with Rindou. You had managed to lose him in the crowds on the main street of Roppongi, intent on taking some time for yourself. And you knew he was going to flip out on you when he inevitably found you but it wasn’t like he could yell at you for putting yourself in danger like Ran had in Shibuya--they prided themselves on how safe Roppongi had become under their rule and all of the delinquents left in this part of the city were absolutely loyal to them and there were always some lurking about that would recognize you if you got into trouble. 

Ran and Rindou had made sure of it. 

And it warmed your heart, really, knowing how hard they worked to make Roppongi safe for you--because they wanted to know you’d be safe if neither of them happened to be around, because they wanted you to feel comfortable walking around the streets on your own. 

You sighed as you kicked at a pebble on the ground, walking up and down a side street a few blocks away from the penthouse. You knew it was only a matter of time before one of Rindou’s little lackeys reported back to him and told him where you had run off to but you needed some time to think without Miss Yua chiding you for leaving school early to hang out with Rindou.

Because you needed to figure out what you had done to upset Ran.

Because you knew it was you. It had to have been. Ever since the night you brought them to the event at the Sugawara estate, he had been acting weird. First, it had just been with you--he had stopped meeting with you to walk you back home from school. And it had been weird but you hadn’t thought twice about it until he had stopped showing up to breakfast and dinner too. He only ever came back home after you had fallen asleep and you had tried to wait up for him on the couch in the main room but it was like he knew every time and he came home extra late because of it and you’d wake up curled up in bed tucked under the covers the next morning.

And Miss Yua must’ve known what was up with him too because usually she would get upset when he and Rindou skipped out on meals but instead she would just put some food away for him and scold you whenever you tried to question her about it.

You must have done something wrong but you didn’t know what. And you were mad at Miss Yua for siding with him when you didn’t even know what you had done wrong. You would have hoped that she would have at least talked to you about it so you could apologize to him so things could go back to normal. 

And now he was even avoiding Rindou and you knew Rindou was genuinely upset about it if the number of times you found him sullenly lurking around your room had anything to say about it. He couldn’t stand being in the room he shared with Ran because you knew it must be big and empty and lonely without Ran around. 

And you felt anxious. Because if you really had upset Ran somehow and he was so angry that he wouldn’t even talk to you or Rindou, then you didn’t know what to do because the last thing you wanted was to put strain on their relationship.

You let out another deep sigh, turning around the corner and finally starting to make your way back toward the penthouse, bracing yourself for Rindou’s wrath. Your hands swung at your sides as you looked at the large building in the distance, hesitating, a foreboding feeling sweeping over you--you swore you could feel Rindou’s anger from where you were. 

Promptly, you turned and started to make your way down another side street rather than back to the penthouse, intent on taking more time for yourself before facing the guillotine. 

You paused instantly, catching sight of a familiar figure hunched over in the middle of the alley, “Ran?” you called, alarmed, and you watched as he looked up, typically neat braids half pulled out and messy around his face, blood staining his skin. “Ran!” 

Panic flew through you as you took off in the direction of the older Haitani. You ignored how he seemed to roll his eyes when he caught sight of you, pushing away the way it stung to focus on him.

“Ran, what happened? You’re hurt,” you said, standing in front of him hesitantly, unsure of whether or not to get closer or not because you knew he was mad at you for some reason or another and you didn’t want to make him even more mad at you by pushing boundaries. 

“Go away,” he muttered, and your temper flared momentarily as you glared at him before forcing yourself to calm down.

“Ran, is this what you’ve been doing?” you were angry, and it took all of your self-control to not raise your voice. “Been going out and fighting people to try to stay away from home?” 

“It’s none of your business,” Ran said, voice low and your fists clenched tight at your side, “It’s something I have to do.”

“You have to do?” you asked incredulously, “and why is that?” 

Ran pointedly looked away, lips twisted down, jaw clenched and your brows furrowed. You hated this. You hated how he always would disappear and take things on himself so he didn’t have to bother anybody. He’d been doing it more and more often and you knew it was bothering Rindou--the two of them had always done everything together but now Ran was going off on his own and handling their gang business without even talking to Rindou first. Rindou was getting frustrated and feeling left out and you hated it, and you hated that you might have a part in Ran distancing himself from Rindou.

“‘nother gang has been tryna move into our territory, had to push ‘em back,” he finally said when you made no move to go away.

“Without Rindou?” you questioned and Ran grit his teeth together, refusing to look at you again. 

“Isn’t it better this way?” he said, and your brows furrowed.

“I don’t know what you mean,” you said quietly, “but no, I don’t think it’s better that you’re taking this all upon yourself.”

You sighed when he didn’t respond, moving to kneel next to him, trying to force him to look at you and failing when he just looked in the opposite direction.

“Hey,” you said quietly. He didn’t make any sign of acknowledgement and you sighed as you tugged your sleeve over your hand and brought it up to his face. You cupped his cheek with one hand, turning his face so that he was looking at you. You wiped away at the blood dribbling from his nose and split lip.

“You mean the world to me ‘n Rin, y’know? And we really hate when you do this ‘cause we know you’re hurting ‘n we just wanna help, Ran, and I know you don’t want to involve me but you shouldn’t shut Rin out, it’s not fair to him. I love you a lot, y’know? ‘n ‘m sorry if I did something to upset you at the event. It wasn’t my intention if I did.” you told him softly. 

Ran stiffened, his gaze finally shifted toward you on his own, looking up at you through long lashes and your breath caught as his dark lavender eyes met yours, “Don’t say that,” he said, voice hoarse, and your eyes narrowed onto him.

“What’dya mean don’t say that?” you asked heatedly, “It’s the truth, you try to take all the burdens on yourself and it’s not fair. Let us help you.”

“‘s not what I meant,” he murmured but he didn’t elaborate on what he actually meant. You frowned, lips parting to speak but he only shook his head, making you pause. “Go back home, y/n.”

“‘m not leaving without you,” you murmured, fingers lingering on his face as you looked down, catching sight of bruises peeking out from underneath his ridden-up shirt. You reached out immediately, brows furrowed as you tugged his shirt up even more, mouth dropping at the sight of the large, nearly black bruises lining up his abdomen. “Ran, wh-”

“There were more there than I expected,” he didn’t let you finish the question and your eyes narrowed in suspicion as he shot you a charming grin and a wink, “You should see the other guys.”

And you were angry because he was doing it again, brushing off how hurt he was because he didn’t want you to know the extent of it. 

“Ran,” your voice was quiet, your hand dropped from his cheek to his abdomen and you listened as he hissed as your fingers brushed his skin, as his abdomen tensed beneath your touch. Your lips trembled as you let your fingers run up his skin, tracing the dark marks marring his skin.

“It looks worse than it really is,” he lied but you knew from the way he wouldn’t meet your eyes that he knew you weren’t going to fall for it. “Y/n-”

“Miss Yua will be the judge of that,” you said firmly, trying to hide how your voice shook at the sight of Ran so injured, “and after Miss Yua looks over you, you must promise me and Rin that you’ll stop this, okay?”

“Y/n,” he tried to protest but you grabbed one of his hands with both of yours, his eyes darted up to meet yours and you watched as the argument dissolved on his face, as his eyes searched yours and his expression dropped. 

“Ran, please,” you said quietly, “Rin has been really upset too. He can barely even stay in your guys’ room.” 

Ran let out a long breath, shoulders slumping, and you knew you had won--Ran was always weak to Rindou. He hated seeing his younger brother upset, he hated being the cause of it even more. He nodded and you swallowed thickly as you rose to your feet in front of him, holding a hand out.

After a split second of hesitation, he took your hand and you helped pull him to his feet, watching as he winced and hissed with every movement, you were careful of the bruises as you wrapped an arm around his waist, letting him lean heavily on you.

“I’d do anything for you guys,” you said quietly, looking ahead even as you felt Ran turn his gaze down onto you, “You’re my best friends. And I know you don’t want to involve me with the gang stuff, and I won’t push you to, I just wish you guys would rely on me more than you do.”

Ran didn’t speak for a moment and just as you went to toss him a questioning look, your entire body felt hot as he leaned his head down to kiss the top of your head, eyes wide as you stared ahead. 

“We rely on you a lot more than your tiny brain could ever comprehend, more than words can describe, really.”

And your brows furrowed as you considered his words, trying to figure out what he meant until…

“Tiny?!” you demanded, offended, and next to you, Ran burst into laughter before wincing in pain, clutching his abdomen, “Serves you right! My brain is not tiny! It’s bigger than yours and Rindou’s combined, actually.”

“Yes, of course,” he agreed but you didn’t like his tone.

“I don’t like the way you said that,” you complained, “but I guess I can let it slide because you got the shit beat out of you.”

“I did not!” Ran was now the offended one as he gaped down at you, “They got a few hits in but they’re in way worse shape than me.”

“So what I’m hearing is that you got the shit beat out of you,” you nodded, ignoring him.

“I did not!”

And you only giggled as he continued his protests as the two of you walked back toward the penthouse, regaling you with the tale of the ten versus one fight he had to deal with an hour earlier and how he totally kicked their asses even though he was outnumbered. 

Your arm around his waist shifted as he leaned into you, far more relaxed, and a warm feeling spread throughout you as you looked up at him, catching sight of the genuine smile tugging at his lips despite the split lip and remnants of the blood you hadn’t quite been able to wipe off.

And as he glanced down at you, eyes turned up and bright, the happiest he’s looked since the week before the dance, you couldn’t help but let any anger you might have had toward him dissolve. 

“I love you a lot, y’know?” you murmured, accidentally interrupting his tale, “You ‘n Rin, more than anything.”

And there was a strange tone to his voice as he responded, one that seemed to be caught between longing and dejection but you didn’t know why, “Yeah,” he said quietly, “I love you too.”

PRESENT. 

Ran.

Sugawara was talking, you could hear him in the background but none of his words registered--it was like television static as your eyes met Ran’s lavender ones, his right eye bruised dark, blood dribbling from his nose and split lips. The neat clothes he had been wearing earlier in the night were ripped and bloodied.

Your fingers twitched at your side, it took all of your self-control not to rush toward him. You felt ill, your stomach was twisting and turning uncomfortably and your head felt light. Ran, Ran is here, Ran got caught but-

How?

How?

If they got Ran, and got him back to the base so quickly, then they had to have been ready to capture an executive--prepared, expecting it.

So quickly? your head ached, you didn’t even know how long you had been unconscious. No, you reminded yourself, Hanma was still getting stitched up when you woke up. It couldn’t have been too long. They must have known.

