Steven Grant Imagine - Tumblr Posts

You Look Like a Museum to Me

Click here for my masterlist.

Click here to add yourself to my taglist.

Prompts - “You’re extra beautiful when you talk about this. You know you’re good at it, and that knowledge lights you up.”

Notes -  I know absolutely nothing about ancient Egypt so if anything is wrong, just go with it.

Steven fiddled with the ends of his sleeves nervously as he glanced in the mirror, seeing nothing but Marc’s slightly amused eyes looking back at him as he watched him panic over his first date with you. Despite being reassured a dozen times that he had this, that you liked him just as much as he liked you, despite all of Marc’s comforting words he still couldn’t get rid of the pit of nerves in his stomach.

“You’re gonna be fine,” Marc told him again, not even annoyed at the amount of assurance Steven needed today. It was nice watching Steven with you, watching how flustered he got and feeling how happy he was. “You’re taking her to the museum, right, giving her a tour?”

“Yeah,” Steven sighed, nodding as he wiped his slightly sweaty palms against his pants, “Yeah, she wanted a tour of the museum.”

“Then you’re gonna be just fine, you know everything about that stuff, you’ll blow her away.” Marc smiled as Steven laughed nervously before checking his appearance one last time and grabbing his bag, one more deep breath and he turned away from the mirror.

After a quick goodbye to the fish Steven was heading out the door, just about managing to catch the bus and making his way to the museum. Marc was right, if there was one thing he knew it was this, how many times had he dreamed about giving this tour and now he got to give it to you.  

Asking you on a date had been nerve wracking, even after everything that had happened lately somehow asking a pretty woman out on a date felt scarier than any of it. Marc had laughed, not in a mean way, more in a fondly exasperated way and encouraged Steven to ask you out, went back and forth with him all night with different ways to ask you and different dates that were ideal for the first one. 

“I know this stuff, I’ve got this.” Steven muttered to himself as he got off the bus, not even noticing the side glances he received from strangers. Marc did and it showed when Steven glanced in a window to see Marc standing with a fond smile.

“I’m right with you buddy.” Marc said as Steven walked up the steps of the museum and found that the words eased his nerves a bit and he took one final deep breath to steady himself before he walked through the doors. 

He spotted you straight away, of course he did, even with the children darting back and forth, the tourists looking every which way, the school group that stood huddled together, somehow Steven missed all of them but managed to see you. You were focused on one of the figures, reading the small plaque in front of it as Steven stood still in his spot, more than content to watch you for a moment. 

“She really is stunning.” Steven mumbled, whether to himself or to Marc, even he didn’t know. His eyes were still locked on you as Marc rolled his eyes fondly from his place in the reflection of a glass barrier before he took control for half a second in order to get Steven moving. 

Steven stumbled slightly but managed to catch himself, shooting Marc a glare but Marc just smiled and gestured for him to make his way over to you. 

He took a steadying breath, feeling both more nervous and at ease at seeing you before he finally did as Marc advised and forced his feet forward until he was looking over your shoulder and humming as he saw just what you were looking at. 

“Ah,” Steven said from behind you, causing you to jump slightly before you turned around, a smile spreading across your face and eyes lighting up as you met Steven’s gaze, “that there is Set. Bit of a knob actually.”

“Oh really?” You asked, not even attempting to stop the laugh that escaped you, completely unaware of how the sound momentarily stunned Steven before he shook himself and swore he would do whatever he had to to keep hearing you laugh.

“Oh yeah, completely mental really, I mean what other word is there for dismembering your own brother and having a fish eat his-“ here Steven cut himself off, already berating himself over his words but then he saw your smile widen and your whole body turned to him, giving him all your attention, your head tilting as he paused. 

He could see Marc in the reflection behind you, the reassuring smile on his face telling Steven that he hadn’t messed up, he could do this. 

“Probably best to start a story from the beginning though, eh?” He continued, encouraged by your nod, smile having yet to fade and attention still solely on him. “Well, Set used to be a hero, people called upon him for all sorts, a protector in life and death but what really made him a hero was saving Ra, the sun god, meant he had made sure the sun would continue to rise. But by the time of the New Kingdom, Set gets a bit jealous, now I don’t know about you but when I’m jealous I don’t go around murdering people but maybe that’s just me.” 

Steven paused as you laughed again, trying to commit the sound to memory before he continued.

“See Set was jealous of Osiris, jealous of the fact big brother was the ruler of Egypt and he wasn’t. It wasn’t just Set killing his brother that was odd though it was the way he did it, instead of, you know, just murdering him quietly Set throws this party, one of those fancy ones, and he brings this casket out after dinner.” The entire time Steven speaks his gaze is locked on you, watching you nod along with his words, expression shifting from smiles to questioning looks and Steven can see the genuine interest on your face, can see that you’re actually listening to what he has to say, listening to him ramble about something he liked. 

Steven couldn’t remember a time when somebody had just let him speak, let him share his interest with them without interrupting him or making a disparaging comment before brushing him off. He had known you were something special from the moment he had met you, hell actually from the moment his eyes had locked onto you but this, this moment right here, just confirmed to him how amazing you truly were, a one of a kind girl he had somehow been lucky enough to meet.

“A casket?” You asked, Steven chuckling at the face you pulled, eyebrows drawn together, nose scrunched up and lips twisting into a grimace.

“Weird right? Well after he brought out the casket he had each of the guests attempt to climb into it but none of them could fit. When it comes to Osiris’ turn, well guess who fits in the casket? Osiris does and when he does get in, that's when Set comes along and slams the casket shut, poor bugger was trapped in the thing all the while Set threw him in the Nile.”

You were more than content to continue standing in front of the glass protected figure listening to Steven as he told you the story about the god it was based on, happy to watch as his hands gestured around as he spoke, observe how his entire face seemed to light up as he got to teach you something, watch Steven be at his most confident as his knowledge seemed to give him a boost. It wasn’t a drastic change, it was only noticeable if you were paying attention, he still fiddled with the edges of his sleeves, still tugged on the strap of his bag but he seemed lighter, completely in his element as he spoke without fumbling over his words and it was a side that you guessed many people didn’t get to see, whether it was due to Steven not showing it or other people not giving him a chance to.

When Steven finished talking he saw your face soften, it was almost of fond expression with something else he couldn’t quite place and it made him smile sheepishly at you, an apology on the tip of his tongue, almost on instinct, for rambling on. He nearly had the words out when you interrupted him and your words almost made his heart ache with happiness.

“So what happened to the brother, did he just die?” You asked him. 

Steven felt his smile widen, not only had you put up with his rambling but here you were asking questions, wanting him to keep talking. It was such a rare thing that all he could do was smile at you, completely and utterly captivated by you. 

He really hoped he wouldn’t mess this up, he was already so gone for you and it was only your first date. Steven hoped to any god that might be listening that there were many more dates to come.

“Well the casket floats down the Nile for a bit before it washes up on the shore and this tree, the tamarisk tree, sprouted up to protect it. The tree was so beautiful that the King and Queen of Byblos cut it down and had it brought to their court. Osiris had a wife, Isis and she tracked Osiris down and managed to get his corpse back, all the while Set’s in Egypt and ruling as King, not a good one mind you, he switched between storms and droughts because he was the god of not only war and chaos but also storms, the people ended up turning on each other just to survive, told you he was a knob.” Steven said, pausing to let your laugh wash over him as he moved his hands to play with the ends of his sleeves once he realised he had been gesturing wildly between the two of you.

“Sounds like he was a bit more than a knob.” You laughed and Steven couldn’t stop the bright smile that spread across his face. “So what, Set just kills his brother and gets to rule Egypt? And Isis managed to retrieve his corpse?”

“Yeah, she gets his corpse back and hides the two of them again in some swampy marshes of the Nile. Once they were back though Set found out and started tracking them down. Isis knew of some herbs that could bring Osiris back and she asks for help to watch the body. When Isis is out though Set comes along and tricks Nephthys into telling him where Osiris was hidden, after he found him he went about hacking his body to pieces,” Steven paused, watching as you scrunched your face in disgust again, hoping he hadn’t put you off but you were still looking at him expectantly so he carried on, not giving himself another moment to doubt himself, “Once Isis was back she and Nephthys went about collecting all the body parts to put him back together but his, um, well a certain part of him was missing, well actually it was eaten by a fish which, you know, bit gross.”

“It was actually eaten by a fish?” You couldn’t help but laugh as Steven nodded, a bright smile still firmly in place as he chuckled along with you. “So that was it then for Osiris?”

“Well since he was incomplete he couldn’t return to the land of the living and instead became the lord of the underworld and god of the death and I can tell you that Osiris doesn’t mess around when he’s judging where you’ll spend eternity.” Steven told you, his tone filled with an emotion you couldn’t quite put your finger on and his eyes shifted just over your shoulder to look at the statue of Set. 

Steven's eyes shifted to look at the reflection in the glass casing, distracted by Marc’s amused snort that you obviously couldn’t hear, his own smile spreading into a grin as he focused on you again.

“You say that like you have experience.” You laughed and watched him laugh along with you. “So what happens to Set then, he’s the King, right?”

“For a bit, yeah but Osiris actually had a son, Horus, who battled Uncle Set for control of Egypt. The two of them went before the Great Ennead and were given contests to battle against each other. Turns out Set wasn’t very good, actually he was complete rubbish and lost every battle against Horus.” Steven explained and felt his chest warm as you interrupted him but in a way that was so different to how others usually did. 

“So Horus became King then?” You asked, unable to stop yourself. 

In all honesty Ancient Egypt wasn’t something you sought out yourself, you appreciated it and it was interesting but you had never been too eager to seek knowledge out about it yourself. However when Steven was the one talking about it, telling you the stories that matched the figures you were captivated, completely hooked on his every word, and wanted him to tell you everything he knew.

“You’d think wouldn’t you but no, actually, Set reigned for over eighty years because Ra refused to vote that Horus should be the King and because the decision had to be unanimous Set was free to be King.” Steven told you, physically feeling himself fall for you more and more as the seconds passed as you frowned, mirroring his expression when he had first read the information from one of his many books.

It wasn’t until he looked behind you that he saw a group of school children making their way from one of the figures over to the one the two of you had been blocking for a while now. You looked questioningly over at him before following his gaze, eyes widening as the teacher gave the two of you an annoyed look causing you to bite your lip and look over at Steven, a grin breaking out across both your faces as he took your arm in his and pulled you along, the two of you laughing as you leaned into each other.

Making your way further into the museum, laughs fading off as conversation filled its place Steven found himself glancing down, your arms still tangled together despite the fact that they didn’t need to be. Steven was thankful you hadn’t let go of him, he was more than happy to stay attached to you the whole way around the museum.

“Steven?” You prompted softly when the man had remained silent at your question, his gaze on you but clearly having missed you speaking.

“Sorry love,” he apologised softly and you couldn’t ignore how your stomach seemed to fill with butterflies at the word love. It sounded beautiful coming from Steven, sounded genuine and not meant an attempt to flirt that would ultimately leave you uncomfortably trying to get away from somebody. 

You really wanted him to call you love again. 

The two of you made your way around the museum, Steven rambling on happily about each of the different things that were on display but he found himself stumbling over his words at some points, your entire attention focused only on him, expression so open and he could happily stare at you all day. When he watched you mouthing along as you read from the plaques attached to the displays or when your eyebrows knitted together when you didn’t quite understand something and you would turn to look up at him questioningly, it was only with Marc’s helpful calling of his name and quick repeating of the question that he was able to stammer out an answer, memorising the way your face light up as you listened to him.

He had never made somebody smile like that, like the way you were smiling, he had never had that kind of smile directed at him and he most certainly had never been the reason somebody’s whole face seemed to light up or made somebody laugh in the way he made you, a genuine laugh that made his stomach flutter and took his breath away.

Even as he was surrounded by some of the most beautiful pieces and ancient displays that would usually occupy his attention for hours, they all seemed dull when compared to you standing next to them. Steven found he would much rather look at you, learn everything there was to know about you, than anything that was in this building.

You were as equally as distracted as Steven was, completely captivated by everything about the man, by the way he spoke, even when he did stammer over his words as he was pulled from his thoughts, how his arm felt still tangled with yours, how his eyes seemed to light up every time he looked at you. You had never felt so much for one person so fast, never realised how quickly you could fall for somebody and yet here stood Steven Grant seemingly on a mission to see how fast he could make you fall for him. 

The date lasted hours and yet it still didn’t feel long enough when the two of you stood just past the museum steps, reluctant to pull away from each other but having no other choice as you were getting ready to say goodbye, heading home in opposite directions.

“Thank you for today, I had a bloody brilliant time.” Steven told you, a smile on his face as you laughed softly, nodding in agreement with his words.

“So did I,” You said honestly, “I hope we can do it again?” 

“Yeah, yeah I’d love to, absolutely.” Steven’s smile spread into a grin and you couldn’t stop yourself from mirroring the expression, face almost aching from how much the man made you smile.

“Good, I can’t wait.” As you spoke you looked up, feeling rain begin to fall from the grey clouds above and looked at Steven. “We should probably get home before it really starts.”

“Good idea,” he laughed, seeming to hesitate for a moment before he nodded and stepped closer to you, giving you time to pull away. When you stayed as you were Steven smiled before leaning forward but instead of going for the kiss like you thought he would, he instead placed the softest kiss to your cheek before pulling away with a shy smile. “Let me know you got home safe, yeah?”

“Yeah,” you agreed quietly, somehow the soft kiss to the cheek flustered you more than you thought a normal kiss would but thankfully Steven seemed as flustered as you. “I’ll see you soon.”

“God, I hope so.” You heard Steven mumble to himself after you had turned away and taken a few steps away from him, a soft laugh leaving you, fully agreeing with the sentiment and making your way home with a smile on your face even as the rain fell down on you, completely ready for your next date with Steven Grant. 

___________

Steven Grant Taglist -

@bxmaaa, @captainamericasdaughter15, @daisyfreshwhore, @myguiltypleasures21, @polyglot-noodle

August

Click here for my masterlist.

Click here to add yourself to my taglist.

Prompts - 'It is August. My life is going to change. I can feel it.'

The change from July to August passed as easily as it always did, the weather was still warm, birds could still be heard chirping away and yet you couldn’t help but feel off. More than half the year had passed and it had passed without anything remarkable happening. The years had all seemed to pass the same lately and no matter how much you promised yourself this one would be different it seemed it was destined to be anything but. 

Of course just when you give up hope of something great, something remarkable happening, is often when your life changes most. 

It was a regular Monday and you were getting by on nothing but a few hours of sleep as you walked the busy streets with a hot to-go cup warming your hands, mind not completely awake just yet and not at all focused on your surroundings. It shouldn’t have been a surprise when you were suddenly jolted, nearly falling to the floor before a pair of arms caught you. 

“Oh god, I am so sorry, are you alright, love?” You looked up, eyes widening at the man holding you in the middle of a busy London street.

His voice was soft and it washed over you, calming your racing heart from both being crashed into and from the man himself, beautiful and captivating and staring at you. 

Of course, you hadn’t answered him and with a mental slap to your face you cleared your throat and answered the question, straightening up as you did, smiling as the man’s arms didn’t leave you. 

“I’m alright, thank you. Sorry, I wasn’t looking where I was going.” You apologised, smiling softly at him, and watching as he mirrored the expression back, your heart seemingly skipping a beat at how beautiful the smile made him look. 

“Oh no, it’s my fault really, completely in a world of my own.” He chuckled and you couldn’t help but grin at him. “Oh bugger, your drink! Let me buy you a new one, if you’re not in a rush of course.” 

You weren’t in a rush thankfully but even if you had been you thought you would have cancelled any plans then and there if it meant being able to spend a single second longer in the man’s presence. 

“Thank you, you don’t have to though.” You told him but he just shook his head, cutting you off before you could say anything else. 

“No, no really I insist.” He told you, finally drawing his arms back with a sheepish smile and you felt the loss immediately but didn’t dwell on it, instead your smile widened as you nodded. 

“Then I’d like that, thank you.” You said and his whole face seemed to brighten up as he shifted his bag on his shoulder before nodding and gesturing for you to follow him. 

What were you doing, this was completely unlike you to go off with a man you’d just met, one that was a complete stranger and yet it didn’t seem like he was. Something about this man seemed to put you at ease, radiating safety and warmth and you were drawn to him immediately. 

You’d been saying you wanted things to change, months passed in the same old cycle and this was a welcome break in the chain. Perhaps August was the month for it. 

“I’m Steven by the way, nice to meet you.” Steven, it suited him nicely. 

“I’m Y/N,” you told him, sending him a smile back, completely unable to help the way it spread across your face as you looked at him. “It’s nice to meet you too.”

The two of you walked side by side, looking to the outside world like a pair of old friends or lovers out for a morning stroll. Steven, for all that he stammered and fidgeted, was surprisingly confident in carrying the conversation, rambling on about whatever came to his mind, asking questions about you, where you were from, what you were interested in and he responded in kind and by the time the two of you came to the coffee shop neither of you wanted to leave the others company. 

“If you’re, well, if maybe by some chance you weren’t busy would you perhaps like to have a drink?” Steven managed to ask and you felt your heart beat faster and your shoulders relax. “With me I mean.”

“Yeah,” you told him with a soft, almost fond breath of laughter as you nodded, watching as he grinned at you, “Yeah, I’d like that.”

As the two of you ordered Steven felt the ball of nervous energy in the pit of his stomach grow, completely outside of his comfort zone and yet something about you put him at ease and made it easy for him to take a breath and relax. 

It wasn’t long before the two of you were seated with drinks in front of you, Steven’s fingers tapping a steady rhythm on the sides of his cup. Somehow this felt more intimate than walking the streets of London, sitting across from each other under the low light of some hole in the wall coffee shop and yet, despite the nerves you both felt, neither of you could think of anywhere else you’d rather be.

“So where were you off to before we crashed into each other?” Steven asked with a grin and you felt yourself relax even more, glad for the easy conversation and the chance to memorise his features some more.

“I was heading to the museum, I have an interview and wanted to get there earlier to make sure I knew where to go.” You told him, watching as he seemed to perk up at the mention of the museum before his eyes widened.

“Oh god, you have an interview and I pulled you away from it. You really didn’t have to-” Steven began but you just chuckled softly, shaking your head, and cutting him off.

“It’s fine, really, my interview isn’t until after lunch, trust me I’ve got plenty of time and I’d rather be here with you than nervously pacing around the museum.” You laughed and watched as he relaxed, a soft laugh escaping him.

“You have an interview though, that’s great!” Steven beamed at you and somehow this stranger opposite you seemed just as excited as you were at the offer and you were glad to have somebody around who shared your excitement. “That’s really amazing, honestly you’ll love it, I worked there for a bit but it didn’t work out.” He told you, his nose scrunching up slightly as he shook his head and you couldn’t help but smile at him.

“Hopefully I’ll love it if I even get the job. What happened with you?” You asked and watched as he turned to look out of the window for a second before shaking his head and turning his attention back to you.

“Oh you know, had a bit of a nasty run in with a jackal and caused some property damage.” He told you, tone so serious that it drew a laugh from you and he couldn’t stop himself from laughing along with you.

“And yet somehow not the worst reason I’ve heard for being fired.” You chuckled before taking a sip from your drink.

Conversation flowed easily from there, somehow you felt like you had known this man, this stranger, for your whole life, like the two of you were long-time friends who hadn’t seen each other for a while and were simply spending time catching up on everything that had happened since you’d last seen one another, except in this case it was catching up on each other’s entire lives.

It was nice talking to Steven, nice to have somebody around who shared the same interests as you, who seemed genuinely interested and listened to every word that left your mouth. Something about Steven made you feel light, feel a happiness that you hadn’t known you had been missing. 

The man was a simply just a stranger who had happened to bump into you and yet here the two of you were, turning an accident into something that would change your futures, would steer you two down a different path, one where your lives became so entwined it would be impossible to remember a time before knowing one another.

You smiled as you listened to him talk, couldn’t help but silently thank the universe or whatever god what listening for sending Steven Grant your way, for having him knock into you and for having you leave for your interview with enough time to spare for meeting Steven. 

Mid-sentence Steven cut himself off, glancing towards the window next to the two of you again causing you to raise your eyebrows and follow his gaze but saw nothing so instead you turned back to him just in time to see his eyes widen as he looked back to you.

