DISCLAIMER!!!! please do not copy my dialogue or writing and pass it off as your own. i do spend a lot of time writing, so it’s very discouraging when i don’t even get recognition for my own work.
Charles Leclerc x Fem!Reader
4.8k words #sorry
Synopsis: A walkthrough of the lives you and Charles spend side by side before they finally intertwined
Author: Long time no see lol sorry, completely inspired by Taylor Swift's new song because I think it's the cutest most romantic thing ever, like "love has a way of bringing things back to life, all you said was hi" gtfo, no smut sorry I felt like it was too long already, love a man who yearns
"Charles, wait for me!" you yelled after him, knees green and smelling of wood and grass and the lollipop sticking out of your mouth. Your small legs push fast as you chase after him.
"Hurry up!" he calls back over his shoulder, "I'm going to winnnnn!" He throws you a grin and even then, your heart beats faster, but at this age you're sure it's normal.
"I didn't even wanna race!"
"Too bad!"
The sun is beginning to dip lower in the sky. Soon the blue will turn into red and orange and it'll be time for Charles to walk you home like he does nearly every day after you're done exploring kingdoms and making worlds. With everything left in your tired little body, you push your legs to catch up. You're too slow. You normally are with him. He's already sitting in the grass, looking up at the clouds.
"You know I hate racing," you say indignantly, lips sticky. "I lost my lollipop."
He grins at you, all chubby cheeks and green eyes, "Don't worry, I'll get you another one when we get home."
You huff, plopping down next to him. "Well, I don't want to go home yet."
"Me neither, but our mamans want us home before sunset."
"But, I'm having fun," you whine, even though you were just complaining.
And Charles, only a year older but so much bigger in your mind, stands up with a hand out to you. "We always have tomorrow."
You take his hand, the wind ruffling through your hair and your loose shirt, because yeah. We do always have tomorrow.
_____
Charles isn't around much anymore. He races now. Go-karts you think, but you're not really sure. You have other friends now. Girls from school who you have sleepovers and paint nails with and who can't possibly understand why Charles's absence feels wrong.
"He's my best friend," you tell them and they scrunch their eyebrows because girls should be best friends with girls and boys should be best friends with boys.
"But isn't his best friend a boy?" one of the girls asks, her blonde hair tied into a braid. "My brother has a best friend, and he's a boy."
She says it like it's something profound, and your chest twists. You and Charles are best friends, aren't you? You're pretty sure. But then again, when he's racing all day he's racing with other boys, not girls.
On the rare day he's free, he still comes over and asks your maman if you can play. Even if he's tired.
He nudges you, bare feet dipping into your pool. "Why are you so quiet? You're never quiet," he teases.
The heat is sweltering today, sweat prickling at your forehead. A shared bowl of watermelon has gone warm between you two. You look up from the ripples of the pool. Charles is a whole ten years old. That's double digits. Something you're still months from. Maybe he's too old to be best friends with girls now.
He's looking at you with those green eyes that make it feel like he's riffling through your brain, opening drawers and pulling back wallpaper. His cheeks aren't as chubby as yours and sometimes you feel like he's growing so fast you just can't catch up. "Do you have a best friend?"
"Yes," he grins, and he looks younger then. "Of course I do."
You look down at the pool again. Your toe nails are a sparkly pink and shine in the mid-afternoon sun. "Is it a boy?"
His face contorts into one of confusion, leaning in like he heard you wrong because, well, he must've. "Why would my best friend be a boy?"
"Because you're a boy."
He laughs then, like he knows so many things that you don't. Like the year between you has given him wisdom. "Girls and boys can be best friends. Who told you they can't?"
"My friends." Your voice is more of a mumble, and your cheeks feel like they're burning.
He scoots over on the edge of the pool until he's close enough to hit your leg with his, "You're my best friend. Not a boy or anyone else. We're always going to be best friends."
You look up at him, the sun gathering behind his head and weaving itself through his brown curls, and suddenly feel so silly. Of course you're always going to be best friends. How silly to think otherwise.
_____
Charles is seventeen now. Most days he looks like a man, but if you tilt your head just right you can still find the little boy you grew up with. You see it in his grin. In his laugh and the way he reaches for you when he does it. In his tear-rimmed eyes when he lost someone who was in the very career he was chasing.
It had been nine months since Jules crashed. Nine months since the Japanese Grand Prix. Nine months since Charles had a real conversation with him. He thought that when the time came, he'd be ready. He'd be expecting it. But it hurt all the same.
He holds your hand, staring blankly ahead while you stare at him searching for any sign that he's okay. Any sign that he's your Charles and not the empty vessel that's stood beside you for the past few months.
You're both in black while people talk softly around you. The service was beautiful. What a shame, he was a good man. Glasses clink and Charles stays silent, leg bouncing against the floor.
"Char," you say softly, but he winces like you'd screamed into his ear. He turns his head halfway toward you, and he looks older than his years. Aged in a way that made smiles lighter and frowns deeper.
You just sigh, holding his hand tighter. He squeezes it back. Just once and his voice is barely above a whisper. It's so soft you could've sworn you imagined it. "Maman wants me to stop."
"I know." And you don't beg him to quit or ask him if F1 is what he really wants because you already know the answer, and you would never take something like that away from him. "But you won't."
He almost cracks a smile. "But I won't."
_____
You and Charles don't talk as much now. Not to say you aren't friends because you'll always be friends, but things are different now. Distant. He's officially joined F1, and you're happy you really, truly are.
But things haven't been the same since your fight a while ago.
"Charles, I-I feel like you're leaving me behind!" you had said, frustration bleeding into your voice as you paced the floor of your childhood bedroom. A picture he had drawn you years ago still framed on your desk. A friendship bracelet you had made him in a different lifetime still on his wrist.
He ran his hands through his hair, looking up at you from his place on your bed. He's getting more handsome each day and sometimes it's so strong it sucks the air from your lungs and makes your stomach flip. His eyes are pleading, like he's afraid he might lose you too. "What would you have me do? Not go after what I've always wanted? I would never ask you to do that!"
"I'm not asking you to do that! You know I would never ask you to do that!"
"Then what are you asking? I'm trying to understand, I really am but you're being so difficult!"
"I don't know!" You say, exasperated. "I watch you go off from race to race, and I am so incredibly happy and excited for you. I know this is all you've ever wanted. I don't want to seem selfish, I just want to feel like I'm still something you want! Like I'm still important! Like I'm-"
His voice cuts you off, soft yet firm, "You are always something I want."
You stop abruptly, looking at him. Lines have crossed in the past few years and as much as you both pretend that it is, this is not the type of conversations that friends have. And friends don't kiss each other and never talk about it. And friends don't stare at each other and wonder what if?
