One thing I will say about Cassandra Clare and early Shadowhunters stuff is she stood on business ten toes down when it came to her villains. No lame nature vs. nurture debates, no last minute cop out redemption arcs for the YA audience, just demon incest, Victorian Elon musk and demon STDs that turn you into an evil worm. 10/10 no notes.
synopsis ; marriage of convenience. you got yourself in trouble. bradley has a bit of a savior complex. together, you come up with what could potentially be the worst idea in the longstanding and illustrious history of bad ideas.
wc ; 12.5k
warnings ; 18+ only, minors do NOT interact; angst; explicit language; explicit sexual content in later parts; pregnancy; mentions of infidelity; mentions of vomit; mentions of Tom Cruise; unhealthy family dynamics; one mention of suic*de but it's not a plot point; age gap
note: uhm... i blacked out. idk either. part 2 should be out eventually, which of course means that i haven't even started writing it yet. there will probably be several mistakes in here regarding the navy, etc. so i'm sorry about that i'm just dumb :-(
sol. sunderlust. crab. bestie... i love you forever, what would i ever do without you?
When you’re fourteen, sitting on a floral couch in one of the nondescript, army-commissioned houses you’ve been moving to every few months since you were old enough to remember, your mother turns on Cocktail with Tom Cruise, and you decide that, once you’re grown up, you’re going to be a bartender. You’re going to do just what Tom does - get a job in some dive, work your way up, learn the bottle slinging and the shot pouring and the flirting, and then you’re going to franchise the whole thing and take it national. It’s going to be just like TGI Fridays, except your drinks will actually be good instead of whatever watered-down punch they serve.
Of course, you’re fourteen, and you don’t even know what alcohol tastes like yet. Years later, you’re going to take a shot of Tequila at a bar, you’re going to splutter and cough and think you might choke, and it’ll leave you wondering if maybe you’ve made a mistake. But for now, you’ve got a dream, and you’ve got a plan, and not a smidge of doubt that you’ll make it all come true.
You’re going to do just as Tom Cruise does - minus the best friend’s suicide from the movie and the real-life Scientology thing and all that. But you’re going to be successful. You know it.
So this, then. This is not part of your plan at all.
Behind you, there’s a bang, and then the back door is ripped open. The buttery light of the bar spills in a rectangle across the beaten path, but it doesn’t reach your little corner. You hear the muffled thud of footsteps, a curse, followed by a shout of your name.
“Yeah?” you call back, hope you don’t sound like you’re balancing on the edge of a mental breakdown. Hope you don’t sound like you feel.
“Your shift’s about to start. I really need you in there cutting up some limes, please,” Jerry, your co-worker, says. Thank God he doesn’t walk over to investigate just what you’re doing huddled in the sand behind the bar.
“Okay,” you answer, voice a little wobbly, “I’ll be in in a sec.”
You wait until you hear the door shut behind Jerry, then you unfold yourself, get your shaky legs underneath your weight. You feel like somebody hit you over the head with one of those huge hammers they use to knock down walls. The nausea is back, too, something queasy and watery that shifts through your stomach.
Inside the bar, everything is like it always is. The chatter of the customers, the drawl of the music, the smell of beer, and the Ocean Breeze scented cleaner you use to wipe the floors. Far below it, the scent of the real ocean breeze drifting in through the opened windows. It seems wrong for the Hard Deck to be unchanged, unaltered, untouched when your own life has gone so completely off the rails.
You sneak in a quick, discreet bathroom break to swipe at the mascara smudged beneath your eyes, to dab at it with some damp toilet paper, to hope nobody will notice the obvious signs of tears still clinging to you. To stare at your reflection in the mirror for a moment, try not to think about that stupid test you buried at the bottom of the trashcan. You can taste your heartbeat in your mouth.
You don’t look any different - same nose, same hair, same eyes - but something has irrevocably shifted inside of you.
Behind the counter, you cut up the limes you promised Jerry. The scent clings to your fingers, the juice settles in the calluses. The steady sound as the knife meets the cutting board and the familiar motion of your hands help to ground you a little.
“Could we get a refill?”
You lift your head and then immediately lower it again, shoulders going up, turning to the side in an attempt to hide your face. If there are two people you don’t want to see tonight, then…
“Oh my god.” Natasha’s face pushes into your line of vision, her eyebrows crinkled, her mouth pursed. “Have you been crying?”
Waving her words of concern away with one hand, you grab for their empty glasses with the other.
“Allergies,” you lie. “I’ve got two on tap here, which one did you guys have? The German or the…”
“You don’t have allergies,” Bradley points out. You’d made it a point not to look at him, but now your gaze snaps in his direction. He stands with his eyes narrowed, with his hands on the polished wood of the bar top. Concern flutters across his face.
There’s something about Bradley Bradshaw. You like to think of it as a gravitational pull. Something with force, something that makes people look at him. Something that grounds them, too, though, gives them a tether.
Ever since he first walked into this bar a little over a year ago, it’s like he’s become a fixture in your life, even if you only see him once or twice a week, even if it’s just a quick exchange of words over a countertop. Bradley Bradshaw makes for a good North Star.
He shrugs, and there’s something almost sheepish to it. “It was part of your list of reasons why you’re better than Hangman last month.”
You pause, still holding the glasses, and stare at him. He looks right back.
“That’s beside the point,” Natasha pipes up. She’s balancing both her elbows on the bartop, pulling herself closer. “Why were you crying?”
That sort of shifts reality back into focus. What are you supposed to say? I let a guy who isn’t even really my boyfriend but also not really not my boyfriend knock me up, and now I have no idea what the fuck to do? To two people who are little more than glorified acquaintances?
You shrug and decide they look like they’d enjoy the new craft beer Penny got on tap. It has notes of vanilla and apple, and you’re not much of a beer person, but even you like it. Or at least you used to.
“It’s nothing,” you say, drawing the first glass. It ends up perfect - amber liquid topped with just the right amount of foam, the little bobbles popping as you push it across the counter toward Natasha. Your life might be a mess, but at least you still know how to draw a damn good glass of beer from the tap. “Don’t worry about it.”
Natasha’s eyes narrow, but then she lets it go. “You know I’ll beat a guy up for you, right?”
You don’t doubt it. If there’s anybody in this bar you wouldn’t want to cross, it’s Natasha, and not just because of whatever training the Navy put her through. You’re convinced she came into the world knowing how to take a guy out.
“Yeah,” you agree and are surprised to find you mean it. Realistically, you’re not particularly close to any of the pilots. You chit-chat sometimes, have had a few drunken conversations after everybody else has filtered out of the Hard Deck while wiping down tables or collecting shot glasses, but that’s not really enough to support a true friendship. Still. If you asked, you have no doubt Natasha would go to bat for you. “It’s okay, though. I’m fine. I’ll put this on your tab, yeah?”
She looks like she wants to say something else, but then decides to let it go. Sighs, “Okay.”
As Natasha pushes off the bar to rejoin her group of friends toward the back of the bar, Bradley takes a step closer instead. You make it a point not to look at him, but the yellow and white of his Hawaiian shirt flashes in your periphery despite your best efforts.
He places a large hand on the countertop, palm down, and you should be looking busy, but all you can do is stare as his fingers starfish across the wood.
“You can talk to me, yeah?” he asks, and his voice is soft enough that it almost disappears in the din of this Saturday night. “Whatever it is.”
You do look up then. Bradley has brown eyes, round and big and deep. There’s something about them that makes you want to trust him, trust his words, trust the sincerity. It almost makes you start crying again.
“Okay,” you whisper. “Thank you.”
Then somebody’s shouting an order at you, and you’re pushing a coaster under a sweating Cuba Libre, you’re pouring a Tequila shot, you’re looking for the maraschino cherries, you’re passing out salt shakers, and you don’t notice as he disappears and you don’t think about anything for a short, blissful, beautiful time.
+
Two months ago, you met Luke halfway through the door of a bar you’d seen on Instagram, something with low lights and neon signs and booths cushioned in lush, ruby velvet. They had this signature cocktail there, something with rum and gold foil and a lot of smoke that drifted up in sweet-smelling plumes.
Luke was charming and laughed a lot, and when he put his hand on your waist, when he looked at you, your heart skipped a beat or two. And still, the first thing you told Penny about at work the next day was the cocktail and not the guy.
You’re almost entirely sure you’re not in love with him, but you’re excited about the idea that maybe someday you could be. Luke is a nice guy. He works in finance somewhere in San Diego, takes you to expensive seafront restaurants, and once or twice, he even bought you expensive lingerie. Luke likes the same movies as you do, likes putting on Jazz music when you go down on him in his car, and that always manages to make you feel strangely sophisticated even with a dick in your mouth. He’s older, and he has a real, grown-up job, completely unlike you with your singles soaked in beer.
He’s a stead-fast, reliable guy. If you have to be in this situation with anyone, you figure it’s better to be in it with him than some twenty-something surfer dude who couldn’t even find the word responsible in a dictionary.
The anxiety has been gnawing at you since last night, has been chipping away your composure and your calm. Has reduced you into a jittery, terrified, chafing shell of your former self. All day you were fumbling - burning your hand on the heated water kettle in the morning, almost running a red light, cutting your finger deep enough it didn’t stop bleeding for a whole five minutes.
Earlier today, you took a last, desperate stand. Propelled by the sort of hope that exists against all better judgment, you went on a CVS run and returned with three more pregnancy tests. You left them back at your tiny apartment, right on the counter where you put them out in the first place, those three tiny, horrible, life-altering plus signs laughing right in your face.
And that was it then. Your fate decided. Your luck run out.
Since you were fourteen, sitting on that floral couch, the course of your life had seemed so clear to you. You’d been so sure of where you wanted to go, so sure of how to get there. And yeah, okay, maybe you used to think you’d get there sooner, but that’s never deterred you before. Slow and steady wins the race, that’s what you used to think.
Now, ten years later, everything is muddled. You can’t see an inch ahead in the fog of all this.
To add insult to injury, those tests were fucking expensive. The next time you check your bank account, you might start crying.
So you spent a good fifteen minutes curled up on your bathroom tiles, staring at your shower curtain, blinking away tears you never shed. You spent a good fifteen minutes trying to figure it out, trying to untangle it, trying to make sense of how you could fuck up so completely.
And then you finally picked yourself up, massaged the grid pattern of the tiles off your cheek, and shot Luke a text asking if he was free tonight.
He drops by at the end of your shift.
“Hi, babe.” Luke grins as he slides into one of the bar stools. “You good?”
You nod, then pause. “Not really?”
You’re wiping down the bartop, dumping an ashtray you collected from the smoking zone outside into the trash. The Hard Deck is empty now, even the last stragglers filed out. Bob selected a song on the jukebox before he left, something slow and decidedly country. Your hands shake when you go to wet the rag again.
