Ugugugugug i can’t stop thinking about the “Jack has to tell Robby when to quit on their girl.” Trope. It’s my favorite of all time and I feel like I have to jump on the bandwagon.
Word count: 0.7k
Warnings: threesome. Mdni. Edging. Fem!reader. Piv.
Your body’s on fire; you can feel the sweat dripping down the side of your forehead and Robby’s hard thrusts from behind you.
He’s been at it for a while. Rubbing soothing circles into your clit that doesn’t seem so soothing anymore when the bud is pulled taunt against your skin and every single touch feels like a wave of pleasure and pain going all the way down your legs.
And every time Robby’s cock rocks back inside you it hits that spot where you can feel him in your throat. He’s just so big and rough, you’ve been considering that he likes torturing you.
“Robby— please… please I can’t.”
This has to be the tenth time Robby’s stopped all his ministrations and edged the life out of you. His hand moving from your clit and going lax against your stomach. His cock sliding all the way out. Going from so much pleasure to absolutely none, leaving your orgasm on the brink of disappearing.
But then you feel a big hand on the side of your face. Brushing away the hair that sticks to your sweaty forehead. Eyes flickering up to Jack he has one of the most caring expressions you’ve ever seen. His legs spread wide in front of you and naked in all his glory.
He’s so pretty, you have to shove your face into the pillow he gave you (because unlike Robby, jack actually cares about the neighbors hearing) or else even just the sight of him might tip you over the edge.
“m’cant.”
Your voice is muffled, hand grasping at the soft cotton of the pillow. Trying to scoot back into Robby because you need that release bad. And Jack notices.
“You gonna give her the next one man?”
Knowing Robby, he’s probably clicking his tongue at jack and shrugging. The universal sign for “will see.”
Gasping there’s a small pressure back on your cunt and when Robby thrusts all the way in your breath hitches. It feels like an eternity with how big he is. Eyes shutting It feels so good but what’s the point of continuing if there’s not that exploding reaction at the end?
“You better give it to her.”
There’s a little bit of demanding in jacks voice, and when your head picks up he’s leaning back on the headboard getting comfortable again as if to watch a show. His dick is erect and flushed red but you’ve long given up on trying to take two at once when your brain can hardly comprehend one.
“How about you sweeten the deal honey?” Jacks voice is so soft. It’s so easy to register between Robby’s grunts and your moans in between each other. “Beg for it. Come on. You know Robby likes to hear that pretty little voice.”
“Please.”
You choke on a moan, words falling out sporadically, anything to sweeten your chances of that coil in your stomach to come back.
“Wanna cum so bad. Please. Don’t… don’t be mean. I’ll do anything.”
“Fuck.”
You feel Robby’s hot breaths on your shoulder, breathing heavily against you. The more Robby’s hips snap against yours the more your body feels like it’s pushing for that release. All the fundamentals coming together to create that spill in your abdomen.
“Robby— please, please, please.”
The sloppy thumb back on your clit, his weight on your back. The warmth. The pleasure. It’s all so so much. You can’t see it but Robby’s eyes flicks to Jacks. As if for confirmation.
“Give it to her.”
And it’s a command from jacks mouth. If it was up to Robby he’d stop now, he relishes in watching you squirm. But this time he picks up speed, biting a soft love mark on your shoulder when you moan. And fuck.
Robby hates it when Jacks right.
Your walls spasm around his dick when you cum. The sounds on your lips and the way your insides tighten around his sensitive cock. So wet and gummy. It makes Robby dizzy. You’ve never came this hard before.
With a groan Robby’s not that far behind. Not when you’re so perfect like that for him. Begging and squeezing like your life depended on it.
“Yes. Thank— thank you.”
You chant and Jack watches in amusement as you both fall apart over each other. Tired and sleepy. Achieving possibly the best sex of your life.
"si com eget me plsd" and then, instead of a location pin, a screenshot of a map with your street barely visible in the corner, which tells him everything he needs to know about the state you're in. he stares at it for a moment. closes his eyes. gets his keys.
you're outside when he pulls up, leaning against the brick wall with your shoes dangling from one hand and your hair half out of whatever careful style it was when you left, and the moment you see his car your entire face brightens and you push off the wall and stumble toward him like he's the best thing you've seen all night.
"simon!!," you say, drawing his name out like it's something you've been saving.
"yeah," he says. "i'm here. come on."
you stumble and crash directly into his side, both arms winding around his waist, your face pressing into his chest with a contented sound that he feels more than hears. he stands with your shoes dangling against his back and your hair tickling his chin and after a moment of trying to help you to walk, he ends up picking you up bridal style and carrying you.
"you're so strong si" you mumble dreamily, staring at him in absolute awe. when he places you into the car and buckles your seatbelt for you, "you're responsible too"
you manage the passenger seat for almost a full minute before you migrate.
he's not entirely sure of the mechanics — one moment you're buckled in beside him, the next you're somehow mostly across the centre console, sideways, your chin on his shoulder and your hand warm and certain on his thigh before he's even made it out of the car park. he pulls over at the first opportunity and sorts your seatbelt properly, reaching across you, and you look up at him while he does it with an expression that has no business being that specific given the circumstances.
"you're so good to me," you tell him, with complete sincerity.
"sit still," he says, and pulls back onto the road.
you sit still for thirty seconds. maybe thirty five.
then your hand starts moving on his upper thigh. slow, idle, the kind of absent touch that might be accidental on anyone else but on you, right now, tilted toward him with your eyes tracking his profile you're gazing at him with pure lust.
he watches the road. says nothing. when your hand shifts onto his bulge he picks it up and deposits it back in your own lap without comment.
you put it straight back.
he lets it stay, this time, because clearly moving it isn't working and he's a practical man.
this turns out to be a mistake, because you start rubbing there too. he tries to stare straight forward and focus on the road, but his pants are undeniably getting tighter.
"simon," you say, in a voice that is different from your usual voice — lower, a little slow, the careful diction of someone choosing words through a pleasant haze.
"mm."
"you're so pretty" you say, very seriously.
"not the word most people would use," he says.
"well you are pretty. so pretty si." in some form of cuteness aggression, you lean over the console and softly bite his neck. then you decide its not enough and give sloppy kisses down his neck.
"lovie sit back."
"i am sitting back. i wanna sit on your face though siiii." you mumble against his neck and your nails drag lightly against his bulge. his jaw tightens incrementally. "simon."
"ten minutes," he says. "we're ten minutes away."
"i just want—"
"i know what you want."
"and?"
"and ten minutes."
you consider this for a moment, apparently decide ten minutes is a negotiating position rather than a statement of fact, and say something directly against his ear — low and unhurried and specific enough that every muscle in his body contracts simultaneously. the car remains in its lane. it takes more effort than he would like to admit.
"christ," he says, very quietly, to the windscreen.
"is that a yes," you say, settling back with the satisfaction of someone who knows exactly what they've done.