You turned your head to the side, gaze cold as you looked at Sugawara from the corner of your eye, “How much of a part did we play in the explosions at the auction hall?” Sugawara paused mid-sentence, looking at you. “You got him from the building and back this quick, you must have been prepared.”

There was a calculating look in his eyes as he considered you, one that made your skin crawl. Finally, he spoke, “The small explosion was ours,” he finally said and your eyes narrowed, he held up two fingers, “We had two reasons for it. One was to incite enough chaos to give us the chance to swoop in and capture one of the Bonten executives.”

But how did he know that Ran was one of them? His tattoo was covered, you-

Your eyes turned to Hanma, as you remembered him outside and on the phone for a decent amount of time. His eyes met yours steadily before he looked away. Anger flared, he-

Two reasons, you forced your mind back to the more important subject, what was the second? Your lips tilted down and your mind raced despite the pain that was shooting through it. Two reasons, one was getting his hands on Bonten and the other…

Kawaragi. 

“Sugawara asked her to check the storerooms.”

The storerooms, where the explosions seemed to have come from. She could have been sent to set it off, a part of you argued but your lips twisted down as you remembered how he greeted you and Hanma, no acknowledgment of Kawaragi being missing.

“Kawaragi,” you said, and Sugawara’s eyes lit up.

“You’re a sharp one,” he cooed, and you forced yourself not to shift uncomfortably under his intent stare. “Yes, Kawaragi had to be dealt with, she could no longer be trusted. Though, I had ensured that the phosphorus munitions were being held in a warehouse away from the actual event which means there was outside interference. I don’t like that.”

Why Kawaragi? was on the tip of your tongue but you caught your uncle’s look of warning from behind Sugawara and stopped yourself. Stop pressing, it looks suspicious.

“I see,” you said. But why did he admit it? You didn’t dare look back at where Ran was kneeling, knowing that as soon as you did you’d be unable to focus. Why, why wh-

A warning, you realized, eyes drawing up to meet Sugawara’s empty ones, a sharp contrast from the excitement that had previously been painted in them. Your throat felt dry but you couldn’t bring yourself to tear your gaze away from his blank ones, void of any type of emotion--apathetic, vacant like those of a doll. It was unnerving, it had dread pooling in your gut. Not a warning, you corrected, a threat. 

“Y/n,” Sugawara approached you, resting a hand on your bicep and it took all of your self-control not to step away, “I want us to be friends, and friends are truthful with each other, yeah?” 

A cold feeling settled in your chest as you nodded in agreement.

“Do you recognize him?”

Him, he was referring to Ran. Your throat felt tight. What do you say? Do you tell the truth? Lie? You didn’t know, you didn’t fucking know.

“Yes,” you said, deciding not to elaborate. But Sugawara only stared at you, waiting for you to explain, you kept your mouth shut—you wouldn’t tell him more than he asked.

“I recognized him too, you know?” Sugawara finally said, and the cold look in his eyes was gone, replaced with that fake friendly expression as he smiled at you and looked between you and Ran. “All those years ago, he and his brother used to attend my father’s events with you, didn’t he?”

Your lips pressed together tight. He remembered that? He never even talked to you or the Haitanis, he was always lurking around with his mother. 

“Yes,” you finally said, voice short.

Sugawara stared at you, you stared right back, “He was your friend,” he said, brow quirking up, the bright smile shifting into a cooler smirk, “Is?” he questioned.

You paused, watching him for a moment, “Was,” you said confirmed, the word was bitter on your tongue, you felt sick just saying it.

“Was?” Sugawara questioned before he clicked his tongue, pacing away from you. You could feel your heart beating heavy in your chest. “I want us to be friends,” he sighed again, “I’d like to make you a proposition, y/n.”

You watched as he paused a few steps away, looking out the window.

“We can make an arrangement about Haitani Ran,” Sugawara offered, and you stilled, gaze drawing toward where Ran was slumped over, eyes lidded as he looked up at you. 

An arrangement? 

Your throat was tight, could you get him out of here? At least make sure that he wasn’t harmed? Your mind spun with questions trying to figure out the best course of action. Was this a trap? Is he testing you?

You didn’t know. You felt sick, you hated not knowing. 

He sounded convincing. You watched as Ran’s eyes widened as he looked between the two of you but something wasn’t sitting right. He sounded convincing, you were almost convinced.

Almost. 

Your eyes flickered above Ran to the glass behind him and you caught your uncle’s wide-eyed glance in the reflection, noting how he discreetly shook his head. A test, you swallowed thickly, eyes drawing back down toward Ran and you forced yourself not to let the confliction show on your face. 

I’m sorry, you wanted to tell him, I promise I’ll figure something out. I won’t be able to do anything if Sugawara doesn’t trust me. 

“I said ‘was’, didn’t I?” you said and your voice was cruel even to your own ears, you didn’t even recognize yourself, you felt sick. You watched as Ran’s face twisted in confusion as he slowly comprehended your words.

“You mean the world to me ‘n Rin, y’know? And we really hate when you do this ‘cause we know you’re hurting ‘n we just wanna help, Ran, and I know you don’t want to involve me but you shouldn’t shut Rin out, it’s not fair to him. I love you a lot, y’know?”

“There’s no need for any arrangement to be made. It’s been years, they don’t mean anything to me anymore. I want to be done with this shit so I can go back to handling business overseas.”

The room was quiet for a moment, you could feel Sugawara’s gaze trained on you, studying you carefully and you forced yourself not to let your face shift as Ran’s dropped once he finally understood what you were saying. The air around you felt cold and chilly as the confusion in his eyes shifted into realization. You were freezing but your blood was running hot and your heartbeat was erratic.

"I'd do anything for you guys."

Don’t be dumb, you wanted to scream at him, shake him, beg him to trust you one last time, you know I don’t mean it. 

But did he?

You hated that you couldn’t answer the question. And you hated that you slowly realized that the answer wasn’t going to be what you wanted it to be. He was searching your face, desperately, for any sort of message because he wasn’t sure--he wanted to believe you didn’t mean it, he was begging you for a sign, and you couldn’t fucking give it to him because everybody was watching you. And you couldn’t even blame him for not seeing through your act, remembering how you had acted with him and Rindou, what you had said to them, knowing that you had really given them little reason to trust you.

Please, you begged him to understand you, you know I’d never-

Hanma Shuji whistled lowly, “Man, that was cold even for me,” he said and your heart sunk in your chest as Ran scoffed loudly. His teeth ground together--so hard that you knew it must hurt, a habit that he had adopted in his late teens as gang stress began to wear him down--and he was trying to hide how his eyes were glossing over with tears, blinking discreetly to try to force them away.

You couldn’t stay. Your hands were shoved in your pants pocket in an attempt to hide the way they trembled, in an attempt to stop yourself from reaching out toward him to hold him, wipe away the blood and tell him that you were sorry, that you would fix this, that everything would be okay. 

But you weren’t even sure that you could fix this, you weren’t sure everything would be okay, all you knew for sure was that you were sorry, and that you would give anything to go back--to when? You didn’t even know. 

To the auction? So you could tell them the truth. To the night you finally saw them again? So you could stay with Ran instead of fleeing, run after Rindou to apologize. Back to before the Munich incident? So you could stop yourself from asking for help from your uncle, so you could have them meet you like you had promised. Or maybe even back to before you had originally left? So you could stay with them when they had asked you over and over again to change your mind.

Your regrets were endless and they weighed heavy on your shoulders, shackled your ankles, clogged your lungs like sand; you weren’t even sure how you were moving forward at this point. You supposed the only thing you could safely say you didn’t regret was stopping that night in the alley--or did you? another voice questioned, look at where you got him. You could barely even function as you looked down at Ran, watching how he couldn’t even meet your eyes, how he was clenching and unclenching his jaw as a last-ditch attempt to try to retain some control over his emotions.

“You should go,” Sugawara finally said and you forced yourself to tear your gaze from Ran to look at him, catching his eyes, “Whether you’re currently friends or not, I’m not cruel enough to force you to watch this.”

Your lips parted at his words, your ears rung and you prayed desperately that your distress wasn’t visible on your face. Bullshit, you wanted to scream, you are cruel enough, you made me choose, you made me choose knowing that there was only one answer but you made him think there was another option.

"I love you a lot, y'know? You 'n Rin, more than anything."

You made him think that I don’t care what happens to him, you made him think I don’t-

“Go,” Sugawara said, and it wasn’t a suggestion anymore, it was a demand. 

Numbly, you turned on your heel, brushing past Hanma. Your thoughts were racing, you felt ill.

“Y/n,” Ran called after you. You kept walking. “Y/n, don’t ignore me!” he called louder, his voice edged on pleading and you wanted to throw up. “Y/n, c’mon!”

You kept walking.

“Hey, y/n,” Hanma said as you reached the door, you paused, not looking back because you knew if you looked back at Ran one last time, you would do something stupid--something that would blow your thin cover for good. “After we finish up here, wanna go grab something to eat?”

What?

His question threw you off, you visibly faltered as you gave him a strange look.

“Whatever,” you agreed halfheartedly, pulling your wrist from his grasp as you continued out of the door, lungs burning, mind splitting as you tried to figure out what you were supposed to do. 

How could you even get him out of here? There were bound to be tons of guards watching over him and the cameras- No, the cameras could be dealt with if you got in touch with Takuya but-

Takuya, okay. Takuya is the first step. He needs to be able to loop the playback so nothing looks out of the ordinary.

It was risky, your chest felt tight as the door shut behind you and you leaned against the wall once you realized that nobody else was in the hall, trying to calm your heart rate. You breathed in and out steadily, pacing your breath, counting to five with each inhale, and five with each exhale. You doubled over, resting your elbows on your knees and pressing your face into your hands.

Ran, you wanted to sob--your throat was burning, your eyes were blurring, you couldn’t breathe and you could barely think. Your head hurt, it felt like a thousand knives were being driven through your skull. Calm down, you tried to tell yourself. Calm down, you were shaking, trembling violently, you feared that if you tried to move, your legs would give out, calm down. 

Get in contact with Takuya, you reminded yourself, that’s the first step. You need him to-

“Fuck you,” you heard Ran spit loudly, interrupting your train of thoughts, “Fuck you, I’ll fucking kill every single o-”

There was a sickening crack and a thud, your blood felt cold, the world tunneled around you as your gaze remained focused on the floor, everything muted except for what was going on behind the closed door. Another thud, and another, over and over and over again, bile rose to your throat, you sunk down the wall until you were sitting on the floor, hand pressed against your mouth, eyes wide and glassy.