Luke frowns and leans across the bar to look at you closely. “What happened?”
“I have to tell you something,” you say and run the tap. The water hits the chrome of the sink with a splatter.
Luke raises an eyebrow, grins. “Illicit confession?”
Under any other circumstances, you would have laughed. But your stomach is coiled up in knots so tight you wonder if they’ll ever untangle again. Like the earphones you fish from the bottom of a purse.
You just so manage a half-hearted chuckle, a sad, pathetic little sound that has Luke’s eyebrow climbing even higher.
He pushes a brown paper bag across the counter. “I brought your favorite take-out… Would that cheer you up?”
Almost immediately, your stomach growls in answer. You’ve been so hungry the past few days that you can’t even manage to be embarrassed. “Mexican?” you ask, something like excitement in your voice for the first time in over 24 hours.
“Ah...” Luke bites his lower lip. “No, uhm… I got something from that one place we went to. The fusion kitchen?”
“Oh…” The excitement dampens immediately, and you force a smile. “Yeah, cool. Thanks.”
“Sorry… you did say you liked it when we went.”
He’s right. You did say that.
Luke likes experimental food, things like that cocktail with the gold foil. Things that look much better than they end up tasting. He takes pictures of them and posts them on his Instagram, and he always makes sure not to get your hand in, your purse, your foot. He doesn’t even follow you back, and you want to not care about trivial things like social media so very badly that you never ask him about it.
He looks genuinely apologetic, though, so you resolve to forgive him. You smile and say, “I did! This is great. Thanks, Luke.”
His satisfied smile puts you at ease.
“So, what did you want to talk about?”
It’s a bit like a bucket of ice water. The ease slips away as quickly as it came. You start wiping almost furiously at a stain on the bartop, then give up. Stare at your fingers gone wrinkly with the sudsy water.
You open your mouth, and then you say, “I’m pregnant.”
It’s not what you meant to say. You meant to ease into this, make it sound… less final, somehow. As if that’s at all possible. As if that isn’t exactly what it is. Final.
You’re never going back from this, you realize suddenly. No matter what happens from here on out, there’s never going to be another moment where this hasn’t happened. Where you weren’t pregnant, where you didn’t mess it all up. The plan, the dream, the life.
Tears aren’t enough anymore. You’re going to run headfirst into the ocean and scream until the saltwater fills your lungs.
Luke laughs. You stare at him.
It takes a moment, but slowly he realizes that you’re not joking. That this is serious. The smile slides sideways off his face.
“Oh,” he says, and you can’t look at him anymore. So you let your eyes wander, down towards the lapels of his white dress shirt. He’s still wearing his suit and tie, and the realization that he’s come straight from the office touches you more than it should. At the same time, guilt settles in your stomach. You’re doing this to him, you’re altering his life, you…
The rational part of yourself scoffs, takes over the reins. It takes two to tango, you remind yourself. This is as much his fault as it is yours.
But that doesn’t get rid of the bitter taste in your mouth.
“Why…” Luke pauses. “Why are you telling me this?”
When you look up at his face again, his expression is carefully blank.
“Uh…”
“Shouldn’t you be telling the father?”
You blink. The cogs of your mind turn slowly like somebody slapped gum between them. “I am,” you say, wondering what the hell he’s on about.
“I’m not the father,” Luke says, very matter-of-factly. “You don’t need to lie about it.”
“I’m not lying.” You’re too stunned to even be insulted by the insinuation.
“It’s alright.” He shrugs his shoulders, his expensive suit in the tacky, glossy fabric catching the light. “It’s not like we’re exclusive. I don’t mind if you slept with somebody else.”
“Not exclusive,” you repeat lamely. Maybe that part shouldn’t catch you as off guard as it does. You’ve never discussed it with him in as many words, never sat down to have the whole boyfriend/girlfriend talk, but you’ve been seeing each other semi-regularly for two months now, and you’d just sort of assumed…
“Sure.” Luke nods. “Don’t blame this one on me, then.”
Oh. Your heart clenches, and suddenly it feels like you can’t breathe.
“I didn’t sleep with anybody else,” you say, but your voice sounds far away.
Luke shrugs. “Well, it can’t be mine.”
You don’t even know what to say to this. You’re in desperate, burning need of a shot, and the realization that you can’t have one zaps through you like a pain.
“We always used a condom,” Luke is saying, and his words drift to you through a fog, through a mist, through a thicket of fear and anxiety and ice-cold panic. “I made damn sure of that.”
“It’s not….” You clear your throat. “They’re only like… 98 percent safe. Condoms, I mean.”
“What, so you’re saying we’re those two percent?”
He looks like he’s about to start laughing again, and suddenly you barely recognize him. You’ve always known that Luke wasn’t the love of your life, but that was fine. Love hadn’t been part of the plan anyway, that was for later, much later, after you’d gone international and gotten rich off Mojitos and Pina Coladas and the occasional Old Fashioned. But Luke had been… well, he’d been nice. Always. He’d been someone to laugh with, had been long walks on the beach, and quick tumbles in his backseat. He’d been fun and nice and…
And you’d been stupid enough to hope. Hope for more, hope for better, hope for something.
“I can’t have a baby with you,” he says. His voice rings with finality.
What are you supposed to say to that? With those three positive pregnancy tests back home on your bathroom counter. With the knowledge that you haven’t slept with anyone else.
“Well,” you whisper, and the words come out softer than you want them to, “you are.”
Luke is very quiet for a moment. He’s looking right at you, the blue eyes you used to think were open, inviting, now slitted and probing. Like a snake.
“Jesus,” he says finally, draws back to run his fingers through his hair, a gesture of exasperation. His voice has lost some of its calm. “What do you want from me?”
You wonder if you look as dazed as you feel. “I don’t… I don’t want anything from you.”
That’s not true. You’d like him to hug you. You’d like him to tell you it’s going to be okay, even if that might be a lie. You’d like him to be nice to you.
Instead, Luke, who looks increasingly distressed, jerks his head and says, “If it’s a family you’re after… I can’t give you that.”
Everything has happened so quickly - the toppling of your plans, the chaos of your life. You haven’t really had time to think about how you want him to react. Not like this, though.
“Why not?” you ask and regret the question the moment it’s out of your mouth. You sound like a child - lost, confused.
Luke sighs. He rakes a palm over his face and shakes his head. When he finally looks at you again, there’s something almost guilty on his face. You can’t tear your eyes away, can’t help but feel your stomach plummeting down down down toward the ground. It’s like standing on the ledge of a skyscraper, feeling what the fall might be like even with both feet firmly planted.
“I can’t give you that,” he says, “because I already have a family.”
Beneath you, the ground seems to quiver.
“What?”
Luke pinches the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger, then reaches into his pocket and produces a shiny, golden wedding band. When he slips it back onto its original place on his finger, you watch the patch of pale skin, several shades lighter than the rest, disappear.
Your breath gets stuck somewhere in your chest.
“You’re… married?”
“Going on five years,” he says, and you think he sounds sad, but maybe that’s just your hope getting the better of you again.
You don’t know what to say. For a moment, you just stand there with the rag still in your hand, listening to the sad, sad voice of some wanna-be cowboy drawling from the speakers. Hear the phantom thud of the cues hitting pool balls. Turn your head to where the pilots were having fun earlier, back when things weren’t all jumbled up.
The whole world moves far, far away from you. Like something you watch on TV screens, something intangible, something fake. It’s not something that happens to people like you. It’s not something that happens to real people.
“It’s… you didn’t tell me that,” you say, and it’s like your voice echoes through a long, long tunnel, bounces off the walls like a tennis ball. “I didn’t know.”
And then you think back on it. Think of whispered phone calls in the dead of night, think of erratic work schedules, think of his insistence to come here instead of going to San Diego. Think of how little you know of his life, how firmly he kept you locked out of it.
Suddenly you’re not so sure if you didn’t know or if you just didn’t want to know. If you closed your eyes to what was right in front of you.
Guilt and anger and confusion flash through you in rapid succession. You feel sick to your stomach.
“I’ll give you money,” Luke says. It’s a peculiar thing - you see his mouth move before the words ever reach your ears, like a movie that’s gone out of sync with the audio.
“Money,” you repeat, very slowly. Or maybe not slowly at all. You just feel like you got stuck in molasses, like the whole world has been dipped in something sticky.
“Well. You’re getting rid of it.”
It’s not a question. He says it like it’s a fact, like it’s something that’s already been decided. Like it’s something you don’t get a say in.
You stiffen, fingers sinking into the wet rag. Soapy water drips over the lacquered wood of the bartop.
“No,” you say. “No, I’m not.”
About five minutes ago, you hadn’t even made your mind up about it yet. Hadn’t decided whether to keep it or not. Had still been weighing the pros and cons in your mind, turning them over like a Rosetta Stone that might help you decipher the encrypted, tangled mess of your thoughts.
And now that he’s said it, now that the option is right there in the open, suddenly you know that’s not the way you want it to happen.
“What,” Luke says, “you wanna have it?”
“Yes,” you answer, and you know it’s the truth.
Maybe it’s stupid. You’re twenty-four. You’re broke. You pick up shifts at a bar to pour tequila shots for other people. You live off the guys you flirt with long enough they decide you’re worth a tip. All those plans of grandeur, of franchises and cocktails and Park Avenue apartments, are dead-ends. You’ve been walking a cul-de-sac your whole life.
And still… something about it feels right to you.
You’ve been thinking about the whole thing in theory - the theoretical truth of that test, the theoretical reaction of Luke, the theoretical existence of that baby, the theoretical impact on your life. But it’s not a theory. It’s real.
There’s a baby growing in you.
It’s the most terrifying thought of your life. You’ve never experienced something so wonderful. Even as the fear eats away at you, even as your stomach churns and your head spins, some part of you feels illuminated with light.
Luke laughs. “Babe… no offense, but that’s a horrible idea.”
You clench your teeth and grit out, “I didn’t ask for your opinion.”
He shrugs. “Well, you’re gonna get it. You really think you could raise a kid?”
“I don’t know,” you say, truthfully, and wonder where all this calm is coming from. “But I want to try.”
Luke stares at you as if you’re growing a spare set of ears right in front of him. Then he laughs again, shakes his head. You can’t see what’s so funny about any of this.
“Babe,” he says, “this isn’t some new Cocktail recipe. This is an actual child you’re talking about.”
If you weren’t so goddamn tired, it would make you angry. Set fire to you like a fuse. But you’re drained, empty, hollow. You want to go home, want to curl up in bed, want to cry. You want to go back two weeks in time, back when you were still just a failing waitress with a big dream. Back before the responsibility of it all hunched you over.
“I’m doing it,” you say, and hope he understands the decision is final. Hope your voice is firm.