"it's a keep your hands where they are and let me drive," he says.
you keep your hands where they are. you also keep talking — which, as it turns out, is considerably worse than the hands. a steady, uninhibited stream of observations and suggestions delivered in the candid cheerful tone of someone who has temporarily misplaced their filter, all of it aimed at him, all of it landing exactly where you intend it to. simon drives. he keeps his eyes on the road. he responds to none of it, which he's aware is not the same as not hearing it, and the ten minutes stretch out into something that feels significantly longer than ten minutes.
he gets you inside.
the lift is its own specific trial. you're facing him with your back against the panel, arms loose around his neck, looking up at him with those eyes that have always been a problem. you're talking again, softer now, something about his hands and something else about what you'd like and he reaches past you and hits the button for your floor and keeps his eyes forward and breathes steadily and thinks about absolutely nothing at all.
"you're ignoring me," you say.
"i'm listening to every word," he says, which is true and is the problem.
you stop twice on the way to your door. once to tell him something about his shoulders that he files away against his better judgement, and once to make a suggestion so detailed and vulgur that he stops walking entirely for a moment, stands in the middle of the hallway, and takes a slow breath before continuing. you look pleased with yourself.
he gets you through the door. gets you to the bedroom. you sit on the edge of the bed and reach for him with both hands, expression open and warm and wanting, and he catches your hands gently and holds them.
"lie down," he says.
"come with me," you say.
"in a minute. i'm getting you water."
you lie back against the pillow with a small sound that does nothing helpful for the ache in his pants, and he turns and goes to the kitchen.
when he gets back he sees you face down on the pillow, one arm thrown wide, your shoes finally abandoned somewhere between the door and the bed. there you were, fast asleep in your dream world, a small pool of drool already forming at the corner of your mouth, breathing slow and even and completely, utterly unconscious.
and there simon stood, water glass in hand, watching you, while he was sporting a throbbing hard-on and nothing he could do about it.
“ungf - fuck - dad - please.” it slips out from between your lips into the hair on john's broad chest; a blurred, desperate whine. one you wish you could immediately take back when you hear his sharp intake of breath against your neck.
his hips still against yours and air catches in your throat; a flush creeping up your neck. “oh shit. sorry - I didn't -” you panic as he drags his cock all the way out of you, leaving your weeping cunt tensing around nothing.
“dad, huh?” he murmurs against your jaw, one hand reaching to pinch a nipple between calloused fingers just to hear you whimper. “didn't know you were into that shit. s’ok. i’ll take care of ya, kid.”
his hands find the meat at the back of your thighs, pressing your knees practically to your shoulders before he slams back inside you in one brutal motion. your back arches off the bed. he presses harder on the back of your thighs to pin you back down.
“fuck, with a cunt like this i’ll be whoever you want me to be. your dad. a fucking plumber. whatever means I get to keep filling up this sweet little hole of yours, sweetheart."
"Jesus christ! König stop it's not gonna... oh my god..."
You clutched at the mans broad shoulders. Cunt split open by just the tip of his cock. You said you'd try. You would give it your best effort. But that thing was a monster. It would tear you in two before he even got it all the way in.
König whined, tucking his head into your neck as he rocked the sliver of cock he had fit inside you just a little deeper.
"Schatzi... bitte... please. Just a little more... you are so tight..."
He sounded so needy. You had never heard the man so needy. You would have loved to let him fuck you silly, but it wasn't happening.
Your fingers carded through his hair gently. Shushing his desperate sobs. Running your free hand down his heaving chest to rest on his hip. Stopping him from pushing any further in.
"If you're gentle, and really good for me, you can jerk off like this. You think you can do that, love?"
He nodded, drooling onto your collarbone as he reached down to grip his cock. large hand easily covering what hadn't been shoved in your poor cunt.
It stung, but listening to him whimper like this was worth it. The fat tip of his cock throbbing inside you. His breathing hot and heavy against your chest. Needy lips finding your tits and latching onto your nipple like a life line.
You continued to pet his hair. Breathing through the stretch while he pleased himself. It didn't take long. The vice your cunt had around the tip of his cock was making his brain melt. Only a few eager strokes later and he was jerking forward. Ignoring your pained hiss as he spilled inside you.
"Danke... Danke..."
Before he had the chance to go limp on top of you, a harsh tug to his hair drew his attention.
"You'll clean up for me, won't you, sweet boy? Make me feel good, yeah?"
The dazed way he looked up at you was gorgeous. Eyes wet with tears and glazed over. Lips parted and drooling. Giving you a slow nod before he pulled out and shuffled lower to lap at your poor sensitive cunt.
König never understood how someone so small could be so cold.
You make a pathetic noise somewhere around his collarbone, burrowing closer as if you’re trying to phase directly through his sternum. He’s on his back, half propped against the headboard, mask rucked up to his nose, book in one hand. He had been reading… until you wriggled under the covers and latched onto him like a starfish.
“Why are your hands so hot,” you mumble into his chest, words muffled by cotton and muscle. “This is ridiculous. You’re like a human furnace.”
He huffs out a quiet laugh, the sound rumbling through his ribs and into your cheek. “Is that a complaint, maus?” His accent drags over the pet name, soft and amused. “Because I can move away.”
You immediately grab his wrist. “Don’t you dare.”
The book ends up face-down on the nightstand with a dull thump, because he knows he’s lost. You guide his hand under the blanket, shoving it down to where your thighs are curled up against your stomach. He goes easily, obedient, letting you put his palm exactly where you want it with the same resigned patience he always has.
Your skin is icy against him, and he actually flinches. “Scheiße, liebling,” he mutters. “You are freezing.”
“You’re fine,” you say, already readjusting him, tucking his hand higher, like you will achieve maximum warmth out of this very large, very confused man if it kills you both. “You run hot. Don’t be selfish. Share with the class.”
He can feel the difference even without seeing it; his hand is burning compared to you, heat trapped under the blankets, his pulse a slow heavy thud against your chilled skin. It doesn’t take long before you melt, muscles uncurling one by one as the warmth spreads.
You sigh. Not a delicate little exhale, either, but a full body, soul deep oh thank god sort of sound that makes his face turn red.
“There it is,” you murmur, eyes fluttering shut. “Perfect. Don’t move.”
“Ah.” His lips tilt behind the mask. “I see. I am… what is the word…?” He thinks for a moment. “Heizkissen. Heating pad.”
“Multifunctional,” you correct sleepily. “Big scary sniper. Personal space heater. Very comfy pillow. Don’t sell yourself short.”
He wants to argue with the “scary” part because you’re here, voluntarily, using him like some oversized hot water bottle, but the way you tuck your face deeper into his chest kills the urge. Your nose is cold where it presses into him. The rest of you is slowly warming, though, leeching the heat from his body.
He wraps his free arm around you, palm spanning most of your back. The room is quiet, the only sounds the soft whir of the heater and your breathing, already slowing into something close to a doze.
“How,” he asks after a moment, “do you always end up like this?”