But you two have done all of the above. And you're friends, right?
"I don't want you to quit F1," you sit on the bed next to him and he stares down at you like you're something holy. Like he's undeserving of you even as you argue and bicker. His heart leaps out of his chest as you grab his hand. It doesn't feel like this when he's with his girlfriend. The thought is shoved down before he can stomach it, before he can really mean it. "I'm sorry. I never meant to argue. I'm just scared Charles. I'm scared of losing you."
He leans his head against yours, "You'll never lose me."
He places a kiss on your head because he knows it's true, and you sigh softly because you've already lost parts of him, but you think you could afford to lose a few more if it's what he wants.
So now things are just...different. There's no loud crack or a clean break, just pieces that used to fit together finding out maybe they're not part of the same picture.
You still fly out to see his races with his family and he still hugs you afterwards like he used to. But now the races are further between and his girlfriend is sat ahead of you. She's lovely, you remind yourself when he presses a kiss to her lips, and your stomach feels sick.
You feel like you're falling behind. Like he's speeding ahead of you and once against you just can't quite catch up. The only time you're really aligned now is when he's lapping you. So why try?
Every race dwindles into only home races. You still watch. And when he wins? With that grin, sticky with champagne, and smiles directly at the camera like he's staring into your room, you still see that boy that you knew and the man that you're not sure you know.
You haven't properly talked to him in about a year. He's single now--not that you care--and exploring the world that seems promised to him. Texts are short and sweet:
Great win today, Charles. You deserve it
Thank you, mon amie
-
Are you coming to Monaco?
Can't make it this year, I'm sorry
No worries see you around
-
Maman told me you moved?
Yea got my own apartment
Nice, I'll have to visit next time I'm home
Look forward to it, be safe today
Always am
-
And you guess it's enough.
_____
The first time you saw him after it felt like he drove out of your life, the world stopped and began to spin backwards twenty years.
You’re sitting at the dining room table with his maman, laughing over a glass of wine in the very spot you spent so many nights coloring with Charles. Playing games with Charles. Growing with Charles. You and Charles may be different, but Pascale never is.
“Have you talked to him recently?” Her voice is light and careless, but her eyes are sharp.
You shake your head, feeling like your chest might explode at the very thought of him. Sometimes, when it’s late in your apartment and Monaco seems to quiet, you think of the first time he kissed you. It was years ago, on a late October day, when you both were still gangly and awkward. You remember his lips, so sure, like you were the one thing he never really had to think about. You look up at his maman, “No, not since a few months.” It had been a simple text:
She broke up with me, he had wrote. It was fresh and happened only minutes prior, but he needed you to know.
I’m sorry, Charles. Are you okay? Need to call?
I have qualifying soon, can’t right now
You typed: Thank you for telling me, and then deleted it because that felt too much like begging to be let in on any part he’d give you. Ok lmk, is what you settled on and that was that.
She frowns at you like she knows something you don’t, “Hm, you guys used to be so close.”
“I guess we just…grew apart. We have very different lives now, you know?” You look up at her, because she’s always known and there’s no reason to hide it from her. “I wish I could’ve just followed him sometimes. Jet from race to race and travel the world with him. But I never would’ve been happy. I never would be able to have a life of my own.”
She leans forward, rubbing your hand gently, and her face looks so much like his you think you could cry if you thought about it too much.
“You’ll find your way back,” her voice sure and motherly, filled with a life of love and loss, “When we lost his papa, the kids lost their father, but I lost my best friend. My Hervè. But he’s still here. He’s in smell of the sea and Charles’s smile and Arthur’s laugh and when I hug my babies, I can feel his arms around us. I see him in you, too.” She takes a deep steady breath, eyes filled with tears she hasn’t shed in a while, “My point is: love is never gone, mon bel ange. Even if you can’t find it, it is there.”
Your throat constricts, and you hope that one day, you can be even half as amazing as she is.
He comes in with a gust of early December wind, and you don’t even notice at first as Pascale’s gaze wanders over your shoulder with a small satisfied smile. Her hand doesn’t leave yours, like she knows you might need it until someone else’s can take her place.
When you’re both ready.
The door shuts softly behind him and all he can do is stare. Bag half off his shoulder, hair wind blown, eyes so green they look like the ocean, and he stares, as if a single blink would make you disappear like you were nothing more than a hazy dream or a distant memory. He had planned what he would say or do when he saw you, imagined how he would feel. Would it still be the same? Would his heart still clench and his eyes still soften? Would the air feel thinner and the world tilt on its axis? He found the answer is yes, to all of it. Charles turns his head to the side, you’re so you. So beautiful, so grown, so perfect. Your name leaves his lips softly, like it escaped from him in a breath.
You whip your head around, wine in the glass trembling with your hand. His eyes meet yours for the first time in a year and everything goes still. “Hi,” he says, but his pupils are blown and his voice is shaking. Because you look like how he left you to chase his dreams. Maybe older, a bit more sure of yourself? Of him? Who knows. But your eyes are the same that used to glare at him when he beat you at a game and your lips are the same ones that kissed him again, and again, and again in your teenage years.
“Charles,” you say, because there’s nothing else you really know. Love is never gone. And you see it. In his eyes, in his voice, in his face, in the shakiness of your breath, in the trembling of your hands.
You’re out of your seat somehow, and his arms are open like he’s been waiting for you. To catch up? Have you ever had to catch up, or have you always been there, right with him? Charles’s strong arms wrap around you, face pressed into your hair like he’d forgotten the smell of it.
“God, I missed you.” You squeeze your eyes shut at his words. Maybe love really is never gone. Maybe it takes on different forms.
_____
“It’s been awhile,” Charles says, hands in his pockets as you walk the town you both grew up in.
“Yeah,” you agree. He felt so far for so long, but seeing each other again felt the same. Like slipping into your favorite sweatshirt or hearing your old favorite song. So maybe, nothing had really ever changed. “It has. How are you holding up?”
Charles knits his eyebrows together, looking down at you with that handsome face you’d known before you knew yourself. “About what?”
It’s your turn to look confused, “The breakup?” They’d been together long enough for it to hurt. Long enough for you to imagine that those fairytale dreams you had as a child of living in a castle with Charles were hers all along.
“Oh. Right. I’m good,” he shrugs, cheeks turning pink in a way he can’t exactly blame on the wind biting at any bit of skin it can find.
The breakup had been…not the worst thing. They had both known it was inevitable, but hanging on is easier than letting go. It came to a silent end, like a ball finally rolling to a stop.
“I’m not her, Charles,” she had said.
“I never asked you to be,” he replied.
“But you want me to be.”