“It’s nearly time for your interview!” He told you and your eyes widened as you pulled your phone out, frowning down at the time, easily getting lost in the conversation with Steven and not realising how much time had passed before debating just how much your interview was worth if it meant leaving Steven’s side. 

If you hadn’t been waiting for this job to come around for months you might have genuinely left the interview but you knew you had to leave no matter how much you wanted to stay. Instead you looked back up at Steven with an apologetic look.

“I’m sorry,” You started but Steven cut you off with a smile, shaking his head fondly.

“None of that now, you have to get to your interview. I know you’re gonna smash it.” He told you and again you were almost taken back by how much this stranger seemed to be rooting for your success.

“It was really nice to meet you, Steven.” You hated that you had to leave, wanted nothing more than to sit in this cosy little coffee shop and just get to know everything about the man in front of you. Instead you started to stand but Steven stopped you before you could.

“I, oh god, don’t bugger this up now mate,” you smiled as he spoke to himself, watching in amusement as he shook his head before glancing up at you with a sheepish smile, “I don’t usually, well when I say usually I do mean ever, but anyway I don’t do this but you are really beautiful, I mean look at you, you’re stunning and I would hate myself if I didn’t ask you if I could see you again.” Steven rambled his way through his attempt to ask you out all the while your smile grew wider.

“I’d really like that.” You said, pulling your phone out again before handing it to him, “here give me your number.”

The two of you swapped phone numbers before walking out of the coffee shop together, each heading in opposite directions and pausing to say a goodbye.

“I’m really glad I met you,” Steven murmured, his eyes widening like he hadn’t meant to say the words out loud causing you to laugh softly, “I can’t wait to see you again.”

“I’m glad we met too.” You told him honestly, somehow feeling more of a connection with a man you’d known for less than two hours than with anyone else you had met in a really long time.

“I should let you go then I suppose, big interview and all that.” He smiled and you couldn’t help but mirror the expression. “Good luck, Y/N, not that you need it, they’d be stupid not to hire you.”

“Thank you,” You laughed, knowing you really had to leave now or you’d be late. “I’ll see you soon, right?”

“I should hope so, I think I’d rather like to have you in my life.” Steven said and the words were so honest that you couldn’t help the soft smile that spread across your face, feeling a soft blush on your cheeks as you ducked your head before glancing back up at him.

The two of you finally said your goodbyes, walking away with matching wide smiles before turning back to sneak one final glance at each other. It seemed after weeks, after months of pleading with the world it had finally given you an answer to your questions, a cure to the lonely, repetitive days in the form of Steven Grant. You could feel the shift when you were with him, a moment that you hoped and pleaded would be life changing, echoing Steven’s sentiment and wanting nothing more than to have him in your life.

You really hoped August was the month to change your life and really hoped Steven Grant would become a constant presence at your side. 

__________________

Steven Grant Taglist -

@bxmaaa, @captainamericasdaughter15, @daisyfreshwhore, @myguiltypleasures211, @polyglot-noodle, @alexxavicry

The London Daily Ride

09:33

# Pairing: Steven Grant x female reader Jake Lockley x female reader # Synopsis: Before you know him as "Steven from the gift shop", you know him as "Steven from the bus stop". Every day, a new opportunity to discover the lovely little quirks of a stranger; becoming more and more familiar. That is, until someone else shows up. # Warning/Content: Fluff/Angst, Character Study, Accurate DID (can be triggering), Touched-starved!Steven, sex (future chapters). # Word Count: 1.3k [read me on AO3] · [next chapter]

There is comfort in being alone.

A bliss in enjoying yourself endlessly with no prying eyes. No expectations from anyone.

Yet, there’s a fine line between solitude and isolation. Withdrawal. Sometimes, you couldn’t tell the difference between the two, and occasionally, you would slip. Going to bed later than you should, burying yourself in one of your hyper-fixations. Not only avoiding social occasions, but preventing the chance to create them altogether.

Still, there is comfort in that. Even in that. Trepidation. A sheltered world you have been masterly building; the possibility of negative interactions denied at its borders. No trespassing. Only safety. That’s the bubble you’re in, that early morning on the bus. Absently seated, not even aware of your own body, since you’ve spent the last few weeks embedding your mind into passion, like a hammer on a nail, geeking out. You have no energy for anything else.

The bubble is about to burst. You don’t want that. Yet, it needs to. It needs to since, out there, strategies of coping are required. Every so often, even a disdainful look from the local cashier is all it takes to shatter to pieces. And of course, being a woman entails, before all, being sharp and quick enough to know in seconds if a stranger’s eyes should be avoided. Men’s eyes. You’ve read the statistics. Experienced some yourself. You know that even when you know them, there’s a risk.

Such is the world. And thus, such is the need for the bubble. Even when alone merges into lonely.

That’s when you see him.

Not much worth a look.

He's on the driver’s side of the standing area, seated backwards. A countercurrent. A perfect diagonal; opposing your figures. Between, the automatic gates of the bus intermittently opening and closing, as the passengers get to their destination or are entering; taking shelter from the cruel Londoner’s rain. Your eyes caught the head tilting down, as he’s clearly drowsing off, and you smile. That’s the little but meaningful details that you like to observe. When the empty interactions slip to reveal authenticity. Even for a few precious seconds.

When you lie in your bed at night, what will you remember? The day passes in a rush, always occupied or preoccupied by work. If not, responding to emails and messages, watching endless feeds on your phone. All that, the long-term memory part of your brain doesn’t care for it. It is devoid of emotions. During the night, the brain will implacably select what is worth keeping. What will you remember, in the dark of a room, after a long day?

The odd-ish, luminous, mischievous details that made you feel, you bet.

It's what makes the difference between boring repetitiveness of the days and fondness for a new one coming.

So, you observe him with new-found attention. Like witnessing a scene in a theatre. The smell of rain on coats tingling your nostrils. The tip-taping on the windows, insistently conveying a sense of shelter in your chest. Your outfit hugging your flesh into reassurance; humid vest, yet clothes underneath dry.   

Not much worth a look. It’s true. His clay-grey gabardine seems to fall too big on his shoulder, even if it isn’t. There, droplets of rain are holding on; still not quite dried. He’s dressed proper, with a shirt almost the same colour; a tad darker. Your eyes descend to his shoes. Navigator shoes. And your smile widens: Typical dad shoes, you think. They are taken care of. The leather has recently been polished, and you nod lightly in appreciation that you know isn’t needed from anyone. However, they aren’t neatly tied as one would expect. Tidy, but distracted, you deduce. Next to the paradox embedded in his shoes, a black saddleback. Effective, yet not remarkable. And you wonder if people, co-worker or friends, would state the same thing about its owner. Your eyes drag across his figure, ultimately coming back to the top. You can’t see much of his face, leaning forwards. Only his mane, a mess of brown -you can only guess- soft curls; damped by the dreadful weather of the day.

He must be narcoleptic, you deliberate. Following the movement of the bus as it takes its turns, you see his head lolling to the side; only to land on the man in his 50s seated next to him; reading a newspaper. The businessman, aquiline and imperious nose, bothers to shoot an exasperated side-eyed look. Still… he says nothing. It’s not really a kindness, but it warms your heart anyway. That alone would have sufficed to light up the coming night. It makes your smile-turned-into-grin need to be tamed. You force yourself to observe the linoleum of the bus, constellated with shoe marks brought by the heavy rain -small dull mirrors- to regain control of the muscles of your face. 

The next bus stop comes. The newspaper-man folds its adjective and gets up. The other shoots its head straight up, one eye half hooded, the other wide; a literal sketch from a comic book. Promptly, he’s apologising profusely, running on sudden adrenaline. And you notice two things: One, a lovely, distinct Londoner accent. Two, how the phrases coming out of his mouth sound a bit boyish.  "Oh sh -. Oh, So-Sorry about tha’. I didn’t mean to- I-" and he offers a contrite smile. "Don’t get much sleep is all."

And as the older man folds his copy of the London Daily, stepping out indifferently: "Y- Yeah, okay. Goodbye then.” And he waves. 

"Thanks for the shoulder!" A full chuckle is menacingly creeping up your throat, as a powerful fondness melts your core.  It’s hard not to see yourself in him. Apologising for things that aren’t really serious, or demanding one. Apologising to someone that doesn’t have the appreciation for it. Now living under your chest, something tender has made its home. Despite that, a sting. As you realise that just a few seconds after he has waved goodbye, he turns his head to consider the dreadful weather by the window and his expression falls. A disappointment of sorts, perhaps, to see the disregard in the other’s reaction. And you think again: Why can’t people just be nice? Not nice. Just decent. In the back of your mind, Humperdinck echoes the end of his refrain: "Lonely is a man without love". Any kind of love, you think. Even from a stranger.  After that, you don’t allow him out of your sight, but he doesn’t notice. His hands laying on his laps with no purpose, he looks behind him, at his right, then at his left -the empty seat-. Then, he looks up at the bus's hanging screen with narrowing eyes; mouth opened. A new stop, people in, people out. By the time he’s in your line of sight again, he has fumbled a book out from the bag near his feet, adjusting his glasses on his nose and frowning at the pages. The glasses of a librarian. Or an archivist. And you wonder again, if what you imagine somewhat defines the person he really is.

Oh, bless him, you think.

Hardly anyone reads in the bus or the train these days. Yourself included. The dopamine-inducing-apps are too hard to resist. A book always seems too much trouble, with a significant chance of missing your own stop when your brain finally settles into the reading. Instead, you much prefer observing the passers-by, searching for the details. You examine his deep frown. His ravish looks from time to time; as he must be reading a particularly interesting passage. His fingers fumbling to crook a corner, you fantasise, for him to read again later. Undeniably, if not found in others, love can be found in other passions.

And then, the realisation hits you. What you’re witnessing has an intimate familiarity. The bubble. His bubble. Laid bare for everyone to see. Yet, no one is paying attention.

No one, except you.

RED FLAGS 3

CO-WRITTEN WITH @THIRSTWORLDPROBLEMSS

Pairing: Steven Grant x female reader (hints of Marc Spector x female reader)

Summary: For the first time since that night, Steven sleeps over, but it might not be him you wake up with in your bed. Or alternatively: Marc makes a dramatic ass entrance.

Warning/content: unease around male character, distinct lack of smex... (I know trust me when I say that I am the one most surprised by this).

Word Count: 4.6k

[PART ONE] [Series Masterlist] [Main Masterlist]

For a man with a sleeping disorder, Steven sleeps like a baby, seemingly without a care in the world. 

Despite his insistence that he wanted to stay up and marathon Blue Planet together, the poor man fell asleep on you (literally) not even twenty minutes in, right around when the crabs were playing football on the beach. 

Honestly, it’s a miracle he managed to fall asleep at all in this position. He’s slumped over at an entirely awkward angle, head and shoulders nearly severed at a 90 degree angle, his cheek resting heavily on your shoulder.

Not that you mind. Sitting with him like this in your dimly-lit flat, as his shoulders rise and fall in sync with the sound of waves from the telly, is oddly comforting. Almost meditative. It would be nice if the two of you could do this together every night. Falling asleep together and waking up together, just like every other normal couple. 

You reach down, brushing a stray curl that’s fallen into his eyes, and just marvel at him for a long second. 

He looks so good like this, free from the tension that is constantly plaguing him. Not for the first time, you think to yourself how unfairly pretty he is. Golden skin, sharply defined cheekbones, curved lashes thick enough to make any woman envious. He’s a gift shop-ist, not a bloody supermodel for God’s sake! It’s entirely unnecessary of him. 

You card your fingers through his hair, raven locks soft against your skin, and gently scrape the tip of your nails against his scalp. Instinctively you await the blissful shiver and sigh that usually accompanies your attention on him. 

Not this time though. 

He’s so still. 

Tilting your head sideways, you scrutinise the sombre expression on his face. 

Eerily still. 

The usual nervous energy in his body is all gone, leaving him relaxed in a way that you’re not used to. 

Without the wide eyes and nervous movement that bleeds into every inch of his body language during his waking hours, he looks different. Not quite like your Steven anymore. 

Your chest tightens at the realisation. A moment ago, you would have attributed it to affection, but now you’re not so sure. 

You’ve only seen Steven this relaxed once before. 

Unease pricks the tip of your fingers, an uncomfortable heat swelling under your nails. You still haven’t been able to make sense of it. That distorted night when the man you love was not himself, replaced by a stranger who looked exactly like him but acted differently. Who regarded you like you were something insignificant—an insect to be quashed. You can still hear it clearly. That oddly-accented voice ringing in your ears. 

Sweetheart, he’d called you, but his voice had held not an ounce of the warm affection that Steven’s overflows with when he calls you love. 

In the quiet privacy of your bedroom, the pace of your heart quickens until it drowns out the tv, pounding painfully loud in your ears. 

This was a bad idea. 

You shouldn’t have asked him to come over tonight. 

It’s been several weeks since that first night you spent the night in Steven’s flat. Neither of you have spoken of it. Steven, for his part, still doesn't appear to remember what happened, and you've been too doped up on serotonin of the post-night love confession. Maybe it's foolish, but you've been enjoying the honeymoon phase your relationship has been plunged into and willfully ignoring anything that might derail your happiness. Most of the time you're able to chalk that night up to a one-time disturbance brought on by lack of sleep, but...

Since then, you’ve taken care to avoid this precise scenario–him falling asleep right next to you. You always leave early from his flat now. After the first few times, you learned not to look in his direction as you get dressed. That way you don’t have to face the hopeful expression in his eyes when he invites you to stay over or watch the way it inevitably dims when you make up some excuse to turn him down.

It’s not normal, and it’s not right. You shouldn’t have to be scared to sleep next to the man you love. It’s a thorn in your side in what is otherwise a perfect relationship. Except ‘thorn’ implies that it is a small issue, and this—whatever this is—is much more than that. 

It’s not a tenable situation. You know this. It’s why you invited him tonight, in the hopes that you could move past it. Past the irrational fear that you’ll fall asleep with Steven and wake up with someone else. 

Your fingers drop from where it’s threaded into his hair, slipping down to the side of his arm until your hand rests on his strong bicep. Deceptively strong. Even relaxed as he is in his sleep, the toned muscles are firm under your touch. Hardly the body you’d expect of a mousy souvenir vendor spending all his day in front of a till at the British museum. 

In front of you, his eyes are fluttering behind closed lids, and you’re afraid of what will happen when he opens them. Is he going to greet you with sleepy murmurs and a sweet shy smile? Or will there be that snide, callous smirk across his lips again? 

Every instinct is screaming at you to leave now before the answer presents itself. There’s a reason why there are so many cautionary tales about women prying into the secrets that men are trying to hide. Every version of that story ends with the woman ultimately punished for their curiosity. 

Part of you just doesn't want to find out. You have no desire to play the role of Bluebeard’s wife and find yourself at the end of an axe. But the logical, responsible part of you, the one who wants to build a long-lasting, adult relationship with Steven, knows that you’ll have to face this eventually, and sooner is better than later.

Who is sleeping on top of you right now? Steven? Or is it the other man? The stranger, who is very much not your Steven. 

You don’t know what you’re planning to do until you feel the warmth of his skin against the pads of your thumb and index finger. All you know is that you need to know. 

Taking a deep breath, you squeeze your eyes shut, brace yourself, and pinch down hard on the soft flesh between your fingers. 

A pained yelp sounds out in your bedroom. His body jolts up and away from you, the mattress bouncing from the sudden movement. You squint your eyes open to see wide eyes gazing back at you. 

“Sorry, sorry.” His words are a slur as he wipes an errant line of drool from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand. 

The constriction in your chest dissipates. It’s your Steven. 

“Did I fall asleep on you?” he asks around a large yawn, “Guess I must’ve. Sorry about that, love.” 

You shake your head, and heat spreads across your cheeks at how silly you’re being. Of course, it’s Steven. Why on earth did you think otherwise? 

Next to you, Steven’s already fluffing up the pillow on your side making it comfortable for you both as he adjusts himself from where he’s slumped against the bed in an effort to stay awake this time. 

You watch him as he’s settling back next to you. There's no sign of irritation from him, as if you didn’t just cruelly wake him up for no good reason. His eyes remain steadfast on the screen where dolphins are playing catch, but it’s evident that he’s exhausted. It is only a matter of minutes before his head lolls forward, the gravitation of sleep luring him back in. 

“Steven, it’s okay. You can–” You hesitate, then steel yourself and make the offer anyway, “You can stay here tonight. You should go to sleep. You have work tomorrow.” 

“Just a little bit longer,” he says, shaking his head. “Don’t want to sleep just yet. If I could, I’d want to stay awake until morning. ‘Til you’re up." 

Between the yawn that contorts his face and the soft stray curl bouncing on his forehead, any unease you felt seconds ago is gone. All you can do is smile at him. God, he’s absolutely adorable, isn’t he? 

“Yeah? And why’s that?” 

His eyes flutter closed, and for a second, you think he’s gone back to sleep, but then he strains them open again, only part-way managing. He looks like he’s barely awake, and his voice is so quiet it’s almost a whisper. “Don’t want to wake up to find you’re gone again.”

Your smile fades at that, and he must feel you tense because he shakes his head quickly.

“Sorry,” he murmurs. “I shouldn’t have– I know you don’t like to talk about it– sorry.” He bites down on his lower lip, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. 

Oh. Oh no. You thought he’d just forgotten and moved past it. But it’s clear now, with his midnight confession, that it still plagues him. His only reason for not bringing it up was to not upset you. 

In your own ways, you’re both still reeling from the events of your first night together. For all the lovely love declarations that were made, resolutions are not found at the end of the love rainbow. 

What can you say to him in this situation? That you did say goodbye that night; he just didn’t remember it? He’d think you were a complete nutter. Or accusing him of being one, and you don’t know which is worse. 

How can you tell him what’s happening when you don’t understand it yourself?

“Steven, we… um… we need to talk.”

His eyes widen, all traces of sleep vanished in an instant. “Oh god, you're breaking up with me, aren't you?” 

You blink in confusion and it takes several moments for you to recalibrate your brain before you can process the sudden panic in his voice. 

Oh, shit. Of course that’s what he’d think when you’ve chosen to open with the ultimate break up line. Bollocks. Not off to a great start, are you? Clearly you should’ve thought this through a bit more, but it’s too late now. 

“No. No, Steven. Not that kind of talk. I’m not breaking up with you,” you interrupt, cutting him off before he can spiral further. It's a little heartbreaking that he’s still so insecure. “That’s the opposite of what I want to tell you.”

Steven’s brows knit in confusion, a bewildered expression bleeding onto his face. 

“You want to tell me that… That I’m…. breaking up with you?” He starts out slowly and incredulously, but a warm smile quickly spreads across his face. The amount of open affection there steals your breath. “Now I know for a fact that is not the case.”

You huff out a surprised laugh, shaking your head “No, Steven. Definitely not that.”  

“Well then, what is it you want to tell me?” He’s still smiling, but you can see the shadow of fear in his eyes.

“Well, um…” 

You pause, trying to gather your thoughts. In the background, Attenborough’s voice is now droning on about turtles shagging. It's distracting to say the least. 

“Hang on a tic.” You blindly fumbling for the TV remote behind you, eventually managing to turn the bloody thing off. “Right. There. Now, just listen for a moment, please?”

Steven obediently falls silent, watching you expectantly.  You take a deep breath, trying to sort out what you’re going to say, and realise that you have no idea how to begin this conversation. 

‘I woke up, and you were speaking with an American accent.’ 

That won't make a lick of sense.

“Well… um… Remember that first night? Our first night… together?” 

At the reminder, those signature wide brown eyes of his darken, boring into your own as his pupils dilate.

“Yeah, I definitely remember that,” he says, voice still hoarse from sleep. Your cheeks heat as you remember staring down into those eyes, just barely visible as his mouth devoured you, hot and hungry. “Don’t think I could ever forget.”

The words are sweet, but they hit you like a bucket of cold water to the face, because that’s just the problem, isn’t it? He doesn’t remember.

“Except, well– you did forget.”

“I did forge–? What? What d’you mean, love?” He tilts his head in confusion. “What did I–?” His words trails off mid-sentence, as he looks away from you, squinting at the black screen of the telly. He huffs out a small laugh, but it’s so obviously forced that it’s almost painful to hear, and it does nothing to mask his lack of composure.