“Like what?”
“Like…” He searches for the right phrase. “Like a stray cat that has found the warm sun beam.”
You snort into his shirt. “You love it.”
“Mm.” His fingers flex against your stomach, slow and absentminded. “I do.”
You go still at that, just for a second. Then you relax again, the tension bleeding out of your shoulders, your body sinking heavier into him. The words weren’t meant to be grand, not some big confession, just a quiet statement of fact, but they land like one anyway.
“Really?” you ask, voice softer now, less teasing, as if you’re asking about something fragile.
“Ja.” His thumb strokes a small, careful circle against the fabric over your skin. “I like when you need me.” He clears his throat, looking anywhere but the crown of your head. “Even if it is only for… warmth.”
You tip your head back enough to look at him, hair mussed, eyes drowsy. The blanket is hitched up to your chin, his arm and hand disappearing beneath it.
“Not only for warmth,” you say quietly. “But it’s a perk.”
Something in his chest does a slow, awkward flip.
You study him for a second more- his flushed ears, the way his gaze refuses to hold yours for long- then you nuzzle back down, apparently satisfied. Your cold toes sneak around his calf.
He jumps. “Warum- ! Your feet, maus-!”
“Shhh,” you murmur, like he’s the one being unreasonable. “Science experiment. I want to see how fast I can make a giant combust from touch alone.”
His laugh is darker this time, rougher. One massive hand slides down your spine, cups your ass, and yanks you flush against his thigh.
“Careful with your experiments, maus,” he murmurs, lips brushing the shell of your ear, voice gone rough and velvet rough. “Keep teasing like that and I’ll warm you the old fashioned way.”
He rolls you beneath him in one smooth, deliberate motion, caging you in with that towering frame, mask still rucked up just enough to reveal the hungry curve of his mouth.
“Sound like a plan, liebling?”
[Inspired by @konigs-lover sending me the most delicious pics of König’s tits]
synopsis: jack has trouble sleeping. you don't make it any easier.
content: 18+ mdni, age gap, swearing, super soft sex (not like super graphic bc I'm weak), reader is annoying as USUAL and jack is just so in love
a/n: teehee. LOL? tbh can I be honest. I'm not sure what this is fr
sorry for using an andrew cody gif. as if u could blame me LOL up top ladies! shoutout @doctcrrobby dani for putting this in my mind. also my dad was in the army and dude literally sleeps on the couch every night and I'm always like dad let's go get you a new mattress and he's like I'd rather fucking die. I don't know why I told you guys that I think I just had to cite my sources on that single line.
Jack’s back ached. It has for years—a legacy of abuse stemming from unforgiving cots, and the punishing weight of rucksacks weighing as much as he did, and strain from bodies thrown over his shoulder en route to safety. It ached from responsibility, and it ached from the perpetual guilt that he’ll probably never rid himself of.
It also meant no bed was ever right. One was as hard as the unyielding ground while gunfire split the air overhead. Another bed he tried sagged beneath him with every twitch, threatening to pull him under. They were too warm, too short, too something.
He felt like Goldilocks, if Goldilocks only had one foot and lumbar pain.
After his wife died, it got worse. Beds were suddenly too cold—cold in a way that had nothing to do with temperature. A vast expanse of isolation that chilled him to the bone. More often than not, Jack found himself wedged diagonally on his too-small sofa, sweat gluing his skin to the overheated pleather, or lying stiff on the ground with nothing but a pillow under his head to protect him against the hardwood floor.
Rest was always just out of reach, as elusive as the peace he naively once thought he could help secure.
Then he met you.
Your bed was great, sure. Amazing, even. Your comforter’s woven out of straight springtime sunbeams, and your mattress stuffed from clouds that angels slept on, probably. Best sleep of his life in that bed.
Beyond the composition, though, what he felt the most is what it meant. It was the one place where Jack could rest. Really rest. Where his body didn’t have to stay coiled beneath the surface, waiting for the next sound, the next shadow, the next inevitable loss. It was the only place no longer had to sleep like a soldier.
Under those covers, he finally understood why kids hide from monsters under their blankets—like a piece of cloth would save them from the horrors. Not because it was logical, but because that softness, that warmth, meant safety. The comforter was flimsy armor, but it was armor nonetheless. A quiet prayer stitched into fabric, whispering you’re okay.
Not every night was easy. Not every nightmare stayed away.
But the difference now was that he had somewhere to come back to.
And with you wrapped in his arms, face buried in his neck, he knows that he could die contentedly in this refuge beneath the covers. That he would kill to have this feeling etched into his very soul.
Most nights, that’s how it was.
Tonight, something’s off.
He doesn’t know what. Can’t quite name it. Just something needling at him.
Poking and prodding him at the edges of consciousness.
Teasingly dangling REM cycles behind closed eyes, only to yank them back, leaving him tangled in restless sharp awareness.
“Psst.”
Not metaphorically.
It comes again, hushed and more incessant. “Pssssst. Jack.”
Jack’s eyes groggily flutter open, eyes rolling as they adjust to the complete and utter darkness that welcomes him back to the land of the living.
A jab in the skin directly above his heart.
He looks down.
It’s your stupid-ass finger nudging his chest. Robbing him of peace.
His muscles unconsciously tighten, instinctively drawing you nearer to shield you from whatever shadow you woke him for.
“What’s wrong? Are you okay?” Jack asks, fatigue pulling his tongue off tempo and lagging behind a brain already whirring to attention. Really, the words come out more of a was wrong? Reyoukay?
Slowly, the rest of his body starts to power on, returning his senses to their rightful place. Distantly, he can hear sirens shooting down far-away streets. The gentle patter of rain on the window. The warm vanilla of your shampoo washes over him.
“You never answered me,” your soft voice drifts up to him. “About the penguins.”
Jack’s eyebrows come together, forming a small crease between his slowly closing eyes.
A deep inhale inflates his lungs.
“When I called you the other day,” you unhelpfully remind him. Like his silence was from lack of memory, not from trying desperately to keep his composure upon understanding he’s been yanked from his beautiful, glorious sleep for something like this.
“When I had my entire arm in someone’s chest?” Jack’s tired voice cuts out like a spotty Bluetooth connection. He clears his throat.
Stronger now, “Is that what you’re referring to?”
You snuggle closer to his chest, attempting to completely ignore the laws of physics prohibiting fusion of bodies, and nod, hair tickling his skin with every pass.
His arms reflexively tighten around you, rough fingers slipping under your shirt to trace the ridges of your spine. A pleased hum rumbles in his chest at the small shiver that runs down your body in response. His head dips down, burrowing against yours so gently tucked into his neck.
“Honey, why do you only want to have this conversation at—” his wrist tilts up and he peels open a single eye, immediately sliding it shut again, “—three in the morning?”
Your shoulders rise in a small shrug as much as they can snuggled safely in your cocoon of Jack and comforter.