Over and over and over again.

You could hear him cursing, the gasps of pain. The walls were thin--too thin, you could hear it all, the impact of every kick, the torrent of questions being thrown at him so quickly that you were sure he barely had time to think of an answer before he received another painful kick.

You were going to throw up.

The door opened but you couldn’t even bring yourself to try to cover your distress--it would’ve been useless anyway, there was no hiding it at this point, you wouldn’t be able to hide your distress quick enough. 

Your eyes darted up and you caught sight of your uncle, face ashen and eyes trained ahead, his hands were tense at his sides, fingers barely trembling. He didn’t even notice you sitting there, letting out a heavy breath, bringing one hand up to rub the bridge of his nose. He looked exhausted, disturbed, you wondered if he felt uncomfortable with what was going on in there. He had never been particularly close with either of the brothers but he had looked out for them all this time and…

“Y/n,” his voice was rough, you stiffened at the sound of it. You hadn’t even realized that he had noticed you. Your eyes met his, “Get up.”

“I can’t,” you said, physically flinching as another sharp cry of pain hit your ears. This is your fault, you felt so sick. So fucking sick, you couldn’t even move. Your uncle leaned down, grabbing you by the bicep and hauling you to your feet. You nearly dry heaved as he pulled you down the hall away from the interrogation room but it didn’t matter how far away he dragged you, you couldn’t fucking get Ran’s gasps and cries of pains to stop ringing in your ears.

He brought you into another room halfway down the hall and immediately you crumbled again, dropping onto a couch, hands hiding your face, elbows resting on your knees. 

“I need to get him out,” you gasped, “They’re torturing him, I can’t leave him, I-“

“Y/n,” your uncle’s void was low, sympathetic, you already knew what he was going to say. Your uncle was never sympathetic.

“You can’t stop me,” you shook your head frantically, “You can’t-“

“I know,” you uncle murmured, cutting you off, “I won’t stop you, but there will be consequences. Kenji will know it was you.”

“Fuck the consequences,” you said, eyes wild as you finally looked up at him, catching sight of the grim expression on his face. A chill hit you and you shivered as your eyes darted around, catching sight of the open window. You looked around quickly, not catching sight of any camera in the room. You should have checked for that first, you needed to get some control over yourself. You were going to fuck up, “They’re torturing him, Uncle Ichirou, they’re torturing him and I gave the okay.”

Your uncle clicked his tongue sharply, “If you had given him anything but the okay, he would have killed him. You kept him alive.”

Your throat dried, the words in your tongue died as you stared up at him. Killed? and then you wanted to hit yourself for being surprised, of course, he would have, you wanted to spit out, of fucking course he would have. He had just finished explaining what happened to Kawaragi because he didn’t trust her, he wouldn’t have risked you pulling something if you still considered Ran your friend.

Fool, you wanted to scream, you would have fallen for it, gotten him killed had your uncle not warned you.

You needed to get yourself together. You would never be able to function in this state. You had to control yourself. 

“I need to get him out,” you repeated, still trying to slow your breath and heart rate, “Uncle Ichirou, I need to get him out, I-I can’t, if he, I won’t, I-”

“I know,” he said quietly when you cut yourself off. But you weren’t even sure what he was saying ‘I know’ too because you weren’t even sure what you were trying to say. Though, there was a knowing look in his eyes that had you confused and on edge. “I don’t know how much help I’ll be able to be,” your uncle admitted quietly, “I’m walking on a thin rope already.”

Your brows furrowed in confusion as you looked at your uncle but he only shook his head, “Nothing for you to worry about,” he said and you opened your mouth to argue but your uncle only spoke again before you could say anything, “Tell me about what happened--at the auction.”

You hesitated--your head hurt, you could barely think back to the auction hall without it feeling like spears were being driven through your head, without feeling heavy, without smelling that putrid smoke or the heat of the fire. “It happened right after the auction started, a small explosion, then the big one,” you said quietly, “Hanma threw himself over me-”

“Hanma?” your uncle’s tone was laced with disbelief, you could see his mind running a million miles a minute behind his eyes, “How curious.”

“What does that mean?” you asked, unnerved by the look on his face and how he wouldn’t elaborate on what he had meant. “Uncl-”

“Hanma Shuji has never really been interested in anything,” your uncle murmured, “He’s just been… there. In the six or so years I’ve known him, nothing has particularly intrigued him, so to speak. A state of perpetual boredness, almost.”

Your brows furrowed, his perception of Hanma being entirely different from yours, but you didn’t even have to speak because your uncle was eyeing you again.

“Until you came along, that is,” he said quietly and you felt distinctly uncomfortable. Why? you wondered to yourself, but you must have voiced your thoughts aloud because your uncle looked dismayed, “I don’t know. I don’t like it.”

Something wasn’t sitting right with you. You had to get your mind off of it, focus back on Ran, getting Ran out. “Who’s supposed to be watching over Ran tonight? I need-”

“What else happened at the auction?” your uncle interrupted you, not answering your question you stared at him.

“We can do this later, right now w-”

“We are not getting Ran out of there when the room is occupied with the other higher-ups,” your uncle said sharply, “There was outside interference, we need to figure out who it was and how-”

“There were a ton of gangs there,” you said angrily, voice rising in pitch as you flung your hands out, “from all over the east, how the fuck am I-”

Krüger rising to his feet, a concerned look on his face. 

Your head hurt as you tried to recall the moments before the explosion--you had been panicking looking for Rindou and Ran but… it was more than just concern, wasn’t it? The expression on his face, it was as if he had known something was supposed to happen, but not at that moment. 

Had he…? But how? Who was he working with? 

“Krüger,” you said quietly, “I think it was Gunter Krüger.”

Your uncle didn’t respond, and you forced yourself to look back up at him and you hated the genuine concern and disbelief that had swept across his face. “Y/n…”

“He was there, at the auction. He knew it was going to happen, I saw his face before the second expl-” you cut yourself off, noticing his expression, “you don’t believe me.”

“Gunter Krüger is dead,” your uncle said carefully, you shook your head, “Y/n, we searched for loose ends for weeks after the incident. He never would have slipped through. I sent two of my most trusted to confirm the body. You saw the body.”

“It was closed casket, I did not,” you said immediately, “I know what I saw-”

“You hit your head hard,” your uncle said and your mouth dropped open, watching him incredulously, “and it was a stressful situation that I’m sure brought back unwelco-”

“Are you kidding me?” you demanded, “You think I was hallucinating him? I know what I saw, Hanma and Kawaragi saw him too. And you have some nerve bringing up the unwelcome memories that you caused.”

“You asked for help, I gave you it,” the same thing he always said, the same thing that always made your blood pressure rise and never failed to make your temper peak.

“You know that wasn’t what I meant,” you spit out, rising to your feet, “You know-”

“You didn’t specify what you wanted,” your uncle said calmly and your blood roared in your ears as you rose to your feet, hands clenched tight at your side. 

“You-” you began, but you swayed on your feet as a wave of pain swept over you, up through your arm and neck and into your head. You stumbled and your uncle reached out to steady you, sitting you back down.

The look of concern on his face deepened and you felt ill. You hated it.

“You shouldn’t be walking around yet,” he said, “I’ll bring you back to the infi-”

“I’ve got her,” you froze, your uncle paused. You turned your head to the side, catching sight of Hanma standing at the door. You hadn’t even heard him approach, or the door open.

Get some self-control, you reminded yourself, you were going to end up fucking up beyond repair.

“Hanma,” your uncle’s voice was strained as he spoke, “There’s no ne-”

Hanma blatantly ignored your uncle and you almost gaped, but you didn’t really have time to consider his actions as he reached down and scooped you off of the couch, wrapping an arm around your waist and leading you out of the room, “I’m heading that way anyway! And Sugawara wanted to talk to you, Ichirou.”

The door shut behind him after he finished his sentence, leaving the two of you alone in the cold, silent hallway.

“Maybe we should just order takeout,” Hanma said easily, “Doesn’t look like you’re up to moving around yet.”

You stared ahead, not even sure if you were hearing him correctly. What the fuck is wrong with this guy?

“Ah, safehouse, forgot, guess takeout isn’t the best idea. I’ll just send one of my men into the city to grab us food, they’re not doing much tonight except for watching over your boy,” Hanma said easily, your eyes darted toward him and he caught your gaze--amber eyes sharp in comparison to the playful smile on his face, as if he hadn’t just divulged sensitive information to you.

Did he even realize?

Of course, he realized, you understood immediately, his eyes were too sharp and calculating for him not to. He knew exactly what he was telling you and how you could use it. He was doing it on purpose, “Doubt I’ll keep ‘em there the whole night,” he shrugged, “Fuck Sugawara for giving us this shit job, boring as fuck, ‘pposed to be Alyona’s little lackeys but they’re not around tonight. Should be taking over tomorrow.”

Why? you wanted to ask him. Is this a test or an opportunity? Why?

You felt cold, anxious. You didn’t know what to do, you hated not knowing what to do. Rain pattered against the roof of the house quickly, harshly, it was loud, deafening but it couldn’t drown out the memory of Ran’s gasps of pain. You wished it would. 

Your fault. This was your fault. 

You were ill again.

“What do you want from me?” and you hated how fucking weak your voice sounded. You were exhausted, your body ached, and guilt weighed so heavily on your mind and soul that you felt as if you were going to collapse in on yourself. You couldn’t get Ran off of your mind, and your phone was buzzing in your pocket over and over again and you were too scared to look because you had a feeling you knew exactly who was calling you.

He paused in front of the door to the makeshift infirmary, “Here, you should go lay down, I need to go check up on my guys real quick.”

He started walking away, you stared after him, “I asked you a question,” you called.

Hanma looked at you over his shoulder, a smile on his lips, “Nothing in particular, not yet, at least. You’re interesting,” his smile faded, he turned away and continued walking as he finished his sentence, not giving you the chance to question him, “in some ways, you remind me of someone I used to know.”