And that was it. No loud fanfare, no wracking sobs, just a single sentence that felt both like a punch to the gut and the most eye opening awakening. Because well, didn’t he want her to be you? Didn’t he want her to laugh the way you do? Didn’t her eyes remind him of yours? Didn’t he have to catch himself from saying your name? God he was an asshole.
“It really wasn’t that big of a deal. Long time coming. She was just the only one who had the courage.” Another casual shrug, even though his hands are clenched in his pockets to stop from shaking. To him, it almost feels like a confession. Like you can see right through his words and you know exactly why they broke up.
“Oh, I didn’t realize. I guess we haven’t really talked in a while,” you reply, giving him a sympathetic look that makes his chest twist as you turn right into a coffee shop.
He steps ahead, firm hand grabbing the door for you as a bell chimes. “Let’s talk about you. What have you been up to?”
You shrug and something deep inside of you settles. A year apart, but everything has clicked back into place. There’s no distance or lingering resentment, just two people who don’t know how to do anything else but orbit each other. “Work’s been work, so nothing crazy. I went on a trip to Iceland with my friends, that was fun. Mainly just hanging around. I usually go to yours on Friday nights to have dinner with your maman. I have a little routine, things are simple.”
He smiles softly at you.
“What?” You grin nervously.
A shrug, “Just missed you.” Then he turns, ordering your favorite drink that he still seems to know as easy as counting.
Ok what the fuck does that mean? Did he say that strange? That sounded strange.
But he turns around, and everything brightens and dulls at once.
_____
Charles shows up to dinner on Friday. Which is fine, it’s his childhood house, but it’s strange because first he knocks on the door. Knocks. On the door to the house he grew up in. You don’t even knock. Then he comes in, drowning in four bouquets of flowers and wrestling with his jacket. You stare in disbelief at the door, peering back to look at his maman who is just as confused.
“Ah, my girls,” he grins, finally hanging up his coat. He’s dressed in a green sweater you bought him years ago and a pair of jeans. The first bouquet goes to his maman, delivered with a kiss on the head. Then his attention turns to you.
He gives you one bouquet first. It’s filled with beautifully full roses and absolutely gorgeous. You appreciate the gesture even though they’re not your favorite, but your maman's-
“For your maman,” he says softly and then when you set those down he hands you two bouquets of lilies. “For you. They’re still your favorite?” He teases, because he knows they would never not be.
You stare up at him in complete silence, but he can read your face better than anyone else. Charles leans down, kissing your head, your forehead, your nose, as your eyes start to sting. You have so much love for him, you don’t know where you put it, how to store it all.
“Thank you,” you waver.
His forehead is on yours, “Of course. You know I love you.”
And you nod because you obviously know he loves you and because this is 100% what friends do. Clearly nobody else has ever had a friend like Charles.
“I love you.”
He smiles, slinging an arm over your shoulder. It’s enough for now. “Come, let’s put them in water.”
_____
F1 doesn’t wait for anyone. Charles of all people knows that, but recently the days ticking down until the next race has felt like a sentence. It’s late. A light drizzle falling over Monaco as he sits in his apartment with his head in his hands. What is wrong with him? This is what he wants. He knows that. So why does it feel…wrong?
The little voice in his head that has always sounded suspiciously like yours whispers, it’s because you never imagined your dreams without her.
Ah. There it is. It stings like a cut. Aches like a tender bruise being prodded. It’s true. Every time he gets in the car, he’s thinking of you. He’s thinking of making it home to you. He’s thinking of winning for his family, his maman, the memory of his papa, his brother, your maman, you.
Great. Just great. This is not what he needed because what if you’re not ready to hear it? What if you need time he can’t give you? What if you…don’t want him? It doesn’t really matter though because it’s so suffocating that if he doesn’t do something soon he’s going to drown in the waves of you.
“Charles what are you doing?”
He’s leaning against the door frame of your apartment like this has always been his space. “I told you I’d come visit your apartment, no?” His eyebrows are raised with a cocky grin, but he’s slightly wet from the rain, and his chest heaves faster than normal.
You squint at the time on your stove, and he takes you in. Pajama pants and a shirt you had stolen from him years ago, hair messily over your shoulder. “When you said that I wasn’t expecting almost midnight.” You move from the door to let him in. You always would.
He slips off his shoes, following you to the couch. Your apartment is nice. Clean, comfortable, smells like you. It’s the kind of place he can imagine coming home to. His leg begins to bounce.
You give him a strange glance, “Are you like possessed or something?”
He laughs but it sounds strangled, “Do you have water?”
You nod, eyebrows furrowed. What the fuck? Is he actually possessed because he kinda ignored the question. The air in the kitchen feels less tight, confirming your theory that he brought that tension with him and it’s currently sitting in your living room.
You nearly drop the glass when you find him pacing in front of the large window overlooking the streets of Monaco. You set it down on the coffee table with a soft clink, and his eyes snap over to yours, one finger over his lips in thought. His mouth opens, and then shuts and then-
“Charles? You’re making me nervous.” You risk a few steps closer. Up close he’s even more devastatingly beautiful, a light dust of freckles and facial hair and an inherent longing he seemed to be born with. The lights of Monaco shine behind him, painting him in a soft glow of oranges and yellows like the sky you used to play under. Once again he looks holy, like he’s gracing the Earth with his presence. Like he could be anywhere in the universe and he chose to be here.
He looks away from you and gnaws on his lip. “I have to tell you something.”
You tilt your head to try to catch his eye, “Ok? Are you feeling alri-”
“Are you ready?”
You come to an abrupt stop, “Am I ready? For what? What are you-”
“Are you ready?”
This time it sounds so much deeper. Are you ready? You get the certain feeling that your answer is incredibly important. That he’s not just asking if you’re ready to hear what he has to tell you, but rather if you're ready to deal with the consequences together. Despite your nerves, you jump because if you’re going to take a risk, Charles seems like the right person to do it with.
“Yes.”
It’s silent. So silent you can hear the shakiness of his breath and the beat of your heart. What is going on? Is he ok? Is he in trouble? Oh my god, did he commit a crime? Holy shit what if he killed someone and now he’s confessing? What if-what if someone’s hurt? Or sick or-
The dread pools in your stomach, rising through your chest.
“Char-”
“I love you.”
“I love you too?”
“No, mon amour. I love you.”
Oh? Oh. Oh my god. Oh. Is it hot in here? It feels hot doesn’t it? You sit on the back of your couch in the sanctuary you’d built without him.
Your name leaves his lips soft and broken, tears welling in his eyes. “Please.”
He’s runs his hands through his hair. He’s fucked everything hasn’t he? Was this too much? He’s rushing you isn’t he? He should’ve slowed down. Should’ve made sure you were on the same page. This was really unfair wasn’t it? He had time to mull it over. He had time to come to his senses and stomach his feelings. He had time to pick them apart and put them back together. Then he came here and decided you had to do that now. He’s moved too fast, yet again. He’s not letting you catch up. He’s not-
“Charles,” your eyes water and your hands shake as you stand in front him. You feel bare, like you’re stripped down to your very cells. “I love you.”