“Could have a different one. Just missed you when I was sleeping,” you sleepily whisper, words so tooth-achingly sweet that Jack absently thinks that you should be a poster child for the American Dental Association.
His heart clenches in his chest—slow and nearly unbearable—because of course you woke him up to tell him that. Of course that’s the reason. And you say it like it’s something so obvious, like missing him when you sleep is something you’re well acquainted with and just wanted to keep him updated on what’s going on.
How do you manage to inadvertently weaponize the most innocuous things?
Jack exhales slowly and shifts down, lips gently placing a kiss on the tangled hair near your temple.
He doesn’t even know if you understand the effect you have on him.
“Never gotta miss me, kid,” Jack mumbles against your skin, lips brushing your temple. “Always’ll be here.”
He feels you shift against his chest—a quiet rustle under the blankets—trying to make space for your hand to wiggle free.
With a groggy blink, Jack’s eyes open, vision sluggishly pulling into focus.
Hovering in the corner of his periphery, he sees it.
Your hand wedged between the both of you. Pinkie looking back at him. Patiently extended. Waiting.
“Promise?” you ask, and your voice is so soft—so small. It’s not a question, really, but the thought that there could be a drop of doubt in your mind pains him. Not after the way he looks at you like you hung the moon, not after the way he builds a home out of every room you’re in.
It twists in him, slow and aching.
Jack’s throat tightens marginally. His curls his own pinkie around yours.
“Promise.”
You shift, nudging your nose up along his chest until your lips are just shy of his neck like the thought of any distance between the two of you is a federal offense, breath a quiet puff against his skin. The blankets shift with you, rustling like trees in the wind. Your voice comes out half-asleep, muffled by the blankets and your lungs smushed against his chest.
“Break that promise,” you murmur, “and I get to take your pinkie.”
Jack blinks down at you, eyes drowsy and soft. There’s a moment he doesn’t say anything. Just looks—memorizing the way the streetlights bleed through the window and highlight the soft curves of your profile, illuminate the way your hair sticks straight into the air. The way your lashes fan against your cheek, and the way your hand—so much smaller than his—rests gently over his ribs, like you’re making sure he stays put.
You’ve never looked more beautiful.
He leans down and captures your lips—quiet and careful, sealing an unspoken vow. When he pulls back, he presses his forehead to yours, his voice low and steady.
“Kid,” he whispers, “you have my whole life.”
The words drift into the space between you.
They’re unmet with any response.
In fact, you’re silent for so long, Jack figures you’ve fallen back asleep.
He lets his body begin to sink, tension softening, breath evening out with yours.
Almost gone.
The holy choir of REM harmonizes in the distance, beckoning him with open arms, ready to anoint him with a divine blessing he’s worked so devotedly to earn.
Your voice slices through the quiet like a celestial record scratch, violently yanking his soul straight back into the prison of his body.
“See, you say I can have your life,” you mumble exasperated. “But won’t answer my question.”
Jack groans.
Loud. From that ancient, grizzled part of his soul that pre-dates the Geneva Conventions. One that can only mean holy shit, I’m going to kill you.
“Alright,” he relents, releasing you from your pinkie promise and rolling off of you with all the enthusiasm of a man summoned to war. “We’re doing this.”
“Nooo,” you whine. Your hands smooth around his middle and pull him back in place. He grumbles in your arms, melting back into you.
You reconnect your pinkies.
“What’s the fucking question?”
You snuggle into his chest, mumbling, “Stop being so bitchy.”
His eye twitches and he makes a half-hearted attempt to push you away, which you halt with the force of a barnacle, clinging to his chest and pulling him on top of you.
Up at three in the morning. Demanding a metaphysical inquiry into the emotional state of flightless Antarctic avians. Jack shoving you away.
And all you want is to do is be close to him.
He curls himself around you once more.
You sigh, loud and dramatic, like you cannot believe he had the audacity to wake you up to talk about this.
“Something about penguins?” Jack prompts.
“Do you think penguins get sad because they can’t fly?” you morosely recount, voice muffled by his bare chest.
A beat passes, Jack’s shoulder lifting in time with your inhale.
“They probably don’t even know they’re missing out,” you continue, somehow completely articulate despite waking up not ten minutes ago. “But they are. Like, they don’t know that they’re taxonomically classified as birds. So, like, they don’t know they’re a bird that can’t fly. And they’re the only ones that can’t fly. In the entire southern hemisphere.”
Every sentence is acknowledged by a gentle press of his lips.
Against your neck, God, you’re insufferable.
The freckle right behind your jaw, God, I’m obsessed with you.
The soft curve of your ear, God, never stop talking.
Jesus Christ, it’s true, you are insufferable. But he would lay here and listen to you read a Wikipedia article about regional variations of the protected left turn signal if it meant you stayed this close, tucked in his arms, forever.
“I’m sure there are other birds in the southern hemisphere, sweetheart,” he murmurs in your ear, eyes drifting closed as your warmth consecrates his. On his next breath, his arm tightens around your waist.
“Albatross,” you agree.
Jack nods, already half-asleep again. “Sure.”
“Skua.”
He opens one eye. “Suka?”
Genuinely, Jack has never heard of that one before.
“What the fu—?” You twist in his arms, head coming up to glare. “Did you just call me a bitch?”
His eyebrows retreat to their exasperated place high on his head before his eyes have even finished opening fully. “How could you have possibly gotten there?”
You narrow your eyes, singular eyebrow ticking up in response, scrutinizing the sincerity of his confusion. Content with whatever the fuck he guesses you see, you slowly slide back under him.
Jack blinks into the dim, blue-tinted air of the room, the glow of the streetlights outside barely brushing the edges of your faces, his mouth coming together in half-formed, extremely confused words.
Your lips, warm and close, graze against his neck with every syllable, and he tenses, fighting back a shiver. “Crazy metathesis there, Abbot. Skua. S-k-u-a. A seabird.”
“There’s no way that’s real. You’re making that up.”
A laugh ripples out of you, soft and sharp, shaking your small frame. Your laughter seems to fill the quiet, swirling with the distant patter of rain. “You think I’d go through the trouble of inventing fake polar-adjacent birds just to gaslight you about penguins?”
“Sounds exactly like the kind of thing you’d do,” he replies, fingers tracing absent, looping patterns along your side. Blankets slide off his arm with a soft rustle as you squirm under his touch.
You’re silent for a second.
He knows he got you.
And he knows you know he got you.
Checkmate, your voice echoes in his head, tugging the corners of his mouth into a fond smile.
A small, displeased sniff twitches your nose.
“Yeah, well, shut up, so…” you sulk.
The rain hitting the window grows louder, the once soft patter growing to a sharp tapping on the glass. It’s like the storm wakes up as you do, deafening all the earlier sirens and yelling people. Wrapped in the warmth, and the darkness, and the percussive sound of water dripping down the windowpane in winding rivulets, it feels like the world has been narrowed to just this room.
And he guesses that he’s rubbing off on you, because you keep talking through it all.