God, is this even a good idea? What if he doesn’t believe you? Or gets really upset? 

You watch Steven carefully, trying to get a sense of what he might be feeling, but his attention seems firmly focused on the telly, as though it's empty screen might reveal the secrets of the universe. After a long moment, he shakes his head, eyeing the appliance suspiciously like it's done him some great wrong. 

Following his gaze, you try to see if there’s something amiss, but it’s just the same blank screen as before. Even when you lean in closer, all you see is the reflection of your own worried face peering back at you. 

Taking a deep breath, you reach out and touch Steven’s wrist to get his attention. He flinches at the touch as if startled, but then settles his attention on you. 

“So you said the other day that your memory is dodgy sometimes… That you do things you don’t remember doing? And sometimes you disappear for a while and don’t seem to remember being gone…?”

Steven nods absently, but even though he’s looking at you, he doesn’t quite seem to be following along. Despite the seriousness of your conversation, his eyes keep flitting back to the screen. 

“Steven!” you call out, snapping him out of whatever is distracting him.

He jolts back towards you, shoulders hunched with guilt. “Uhm– sorry, I thought I saw–” His eyes flicker to the screen again, but then he seems to think better of it, turning his head deliberately away and settling his eyes back on your face. 

Part of you is annoyed that his mind is seemingly faraway and he isn’t paying attention to you. This is not a conversation you are over the moon about either.  But as you watch him, you see the nervous tension in his face. It's there in the way he swallows convulsively, the way he doesn’t quite seem to know what to do with his hands, and you chide yourself for your own impatience. He’s clearly distressed. This can’t be easy for him to talk about. You soften your voice as you continue. 

“So then the other night…  I think it might have been a bit like that?  It was like…”

This time, it’s you who looks away, unable to look at his worried face any longer. You drop your gaze to the bedding, tracing the lines of the wrinkled sheet as you try to pluck up the courage to put your worries into words.

“You were… different. Not your usual self. You weren’t…”  You struggle to find the right words, not wanting to sound like you’re whinging or accusing him of anything. “Sorry. I’m not explaining this very well…”

God, you’re making an absolute hash of this, aren’t you? 

Looking up, you find Steven staring at the screen again. It’s like he’s drowning in his own reflection, face pale, eyes lost and confused. You’re not sure if he’s even hearing you at all. Maybe telling him this isn't the right thing to do. 

You drop your gaze back to the covers as you try to consider your options one last time before wading into the point of no return. You feel like you're standing in front of a locked chamber, key in hand. You can still turn back, go on with your relationship as it is, hoping that nothing will happen again (terrified that it will). 

But...There really isn’t another way around this anymore is there? You can’t keep pretending things are normal, that there reaper’s scythe isn’t looming over your relationship ready to fall at any moment. If you want this to work, this relationship you have with Steven, you will have to drag the figure that is lurking in the dark into the light. Unpleasant as it may be—scary even—you need to tell him, and there are no pretty, perfect words that can make this a more pleasant conversation. 

“Look, Steven, I didn’t leave your place before you woke up that first night. We were both awake in the middle of the night. I talked to you, but it was strange. Like you were somebody else. Like–” 

The rest of your sentence dies with a squeak of alarm when a heavy pressure that seals firmly over your mouth, trapping the sound in your lungs. You jolt in surprise and rear back, trying to escape. 

You don’t get far. 

The iron grip of a large, strong hand is bridging the span of your mouth, fingers digging almost painfully into the sides of your jaw. It's keeping you motionless and unable to pull away. 

In front of you, dark, narrowed eyes, slit in anger, are boring into yours. Whatever you were intending to say dies on your lips as he hisses out a single word of warning. 

“Don’t.” 

This is not your Steven. 

You try to protest, but all that comes out is an unintelligible noise muffled against the flat of his palm. 

The initial shock fades into indignation at being manhandled. You glower at him, squinting your eyes as you attempt to convey the depths of your scathing displeasure through your glare alone. 

The man seems unimpressed at best, unmoved by your poor attempt at defiance, as his eyes pin you down with an intimidating intensity. They’re less predatory than your first encounter but intimidating nevertheless. 

“Do not tell Steven,” he reiterates. His voice is flat and commanding, like he wants you to know his word is final with no room for debate. Nothing like Steven’s chipper tone. 

The harsh grip on your jaw gradually relaxes, and his hand slides slowly to the side. Despite the fact that logically you know this is not your Steven (can't possibly be), despite the fact that all your survival instincts are telling you to be careful, there is a part of you that has imprinted on the physicality of the man before you. Every nerve cell has been wired to respond to his touch. As his fingers slide across your lips, you feel the faint spark of attraction singing in your veins. And God, how fucked up is that? 

You should be scared shitless. This man is nothing but red flags, and you should probably turn around and run away from all of this. 

Instead, you think of Steven. Of how he’s never been able to lead a normal life with the small joys that are long due to him. Simply because he doesn’t know. A protectiveness swells up inside of you that overrides any self preservation instinct you have for your own safety.

So despite yourself, the next words coming out of you are: “He deserves to know.”

Not-Steven, closes his eyes as if your very words are embedding a deep-seated migraine in his skull. “Don’t. He’s alright as he is. ” 

“That’s not for you to decide.” 

“Trust me on this. I’ve known Steven a lot longer than you have. He doesn’t need my mess.”

"He's got it though, hasn't he?” you exclaim before you can think better of it, your voice loud and sharp in the silence of the flat.  

His eyes, dark and intense flit over your face, and you find yourself sitting up straighter and lifting your chin defiantly. In for a penny in for a pound. 

“He's exhausted all the time. Missing hours, sometimes days of his life. Constantly in danger of losing his job, his flat… his girlfriend.” You think of the nasty wounds you saw on Steven's chest, black-blue bruises marring his soft skin on your first night together. “Maybe even his life for all he knows!” 

You’re suddenly furious at the unfairness of it all. At the shit hand Steven’s been dealt; at all the people who never gave him a second chance when he messed up because of it; and most of all, at the man in front of you watching you with a furrowed brow and a belligerent set to his jaw. This bloody wanker who is asking you to lie to the man you love about something that’s making him unhappy. 

You have to pause and take a deep breath before you’re sure you’ll be able to continue civilly.

"He's got the mess already. Your. Fucking. Mess," you say, quieter now, but with no less anger brimming in your chest despite your efforts, "and he deserves to know why."

There’s no answer. He’s just staring at you in silence. You press on before you lose your nerve. 

“You’re asking me to trust you, but I don’t even know you. Not a single thing about you. The only thing I know is that you’re not Steven.”

The man looks to his feet, frustrated, and for the first time the forcefulness of his voice cracks. It's almost pleading despite the frustration that runs deep. “Steven deserves to be happy. A happy, simple, normal life. That ends the moment you tell him.” 

You hesitate, and the two of you stare at each other for a long moment. Both firm in your conviction that you have the right of it, neither one willing to back down.

“Marc,” he mutters. 

“I’m sorry?”

“My name. It’s Marc.” He spits it out with impatience, like you’ve dragged it out of him and he’s begrudgingly been forced to say it when you haven’t even asked for it. 

“Pleasure,” you say on instinct, then think better of it. “Well, sort of anyway. But that’s not what I need from you.”

Right now, in this moment, he looks more like a sullen child than the intimidating person you had taken him for just seconds ago. “Then tell me what you need,” he demands, “because I can’t have you dragging Steven into all this.” 

The command draws you up short because in all honesty, you don’t know. Should your needs even factor into this? It’s Steven’s needs that are the priority first and foremost. But... does Steven even want to know? What if this Marc is right? What if whatever’s happening—this mess that Marc keeps referring to—is something that Steven would be happier not knowing about? What is the right decision in a messy situation like this? 

The honest answer is you don’t know. 

The only thing you do know, the most important factor in this ridiculously complicated puzzle that you’re unable to solve is Steven’s safety. 

“I need to know that when you disappear and go off to wherever it is you go and do…”—you wave your hands at him vaguely—”whatever it is you do that makes Steven disappear for days, that he’s safe. Steven that is. I need some reassurance that Steven will be okay. It’s his body too.”

“You’ll keep all this a secret from Steven if I let you know he's safe?” Those familiar dark eyes bore into yours with an unfamiliar intensity.

You hesitate, not sure you’re making the right choice, but what other choice is there? 

“For now, at least,” you acquiesce with a nod.

He doesn't nod back, and there's no physical cue from him that he's accepting the bargain you're proposing to him. Instead, he turns away from you, leaning over to reach for something on your nightstand. When he turns back, he’s holding a pen.

“Give me your hand,” he orders flatly.  

You hesitate, then extend your hand slowly, offering it to him.

He takes it, his touch surprisingly delicate compared to the tight grip he had on your face earlier. His fingers are warm–almost hot–against your skin as he holds your hand in his and starts scribbling on your palm. 

It tickles, but you don’t let yourself squirm, craning your neck to watching curiously as a long string of numbers appears.

Finally he finishes, capping the pen one-handed and tossing it back onto the nightstand. Then he turns your hand over in his and looks up at you.

You meet his gaze just in time to see the change happen: narrowed eyes rounding into large saucers. The sullen anger etched into every line of that chiselled face fading into a warm vulnerable softness. And there he is, your Steven is back. 

“Sorry, were you saying something? I’m sorry, I think I must have slipped off somewhere for a second there.” 

If only he knew how right he was.

You shake your head, lacing your fingers with his, and clasping his hands in yours. “It’s alright. I was just saying that it’s probably time for us to get some sleep.” 

Steven’s lips tighten into a frowning line, clearly dubious of your answer. Even before he turns those big, round puppy-dog eyes on you, you feel the guilt in you fester. 

“Is it… um…”  he hesitates, and the uncertainty on his face breaks your heart all over again,  “Would it be alright if I sleep here tonight? I don’t want to intrude, but I’d really like to stay. So we can wake up together in the morning.” 

You want to say yes to him. You really do. But you’re still caught up in the emotional whiplash from the surrealistic events that unfolded in this very bed mere moments ago, your brain is trying to make sense of everything that happened. You don’t even know how to begin to answer him right now.

You’re sure you won’t be able to catch an ounce of sleep with him here. 

But hell, you’re not sure you’ll catch an ounce of sleep with him gone either. So you fake a smile as best you can, because maybe if you manage to convince Steven, you can convince yourself that everything is alright. 

“I’ll make you breakfast in the morning,” he throws in as an offer and you can’t help the way your smile melts into something real at the hopefulness of his tone. 

“That sounds lovely, Steven.”

His smile spreads wider, then he scoots down to lay in the bed. You follow until you are lying on your side, with your ear pressed to your pillow as you find yourself looking up at Steven’s face. His features are soft and gentle and all so familiar as he closes the distance between you and presses his forehead to yours. 

Maybe it’s just the adrenaline leaving your system, but somehow, despite the events of this evening, as Steven wraps his arms around you, you realise just how tired you are, and you let yourself succumb to it. Closing your eyes, you snuggle in closer to his chest, surrounded by his warmth and scent. As you drift to sleep, your last conscious thought is that you need to remember to write down the numbers on your palm in the morning in case it smudges. 

When you wake the next morning, blankets drawn up warm around your shoulders, it’s to an empty bed. Steven is no longer there. 

Author's note

This has truly been 84 years, and thank you to everyone who's still reading this. A big part of the delay (besides various irl factors such as me moving internationally) was that we wanted pre-write the whole series before we posted this next part to make sure that we don't just leave readers on a cliffhanger of an unfinished series. The first draft of the series is 90% done now. The rest of the parts should not take months in between to be posted (watch me jinx myself and get hit by a bus by saying this).

Big heartfelt thanks for everyone who has taken the time to read this series, and a special thanks to those who have gone above and beyond to comment/reblogged to let us know their thoughts and that they enjoyed the series. I know I'm rubbish at replying sometimes, but please know that we read these and absolutely gush like a little girl with a crush squeeing in excitement.

Dedications

I have a lot of people to thank for, while I've been trying to pound out the complete draft of this series: @jazzelsaur @radiowallet @write-and-buried @the-ginger-hedge-witch and @frannyzooey are just but some people who have been holding my hand when I've been screaming into the ether, duckrubbing and helping me with both plots, cockulations and vibes.

But most of all, I need to take time to thank my co-author, @thirstworldproblemss for bearing with me and humoring my roller coaster of -- despair, crying, laughing, more crying, debilitating horniness, utter despair again-- that has been me while we've been writing this one.

For listening to me whine and bitch and whine about furniture choices and sending 20 photos of the same damn reading chair in different shades of pink.

For not killing me when I keep giving her second by second live updates on how my ebay auctions for dinnerware sets that looks like vegetables.

For withstanding the weekly photobombs of replacement plants from Columbia Road, because I keep killing the ones I have.

For being the best friend a clown could ask for. Your presence in my life is one of the most precious and joyous things I could ever have asked for.

The London Daily Ride [2]

09:37

# Pairing: Steven Grant x female reader Jake Lockley x female reader # Synopsis: Before you know him as "Steven from the gift shop", you know him as "Steven from the bus stop". You summon all you might to speak to him. # Warning/Content: Fluff/Angst, Character Study, Accurate DID (triggering), Hot/Sweet!Steven, Slow Burn. # Word Count: 3.4k [read me on AO3] · [previous chapter] · [next chapter]

Four minutes. It’s all it takes. And he’s looking at you, only manifesting utter shock.

To be frank, you are as well. Seeking contact outside your comfort zone is no hobby of yours, and yet, here you are. As you’re waiting for the next bus stop, in the delimited square of the standing area surrounded by seats and passengers, your eyes have struggled to recover their independence. Irremediably drawn to the silhouette hunched over his book, glasses on his nose, unconditionally absorbed by his reading. From where you were, you couldn’t decipher the nature of the paragraphs, yet you couldn’t miss a collection of photographs in black and white with recognizable figures of Egyptian gods. As one of his hands had reverently skimmed over some parts of the illustrations, you had observed the brush of his fingers, divulging his lingering admiration. Your chest has squeezed itself into a delicious awakening.  The sleeve of his rumpled jacket revealing his wrist, his golden skin was at odds with the rain. Not fitting quite right in the decorum. Like a misplaced ray of sunshine in a greyscale.  Your organs are unsure if they are misplaced as well. Your stomach seems to be in your throat. Your brain, either nowhere to be found or racing like an untamed horse. Your skull, a shell for raw emotions. It requires a few seconds to realise that your body, part by part, is coming alive anew. The link that had been severed for several weeks is blooming again. You shift your feet. Detect the vibration of the large motor coming up to you. Feel the pain lodged in the arches of your feet, standing so still until now that it hurts. Your stomach grasps that it’s hungry. You forgot to eat breakfast this morning.

Outside, it’s pouring. Inside as well. Overwhelmingly. For a few seconds, you are both blinking at each other, and you feel as if it would be the perfect timing for recorded laughs from an invisible public. But no lines of dialogue come to you. You can only blankly stare at him. 

"Sorry, wha’?"  His voice. Boyish tone. Authentically wondering. A detail to add to your collection of appreciation. You can’t tell if the irresistible pull that drowned you in is fascination and yearning; or if it’s his bubble of comfort calling your own until both collide.  Either way, you observe his book like a lifeline as he continues. You’re not yet ready to cross his gaze. You have time. You always get up a few stops in advance. "Ah, loud noises here, yeah?" he says, pointing around aimlessly, leaning slightly towards you, so you can hear him better without raising his voice too much. "Sorry, I didn’t quite catch tha’."  So, you repeat the question you prepared; or rather, blurred out while you were positioning yourself to wait for your bus stop. "Good read?"  Two words. It’s barely an ask, and it’s missing a verb. Cue the laughter. You don’t know if it’s you or your question that’s missing substance. And who asks yes-or-no questions anyway? How could it even create a conversation? Somehow, it does. He does .  "Oh, that?" he closes the books to display the back cover, and he laughs softly, oh so softly, that with the racket of the bus, the rumbles of conversations, and the tumbles in and out of passengers, you could almost have missed it. It has an unmistakable endearment as his head falls to observe the companion of his ride. "It’s an astonishing read," he corrects with a kindness of his own. "Absolute marvel, if you ask me."

You feel his gaze returning to you as he explains in considerable detail how Howard Carter, anything but a true Egyptologist or archaeologist, and after five years of unsuccessful and costly searches in the Valley of the Kings, had ultimately made one of the greatest discoveries in History. Mister Carter, aged 48, was yet to fulfil his dreams about ancient tombs awaiting in the dark belly of the Valley. And on the 4th of November 1922, deeply buried into the protective Egyptian sand, below what was thought to be an ancient village, the door of the Tomb of Tutankhamun was in front of him, the seal of ropes and clay still on the entrance, unbroken. You’re not sure when your eyes unfocus plainly, your mind conveying fantasised images of oil lamps shining on treasures; the flickering flames revealing them for the first time in three thousand years. And then he looks at you, truly looks at you, with a burnt sienna that reminds you of the ochre steppes beyond the desert, where untamed Arabian horses are free to ride at full speed. And his traits become very still, until they are overcome with a gentle sadness of sorts. The one you’ve seen before, as the newspaper man had stepped out indifferently. He stops himself as if he was doing you a mercy.

"Look at me, rambling." And he adds with an apologetic smile: "You prob’ly don’t want to hear about tha’." 

It takes you a few seconds to travel back from the depths of Egypt in its early 20s to rainy London and a cramped bus. You breathe. You observe him. Hands on his closed book. You don’t reinforce his false interpretation. You redirect instead.

"I heard that Carter was on the verge of giving up when he found the tomb. Wasn’t he helped by a Lord of some sort?"

You tend to forget many things, yet you don’t forget little fun facts about an inspiring story or piece of history. Your memory is as good as the interest you have in the documentary you’re watching late at night on the history channels, while sorting through your files for the next day’s trials.

Eyebrows raised, mouth briefly closed, a quirky little smile is twisting his lips.

"Well, someone knows her British archaeologists." He lets out a tittering laugh; somewhat astounded: "That’s amazing."

His eyes meet yours with directness and fortitude. A swirl of spice and espresso that you are somehow sure that will never quench your thirst.

"Oh, I don’t think so. I’m afraid my brain only remembers bits and pieces when it wants to." You shrug with no embarrassment. "I’ve got no control over it whatsoever." 

For a few seconds, he smiles, as if he would precisely understand what you meant. And then, he frowns.

"Sorry, I don’t mean that in a creepy way, but …" You can feel how truly puzzled he is, yet can’t quite put your finger on what .

What he says next leaves you in the same state.

"I’m not imagining this conversation. Am I?"  Then, he’s slightly frowning a little bit more with an almost comical disarray: "… Am I?" You like how the second time he says, Am I? like he's actually wondering. And indeed, it doesn’t feel like any ordinary London rainy day now, does it? Something has shifted from the well-constructed routine that you typically experience in the morning. The frightening and marvellous premonition that what’s happening is important . Like the tide withdrawing after a muted earthquake… or was it just the vehicle trembling beneath your feet? Maybe, just maybe, this was a shared feeling. 

As silence drags itself, you realise that he somehow needs confirmation. Looking expectantly at you. 

"You’re not. Absolutely not."

You hope that the hint of doubt isn’t coating your voice. At least, you feel real. 

As if he’s now a bit lost, he’s vaguely looking at his book. With the commotion of the bus, you can’t make out what he’s muttering to himself. However, you can deduce that your confirmation is not enough. 

"If I could …" 

His eyes focus on you again.

"Wha’?" 

"Prove it to you?" 

The hissing of the double-decker has its stops makes you almost trip, and you’re only still standing vertically thanks to one of the yellow poles. Just like that, the shared bubble bursts. Without warning, still with red glasses on his nose, he gets on his feet instantly.

"Oh, bugger! My bus stop!!" 

He gasps so hard that a few heads turn around.

Now, he’s frantically shovelling his book into his saddlebag as the bus is departing again. Then, he stands next to you, breastless, his possessions against his chest with one arm, the other almost over your head, hanging from one of the ceiling handles. A source of warmth unexpectedly at your side. His glasses now crooked, he offers a contrite smile. You don’t know if it’s just the embarrassment of missing his stops or due to your sudden proximity.

"All righ’, that settles it then." 

You tilt your head in interrogation.

"If this was a dream, I wouldn’t look like a knob now, would I?" 