He stops, the world tilts, time goes backwards. You’re five and six playing in the field, and you can always play again tomorrow. You’re nine and ten, and he’s telling you that you’re always his best friend. You’re fourteen and fifteen, and he’s kissing you for the first time. You’re sixteen and seventeen, and he’s holding onto your hand as he navigates the sea of grief. You’re twenty and twenty-one, and he tells you that you’re always something he wants. You’re twenty-three and twenty-four, and he’s confessing his love for you in the world you built for yourself—but there’s always room for him.
His hands are on your face, pulling you into him. Charles’s shaking hands trace your face, like he hasn’t memorized all of it at every stage in your life. Your hands come to rest on his forearms. His eyes are a deep green in the light, and you get sucked into them. “I love you, Charles.”
He lets out a noise that sounds almost like a sob, and his lips are on yours. It’s not like before. It’s not like sneaking kisses in your teenage years, awkward and filled with things neither one of you knew how to say. It’s sure. It’s honest and raw. It’s you sharing a lifetime of love. It’s him loving the way your knees were always stained with grass, and it’s you loving when he would sneak lollipops out of the house. It’s him loving how you’ve always held him together, and you loving how he’s always pulled you apart.
One hand drifts from your face to your waist, and he squeezes just because he can now. You hands feel his heart pounding against his chest like it’s trying to crawl home to you. He shivers as your hands wander over the broad expanse of his shoulders and tangle with the curls at the nape of his neck.
There’s still a lot to discuss. Still a lot to figure out and compromises to be made and plans to be formed, but you knew him all those years ago, and you know him now. So you know you’ll figure it out together.
summary: johnny storm is on a mission to woo the newest addition to the space crew, who doesn't seem to like him very much. it almost works. almost. (10.8k words)
pairing: johnny storm / f!reader
contents: strangers to lovers, enemies to lovers, fluff, angst, grumpy x sunshine (grump!reader), johnny can't flirt to save his life, cw for very brief mentions of blood and gore, space sex, dry humping, smut 18+, mdni!!!
A long, long time ago, before bodies were ever invented, the atoms of all living things existed in the stars. Humans were, at their core, nothing more than an inherent act of defiant creation — just a bunch of tiny solar systems pretending to be people. At least, that’s what you preferred to believe anyway, ‘cause the comforting thought eases your worries about your own misgivings. Restless, removed, reclusive.
Because, of course, you can’t sleep when the stars are whispering your name. Of course, no one will ever know you quite as well as the moon, when it had known you long before man ever did. Of course, you’re so often filled with a celestial-like solitude when you were never meant to be in this world to begin with, and fell into it completely by happenstance.
The vast infiniteness of the universe reminds you, every day, of how small you are. And every day, it reduces you to a starry-night sort of silence.
Johnny Storm struggles to approach you accordingly. He knew you only distantly, like all heavenly bodies are meant to be known. All he knew of you was that you were a professor — the first of your kind, a colleague of Reed’s, and a scientist whose accolades had caught his sister’s attention. Such vague descriptions did little to capture your beauty, a youthful and quiet sort of charm. As lovely as the stars and perhaps as lonesome as them, too.
And how was he meant to talk to the girl with the galaxy in her eyes? It’s a question he hasn’t quite figured out the answer to yet. But he’s damn sure going to try.
“How well do you know him?” is the first thing Johnny thinks to ask, while the group of soon-to-be astronauts squeeze into their all-white ventilation garments.
You give him a deadpan look in return, clad only in a black tank top and a pair of spandex shorts, as you tug the skin-tight fabric up your legs.
You don’t know Johnny Storm all that well, just that he’s Sue’s younger brother and a pretty damn good engineer. But, in the few short days you’ve gotten to know him, you’ve noticed his strange penchant for covering his awkward tenderness with a feigned sort of arrogance. He’s obviously still getting used to this new world, and the subsequent attention that comes with being among the first people in space — aptly called the Saturn Five.
You figure he’s not yet accustomed to the sudden adoration from the public, and so he’s forced to improvise accordingly.
“How well do I know…?” you trail off.
“Oh, right. Yeah—” the blonde boy stammers, laughing softly at himself.
Your emotionless stare never wavers.
Johnny’s cheeks flare. “My— My brother-in-law, I mean. Reed.”
“Not well,” you answer in a detached monotone and drag the white sleeve up the length of your arm. “Mostly by reputation.”
Johnny scoffs and drags his garment over his freckled shoulders, lean torso straining against the fabric of his thin t-shirt. “And you still decided to show up?” he quips.
You don’t share his amused smile. You rarely ever do. Never, actually. Most of the time, Johnny can’t tell if you realize he’s joking or if you just don’t care.
Now, you just nod in response and answer his rhetorical question in a single word. “Yes.”
Johnny nods to himself, too, and pulls the silver zipper of his suit up his chest. “Yeah, no. I get it. Reed’s a pretty good guy, I guess— But I’m just here to make sure my sister doesn’t do anything, honestly,” he confesses in a breathy chuckle. “…What about you?”
“What about me?” you repeat with pinched brows, tugging on the other sleeve.
“What are you in for?” Johnny wonders with a playful squint in his light blue eyes — the exact color of the sky at two o’clock on a Wednesday afternoon, or the color of the ocean at exactly 33 meters deep. “‘Cause I know it’s not just because you like my company, Doc.”
“I don’t know,” you shrug. “To change the world, I guess.”
“That’s all, huh?” he laughs.
You nod once. The zipper whizzes quietly as you drag it up to your neck. “That’s all,” you answer in a monotone before turning on your heel and walking away.
Johnny’s footsteps echo through the expansive launch facility as he rushes to catch up with you. He walks a little too close for your liking, enough for you to feel the warmth radiating from his pale skin and to smell the vanilla-tobacco cologne on his long neck.
His broad shoulder brushes yours with every quick stride down the white brick corridor, moving in extra close every time you pass by bustling scientists in lab coats or clunking machines that didn’t exist to the world a year or more ago.
“I wasn’t— I wasn’t prying too much back there, was I?” he frets with furrowed brows, ocean eyes swimming with concern as he ducks to look at you.
You don’t share his gaze as you hum in a detached tone of voice, “I don’t know. Were you?”
“Yeah, maybe,” Johnny sighs with a shrug. “Half-and-half, I guess— Prying and, for selfish reasons, genuinely concerned for your wellbeing.”