--

wordcount: 7.2k 

REBLOGS AND FEEDBACK HIGHLY APPRECIATED 

GAH

WAKASA

Wakasa “White Leopard” Imaushi

+ natural hair colors… for science

CLICK for full res

Say That I'm Yours (gojo x f!reader)

Summary: Gojo has never experienced jealousy. But after overhearing you talking to Utahime about your ex (who is also her current boyfriend), he can’t fight off the shaky, unfamiliar feeling in his chest. You have to reassure him that he's only yours in the bedroom.

jjk masterlist

Content/Warnings: NSFW 18+, jealous and needy Gojo, pet-names (m!recieving and f!recieving), vaginal fingering, Gojo has a praise kink, and discovers that he loves to be called pretty boy, insecure Gojo, emotional hurt/comfort, a little angsty at first, oral (m!recieving), soft sex, unprotected sex, cream pie. At first, Satoru takes initiative, then you take over. Primarily dom!reader and sub!gojo. (soft/service!dom gojo too?? I think???)

Note: We’ve reached 500 followers! Woo! As a little treat to celebrate, I wrote my first ever smut piece. And uhhhh… I’ve never done this before so I apologize if it comes out a little wonky. If you haven’t read it already, this piece is NSFW so MDI.

P.S: Feedback is appreciated!

P.P.S: sub/soft!gojo rights.

Words: 10k

------

Gojo Satoru never considered himself to be a jealous man.

And personally, when he does get jealous, I do think he would get A LITTLE possessive. But contrary to what everyone else headcanons him to be, he wouldn’t be rough.

As Gege Akutami stated himself, Gojo is perfect in every way aside from his overly childish personality. Looks, wits, having complete mastery of his overall skill, Satoru really does have it all.

So aside from jealousy, he’s also never felt an ounce of insecurity in his life.

Plus, why would he? Growing up, he was brought up as the ‘perfect child’ in his clan, being the ignition to his ego. And currently, your devotion to him is higher than any other person he had previously come across with. And even though you don’t try, your physical expression towards him has fueled his ego in an unnecessarily large amount over your dating period.

You’re not a person of words, but merely a woman of touch. You talk a lot, but you’re not very poetic, so verbally complimenting Gojo is almost non-existent. But he doesn’t mind, since the number of compliments he has received from multiple people about his physical looks is 10x more than how much an average person receives in their lifespan. Though, it’s not a lie if he wants to hear how his eyes are like the sky or how his hair is like snow from you. Typical and repetitive, but it’s refreshing if those words trickle from your tongue instead from people he doesn’t care about.

But they never did, and he accepts that. He’s aware that you’re not the complimenting type, but the way your hand caresses his hair in the winter snow, fingertips lightly kissing his bare chest almost every night, and how you gaze into his eyes as if you were cloud-gazing is enough to make him feel like he’s the most gorgeous man alive. So it’s normal for him to never feel envy, insecurity, or any other negative, self-indulgent emotion. This relationship alone already sets him above cloud nine.

So, what happens if Gojo were to come face-to-face with those unfamiliar feelings for the first time?

—--

Utahime was extremely nervous when she introduced her partner to you and Satoru, especially you.

And it was definitely awkward to reunite with your former ex with your current boyfriend by your side… But it was Utahime’s fault, for she was rambling (and indirectly apologizing) about how painfully weird this must be to the both of you. And while Satoru joyfully soaked in her rare emotion of being flustered, you happily greeted your ex, and both exclaimed that this interaction isn’t weird or awkward at all.

Yes, Utahime’s boyfriend was your first love, but it ended smoothly and with no hard feelings. Your time apart is 5 times longer than your time together. In fact, this feels like a reunion between old friends rather than former, romantic companionship. That being said, Satoru feels at ease since you’re so relaxed and the man opposite to him (who goes by the name Rai) is non-threatening at all.

Therefore, lunch went smoothly, where everyone caught up with each other. You and Rai discussed any milestone events between the gap of seeing one another last and now, while Utahime irritatingly throws insults towards Gojo’s gleeful taunts.

After stopping at an ice cream parlor for dessert on the go, you and Utahime decide to sit outside on a bench to talk about “girl stuff” while the boyfriends entertain themselves.

“I have to take this call,” Rai waves his phone and Satoru dismisses him by flashing a toothless grin. And once the man leaves, the 28-year-old sorcerer ponders where you and his former classmate trailed off too. Sensing your cursed energy, he makes his way to the bench where you and Utahime are chatting.

“There’s no way he did that!” Utahime playfully slapped your shoulder while you hid your face from laughing too hard.

Amused, your boyfriend keeps himself at a distance, admiring how delighted you are, while also basking in how your skin glistens against the sun. But he remains close enough to eavesdrop.

“He did, he did!” Your finger swiped a tear off the bottom of your eye. “For 2 months after our first anniversary, he told the same restaurant that it was our anniversary for free dessert whenever we visited. And they believed it until all the waiters served us.”

Perplexed, Satoru raised an eyebrow, unfamiliar with your storyline. No? On your first anniversary, he took you to the Bahamas and 100% did not do that… Though it’s financially unnecessary, he thought it was a genius plan.

“It is something Rai would do,” Utahime sighed, calming down from her fit of laughter. “I’m 31, but he still sometimes tells the servers that I’m 25 whenever he wants to get under my skin.”

“Oh geez… A literal trickster at best.”

Satoru frowned upon discovering that you were talking about your past experience with Rai and how open you are about it. Well- it’s not that he minds. He shouldn’t mind, actually.

You probably talk about your experiences with Satoru to your friends all the time! Eagerly, he waits for your turn to share a goofy story about a time with your very dearest. But, that conversation never came to be.

Utahime shifts her seat and stands straight with relaxed shoulders. “In all honesty, I’m glad that we are able to talk about this. I was so nervous about how awkward it might be for you since Rai was you know…”

Her voice trailed off to some sort of unsettlement and you took that as an opportunity to smile genuinely at the nervous teacher.

“Ahh don’t be!” You gave reassurance by tapping the side of her thigh. “Rai is a great man! He and I ended on very good terms. I was actually very happy to see him today. Looks much different than the last time I saw him.”

“Really?” Utahime’s eyes ogled. “What did he look like when he was younger?”

Meanwhile, Satoru pressed his back against the wall with crossed arms. Removing his glasses, he barely needed to glance over the concrete corner to see you pulling old pictures of a group. And there you were in the middle while your finger led his attention to a figure of a man all the way to the left. Right from the get-go, Satoru knew that this picture was from you in high school, meaning that it was before you and Rai started dating. That was the only fact you told him.

The 31-year-old squinted her eyes and used her fingers to zoom into the photo. “Huh, he does look a lot leaner, but with more of a babyface. You didn’t become his girlfriend until the beginning of college, correct?”

You nodded. “Yeah. This picture was actually taken the day we met.”

Satoru felt his lips unconsciously pouting at the statement. Do you have any sort of memorabilia of the time you met?

‘It’s a group photo. Don’t be weird about it,’ The sorcerer brushed those uncomfortable, unfamiliar thoughts away.

“You guys knew each other longer than I thought.” Utahime happened to express Satoru’s thoughts out loud.

“Actually, I knew about him first before he met me,” you recalled, which sparked your lover’s curiosity. He leaned closer, so his ears could capture everything you say. Not that it bothers him, of course.

Assuming that the woman you’re talking to had a nonverbal reaction, you laughed outwardly. “You were no longer in high school, but he was very popular in our class! Though… there weren’t that many people, to begin with. Anyways, he would always be chirpy and courteous to those around him. I wasn’t that outgoing so I just kinda admired him from the back of the class until it was our last semester of high school… You’re okay with me telling you this, right Hime?”

“Please, I’m not the envious type. I want to know who my partner was before I met him. But I think your boyfriend might get jealous.” Satoru could hear the hesitance that trailed off his former classmate’s tone. He almost wanted to jump in and laugh at how stupid that assumption was.

Satoru, jealous? It’s sinful to put those two terms in one sentence.

“Nah, he’s not like that.” You raised a hand, brushing it off. “Anyways, where do you want me to start?”

—--

Maybe Satoru did something bad and the Gods punished him for it. With Rai gone for 30 minutes, you told Utahime your old companionship with her current lover. How after months of friendship, you were the one who initiated it and how he was your first everything. Before having proper money, you and Rai would go on adventures as dates to compensate for simple meals. And to make matters worse, Utahime all soaked it up as if she was the spectator in this failed relationship.

Not an ounce of possessiveness or jealousy courses through her veins. Just utter curiosity and fascination.

Gojo told himself that he felt the same thing. However, it left a sour distaste on his tongue and a churned stomach upon hearing all of this. He had his fair share of experiences before his current one and you were being honest about yours. You liked your relationship and that’s that.

But why did he carry the feeling of wanting to whisk you away from ever getting near Rai? No, Gojo Satoru is never jealous. He’s being protective.

“What are your favorite features about him?!” Utahime asked, clamping her fingers together. You sat up straight, rubbing the back of your head with an unsure laugh.

“Uhhh are you sure you want me to answer that?” As much as you’re happy about your friend’s enthusiasm, you felt like you might be setting yourself up in a trap.

“Oh come on! My boyfriend’s really hot and kind, and I don’t have anyone to fan him over with! Please, I won’t get mad!” The semi-grade 1 sorceress grabs your hands, tightly squeezing them. You scanned her eyes, trying to see if there was any envy or malice behind her enthusiastic gaze. However, any implication did not arise and you concluded that your friend was just lovesick with no one to talk to about it.

But Satoru sure as hell didn’t want you to. Actually, he was absolutely sure that you didn’t want to answer either. He’s had enough of this and he senses that you are too. If anything, he can’t wait to accuse his senior of acting like a teenage girl for the next year and forever. Pushing himself off the wall, he began to showcase his loud, obnoxious appearance until he halted at the sound of your voice.

“Like physical? I’m not too sure, actually. I used to like how light his brown hair would get in the summer.” You opened your mouth to continue but closed it immediately.

Satoru tugged on the strands of his white hair, frowning at the color. You liked running your hands through it, but you’ve never commented on how nice it looked.

“Isn’t it gorgeous? Everything about him is perfect-” Utahime fawned. Her face beamed a bright red as she geeked over her man, clutching onto you in the process. Your stuntedness formed into a genuine smile, due to how happy you are for a lifelong friend. At last, she’s found happiness.

She continued. “His hair, his face, his eyes-”

It even shocked you that you managed to interrupt Utahime’s rare tandem. “-His eyes are very beautiful! It’s like looking into a green nebula. It’s what drew me into him the most and I think he was sick of me always saying that.”

“Sincerely out of this world. I can’t describe it in words, but every time I look into them, I feel like I’m in a hypnotic trance.”

“-Like you’re simply lost whenever he’s talking?”

“YES!”

“Yeah, I noticed you blanking out whenever he was talking to you.”

“Oh shut up, you most likely did the same thing when he was yours.” Utahime playfully nudged and you furrowed at her tease.