And just like that, he has the power to reunite your bubbles again. He’s so close to you, huddled in the standing area with other travellers, that his minty heated breath is tingling the skin of your face as he’s laughing softly. A smile hidden all along at the corner of your lips blooms into a laugh.  

It sure feels unreal to me, you want to say, but the whisper doesn’t even leave your lips. Time’s up.

"I better jog on before I miss my stop again… Nice meeting you," he says embarrassingly, not knowing what to do with his busy arms, wanting to probably squeeze your hand but thinking better of it before rapidly taking off his glasses, precariously balancing on the bridge of his nose. Your raincoat brushes his grey-clay gabardine as the bus is stopping again and finally opens its doors. He squeezes himself between the others, stuttering and apologising while making his way out. He adds before he gets off: "I will see you… on the flip-flop."

On the flip-flop? 

Stepping out, he’s sheepishly smiling at you before partly disappearing behind the automatic closing doors. His face takes on features expressing pure dread, as he seems to realise he has omitted a crucial element. Through the doors, you hear him shout at the departing bus:

"THE NAME IS STEVEN BY THE WAY" 

The belly laugh you get after that has been the best you’ve had in years. You don’t care about the passenger sending either a concerned look or a smile to share your hilarity. It's the kind of laugh that fills one’s core with ease and light. When you brush the corner of your eyes to dry saline drops, you are desperately, positively wrecked with joy.

Morning after morning, Steven becomes part of your daily routine.  His illuminating smile. His wave. Your cheerful “Good Morning!”. Your re-found sense of comfort. The usual empty seat on his left becomes yours. Habits have the reputation of dying hard. You enjoy loneliness until your craving for connection is so strong that you can finally rejoice at the prospect of long conversations with your friends and parents. A coping mechanism that served you well these recent years, creating distance when everything becomes too much. Allowing your mind to be consumed by objects of desire and passion. Plus, what law firm would complain about the ability to work intensely for eight hours straight? Your addiction to seclusion has its ups… and lows. At one point, you can feel how your mind is desperate for an authentic interaction. As starved as your stomach that morning in the bus. However, you perceive that for Steven, starvation ignites from elsewhere. There’s no self-infliction. No harmful habits are involved. He did not choose seclusion; not like you. Seclusion seems to have chosen him. That’s when your endearment turns into something more profound. Steven isn’t really the shy guy that you first thought; avoiding social interactions. On the contrary, as you observe him day to day, it turns out that’s the other way around: Steven is so driven and desperate to connect with others, with so much enthusiasm … that it becomes awkward for most people on the other end. And that’s what most people are afraid of: deep and uncompromised consideration, with an intent to genuinely bond. And who is brave enough to let the mask down before a stranger? You understand what Steven can’t. People fear the possibility of attachment —his intent to truly bond— because they fear vulnerability.  Steven was the opposite of everything you ever knew. The opposite of masculine stereotypes. Gentle. Caring. Willing to be vulnerable . Even the choice of his food was a far cry from the raw, bloody, virile steak. More than that, the more you come to know Steven, the more you come to redefine falling in love. Until now, you had experienced the rush of falling. The intense months of passion and then the degradation throughout the years. You had always thought the butterflies were the predictable sign of true, unyielding attachment. The sign that someone is a match for you. Then … Why was it never good enough to sustain a relationship? The fire of passion is all good and well. However, what good is it when comfort is never built? When the wood is lacking, and there’s no fire left; what is left? As one would expect, there’s always a bit of nerves to a new encounter, but it had become abundantly clear that even if there was alchemy, meeting Steven each morning wasn’t the nerve-wracking experience that you ordinarily had with men. Instead, it was soothing. Your favourite TV show after a strenuous day. The purring of your little black and white cat on your lap. Your decade-old copy of your favourite book that has lived in your high-school backpack, dog-eared pages, spine broken, yet losing none of its powerful story. Steven was all that and more; conveying a tranquillising warmth that felt like home . When we are loved through passion and passion alone, what interest does that person really have in you ? Besides the butterflies? Besides the attraction? All that’s left is a fusion of well-matched bodies. And when the chemical reactions finally fade, as the neural pathways are used to the rush of hormones, what is left to celebrate? In your hard-earned opinion, passion is more about losing oneself in another than truly knowing the other. Lonely were some nights in your tiny flat cramped in the heart of Camden. Lonelier it was to be loved by someone who believed that passion could build and solve all. And for a time, you were no exception.

So, when Steven naturally places his hands on your shoulder, as any friend would, showing you a paragraph of his readings about an artefact, saying: “Oh, no, no, that’s impossible. You’ve actually never seen it?". Your head says no. “Oh, all righ’ then. You’re in for a treat now, aren't you! I’m pretty sure you’ll love it. Come by the museum Thursday, yeah?”. You’re convinced that that guy doesn’t want the passion . He merly wants to share his favourite place to ever exist in the world. Romance has nothing to do with it.

When Steven holds his sides for laughing too long, one morning, when you compare Donna to a velociraptor, you feel as if you’ve known him for years, and is this what a best friend feels like ?

When you gently nudge him to point out at the window an advertising sign for Cammas Hall, revealing how you absolutely adore going to the countryside, just north-east of London, and Steven leans in so very close to you, as to make a confession: “Their maize maze is mental, innit? Ah! Say that three times fast. Maize maze, maize maze … ”. And you laugh; you know there isn’t an ulterior motive. No excuse to get close or physical. The glimmer of copper in his eyes tells another narrative. Again, he just wants to be a part of, to make you a part of .

When Steven sits in silence beside you, exhausted from his sleep condition, and finally drowses off; only for his head to fall on your shoulder, your heart doesn’t hammer. You run your hand through his oh-so-soft brown curls to clear his face; to ensconce his head in the crook of your neck, as a mother would do for a child. The tenderness living under your chest radiates and encompasses the both of you. You just want him to be okay. And you can only hope that it is the same for him.

In fact, you’re pretty sure. Because it’s another element with Steven: he doesn’t make you doubt his attention or his building affection. He lays it bare, for everyone to see. Just like his bubble. Every paper is about superheroes these days. It’s filling the news and every talk show. They aren’t talking about unsung heroes, those from ordinary life; those who lay bare their hearts.

There is no game here. No “can’t wait to get to the next base”. As if Steven would be forever happy to have those simple moments to share. Alchemy is just a bonus. Not the other way around.  I’m not imagining this conversation, am I?  You swear that sentence could have come straight out of your mouth.

You think again about your loneliness, your “almost-addiction”, and how it shields you from the bad … and the good. With Steven nearby, seclusion appears to be less attractive. And the outer world feels like a decent place again.

Changing harmful habits is a challenge. Yet, with the right person, it seems to fall like the scab of an old wound, rather than a vivisection.

It was both wonderful and terrifying … that one person, one encounter, could change so much. 

The picture of Steven Grant is constructing itself. Even its flaws.

Attentive, caring, devoted to what he loves.  A sensibility and sensitivity like an acute nerve, exposed to the elements. You know all that. That’s why when Donna crushes his hopes to be a tour guide yet again, you truly question how those devastating interactions are pretty much all the socialising he gets. He has colleagues, but friends ? Surely, this isn’t healthy. Adding to that, his sleeping condition is bringing questions to the surface, when one morning, he’s thrilled about his new puzzle, a new variation of the Rubik’s Cube. A tetrahedron that will undoubtedly keep him awake this time . 

"Oh, it’s ace. Yeah, it’s amazing. New shape, new algorithms, you know what I mean?"

"So, you’re able to sleep," you point out a cup of warm coffee in your hand, sitting next to him. "It’s just that you … won’t?" There’s nothing accusatory, you’re just pointing out the incoherence. 

You’re working in a law firm, for God’s sake. Finding incoherences and counter-arguments is what you do. Your ex had a lovely little nickname for that, calling you “The Scalpel”. Acute questions. Pushing and inquiring where it hurts. Incisive . “Can’t you stop analysing and arguing on every fucking point all the time? Just … let it go ”. At that time, you were pretty sure you were mostly cutting through bullshit. But now, Steven is at your side, vulnerable and sensible and right, this time, it’s different, don’t be such a fucking scalpel, dumbass, you admonish yourself.  

The white of his eyes is more visible, and his forehead wrinkles, as he stares wide at you. He babbles a confused explanation; how of course he can sleep, but, you know, his body wants to get up and wander about, he’s not an insomniac or narcoleptic or anything now is he. And he laughs awkwardly— and he crosses your eyes again and oh, oh— he realises that’s exactly what you assumed. But yeah, nothing to worry about, the sleepy part was fine, it’s the dreams you see. The vivid dreams that make Steven exhausted and how is this a medical condition you think racingly; when dreaming is more exhausting than living ?

There and then, the perfect picture that you’ve assembled of Steven begins to crack. Like an oil painting, as time does its work, the thick layers of paint begin to split and break. Reluctantly showing the rough sketches under; exposing the wood beneath. You were wondering how deep the fractures were. If the cracks you were witnessing were just the thin upper layer of varnish giving up, in need of light restoration. Or were the lacerations so deep that they would eventually break the painting apart? If it was ever the case, would Steven be the whole piece of work; or merely a section of it ?

But you don’t press . You do not invade and question. No arguments or counter-arguments. 

Somehow, you think you understand.

Aren’t we all parts and pieces, holding together by sheer will? 

Steven laughs—a laugh you've hardly heard before, as if it were gripping his very throat with unspoken emotions.

One of his hands lands before his eyes, as if perhaps the news is too much to take in: he has to close himself from one of his senses and be in the dark for a few seconds to fully comprehend what you've just announced.

"I'm pregnant."

"Wha'?"

"Steven," you had repeated calmly, the blue test in your hand and approaching the corner of the bed to sit beside him, "I'm pregnant."

Maybe it was too much? Maybe Steven wasn't ready for it?

Then, his palm falls to his heart, revealing the crinkle of his eyes that you've come to know and love. And he let himself fall as well into the news with a delighted sight.

"Oh my days," you hear him say with a tone conveying genuine wonder.

Then he sits himself back up as if he had an electric shock, turning all of his being towards you.

"Are you all' right, love?" he asks, placing his warm and big hands suddenly on the sides of your arms, a concerned look tainting his brown eyes. "You don't feel sick or anything?"

It's your turn to laugh and reassure him: "It won't come for a few weeks."

His comforting palms ensconce themselves in the crook of your neck. His lips meet yours with a softness that almost breaks you. Once. Twice. Longer, and he lingers, then puts his forehead against yours. 

"Okay, I'll be with you, love, every step of the way, yeah?" 

"I know," you confess to him with almost a whisper, and you add, "I love you." 

"I love you."

Then, he takes you into the crook of his arms, an embrace that makes you shriek and giggle as he gently pulls you to fall with him on the quilt. His laughs mingle with yours, and time suspends itself as you both share with delight the oldest secret humanity has ever known.

𝒫𝒪𝒱: You tell your husband Steven that he is going to be a father and his reaction caused you a lot of tenderness (he’s so cute God!!!)

hi! i dunno if your requests are still open but if they are i was wondering if you could write headcanons for dr strange and/or tony with a male so whos sorta like a eldritch god/horror? if not i understand but thanks anyways(:

Marvel x eldritch horror male reader

  How did you know non-human reader fics were one of my favorites?

I sprinkled in some Steven Grant cuz I am obsessed with him, even though I haven’t watched the show yet, hope that’s okay lmao. I don’t know much about DID so I tried not to mention it much, and used what I know, so hopefully its alright.

I loosely based the readers main appearance of an oc of mine who is something like an eldritch horror themselves ^^

 I may have gotten carried away, but enjoy anyways.

Tony Stark

-          You meet when Tony is trapped in space with Nebula. You were just floating through space like always, taking in the sights and whatnot when you saw the ship and felt living organisms inside. One of them feels near death though, so you worry.

-          You haven’t interacted with many humans in your eternal life, so you panic and slither your everchanging form into the ship towards the dying being. Feeling around you with your smoke like mass, and using your abilities you can tell he is dying from lack of oxygen, so you make some.

-          He’s still falling unconscious, but not dying this time. So, you grace his mind just enough to get an impression, and take the form he would find most pleasing to look at. You end up taking him into your now only two arms, and holding him as he rests.

-          Things pass like in the movie, except you easily reverse what Thanos did and take the stones away from the ugly grape and fling him into the void.

-          Now that the threat is gone you grow close to Tony, and take great interest in human culture. You could learn it all immediately if you pleased, but having Tony show you and explain it made what would be your heart warm up.

-          In the beginning Tony, and all his companions, thought you were some type of alien that took human form, like the Skrull. So, it was kinda awkward to explain that you weren’t just that, you were what they called an eldritch horror.

-          Tony needed some time to come to terms with it, especially the fact that you were far beyond science. But after a while he seemed to just accept it, giving up that he couldn’t ever figure you out. Though he does try to at times still.

-          The two of you start dating, and it takes some time to get used too, mainly for Tony. You grow more comfortable letting your human go and just being more yourself. Though you keep your form mainly human.

-          You help out the Avengers at times, but mainly leave it to the heroes to go save the world. Though you will swoop in if they’re in life threatening danger.

-          You pick up cooking, though it isn’t very successful in the beginning, but tony seems to be very supportive, though he isn’t that happiest to be the taste tester as some of the dishes he swears are cursed.

-          You get better over time though.

-          The relationship is announced to the public, and you have to keep your human form when out and about for obvious reasons. The world is led to believe you have shadow based powers and have lived alone for most of your life, which makes up for you not understanding many parts of society just yet.

Stephen Strange

-          You meet when Stephen is doing magic work, maybe he has to cross over to the shadow between realities or universes to collect something or fight someone. He catches your attention by entering your domain, which normally no one can enter.

-          You keep your attention of the cloaked man, as he moves through your darkness with ease that surprises even you. His cloak flinches back when you reach a shadow up to pull on it, which confirms that it is alive.

-          The magic-user walks around your domain for a long time looking for what he’s after, but can’t seem to find head nor tail in the eternal darkness. You feel what’s almost akin to pity, like what you feel when you see a kitten stumble and fall. So, collecting a tiny part of your mass, you take a human-like shape.

-          The shape is like if you took shadows and dark mass and shoved it into a human shaped mold. You hadn’t really met humans before and you didn’t want to dig through his mind, so you took the next best option.

-          Stephen gets ready to fight when you appear, but when it becomes obvious, you’re friendly he tells you why he’s there and what he’s after. You offer to help him which he hesitates with at first, but ends up accepting. With little work of your powers, you’ve moved the two of you to what he needed

-          The two of you fall into talks, you mainly asking questions which he only seems to answer out of politeness as this is your realm, but as time passes, he becomes more friendly. He’s on edge around you in the beginning, but it lessens up.

-          When he leaves you vow to visit him regularly, which you then do. You pull apart the curtains of reality and step into whatever room he’s in, and as time passes you start to take a more human form as you learn about them. Though you keep certain features about yourself, like having more than two arms and smoke-like clouds rising from you at times, though Stephen doesn’t seem to mind at all.

-          The sorcerer grows to really apricate your company, and he treats you much warmer as time passes.

-          You dating is never really said in words, at some point you just start staying with him for longer, you start holding each other and kissing. Its only when Wong tells you to take your sucking faces somewhere else it clicks for the both of you.

-          Your relationship continues as normal, doing sorcery things, reading books, traveling places. Though now there’s more physical affection.

-          Stephen is very interested in the special brand of magic you use, though you explain it isn’t magic and just more you are bending reality to your will. He’s still very interested though.

-          He takes time off from being sorcerer supreme to spend time together, the two of you especially like traveling to other planets or alike to explore or go on holiday.

Steven Grant (Marc and Jake too i guess)

-          Unsurprisingly you meet Steven because of moon knight business. You first spotted him when he entered the afterlight as it is partly your domain, but before you could interact with him, he left again. You’re intrigued by the man, so you keep one of your many million eyes on him.

-          You let small parts of yourself start to slither into the human realm by poking holes in the fabric that is reality. Normally you would just have shoved a chunk of yourself out there, but the god that follows Steven around would notice immediately. Not that you couldn’t win with ease if the god wanted to fight, but you didn’t feel like it.

-          You had planned to grace over his mind for a shape when he slept, but he so rarely did. It made the small part of yourself you had put under his bed jolt as he got right back up, after he had gone to sleep. Flexing your abilities, you figured out there were not one, not two, but three people in the body, one of them being Steven.

-          Now you have always been an eternal everchanging being, so it didn’t weird you out or anything, you simply noted down for later to pay attention to who was fronting and that was it.

-          Weeks pass like this, and you’re comfortable just watching and observing. That is until Steven apparently gains control of the body in the middle of a battle. He’s lost and doesn’t even realize he’s in a fight until he almost gets punched.

-          Steven appears not to be much of a fighter, but you stay still until one of the people he was fighting pulls out a gun, which you now know is a weapon. You collect all the small shadows you’ve had cross over and mash them together to take form. You take a human form, the only thing showing you’re less than human nature are your eyes, which turn pitch black.

-          You make quick work of the goons, going as far as to crush the gun in your hand and flinging the people across the street and into a dumpster.

-          The god that follows Steven around immediately gets confrontational and curses at you and wants you gone, but you ignore him to crouch down to Steven and ask if he’s alright, lifting a smoke covered hand, where the smoke slithers around and seems to heal whatever bruises and cuts he has.

-          It takes some explaining and calming Steven down to explain who and what you are, and why you are there. He blushes when you explain how you found him so interesting and sweet you couldn’t help but want to stick around.

-          Khonsu seems to stop his cursing and threats when he figures out you are far beyond even his level of power, though the two of you don’t seem to realize. You don’t even notice when he seems to leave, giving you major side-eye.

-          One thing leads to the next and you’re spending a lot of time together, though its just you and Steven since you leave when you notice the other two fronting. You don’t want to make them uncomfortable or anything, and you and Steven thought that since Marc and Jake kept a lot of secrets in the past from him, its okay until you two know each other more.

-          When you start officially dating you end up introducing yourself to Marc and Jake, who both seem quite uneasy with you, but when they hear how you and Steven talk about each other they begrudgingly agree.

-          They won’t admit it, but they start to like you too, and get red in the face when you compliment them or hug them.

-          You and Steven talk about his interests for hours, and you can tell him many things that Khonsu doesn’t know or hasn’t told him, you even go as far as to tell him about how you have your own realm and alike. You visit it at some point, though there isn’t much to see as its just darkness and void.

-          Steven helps you learn the ways of the human world, though he struggles with it himself too, so you lean on each other for support. Though most days it can become quite a lot and you’ll just go home and cuddle in bed until Steven falls asleep and either Marc or Jake takes over, the man blushing when they realize they’re in your arms.

me patiently waiting for steven grant x reader after watching the first episode:

Paper butterflies

paring: moon boys x fem! reader; established relationship

summary: instances when moon boys found safety and love in your hands.

Who holds the reins of my desires if not my hands? My hands—my body’s gates of tenderness, the tools of my wonders, be they violent or gentle, be they both.

Natalie Diaz, from The Hand Has Twenty-Seven Bones—: These Hands If Not Gods

a/n: inspired by this lovely art piece.

genre: mostly domestic fluff

warnings: mention of nightmare, verbal harassment, swearing, slight violence

--------

• You place your hand on table corner, cupping the sharp edge so Steven doesn't accidentally hit his head when he bent down to pick up the spoon he dropped, the little gesture didn't go unnoticed by Steven.

To you, it was an instinct, most natural thing. Steven was baffled. No one loved him like you—you loved him intentionally and subconsciously, like every beat of your heart.

"You want some?" you stretch out your hand, holding out a small bowl of strawberries in front of him.

"Love?"

You hum in response, already chewing a piece of strawberry, juice dripping slightly down your lips.

He outstretches his hand, touching your cheek gently. He leans closer, pressing his lips on yours, his tongue swirling around the strawberry juice.

"Oh". No matter how many times Steven had kissed you before, his kisses still left you feeling giddy.

"Thank you, Y/n/n"

"Whatever for?"

For everything you are and everything you do.

"Nothing" he shakes his head. A mellow smile adores his handsome face.

• "Let me see"

Marc volunteered to chop the vegetables while you cooked, accidentally knicking his thumb finger.

"It's nothing, I'm alright, babe" he brushes you off and watches your eyebrows meet together in worry.