Luke exhales. A muscle in his jaw twitches as he grinds his teeth, as he turns half away from you.
Finally, after an eternity, he says, “I can’t be involved in this.”
For your part, you understand that decision is final too.
You nod, grab onto the bartop to keep yourself from toppling over. The ground beneath you is a gaping, beckoning abyss. It’s going to swallow you whole.
“Fine,” you whisper. “I’ll do it alone then.”
For a moment, Luke looks almost surprised. As if he was sure you’d fold eventually, see reason. Listen to him.
You wonder if that’s how it’s been before - him pushing and you giving in. Rearranging your life to fit his schedule, his plans, his wants. Shrinking yourself to make room for him. And you didn’t even notice.
You straighten your spine.
“For what it’s worth,” Luke says as he slides off his chair, “I’m sorry.”
And then he does what men do best: He leaves. Walks away from you and the baby growing inside of you. Walks away from the mess he made, the dream he shattered, without a care or a thought. Without looking back.
You watch his retreating form, watch the set of his shoulders, the spring in his step, watch as he bounds down the steps onto the gravel of the parking lot, watch as the shadows eventually blot out the sight of him.
Good riddance, you want to say, but you can’t even form words.
With your heart torn to shreds, with your fear clawing a bloody path up your throat, you sink down onto the floor, press a hand to your mouth, and you sob.
+
Twenty minutes later, Bradley Bradshaw finds you in the exact same position.
You know it’s been twenty minutes because you’re staring at the digital clock of the dishwasher, counting down the wash cycle. The neon red of the numbers blurs through the veil of your tears.
It’s like somebody’s cut your chest open. Scooped you clean like taking a spoon to a tub of ice cream. Behind your ribcage, you feel hollow in a way that aches down to your bones. That spiderwebs through your veins.
Bradley pauses in the doorway, silhouetted by the outdoor lighting you still haven’t turned off. Like this, with your vision blurred, he looks like a drawing of the Virgin Mary on one of those cheap, tacky candles. Descending on a flurry of clouds and light and doves. Only this Virgin Mary wears Hawaiian shirts, apparently. It almost makes you laugh.
He casts his eyes over the room, a slight furrow dipping between his brows. It takes you a moment to understand he hasn’t seen you yet, not with how you’re crouching by the crates of Corona.
Part of you wants to hide, wants to crawl under the jutting canopy of the bar. Wants to pretend you’re not here, fold yourself into a tiny pocket square of a person until he leaves again.
“Hello?” Bradley asks, genuine confusion laced with the word, and you know you can’t do that.
“Hi,” you call back, and your voice sounds tiny. Miserable. You push up on your knees to preserve a bit of your dignity. The room goes spinning in a whirlwind, and you catch yourself with both hands on the wood, lifting up to peek at him over the edge of the bar. “I’m down here.”
For a moment, Bradley just stares at you. He takes in the scene, the smeared mascara, the swollen eyes, the fresh tears leaving tracks down your cheeks like you’re drawing rivers on a map.
Then he snaps into action. He’s crossing the room before you can even really come to terms with the fact that he’s here in the first place, pushing through the hip-high swinging door that separates the oval space hugged by the bar from the rest of the room and falling to his knees by your side.
“What happened?” Bradley asks, something hard to his voice. But when he goes to touch the side of your face, carefully as if you’re injured, as if you’re made of porcelain that’ll break at the slightest jostle, his brown eyes show nothing but genuine concern.
It makes you cry harder.
“Nothing,” you say, which is a ridiculous lie, all things considered. You’re crouching on the floor of your workplace, over an hour after your shift has ended, crying your eyes out. Clearly, there’s something wrong. “I’m fine.”
Bradley sits cross-legged on the hardwood floors, his knee close enough to graze against yours. He looks decidedly out of his depth, almost uncomfortable. Helpless. His mustache quivers as he opens his mouth, then closes it again.
But he doesn’t push. Doesn’t try to get you to explain it, doesn’t ask again. He just sits there with you, elbows on his thighs, and lets you cry.
It’s nice not to be alone. To have somebody with you, even if he doesn’t know you. Even if he has no idea what it is that has you on the brink of a complete crisis.
You do your best not to think about it. Not about the baby, not about the guy who just dumped you. Not about gold foil and Instagram posts and wedding bands. Not about how he’s made you a homewrecker, and you didn’t even know.
Maybe this is karma. The universe punishing you for your sins. Something like that.
Maybe it’s just really, really bad luck.
“What are you doing here?” you ask when you’ve finally calmed yourself enough the sobbing has subsided to sniffles.
Bradley jerks his head noncommittally. “I forgot my wallet.”
“Oh.” You try to get up, but your legs won’t cooperate. “I’ll help you look.”
He shakes his head, pulls you back onto the floor by the elbow. “It’s okay,” he says. “I’ll look for it later. What happened?”
There’s something about his tone that tells you this time he won’t let you get away with a half-assed lie. Which doesn’t stop you from trying.
“Just… rough day.”
Bradley looks at you, then pulls his knees up, lets his arms dangle between them. “You don’t have to tell me,” he says, and his voice is very gentle. “But if you want to… I can listen.”
This is the thing about Bradley Bradshaw. He has the kind of face that makes you want to tell him things. Makes you want to spill your secrets to him, pour them into his space. He’s steady, reliable, calm. It would be so easy to trust him.
That’s dangerous.
But you’re so tired, and you’re so broken, and you’re so terribly, horribly lonely. With Luke gone, with your parents out of the picture, with nobody to help and no one to hold you, the loneliness is like an ache, like a stain, like something that festers and spreads and unfurls inside of you.
You just want to pretend you don’t have to do it alone. Just for a moment.
So you say, “I think I did something stupid.”
Bradley’s eyes are very brown. A soft shade of brown, like milk chocolate. When you look at him, you feel warm all over.
“Alright,” he says, and there isn’t an ounce of judgment in it. It’s just a gentle, careful nudge for you to continue.
“I…” You exhale shakily, look down to the floor, twist the bracelet around your wrist. It’s so much harder to form the words the second time around. “I’m pregnant.”
Saying it to Bradley, who is practically a stranger, saying it to someone outside of whatever little bubble, whatever vacuum two people playing at love built around themselves, makes it real in a way it wasn’t before.
You’re pregnant. In a few months, your belly is going to grow to the size of a watermelon. You’re going to get ultrasounds and wear maternity clothes and buy a crib. You’re going to hold a baby in your arms, a baby that will become a toddler, will become a child, will become a teenager, will become an adult. They’re never going to leave again.
I’m pregnant.
One moment - and in it the rest of your life.
It’s a skyscraper, it’s a monument, it’s a mountain. It dwarves you. How can you ever be enough for the path that lies ahead?
The panic jumps you. It rattles you. Suddenly you’re panting, you’re shaking, you can’t think, your head spinning circles around the enormity of it all.
“Oh,” Bradley says. He sounds like he expected you to say just about anything except that. “Congratulations.”
You stare at him, and he backtracks.
“Unless you don’t want me to congratulate you? Sorry, I shouldn’t just….”
“No,” you stop him, your voice a tiny, trembling thing. “It’s okay. Thank you.”
You wonder what it might be like if you were older, if you were married, if you weren’t such a fuck-up. Would people beam at you, hug you, shake your hand? Would they share the joy they must assume you feel?
Neither one of you says anything for a while. Through the opened windows, the sound of the ocean drifts in, of the waves crashing against the shore. The chrome of the fridge you’re leaning against is cold even through the layers of your shirt. You count the wooden tiles on the floor.
After half an eternity, Bradley says, “I didn’t know you had a boyfriend.”
It’s like a knife to the heart, it slices right through you, stabs you between the ribs. And you’re not even angry, don’t even feel betrayed… it just hurts. The kind of pain that stays with you. The kind of pain that leaves phantom traces even after the wounds have healed.
“I don’t,” you say finally.
Beside you, Bradley shifts his weight. “Sorry,” he mumbles. “I’m really putting my foot in it today, aren’t I?”
It’s almost enough to make you laugh. “It’s okay,” you say, even though it isn’t. This whole thing isn’t okay. “I’ll be fine.”
Without hesitating, Bradley says, “I know you will be.”
There’s such conviction in his voice that it baffles you. You stare at him, but he doesn’t seem to notice.
“He’s… have you told him, though? Or are you guys not in contact?”
Still trying to recover, you shrug. “Yeah,” you whisper, drawing your shoulders almost all the way up to your ears, “I told him.”
You can tell he wants to ask more, but he gives you a second before his next question. “And you… you guys are gonna try co-parenting? Or is he… are you going to get married?”
That makes you frown. You say, “What is this, the 1950s?”
“I just think….” Bradley clears his throat. “I just think if you get a girl pregnant, you should step up. Take responsibility.”
Of course he’d think that. You’re not even surprised.
There’s always been something traditional about Bradley Bradshaw, like he’s one of those men written by women people rave about all over TikTok. If he takes a girl out on a date, he probably holds open car doors and pulls out chairs for her, hands her his jacket if she gets cold.
Distantly, you wonder what that would be like.
“I don’t want somebody to marry me out of responsibility,” you say. “I can take care of myself.”
Bradley scrambles. “I know that!” he says quickly, and out of the corner of your eye, you see him shift his weight forward, elbows resting on his thighs. “Of course, I know that. I just thought… I just thought you shouldn’t have to do this alone.”
It’s such a simple thing to say, but it almost bowls you over. You turn your head to the side, press your face into your shirt sleeve and dig your fingernails deep into the skin of your shins.
Bradley watches you, eyes intent, and then he probes carefully, “Are you… are you going to keep it?”
You sink your teeth into your lower lip, blink against the sudden dampness. Keep your face turned away from him. The shame of it all, of the situation you’re in, of him seeing you like this, overwhelms you. Your vision blurs.
“I think…” You swallow around the lump in your throat. “I always used to think if I ever got in this situation, I’d just get an abortion but now… I don’t… I just don’t think it’s the right thing for me.”
Slowly, he nods. “You want to have the baby,” he says, and it’s not really a question, but you answer anyway.
“Yes. I mean… I don’t know, it’s just… I want this. I don’t know why or how, but I… it feels like I have to do this.”
“Yeah,” Bradley says, completely sincere. “Your body, your choice.”
Now you do snort. “What, are we at a rally?”
“I follow a few Instagram accounts,” he admits. His voice has gone almost sheepish. “Abortion rights should be everybody’s concern. Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.”
It’s endearing in a strange way because there’s nothing performative about it. It’s just bumbling and awkward and peculiarly genuine.
“You sound like you spend too much time on Twitter,” you say softly, and it makes him laugh. Bradley’s got a nice laugh, one that starts in his belly and seems to end at the back of his throat, punches out into the air from back there.
After things have gone quiet again, the anxiety sets back in. Or maybe it’s been there all along, chomping at the bit, and you just didn’t notice.