“Sure.”

Now, this is something that Gojo had to admit that it kinda hurt. His eyes were the staple of his well-being, the frontman of his physical confidence. Yes, you drew your thumbs underneath those rare pairs, but the fact that you never called them beautiful or verbally admired them once stung.

But when Rai was yours, you apparently complimented him like it was no problem.

'Beautiful and captivating, huh?' He whimpered softly as the uncomfortable feeling washed over him. He never heard you traject those words to him before.

“Um… Well, I’m sure that you know, but he was absolutely sweet and very courteous.” Your tone softened as you reminisced about the old times. “We didn’t have a lot back then, but he still managed to make every day feel like we could do anything even though we didn’t have everything… Oh God, that sounds weird. I didn’t mean it that way, I’m so sorry.”

You face-palmed yourself and something inside Satoru’s gut twisted. He would always shower you with gifts and other spoils, but mainly as reconciliation if his busy schedule stole him away from you. Before he knew it, his hand was placed over his heart, his stomach doing massive somersaults.

Do anything… Did Satoru fail to give you satisfaction when he could do everything?

But when Rai was yours, you felt like you could.

“I know what you mean!” Utahime playfully tugged on the strands of her hair. You swore you could see stars beaming from her brown orbs. “One time we forgot our wallets after eating at a karaoke bar, so he had to improvise his way of paying by having me sing for tips and we still had leftover money for more drinks!”

“Ugh, clever bastard… Where does he get a brain like that? That’s also one thing I admire about him.”

“Well in terms of strength, he’s only a grade 2, so he had to be more creative when it comes to fighting curses.”

‘I can get creative!’ He mentally argued, though he never really has to, since he can snap and the curse would perish.

“True… When we’d spar back then, Rai would still manage to beat my ass even though I’m ‘stronger’ than him,” you put the term in air quotes.

You and Utahime convene until the latter’s boyfriend returns from his phone call. He flashed Satoru a wide smile and through his dark sunglasses, your partner analyzed the ex’s eyes.

They are very green and arguably mesmerizing. But, Satoru believes his are prettier.

But, is that what you think?

With an uncomfortable heart, the men returned to their beloved partners. You squealed when Utahime received a loving kiss from Rai, while Satoru snaked his arm around your waist.

You could’ve noticed how secure his grip as if you weren’t so busy talking to Rai about your past as mission partners.

—--

A few days later, you’ve noticed Satoru being extra clingy… and nice?

The usually messy and disorganized sorcerer started to clean up after himself and always abide by what you wanted.

The man who had the palette of a child opted out for a savory breakfast rather than going to a sweets cafe because you wanted to. He’d be more affectionate in public, not letting you out of his reach. Oddly enough, he would settle the bridge of his sunglasses on a lower portion of his nose, so you have to see in his blue eyes when you’d talk in public.

It worried you for a moment since new habits have been created and broken out of the blue. With no explanation, he would always do his best to please you.

From your basic wants to intimate needs, for some reason, Satoru wanted to give it his all.

—--

“What is with you, Satoru-” You sigh as your partner leaves delicate kisses on the nape and then to the side of your neck. His large hands slide down from your waist to your hips and pull you closer to him. “You’re so touchy today.”

Like the last couple of days…

“I just missed you,” his hot breath releases a chill down your spine. He then sets down the spatula you were holding while turning off the stovetop. “Just missed you so much.”

Though your ‘annoyed’ exterior shows any satisfaction, it’d be a lie if you claimed that you aren’t melting from his touch. The heat inside the kitchen adds more to the desire burning deep in your core and it doesn’t help that the person casting the effect spins you around and has lips hovering centimeters away from yours.

“Beautiful…” The tip of his right thumb brushes the bottom of your lip and he licks his own. You glance up to meet his eyes, but his starry blue irises have turned to a thinner ring, as his pupils dilate in infatuation. His remaining fingers cup your jaw, adding more fuel to the pit of your stomach.

His left-hand sneaks down to the flesh of your ass and you yelp in surprise as he pulls you towards him. Taking your open mouth as an advantage, Satoru doesn’t hesitate to slip his tongue in as his lips connect with yours. You wrap your arms around his waist, and the throb between your thighs increases.

“Mmph!” You groan and Satoru initiates the next step by rubbing his hips against your clothed body. Tongues dance together while he continues to grope your ass, but his hand shortly rises underneath your shirt, feeling every curvature of the small of your back. The sloppiness in his pace and the subtle whines in his throat is enough to help you predict how hard he is underneath his layer of clothing. Teasingly, you break the kiss and slip a finger inside his beltline.

A string of saliva bridges between the two lips and Satoru grouches at the disconnect. His lips swell pink from the heated activity while his cheeks are flushed, anticipating more. From his chest, the light blue, silk button-up rises up and down, and your partner pants heavily as if he just ran a marathon.

Usually, at this point, he would make some condescending or teasing remark on how much you want to bed him. However, his mouth remains gaped, only the sounds of his breathing pass between the two of you. Wanting to test him, your index finger slips lower until you can feel the skin of his abdomen. Satoru quickly exhales from the sudden touch, but there’s no usual smirk or raised brow on his face. Only an expression that screams, ‘Please continue.’

“Baby, are you okay?” You gaze at him, still catching your own breath.

He’s strangely quiet as if he’s suddenly shy. And that’s typically not who Gojo Satoru is.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” The hand still underneath your shirt begins to make its way to the right side of your waist, and the closer he gets to your stomach, the amount of butterflies increases.

After noting how your jaw clenches at the action, Satoru bends down and leaves a kiss on the side of your neck. It’s wet, but not entirely sloppy. Instead of using his tongue and straight-up licks down to your sternum like a usual, teasing bastard, he takes time and kisses his way down. The jolt between your thighs returns.

“We- We can’t. I still need to cook for you.” Automatically, your right hand reaches up to the back of his head, using your fingers to grasp his white locks. Your action contrasts your words and Satoru takes that as your approval.

“I’m not hungry.” But the way both hands move below your shirt says otherwise. Since you’re at home, you wear your favorite v-neck with no bra underneath. Freely, two thumbs brush over your hardened nipples, rubbing them in a circular motion, and your hands grip the counter for support.

“But-”

“Right now, I just want you.” There’s a different look in Satoru today. He’s never been so direct on what he wants until now. Whenever he would declare his needs, he would mask his desires with a playful tone. This time, he says it as if these are direct orders from a life or death mission.

Sensing your shift in mood, the sorcerer detaches his tongue from your exposed chest and looks up at you. The inner corners of his brows scrunched and his lips glisten under the fluorescent light. He shoots you a look of what appears to be desperation, almost like he’s in pain.

“Please-” he breathily urges, one hand scooping the bottom of your ass while the other arm is wrapped around your waist, waiting for approval. “I want to make you feel good, right now.”

Your legs tremble at this new side of Satoru and something about him practically begging to fuck you ignites something in your soul. You can’t pinpoint what exactly, but whatever it is, his wish is your command.

“Yeah, okay.” You breathe out and as if it’s choreographed over a hundred times (and to be honest, it is), you feel a set of palms grabbing your bottom and he hoists you up. Your legs immediately wrap around his waist and your lips crash against the side of his neck, hungrily sucking and licking where other faded love marks are. After being able to find his sweet spot, Satoru’s shoulders shudder at the intense feeling while he glides his way into the bedroom while carrying you, his constricted cock begs to be freed from his tight pants.

His main mission right now is to please you.

—--

Once he lays you down, you don’t hesitate to remove your own shirt and toss it to the side, revealing your bare breasts in all their glory. And for a few seconds, Satoru halts on top of you, hands next to your shoulders, soaking up the appearance of a goddess in front of him. A thin layer of drool begins to dribble down his lips.

Previously he’s admired you many times before sex, but because you’ve been so indulgent at his changed behavior, this is your first time noticing how he’s acknowledging your physical appearance. With how reserved he’s being, it gives you a little confidence boost, since you’ve never seen such a man in awe of your presence.

His bewildered eyes, a pool of drool below his lips, the imprint of his massive hardon against his left thigh, all of this is your doing. You’ve brought the strongest sorcerer to his knees, and you’ve never acknowledged that until now. With a burning face, your fingers pinch your own nipples, the pleasurable sensation causing you to moan.

Satoru, who is still on top of you (and fully clothed), bites his lip at how it’s not him forcing that sound out of you. In protest, his right hand carefully pushes away your left palm and continues to knead your breast.

The ends of his hair tickle your bare chest as his mouth trails lower to your stomach, enveloping each kiss with non-verbal, mental praises. He hopes that you understand the messages behind his actions, for he can’t find the right words that will do it justice.

You’re his goddess, and no one else's.

He wants you to feel good.

He wants you to say that you’re feeling good.

He needs you to say that he’s doing a good job, that nobody could ever compare to him.

“Someone’s feeling… very lovey today,” a hitched giggle is drawn out while your palm continues to pet his hair. It’s difficult to formulate a coherent sentence while he’s so busy leaving wet marks around the sensitive areas of your skin. 3 years together and he’s mastered all of your sweet points.

Wanting to share the pleasure, you raise your foot and rub his very prominent erection, gliding it back and forth. The sudden friction in his pants makes him halt his movements, a trembling hand wraps around the ankle of your jeans. Stopping your actions, you look up at an out-of-breath Satoru, who looks rather conflicted between wanting you to continue or needing you to stop.

One more swipe and it looks like he’s about to combust.

“Aww is my pretty boy about to cum in his pants?” The sultriness in your tone even shocks you. Usually, this is Satoru’s role to play, telling you how ‘pretty’ you are underneath him while mocking your desperation for release. But seeing how compliant he’s been, your subconscious tells you to take the dominant part- verbally at least. And not gonna lie, you do want to see the image of Satoru completely soiling his attire. If it wasn’t for his hold on your ankle, you would’ve been sliding your foot along his clothed shaft to the very tip of his very pretty dick.

A small patch of wetness seeps through your jeans and you’ve just noticed how soaked you are. It doesn’t help that the lewd image ingrained in your head is the major cause of all of this.

But what you didn’t know is how close Satoru is already. This whole charade is an experience for the both of you- you’re grunting at wanting to see your partner completely at your mercy while he’s about to combust from your sentence alone.

‘Pretty boy'

‘My pretty boy.’

His cock continues to twitch as the nickname cycles in his head again and again. It’s the first time you’ve ever called him something like that for intimate purposes. Even from his past sexual experiences, he’s never been the one who’s doused in possessive compliments so this is a new discovery for him.