You stop suddenly in the middle of the narrow hallway. Johnny stumbles on his feet beside you. A group of doctors walk down the corridor, then — a gaggle of men with heavy glasses on their noses and clipboards in their weathered hands. He has to take an extra step closer to you to let them pass by.
His chest brushes yours at the dwindling proximity, which seems to affect him far more than it does you. The scent of your perfume makes him dizzy; something fruity, like a raspberry, maybe. Far sweeter than the way you glare at him now.
“Concerned about what?”
“Well, I just mean it’s— It’s one thing for Reed to rope all of us idiots into his crazy plan, you know? We’ve all known him for years, we already know he’s crazy,” Johnny laughs, only partly joking. “But you’re…”
“What? A stranger?”
“Normal,” Johnny corrects before shrugging. “Well, actually, pretty would’ve been my first choice, but… tomato, tom-ah-to, right?”
He flashes you a crooked pink smile then, which would’ve made any other girl swoon at his feet — a proven theory he’s tested at several bars since he became known as Johnny Storm, faithful member of the heroic Saturn Five. But you don’t even blink, totally unmoved by his charm (or lack thereof).
Johnny sighs and drops his head. He finally lets go of all the boyish theatrics he thinks for some reason he needs, which you’re grateful for.
“Look… If something were to happen to us up there, I think I could stomach that, you know— It’d be awful, obviously, but we’d handle it. Like we always do…” He trails off, button eyes round and full of a distant worry that sends him rambling before he can stop it. “But this… This is dangerous stuff, Doc. And Reed knows it. And he shouldn’t have recruited anybody else, but he did, and if something happened to you… I don’t think I’d forgive myself.”
You’re slightly moved by his admission, though you don’t show it on your face.
“Well, I guess, it’s a good thing nothing’s gonna happen up there.”
You turn to walk away again, and Johnny nearly trips over his own feet to stay in stride with you. “Hold on. Just— Just one more question, alright?”
“I’m going on this mission, Johnny Storm.”
“It’s not that—” he insists, voice breaking slightly at the use of his full name.
Even despite your not-so-subtle bitterness towards him, he thinks he hears something strikingly soft in your voice. It’s something almost tender, and perhaps only in his head, which gives his name a brand new meaning. You make it sound like everyone else has been saying his name wrong his whole life.
“I was just going to ask if you wanted to maybe hang out later, by the way, hypothetically,” Johnny rambles, talking wildly with his hands.
You notice his panicked gesturing from the corner of your eye, and how quickly he tucks his anxious fingers underneath his strong arms when he crosses them over his chest. He thinks he almost catches you smiling before you swallow it back down again a second later.
“I’m a little tied up here, actually,” you tell him, though it comes out too monotoned to sound like the half-joke you meant it as.
“Oh. Right. Yeah, me too…” Johnny nods, trying to play it cool despite his stammering.
You enter the main lab side-by-side for your daily check-ups. The rest of the Saturn Five are already waiting for you there. Ben, Reed, and Sue all sit next to each other on their exam tables, hooked to a series of buzzing machines which draw their blood into crimson tubes hanging at their side.
Johnny trails like a puppy behind you, brows raised and eyes glittering in a sheepish sort of look. “So, what about tomorrow, then?”
“Leave her alone, Johnny,” Sue calls across the room with a knowing smile on her face, always inherently gentle in her way, but still teasing like all older sisters are entitled to be.
The blonde boy gapes in response as he stammers, “I’m— I’m not even doing anything!”
“You’re bothering her.”
“I am not!” he argues instinctively, then flashes you a worried ocean-eyed look. “Am I?”
“I don’t know. Are you?” you shrug, as unenthusiastic as ever.
Johnny smacks his lips against his teeth. “Yeah, that’s not helpful—”
“She’s our lead astrophysicist, Johnny—” Reed reminds playfully from his wife’s side, olive skin growing sticky and pale as the nurse takes his blood. (He’s more frightened by needles than the unknown emptiness of outer space. It’s weird.) “—Which is code for: she’s way too busy for you.”
“Too pretty, more like,” Ben scoffs from beside the older man.
Johnny’s face screws in offense, which only makes them laugh harder at the stupid joke — even if it is sort of true. When you part from him to head to your own station, Johnny thinks he hears you laughing at it, too. A quiet, breathy sound that’s more of an exhaled breath than anything, but still a laugh nonetheless.
“Oh, really?” he huffs dramatically, ‘cause he’s been trying to get you to smile for three whole days now. “That’s what gets you?”
Your last night on planet Earth is spent talking to the moon, crescent-shaped and gleaming. It tells you not to worry, though not exactly with words. It just holds you in its gentle glow and reminds you that you aren’t leaving anything behind, that there isn’t anything new you could possibly discover in the vast infiniteness of space. Because the universe was your first ever home in truth, billions and billions of years ago, and now it’s calling you back.
Like a childhood room you only see on holidays, frozen in time like you never even left it.
That’s how Johnny finds you — at an ungodly hour of the early morning, standing in the center of the worn sidewalk, bathed in the neon hues of the bright city square that never sleeps. You drown in your cable-knit sweater, arms crossed over your chest and fingers tucked away in a feeble attempt to hide from the early spring chill. You keep your chin tilted towards the sky, and your eyes trained on something far away.
He wonders if there’s something up there only you can see. That’s how you tend to look at the world, anyway, like you’re keeping all of its secrets.
“Where do you think it ends?” Johnny blurts, always so wrapped up in his own head that he tends to continue inward conversations rather than start brand new ones.
You’re unstartled by the suddenness of his arrival, ‘cause you felt him behind you long before he ever had to announce it — consumed immediately by his palpable body heat, along with the minty aftershave and sea-salt bodywash on his skin from a fresh shower.
“Why do you ask such vague questions?” you snap in return, as harsh as the late winter chill.
It’s your basic primal instinct to be annoyed by his presence, like the rage is hardwired into you. The simmering embers of misplaced anger in your chest are quickly snuffed out by the rolling breeze of a lingering winter, which bites mercilessly at your cheeks and the tip of your nose. Something primitive in the back of your mind subconsciously wishes he’d come closer then.
When you turn to glare at the blonde boy over your shoulder, you find him donned in a fitting long-sleeve tee and a baggier pair of plaid pajama pants. His strong, shaven chin is tilted upward, and his sleep-swollen gaze is pointed to the sky like yours once, only it’s a lot more annoying when he does it.
Johnny laughs on a quiet, exhaled breath. “I mean, where do you think the sky ends and eternity begins?” he repeats, a question that has plagued him for some days now.
He’s tormented by the thought of a thin, black veil — one which separates the only home humans have ever known from an emptiness that goes on endlessly in every direction. Is space just dark and dead and doomed? his mind rages. Is everything worth marvelling at just here on Earth?