You ignore his words, giving him a 'what' look when his lips curved up in a smile. It doesn't matter if your boyfriends are the moon knight system, when they get remotely hurt in front of you, you panic.

"You've seen me get bloody many times before" he takes your fumbling fingers in his.

"I don't care if you are moon knight and have magical healing powers, you are my still my baby and I'm allowed to worry about you even if you dress up in your fancy suit with that silly cape and fight" you move past him to grab a band-aid from the first aid kit.

"The cape is not silly!"

Khonshu hit his staff on the floor.

Marc chuckles. "Hey, don't hate the cape", his thumb circles the top of your hand absent mindedly, "I saved you with that cape twice" he says, the smile never leaving his face once.

"How dare you talk about my powers like this? you little worm!" his voice booms.

"Khonshu is not happy to hear that" Marc chuckles again.

"Where is he standing?"

"On your right"

You turn your head to your right and stick your tongue out at Khonshu.

"Odd little mortal"

Now amusement laced Khonshu's voice, his earlier annoyance lessened.

• Khonshu have seen Jake smile once or twice maybe.

But when Jake was around you, that act came to him easily, natural as his skills with guns.

You two decided it was a nice evening was a casual stroll around the park, the fresh air and all. Besides, it would be nice to chill with Jake, you thought.

"Jake" you call out, watching him walk ahead of you.

"What is it, querida?"

"You dropped something"

His eyebrows furrow as he pats his pant pockets to check if he dropped something.

"This" you slip your hand into his hand, intertwining your fingers with his.

He chuckles, "You are so cheesy, cariño"

"Oh, you like it", you smile back, watching the way his eyes crinkle and lights up his whole face. There is so much spark in his deep brown eyes—warm and tenderness.

He brings your interlaced fingers to his lips and presses a kiss on the back of your hand. This little gesture spreads warmth through your entire chest.

If Khonshu had eyeballs he would roll his eyes, Jake thought. But he ignored the God of the moon, continued to hold your hand for the rest of the walk.

• You knew Steven reads a lot. You wanted him to have something pretty for bookmarks. What better way to make it by yourself? After watching many pinterest and youtube videos, you made those cute butterfly bookmarks in different colours with different patterns on them.

"Yes, love?" he says, when you called him to get his attention. His gaze is still glued to his book.

You stride towards him to stand near his desk. "Pick one" you say, holding out your closed fists in front of him. Your grasp was gentle not to crush the butterfly bookmarks you are holding.

A small smile forms on his face, he closes the book and pulls down his glasses, taking it off and placing it next to the book. "This one" he touches your left fist, with that sweet smile still gracing his face.

You slowly open them to reveal a bright orange butterfly bookmark. You eventually open your right hand too revealing a blue one. "Since you are cute, you can have this too"

"Oh, these butterflies are lovely!"

"These are bookmarks, I know how much you like reading, so I wanted you have something cute, I know it's not much-"

He couldn't focus on your words.

You had his whole heart. How is it possible to love someone this much? He felt like his heart is about to leap out of his chest.

The smile on his face widens, "Oh, darling". He gently takes off those bookmarks and places them safely on his desk. He then pulls you on his lap, taking your face between his hands, he presses the softest kiss ever, as if physically giving you his love for you.

• It wasn't new to see your boyfriends have nightmare in the middle of the night. Marc had the most nightmares, Steven would have them too. But it was a bit surprising when you saw Jake screaming in his sleep.

"Hey, hey, Jake, Jake..." you didn't shake him too hard in case if it made him even more alarmed. You prop yourself to sit and switch on the bed side lamp. "Jake, babe, you need to wake up, it's okay..." you touch his chest, trying to shake him.

He screams, his hand clutching the left side of his neck. He jolts up still screaming, his eyes opening.

Even though you don't see his face clearly in the dark, the dim light from the lamp illuminates his face. His eyes are wide with panic, darting around the surrounding.

"Hey, hey, it's just me" you carefully touch his shoulder. "Baby, it's okay, you are safe now, you are safe..." you half whisper, keeping your voice gentle.

The panic in his eyes vanishes slightly when he hears your voice and sees you next to him.

Not saying a word, he wraps his arms around your waist, burying his face in your chest.

Oh, God. What kind of nightmare he just had?

You don't dare to ask. You hold him tightly as he is holding on to you. "I'm here now, you are safe" you repeat it again, rubbing his back in soothing gesture. "It's okay, baby, it was just a bad dream, you are with me here now, you are safe..." you continue to whisper calm things in his ear, until you feel his breath becomes steady and uneven. You press light kisses to his head in between saying those comforting words.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

He replies few seconds later, "no".

You didn't want to push him. You gently run your fingers through his hair. "Want me to punch the monster under the bed?" you joke, in an attempt to ease the situation.

He don't say anything but you could feel him smile against your chest, then a slight chuckle.

That's more than enough for you. "You are safe now, baby" you say it again, like a promise. You kiss his forehead.

You stayed up for a while to make sure he was completely calm and sleeping peacefully as he could be in your arms.

• A jerk at bar decided it would be fun to mess with you despite you making it clear you aren't interested. He cursed you out and moved away. You sent a glare in his direction before walking back to Marc.

"Is everything alright?" he instantly rushes to your side after seeing your annoyed face.

"Don't worry, I'm good" you smile at your man, trying to assure him, "Just a creep"

Anger flashes in his eyes. "Did he bother you? Where is he?" he clenches his jaw.

"Marc, it's okay. I got it handled. We are here to have fun remember?" you rub his arm up and down, calming him down.

He didn't want to ruin the night for you so he put on his best smile and kissed the side of your head. "Let me get our drinks. The usual?. He can be peaceful for you tonight.

"The usual" you smile back at him.

Moments later, you turned your head to hear a slight commotion.

It's that same jerk who verbally harassed you arguing with Marc. He 'accidentally' spilled drinks on Marc and now smiling like a smug bastard.

You roll your eyes in annoyance.

Why was Marc trying to smooth things over when it's not his fault?

You storm towards the jerk, staring right in his face. "Hey asshole, shut the fuck up or I'll make you shut up"

"What did you say, bitch? The fuck you gonna do? Cry? Run to your man?", he laughs mockingly.

"What did you just say to her, you piece of shit?" Marc lost his patience.

Before Marc could get to that jerk, you clenched your fist perfectly and throw a strong punch to his jaw.

"Or that" you shrug, shaking your fingers. You take a glass of drink from nearby table and chug it in one go.

He cradles his jaw, blood spilling from his mouth, his gaze was devoid of mockery, now full of anger and fear.

"Now, apologise to my man" you gripped his collar with a death glare.

My man.

Marc couldn't help but smile.

"Geez! Sorry, man" he admits, defeated.

"That's better" you let go off him.

"So much for fun" Marc smirks.

"I had fun" you smile sweetly. " I know you could take him out, but no one messes with my man and leaves. No one"

"I'm proud of you, baby" he kisses your knuckles. "That was so damn hot" he whispers in your ears, making you chuckle.

"Our girl is a badass"

"Agreed"

You never showed them your tough side before.

All of your boys are absolutely in awe and turned on. Oh, you are definitely going to have fun that night, alright.

while we untangle

Pairing: Steven Grant x F!Reader (implied Marc Spector x F!Reader) Wordcount: 2.9K Warnings: Explicit AF. SMUT. DID. Wounds. Oral. CUM eating. Sry. Summary: Things happen to Steven. He ends up with dates he doesn’t remember making. He finds his fridge full and fishes with two fins. There is an attractive woman inches from him and he should just shut up and take it as a sign from God or Gods. Whatever. A/N: wow i wrote this instead of working on wys because i hate myself. title from Rufus Du Sol's No Place. i know vague shiz about moon knight but this is my current headcanon of marc being aware of steven and steven just doing his best (lmao). idk if this is really spoilery.

Steven doesn’t quite recall when he started dating you. He does not remember how it happened. You just appear and he simply goes with it because you’re soft and warm and you call him by his name.

It’s a little like magic. He falls asleep and wakes up and you’re there.

“Hi,” you murmur by the side of his bed. His body is aching. His shoulder is screaming. He feels his bones bunching up against the thin shell of his skin.

“What?” He shakes his head. “Who-?”

Their first conversation (that he remembers) is just fragments of words. It is a series of cut-off questions.

Who? What? Where?

You lean forward so quickly he nearly misses it. A flash of your hair and your eyes glittering like fish scales in the blue dawn light. You touch his jaw and use your other hand to comb his sweat-damp curls back from his brow. He wants to say something because he feels naked in front of you - this stranger in his sweats and one of his t-shirts.

Who are you? Who are you?

Instead, he says: “I’m sorry…I didn’t expect guests. I would have cleaned…”

He would have. He would have made an effort. You smile at him and that’s when he notices the gash at your hairline. The strange bruising along your collarbone.

“Did we…?” he finally asks because why else would a girl be in his apartment - at his bedside. Your lips quirk and you shake your head.

“I’m - do we know each other?”

He really shouldn’t press his luck. Things happen to Steven. He ends up with dates he doesn’t remember making. He finds his fridge full and fishes with two fins. There is an attractive woman inches from him and he should just shut up and take it as a sign from God or Gods. Whatever.

“In a way,” you hum as you stretch your arms above your head. Your joints crack and that cut on your forehead beads with blood. A few hours later, he will notice that it’s gone. He will notice that marks on you never last longer than a day.

“In a way?” he echoes. He is lost in this conversation just as he is lost in most conversations. Everyone seems about five feet ahead of him at all times.

“Yes - in a way, but,” You shoot your hand out and grasp his own tightly. He notices his palm is covered in raven-black grease and you don’t seem to mind. “I suppose we should meet formally.”

You tell him your name and he repeats it - rolls it around over his tongue like a smooth marble. His accent is thick and often too chewy in his mouth. He doesn’t know why he even uses the term “accent” because shouldn’t it just be his voice? His tone. His.

He feels like he’s trying to shove himself through a narrow hole. Nothing fits.

***

He starts waking up with you - coming to with you - in weird places. One time, he’s restocking mugs etched with incorrect hieroglyphics and the next thing he knows he’s coughing up blood on a rain-soaked street. It’s thundering. The clouds spiderweb with lightning. There’s the smell of wet leaves and garbage and a neon Exit sign is blinking above him.

“Marc! Help me out here.” You’re a few feet away punching the hell out of a man in back. There’s a splash of blood. It splatters over your nose and chin. You’re in this tight suit that shimmers grey-blue in the rain. Weird. When your eyes meet his, you suddenly grimace. Your expression flits between seemingly concerned and incredibly irritated.

“Who’s Marc?” He rubs his forehead. His teeth feel loose in his mouth. “Wait - where are we?”

Wait. Wait. Wait. He’s always colliding into a disaster or conflict before he can confirm what it is. Where - when - what -

“Fuck,” you growl and then the man you’re fighting socks you right in the temple. You stumble to your knees. Steven doesn’t really think - he doesn’t have to - he rushes forward in some hopeless attempt at protecting you and - well - everything goes black again.

***

He wakes to the tinkling music of a Carnival. He’s got his hands wrapped around a pole with chipped gold paint. There’s a thousand colors blurring into a mosaic of blues and pinks and purples and reds. Yellow as buttered popcorn. Green and copper as scarab beetles. He can taste sugar on his tongue. Cotton candy. His stomach aches.

He looks down and sees the white mane of a wood worse. It’s uncomfortable between his legs. He blinks. He shakes his head.

“You okay?”

He turns to find you sitting - riding - next to him. You’re straddling a unicorn, which oddly seems fitting since he’s about 67% certain you don’t exist. There’s an unreadable expression on your face. A strange transformation. You go from cheerful to anxious and he feels as if he has interrupted something. You bite your lip and reach for his hand. You thread your fingers together as the carousel picks up speed - as it circles and whirs like a cyclone.

That terrifying, obnoxious jingle of music.

“Hi Steven,” you tell him, which he doesn’t understand. Why are you greeting him when you’ve obviously been with him for a while. Are they on a date? This must be a date. Did he drink? He swears it was 4 PM last he checked, but the sky is black-navy. Violet and midnight.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters as he clings to the pole with one hand as you hold onto the other. He leans his too-hot temple against the wet-cold surface of it. “I’m sorry.”

He doesn’t know what else to say.

***

His eyes flutter open and it’s day again. The midafternoon sun peeks through his heavy blinds. You’re sitting next to him - hunched over like a curled C. One of his heavy mythology books in your lap. You’re reading about Isis and Osiris and he wonders if all his pieces are scattered over the Earth. It would make sense. It would honestly be a relief. An explanation.

There’s a white bandage around your arm with old blood staining half of it. It’s practically brown. He sniffs a metallic tang in the air along with the harsh scent of antiseptic.

He lifts himself up gingerly. More soreness. More agony in his back and the constant headache that thumps at the center of his forehead. He leans into you out of reflex, his chest brushing your shoulder. He touches your arm - drags his finger down the bandage.

“I didn’t do that did I?” He can’t trust himself. He doesn’t know anything. He loses days and nights and you are the only constant in his life. The one unmoved variable.

You twist around to look at him. You’re visibly exhausted. He wonders when you sleep because he’s never seen you do it.

“No,” you assure him. They’re so close that your breath fans over his lower lip. They’re dating and they aren’t. “Dating” is the only word he has for it because he wakes up and you’re in his room or literally in his bed. Sometimes you haul him to a restaurant or coffee shop.

Eat, Steven. You’re very pale.

They’ve never kissed though. They’ve never done anything beyond you looping your arm through his as you take him around London. He hadn’t realized it until now, but every errand they go on has been for his benefit.

You need more shampoo. You need another jacket. You need to get your haircut. Do you want another fish so he has a friend?

You let him talk to you. You let him vomit his words all over you because he has no one else. His mum’s voicemail. His mirror. His mind. One minute, he’s spilling his guts to a living statue and the next he’s spilling his guts to you.

And you respond. You nod and agree or disagree or drop your chin into your hand and listen intently. You laugh when he says something he actually meant to be funny.

“You’re such a weirdo,” you tease in between sips of coffee. It makes his lungs expand to the point he can finally get a full breath in. He is wide awake.

He shifts on the bed. The springs squeak. His sheets are scratchy and he notices there are granules of sand in the folds of linen. Bloody hell and all that.

There’s a wrinkle between your brows as you watch him watch you. You don’t avert your gaze like so many others do when he makes them uncomfortable. He can’t help it. He forgets himself sometimes. You’re different. You meet his stare straight-on.

His voice is low and urgent when he finally asks: “Why do you take care of me?”

You suck your lower lip between your teeth. It turns a color and he has to stop himself from swiping it with his tongue - from digging his thumb into the flesh. “I promised someone I would.”

He should question that. Who?

You know who.

The voices have returned. Swelling and shivering at the back of his head. They distract him. Solid. Tempting.

You know her mouth. You’ve tasted it before just not as you. You’ve had her. You’ve felt her. She’s ours.

He doesn't know what to do. He’s aware of his own awkwardness. He’s aware that he often misses social cues even though a large part of him seems to understand them. He just can’t get there.

“Steven,” you whisper like a secret - like their secret - every fucking letter deliberate and compassionate.

He wants to feel this.

He surges forward and kisses you. His body does it before his brain even catches up. He grips the hinge of your jaw and crushes his mouth to yours. You squeak in surprise before relaxing - before allowing him to cradle your cheeks between his hands and continue.

It feels familiar.

His lips move against your lips. His tongue traces your tongue - teasing and caressing and it subtly changes from sweet and careful to frantic and dirty. Your hand is on his chest - right where his heart thumps. He scrapes his teeth over your lower lip before soothing it with his tongue. He makes a demanding sound and pulls you closer.

He senses that he’s been at this threshold a thousand times previously. He has to move forward. He knows the steps. He needs to take you - plant himself inside you where he’d be safe. He’s been safe.

His hand palms the crown of your skull. He tilts your head to deepen the kiss. You respond gracefully - your own fingers now locked in his t-shirt. They trade kisses in his dusty room with all of his old books and white-noise sound machines and cheap cutlery. You sigh into his mouth - your breasts crushed against his chest. Your heart. His heart. Pound for pound. Sharing a rhythm. How much would they weigh? The bandage on your arm chafes the inside of his bicep.

You shiver and it surprises him - the fact that he’s capable of arousing such a sensation out of you. He wants to go further.

He wedges himself between your legs. He doesn’t know entirely what he’s doing and yet he does. He’s had to have done something like this before. Maybe, at school. His twenties? He should know though no distinctive memories come to mind. No images of teenage lust in a backseat or fumblings in a dark theater.

Still - he appears to be getting it. Gestures before thoughts. It’s like the act itself is already written on his bones - taped somewhere in his mind with instruction.

At some point, they get naked.

You are spread out on his pillows and he uses his hands to open your thighs. He watches your cunt - shiny and pretty in the afternoon light. There are bruises on your hips - along your ribs. He wants to ask, but doesn’t.

You already know, Steven. You saw her get them last night. Fighting. You have some too.

That voice that’s like his voice, but not.

He slips his fingers against the seam of your folds - nudging between them and watching the effect it has on you. He thrusts to the knuckle before twisting his hand so he can press his thumb to the peak of your sex. You’re so wet and hot and each jerk of his fingers makes you tighter. The repetitive clench of your walls as he eases you through it. The push of slick more erotic than anything he’s ever even dreamt of.

“Oh,” you moan softly. “Oh - shit.”

“I-I think - is that alright?” he stammers - his chest tight - his cock so hard that it juts against his stomach.

You nod furiously. You open your arms to him - come come come - be with me. He goes - capturing your mouth - tongue warm as it slides over yours in a desperate, messy tangle. Your hand circles his cock, grasping him tenderly. You stroke him slow as he fucks into your palm. He kisses you. He kisses your throat - your breasts - your cheeks. You lead him - let him in - and then the head of his cock is rubbing right up against your pussy. It’s furiously hot - making slick sounds as it slips through the seam of swollen flesh.

You stare up at him, lips twitching and kiss-bruised. He keeps his eyes fastened to your face as he sinks in too quickly. You stretch around him - nails digging into his shoulders. Your mouth parting. Oh - it’s like this.

You feel like home. You feel like him. He knows this. He knows the wet clutch of your sex around him. Vice-like. Murderous. He rocks down and you glide with him. He draws back until he’s nearly out of you before snapping forward - punching a moan from your lungs. A push and pull. He tilts his hips and you follow - knowing the ebb and flow of his movements like you’ve done this before. You fist a hand into his curls as you nip his jaw. There is the loud liquid suck of your body greedily accepting his cock again and again. It’s so crude that he can’t quite believe it.

“Steven - fuck,” and now he is acting without thought. He is allowing the insides of himself to take over. It’s like a dance that he is watching from a step away, but oh he feels every second of it. He savors the soaked clasp of your cunt. The smell of your sweat and your hair and your lush skin as it slaps against his.

You shove him away and he groans as he rears back on his heels. His pleasure is dismantled. It is interrupted. You rise up on your knees and kiss him hungrily - nearly swallowing his tongue before you turn around. You get on all fours - your grip taut around the bed frame. His gaze traces the lines of your body - the curve of your ass that hitches into his hip bones and fitting snug.

You know what to do. You’ve done it before. Our girl likes it like this.

Ours. Ours. Ours.

That voice unbearably deep and vibrating with power. It’s like heartburn in his chest - bubbling up his throat.

This is for you, Steven. Trust us. Trust us.

He takes himself in hand and guides it back into your spread, dripping cunt. He bottoms out and you respond beautifully - a fragile wisp of a sob as you blossom around the length of him. You bury your forehead into his pillow. You bite the blanket.

Steven has never been able to keep quiet, but now he is out of words. He grunts low, rumbling noises and sometimes: oh god - fuck - so good -

He hopes that it’s enough for you to realize that this is everything he’s ever wanted. This true connection when he’s always felt like he’s living behind glass. He’s grateful.

He reaches around to pluck at your clit - something he wouldn’t have known to do or hadn’t done before and yet he does. It’s imprinted. The second he touches the swollen nub of it, you seize up like you’ve been electrocuted - pleasure ringing through your veins and limbs and he meets it by grinding deeper into you and there are filthy words flying from your lips in heaving, breathless whimpers and Steven blushes bright red because he can’t quite believe he’s done this with you - even as his cock spits inside you - even as he fills you to the brim without wasting a drop. When he eases himself out, there is his own pearly seed sliding down the backs of your thighs. It seeps between your swollen folds, dripping onto his comforter, which he will never wash again -

He touches it with his fingers - mesmerized. The voice in his head is throaty and smug: do it, Steven. I know you want to. She’ll love it.