Yes, yes! He’s your pretty boy. Yours and yours only. His heart thumps and his stomach flutters while ogling the wet patch seeping through your jeans. From your perspective, that flustered expression Satoru had is now mixed with a certain fierceness. The brightness in his eyes darkens as he single-handedly undoes the buttons of your jeans and even though he’s still got it, it’s cute at how clumsier he looks.

“No-” He grunts, answering your question. Bringing the middle and ring finger up to his mouth, Satoru coats them with his tongue, though you’re both aware that the extra lubrication is unnecessary. You’re already leaking through your jeans, that’s more than enough.

You swallow, gazing at the man above you, the superiority in your thoughts leaving your head.

‘Aw shit.’

A string of saliva connects his bottom lip to his coated fingers and Satoru swirls his tongue around your right areola.

“Haaah…” You gasp and fist the bedsheets and the skin of your boyfriend’s hand disappears below your panties as those long fingers trace along your puffy lips, a silent warning that he’s about to enter.

Shimming off your pants but leaving your underwear on, Satoru sits up more on his knees and eyes the bottom of your panties, the darker shade due to your juices adds more to his arousal. Yes, he felt how wet you are. But upon seeing how soaked you are, he’s extremely close to going completely feral.

“You’re leaking…” He replies astounded like this is a brand new sight for him. Your hips angle up, trying to match the slow pace of his fingers, your cunt beckoning for his fingers to slip in.

“Mhm, yeah. I am.” Your patience is starting to wear thin.

‘Is this some type of long foreplay?’ You thought to yourself, biting your lip.

Though you like this ‘wonder-like’ version of Satoru, you just want to feel him. Spreading your legs farther, your hand cups above his that’s hovering over your wet core. “You feel that? You feel how soaked I am, Satoru? It’s all- oh God… It’s all for you.”

If you weren’t so desperate for him to continue, you’d find yourself extremely pathetic for being the one indirectly begging for him to begin. And upon seeing your need, Satoru doesn’t waste any more time. After all, it is his duty to satisfy his queen.

Almost apologetically, his two fingers slip inside- warm, gummy walls instinctively tighten around them. Trying to add more stimulation, his thumb presses on your clit, rubbing in circular motions. His free hand palms his own erection and his hips begin to rut against it, pacing with how his fingers curl inside of you.

Satoru thrives on how contorted your face is, how your eyes roll to the back of your head and how your lips form an ‘o’ shape. The way that both hands tightly grip the sheets beside you, but how you desperately claw on them as if it’s his muscular back. Your hips buckle up, grinding the open air and he marvels at how ravenous you look.

“Sa- Satoru nghhh- yessss,” you reach out trying to grab his arm- grab any body part. Still pacing back and forth, Satoru holds out his free hand and you grip it tightly.

“Yes?” He groans with you, the squelching sounds of your wet cunt taking his fingers are music to his ears. You mouth his name again, mixed with urgent moans. He himself can feel precum creating a pool on his underwear. You try to speak and he wonders what to do next.

Does the fist himself while he continues fingering you? Or should he just focus on you? He can take care of his needs later. Right now… Right now Satoru wants needs you to-

“I’m about to… I’m about to cum.” You squeeze the last 4 words with clenched teeth.

“Then go ahead, sweetheart. Cum nice and hard for me.” He licks his own lips, nodding along with you like your release is also his.

“No.” You hiss and his eyes widen, surprised by your answer. Immediately, the thrusting of his fingers slows down to a stop. And you whimper at how you’ve edged yourself.

“What’s wrong, baby? Did I do something wrong? Did you not like it?” His mind races with many factors on how he displeased you. You seemed to have enjoyed it. The way that your insides squeezed around his fingers was enough to tell him that he was fingering you in the right places.

Settling from your almost high, you laugh and scoot closer to him, calves sliding underneath the middle of his thighs. Glancing at his perplexed face, you reach up to his white-collar, and yank him down, his lips connecting to yours once more.

You can feel the sound of his grunt vibrate on your tongue and like a pro, your fingers nimbly work their way down, undoing the first three buttons.

“I loved it,” you mumble between the heated kiss. “I was so close, but I want to cum from your cock, not your fingers.”

“Huh?” Satoru exhales sharply. His already flushed face deepens even more and the confident fire in you returns. Biting his lips, your hands trace down from his chest, purposely brushing over his nipples, and press on his muscular abdomen. Your left-hand removes the small leather strap from the buckle and tugs him closer.

“What are you doing?” He asks as if his eyes have deceived him. Your left fingers successfully undo the buttons of his jeans with one hand while your right ones lightly graze over his restrained erection. Satoru exhales, hips involuntarily rocking back and forth.

“What else?” You tease, applying more pressure against his clothed shaft. “Remove your top for me, Satoru. It’s not fair that I’m the only one naked right now. Why are you being so shy all of a sudden?”

Complying with the request, but ignoring your question, Satoru unbuttons his silk top, fingers fumbling and shaking. It is cute to see, but his sudden nervousness makes you nervous as well. Why is he being so fidgety? Did he do something bad?

On his second to the last button, you place your hand on top of his, signaling for him to stop. Reading the uncertainty on your face, Satoru can’t utter a word. His flushed chest heavily breathes, waiting for your next thought.

“What’s wrong, Satoru?” You speak softly, with an edge of worry.

“What do you mean?” He tries to play it off, but here’s the one thing about Gojo Satoru. He may be good at hiding his feelings, but if you interrogate him in a highly vulnerable environment, he’s shit at pretending. The warmth in his cheeks adds another knot of evidence.

Tugging on his wrist furthermore, you encourage him to sit down, officially halting the intimate activity. Disappointed by his lack of usual finesse, Satoru’s face beams in embarrassment rather than arousal.

“I mean…” You pull a pillow, hiding your exposed chest. “Why are you so nervous?”

Satoru does his best to pull a mischievous tone. “Is it wrong to be nervous when I pleasure my goddess?”

“ I-uhhhhh,” Your stomach releases butterflies, due to his suaveness. However, you still feel how hesitant Gojo is. It’s like facing a virgin. “You’re always very confident during sex. I’m usually the flustered one.”

You chuckle, pointing a finger at yourself, but your boyfriend hides his eyes through his hair. Frowning you scoot closer, as you settle your way onto his lap. Your arms wrap around the back of his neck and your wet core presses against his softening erection.

“Come on baby, talk to me.” You press an open-mouth kiss on his right pec and a small nibble on his collarbone. Satoru shudders at the warm feeling as he wraps his arms around your back to pull you closer. “Please?”

It took him a while, but the sorcerer finally connects through eye contact, his magnificent ocean eyes sending a loving shrill down your spine. You find yourself getting lost in his gaze.

“I overheard you and Utahime talking on the bench, the other day,” he grumbles and your ears perk up at his answer.

“How much did you hear?”

“I heard enough to know that Rai was able to make you feel like you could do anything in the whole world.” His voice drops and so does your heart. “Even with everything I have, no matter how many riches or treasures I give you, it’ll never amount to anything that he gave.”

Your face drops to a frown, shocked at what you’re hearing from both ears. How on earth did he assume that?!

“No baby, no.” You coo, sweeping the soft, pearl-like strands of hair from his forehead. Your lips plant on the recently exposed skin, and you slowly travel down to his nose, rosy cheeks, and jaw before stopping inches above his lips. Satoru whimpers at the distance, while also recalling your denial.

You slowly inch forward. “That was all in the past, my love. Rai is a great person, but the amount of affection he has given is no match to how much care, devotion, gifts (you jest by nibbling on the cartilage of his ear), and love that you've given me. Likewise, my feelings for you are incomparable to how I felt towards him. Don’t compare yourself to my past experience, Satoru. You’re my present and future.”

He swallows at your words. The sadness in his blue hues brightens into love and hope. His lips gape as he looks at the face that is inches above his. Truly a goddess in human form.

“Really?” He still needs to feel reassured.

‘Please tell the truth.’

“Yes, truly. I love you more than any man or woman I’ve ever come across and will come across.” Your thumb grazes his bottom lip as he mumbles back the same three words. The kiss starts slowly as if he was still hesitant over the whole ordeal. But your eagerness helps push him to come back to his comfort zone.

As he inserts his tongue into your mouth, you begin to pace by grazing his hair through your fingers. Your hips rock, lapping over the hardening member below, and the butterflies from your stomach return.

But before you can escalate even further, Satoru pulls away, this time earning a whine from you.

He breathes heavily, pulling on a rather teasing pout. “Say that my eyes are pretty.”

“What?” Your fingernails lightly trace over the sides of his neck and your partner shivers from the tingling sensation.

“You don’t compliment me, ever.” He forces out, rather pettily. “Just this once, please say something nice about me.”

His last sentence is hushed and desperate-sounding. You giggle at his shyness once more and peck the tip of his nose. Though, your stomach swirls with guilt, as it seems like you never showed him enough love.

Time to fix that.

“I’m sorry if you got the wrong message,” your lips travel to his neck, words vibrating through his flawless skin. His head leans back and his Adam's apple bobs from the pleasure. “But I always think that you’re beautiful, Satoru. It’s just that the whole world knows it.” Slowly, you remove yourself from his lap and have him lie flat down on the large mattress.

With all four limbs pinned around him, you continue to shower him with praise. You ravish every piece of exposed skin on his body starting from the top and he flushes brightly while looking away. “I thought that you’d be sick and tired once you hear it from me multiple times.”

“Never… I would never get sick of it coming from- ohhh…” Satoru hisses as your hand lightly tugs on the roots of his hair. With your right knee moving to the middle of his thighs, you put slight pressure on his balls, having him slowly grind for more friction.

“Your hair is purer than any shades of white and softer than all the silk I’ve ever touched.” Your grip softens as you kiss the side of his head. Soon after, you travel down to his eyes. Thumbs softly brushing the delicate skin underneath them. His blown-out pupils stare directly at your soul, the power of his six eyes distinguishing the warmth that flows through your veins.

You place a peck on each outer corner. “If only words can bring justice to how mesmerizing these eyes of yours are. Did you know how embarrassed I was the day you first removed your blindfold? I thought that I wouldn’t be able to pry away and you’d catch me staring.”

“I did. I caught you all the time.” He hums amused, but his gaze never leaves yours. Though it’s just the two of you in this room, you whisper a message that is created for him and only him.

“The sky and ocean, all-in-one. How did I get so lucky to see the gates of heaven when I’m still walking on this earth? Maybe I instead, am the honored one.”