“100 kilometers above sea level,” you answer instantaneously. “Approximately, anyway.”
Johnny’s head snaps in your direction. “What?”
“100 kilometers above sea level,” you repeat like it’s obvious. “That’s where the Earth’s atmosphere separates from outer space—”
A laugh sputters suddenly past Johnny’s pink mouth. The boyish sound echoes through the empty city square, which is only filled now by your bodies and flashing neon signs.
A deep frown settles between your brows in return. “Why are you laughing?”
“I’m not,” he insists despite his chuckling. “I swear, I’m not—”
Your eyes narrow at him while his lighter ones glimmer with a newfound life. His cheeks flare a faint pink color from his poorly held-back laughter and the unforgiving late-night chill. He balls a pale fist in front of his mouth to hide how wide he’s smiling.
“It’s a fact—”
“No. I know, I just… I needed that, I think…” Johnny confesses before dragging in a much-needed breath; his first good one all night, maybe. “I’ve just been so in my own head lately, you know? With a bunch of existential stuff from the launch, I guess. I think I just needed to get out of my head for a second, so… Thanks—”
“I didn’t say it to make you feel better,” you snap.
Johnny smiles in the face of your glowering. “Yeah, I know that, too… I’m pretty sure you’re physically incapable of lying.”
“Okay, well, that’s just not true,” you scoff. Not because he’s totally wrong, but because you don’t need him thinking he knows a single thing about you — even if you have spent every day of the past year together.
“Really? Johnny hums with a knowing smile, crossing his arms over his toned chest as he takes a daring step closer. “Then tell me something nice.”
You swallow hard at the dwindling proximity between you. His body heat is all-consuming, swaddling you in a blanket of warmth and tenderness without trying. Whatever the sun is made out of, I think your soul might be made of it, too — those are the first words that rise like bile in your throat. Or your heart, maybe, and you’ve just got sunlight running like fire through your veins.
“Your eyes are very blue,” you observe in a monotone instead. “Like, the kind of blue where it starts to get a little scary if I look at you too long.”
Johnny’s plush grin widens. A big, boyish smile that moves everything inside of you — a flame that melts your body and turns your bones to ash, lighting up all the dark corners.
“And how long did you have to stare at me to figure that one out, Doc?”
“Why does everything have to be some kinda flirtatious remark with you?”
“Because sometimes I can’t tell if you’re flirting with me or starting a fight, so I just assume it’s both.”
“Well, I’m definitely not flirting with you, Johnny Storm—”
“Oh, definitely not…”
“—Flirting is for children. We have a job to do.”
“Right,” he nods in a playfully solemn voice, with a wide smile and a sparkling look in his button eyes. “It’s very serious.”
You shake your head and turn away, headed back towards the towering skyscraper that overlooks the entire city — where you’ll spend your very last night on Earth before you’re seeing it from a space shuttle.
“I hate you,” you grumble as you go.
Johnny’s shoes scuff the pavement as he trails slowly behind you. “No, you don’t…” he lilts under his breath as he follows you inside, blanketed immediately by the warmth of the Baxter Building.
The boy spends his last few hours on the planet pondering not what separates his world from the immeasurable cosmic, but rather how disturbingly thin the veil is between hating someone and loving them.
Nylon for the base. Spandex for mobility. Urethane for the pressure. Nomex for high temperatures. Mylar for the heat loss.
As Johnny helps dress you in the clunky blue and white space suit, you imagine each differing chemical coming together, resulting in a unique mixture that will (hopefully) prevent you from dying the moment you break through the atmosphere. All per Johnny Storms’ blueprint.
“How’s it fit?” the blonde boy wonders aloud from where he stands behind you, latching the last buckle around your back. He gives it one sharp tug just to make sure it stays in place, and you sway softly on your feet to keep your balance.
You nod once. “Good.”
“Better than the last one?” he asks with a smile evident in his voice, knowing that his first trial of spacewear was a complete and utter nightmare. It was too tight in some places, too loose in others, and failed not just one but two fire safety tests. That was about a year ago now. You’d like to think you have a little bit more faith in him these days.
“Anything would be better than the last one,” you scoff.
“Rude,” Johnny frowns.
You spin on the heel of your boot to face him and momentarily falter at how close he is to you. You take a sudden step back from him, like someone jerking away from an open flame. You turn away from his prying gaze and motion to his personalized suit still hanging on the display.
“Do you want help?” you offer unenthusiastically despite yourself.
“Nah,” Johnny declines, shaking his head and crossing his strong arms over his chest. His biceps strain against the tight fabric of his ventilation garment. “I got it. You go ahead.”
Your eyes narrow in a challenging squint. “You said it was a two-person job.”
“Because I wanted to help you,” he shrugs with his cheek tilted to his shoulder. “And I knew you wouldn’t have let me otherwise—”
“So you lied?”
“No, I… slightly misrepresented the truth in order to spend a little extra time with you…” Johnny corrects, blue eyes squinted as he carefully chooses each word. He smiles at the scowl you give him, “…Shoot me.”
“I’ve been meaning to, actually,” you deadpan and turn away.
You hear Johnny snickering behind you as you leave, like he finds something strangely sweet in the empty threat.
He likes it best when you’re mean — he thinks you’re gentlest that way, tender like a green and yellow bruise that’s still healing. The kind you dig your thumb into and revel in the pleasurable soreness you find below the skin. You’re like that, in a way. A delicate lover somewhere deep down in the bruising enemy you’ve decided to be.
Down the windowless corridor and through a set of heavy metal doors, you find the hangar bustling with unfamiliar faces and bulky cameras. The muffled chatter erupts into a thousand droning voices as you enter the room. A visibly anxious and already suited-up Reed Richards stands at the head of it, at the very center of the hounding press.
You freeze in place as the door clicks shut behind you. Your presence gains the attention of the media personnel across the hangar. You cower under their prying eyes and flashing cameras.
“What is this?” you wonder aloud, to no one in particular.
Reed hesitates for a moment, mouth agape and dark eyes wide, as his brain tries to figure out how to answer your question and the hundred others shouted his way. So, he just walks to your side instead, and the gaggle of journalists and photographers follow like so many ducklings behind him.
“This is Doc— Our in-house cosmologist and astrophysicist,” the older man announces as he stands at your side. He puts a gloved hand on your shoulder, almost apologetically so, like he’s trying to silently convey that he hates all this just as much as you do. His fake smile wavers slightly after having been plastered on his face for so long. “If anyone knows what’s waiting for us up there, it’ll be her.”
“I didn’t consent to this—” you deadpan, flinching at the blinding camera flashes.
Your protest gets buried under a barrage of questions shouted at you from every direction. Each member of the press is trying to be heard over the person standing next to them, who is trying to be heard over the person standing next to them. It’s an unforgiving cycle that fills the expansive room with chaos.