“You must think I’m crazy,” you say finally, a self-deprecating chuckle loosening from your throat.
But when you glance up at him from beneath lowered lashes, stomach tight with anticipation, Bradley doesn’t look judgmental at all. Instead, his face is wide open, his eyes clear, the corners of his lips still curled upward with the remnants of his smile.
Luke laughed at you, but Bradley is looking at you with something like admiration, and it takes your breath away.
“No,” he says. “I think you’re really, really brave.”
And then you’re crying again.
You’re surprised there are any tears left in you after your earlier session, but they burst forth now, in a sudden eruption of all the fear and all the pain. And Bradley is so nice. So goddamn kind even though he doesn’t know you, not really, even though this isn’t even his problem. Sits there on the floor of the Hard Deck with you at half past one am on a Sunday night, and doesn’t complain, doesn’t sigh. He just listens.
You don’t feel brave. You feel terrified, you feel overwhelmed, you feel… you feel… you feel like the whole world has toppled over. You feel like Atlas crashing down, buried beneath the weight of his burden. You feel tiny. Inadequate. You feel scared, scared, scared.
“I don’t know what to do,” you confess, choke it out between sobs. Wonder why you’re telling him this. When you don’t know him.
Funny how it is so much easier at times to be honest with strangers than it is to be honest with the people we love the most.
“I’m so… I’m so scared, Bradley.”
He moves as if to touch you, then seems to think better of it and slumps back into himself. The expression on his face is unreadable, his eyebrows furrowed, his jaw clenched.
“He’s not gonna… the father isn’t going to help you out?”
It makes you realize you never really answered his earlier question. And you don’t know why, can’t explain it rationally, but for some reason, this, too, makes embarrassment well up at the back of your throat.
What is Bradley going to think? The poor, little, stupid girl who got herself knocked up by a guy who won’t even stay? Is that what everybody’s going to think now? Is that all you’ll be?
It’s a life sentence, this whole thing.
You shrug, pause. Shake your head. “No,” you say finally. “He’s not going to be involved.”
You know it’s true. Luke won’t come back, not now, not in ten years, not in twenty. There was something final about that exchange, something permanent. Something that can’t be undone.
Suddenly, you think of that tiny, unborn child inside of you. Abandoned before it ever came into the world.
It’s just you and me now, baby, you think to yourself, and it goes through you like a current, sweeps you under like a wave. We’re all alone. All we have is each other.
“What about your parents? Your dad’s in the Navy, too, right?”
If you could, you’d run away. Fold yourself to invisibility. Slip into the pockets between moments and become something other, something that exists out of sight.
You think of your parents. Floral couches and polished hardwood floors. Tom Cruise on the television as your mother scrubbed every part of the house like she was getting rid of an illness, wiping away a disease, perpetually finding another stain or another cobweb or another wrinkle to smooth over. Think of your father, rigid and strict and absent. Always on some mission, always thinking of a greater good that definitely didn’t involve you, always looking through you even as he looked at you. You don’t know if you have a single memory of him smiling.
You haven’t spoken to them once since you gave up a perfectly fine full-ride scholarship to college.
“My parents,” you say, and as the words spill from you, you realize they’re the truth, “would probably kill me if they found out I got pregnant out of wedlock. Maybe if I were married, they’d give me back my trust fund or something, but… No, I don’t think they’d help me out.”
A muscle in Bradley’s jaw jumps, then he’s looking away. Turning to the side so you’re knee to knee again. You stare at his profile, at the curl of his ears, the cut of his jaw. The jagged edges of his scars blur through the fog of your tears.
“So, how are you… do you have a plan?”
You had one. You had Mojitos and Daiquiris and Cosmopolitans. You had a slew of business classes at a community college. You had a dream and a set of tools to achieve it, and when you close your eyes, you can almost see it right there in front of you.
But now it’s been swept up in a hurricane. Swallowed by a tsunami.
“No,” you admit, and your voice trembles. “I have no idea what to do.”
Bradley’s jaw moves as he chews on his lower lip. He swallows, and his throat unudlates with it, and then he’s shifting, shuffling forward a bit.
“I…” He clears his throat. If you didn’t know any better, you’d say he looks nervous. “I may have an idea.”
“An idea?” you repeat slowly.
You think he’s going to tell you about some friend who’s looking to hire someone, looking to rent out a very cheap apartment, works at a doctor’s office and is going to treat you for free. Something like that, maybe.
Instead, Bradley takes a deep breath and says, “Marry me.”
It takes a while for the words to register. At first, you think you’ve misheard, then you wonder if maybe the romantic parts of your mind cooked that up. If he even said it at all.
But Bradley is looking at you expectantly, the only indicator of nerves the slightest glimmer in his brown eyes.
And you can’t help yourself. You laugh, even through your tears. It’s a sound that rips from you unconsciously, unstoppably, because surely he’s joking. It’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever heard.
“Good one,” you say, and wonder just how big of a mess you look like. You wipe at your cheeks, your nose with your sleeves and sniffle once, twice.
Bradley’s lips twitch into the pathetic half of a smile, then he’s serious again, avoiding your eyes.
And that, finally, is when you realize that he isn’t joking at all.
“I…” You pause, mind whirring, head spinning. “What?”
“It’s just….” Bradley shrugs, then explains, “It’s only a suggestion. But you said your family might consider supporting you again if you were married. It might be an option.”
You don’t know what to say. You feel like you’re in a low-budget Hallmark movie.
Bradley pushes on, “It wouldn’t be permanent. We could get a divorce quickie in a year or two, just stay together long enough for you to get settled with the baby and everything. Plus, you’d get free healthcare.” He glances at you, and the blank expression on your face must light a panic in him. Now his words come faster. “I wouldn’t expect anything from you, of course I wouldn’t. It would just be… keeping up appearances. Just for a while….”
Finally, he trails off. The silence stretches between you like a palpable thing, thick and dense like summer heat.
When you were twelve, sitting in the back of the car as your parents argued up front, the woods of Washington flying past in rapid ribbons of black and blue and green, the moon a disk of silver in the sky, a deer ran out into the road. You remember the screeching of the tires as your dad did what you’re not supposed to and brought the car to a sudden, abrupt stillstand. You remember the wide eyes of the animal, the muscles locked in its state of catatonic horror. You remember the flanks rising and falling quickly beneath the matted fur.
For a second, you feel like that deer. Frozen. Caught completely off guard. Vulnerable.
Then you think you might be a little overdramatic.
You say, “What the fuck, Bradley?”
Part of you expects him to backtrack immediately, laugh, and tell you that he was joking after all. But Bradley stands his ground, even as he still won’t look right at you.
“I probably wouldn’t even be home much anyway. I leave for work all the time,” he says, brows drawn into a straight line above his eyes as he stares intently at his thumb rubbing circles into the skin of his arm. “But I could babysit, and then you could go back to work. I really wouldn’t mind. I’m good with kids, you know?”
You’re not entertaining the whole thing, not really, but you can’t help yourself. Your curiosity takes the upper hand.
“Why would you… why would you ever offer this? You barely know me.”
Bradley seems to think about it for a long moment, his face unreadbale. Then finally, he says, “There’d be something in it for me, too, you know? I’ve been meaning to get assigned to North Island permanently, do a relocation. But those spots tend to go to the guys with family, so…” He shrugs, but the gesture seems forced. “I could help you out, you could help me out. Win-win.”
“That’s all?” you ask, and you don’t know why there’s something like disappointment in your voice.
Bradley looks like he wants to say something else, and for a moment his face is vulnerable. But then it shutters again, and he nods. “That’s all.”
For a second, just a second, you let yourself imagine it: Imagine saying yes to this mad, insane, incredible proposal. Imagine marrying Bradley, someone soft and warm and responsible, someone completely opposite to Luke. Imagine him in a tux and you in a white dress, imagine his mustache tickling against your cheek as he leans in to kiss you. You imagine one of the quaint little houses you grew up in, but one that would belong to you, at least for a while. You imagine a toddler running through it, imagine Bradley bending down to scoop them into his arms. You imagine a life without this aching, shifting loneliness. You imagine a life with Bradley.
When you finally shake your head, when you let go of that ghost, it feels like it takes a piece of you with it.
“No,” you say softly, and it breaks you open in ways you can’t describe. “I can’t let you do that, Bradley.”
It’s just too insane. Too far out there. It wouldn’t be fair to him, when you’d be getting so much more out of that arrangement.
And besides. I don’t want someone to marry me out of responsibility. That’s what you told Bradley earlier, and you meant it.
When you do marry, when you walk down that aisle, you want it to be for love. And people can call you delusional, naive, whatever. You don’t care. You just know you want the big thing, the real thing, True Love, capital t, capital l. You want the hurricane of romance, the monsoon of love. You want to fly into it.
Bradley’s quiet for a moment. Then he says, “Okay. But if you… change your mind, yeah? I’ll be here.”
And he means it. Bradley carries his heart on his sleeve, you’ve learned this much. He tries to hide it, but he’s no good at it. Eventually, his emotions always get the better of him, burst forth like fountains. It’s part of his charm.
“What,” you say, “right here on the Hard Deck’s floors?”
It’s a sad attempt at a joke, but Bradley is nice enough to laugh anyway. “Sure thing. You guys have the cleanest floors in all of North Island, did you know that?”
You hum. “Sure. I’m the one who cleans them.”
Finally, you get up off the floor, unfold yourself from the bundle of misery you’ve crumbled into. Your legs ache, your back hurts, your chest still feels hollow. All the crying has left a dull pain pulsating behind your left brow.
The two of you look for Bradley’s wallet together, finally find it over by the pool table. You pretend like you’re not still reeling from his proposal, like it’s not suddenly become impossible to do so much as look at him without your heart flopping around like a fish finding its sad end on dry land.
“Can I give you a ride home?” Bradley asks as he watches you lock up. The Hard Deck has an old lock that gets jammed whenever the slightest bit of dampness creeps into the air. You have to hang onto the doorknob with all your weight while simultaneously turning the key to get it to lock.
“I drove here,” you say, casting your eyes about for the tiny tin can you call your car. You can’t even remember where you parked earlier.
“You okay to drive?” Bradley asks.
You glance at him. With the lights off, the parking lot is almost covered in a thick blanket of darkness. The headlights of a few passing cars winding their path along the coastal highway illuminate patches of gravel now and then. Moonlight spills silver and dim across his shoulders, like fingers caressing him. He looks concerned, examining the state of you.
The truth is that you’re tired. Bone tired. Dead tired. So tired you could probably go to sleep where you stand if you put your mind to it. But you don’t want to bother Bradley anymore, have already stolen enough of his time.
So you’re about to decline, but it seems you hesitated too long.