“What, so, do you think that even if they don’t know they’re penguins, they probably see other things with wings and are like, must be nice?” you ask. “Was that your point?”
Jack didn’t even have a point with his follow-up question. It was just something to keep you occupied, in the same way he gives his nieces an anatomically correct model heart to play with when they come over.
He just wants to keep hearing your voice. So, he hums, faux contemplative. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, or whatever.
“Could also be an innate longing to fly,” he says.
You squint over at him like he’s a very confusing legal document. “What?”
“Like how humans want to live in the forest and hunt and gather.”
You blink. “Do they?”
He nods against your neck, self-assured, and rumbles, “Deep evolutionary memory.”
“Uh-huh,” you mutter, skeptical.
Then, after a moment, he says, “There’s definitely something innate, alright.”
He doesn’t specify what.
You don’t press.
Mostly because you know Jack Abbot well enough to know he probably means something like the innate desire to go back to sleep.
“So you do you think they’re sad?”
“I think,” he shifts, settling more of his weight on you, which you receive with a happy sigh, “they go so long without something, they forget what the weight of that loss even feels like.”
He pauses, almost lets it stop there. But then Jack says, “Penguins also mate for life. I think. I saw it on a documentary.”
“Oh!” you whisper, soft and full of sleepy delight. “That could be us, Jack.”
Your voice curls around those four letters identifying him as him, dripping with sleep and affection and something bordering reverence. You always say it like that, like it means something, but tonight, with his watch blinking 3:07AM and a storm crawling outside the window and you curled up in his arms, it hits different. Hits deep. Like gospel. Like divine direction spoken through the mouth of the world’s most annoying, sleepy prophet.
Four simple letters, his truth and his life.
Jack’s hand finds the nape of your neck again, thumb rubbing slow circles into your hairline. He breathes in—long and deep and steady.
“Yeah, sweetheart,” he murmurs, voice low and warm. “that’s us.”
A beat passes.
“Could’ve been puffins, though,” he mutters as an afterthought.
The quiet stretches.
Jack tightens his grip, just a little. Doesn’t know how else to say what’s caught in his chest.
“If they are sad,” he concludes, “Maybe it gets lighter when they’re with the one they love.”
Jack doesn’t expand, but he’s pretty sure this time he isn’t talking about the penguins. Not even a little. He’s talking about the way he said that’s us instead of that could be us. He’s talking about how you slot against him like a divinely ordained puzzle piece. About how, with you, loss doesn’t press so hard against his ribs.
Maybe penguins can’t fly.
But Jack knows—a bone-deep truth—that if you were a penguin, he’d learn. Even if his body wasn’t anatomically built for such an action, he’d learn. Just to show you the sky.
Your arms tighten around him, your hand sliding up to scratch lightly at his scalp. The touch undoes something in him.
“I love you, know that?” you whisper.
His palm splays wide across your hip and he swallows.
“I know, kid.”
Then, more softly, “You love me too?”
And even though he’s half asleep and mulling over your avian philosophy, there’s zero hesitation.
“I love you more than I ever thought I’d get to,” he confesses softly.
The comforter slips a little as you shift, tangling your legs with his and nestling yourself closer beneath him.
It hits him sometimes, how much he loves you—hard and sudden, like a blow. The kind he’s trained to roll with. But there’s no training for this, no drill that teaches you what to do when someone curls up in your arms in the middle of the night and trusts you so absolutely, so unconsciously, that it feels like a genuine extension of the self.
You're ridiculous.
And he would do this for the rest of his life.
He would let you poke him awake at 3:00AM for every stupid, nonsensical question in your brain. He would spend every hour learning the rhythm of your thoughts, memorizing the way your voice gets sleepy and small when you ask if he still loves you like you’re not already written into his genetic code.
“I love you,” he whispers again.
God, he does. He loves you so much it’s physically stupid.
“I know.” You trail the tip of your nose across his chest and gently press a kiss right over where his heart beats. “Just like hearing you say it.”
“I’ll say it as many times as you need,” he murmurs. “I’ll write it on every fucking thing you bring Robby to sign if that’s what it takes.”
“Those go to insurance,” you mumble against his skin. “You can’t just write in love declarations.”
“Says who?”
“Canon law.”
“Sounds made up.”
“You’re made up.”
Jack laughs, full this time, chest vibrating under your ear.
He presses a kiss into your hair again. “Go to sleep, sweetheart.”
“I’m tryiiiiiiiing,” you whine petulantly. “You keep talking, Abbot.”
He shifts just slightly, hand smoothing down your back. You sigh in response, one of those unconscious sleepy noises that makes him bite down on the inside of his cheek to keep from absolutely melting into the mattress.
Soft lips brush the hollow of his throat as you murmur something half-asleep, unintelligible, and Jack exhales sharply, jaw flexing once. It’s not fair—the way even your unconscious affection feels deliberate. The way you can press your mouth to his skin like that, so casual, and not realize you’re rewiring every nerve in his body.
He shifts on top of you, just enough to turn his head, to press a slow kiss to your crown.
“Jesus,” he mutters into your hair. “You’re gonna kill me.”
“You’re a doctor,” you murmur. “Just resuscitate yourself.”
Jack huffs a laugh, low and warm. “That’s not how that works.”
“Sure it is,” you insist. “They let you keep the paddles in your car, right?”
His brows pinch together. “No—”
“Then what’s the point of medical school?”
He huffs a laugh. Beneath him, you wiggle, trying to escape the air tickling the sensitive skin of your neck, and he groans.
“Honey, please,” Jack mutters, mouth still pressed against your skin. “Stop moving.”
You go still for half a second, just long enough to make him think he’s won, before you shift again—less of a sleepy squirm and a little more intentional—and his hips respond before the rest of him catches up.
“God, you’re so annoying,” Jack groans, the sound muffled where his mouth is pressed against your neck.
His hips shift against you again. Your breath hitches, hands scrambling for purchase at his shoulder, fingers clutching fabric and muscle like your body’s trying to ground yourself in him.
“Yeah,” you breathe out, barely audible. “But I’m yours.”
Something flickers across Jack’s face, and his hand slides lower, under your shirt and over the curve of your waist—broad palm settling flat against your skin like he could hold you together with touch alone. His thumb moves in slow, hypnotic circles, brushing tenderly just beneath your ribs.
“I’m yours,” you say again, quieter this time.
And Jack stills for half a second—just enough for you to feel the tremble that runs through him, the sharp exhale that catches on something jagged in his chest.
His breath stutters, raw.
“Goddamn right you are,” he murmurs, his voice thick and hoarse and impossibly soft.
He raises on his elbow just enough to see you, drinking you in like he needs to memorize every inch before he dares move another step forward. Then, slowly, deliberately, his mouth drops to your collarbone—gentle and unhurried, lips warm and reverent.
Not so much kissing your skin, as reading it like a sacred text.
Every gasp and mumbled word you say is repeated in kind. His quiet prayer, said as a devout disciple.