“How did the two of you meet?!” a newswoman questions into a bulky microphone from where she stands before a large news camera.
“At Colombia—” Reed answers, faltering briefly when the rest of the Saturn Five walk into the room behind him. Sue, Johnny, and Ben enter wearing their own customized spacesuits. The older man locks eyes with his wife almost immediately, who flashes him a sympathetic smile in return.
Johnny waits for you to look at him, too. He thinks he’s spent the better part of the past year just waiting for you to look at him. Because, most times, he sees you before he’s seen anything else in any given room.
Reed, realizing his sudden silence, stumbles over himself to continue. “Uh, Doc was giving a lecture on black holes, I believe it was, and I—”
“Cosmic radiation,” you correct bluntly.
“…What?”
“I wrote a book on the Black Hole Paradox, but I never taught the Black Hole Paradox,” you ramble in a detached monotone. “We met after a lecture I gave on cosmic radiation— specifically the idea that cosmic rays can penetrate the body and alter its molecules, leading to extreme genetic mutations, which can be passed down for generations.”
For perhaps the first time since security allowed the press into the hangar, silence fills the all-white room. You tend to have that effect on people. On everybody, it seems, except for—
“See what I mean?” Johnny says with a wide grin, relatively unfazed by the hundreds of cameras pointed his way. The lenses follow his every move as he walks to stand beside you, throwing a heavy arm around your shoulder. “Best damn cosmetologist I ever met,” he blunders unknowingly, but with a crooked pink smile that’s hard to say no to.
“Cosmologist,” you correct without taking your emotionless stare off the camera zoomed into your face.
You duck from beneath Johnny’s arm and shove through the crowd of media personnel, heading for the doctors waiting on the other side. The blonde boy takes the sudden attention with ease — he’s gotten all too used to it over the past year.
“She’s the prettiest one, too,” he jokes into the news camera, with a gloved hand cupping the side of his mouth like he’s telling some sort of secret. “But don’t tell her I told you.”
The fiberglass helmets are made of a thick polycarbonate, which Reed’s spent several years perfecting for this very mission. One of the many nurses slides it over your head and locks it into place. The amber-tinted visor, designed to reflect thermal radiation, paints the white building in so many shades of flaxen gold.
Johnny stands beside you — because he’s always somehow right beside you — and turns his heavy head to look at you when the doctor locks his helmet into place. The tinted glass dullens his ocean-eyed gaze and muffles his voice when he asks you, “Remember that date I asked you on?”
“Which one?” you deadpan.
“Any of ‘em?” he shrugs. “Is it too late to hash that out, you think?”
“Well, you can’t exactly take me out for coffee now, can you?”
A pink smile curls from behind his thick, glass visor. “Well, we get back in two weeks, Doc. I’ll have plenty of time to take you out for coffee then.”
“Trust me, Johnny Storm, you’ll be sick of me in two weeks.”
His laugh is muffled, but no less cherry-colored. “I’ve seen you every day for the past year, Doc,” he argues. “If I’m not sick of you by now, I don’t think I’m ever gonna be.”
It makes you frown. You don’t understand why he’s lying. ‘Cause you are, by nature, a rather demanding creature. You’re moody, cynical, and sometimes cruel. You’re at times totally untangible, and at others extremely unreasonable. You’ve intentionally made it very difficult to love you because you’ve spent many years not knowing men to be kind.
But Johnny — perhaps obliviously, and led only by his unbridled curiosity — longed to be close to you despite his inherent softness, and despite all your metaphorical barbs.
“Coffee, then?” you monotone without a glance his way, lest he see the vulnerability swimming in your gaze. “When we get back, I mean.”
Johnny glows at a moment’s notice. His button eyes widen in a not-so-subtle look of shock as his pink mouth falls softly agape. ‘Cause, sure, he’s been trying to get you to like him every day for the past three-hundred-sixty-five of them, but he didn’t expect it to happen so suddenly. Or at all, really.
He nods beneath his helmet, rapid and boyish, and smiles at you far wider than you think he realizes. “It’s a date, Doc—”
The comms built into your helmet hiss as they crackle to life. Johnny flinches as his sister’s voice comes through the faint static. “Comms check. Everybody sound off,” Sue instructs from his other side, flashing her baby brother a knowing look.
“Check,” Reed nods.
Ben salutes with two fingers pressed to his forehead, over his rounded glass helmet. “Check, check.”
A cameraman moves down the line as each of you speaks. The chunky gadget sits heavy on his broad shoulder as he squints into the rubber eyepiece of the viewfinder, zooming into each of your faces.
“Check,” Johnny says with a nod in his direction, always so painfully casual.
The cameraman settles finally on you. He looks at you through the lens as though it were a third eye, and your face screws with a subtle scowl. “Tell this man to get his camera out of my face,” you answer in a flat voice.
Sue’s pretty laugh sounds through the static. “Comms are live.”
The large hangar door whirs slowly open. Early morning daylight bathes the room in shades of orange-gold. The Excelsior towers before you, sleek and silver and shimmering in the soft sunlight. The five of you walk in a line up the steep tarmac, inching closer to what will become your new home for the next several days.
Reed reaches for Sue’s hand before they pass the threshold. “Good luck kiss?” he offers, already leaning in towards her.
“Maybe just one for the road,” the older woman grins.
Their lips pucker for a kiss, but their fiberglass helmets bump audibly together instead. They laugh about it, anyway, as the double doors to the shuttle part with a faint hiss.
Johnny turns expectantly to you then, eyes round and silently hopeful. Your scoff crackles through his comm. “In your dreams, space-boy,” you deadpan and walk on ahead of him.
“Ouch…” Ben winces playfully in response as he enters ahead of the blonde boy.
Johnny shrugs off the rejection with a slow nod. “Rain check, then.”
You still remember that strange liminal space between high school and university, where they called you overtly ambitious like it were synonymous with the word bitch. No one had been to space before, let alone a woman, and very few of your kind were able to break into the astronomy field at all. Therefore, no one was quite inclined to believe that you’d be the first among them to be truly successful.
Why don’t you just settle down? they huffed impatiently, like your life wasn’t just beginning. The best way for your kind to contribute to society is to be a mother— Everyone knows that.
That was, of course, before you were pictured on the cover of the Times with the rest of the Saturn Five — wherein you were described in print as ‘perhaps the most eminent female astrophysicist of our time.’
You were among the first of women to earn a degree in the field, and the first ever to receive your doctorate from the same university. You were the first female faculty member of Columbia’s astrophysics program — an assistant professor for some excruciating months, until it became rather grating to take orders from men four times your age. Sometime thereafter, and despite all the odds, you were the first female full-time astrophysics professor.