His heart swells at the softness of your words. You, the goddess in his life, find yourself the honored one because of him. It nearly brings tears to the god-like sorcerer’s eyes.

Satoru slithers his large palms where your ass meets your thighs, unable to keep his hands away from you. He molds them and you swallow, the throb in your pussy begs to be touched, to continue unfinished business.

“Slow down, pretty boy.” You purr with a kitten-like grin. His hands around you clamp at the name and your knee feels his hips thrust up. His eyes almost roll back and his nose scrunches at the endearment.

“You like being called that, huh baby?” Your knee presses against his clothed crotch, earning a wince from his pretty mouth. “Is that all I need to say to get you this vulnerable? Call you my pretty boy?”

Another grind against your knee. Satoru looks up at you in a hazed condition. Though the main event hasn’t arrived, he looks like he just came from a 3-time post-orgasm state. With the cat biting his tongue, Gojo nods profusely, desperately uttering yes.

Sweat seeps through his button-up as you kiss his glossed lips. This time, you and Satoru had to fight for dominance. His is pure infatuation and desperation, while you want to gain control in taming the strongest sorcerer. You bring your body down as he slips a finger through the hem of your panties.

“Please…” He begs as you pull back, crotch fully grinding against yours. His hands move your hips in a slow rhythm, your wetness staining his already soaked imprint. The friction of your panties is enough to make you cum alone. “I want to make you feel good. Please let me make you feel good.”

That can happen, but seeing a vulnerable Satoru below you, desperate for your pleasure while curling his toes at every praise is rather enjoyable. A new, undiscovered flame lights your stomach and you want to do what it takes to explore this rare opportunity.

“You always do that,” you pout, going lower. “But this time, I-” Each word, leaves a love bite on his neck and down to his collarbone and chest.

“Want.”

Bite.

“To.”

Bite.

“Make.”

Bite.

“You.”

Kiss.

“Feel.”

Bite.

“Good.”

Bite.

You tug on his hard nipples with your teeth and fingers, making Satoru buck up in surprise.

“Nghhh!” He pants, tears pricking his eyes. His hands grip the sides of the bedsheets and since you’ve moved lower, his hips are humping nothing but air.

Removing the last two buttons of his shirt, you encourage him to shimmy out of it and toss it to the floor. No distractions.

As you move lower to his abdomen, you continue to spill praises and all the verbal affirmations that you’ve never told him. You feel extremely guilty for neglecting him in that aspect since you believe that he thinks that he just doesn’t need to hear anymore, so you want to make up for it as much as possible.

When you make it down to his pants, you debate whether or not you want to tease him even further or just begin business. His legs tremble the moment he feels the belt unfastening.

“Are you okay baby?” You ask innocently, tracing one hand around his v-line while the other gently grazes on the massive bump in his jeans. Satoru throws his head back, gripping both of your hands with his.

“My love, please.” His throat is dry, and his neck all the way down to his abs are decorated with your love marks. “I’m going to cum just by this- I can’t- I- Oh my God…”

“You can cum twice, can’t you?” He barely notices how you already unzipped his pants, the only layer blocking your skin from his dick is the heavily coated gray boxer briefs. It rises as it is freed from the constricted attire. After removing his trousers, you begin to toy with the outline with your hand. You can already feel the drool pooling in your mouth.

“I didn’t know you could get this soaked, Satoru!” You’re genuinely impressed by how much pre-cum your boyfriend is able to produce. On your hottest nights, he’d already had his dick pumping inside you if he were this horny. “How lucky am I to be dating the world’s prettiest boy with the prettiest dick?”

Satoru wants to laugh at the compliment, and retort something cheesy. But his mind is too swayed to even think coherently. He is pretty. You’re his pretty boy.

He loves that.

Peeling off his stained boxers, his hard dick springs freely, the light reflected by the sheer coat of his juices. The flushed tip leaks even more out and you almost feel pity at how long you’ve left him waiting.

The sorcerer can barely raise his dizzy head to see what’s going on. When you make eye contact with him, a devilish smirk appears on your face and Satorh’s thighs clench when he feels your hot breath going near it. He’s almost afraid of what you’re going to do.

“J-Just- just… Aghhh, my love! I-” He is instantly greeted by the softness of your mouth and hand circulating around him. His balls are heavy with cum, the only thing prohibiting him from shooting down your throat is his sheer willingness to draw out this pleasure as long as possible.

You can’t go all the way down, as the halfway point is already your limit. As your right hand strokes the bottom portion of his shaft, your left pays gratuitous attention to his balls, massaging them to increase the pleasure.

Meanwhile, your own cunt is begging for the pleasure Gojo’s receiving. With your knees still on the bed, your ass sticks up in the air, the angle forcing your sticky wetness to travel down to the front of your core. It doesn’t matter anyway, you’re already leaking on the bed.

At this point, Gojo is already babbling incoherent sentences. His head lolls to the side, his blue hues barely visible due to how far they rolled back. His right-hand fists the bedsheets, knuckles paling due to how tight he’s pulling on them. The other is submerged in your hair. He’s more gentle about it, but every once in a while he would subconsciously thrust a little too hard, making you gag. You encourage him to keep going by swirling your well-coated tongue around his tip.

A few more pumps, Satoru is spilling. His abdomen flexes at the intensity, veins popping out in his lower stomach. Your head bobs to match his quick-paced movements, but he’s losing control of himself. Satoru’s thighs flex as he humps up, forcing more of his cock into your throat.

“Baby,” he warns feverishly, gripping tighter on your hair. “I’m cumming, I’m cumming-”

Your head spins at the intensity, barely being able to take a breath. You hum, sending vibrations down his twitching cock.

He groans and whines, yearning for the long-awaited release. His toes curl and his muscled thighs shake as his member shoots long streams of cum down your throat.

“You’re so good to me… So, so good.” The grip on your hair turns into strokes as you swallow all of his seed. Once he relaxes, you slide your mouth from his cock, jaw aching from the rigorous pace. However, that’s not the only part of your body that’s aching.

Your cunt begs to be taken care of as you crawl over a recovering boyfriend, who’s still catching his breath.

The desperation in his eyes has cleared, but the lust still remains. You lick your lips before interlocking with him, your bodies pressed against each other. His hands roam around your back before one slides down to your ass, underneath your underwear. You grunt at how grabby he still is.

“Don’t you want a break?” Though, it’s a ridiculous inquiry, since Satoru’s hard shaft is already rubbing up against your pussy. You both simultaneously moan at the sensation.

“No breaks for you,” he chuckles as he pulls you in for a kiss. “I still need to make you finish. My poor baby has been waiting for me, huh?”

You sneer at his tease. “You cum once and all of a sudden, you’re back to the way you were- Woah!”

In your next blink, you find yourself lying on your back, your recently relieved lover now hovers over you. It really is like looking up at the sky, his glossy eyes shining brighter than the blue sky outside. You feel your entire body heat up as he ogles you from your head to your feet.

“Absolutely divine,” his voice rasps, the cock you just fucked with your throat taps against his thigh, clearly aroused. You rub your thighs together, looking for some relief. “Now, where were we before you sucked me off?”

The edge of his pointer finger traces around your folds, outside of your panties. He knows how much you love the friction, as you grind against his finger, nipples hardening at the action.

You moan softly, enough to capture his attention. “Satoru-”

The star-like gaze you offer sends the message completely. Bending down, Satoru plants a long, passionate kiss as he circles your clit with an additional finger. You squeak against the pleasure, wanting more. More, more, more.

“Why are you so beautiful?” He mumbles, barely pulling away from you. Your saliva connects each other’s lips and no longer having the patience, you take his hair and pull him down.

His flushed chest lies against yours and Satoru leaves open mouth kisses on your neck, hitting all of your major sweet spots before trailing down to your breasts, the same way you did for him not too long ago.

With his long tongue, Satoru teasingly circles around your areola before fully latching onto your nipple, biting and sucking to his heart’s content.

You roll your eyes back to the incredible sensation, a warm shrill traveling around your body. It leaves your cunt even wetter, desperate for parts of Satoru that aren't his fingers.

“You're such a good boy,” a new nickname leaps from your tongue and swims into his ears. Satoru tenses at the pet name, and you can feel the vibrations of his whimper against your breast. Your fingers lace over the strands of his white hair as he continues to play with what seems to be his favorite features of your body.

But even with the jolting sparks of sensitivity those buds provide, it’s not enough to satiate the burning drive in the pit of your belly.

“‘Toru,” you say sloppily, wiggling your hips to the rhythm of his fingers. “I need you- inside me. Fuck me- Please.”

You bite your lip and he lifts his head up, the infatuation still possessing his very being.

His digits leave your clit and instantly, you grind for the missing feeling. Satoru nods as he removes your panties, basking in the beautiful bareness. The slickness laminates your intimate area, something that temporarily captures your partner’s attention.

He supports himself on top of you but furrows his eyebrows.

“No condom.” He displays an innocence in those orbs, mixed with twinges of disappointment. You laugh and shake your head.

“I’m on birth control. You can cum inside me as much as you want now.”

It makes his ears perk, mouth slightly parting from the genuine surprise. You’ve both never done it raw before, but you trust Satoru with your entire life to make this decision.

“Are you… Are you positive?”

“Yes, and my pregnancy results will be negative.” You stick your tongue out at the pun and Satoru laughs at your cheesy joke.

“I love you.” He looks at you earnestly, pressing a light kiss to your lips.

“I love you too.” You say as he lines up the tip to your leaking hole. It’d be a lie to say that you weren’t nervous, but the excitement and the fogginess of your arousal override any negative feeling.

Spreading your legs even wider, Satoru goes in slowly. Thanks to the accumulated fluids you’ve both produced, slipping in comfortably is an easy task. However, your partner struggles to keep his composure at the foreign sensation.

You throw your head back as your body welcomes his cock, no latex rubber blocking the two of you. Of the many acts you’ve done together, this is the first time where it’s just you and him.

“You’re so tight… And g-ood.” He stammers, stopping only halfway. Satoru clenches his teeth to prevent himself from releasing prematurely. Man, thank God he already came once, or the pent-up sensation would’ve ended him. “Oh, you feel so good- taking all of me in.”

He grunts while inching deeper inside of you, nuzzling his face into your neck. You have your mouth pressed against his trapezius, teeth sinking in the skin.

The satisfaction of feeling his heavy balls rest against your entrance enables you to grind on his flesh. The cascades of whimpers fall out of your mouth, beckoning for him to move.