Every sound from your lips something new to learn and to replicate—answering each quiet whimper with the same patience and care you might use when translating something holy.
Every press of his mouth, devout exegesis.
His nose nudges your shirt higher, one kiss at a time, until his mouth is moving over your sternum, your ribs, following the rhythm of your heart.
You breathe his name, barely a sound.
“I’ve got you,” he whispers into your skin. “You don’t have to do anything. Just let me take care of you.”
You nod before your brain even catches up. Of course. You’d fucking let him do anything.
He eases your shirt up, slow and careful, ceremonial in the way he lifts it from your body. He doesn’t rush. Doesn’t tug or fumble. Every movement is tender, reverent, every inch uncovers a secret you’ve chosen to share with him, and he refuses to take it for granted.
And when he looks back up at you, his expression unravels. All the smartass quips and dry commentary gone. He looks at you like you’re the only thing in the world worth believing in.
“Jesus, sweetheart,” he breathes, voice cracking under the weight of sacrament. “You don’t even know.”
Fingertips dragging across your waist, featherlight, hesitant. His thumbs brush over the dip just beneath your ribs and his mouth follows, open and warm. He kisses your stomach like it means something. Like it’s sacred.
Your body arches under him, chasing the heat of his mouth, and he cradles your hips with both hands, trying to steady you—trying to steady himself.
You’re already trembling. You don’t even realize it until he whispers against your skin, “You’re shaking.”
You laugh soft, breathy, half-lost in the haze blooming behind your eyes.
“Because you’re being so nice to me,” you murmur.
Jack lets out a shaky breath, chest tight. He presses his forehead to your bare stomach, arms tightening around your waist.
“God, you have no idea,” he says, muffled, “what I want to do to you.”
Then he’s slowly kissing up your chest, lips dragging languidly, following the dip between your ribs, the rise of your sternum, the hollow at the base of your throat—pausing, breathing, letting himself feel the shape of you with his mouth like you’re a language he’s only just starting to learn.
One hand drifts up to your face, fingers brushing tenderly through your hair, tucking it back with a care so gentle it makes your breath hitch. He tilts your chin slightly, and his mouth finds just below your jaw, warm and soft and deliberate. He lingers there, just for a moment, committing the cadence of your pulse to memory. Then your jaw. The corner of your mouth. The faintest brush of his lips, hesitant and full of awe—unsure whether kissing you is a right or a privilege.
And then he is kissing you. Fully. Deeply.
Like it’s the first time all over again.
Like he can’t quite believe you’re real, and even less that you’re his.
“I swear to God, I could die like this,” he breathes. “I could live like this. Please let me live like this.”
And you feel it, all of it. In his hands, in his voice, in the way his body fits against yours like it was made to be there.
You pull him in closer. There’s no space left between you, but it’s still not fucking enough. Not until his body is pressed to yours, bare and burning, skin to skin, and the sound he makes when he slides home is a choked-off groan that you feel in your ribs.
Your name slips from his lips like a prayer.
His movements are slow—agonizingly slow—like he’s not trying to fuck you, he’s just trying to stay inside this moment as long as he can.
His mouth finds yours again, and he kisses—soft and shaking and so full of love it leaves you breathless. He murmurs against your lips, praise and want and desperation all tangled together.
“So good,” he breathes. “So perfect for me. You’re mine. Say it again.”
Your eyes are damp, lips parted, breath catching with every push of his hips.
You cup his face, grounding him to you, and whisper, “I’m yours,” more certain this time.
Not a confession. A confirmation.
Jack groans softly, forehead dropping to press against yours like he’s trying to soak in the words, let them burn themselves into his bones. His hand cups your face, thumb brushing the corner of your mouth, eyes flicking down to your lips as if he's still trying to process that you said it. That you mean it. That he gets to have this. Have you.
He kisses you again, slower this time. Deeper, with a quiet desperation. The kind of kiss that makes your chest ache. Like he’s trying to tell you all the things he doesn’t know how to say. Like he’s memorizing you molecule by molecule.
And still, he doesn’t rush.
He shifts, just enough to press further into you, his body cradling yours like he was built for it. Like there’s nowhere else on Earth he could possibly belong. His hands move over you with care—palms dragging down your sides, fingers tracing every dip and rise of your body as though mapping something sacred.
“You feel like home,” he whispers, more to himself than to you. His voice sounds broken around the edges, like it’s unraveling under the weight of how much he means it.
You tilt your chin up to kiss him again, gentler now, your fingertips skimming through his hair, down the strong line of his back.
The roll of his hips is unhurried, worshipping rather than commanding, and your breath catches on a soft gasp that he kisses off your lips. Each motion drags sparks across your nerves, and every one of them is lit by the way he looks at you.
Like you’re something miraculous.
“I’ve never—” he breathes against your cheek, like the words are betraying him by coming out at all. “—never wanted anything like I want you.”
He’s trembling a little now too. Not from nerves. Overwhelmed in the way only someone completely, irrevocably in love can be.
“I’m right here,” you whisper, threading your fingers through his, bringing one hand to rest against your chest. Right over your heartbeat. And then you echo his words from earlier back to him, “I’m not going anywhere.”
And you feel him break open just a little more.
His mouth dips lower again, dragging a trail of kisses down your neck, across your collarbone. He presses his lips to the space just above your heart like he’s trying to seal your promise inside of him. His hands, ever careful, move with intention—cradling your body, anchoring your breath to his, grounding you both in the kind of intimacy that’s so deep it feels like silence.
And when you come—quiet, breathless, your whole body curling toward him—Jack holds you like he’s cradling something holy. Like he’s never known anything more divine. He follows not long after, his body shaking with the force of it, breath caught somewhere between a gasp and a prayer.
Afterward, he doesn’t roll away. He doesn’t loosen his hold.
He just stays there. Wrapped around you. One hand pressed flat to your spine, the other curled protectively over your waist, lips brushing lazy kisses into your hair as your breaths slowly begin to sync again.
“Still mine?” he murmurs, voice warm and quiet and nearly drowsy.
You nuzzle into the curve of his neck. “Always.”
Jack hums, eyes fluttering closed. You feel the smile against your temple.
“Good,” he whispers. “That’s all I’ll ever need.”
You’ll fall asleep again soon, he knows. You always do. But Jack stays awake.
Just for a while.
Just to keep looking at you like this.
Because in another life, maybe he wouldn’t have gotten to have you. Maybe someone else would’ve held you like this. But he’s got you now. And no amount of battlefield trauma, or paperwork, or middle-of-the-night penguin debates is ever going to make him take that for granted.
No thoughts just older!price taking you out to a really nice restaurant after you shyly admit your previous boyfriends just took you to fast-food...
You, foolishly, assume this will be a nice evening with your partner. Smiling while you read over the menu, your heart so full of affection for john.
Only for the mood to be instantly crushed when your waitress comes along and comments "wow, it's nice to see family celebrating valentine's! I wish I got to spend more time with my dad!"