“I’ll take you home,” Bradley says decidedly, “and you can come get your car tomorrow, okay? I don’t think you should be driving like this.”
“You don’t have to do that, you….”
“I know,” he interrupts you, a smile spreading on his face. “But I’ll feel better knowing you got home safe.”
That makes your insides clench in a way they shouldn’t. Your chest feels tight, and you look away just in case you start crying again.
Is it too soon in your pregnancy to start blaming raging hormones?
Wordlessly, you let Bradley lead you across the parking lot toward his monstrosity of a car. His hand hovers at the small of your back, incredibly close yet never touching. He’s big behind you, bulking, and you try not to think about it. When he opens the door for you and waits until you’re buckled in to close it, you feel like your head’s going to explode.
The ride home is quiet, as is the town around you on this Sunday night. An old Killers song plays on the radio, and you think of deer stepping out into streets, then press your eyes closed and will the thought away.
In Bradley’s car, with the windows rolled down, with the Californian night breeze whipping your hair into your eyes and clearing the fog from your head, for a short, blissful while, nothing seems real. It’s one of those liminal moments, a not-time, when reality feels like a dream and even the sharpest knives don’t cut deep enough to hurt.
It ends quicker than expected because time always goes the fastest when you want it to go slow. Then you’re thanking him, saying goodbye, both of you pretending he didn’t just propose some strange, fake marriage to you behind a bar counter not even thirty minutes ago.
Bradley waits until you’re inside the building before he starts the engine again. You hear the roar of it as you climb the stairs up to the second floor.
In your bedroom, you don’t even bother getting undressed. You just slip under the covers, pull them up over your head, bury in the sticky, stale air beneath them, close your eyes, and fall asleep within seconds.
+
The first time you told your parents about your bartending dreams, your father yelled at you for forty-five minutes. He hurled words at you that hurt, that left scars, that made you wonder and kept you second-guessing yourself for years, that stayed with you. Your mother didn’t say anything.
Somehow, that was worse.
You call her on the landline at five pm on a Tuesday, just before your dad gets back home, and she answers after the third ring. You’re so sure she’s going to acknowledge the four-year gap in contact, the crumbling of the relationship, the fall-out of screaming and crying, and your dad kicking you out of the house.
What you get, instead, is a ten-minute spiel about who brought what to last week’s church potluck and which laundry detergent your father’s contact allergies don’t act up with.
You’re sitting cross-legged on your bed, your digital alarm clock counting down the time in radioactive green. Outside, you hear the sounds of jets roaring through the sky. In your tiny kitchen unit, the faucet is leaking.
Finally, five minutes into a lecture on the advantages of pre-chopped garlic, you interrupt, “Mom?”
You wonder if she hears the shift in your voice, the slight tremble of it. Something makes her go very quiet on the other end of the line, no sound but her breath.
Drip-drip-drip goes your faucet.
When she doesn’t acknowledge you, you push on, your heart beating a staccato rhythm against your ribcage, “I might… I think I might need some help.”
She doesn’t answer for so long you think you might have lost connection. Then you hear shuffling, imagine her walking through her empty house the way she sometimes does - like a phantom, like a specter.
“With what?” she asks after an eternity.
It’s all you can do to keep yourself from hyperventilating. Years of pain and fear clog up your chest, settle like goosebumps on your skin. You close your eyes and let your head drop back against your pillow.
“I’m pregnant,” you say.
And then you can feel it through the phone, like something physical. What you’ve always known deep down. The disapproval and the disappointment, and the complete lack of understanding.
You’ve never been who your parents wanted you to be, and they’ve always punished you for it like it was a crime.
When your mother says your name, it’s so plain. That she can’t understand what you’re doing, with your cocktails and your late nights. That she doesn’t see why you’d ever choose something like that over a real education and a real job. That she cannot fathom how it could come to this now - you, broke, young, alone, pregnant.
It’s like being five again, trying to get somebody to look at the picture you drew. It’s like being ten again and being overlooked. It’s like being fifteen again, still vying for the attention you’ll never really get.
Your mother is a stubborn woman, set in her ways. She knows what she wants from people, more specifically, what she wants for them. And you’re no exception. Nobody’s ever asked her a question whose answer she couldn’t find in the bible.
More than wanting you to go to college, wanting you to work in an office, your mother has always wanted you to get married. To fit yourself into the picture-perfect stencil of white picket fence and smiling husband she cut herself. For you to let some guy put a ring on you, put a kid in you, buy you a house and a porch swing and a family van.
It’s pathetic, but it doesn’t matter how much time passes. How much older you get. At the end of the day, you still want her approval, just once, even if you have to lie to get it.
So, like a child, like you’re five again, like you’re ten again, like you’re fifteen again, you say, “I’m getting married.”
“Oh?” your mother asks, and there’s so much hope in the one word it hits you like a ton of bricks.
“Yeah,” you confirm, and then the lies just burst out of you, and you hate yourself, hate yourself so much it’s like bile on your tongue, “yeah, we’ve been engaged for a while, and now with the baby and all… It’s been long overdue.”
Your mother almost sounds excited. Sure, she’d probably prefer for you to have been married before getting knocked up, but all of this must still seem better than the last plan you presented to her four years ago. “What’s his name? What’s he do?”
You squeeze your eyes closed. If your mother knew you at all, if you hadn’t spent the past few years not speaking, you’d like to think she would have heard the shame in your voice when you say, “Bradley. He’s a Naval aviator.”
It might be the worst thing you’ve done in your life: Dragging poor, kind Bradley Bradshaw into the mess you’ve made of your life. Nevermind that he offered. It doesn’t matter.
Your mother starts babbling, the way she only does when she’s actually pleased about something. She’s talking about how happy your dad will be that you’re getting married to a fellow army guy, but you barely hear it. Now that you’ve gotten the approval, it doesn’t feel at all like you thought it would.
It just hurts.
For a while, you just let her keep talking as you blink away the tears, as you stare at your bedroom wall, as your mind spins and spins and spins in circles. Then you promise to send her an invite, say your goodbyes, and hang up.
It’s like you’re numb all over. You stay on your bed for another five minutes, and then another, and you feel just as empty as you did after your last conversation with Luke.
What has your life become? How could it crumble as quickly as it did, going from okay to horrible in less than a week?
Even when you weren’t speaking to your parents, you never felt this distant from them, this far removed. A chasm you’ll never be able to breach. An ocean you’re never going to bridge. The only way you’ve ever gotten your mother to be happy with a decision you’ve made is when you lied to her.
The loneliness is everywhere, then. In your chest, in your bed, in your veins. Crawling like a shadow that swallows you whole.
And then the panic sets in, ice cold in your veins, and with it comes the guilt. Your stomach rolls with it.
What have I done? you wonder. What have I done to myself, to Bradley? How will I ever get out of this?
You scramble. Blindly reach for a dress to slip into, for a pair of flip-flops, for your car keys. It’s a miracle you don’t crash on your way to the Hard Deck. Your heart works itself up into a frenzy, and the guilt gnaws at you, slashes at you, paws at you. All these emotions are tearing you apart.
In the back, Bradley and Bob are playing Pacman on one of the retro machines. They’re pretty loud, too, and from what you gather in your mad dash through your workplace, Bradley seems to be disproportionally competitive about the whole thing.
Figures. Nobody gets into Top Gun without a cutthroat streak and a mean penchant for ambition.
“Bradley,” you say, and when he looks up, his eyes sparkling, the smile slides right off his face. “Can I talk to you?”
He seems stunned for a second, then nods and deposits his beer on a nearby table. “Sure thing.”
You lead him out the back. Out of the corner of your eyes, you spot the exact corner you huddled in a few days back, agonizing over the positive pregnancy test, the decline of your life, the decay of your dreams. Don’t look, you tell yourself, and then do it anyway.
The sun hasn’t set yet, but twilight is descending on the world rapidly. Everything is washed into soft pastels, the sand and the last surfers shaking salt water from their hair. Bradley’s shirt and the honey gold of his skin.
You can’t look at him. It’s a shame that grows in the pit of your stomach, that settles there, heavy like a stone. How can you do this to him?
You’ve never felt worse about yourself, and still… The fear is too big.
Since you decided to give up on the scholarship, since you walked out of your parents house four years ago, you’ve been on your own. You’ve been footing your own bills and renting your own apartment and paying for insurance on your car. You were alone the time you got a cold so bad you couldn’t get out of bed for two days. You were alone when your tire popped on the highway and you almost hit another car. You were alone when you got rejection after rejection from the big San Diego bars, the ones that end up featured on TV and in magazines.
And that was fine. You’re strong, you know you are. Any issue that came your way, you managed to figure out eventually. You’ve been doing fine without any help.
But this, here, now. This… You just can’t do it on your own. Not when it’s about a baby. Your baby.
So you take a deep breath and ask, “Is the offer still on the table?”
Bradley exhales. You watch as he takes a step closer to you, as his shoes move in the field of your vision, grains of sand crunching beneath the soles. When he speaks, a cadence of insecurity has snuck into his voice, “The marriage?”
You nod because you can’t say it. Your mouth just won’t form the words.
“If…” Bradley clears his throat. “If you want it… yeah.”
When you look up at him, there’s something strange on his face. Something that looks less like surprise and more like awe.
His eyes are so brown, and your heart beats so fast, and you’re dizzy like you just got off a rollercoaster.
“I…” You pause to collect your thoughts, and then you rush it all out at once, scared that if you don’t say it now, you never will. “If I were to say yes, like, hypothetically… I’d need to know that you’re not just doing it for me. That there’s something in it for you, too, so….”
He’s nodding before you’ve finished. “I told you. I wanna stay here. I’m sick of getting sent around the country all the time, so… It’s good. It’s an opportunity.”
An opportunity. That sounds like business, sounds like a transaction, sounds rational and level-headed and reasonable, and you latch onto the idea. Maybe if you try to take the emotion out of the equation, it’ll be easier.
Bradley seems relaxed about the whole thing, much more relaxed than he should be given the absurdity of the situation, but you feel like you need to make things clear anyway, if only to put yourself at ease. That’s what people do before singing contracts, right? Put all the cards out on the table?
So you go on, “And I wouldn’t, like… Like you’d still get to do anything you want. I wouldn’t expect you to help with the baby or anything. And you could keep dating, of course, you could, I won’t mind. I promise. It’d just be for show, right?”
Bradley hesitates, and for a second, you think he’s going to say something. But then he just shrugs, nods, says, “That’s fine. Yeah. Whatever you want.”
For a moment, you both just look at each other.
“This is insane,” you say because it is, and you don’t know what else to say.
And Bradley just chuckles and agrees smoothly, “Yeah, it’s nuts, isn’t it?”