He listens. He flips you onto your back - mouthing at your throat and tits before he travels downward. He forces your knees apart and buries his face between your legs - lapping and sucking and devouring what he has done to you. You arch up - hips jerking against his face. His nose hooked enough to deliberately scrape against your clit as he licks from your fucked-open pussy.

You cry out, yanking at his curls until it stings and he’s sure he’s missing patches of hair. He won’t let up. He latches and remains there - his hands now under your ass as he lifts the bowl of your pelvis up - like a platter - like an offering to the Gods - overflowing with nectar - a ritual -

He’ll repeat it. Day in and day out. He will perform this.

His skin burns with arousal. A fever. You know it’s him doing what he’s doing as he feasts - as he suckles his own come from your sex. He does not know this and yet he does. Another lifetime perhaps. Another yesterday. All of his memories are wrapped in plastic and yellowed with age. Opaque. Potentially not his. But this is clear. This he is sure to remember.

He knows. He knows. He knows this and there aren’t any lost hours between them. It is one long day and one long night of this tryst where he doesn’t wake up with a broken jaw or bleeding gums. He does not question your presence or why his fish die or why you care enough to keep him alive when no one else seems to notice him. He’s Steven and you call him by that name.

while we untangle

Pairing: Steven Grant x F!Reader (implied Marc Spector x F!Reader) Wordcount: 2.9K Warnings: Explicit AF. SMUT. DID. Wounds. Oral. CUM eating. Sry. Summary: Things happen to Steven. He ends up with dates he doesn’t remember making. He finds his fridge full and fishes with two fins. There is an attractive woman inches from him and he should just shut up and take it as a sign from God or Gods. Whatever. A/N: wow i wrote this instead of working on wys because i hate myself. title from Rufus Du Sol's No Place. i know vague shiz about moon knight but this is my current headcanon of marc being aware of steven and steven just doing his best (lmao). idk if this is really spoilery.

Steven doesn’t quite recall when he started dating you. He does not remember how it happened. You just appear and he simply goes with it because you’re soft and warm and you call him by his name.

It’s a little like magic. He falls asleep and wakes up and you’re there.

“Hi,” you murmur by the side of his bed. His body is aching. His shoulder is screaming. He feels his bones bunching up against the thin shell of his skin.

“What?” He shakes his head. “Who-?”

Their first conversation (that he remembers) is just fragments of words. It is a series of cut-off questions.

Who? What? Where?

You lean forward so quickly he nearly misses it. A flash of your hair and your eyes glittering like fish scales in the blue dawn light. You touch his jaw and use your other hand to comb his sweat-damp curls back from his brow. He wants to say something because he feels naked in front of you - this stranger in his sweats and one of his t-shirts.

Who are you? Who are you?

Instead, he says: “I’m sorry…I didn’t expect guests. I would have cleaned…”

He would have. He would have made an effort. You smile at him and that’s when he notices the gash at your hairline. The strange bruising along your collarbone.

“Did we…?” he finally asks because why else would a girl be in his apartment - at his bedside. Your lips quirk and you shake your head.

“I’m - do we know each other?”

He really shouldn’t press his luck. Things happen to Steven. He ends up with dates he doesn’t remember making. He finds his fridge full and fishes with two fins. There is an attractive woman inches from him and he should just shut up and take it as a sign from God or Gods. Whatever.

“In a way,” you hum as you stretch your arms above your head. Your joints crack and that cut on your forehead beads with blood. A few hours later, he will notice that it’s gone. He will notice that marks on you never last longer than a day.

“In a way?” he echoes. He is lost in this conversation just as he is lost in most conversations. Everyone seems about five feet ahead of him at all times.

“Yes - in a way, but,” You shoot your hand out and grasp his own tightly. He notices his palm is covered in raven-black grease and you don’t seem to mind. “I suppose we should meet formally.”

You tell him your name and he repeats it - rolls it around over his tongue like a smooth marble. His accent is thick and often too chewy in his mouth. He doesn’t know why he even uses the term “accent” because shouldn’t it just be his voice? His tone. His.

He feels like he’s trying to shove himself through a narrow hole. Nothing fits.

***

He starts waking up with you - coming to with you - in weird places. One time, he’s restocking mugs etched with incorrect hieroglyphics and the next thing he knows he’s coughing up blood on a rain-soaked street. It’s thundering. The clouds spiderweb with lightning. There’s the smell of wet leaves and garbage and a neon Exit sign is blinking above him.

“Marc! Help me out here.” You’re a few feet away punching the hell out of a man in back. There’s a splash of blood. It splatters over your nose and chin. You’re in this tight suit that shimmers grey-blue in the rain. Weird. When your eyes meet his, you suddenly grimace. Your expression flits between seemingly concerned and incredibly irritated.

“Who’s Marc?” He rubs his forehead. His teeth feel loose in his mouth. “Wait - where are we?”

Wait. Wait. Wait. He’s always colliding into a disaster or conflict before he can confirm what it is. Where - when - what -

“Fuck,” you growl and then the man you’re fighting socks you right in the temple. You stumble to your knees. Steven doesn’t really think - he doesn’t have to - he rushes forward in some hopeless attempt at protecting you and - well - everything goes black again.

***

He wakes to the tinkling music of a Carnival. He’s got his hands wrapped around a pole with chipped gold paint. There’s a thousand colors blurring into a mosaic of blues and pinks and purples and reds. Yellow as buttered popcorn. Green and copper as scarab beetles. He can taste sugar on his tongue. Cotton candy. His stomach aches.

He looks down and sees the white mane of a wood worse. It’s uncomfortable between his legs. He blinks. He shakes his head.

“You okay?”

He turns to find you sitting - riding - next to him. You’re straddling a unicorn, which oddly seems fitting since he’s about 67% certain you don’t exist. There’s an unreadable expression on your face. A strange transformation. You go from cheerful to anxious and he feels as if he has interrupted something. You bite your lip and reach for his hand. You thread your fingers together as the carousel picks up speed - as it circles and whirs like a cyclone.

That terrifying, obnoxious jingle of music.

“Hi Steven,” you tell him, which he doesn’t understand. Why are you greeting him when you’ve obviously been with him for a while. Are they on a date? This must be a date. Did he drink? He swears it was 4 PM last he checked, but the sky is black-navy. Violet and midnight.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters as he clings to the pole with one hand as you hold onto the other. He leans his too-hot temple against the wet-cold surface of it. “I’m sorry.”

He doesn’t know what else to say.

***

His eyes flutter open and it’s day again. The midafternoon sun peeks through his heavy blinds. You’re sitting next to him - hunched over like a curled C. One of his heavy mythology books in your lap. You’re reading about Isis and Osiris and he wonders if all his pieces are scattered over the Earth. It would make sense. It would honestly be a relief. An explanation.

There’s a white bandage around your arm with old blood staining half of it. It’s practically brown. He sniffs a metallic tang in the air along with the harsh scent of antiseptic.

He lifts himself up gingerly. More soreness. More agony in his back and the constant headache that thumps at the center of his forehead. He leans into you out of reflex, his chest brushing your shoulder. He touches your arm - drags his finger down the bandage.

“I didn’t do that did I?” He can’t trust himself. He doesn’t know anything. He loses days and nights and you are the only constant in his life. The one unmoved variable.

You twist around to look at him. You’re visibly exhausted. He wonders when you sleep because he’s never seen you do it.

“No,” you assure him. They’re so close that your breath fans over his lower lip. They’re dating and they aren’t. “Dating” is the only word he has for it because he wakes up and you’re in his room or literally in his bed. Sometimes you haul him to a restaurant or coffee shop.

Eat, Steven. You’re very pale.

They’ve never kissed though. They’ve never done anything beyond you looping your arm through his as you take him around London. He hadn’t realized it until now, but every errand they go on has been for his benefit.

You need more shampoo. You need another jacket. You need to get your haircut. Do you want another fish so he has a friend?

You let him talk to you. You let him vomit his words all over you because he has no one else. His mum’s voicemail. His mirror. His mind. One minute, he’s spilling his guts to a living statue and the next he’s spilling his guts to you.

And you respond. You nod and agree or disagree or drop your chin into your hand and listen intently. You laugh when he says something he actually meant to be funny.

“You’re such a weirdo,” you tease in between sips of coffee. It makes his lungs expand to the point he can finally get a full breath in. He is wide awake.

He shifts on the bed. The springs squeak. His sheets are scratchy and he notices there are granules of sand in the folds of linen. Bloody hell and all that.

There’s a wrinkle between your brows as you watch him watch you. You don’t avert your gaze like so many others do when he makes them uncomfortable. He can’t help it. He forgets himself sometimes. You’re different. You meet his stare straight-on.

His voice is low and urgent when he finally asks: “Why do you take care of me?”

You suck your lower lip between your teeth. It turns a color and he has to stop himself from swiping it with his tongue - from digging his thumb into the flesh. “I promised someone I would.”

He should question that. Who?

You know who.

The voices have returned. Swelling and shivering at the back of his head. They distract him. Solid. Tempting.

You know her mouth. You’ve tasted it before just not as you. You’ve had her. You’ve felt her. She’s ours.

He doesn't know what to do. He’s aware of his own awkwardness. He’s aware that he often misses social cues even though a large part of him seems to understand them. He just can’t get there.

“Steven,” you whisper like a secret - like their secret - every fucking letter deliberate and compassionate.

He wants to feel this.

He surges forward and kisses you. His body does it before his brain even catches up. He grips the hinge of your jaw and crushes his mouth to yours. You squeak in surprise before relaxing - before allowing him to cradle your cheeks between his hands and continue.

It feels familiar.

His lips move against your lips. His tongue traces your tongue - teasing and caressing and it subtly changes from sweet and careful to frantic and dirty. Your hand is on his chest - right where his heart thumps. He scrapes his teeth over your lower lip before soothing it with his tongue. He makes a demanding sound and pulls you closer.

He senses that he’s been at this threshold a thousand times previously. He has to move forward. He knows the steps. He needs to take you - plant himself inside you where he’d be safe. He’s been safe.

His hand palms the crown of your skull. He tilts your head to deepen the kiss. You respond gracefully - your own fingers now locked in his t-shirt. They trade kisses in his dusty room with all of his old books and white-noise sound machines and cheap cutlery. You sigh into his mouth - your breasts crushed against his chest. Your heart. His heart. Pound for pound. Sharing a rhythm. How much would they weigh? The bandage on your arm chafes the inside of his bicep.

You shiver and it surprises him - the fact that he’s capable of arousing such a sensation out of you. He wants to go further.

He wedges himself between your legs. He doesn’t know entirely what he’s doing and yet he does. He’s had to have done something like this before. Maybe, at school. His twenties? He should know though no distinctive memories come to mind. No images of teenage lust in a backseat or fumblings in a dark theater.

Still - he appears to be getting it. Gestures before thoughts. It’s like the act itself is already written on his bones - taped somewhere in his mind with instruction.

At some point, they get naked.

You are spread out on his pillows and he uses his hands to open your thighs. He watches your cunt - shiny and pretty in the afternoon light. There are bruises on your hips - along your ribs. He wants to ask, but doesn’t.

You already know, Steven. You saw her get them last night. Fighting. You have some too.

That voice that’s like his voice, but not.

He slips his fingers against the seam of your folds - nudging between them and watching the effect it has on you. He thrusts to the knuckle before twisting his hand so he can press his thumb to the peak of your sex. You’re so wet and hot and each jerk of his fingers makes you tighter. The repetitive clench of your walls as he eases you through it. The push of slick more erotic than anything he’s ever even dreamt of.

“Oh,” you moan softly. “Oh - shit.”

“I-I think - is that alright?” he stammers - his chest tight - his cock so hard that it juts against his stomach.

You nod furiously. You open your arms to him - come come come - be with me. He goes - capturing your mouth - tongue warm as it slides over yours in a desperate, messy tangle. Your hand circles his cock, grasping him tenderly. You stroke him slow as he fucks into your palm. He kisses you. He kisses your throat - your breasts - your cheeks. You lead him - let him in - and then the head of his cock is rubbing right up against your pussy. It’s furiously hot - making slick sounds as it slips through the seam of swollen flesh.

You stare up at him, lips twitching and kiss-bruised. He keeps his eyes fastened to your face as he sinks in too quickly. You stretch around him - nails digging into his shoulders. Your mouth parting. Oh - it’s like this.

You feel like home. You feel like him. He knows this. He knows the wet clutch of your sex around him. Vice-like. Murderous. He rocks down and you glide with him. He draws back until he’s nearly out of you before snapping forward - punching a moan from your lungs. A push and pull. He tilts his hips and you follow - knowing the ebb and flow of his movements like you’ve done this before. You fist a hand into his curls as you nip his jaw. There is the loud liquid suck of your body greedily accepting his cock again and again. It’s so crude that he can’t quite believe it.

“Steven - fuck,” and now he is acting without thought. He is allowing the insides of himself to take over. It’s like a dance that he is watching from a step away, but oh he feels every second of it. He savors the soaked clasp of your cunt. The smell of your sweat and your hair and your lush skin as it slaps against his.

You shove him away and he groans as he rears back on his heels. His pleasure is dismantled. It is interrupted. You rise up on your knees and kiss him hungrily - nearly swallowing his tongue before you turn around. You get on all fours - your grip taut around the bed frame. His gaze traces the lines of your body - the curve of your ass that hitches into his hip bones and fitting snug.

You know what to do. You’ve done it before. Our girl likes it like this.

Ours. Ours. Ours.

That voice unbearably deep and vibrating with power. It’s like heartburn in his chest - bubbling up his throat.

This is for you, Steven. Trust us. Trust us.

He takes himself in hand and guides it back into your spread, dripping cunt. He bottoms out and you respond beautifully - a fragile wisp of a sob as you blossom around the length of him. You bury your forehead into his pillow. You bite the blanket.

Steven has never been able to keep quiet, but now he is out of words. He grunts low, rumbling noises and sometimes: oh god - fuck - so good -

He hopes that it’s enough for you to realize that this is everything he’s ever wanted. This true connection when he’s always felt like he’s living behind glass. He’s grateful.

He reaches around to pluck at your clit - something he wouldn’t have known to do or hadn’t done before and yet he does. It’s imprinted. The second he touches the swollen nub of it, you seize up like you’ve been electrocuted - pleasure ringing through your veins and limbs and he meets it by grinding deeper into you and there are filthy words flying from your lips in heaving, breathless whimpers and Steven blushes bright red because he can’t quite believe he’s done this with you - even as his cock spits inside you - even as he fills you to the brim without wasting a drop. When he eases himself out, there is his own pearly seed sliding down the backs of your thighs. It seeps between your swollen folds, dripping onto his comforter, which he will never wash again -

He touches it with his fingers - mesmerized. The voice in his head is throaty and smug: do it, Steven. I know you want to. She’ll love it.

He listens. He flips you onto your back - mouthing at your throat and tits before he travels downward. He forces your knees apart and buries his face between your legs - lapping and sucking and devouring what he has done to you. You arch up - hips jerking against his face. His nose hooked enough to deliberately scrape against your clit as he licks from your fucked-open pussy.

You cry out, yanking at his curls until it stings and he’s sure he’s missing patches of hair. He won’t let up. He latches and remains there - his hands now under your ass as he lifts the bowl of your pelvis up - like a platter - like an offering to the Gods - overflowing with nectar - a ritual -

He’ll repeat it. Day in and day out. He will perform this.

His skin burns with arousal. A fever. You know it’s him doing what he’s doing as he feasts - as he suckles his own come from your sex. He does not know this and yet he does. Another lifetime perhaps. Another yesterday. All of his memories are wrapped in plastic and yellowed with age. Opaque. Potentially not his. But this is clear. This he is sure to remember.

He knows. He knows. He knows this and there aren’t any lost hours between them. It is one long day and one long night of this tryst where he doesn’t wake up with a broken jaw or bleeding gums. He does not question your presence or why his fish die or why you care enough to keep him alive when no one else seems to notice him. He’s Steven and you call him by that name.

𝐀 𝐌𝐚𝐧 𝐖𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐞 - Steven Grant

this has been sitting in my drafts for months, but i finally got the motivation to finish it lmao. Happy Thanksgiving for those who celebrate! Gobble gobble bitches🦃

Warnings: mentions of The Blip, implied PTSD, a slight sprinkle of angst, and fluff. that's it, I think

word count | 4.3K🤙🏻

You never took the bus. In all your years of living in London, you had only ridden the bus a handful of times. You usually ride your bike most places, especially to work. Eco friendly, your friend called it, not that you really cared. But it just so happens, that your bike was stolen. So, your hand was forced.

You worked at a bookstore, and you liked it well enough. After being Blipped for five years, your parents decided to give you their store, they were getting old and couldn’t take care of it as much as they could before; plus, they thought it would make you happy and get your mind off being dusted out of existence for so long. And it did, to a certain extent. You were happy surrounded by books, but all the years you missed out on was still nagging at the back of your mind. Your therapist said it would get better with time. But other than the feeling that something horrific could happen at any given moment constantly plaguing your mind, you were content with life; but there was one thing still missing.

You weren’t the best at dating, never had been. Every time you thought you found “the one” or just a genuinely good person, they’d come with a serious hamartia that they were hiding, one that you usually would find out a good couple months into a relationship. But then again, you were also very picky as your parents would say, but you just had standards. You’d think living in such a big city would give you a few good options at least. But alas, you were probably doomed to live the rest of your life in solitude.

You didn’t really notice at first, often stuck in your own little world, but you finally realized that you saw the same man on your bus almost every day on your way to work. It wasn’t that big of a deal, if only he wasn’t so handsome. You never considered yourself to be much of a shallow person, knowing that personality is what really counts, but you couldn’t help yourself to gawk when this man wasn’t looking. Maybe it was his shy and disheveled demeanor that intrigued you, or maybe it was that you were being so utterly vain that his strong jawline and dark brown eyes awakened some primal force within you that drew you to him. But considering how horrid you are at making the first move, you’d never know.

Your silly little crush didn’t go away. It didn’t help that your bookstore was right across the street from the museum he worked at. You felt like a stalker, knowing where he worked and eventually learning his name when he forgot to take his name tag off one night. Steven. It suited him. You thought about visiting the museum once, but that would definitely be stalkerish behavior, but anyone was allowed into museums, right? It wouldn’t be weird if he were to visit your bookshop. Then again, if some dude were staring at you every time you got onto the bus and suddenly paid a visit, you would probably call 999. 

Yeah, you decided against it.

It wasn’t until one early morning that forced you to confront this crush. Steven entered the bus with dark circles under his eyes, more pronounced than usual. He looked like he could’ve fallen over any given moment, he looked like he hadn’t slept in ages. You tried not to tense up when he took a seat next to you, your heart threatening to beat out of your chest. You prayed you could act like a normal human being until the bus ride was over. But then, almost half way to work, he did something you never would’ve expected. He leaned his head on your shoulder.

Your eyes were practically bulging out of their sockets. It only took a couple seconds to realize that he didn’t do it on purpose, poor thing fell asleep and his head naturally lolled to the side, where your shoulder just so happened to be. You had no idea what to do. Do you wake him up? He’s just a stranger, this is weird and he definitely should not be doing this. But he looked so peaceful, and he did look like he had gotten absolutely no sleep. But would he think it would be weird if he knew you just let him sleep on you? You hoped no one else could see how panicked you looked.

You felt your face heat up as you ultimately decided to let the exhausted man remain situated against your shoulder, the bus ride was almost over anyway. You felt your nails dig into your palms, trying to focus on anything but the warm feeling that radiated throughout your body. As the bus rolled to a stop, you gently nudged the sleeping man until he sat straight up with wide eyes, clearly disoriented. He looked at you in confusion before uttering a quick apology before he made his quick escape from the awkward situation. You didn’t blame him, but you did feel a little embarrassed yourself, even though you probably had no reason to be.