Your face instantly heats with embarrassment at the implication. You know price is a bit older but...really? She continues, not at all picking up your reaction "I've always said valentines was about all forms of love. You're a great father, sir."
You glance across the table to see price smiling that smug little smile, reserved for times when he gets what he wants. "Thank you, miss. Families important, eh?"
He cuts his gaze to you, delighted in whatever he sees in your expression. You're too mortified to correct her, a fact that makes john smile even more. That bastard, he planned this.
The worst part? When the waitress came back to grab the check, price made sure to cup his palm behind your neck and pull you into a deep, not at all public appropriate kiss. You'll never forget the look of horror on the waitresses face.
....you'll also never forget how insanely turned on you were the whole time, making price pull over on the side of the road to satiate you.
I was listening to The Story of The Phantom (any other musical geeks here??) on my way to work yesterday and FAHK I could not stop thinking about our bby gurl Simon Riley as The Phantom!! I mentioned this forever ago too so why not finally bring it to life.
GN reader x Phantom!Simon "Ghost" Riley
You swear that this creaky old building is haunted. Your father bought a rundown theater a few months ago, determined to make it the greatest opera house in the country. All with you in the spotlight, of course. He's made millions off of your talents, your voice and your stage presence. Even so, when you walked through the depressing building for the first time, you were sure he just sank you both. You were already planning your Fall from Stardom interviews for pennies.
Every week, you come to practice on stage. Dancers mumble about how they feel like they're being watched even in the dressing rooms. You scoff and tell them it's all in their minds. But that's really for your own sanity. You know they've seen the way you glance over your shoulder, knowing something is there.
Ghosts, some actors say. Apparently, the last owner hung himself from the rafters after falling into debt. It's how your father got the building so cheap. The city's people whisper about it being cursed. Something about the owner before last disappearing mysteriously. To their faces, you brush it off as idle gossip. But when sitting alone at the grand piano in the late night, you're not so sure.
The stories swirl your mind, making it nearly impossible to focus on the keys. Your fingers move stiffly, striking the wrong notes which earns a wince from you each time. You've been stuck on this new piece since the move. Your worries weighing too heavily to allow your hands to glide with the needed effortlessness.
Above, there is a creak. You've grown accustomed enough to it to know there will be nothing if you look up, so you sigh and roll your shoulders instead. "Alright, again..." You mutter to yourself, starting again at the beginning.
You hum along, trying to force your usual air of ease. First the words escape you, then you hit the wrong key. You swear and stand up from the bench. An hour straight of practicing and still, you're getting nowhere. Huffy, you gather your pages.
Above, there is another creak. It's quiet, like a mouse's whisper, but there is an odd intent behind it that has you pausing. Looking up, you see that frustratingly familiar nothing. A growl leaves your throat.
"Enough already!" You shout, your voice echoing through the empty theater. "You just go on and pester someone else because I've had it for tonight!" You slam your papers back on the piano before storming off to your dressing room.
It was childish, you know. So you only allow yourself to sulk for a moment on your plush couch before stepping back out onto the stage. You've sat down to resume playing before you realize your pages are missing. "You dunce," you mutter to yourself, ducking beneath the piano, expecting that they'd flown off in your fit. Seeing nothing, your brows furrow. You stand and circle the piano, you even check inside the bench, and nothing. They've disappeared. It's as if they'd never existed at all.
"I've earned a drink." You declare, slamming the piano's lid shut. After your shitty week, you're not about to accept this shitty night.
Back in your dressing room, you pour a glass nearly to the brim. Something your father would chide you for. You can almost hear him calling it "uncouth". You grin as you chug the whole thing. Wiping your mouth free of a loose dribble, you freeze.
There it is again. That whisper of a song in the building's draft. For two weeks, you were convinced there was some recording playing. You even searched for speakers in the walls. Finding none, you told yourself it was all in your head.
But this song is new. It's your song. The one you've been struggling to learn. And that certainly can't be in your head. Right?
You stand there a moment, just listening. Despite how quiet it's being played, you can tell that it's correct. Every key, perfect. It draws you slowly out from your room. You tiptoe through the backstage areas, hoping to find the source before the song ends.
Despite playing this game before, you have a newly found need to find this mysterious piano. Its player. Especially its player. The entire song plays with you as dumbfounded as when it began. You sigh, knowing your chance has ended. The songs never play twice.
Turning for your dressing room again, your breath halts. The first chord reaches your ears. So tiny in the grand, weathered building. But there. It is playing again, so your hunt resumes, more fevered this time. You rush onto the stage, hoping to catch the slightest hint of a direction.
The room spins too fast as you turn, helplessly trying to hear anything with a semblance of an answer.
"End this torture!" You shout at last. The music ends abruptly. You'd meant "show yourself", not "cease your beautiful playing." With the beginnings of a frustrated sob bubbling in your chest, you throw yourself onto the grand piano's bench to hide your face in your hands. For a moment all you hear is your own ragged breath. A sniffle.
Then, like an angel's hum, the song picks up. There is a hesitation to it this time. It's slower, as if unsure if it should continue.
You jerk to your feet, your lungs holding still, in case their next inhale drowns out the sound. As always, there is no direction sourcing the noise. It simply floats through the air, surrounding and passing through you at once. Like a lullaby, you think. Your eyes close, trying to picture the notes as they travel. Instead, you see the lyrics. Not so much the literal letters, but it's suddenly all there, in your head in a way you've struggled to accomplish all this time.
So you sing. You let the music draw out each verse from your throat as if magic. It is only at the song's end that you open your eyes again. You hardly register that you're smiling.
"Thank you." You call. Not quite a shout, but loud enough to reach your mysterious miracle. "You are very kind, if not unconventional," you giggle to yourself. The realization that you're stood in center stage speaking to no one at all sets in and a frown pulls at your lips.
You're a loon. You shame yourself, then quickly gather your things. This place really is making you lose your mind. Still, as you reach the back door, you can't help but glance back. The urge to call out "Good night!" presses. For fear of giving in, you shove through the doors with more force than necessary.
your writing about Jack Abbots leg? I wanna reblog it 10 million times. obsessed. no one really writes about his leg which ofc it doesnt identify who he is, hes more than his leg, but i think its good to mention it every once in a while at least so people don't just forget. though its not his whole identity, its still part of his character AHHHH. anyways, i love your writing
AW OMFG?!?! THANK YOU AND I LOVE YOU 😭😭
This is exactly how I feel too! Jack’s leg does not make him who he is- no disability makes a person. But it is a very important part of who. he. is. He’s a soldier, a veteran who has literally lost a part of himself. That Matters!!