As you look at him, here in this pastel lighting, here on the verge of something monumental, there’s something so reassuring about him. Something so steady and reliable and constant. Something that makes you think, with him, maybe it could be okay, no matter how insane the whole idea is. An opportunity. An investment that just might pay off.
North star, you remind yourself. Bradley Bradshaw is the North Star.
At the very least, you won’t be alone.
“So is that….” Bradley shifts, scratches the back of his neck. “You saying yes, then?”
There’s a lump in your throat like you’ve swallowed a pebble. It almost chokes you.
“Yeah,” you agree finally, and can’t believe you’re saying this, doing this, can’t believe you’re this mad and this selfish and this desperate. “I guess I am.”
It’s awkward after that. You both just stand there, you with your arms around your own ribcage, Bradley with his thumbs hooked into his belt loops. Space and silence stretches far and gaping and glaring between you.
Then he says, “Can I hug you?”
That’s sort of the last thing you expected him to say.
You blink at him. “Uhm… sure?”
When Bradley pulls you into his arms, when he holds you against his chest loosely, carefully, giving you room to pull away at any moment, the whole thing almost bowls you over. It’s the first time anybody’s hugged you since you found out you’re pregnant, since your entire world came crashing down, and you can’t help yourself. It’s a visceral reaction. You cling to him, wrap your arms around his neck, press your face into his shoulder and your chest against his and squeeze your eyes shut, and stay there for longer than you planned to, longer than you should. Let him hold you tight enough that for a moment, for a while, it almost feels like you’re whole again. Like you’re not alone.
For the first time in a week, for the first time since that positive test, things feel real. You feel real. Only with his hands on you. The thoughts that have been echoing through your head constantly, loud enough to drown out everything else, quiet.
You could get addicted to it, could get greedy and selfish and never-satisfied. Could eat it raw.
Bradley smells like sunscreen and sandalwood. You try to commit that scent to memory, try to ingrain it into your brain and your body. Something to remember the next time the loneliness sets in.
Finally, he pulls away, and his smile is gentle. You feel every inch of separation like an ache in your bones, like an echo, like a reverberation.
You can’t cry again. You’ve been doing it so much recently that you just won’t allow it again. If you’re going to do this, if you’re going to be a mother and a wife, in whatever capacity, you’ll have to be strong. No matter how hard that will be.
“I don’t even have a ring for you,” Bradley says, a frown etching itself into his forehead. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh.” You’re shaking your head quickly, vehemently. “No, Bradley, that’s fine, you don’t need to….”
“I think you should have something, though. I want to give you something,” he interrupts you. “I just don’t know….”
And then he seems to think of something. The epiphany is practically written all over his face, and for a moment, he looks so much younger. Rosy cheeks and all.
Bradley reaches into his wifebeater and pulls his dog tags from beneath the fabric. Before you know what’s happening, he’s tugging the thin silver chain down over your head, moving your hair out of the way carefully. It settles against the skin of your neck, warmed by his body heat.
You stare down at the metal dangling over your dress, the letters of his name etched into it. Bradley Bradshaw.
Your heart seizes.
When you were younger, much younger, you used to dream of this. You used to imagine what being proposed to would feel like, what it would be like. A fancy restaurant, an expensive glass of champagne, and a diamond ring at the bottom of the flute. Something flashy, something extravagant, something beautiful. The man in your fantasy was faceless at first, and then he looked like Robert Pattinson, and then he looked like your first crush, and then he went back to being faceless again.
He never had a mustache. He was never a stranger. Your dreams were never this: Rushed and fake and no ring at all. You, pregnant with somebody else’s baby, and Bradley, marrying you to get assigned to a base of his choosing. None of it real. No True Love, no capital t, no capital l. Not even lowercase. Nothing but madness and guilt and business between you.
And still you want it, want it so bad it swells inside you, pushes against your ribcage with enough pressure to crack bones - you want to be wanted.
You wonder what Bradley dreamed of. Not you, probably. So much younger than him, so naive, so gullible, falling for married men and getting yourself into situations you can’t climb out of yourself. Making him do this when he deserves better, more, deserves something true and real.
It makes you sick to your stomach. It makes you want to cry. It makes you want to ask Bradley to hug you again, so you can forget, just for another second, just for another moment.
Instead, you say, voice barely a whisper, “Thank you.”
Bradley shakes his head. “You don’t have to thank me,” he says, and he sounds so genuine you have to avert your eyes. “We’re friends, right?”
Friends. This man you barely know. This man who is doing something unfathomable for you.
“Yeah,” you agree softly. “Friends.”
And then later, in the bar, as Bradley’s friends discuss some new Star Wars show you haven’t seen, as they order round after round of beer you can’t drink, as the sky goes from pastels to blues to blacks, you’ll pretend you don’t see Natasha staring at the dog tags around your neck, pretend you don’t wish you could hold Bradley’s hand, pretend you don’t feel like you’re falling apart, like you’re capsizing where you sit, like you're kicking water miles and miles and miles below the surface.
Beneath the table, you put a hand on your stomach, fingers spreading out, close your eyes, and let the current drag you under.
pairing: james potter x fem!reader (slytherin and pureblood)
part: one , two , three
summary: james had never really noticed you, not until you came back to your seventh year pretty and was sat next to him in defense against the dark arts.
a/n: so i’ve decided to make up this complex story in my head and if i don’t write it i think my head might explode. anyways enjoy this heart aching story, this will definitely be a series. not proofread OKAY BYE ENJOY
James Potter had never noticed you, he was too wrapped up in Lily Evans to even look in your direction. But when he got on the train, ready for his seventh and final year at Hogwarts he watched as you entered in through the door. He had always seen you as the pureblood that he found quite annoying, but this moment? The sun hitting your face and brightening it up as you smiled at one of your friends, well— his heart sunk.
He wanted to say hi, but you brushed passed his shoulder to go and find your usual friends in their usual compartment. Yet his eyes lingered, he couldn’t look away.
Throughout the day he found himself searching the crowd of incoming students to find you, just as he did for Lily all these years. All he could think to himself was how he had wasted the past six years pining after a girl who didn’t even look in his direction when you were right there.
“James, who are you looking for?” Sirius asked as they sat in the Great Hall for dinner.
“Hm?” James looked over, being pulled from his thoughts while he looked over the Slytherin table a million times and still couldn’t seem to find you. “Oh— no one.” he shook his head.
“Liar.” Remus smirked, looking down at his food which made James furrow his eyebrows in response.
“Excuse me?” He laughed a bit, trying to cover up the fact this his friends were onto him.
“By this time every year you’re sat next to Lily Evans flirting with the poor girl, so why are you sitting with us and looking at the—” Sirius took a moment to follow his previous line of sight. “the Slytherin table?” he found himself shocked with what he found, his mouth turning into a confused frown.
“I’m not looking at the Slytherin table.” James lied, his eyes rolling before looking back down to pick at his food.
“Right..” Sirius slowly nodded.
“I’m not!” James tried to defend, but it came off more aggressive than he had originally hoped for, his own actions immediately throwing himself under the bus.
“Woah— calm down. We’re just messing with you.” Remus laughed lightly and James stared at him with his lids lowered before he scoffed and shoved a spoonful of mashed potatoes in his mouth. He hated mashed potatoes of course, but anything to keep himself from tattling on— well, himself.
The next day he had DADA class first thing in the morning, sitting at his assigned seat towards the back of his class, something he was grateful for because he could do his usual in class shenanigans. But— as soon as he was starting to get used to his new seat, the chair beside him was pulled out, and none other than you had sat down next to him.
He watched in shock as you set your books down and took your seat, slowly looking over at the dark curly haired boy who sat next to you. You looked confused as to why he was looking at you the way he was.
“Do you need something, Potter?” you asked, his last name falling off your tongue with ease and he had wished for nothing more than for you to say his first name.
“Oh— uhh.” he stammered, why was he freezing? He never froze, he was James Potter for Merlin’s sake. The king of flirting, so this was very unusual for him. Say something. Anything.
“Nope, everything’s good.” he breathed out finally, looking away awkwardly. Why did he have to be so awkward? He was ruining his chances with you, which were already very slim considering who you were, who your family was.
Pureblood family, strictly Slytherin. Just like Sirius’ family. You were what some called the pureblood princess, untouchable unless you were raised just as you were. James definitely wasn’t, but that wasn’t going to stop him. Hopefully..
“Good, I was beginning to think you didn’t like me sitting here.” you joked, something you didn’t do very often. In fact you were usually very quiet, really only spoke when you were spoken to. Just as you were taught growing up.
“Oh no, you can sit here— I mean I want you to sit here..” he stuttered again, but looked back up at you again.
“I have to sit here.” you smiled, this playful smile that made his heart skip a beat and he laughed lightly.
“Right yeah, I suppose you do.” he motioned towards the seating chart displayed on the chalkboard in front of the room.
You scoffed, shaking you head before looking down at your DADA book, opening it up and tucking your hair behind your ear to expose a bit more of your face.
The entire class James was trying to find some excuse to talk to you, yet he couldn’t find any reason to. Only small stolen glances in your direction, watching as you paid attention to the professor and wrote little notes with a quill on a blank sheet of paper.
Then class had ended, and just as soon as you came, you left. James sat for a moment, leaning back in his seat and sighing audibly before standing up and walking into the hallway.
“When did you start getting whipped for Y/N?” Remus appeared beside James, which he sighed in relief seeing who it was.
“Merlin, you scared me Moony.” he rolled his eyes.
“Well, are you gonna answer me?” he asked.
“I’m not whipped for Y/L/N.” he stared forward, not wanting to look at Remus because he knew his face would betray him once again, just as it did the night before.
“Right, you can lie all you want but I saw you staring at her that entire class when Lily was sitting right in front of you.” Remus exposed him. “Better not tell Sirius, he’d get pissed if he found out you like a girl like Y/N.” he warned his friend.
“I’m not, so you have nothing to worry about.” James defended his actions, but he knew he had been caught.
“Whatever helps you sleep at night.” Remus teased.
The rest of the day he couldn’t stop thinking about you, the face you make when your focused and how you smiled at him at the beginning of class. He tossed and turned in his sleep thinking about it, groaning as he shoved his pillow over his face in frustration. It was like his crush on Lily but a million times worse and he couldn’t understand why. Why was he suddenly so head over heels for the pureblood princess?
The following weeks seemed to go by rather slowly and he tried to blame it on him just being ready to finish school, but in reality you were stuck in this special little place in the back of his mind. He saw you in the library every Thursday, his day to study and catch up on homework before the weekend.
You had barely spoken to him too, randomly asking for a quill when you forgot one, him asking for a piece of parchment paper when he had ran out. Helping answer questions for each other when the two of you got a bit confused, but that was it.
Lily even spoke to him more than you did, and yet every time him and the red head would talk he didn’t get the same feeling the previous years when the girl gave him attention, he had secretly wished it was you talking to him.