Satoru starts slowly, his arm cradles your neck for support. Breathless moans from his end tickle your neck.

“Faster-” You suggest and your every wish is Satoru’s command. His pace quickens, and the sounds of his skin slapping skin move in a rhythmic beat. “Yes, thank you! Good boy- oh my g-”

Your vision blurs as his cock perfectly hits the g-spot, your legs wrap around his hips to adjust the angle.

Satoru lifts his head up, seeing stars. Tears accumulate at the edge of his eyes, his puffy, red lips practically drooling from the pleasure. He kisses the corners of your lips, whispering.

“Am I good enough for you?” It almost sounds like he’s embarrassed to ask.

The back of your fingers stroke his face before combing through his hair. “Yes baby, you’re always so good for me- so perfect and beautiful. You are more than enough for me- hahhhh… yes, yes, yes!”

Your praises are cut short as you feel a jolt in your stomach. You’re almost there, your calves pull Satoru’s hips, encouraging him to drive faster and harder. He looks like he can barely hold it in.

“My pretty boy is always so good for me-” You coo, repeating the same thing over and over. "Right baby?"

“I- I- Mhmm… ‘m yours.” His red face scrunches, quiet pants turning into loud whines. “I’ll always be yours… Please, mghh- please say that I’m yours- nobody else."

His insecurities flow out of his mouth with no filter stopping him. It’s unfair, but Gojo Satoru hates the burning sensation in his chest, realizing that someone else once belonged to you and you belonged to them.

Instead of jealous rage, he emotes envious fear.

No- he’s yours. Only him and him alone. After all these years, he realizes that he doesn’t want to be alone. Satoru will give you anything and everything to his avail to never leave him.

“Please, please, please…” He begs. Desperate whines accumulate as a free hand cups your bouncing breast. His slick cock twitches in you, yearning for a release. Satoru doesn’t know how much longer he can hold it in, but he needs you to come undone first- his goddess, his everything.

Your hands cup his pink face, forcing him to gaze up at you. Those infatuated pairs he once expressed turn into a gape of restlessness. He still needs to be reassured that your mind, body, and soul belongs to him as he does to you.

“Everything about you is made for me. Your spirit and body are mine.” Your stomach flips as the fire burns higher. Your toes curl as you’re moments away from approaching your orgasm. Satoru’s heart thumps 3 times faster than the pace he’s thrusting in.

“I am yours and you are mine, understand baby?” You continue, head spiraling. Satoru nods vigorously, his own drool pooling down to the side of your face. Oh, how he loves this feeling. His heart is warm and his desires are satisfied all due to your love. “You’re my one and only true love- forever and always. Always my pretty, handsome, perfect boy. Nobody could ever compare to you. Can you say that for me?”

His cock painfully twitches, bits of cum slowly spilling out of his slit. It’s too much. He can’t hold it in anymore.

“I’m yours- ‘m only yours.” He dedicates, in short sputters, saying your name. “I love- mmgh- I love you. Oh my God, -always yours, only yours.”

“I love you, Sa- hahhh- ‘toru!” Your volume rises as you praise his name. It sounds so beautiful as it rolls off your tongue. Your legs clutch tightly around his back, and your body pushes up to press against his.

His hips thrust faster, tightly wrapping his arms around your back and hips to hold you up. Moaning your name, Satoru is in a daze. His momentum is vicious as the animalistic side in him attempts to make an entrance.

“I’m cumming, Satoru! I- I-” You shower him with praises as he finally tips you over the edge. You see flashes of white and shake violently against his hold, gasping as your body rumbles into a turbulent orgasm. Your thighs quake as euphoric bliss travels through your system.

During the start of your orgasm, Satoru begins soon after. With one final thrust, he moans as he sets you back on the bed. His abdomen clenches and small tears spill from his face as his mouth creates an ‘o’ shape. Soon after, he grits his teeth, stammering your name as several long, white ropes shoot out, his love spilling inside of you.

Satoru continues to thrust slowly, riding the high of arguably, his best orgasm of all time. You shudder in his hold, with no words that are worthy enough to process what just happened.

You lazily smile up at the ceiling, combing through his hair, and after a few minutes of silence, he finally pulls out. His cock is drenched in milky rings, and the bedsheets are crumpled and stained with an unjustifiable amount of both of your fluids.

Satoru lies on top of you, speechless. He pants, trying to catch his breath. Even in his most difficult missions, he never had to exert so much air through his lungs until now.

“If you wanted to talk, we could’ve just done that.” You finally break the silence, giggling from the very intense session.

Satoru’s face doesn’t lift from your chest. His eyes flutter as he does a sarcastic eye roll. His cheek splays on your skin, disorienting his speech. “Pfft, that’s boring.”

His fingertips graze over your forearm, trickling down to your wrist and then enveloping your fingers with his. Satoru’s larger thumb massages your knuckles, before bringing them up to his lips.

“You know,” You stir, rocking the hand that’s intertwined with Satoru, side-to-side. The tone you bring is gentle but serious, bringing up something that isn’t the typical lovey post-sex topic you guys would initiate. “There’s no need for you to get jealous over anything, Satoru. You’re the only one I want.”

Slowly, he rises and peers at you, the pearl-white strands dusting over his glossy eyes. “I know... I just didn’t know how to handle what I felt when you talked about another man that wasn’t me.”

“I’m sorry about that, baby. Utahime kept pushing me and I was just really happy to see how she finally found her own love, so I just kept on rambling with her.”

“I should’ve taken a video of her for blackmail.” Satoru scoffs at the lost opportunity.

“However,” you laugh, shifting the conversation. “I did like this jealous side of you. It was cute.”

Gojo’s mouth drops at the comment and some confusion stems from his sentence.“My jealous side is… cute?”

As I stated earlier, I whole-heartedly believe that Gojo would get possessive, in ways that may differ from what other people think. He can take over the whole world with the palm of his hand and force his way to do the unthinkable. But if there’s a rare, uncontrollable factor that could pull whatever or whoever he cherishes away? Then, he gets desperate.

Gojo Satoru would get possessive by clutching onto his loved one, asking if he’s enough, and giving all that he could. After all, he was a gifted child who was the exact norm of perfectionism. So when he sees a competitor who could challenge his being, he’d crumble, get desperate, not knowing what to do.

But, just reassure him that no one could ever beat him.

“Yes, cute! Can we do that again next time?” You giggle at his very prominent pout.

“I’m not the only person that’s switched roles. You’re quite mouthy and feisty when you take charge.” He glares, but softens wholeheartedly at your amusement when his eyes connect with yours.

"I am only yours, right?" Satoru whispers once more, inching closer to your face, hinting at an answer that he wants to hear again and again.

From lust, to fear, to love, those same blue eyes cultivate the same message he had always intended to deliver.

"Yes, Satoru." You rub his back as he nestles his head on your chest, finally humming into relaxation. "You're only mine."

Satoru Gojo is yours and only yours. Always have, always will.

FORCED CHEMISTRY

A SCIENTIST!GOJO SATORU X ASSISTANT!F!READER FIC.

CONTENT WARNINGS: NSFW (mdni), manipulative!yandere!alpha!Gojo, omega!f!reader, dubcon, a/b/o dynamics, mating bites, breeding, knotting, sex pollen, syringes/injections

WORD COUNT: 3.6k

A/N: here’s my piece for my discord server’s collab: rated L for Lewd! big thank you to @hisoknen for beta reading and offering your thoughts!! still super happy that you love the way i write this dumb bastard man 🥺

Heavy are your footfalls that meet the unyielding terrain of the mysterious planet that’s been on you and your fellow scientists’ radars for quite some time now. You exasperatedly thumb through what’s left of your notes while your lanky boss stretches a foot or so ahead of you, long arms inviting the sky into them. He throws his head back over his shoulder to flash an award-winning smile at you. It drops and forms into a pout when you don’t even dignify him with a look.

“Still mad at me?” he asks.

You pinch the bridge of your nose. “Yes,” you hiss through your teeth, “Gojo you ruined a significant portion of my field notes with your reckless, thoughtless piloting. Again.”

Gojo’s suddenly in front of you, face leaning into yours. You jump, taken aback at the close proximity in which you can smell the aroma of coffee off of him from the stack of unsalvageable notes you had thrown at his face.

“Y/N.”

“Yes, Gojo?”

“You shouldn’t frown so much. Y’know, they say it takes twenty-six more muscles to frown than it does to smile.” he cheerily singsongs as he pulls at the corners of your lips into a mock smile. You swat his hand away, irritation etched deeply between your brows. “You’re insufferable.”

“You’re gonna get wrinkles the more you keep contorting that pretty face of yours. C’mon, follow my example!” Gojo says as he beams down at you. You continue staring at him with such blatant unamusement that he practically deflates and kicks a rock away dejectedly. He mumbles under his breath, causing you to quirk an eyebrow.

“Have something you want to say?” you inquire before he mumbles again, this time facing away from you. 

Whining, he turns to fix puppy-dog eyes on you. “I already said I was sorry…”

You suck in a harsh breath, the irritation rolling off of you in waves. “‘Sorry’ doesn’t cut it you absolute idiot! You knew how important those notes were. I needed those to work off of for Yaga’s report and you just—!”

“What if I told you I already submitted a report for you using the notes you like to just leave around where any old idiot like me can pick them up?” Gojo grins seeing you sigh and rake a hand through your hair.

Before any words could leave your mouth, a bellowing boom shakes the ground somewhere in the distance, acid green liquid spewing high into the air. You both share a glance.

“Adventure awaits, dearest Y/N!” your moron of a boss exclaims before marching onwards towards the source of the booming noise. You follow in his footsteps, trying in vain to match his strides. Why’d the damned bastard have to be so tall?

As you two cautiously approach the area of concern, Gojo quickly throws a set of technologically-advanced headphones at you which you catch effortlessly and immediately wear. Beyond the planet’s flora and fauna that spreads into the horizon, a geyser comes into your line of sight. Another rumble reverberates through the ground as that same liquid from earlier shoots out of the hole. Stabilizing your feet, you continue on alongside your partner.

“Hand me a reinforced test tube,” Gojo tells you in a businesslike manner. “We need a sample of that to bring back to HQ. Stay here.”

You nod solemnly as you place the tube in the waiting palm of his hand, expecting your boss to come bounding back to you excited at the prospect of new material to research.

What you didn’t expect when you went to search for him, was the blow to the back of your head, effectively shutting the lights of your world off, submerging you into total-encompassing darkness.

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