You thought about that bus ride all day, your brain fogged over and distracted from your work, the bells that sounded off any time someone would enter the store being the only reality check that would snap you back from your racing mind. A part of you just wanted to buy another bike, never take the bus ever again, but you knew you wouldn’t be able to afford it, not now at least. Maybe you could just walk all the miles back to your flat…in the dark…without the proper means to protect yourself…yeah, awkward situations were more appealing than the threat of getting jumped in an alleyway.

You hoped Steven wouldn’t be on the nightly bus ride home like he usually was, only occasionally he would work late, but that just wasn’t in the works for you. How lucky. Apparently it was a busy night, people coming and going, it was a Friday to be fair. But there were no empty seats as he boarded the bus, being the last person, only one was empty, one next to you. You felt like a regular old Mary Sue. And you could tell by his expression that he was panicked, clearly not forgetting what happened that morning.

You wore a tight lipped smile as he walked towards you, the bus suddenly moving jolting him a bit forwards with a stumble, but he quickly tried to brush it off with suave. “Uh, is this seat taken?” The man asked timidly, his hand slightly shaking as he pointed to the spot next to you.

Obviously not. “No, go ahead.” You smiled, more genuinely that time, feeling that familiar heat rise up to your face as he settled next to you.

“Cheers.” He nervously smiled back, hugging his satchel close to his chest.

You couldn’t help but smirk as you noticed his eyes already started to droop shut, the man wearing exhaustion like it was second nature. It also made you a little sad. “Hope you get some sleep tonight, maybe you won’t fall asleep on me again in the morning.” You chuckled, not being able to resist teasing him slightly.

“Oh, goodness.” The man cringed at himself, turning to face you with a guilty expression. “I’m so sorry about that, miss. I didn’t mean to-”

“It’s okay!” You cut him off with a giggle. “You don’t have to apologize, I get it. I’m not a morning person either. Sorry if me not waking you up right away was weird, I just didn’t have the heart to when you looked so tired.” If you weren’t blushing already, you most certainly were now.

“Ah, it’s not weird. I appreciate it actually. Your shoulder was very comfortable.”

“Jeez, how awful is your bed if you think this boney shoulder is anywhere close to being comfortable?” You laughed softly, a shy smile stretching across his face. “I’m Y/n, by the way. Thought you should know considering I already know yours.” You gently flicked the name tag that was still pinned to his jacket. “Nice to meet you, Steven.”

The next morning you were greeted with Steven’s smiling face, that nervousness behind it making it more endearing. You didn’t hesitate to take a seat next to him, feeling more confident now that you’ve actually had a conversation with the man. So far, he seemed sweet, shy but sweet. He definitely seemed worth your interest, you wanted to get to know him. Hopefully he felt the same.

“A gift shop-ist? I don’t think that’s a word.” You chuckled. “Why not just a salesperson?”

Steven shrugged. “Doesn’t sound that much more appealing, now, does it? Well, what do you do? Where do you work?”

“I own the bookstore right across the street from the museum. So, I guess that makes me a bookstore-ist.” You giggled at your own joke, Steven letting out a small amused snort making you feel better about it.

“Oh, a bookworm, are you?”

“Yeah, I guess. I’ve always liked reading. The store was my parents, but they passed the baton over to me. I like it.”

“Huh, I’ll have to check it out sometime.”

“And I’ll have to check out the museum. Don’t know much about Egyptian history, but maybe you’ll be my tour guide?”

“If my boss doesn’t get on my arse about it. Well, eh, it doesn't matter. I’ll be happy to take time out of my super busy schedule to teach you all about all the pharaohs and gods and anything else that won’t bore you to death.” He grinned.

“Well, with you teaching me I’m sure I’ll never get bored.” You were thankful the bus finally arrived, the somewhat intense eye contact the two of you shared was getting a bit much for you to handle. “Well, see you later!” You waved as you started to walk to your workplace, Steven replying with a cute little “laters gators.”

It didn’t take too long before you and Steven got close, well, you thought so anyway. The two of you would always sit or stand next to each other on the bus each morning and night. Sometimes, you’d even visit each other’s place of work. You learned each other’s coffee orders, so you’d sometimes surprise each other with coffee. The first time you did it, Steven wore the cutest flustered expression on his face. So far, you two were friendly. Just friendly. You knew you wanted more, you just didn’t know if he felt the same, or even how to bring it up. You’d been out of the game for so long you didn’t even think you remembered how to kiss a person. You didn’t want to embarrass yourself or get rejected, you didn’t know if you could handle that.

Talking to your sibling about it, they just told you to get over the stupid fear and just ask the man out. Of course, it was easy for them to say, they were more outgoing and fearless. For once, you wish you could’ve turned off your introvertedness and anxiety. You got good vibes from Steven, he seemed perfect. Too perfect. And your track record showed that perfect meant they were less than perfect. You were a bit of a pessimist, you hated that about yourself, but it’s probably what had saved you from one too many toxic relationships. On the surface, Steven looked like he’d never even hurt a fly. You wondered what was underneath that timid exterior. But maybe there wasn’t, only time would tell.

It was a cold dreary morning when your feelings started to spiral out of control. You seemed to wake up on the wrong side of the bed, feeling sour for no particular reason. Just one of those days, you supposed. You had trouble hiding your mood on your face, Steven seemed to notice it immediately as soon as you boarded the bus. He had asked you what was the matter, but you just brushed him off by saying the weather dampened your spirit. Later, he had brought you a hot cup of coffee on his break, saying that days like these needed some warmth, which in turn made you feel all warm and fuzzy on the inside. You encouraged him to look around, knowing that he enjoyed reading as well. It was hard to concentrate on working when he was walking about with an awestruck expression, gently running his fingers over the spines of the various books that lined the shelves. “Do you have any books about Egypt?” Steven called out from across the room.

“Yeah, some. On aisle 6, along with other history books.” You pointed out, smiling to yourself as Steven walked to the designated aisle with a skip in his step. He asked about a specific author, wondering if their new book was in stock, clearly anxious to read it. “No, sorry.” You frowned sympathetically after looking it up in inventory. “I can see if it’s available somewhere else?”

Steven shook his head. “That’s alright. Wouldn’t expect it to be anywhere, the author isn't very well known and there's probably not many copies out there. But thanks for looking.”

And that’s when you got the idea. You weren’t good with words, but you loved buying people gifts. When the holidays rolled around, you were an expert at gift giving, you pride yourself on it. Maybe you could express your feelings by buying him this book he wanted so much. It was a bit pricey, being scarce and all, but you could afford it and you wanted to see the smile on Steven’s face, if just for a moment. Before you could think about it any longer, you clicked the purchase button.

And oh man, was it a long anxious wait for the book to arrive. You had to order it from a different country, so obviously it was going to take a while. But you were impatient, and you counted the seconds until you heard the sweet shrill sound of your doorbell ringing, excitement bubbling up in your chest as you opened the door to find the package exactly where you expected to find it. You hoped Steven would be as happy as you were, and you didn’t even want the book for yourself.

You were disappointed when you didn’t see Steven on the bus the next morning. He probably just slept in again. You were so anxious to give the book to him, but then you didn’t see him all day, which was unusual. He usually paid you a visit at least once on his break. Then another day went by…then another. A whole week passed and you started to get worried. He wouldn’t answer your texts or calls, you even went to his work to ask for him but he hadn’t been in. You never pegged him as someone who would just up and disappear. But then again, how could you know that? You were practically just coffee buddies. Guess you got the book for nothing…

It was another week before Steven started showing up again, but you made a point not to even make eye contact with him, not even when he greeted you warmly as he sat next to you like nothing ever happened. From the corner of your eye, you could see his downcast and confused expression and you almost took pity on him. Almost. You probably should’ve seen it coming, there was always some fatal flaw about most people, your blinding crush on Steven made you forget. It was probably for the best, you only would’ve gotten hurt. Terrible timing though, you were at a point where you really needed a friend to talk to.

That constant feeling that something bad was going to happen at any given moment was proved correct. Thankfully, it wasn’t half the universe getting blipped out of existence, but it was almost just as mysterious and frightening. One night, the sky completely changed. It looked like a Van Goph painting, but instead of it making you feel a sense of peace and comfort like viewing the painting normally did, it terrified you. Seeing the sky warp out of focus, it brought on some severe panic attacks. What did this mean? What was happening and what consequences would it have on the world? It plagued your mind. But even after getting Blipped, you never really talked about it with anyone, not even your family. You just kept all these feelings bottled inside, not wanting to burden anyone with your problems. With every new supernatural phenomena, you felt all these feelings begging to come to the surface. You couldn’t have that, you had responsibilities. But with Steven...he seemed like the type of person that you could actually talk to, if it weren’t for him ghosting you. You’d just have to keep it all inside a bit longer.

Stepping off the bus without a word to Steven made you feel hollow, cold without the coffee he usually would bring you as you both make jokes and bitched about the morning weather typically being foggy and/or rainy. It was one of those mornings, and it just made you feel worse. It was also a slow day, barely anyone coming into your store which was unusual, especially on a rainy day. You felt sluggish, not interacting with anyone made you feel like a lifeless zombie. You just wanted a customer, just one. But as soon as Steven walked in, you immediately regretted that sentiment.

You could instantly sense Steven’s nervousness as he walked up to your counter, hands fidgeting with one another and keeping his gaze fixed anywhere but you. “Hiya.” He spoke softly, an unconvincing smile on his lips.

“How can I help you today, sir?” Your bluntness made him blink in shock, obviously not expecting you to be so cold. You were being petty and you hated it, but you couldn’t help yourself. It was an annoying habit to be passive aggressive, and seeing the deepening frown on Steven’s face just made you feel worse.

He sighed. “Look, I-” He stuttered, “I know you’re probably wondering why I disappeared. And I know you might be upset-”

“Might?” You scoffed, biting your lip, trying not to let your emotions get the better of you. “We talked every day, Steven. And then all of a sudden, you’re gone. Without a word or reason why. So, yeah, sorry if I can’t help being a bit upset.” You chuckled bitterly, sighing sadly when you saw him shrinking away from your words. “And…I was worried. I thought that, I guess that I’d never see you again.”

“You were really worried? About me?”

“I mean, yeah. You’re, like, my only friend.” You blushed.

“Oh, wow, really?” He chuckled in disbelief.

“What?”

“Nothing, it’s just…man, you could do so much better than me. I’m just this ball of anxiety. I don’t know how being friends with someone like me could be very nice.”

You frowned, saddened by his lack of self confidence. “Come on, Steven. Don’t be so hard on yourself. But you did seriously worry me. Where did you go? What even happened?” Steven looked up at you with wide eyes, fidgeting with the ends of his jacket. He looked like he was having a conversation with himself, his gaze becoming blank and unfocused, then looking back at you like he had forgotten you were even standing there. It didn’t make you hopeful that you were going to get an answer, and the realization made you deflate with a sigh. “You’re not gonna tell me.” You stated.

Steven gave you a sympathetic frown, his eyes already pleading for forgiveness without having to say anything. “I would, truly, I would. But I’m sorry, I can’t. It’s…complicated.”

You shook your head, trying to ignore your throat tightening and your already stinging eyes. You wore a tight lipped smile, taking a deep breath and meeting his gaze once more. “You don’t have to apologize. You don’t owe me anything, it’s not like you’re my boyfriend or anything.” You chuckled bitterly, quietly excusing yourself to the bathroom before Steven had a chance to say anything else.

You hated crying, for any reason; and you especially didn’t like crying because of someone else, it wasn’t worth it. But you couldn’t stop the tears from flowing as soon as you closed and locked the door to the store’s bathroom. You covered your mouth to muffle the inevitably whimpers and squeaks that escaped your lips. You prayed that Steven couldn’t hear you, if he was even still in the store. Probably not, you felt like you must’ve scared him off. But to your surprise, you froze in place when you saw him still at your register. You quickly noticed the item in his hands and your heart felt like it was going to implode.

Neatly wrapped in Egyptian themed wrapping paper, a sandy white texture decorated with gold hieroglyphics with a simple post-it note on top that read ‘Steven’, the book that you went through hell to get for the man but never ended up giving to him. A desperate attempt to get him to realize your growing feelings for him. The gesture felt silly now, you certainly felt silly as Steven looked at you expectantly. “Sorry, it’s just…it had my name on it.” He explained with a slight stutter. You cursed yourself for not just leaving it at home where it would be safe from prying eyes. Maybe you should’ve chosen a more subtle paper so that it wouldn’t stand out as much as the gold. “I didn’t want to open it without your permission.” Ever the gentleman, huh?

Despite not being in the friendliest mood and still recovering from your quick cry in the bathroom, you shrugged and motioned for him to go ahead and open it. If only he hadn’t found it, then you could’ve just given it away or something and never have to think about it again. That would’ve been easier.

You waited with bated breath as Steven gently unwrapped the gift, careful not to tear the paper too much, as if it cost more than seven pounds. You almost didn’t want to look at him as the actual book started to peek through, the title flashing in white bold font smack dab in the center of the cover. It was only when the wrapping paper was completely off did you steal a glance at Steven’s face.

Your heart pounded as Steven's face immediately lit up with pure happiness, a wide grin spreading across his face and his bright eyes glancing back and forth between you and the book. "It's the book I wanted..." He said in disbelief. "You...bought this for me?" He stuttered.

You shrugged. "Yeah, who else would it be for? There's no one else I know obsessed with Egyptian history."

"You didn't have to do that."

"I wanted to."

There was a deafening silence for a moment where Steven just looked at you with an expression you could only describe as awe, like you just hung the moon and stars and how lucky he must've been to be in your presence. But of course, your insecurities told you that wasn't the case, it would never be that case.

"Thank you..." He whispered, so softly you had to strain to hear it. "This means a lot to me, really. I'll pay you back."

"No." You said immediately. "No, Steven. It was a gift. I didn't get this for you and expected anything in return."

Steven sighed, placing the book down gently on the counter, taking a step closer to you. "Look, I-...I'm not good at not being my awkward self, especially in front of such a beautiful person. I never wanted you to be angry with me. I have a lot of secrets, and I know that doesn't sound like the type of person you'd want to spend your time with. But if you let me...I'd love to take you out. And maybe we could get close enough where I can tell you all those secrets. But I understand if you never wanna talk to me again..."

You were blushing fiercely, your cheeks heating up you could practically feel your blood boiling just beneath your skin. You never expected Steven to be so bold, even though it didn't exactly sound that bold with his stuttering and slight waver in his voice. But it flustered you all the same. You rarely ever met someone and wanted to know all their secrets, but he made it sound so alluring. Tantalizing, like learning more and more about him was some incredible journey you had the opportunity to venture on. Him disappearing for a while and not telling you why was one thing, but you could sense another red flag in that speech of his somewhere. But the way he was looking at you, his pleading eyes, those big brown enchanting eyes that you wanted to get lost in. You didn't have the heart to say anything but yes.

"You really want to go out with me?" You voiced almost breathlessly.

Steven smiled wide. "Of course I do, darling. Since the first time we had a conversation, you made me feel like I could have something in my life other than chaos. You made...you make me feel at peace."

You chuckled bashfully, practically putty in his hands already. "How chaotic could the life of a gift shop-ist be?"

"Go out on a date with me and I'll tell you. What do you say?"

"Yes." You smiled. "I say yes."

jeez, finally took a break from posting only smut lmao. i miss steven, my baby boy🥺

FOR SCIENCE | the project proposal

In which the Moon Knight alter system presents a unique opportunity to settle the nature versus nurture debate, once and for all...

Steven Grant/Marc Spector/Jake Lockley x afab!psychologist!reader (3.2k+)

RATING: EXPLICIT (18+, mdni) WARNINGS: descriptions of mental illness, depictions of DID, fetishization of mental disorders (DID), potentially unethical scientific practices, no smut in this part NOTES: again, please don’t read this if you’re concerned at all with research ethics, as this is NOT a good demonstration of scientific procedures and studies. DISCLAIMER: although i’m incredibly knowledgeable about psychology, i am NOT a professional. all psychoanalyses made throughout the course of this storyline are entirely my own, based on my own interpretations of the characters. in a similar vein, i am also not an expert on DID specifically (although i am well-read on mental disorders and diagnoses), so i apologize for any incorrect terminology or misrepresentation. don’t hesitate to call me out if i say something wrong!

next part →

Marc Spector’s psyche was a psychologist’s wet dream.

Three distinct personalities, completely separated from each other, all occupying the same host body. At one point, all mutually unaware of the others, but now living together in solidarity and (relative) cooperation.

Meeting Marc Spector was a happy accident—but meeting a man with a clearcut case of Dissociative Identity Disorder as a Professor of Psychology? Now that was just pure, dumb luck.

You had met Steven Grant first. You’d run into him at the British Museum during a university-sponsored visit. Your interaction had been brief, but it was memorable for you nonetheless—there was just something about those soft brown eyes and dopey, shy smile that melted your heart.

Imagine your surprise when you accidentally ran into that same man on the bus, only for him to introduce himself as Marc with a midwestern American accent and a cold, calculated gleam in his stare. He was forward and confident—very much unlike your previous encounter with him. When you called his bluff and swore you’d interacted with him under the guise of Steven, he pulled you aside and gently tried to justify the confusion.

“It’s—I have this...condition. It’s—have you ever heard of Dissociative Identity Disorder?”

You had tried hard to fight your smile.

“Yeah, I’m familiar with it.”

It was only revealed to him—after his winded and lengthy explanation—that you had a doctorate degree in clinical psychology and specialized in mental disorders.

Steven’s curiosity was piqued, and Marc silently hoped you’d be able to shed some insight into the functioning of his fragmented mind. You quickly established an easy friendship, somewhat reminiscent of a relationship between a client and therapist—although you knew and cared for each other on a much deeper and more intimate level.

Several months later, you were finally introduced to the most elusive alter within the system—Jake Lockley.

You began to spend the majority of your free time with the men—all three of them seemed to be relatively taken with you. Steven was sweet, Marc was shrewd, and Jake was steadfast. It was sometimes difficult to conceptualize that they all shared the same physical body with how differently they behaved.

It hadn’t started as a project—genuinely, truly, it hadn’t. It wasn’t your intention to be so captivated by those big brown puppy-dog eyes or the softness within his smile. And the feelings you had for him—for all of them—were real, and raw, and indisputable. You would never, ever, ever do anything to make them feel uncomfortable or jeopardize your relationships in any way.

Which is why this was such a bad fucking idea.

Your nails drummed against the side of your porcelain coffee mug as your nervously chewed on the cap of your red pen, making a futile attempt to focus on grading the research report in front of you, but your attention was clearly elsewhere. Your eyes kept darting to the clock on the wall across from you, watching the second hand tick away slowly. The coffee shop was playing gentle soothing acoustic songs, the smell of cinnamon lingering in the air, but even the coziness wasn’t enough to shake your nerves.

“Hey, there, Doc.”

Your head perked at the sound of a familiar voice, a warming hand clapping your shoulder as Marc Spector walked to the other side of the small table and sat down across from you. You groaned at his greeting, pulling your reading glasses from your nose and setting them on the table in front of you.

“Marc, I swear, if you call me that one more time, I’ll—”

He threw his hands up in mock surrender, although he was smirking slyly at you.

“Alright, alright, jeez—what’s got you wound up so tight, huh?”

He reached for the paper on top of the stack in front of you, reading off the title aloud.

“An In-depth Investigation Into the Underlying Psychological Causes of Erectile Dysfunction in Men Under 50.”

His face contorted in a look of disgust.

“Jesus—that’s gotta be the most boring fuckin’ thing I’ve ever heard.”

You watched as his eyes fluttered briefly, his posture sinking and his features softening. When his eyes regained focus, he shook his head, huffing.

“Bugger off, Marc—I think it sounds plenty interestin’.”

Steven smiled graciously, offering the packet back to you. You accepted it tiredly, throwing it atop the pile of what seemed like an endless supply of mediocre student submissions that had yet to be graded.

“Thanks, Steven, but Marc’s right—my brain’s fried. I swear, if I have to read another shitty case study about men whose dicks don’t work, I’ll gouge my eyes out.”

The man chuckled at your confession as you shoved the stack of papers into your briefcase clumsily, snapping it shut without a second thought and letting it fall back to the floor beside your table. You carefully picked up your mug and took a long, slow sip—your coffee was barely lukewarm, at this point, as you’d be sitting at the cafe for hours, working quietly as you patiently waited on your friend’s arrival.