But after almost a month of little words exchanged, something had changed, he had stood up for you.
It was in DADA, the class was learning about the Imperius when a Ravenclaw students decided to make a very mean joke towards you.
“Alright students, today we will be learning about the curse that controls the mind. It is called the Imperius curse, it is very dangerous and it is very important you know how to protect yourself from it.” the professor explained.
“Protect ourselves from it, or from people like Y/N’s family?” the witty Ravenclaw girl spoke up. James looked up from his book towards the girl, then towards you. Usually when someone made a sly comment like that you would fire something mean back, but your face told a different story.
Tears filled your eyes and you looked at the girl who had a smirk on her face. “Now that’s quite enough, Miss. Golding.” the professor warned.
“That was a real bitch move, Grace.” James said towards the girl, which caused you to look at him in shock. Was James Potter really standing up to the Ravenclaw to defend you? He had ignored your every move for years and yet here he was actually being nice. Shocking, to say the least.
“That’s detention for you, Mr. Potter.” the professor sighed.
“That’s not fair, Grace said something first.” James defended his actions.
“Okay, detention for you too, Miss. Golding.” the Ravenclaw sighed.
James looked over at you and shot a small smile on your direction, you smiled back.
After class you found James in the library studying and approached the table he sat at by himself. “Hey, uh—” you started awkwardly. “Thanks for defending me in class earlier, you really didn’t have to do that.” you smiled.
“Of course.” he said softly, a small smile on his face as well.
“Sorry you got detention.” you pressed your lips into a line. You really did feel bad, and felt like it wasn’t deserved that he got detention for standing up for another student when they couldn’t.
“It’s okay, it was worth it.” he shrugged and leaned in a bit closer. “Between you and me Grace is a pain in the ass.” he joked, earning a breathy laugh from you.
“Yeah, she is.” you nodded. “Do you usually study alone?” you asked. James froze yet again.
“Uh— yeah. Usually.” he looked down.
“Do you care if I sit?” you questioned, motioning to the chair on the side of the table next to him.
“What? Oh, no. Not at all.” he motioned towards it. “Please.” he came off as desperate, mentally face palming.
“Okay.” you laughed again, sitting down and setting your books in front of you. The two of you spent an hour sitting side by side in silence, and every once in a while he peaked over his book to take a look at you. He couldn’t help it, you really were those one of a kind girls.
“James!” he heard his name get called, looking over to see who the feminine voice was. Lily Evans, of course it was. How come when he finally was moving on she seemed to appear more often?
“Lily.” he nodded towards her as she approached him. “Can I study with you?” she asked, her eyes darting over at you and then back at James. You stared up at her for a moment.
“Oh, look at the time! I best get going before my friends start wondering where I am.” you said, gathering your things and shoving them into you arms. “See you around, Potter.” you smiled in his direction before walking off.
“See— see you.” he muttered to himself, finding himself watching as you left.
“James?” Lily called, snapping him out of his gaze.
“Yeah? Oh, yes! You can sit, study— yeah.” he nodded before looking down at his book. But he didn’t steal glances at Lily, in fact he stayed glued to his DADA boom instead.
Every Thursday after that the two of you sat in the library and studied for an hour, and every single time Lily would come in and ask to study, and every single time you would leave when she did.
You knew Lily Evans didn’t like you that much, not very many people did. It was hard to like someone who came from the background you did, you understood that. What you couldn’t understand is why James Potter was suddenly being so nice to you? It was like a switch in his brain flipped over the summer, his usual cold demeanor towards you turned into a warm and welcoming one.
So one day as you sat reading next to James, he finally spoke to you, causing you to look up from the notes you were writing. “What are you doing this weekend?” he asked.
“What?” you asked shocked.
“What are you doing this weekend?” he repeated and you stared for a moment completely dumbfounded. You set down your quill.
“I’m not sure.” you shrugged, because you weren’t sure. You usually sat in the Slytherin common room with your friends and talked about your week with each other, talked about your families or sat in silence. It was boring.
“Wanna go for a walk around the Black Lake?” he asked casually.
“Why? You’re not going to push me in or anything, right?” you joked and he laughed.
“No, I’m not going to push you in.” he smiled.
“So— why then?” you repeated.
“Sirius and Remus are going on a date, Peter is hanging out with Marlene, and I like to go on walks with my friends on the weekends.” he shrugged.
“Oh so we’re friends now?” you teased.
“Of course! We sit with each other every Thursday and next to each other everyday in class.” he explained further.
“I will go if you answer one question for me.” you decided.
“Shoot.” he leaned back in his chair.
“What happened?” you asked, he furrowed his eyebrows, unsure of what exactly you were asking. “I mean, something must’ve happened over the summer. Before you used to hate me, and tease me.” you explained.
“So what happened? Why are you defending me now and hanging out with me?” you looked at him. James thought for a moment.
“I don’t know, I guess I changed my mind— about you.” he looked at you, his face relaxed as he searched for any reaction on your face.
“Changed your mind what about me exactly?” you dived deeper.
“I already answered your question, are you in or not?” he asked.
“James.” you warned, earning a sigh from him. He really didn’t want to have to ever explain this to you.
“You, your family, they stand for everything I’m against.” he replied honestly. “But at the beginning of the year when you walked onto that train, I don’t know how to explain it but, you changed. You looked really well, happy. Very unlike your family.”
“Classic me, came back to seventh year all pretty.” you joked, looking away, but his words stung. All these years he saw you just as everyone else did. Your unforgiving last name revealing who you were supposed to be.
“Not just pretty, Y/N, you looked happy.” he reiterated. You looked back up at him. “Besides, you’ve always been pretty. I was too sucked up in the rumors to notice it.” he looked at you deeply, like he was the first person in this entire school to see you.
“What about Lily Evans, is she too busy?” you questioned.
“I don’t know.” he shrugged, he was being honest. He hadn’t asked Lily what she was doing. “I asked you what you were doing, not Evans.” he smiled.
“Okay, I’ll go to the lake this weekend. But I swear if you push me in—” you started to get defensive but James only laughed.
“I’m not gonna push you in. What, are you afraid of water?” he teased.
“I can’t swim, and I’m not just saying that to sound cute. Like I would literally die if I fell in the water.” you replied honestly.
@penfullofwordsaheadfullofstories wrote the first half of Bruises and then kindly gave me the opportunity to finish it, so that’s why the story is split between two different tumblr users. Check out her masterlist or mine for more awesome content!
Summary: During the Golden Age of Narnia, Peter takes an interest in Y/N, a maid at Cair Paravel, and goes to great lengths to keep her safe from her abuser. But there’s more to Y/N than either of them know.
okay so, i can explain!! it’s 1 am and i completely read this incorrectly, so it’s about the reader finding a picture of herself in his wallet because i’m an idiot! i was going to scrap it but i am just proud of myself for actually completing a blurb without giving up
so, i will be writing the actual request tomorrow because it’s so cute and adorable and makes a lot more sense than this and i can’t WAIT write it because 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺 so fluffy man 🫶 but until then, enjoy this piece of work i am writing while very woozy on strong pain meds that ultimately makes zero sense! (posting this on mobile too because my dedication the craft is not enough for me to look for my laptop charger soz queens xxx)
“Have you seen my purse anywhere, Roos?” Your eyes dart around the living room, trying to retrace your steps.
“No, why d’you need it?” He shakes his head, glancing over at you from where he had collapsed on the couch.
“Uh, I need to go to the grocery store. I think a 6”1, 200 pound Navy fighter pilot raided my refrigerator.” You quip, smiling snarkily at the man in question. He grins as his eyes scan over your form, letting out a little appreciative hum.
You’re wearing that pretty little sun dress that drives him crazy, and he can’t say he doesn’t enjoy the way it accentuates the curve of your ass as you get on all fours on the floor, leaning down to check for your purse under the couch. You wouldn’t be surprised where it ended up, Bradley had an annoying tendency to just kick things on the floor out of his path; especially if he had been making a bee line for the couch, then he definitely wouldn’t pause to pick it up.
“What are you humming at, perv?” You question as you stand back up, rounding the couch so you were standing behind it, eyes once again scanning the room for the missing purse as you let out an aggravated scoff.
He laughs vehemently, his head tilting back against the back of the couch until he’s peering up at you from where you stand behind him. “Oh, just my breathtakingly beautiful wife.”
You scoff, a manicured hand coming down to absentmindedly play with his mess of curls as you tried to track down your purse. This will bug her all day, Rooster thought to himself, as he watched you scan the entire room over and over again.
“Wife?” You grinned. “Did I miss the wedding?”
He laughs again, your witticisms humouring him greatly, grabbing the hand knotted into his hair and bringing it down to his lips, pressing a kiss to the soft skin just below where your pretty engagement ring lay on your finger.
“Formalities, honey.” He tuts, and another hum slips from his lips as you bend down to press a soft kiss to his rosy lips. His mustache tickles your chin, your kiss slightly awkward, seeing as your face was leaning over his slightly uncomfortably.
His arm reaches up, hand knotting into your hair to keep you close to him as his soft lips work against your even softer ones. Your nose brushes against his chin as you reluctantly pull away, the ache in your lower back growing more and more every second you keep yourself in the awkward position.
You wipe at your mouth, giggling as you bring your thumb down to wipe at his chin. “You got a little gloss…. everywhere, Roos.”
He chuckles, wiping at his skin. “You can bring my credit card, if you want. I think it’s in my jacket pocket. I’ll look for your purse when you’re gone.”
You hum, annoyed at the fact your purse was still missing, but thankful for your fiancés generous nature. You squeeze at his muscular shoulder, before you’re walking into the hall to grab the wallet out of his coat pocket. “Thanks, baby; you’re a godsend. I’ll transfer you the money later.”
He sends you an incredulous look once you come back into the living room. “Don’t worry about it, sweetheart. Pretty sure it’s my turn to go grocery shopping anyway, you need to stop doing my share of the chores for me.”
You chuckle, gasping dramatically before you open up his worn, leather wallet to grab his card. “What? And have my big strong fighter pilot fiancé be burdened with tedious household tasks that should be for civilians only? I would never!”
He shakes his head, having grown accustomed to your sarcastic remarks throughout your relationship, and anyway, you both know that he’s undoubtedly going to be the one making dinner and doing the dishes tonight.
“By the way, I feel like we should address the fact you’re totally sugar daddying me right now? I know it’s only groceries, but it’s still kind of hot.” You chide.
He mumbles something about how you have serious issues, and you're about to shoot him a quippy remark in response, until your breath gets stuck in your throat. Stowed away in the transparent pocket on the left hand side of his wallet, are two small pictures. One of his mum and dad, smiling happily at the camera; and another one of you.