Of course I'm sure plenty of other bloggers achieve this much better than I do but I really really appreciate that you like it. 🥹
ADDIE 💗💗 I HOPE ALL IS WELL BB!!!! so sorry to hear about your writer's block (i feel the damn same unfortuently and it suuuuucks!!!) so if i can hopefully spark a little something-something.... perhaps " ³⁾ lips pressed against a brow-bone " with puppy dog pope cody??
liliana!!! i'm good and i hope you are too!! this does spark something in me, i really gotta get back to writing for my boy andrew (also i LOVE your new blog theme, the header is everything)
prompt is from this post and i've decided to make his part of my selectively mute!andrew universe
God, what were you going to do with Andrew?
He'd come to your door tonight, in the very late hours, bruised and bloody. He wouldn't say anything, wouldn't tell you what had happened, what he'd done, or why he wasn't home with his family. He sat down on your couch and had put his head in his hands and stayed there for the longest time.
You watched him carefully from the other side of the coffee table, nibbling on your bottom lip as you tried to figure out what to do. Part of you wanted to march over to him and shake him until he told you what was going on. He did this too often, came over without an explanation, and while you liked being the safe space for Andrew to land, it made you sick with worry. You were his friend, probably his only real friend, and you deserved an answer. You knew you were unlikely to get one though, considering Andrew didn't speak ever.
Another part of you wanted to drag him to your bedroom and urge him to fall asleep next to you, no questions asked. You decided that at most you needed him to just look at you.
You rounded the coffee table and parked yourself in between his knees, staring down at him as your feet in his field of vision got his attention. He raised his head from his hands and craned his neck back to look up at you. He had bruises near his temple and on his jaw, with a cut on his eyebrow to compliment the bruises around his eye. What stopped your heart was how his beautiful hazel eyes were wide and shiny with unshed tears. You resolve crumpled immediately at the haunted look in his eyes, all thoughts beyond taking care of him leaving your brain.
Your eyebrows creased in worry as your hand came up to cup under his chin, tilting his face up more for you to see. Andrew didn't fight you, he just sat there - pliant and submissive to your touch. You took careful catalogue of his injures and noted his slightly downturned mouth and the relaxed nature of his eyebrows. It was a little jarring to see, since Andrew typically walked around with his eyebrows intensely furrowed in a dark expression that had people scrambling to get out of his way. To see him so broken, so open with his emotions laid bare on his face was too much for your poor heart.
You bent over at the waist, your hand still holding his face still, and pressed your lips gently to his brow bone while being careful to avoid his injury. You heard a barely audible sigh from Andrew, so soft you almost hadn't realized what it was. You let your lips linger on his warm skin, the kiss dragging on for an extra moment or two.
When you pulled away Andrews eyes were closed, his face slack and his mouth parted. You didn't pull away completely and instead kept your face near his until he finally opened his eyes.
"Let's get you cleaned up." You straightened up and outstretched your hand to him, forcing him to make the choice to follow. He slipped his large hand into yours without a second thought and let you lead him to the bathroom. You used what limited first aid skills you had to clean the blood off of his face and his knuckles, before adding a small bandage over his eyebrow.
Andrew leaned back against the bathroom counter as you cleaned him up, his eyes watching your carefully. He had a habit of staring, like he expected you to disappear at any moment and he wanted to commit you to memory. Normally you didn't mind, but right now, being so close to his face, it was hard to not met his eyes every other second. It was even harder to not just stare back and get lost in his orbit.
Due to Andrews selective mutism, he did a lot of communicating with his facial expressions and through his eyes. You'd gotten extremely good at reading and understanding him without needing a word spoken between you. In this moment his eyes were saying thank you but there was something more underneath, a sad question that you wanted to ignore.
Why?
It was a stupid question in your opinion. Why would you help him? Because you cared. Because he was your friend. Because you were pretty sure no one in the whole world had ever really, truly cared about him before, had every shown him genuine kindness, had provided a safe space for him to breathe.
That's why when you finished patching him up and he walked out of the bathroom, you weren't surprised when he turned towards the front door to leave. You quickly got in his way, stopping him in your hallway with gentle hands against his chest.
"Wait, I want you to stay." You said. Andrew started to shake his head, his expression growing more guarded.
"Please," You begged desperately as you stepped forward to wrap your arms around his torso, hoping your whole body would block him from leaving. You hugged him tightly, your body flush against his and your face pressed into him.
"I need you to stay. I'll get so worried if you leave, I need to know you're safe. Please." You pleaded, your words muffled against his solid chest. You felt a little bad about trying to appeal to Andrews concern for you, that if staying made you feel better, that he'd likely do it. But you really did need him to stay. You wanted him to have one night of actual, peaceful rest.
You could have cried in victory when Andrews arms lifted to wrap around you, holding you in his warm embrace. He pressed his cheek into the top of your head and you felt him nod. You didn't waste a moment, instead pulling back just enough to grab hold of Andrews hand to pull him towards your bedroom.
He followed where you lead him, and when you told him to take off his shoes and get into your bed, he obediently followed your orders. It took some encouragement from you to get him actually under the covers and lying down before you slipped into bed next to him.
You told yourself that your concern that Andrew would leave the moment you'd fallen asleep was the only reason you snuggled up next to him, your head resting on his shoulder and your arm draped over his chest. Andrew wrapped a tentative arm around your shoulders but when you took hold of his other arm to encourage him to hold onto you, he relaxed more and touched you with more conviction. His arm pulled you closer to him as he turned his head to nuzzle his face into your hair.
"Goodnight Andrew." You sighed contently, your whole body melting under his touch. With Andrews warm body and gentle breath providing you with a feeling of safety, you began to drift back to sleep very fast.
So fast you weren't sure if the kiss Andrew pressed to the top of your head was real or a dream.
John won’t go to the club with you. But he will drag you to his old man bar.
It’s the type that has street signs and car parts stuck to the wall. They don’t have any of the nicely flavored liquor you like, but the drinks are half price on Thursdays…and there’s pool tables.
Which. Wouldn’t matter. You’ve never been known to play pool, frankly you don’t know how to. But that’s kind of part of the appeal…because now John wants to teach you.
So, he drags you to his old man bar where you’re the only thing that’s not aged, and buys you your drink of choice (though, without the fun flavor you like), gets himself a whiskey, and then drags you to the pool tables.
Then, when you absolutely whiff your first shot, he comes up behind you, pressing his whole front into your back, and caresses down your arms to place your hands properly. He slides the stick back and forth to show you how it should glide through your hands, and you try to ignore the image that creates.
Once you’re both griping the pool stick properly, he bends you over the table, pushing you against it with his hips, and bring his head around to your ear to whisper about aim. And you pretend like you’re listening, but all you really catch is a whispered “juuuust like that, sweetheart.” His breath is hot against your neck, and it makes goosebumps shoot up.
When he finally takes the shot, he jerks forward with the force, jolting himself into you and squishing your hips harder against the table. The force makes a small noise leave you, but he doesn’t acknowledge it, just gives you a peck to your neck and a “perfect, baby.”
And then he’ll pull back like nothing happened, like you’re not sweating and feeling the effects of that in…other places. And the rest of the bar will look at him like he’s a perv…which he is, but you like him like that.