Although Steven was blissfully oblivious, Marc was observant. His consciousness pushed to the front, studying you carefully—your white-knuckled grip against your cup, your shifty eyes that were looking everywhere but at him, the tension in your shoulders and nervous bouncing of your leg.

“Alright—what’s wrong?”

Your gaze snapped over to him where he was sat with arms crossed over his chest, eyes narrowed in suspicion. You tried to force a smile in an effort to cover up your uncertainty.

“Nothing’s wrong, Marc. Promise.”

You held his gaze intently, trying to convince him with your half-hearted response. His stare didn't waver, and after a few brief moments, you had to look down, overwhelmed with the intensity of his scrutiny.

“Alright, let’s try that again. Y/N—what’s wrong?”

You let a long, exasperated sigh, running a tired hand down your face. This had been weighing on you for a few days, at this point, and you still weren’t sure if you could handle the emotional labor this conversation would require.

“It’s true, nothing’s—nothing’s wrong, per se, I just—I just need to talk to you. I’ve—I have this idea—”

“Like—a work-related, science-y idea? You want Steven? Or—I can try my best to help, but sometimes you get excited and start talking really fast and I can’t keep up, but—”

“No, Marc, it’s not—I mean, it’s not really science-y, but like, also—it kinda is? I don’t know how to explain it, but I really need to—”

“I mean, whatever it is, you seem pretty worried about it, so obviously it’s important, and—and I just wanna make sure we’re giving you whatever response you need, or, at least—”

“Jesus, Marc, if you’d let me finish.”

You clipped, and his jaw snapped shut instantaneously, somewhat taken aback by your outburst. You were normally so controlled, practiced with your expressions, so seeing any sign of emotional imbalance was startling.

Guilt immediately flooded your stomach after you lashed out—you buried your head in your hands, taking a few slow, deliberate breaths in an attempt to quell your rapid heartbeat.

“Shit—sorry, I didn’t mean—this is just... I’m not sure how to go about this.”

You felt the featherlight brush of calloused fingertips against your forearm, coaxing your face away from your palms. When you finally lifted your head, Steven had returned, his eyes soft and reassuring. He pulled your hand into his, squeezing briefly before rubbing his thumb comfortingly across your knuckles.

“S’alright, love, truly. Take as much time as you need, and—and if there’s anythin’ you need from us, it’s yours. Just—whenever you’re ready.”

You tried to ignore the butterflies flitting in your stomach at Steven’s gentle promise. You inhaled once more, before finding his eyes.

“This—I need to talk to all three of you. Can you—are you in a place where you can all be co-conscious?”

Steven’s lips turned up at the corners at your thoughtfulness. He received verbal responses from both Marc and Jake—a confirmation that they were both actively listening.

“’Course. We’re all here. Is—do you have a preference, as to who you’d like to speak with?”

You returned his smile, offering a slight squeeze to his hand.

“I mean—since you’re already fronting, might as well stay, huh?”

Steven blushed, trying to fight the giddiness that came from your validation. He quickly steeled himself, reminding himself that you were struggling to open up to him.

“Alright. Whenever you’re ready, then, yeah?”

You cautiously pulled your hand away from his, mostly to keep yourself grounded and get out what you needed before you second-guessed yourself.

“So.”

You cautiously began.

“I had this—this idea. And it’s—it sounds crazy, and I get that, but I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it, especially because—well, I just feel like this is something that could have damning effects on the entire field of psychology, with both practical and theoretical applications, but—that doesn’t mean—I don’t want you to feel obligated by any means to agree, or—or to feel pressured into anything, and I definitely don’t want you to think that—that I’m using you, because that couldn’t be farther from the truth, I swear, and—”

“Y/N.”

His tone was soft, a quiet interruption from your rambling, and your eyes widened in concern. However, he offered you a reassuring nod.

“Just tell us what it is, yeah? We’ll go from there.”

You nodded slowly, squeezing your eyes shut, before beginning again.

“There’s this huge debate in psychology. It’s pretty much the basis of a lot of our research—the whole nature versus nurture debate. Basically, it’s all about how much of our personalities can be attributed to genetics versus how much can be attributed to our life experiences.”

Steven was listening intently, leaning forward into your words.

“Well, it’s—it’s a concept that’s really difficult to research, because, well, we don’t really have a basis of comparison. The best thing we have to go off of is when identical twins get separated at birth and grow up in different places. Or, at least—that was the best we’ve had up until this point. Does—does that make sense?”

“Yes.”

He assured, nodding in acknowledgement. You only hoped the other two alters were keeping up.

“So, basically what I’m getting at here, is, well—you, and—and all three of you, really—Marc and Jake, you guys provide a really, really unique opportunity, because, well—you share a body. So, physiologically, you’re completely identical. The only thing that’s different about you is who you are, so—your life experiences and memories and things like that. You’re—you’re like the perfect example of how our experiences shape our beings.”

“Right. Right.”

Steven followed your train of thought carefully, brows furrowed. You took a deep breath. This is the part you were dreading.

“So, I had this thought... you three boys are so vastly different from each other. Like, really, really different, and—and you each have your own preferences, things like that, but—but you still have the same body. In my Abnormal Psych course, we’re studying intimacy and desire right now. So—so what I was wondering was about your—your sexuality. Like, to what extent are your sexual preferences due to your biology rather than your cognition.”

Steven blew out a shaky exhale, though he tried not to appear perturbed by your words. His mind was silent—he could feel the intense focus from his alters, now hanging on your every word.

“What if there was a way, to, you know, test, how different your sexual preferences are? And to test and see how your arousal is different, or the same, based on locations of stimulation and things like that?”

Bloody fucking hell.

In a split second, Marc was fronting, Steven slipping back into the headspace, completely overwhelmed and unsure of what to say or how to react. You noticed the abrupt switch, and after recovering from the brief whiplash, you felt panic spur within you. You’d scared him away.

Marc’s brows were furrowed, like he wasn’t completely picking up what you were putting down.

“So, what exactly are you suggesting?”

You closed your eyes.

“I guess—what I’m suggesting is that you—you help me research. You—you let me study you, each of you, independently, to see—to see how different your sexual behaviors and preferences are.”

“Like—like a questionnaire, or something?”

Marc questioned, but when you shook your head, eyes casting downwards, it suddenly dawned on him. Steven’s departure made sense. Everything made sense.

“So... so lemme get this straight.”

Marc made a stopping motion with his hand, gesturing for you to pause.

“You—want to have sex, with me—with us... for science?”

“Well, I mean, it—it doesn’t necessarily have to be with me, I could—we could find someone else, if you’re more comfortable, and—and I could just observe, or—”

“So you’re a voyeur, now?”

You jolted and Marc’s vulgarity, eyes quickly scanning your surroundings to make sure no one was listening in on your conversation. Luckily, the cafe was relatively deserted at that point.

“No! No, that’s not—I’m just saying, with what I’m suggesting, it—it would make the most sense for the researcher to—to be more hands-on, but that’s...”

Your voice trailed off, staring at a speck of grime on the table, trying to calm the rapid racing of your heart.

Yeah, seems she's interested in being real hands-on, huh?

Marc struggled to hold in his snickering at Jake’s internal dialogue, but after seeing the worry that was clinging to your features, his sympathy prevailed.

“Y/N.”

He spoke calmly, cool and collected. Your eyes flitted to his, where he was watching you intently. However, you could see the ghost of a smirk on his face.

“So what you’re saying is... you want to have sex, with me, for science.”

He reiterated, and you opened your mouth to protest, to defend your credibility, to rationalize your bizarre proposition, but instead, a long sigh escaped you as you admitted defeat.

“Yes. Yeah. That’s…exactly what I’m saying.”

A brief silence stagnated between you, and there was a tightness forming in your chest as every worst-case-scenario began coming to fruition in the forefront of your mind.

“I’m—I’m so sorry, Marc, I didn’t mean to overstep, or—or—”

“What, exactly, would this entail?”

Marc inquired, unable to deny his curiosity. You blinked once, then twice, processing his words.

“So—so you’ll do it?”

He held up his hands as if to tell you to slow down.

“Just—hang on. Hypothetically speaking, what—what would this even look like?”

Excitement zipped up your skin as you reached down into your briefcase, pulling out a manila folder full of several sheets of scribbled ideas and disorganized thoughts.

“Well, see, I’ve been brainstorming—”

Christ, she has the whole thing planned.

Steven’s voice sounded faint, breathless, winded. Marc ignored him, instead focusing in on your sudden enthusiasm.

“—and I came up with a research plan. So, the way it would go—we’d meet for the weekend, three weekends in a row, with a week break in between. Each alter will have their own weekend to be the subject of study. Day one, we—well, you would lead the sexual encounter. Do what you want, showcase what sex usually looks like for you, what you like, what you don’t like—”

Marc's mind was reeling. He shamelessly attempted to ignore the effect your words were having on him. Do what you want. What you like. To you.

You were still talking.

“—and then the second day, you’d let me take the reins. I’ll psychoanalyze your behavior from the first day, and synthesize that with all the information I already have about you, and I’ll try to—well, I don’t wanna say push your buttons, but—basically, as shitty as it sounds, I’d be trying to bring to light any vulnerabilities, prod at the soft spots, stuff like that. Try to see if I can find what it is each of you seeks out through sexual intimacy. Does that make sense?”

Marc shook his head, lost in thought, but he blinked away the fog in his mind and quickly corrected himself with a nod.

“Yeah, I mean—I think so? Would this—what would you do, once it’s over? Like, what’s the point?”

“It would never be published, or shared with anyone else, I can promise you that. It’s—it would mostly be for me. Kind of like a passion project, I guess. I’ve been thinking about it for awhile, and, well...”

Passion project?

What’s she mean, ‘she’s been thinkin’ about it for awhile?’

Marc almost shushed the voices in his head aloud, trying to clear his head of static so he could properly take all of this in.

He looked up at you, and you were staring up at him with eye round and hopeful, almost reverent as they passed over him. He blew out a slow breath.

“Do... can we have time to think about it? To talk about it?”

The fuck do you mean, jefe? I’m ready to start right now.

You nodded encouragingly, although Marc caught the brief glimmer of disappointment in your eyes.

“Of course, Marc. Take as long as you need. And—please don’t feel obligated to say yes. I mean it. I know—I know this kind of came out of left field, and—and I don’t want to violate any boundaries, or—or jeopardize our friendship in any way, I would never want to do anything to make you uncomfortable, just—”

You stalled your tangent with a slow breath.

“Just let me know, okay?”

Marc nodded at you, smiling softly and contemplatively as he rose from the table and exited the coffeeshop, leaving you to stew in anticipation and something adjacent to remorse.

The call came in the next day, at 11am on the dot. It was Steven on the other line when you answered, walking out of the lecture hall doors as your class adjourned.

“Hello?”

You answered.

“Mornin’, Y/N. It’s, uh—It’s Steven.”

You giggled.

“I know, Steven. I have caller ID, and believe it or not, your accent is kind of distinct.”

You could practically hear him blush on the other end.

“Right. Yeah. Well, I just—I was callin’ to, uh—Christ, of course they made me do this, I can’t even—”

“Steven.”

You interrupted gently, your calmness soothing his nerves to some degree. He took a breath.

“Sorry. I—We talked it over. The whole—your experiment. And—and I think we’re all up for it.”

You froze in your tracks, students continuing to rush around on either side of you in the hallway. Your hand was shaking.

“I—really? Are you sure?”

“Well, no—I mean, yeah, I just—of course, I’ve got some reservations, but, I mean—it’s for science, yeah?"

A smile was creeping up your face.

“Yeah. Yes. For—for research purposes.”

Yeah, solely research purposes, my ass.

Marc quipped internally, and Steven gulped.

“Right, then. Could we—shall we meet again today, or—whenever, to talk it over a bit more?”

You nodded before realizing he couldn’t see you.

“That’d be perfect. We can meet same time, same place as yesterday?”

He gave a hum of agreement, and you felt suddenly breathless as the reality of the situation began to set in.

“Right. I’ll—I’ll see you then, okay, Steven?”

“Yeah, ‘lright, cheers.”

“And, Steven?”

You called quickly, hoping to catch him before he ended the call.

He hummed in response. You smiled.

“Thank you. Really, thank you.”

Time For a Break || Steven Grant x fem!Reader drabble

Summary: You've been studying for hours. Steven gives you some smooches to distract you and make you take a break

Warnings: none 🥰

Word count: ~ 600

Authors: Cass & Rouge

While making the tea Steven watched you from the kitchen.

Sitting on the couch with a thick book in your hands, you were completely focused on your work.

He was proud. Of course he was, since you worked hard to become a doctor. Sometimes you were taking it too far, but it was just your little dream. According to him, at least. "Maybe you should take a break," Steven suggested, but no response was forthcoming, since you were too focused. He walked to you with two mugs of tea in his hands, sighing. After placing both mugs on the little coffee table, he kissed your cheek and said, "Hey, Y/L/N. Can you find a few minutes for your beloved man?"

You turned your head to give him a look while massaging your temples.

There was a look of concern on Steven's face.

You reached out your hand and rubbed his shoulder, a reassuring smile on your face. "Don't be concerned, Steven. I have an extremely critical oral exam coming up next week, and I need to be fully prepared if I am to get a high grade." You picked your mug and took a few sips of the hot liquid, smiling to yourself - Steven knew exactly how to make your favorite tea, not too bitter, not too sweet, just right.

"Don't tell me not to be concerned when you didn't hear me just a moment ago and you have been stuck in those books since morning," Steven said and placed one more kiss on your cheek, and then lips. "You need a break."

"Baby, I can't take a break. Once I get distracted, I'll have to skip learning for today."

"Don't be silly, luv. An hour or two won't stop you from learning. It will refresh this pretty head of yours."

A blush appeared in your cheeks as you chuckled softly. "Maybe you're right..."

He nodded, gently patting your shoulder with his hand. "Of course I am right. You should give your head a rest so you can learn even more."

You put the mug back on the table and laid on the couch, placing your head on his lap.

Steven moved a hand through your hair as he hummed, "That's a lot better than reading all the time, innit?"

"Are you proud of me?"

He nodded, "Of course I am proud of you. You do so much, you work hard. But I am also mad at you."

"Mad?" You looked up at him, frowning.

Steven shook his head as he said, "Yes. You overexert yourself. I swear I hear you reciting those books of yours while we are in bed."

"I don't!" You protested loudly.

Just recently, I heard you muffle and mutter something about the brain and how it works. Hearing all about that gray matter or something was a tad creepy and graphic," Steven pretended to shiver. "It was like sleeping with some sort of crazy serial killer."

"Maybe deep down I am one," you teased, reaching out to stroke his cheek. "I love you so much, Steven. Thank you for all of your concern, that's adorable."

"Well, I care about you and your well-being because I love you," Steven smiled and kissed your palm. "And you seriously overwork yourself lately."

I'll consider a longer break if you offer me one of your sweet smooches."

Laughter filled the air as Steven leaned down and placed a sweet kiss on your lips. "I love you."

You gave the kiss back and smiled as he straightened his back again. "I love you too. Thank you for everything."

𝓓𝓪𝔂 13 - Blur The Lines || Steven Grant x fem!reader

Masterlist

Summary: You are best friends with Steven Grant. Even though you enjoy your friendship, you decide to blur the lines.

Warnings: smut (handjob, cumming without penetration)

Word count: 1137

Author: Rouge

A/N: the prompt for today is: Masturbation

Steven Grant is my best friend of many years. Sweet, smart, and with a dry wit that makes you laugh; measured and considered; he is the most level-headed person I've ever known.

I find this appealing, and it's one of the reasons I like him so much. Although I know he wouldn't blur our carefully drawn friendship, I yearn for it. I want to shock him so that he loses his composure and I can feel his desire for me. However, I feel insecure about the fact that he doesn't seem to be even slightly interested in me; I can describe a whole sexual encounter and Steven won't even raise an eyebrow.

It is not that I have tried to seduce him, but I have decided to change that. In this story, I'll tell you how I tempted Steven to cross our boundaries.

It was a hot summer night and I was staying at Steven's flat. On a visit to London, I crashed on his floor since we lived in different cities.

Our day was amazing and we really connected; we talked about work, health, and minds. It felt so good to be so close to him emotionally, but I wanted to be that close to him physically as well. When we got back to his flat after a walk, I decided to tease him a little. 

The summer dress I was wearing was green and floaty. As we sat on the floor chatting, I pulled my knees in, exposing my underwear to him; Steven glanced at my knickers a few times, but didn't seem concerned at all.

I decided to take a less subtle approach at that point. "Steven," I began, my voice light, "What do you think about when you masturbate? Do you watch a lot of porn?"

A little frown appeared on Steven's face as he held my gaze. This question was slightly out of the blue, but it wasn't really outside of our normal conversational limits. A sigh escaped his lips as he replied, "Really, I don't know. I sometimes watch porn, but I feel like it's getting a bit old."

The sight of him looking unnecessarily weary for our age hurt my heart a little. He's been clearly unlucky in love and hasn't really had much intimacy with others; I couldn't help but move closer to him. My intention was to be more direct, "Sometimes I fantasize about cuddling you while you touch yourself. Would you be open to that?"

His eyes met mine; his lips parted a little, but he did not appear upset; rather, he appeared curious. "Y/N, you know how much I love you, but I don't want to lose our friendship."

The solemnity of his speech made me laugh a little. "Who's talking about losing this friendship? We're so close, I just want to show that closeness." As I gauge his reaction, I smile lovingly. "No romance, just plenty of sexiness."

Steven smiled and nodded slowly as well. As he considered the idea, he kept calm as ever, nodding in approval. "A physical expression of friendship, no romance, only sex... I guess I can see that..."

"So?" I asked lightly.

He smiled and nodded, "Then let's try it. You need to spoon me."

We almost raced to his bed after laughing. Taking him close between my legs, I sat behind him. My lips were right by his ear, and I whispered to him to pull out his cock as I knelt up to view his crotch. 

Suddenly, he looked nervous, but did as I said, his cheeks blushed.

Having been best friends for so long, I knew he appreciated women who could take charge a little. The size of his cock surprised me; it's gorgeous, long, and slightly girthy. I gently caressed him. 

I breathed instructions into his ear and he became harder.

Having moved my hands away from him, I didn't need to say anything more; any initial shyness was gone as Steven's lust intensified. He started to stroke his full length as I whispered sweet nothings into his ear.

As he shared this moment with me, I felt myself getting nice and wet. Steven was so vulnerable right now, but we were at ease, our bodies as close as our souls. I slided my hands along his thighs, caressing his legs. Trying to squeeze as close to him as possible, I wanted to soak up his lust until I was dripping. Unconsciously, Steven gasped. 

His cologne lingered against my nose as I kissed him along his ear, down towards his neck. It was still possible to see his lovely cock being worked to its full size in his hand. 

Slowly and steadily he pumped himself, occasionally playing with his tip with his thumb, but never neglecting the full length of his considerable cock.

Without intending to, I licked my lips; I wanted to get on my knees and suck him off, have him fuck my mouth until I begged him to stop, but this wasn't about me - I needed to focus on him.

"That's it, sweetheart," I whispered to him, my mouth at his ear.

Steven started to pant a little.

"Steven, please, I need you to cum, baby, so bad," I begged him, gently nibbling on his earlobe.

As he leant back into me, he moaned and beat his cock faster.

As I moved my hands along his thighs gently tugging him so he had to spread his legs a little for me, I gently whispered, "That's it, sweetheart. Cum in my arms, baby, I love you so much."

Steven seemed to lose control. I locked eyes with him; he looked desperate, and lust-filled, and completely exposed to me, as his hand manically rubbed at his cock, hard and fast.

I kissed his forehead and caressed his cheek.

Turning to me, he let me hold him.

Over and over, eagerly and desperately, I instructed him to cum for me. He moaned openly, staring at me with desperate, almost devoted eyes.

"I need your cum," I breathed, feeling my wet cunt lips slip against each other as he jerked against me. 

In the end, Steven spewed long streams of thick, white cum all over himself.

For the first time, I kissed Steven on the lips, and he responded passionately. The moment I looked down at my best friend, who was covered in his own cum, I was astonished at how sexy and happy he looked.

Scooping up the cum with my fingers, I swallowed as much as I could before licking my fingers clean. There was a sense that I was really his, and he seemed really mine. I had made him happy, and he had given me what I craved the most - hot cum to lick up, while gazing at a man I cherished.