You didn’t even know he’d taken the picture; you were on the beach, in the middle of laughing, probably at something he’d said, eyes looking over the camera, filled with nothing but love; so you were definitely staring at him. The picture had been folded at the edges so it would fit snugly into the pocket. Your heart melts, looking up from the wallet to stare at your fiancé.
He could feel your eyes on him, but his eyes didn’t move from the television; not thinking much of your gaze. “If you found the picture of me and my second family, I can explain.”
You don’t even laugh at his joke. You just clamber onto the sofa, your legs either side of his lap as you wrap your arms around his shoulders, pulling him in tight to you. Ultimately, you don’t really know why you’re so touched by the picture. You’re engaged, it’s not overly unique to have a picture of your fiancée in your wallet. However, when you saw the photo, you just couldn’t shake the overwhelming feeling of being totally completely adored and cherished by the love of your life. You felt so much love for the man, while you also felt incredibly loved by the man. “Hey, what’s all this about; you okay, baby?”
You nod, cupping his face into your hands as you shoot him one of the prettiest smiles he’s ever seen. “I love you. So much. You know that, right?”
He nods, a bemused grin painting his face as he laughs. He is completely lost, unsure of where this all came from, but he graciously accepts it anyway. “I know, honey. I love you too.”
SYNOPSIS : after hyunsuk lends you his blue crayon in elementary, you fell head over heels for him, which resulted in you confessing your undying love for him and stealing his first kiss when you two were just six. years pass and you two lose contact, but hyunsuk remembers the day very vividly and wishes himself a ‘happy anniversary’ every year, celebrating it as an inside joke.
on your 16th anniversary, as he blows out the candle on his cupcake, he wonders what you were doing and wishes to see you once again. who knew his wish would come true? that too, very soon as you walked into his university the very next day as a transfer student.
GENRE : college au, social media au, fluff, comedy-crack, best friends to strangers to lovers kinda (?)
PAIRING : performing arts major! choi hyunsuk x performing arts major! female reader
WARNING(S) : members aged up and down to match the ‘00, ‘01, ‘02 and ‘03 liners, swearing, please ignore times and dates on the pictures, there may be plotholes so yeah
HEADS UP : pictures used in the smau are in no way to give an idea about what y/n should look like! the pictures are merely used to show what the ongoing scene looks like and nothing more. will try not to include much pictures like that, but i hope you can forgive me for a few pics here and there!
RELEASE DATE : 22.02.2022
UPDATES : whenever i can
TAGLIST : open! just send me an ask!
PROFILES : brokeboisuk and co. || therapy kids
01 : HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO ME
02 : DREAMS COME TRUE
03 : SWIPER NO SWIPING
04 : YOU'RE STILL A TRAITOR
05 : CAUGHT THEM IN 144P 🤠📸
06 : YNSUK NEWS ; THE ANNAHOON FANSITE
07 : I'M FRYING HYUNSUK
08 : DANIEL 'DANNY' CHOI
09 : FAKE MARRIAGES AND STOLEN KISSES
10 : GROCERY SHOPPING AT 2AM
11 : THE ASAHI HATEPAGE WAS KIDNAPPED?!
12 : STAN TAYLOR NOONA
13 : ✨ MISSILE LAUNCHER ✨
14 : Y/N'S SUGAR DADDY AGENDA
15 : ROOMING WITH BROKE BOI SUK
chapters will be added later as the story progresses
synopsis: there’s nobody you detest more than park jongseong—he’s obnoxious, he’s rude, and he always manages to top you in every single class. while you pride yourself as one of the smartest students in your school, there’s something you can’t quite figure out the formula for—the explosive chemistry between you and your (hot) enemy.
characters: park jongseong x fem!reader
genres: romance, fluff, comedy, high school
au(s): academic rivals, “i wanna punch him except he’s really fucking hot fml” au, jay being an annoying, cocky asshole
contents: frenemies to lovers, constant bickering & banter, childish arguments, studying fluff, suggestive themes, smartass jay w brains
warnings: swearing, lowercase intended
a/n: my first jay fic! <3 my fav trope is enemies to lovers so i’ve been dying to write something like this T^T i legit had so much fun writing all the banter and felt the “frenemies” vibe was cute! anyway i really hope u guys enjoy it!! :>
MASTERLIST
❝ chapter one: piggy
❝ chapter two: baldie
❝ chapter three: buttfucker
❝ chapter four
❝ chapter five
please support me via liking, reblogging w tags & interacting! ♡ thank u sm for reading, hope u enjoy this one :> my other works can be found here.
synopsis: heeseung is not, by any measure, date-able. he’s dorky, he’s nerdy, and he does this weird thing where he snorts loudly every time he laughs. in fact, he loves everything that normal people are allergic to — computer science, collecting rare comic books, and birdwatching on the weekend.
given that you two have obviously nothing in common, you find yourself utterly flabbergasted when you receive a letter in your locker, on which heeseung has written, "hi. will you please teach me how to date?"
pairing: lee heeseung x fem!reader
genres: romance, comedy, fluff, high school | written series
au(s): nerd!heeseung, popular girl!reader, (kind of) fake dating, “nope. no. there is no fucking way i could ever be attracted to a boy that plays sudoku in star wars pajamas” au, cute opposites attract (!!!), light mutual pining angst
contents: a cinderella story in which you transform heeseung into a hot boy and start panicking bc you’re not supposed to be attracted to him but u are —or— you're the popular girl with a thousand insecurities and heeseung can see right through u
featuring: txt, itzy
warnings: swearing, mentions of drug use, lowercase intended, some suggestive scenes :>
kayla’s playlist (@miiiwaa) ♡ my shitty og playlist . tags : #.*triage .
a/n: this fic is solely inspired by hee's pics from the 2022 seasons greetings. screaming crying HEE IN GLASSES HAS ME IN CHAINS. anyway omg i hope u give this fic a chance! this is gna be wild ASDFKLJ i’m so excited for this :DD
please support me via liking, reblogging w tags & interacting! ♡ thank u sm for reading, hope u enjoy this one :> my other works can be found here. edit: thank u sm for all the love on the masterlist 🥺
❥ pairing: park jongseong (jay) x female reader
❥ genre: series, fluff, romance, angst & slightly suggestive, enemies to friends to lovers, slowburn, college!au, basketball player!jay, radio host!reader
❥ rating: pg-13
❥ warnings: will be included in each individual chapter
❥ status: ongoing
❥ update: thursdays @ 8 pm GMT
❥ word count: will add once completed
❥ synopsis: Y/N hosts a show on her university's radio where she listens to guests' concerns about their relationships and gives them advice. She is pretty much single and very much against dating. Why get your heart broken when you can live your life with it whole?
Jay is a popular guy who loves to break hearts just for fun. Or so, that's what he wants everyone to think. Things change when he is challenged by his teammate Heeseung to make Y/N fall in love with him in less than a month. Easy enough, right?
Except Jay doesn’t want to fall in love. And she couldn't care less about him or the possibility of having a relationship with him. Then what are these feelings he suddenly has towards her demanding him to call off the bet?
❥ A/N: The premise of this series is heavily inspired by the movie "She's All That" (1999). You might see similar themes/tropes from the movie portrayed in this series. This series is also inspired by this drabble I wrote a while ago for one of my Weekend Events!
❥ Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist to be notified whenever a new chapter is posted!
🏀Chapter List 🏀
[Chapter One - Make It A Bet]
[Chapter Two - Try Harder]
[Chapter Three - A Combination For Disaster]
[Chapter Four - Happy Mistakes]
[Chapter Five - Call It A Date]
[Chapter Six - Just A Kiss]
[Chapter Seven - Bitter Confessions]
[Chapter Eight - Strangers Again]
[Chapter Nine - What Hurts The Most]
[Chapter Ten - Make It Count]
[Chapter Eleven - Broadcast This Truth]
[Chapter Twelve - Where I Stand]
[Chapter Thirteen - Make It Happen]
[Chapter Fourteen - The Morning After]
[Chapter Fifteen - Win Some, Lose Some]
[Chapter Sixteen - Face Your Fears]
🏀Extras 🏀
[Spotify Playlist] 🏀
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. The representation given to the characters is not related to the people mentioned and should be taken as a work of fiction. This does not reflect my opinion nor the actions of the individuals in real life.
SYNOPSIS: you and jake sim have always been academic rivals. it was always you against him for top of the class, and jake is sure that you two were made to hate each other. a couple years later when you debut and become an idol, you find yourself talking to him again - but it’s in a group chat with other aussie idols, and perhaps you realise that he isn’t that insufferable.
PAIRING: idol! jake x idol! fem! reader
GENRE: smau, crack, enemies to lovers, slowburn kinda, idol au
WARNINGS: swearing, ignore timestamps, some alr debuted idols r in a group i created laughs, photos of ive’s yujin will be used as y/n only to visualise the outfit / concept
FEATURING: enhypen, lily of nmixx, felix and bang chan from skz, rosé from blackpink, yoon jia, kim doah and kamimoto kotone from gp999
TAGLIST: CLOSED
STATUS: ongoing
AUTHOR’S NOTE: helloooo here is the jake smau as promised!! my first smau for hyung line woooooooo LETS GAUR !! this is going to b a long one (40 chapters most likely!!) permanent taglist will already b tagged and thank u to sophie @chicksung for coming up w the title ^_^
PROFILES: ONE / TWO
ONE － jake?? fanta spiller jake??
TWO － 5th grade science fair
THREE － thank you wikihow
FOUR － passive aggressive communication
FIVE － hangout gone wrong
SIX － oscar winning performance
SEVEN － praying on my downfall
EIGHT － its going down
NINE － this is not slay
TEN － forget but not forgive
ELEVEN － jay my bff
TWELVE － eye twitches
THIRTEEN － star crossed haters
FOURTEEN － silly little people in my phone
FIFTEEN － mr bang pd-nim why
SIXTEEN － try not to argue challenge
SEVENTEEN － 247 what
EIGHTEEN － pure luck
NINETEEN － shocking development
TWENTY － ur not as bad as i thought
TWENTY ONE － selca…?
TWENTY TWO － think twice? i dont even think once
TWENTY THREE － disbandment era
TWENTY FOUR － hatred with a capital h
TWENTY FIVE － math olympiad
TWENTY SIX － hide from the cameras
TWENTY SEVEN － rumour rumour rumour
TWENTY EIGHT － oh shit
TWENTY NINE － buzzfeed quiz
THIRTY － giant question mark
THIRTY ONE － sunoo best wingman
THIRTY TWO － romance what?? no way
THIRTY THREE － call that chemistry
THIRTY FOUR － itslay
THIRTY FIVE － in a bro way
THIRTY SIX －u + me = ??
THIRTY SEVEN － thank u sungchan
THIRTY EIGHT － inkigayo sandwich
THIRTY NINE － yes or yes
FORTY － ur pretty cool