Such accolades inevitably caught Sue Storm’s attention. She liked your persistence, and Reed Richards liked your mind. And somewhere between then and now, you were recruited to become one of the first ever humans to experience the uncharted terrain of outer space.
As you strap into your seat on the Excelsior, you can’t help but wonder about who you’re living behind, and what those who doubted you must think of you now — if they marvel at what you’ve accomplished, or if they pity you still for trying so hard to break the mold.
“Final check and check, please,” Sue instructs through comms, from where she navigates between the two pilots.
Each of your voices crackles through speakers in return, and only then does Ben initiate the ignition sequence. You watch from behind him as he presses a series of buttons on the light-up panel, a pattern you’re unfamiliar with that he knows all too well. His weathered fists push a weighted lever, and the shuttle roars to life.
You feel the floors trembling beneath your weighted boots. Your seat shakes with it, too. Your gloved hands clutch the straps of your buckles in an unforgiving grip while a funny feeling rolls over your stomach. Not with fear, or worry, or excitement exactly — but the distant acknowledgment that your life’s going to change forever.
“We’re go for launch,” Ben announces to his co-pilot, who presses his own series of blinking neon buttons.
The whirring engine jerks suddenly as it lifts from its place on the ground. Four million pounds of pure steel propel suddenly towards the heavens with the burst of a golden flame. There’s a harsh pull and then a numbness, which turns into a heavier, emptier feeling as you break through the atmosphere — roughly 100 kilometers above sea level.
“Woo-hoo!” Johnny exclaims boyishly into his comms, arms raised above his head as the shuttle pierces finally through the dreaded veil — as he witnesses, for the first time in human history, where the bright blue sky meets an all-black eternity.
The gravity is slow to dissipate. It makes everything feel suddenly lighter — the cool air running through your suit, the heavy boots on your feet; your stomach, your heart, your mind. The dizzying feeling must be to blame for the absent-minded smile on your face, you think, ‘cause you look at Johnny then like you’re watching the beginning of the whole world.
A giddy laugh sputters suddenly like magic from your lips. Johnny and the stars sigh in unison. He’s been wondering ever since he met you what the sound of your laughter must sound like. Your smile is the only thing he’s dreamt of for the past year, the only thing, and he mourns it all over again when you ultimately turn away.
The Earth grows more and more distant. What once seemed so limitless, now looks so tiny against the star-speckled void of outer space. Everyone you’ve ever known, everyone there ever was, lived their entire life on this indistinct orb of green and blue. Every saint and sinner, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization. Millions of years of joy and suffering are contained within this brief smudge, swimming in a sea of never-ending blackness. A fleck of dust lost inside a bright sunbeam.
“You seein’ that?” Johnny wonders into his comm, to no one in particular, though he still hasn’t quite taken his eyes off of you.
You nod wordlessly for a moment, ‘cause you can’t believe how blue the world is from here.
It’s a rich, vibrant color that humans couldn’t recreate if they tried, ‘cause such a cerulean-cobalt shade cannot travel the entire distance from the sun to the land. Its molecules, instead, get scattered in the wind and the water, before reflecting in the more observable lighter hue that paints the sky.
But this? This deeper, dreamier, more melancholy blue — this blue that does not reach the Earth, this blue that gets lost on the way to the humans down below — holds the beauty of the entire world in its hand.
“It’s beautiful…” you murmur into the crackling comm, more speechless than the rest of them have ever seen you before.
You turn to Johnny then, who sits across the aisle from you, and wear the orbital golden sunrise in your gaze. Inside his, you find the same dreamlike blue that paints the depths and edges of the faraway Earth. The lost, untouched ultramarine swims now in his round button eyes as he stares unblinkingly at you.
“Yeah…” he nods within a breathless sigh, overcome by the ethereal infinite surrounding him — and the one sitting just beside him in the shape of a girl. “Beautiful.”
The routine you fall into in space is not quite unlike the one you had on Earth. You’re alone more often than not, hidden away in the observation room with your books and your journals, trying fruitlessly to make sense of the inherently nonsensical universe around you. It’s exactly how you’ve spent most of your life, really — the only difference now is you feel much more at home here, on the Excelsior and in the unpathed emptiness of outerspace, than you ever did on Earth.
Sue Storm is perhaps the only one of you who understands the importance of a real schedule. You and Reed, particularly, would work your circadian rhythms half to death if she let you. But, in an attempt to maintain a routine in an inherently timeless place, Sue insists on taking all of your meals at the same time every day, and in the same spot at the small kitchen table in the galley.
You sit between Johnny and Ben for at least an hour out of the day there, and catch up on plans or other miscellaneous discoveries found while on opposite sides of the shuttle.
The five of you exercise for one hour every day, before breakfast and after dinner, in order to keep the strength in your bones and muscles, which would otherwise be sucked out of you from the microgravity. The rest of the day is fair game and often spent with the five of you scattered about. Sue and Ben are usually navigating in the control room, Johnny and Reed are always finding something to do with their idle hands, and you can often be found on the observation deck looking for something new in the nothingness spanning before you.
And when the rest of the Saturn Five, at the end of a long day, return to their sleeping bags strapped to the wall — yours is the only one left empty. And Johnny knows immediately where to find you.
You drift like a dream in the dim cupola, a room made of so many fiberglass windows. The starry, black velvet universe sits just outside — an undreamt emptiness at your fingertips.
Your hair is tied back and out of your face. Your body is adorned in your nightclothes, a simple white tank top worn over a pair of red gingham pants. Your legs are crossed beneath you, as if you were sitting down, and you scribble something into a journal while a heavier textbook floats at your side. You’re a pretty girl dressed for a quiet night at home, observing Mars as casually as someone would watch their television.
Johnny knocks briefly on the ajar door before he enters. He’s already in his pajamas, too — an old t-shirt that clings to his lean torso and a pair of dark sweatpants that sit low on his hips.
“Sue wanted me to tell you it’s time for lights out, so… Lights out.”
You nod without looking his way, still slouched over the book in your lap. “Good night, Johnny Storm.”
His quiet laugh fills the silent room. “I think she meant she wants you in bed, too, Doc. You know how she is about the schedule.”
“Well, I’m busy, so…”
“You’re always busy,” Johnny scoffs, shutting the cupola door behind him as he maneuvers into the room with you.
The lack of gravity makes his bones feel lighter than air as it carries him towards you, cradling him in its cold and heavy hand. He lingers just behind you, warm with exhaustion and smelling of musky vanilla-berry shampoo as he peers over your shoulder. He can hardly make sense of your haphazard scribbles. Your pen whizzes across the page like something’s telling you’re about to run out of time.
“What are you writing about?”
You motion wordlessly to something at your side, as easily as a parent shrugging off a child. Johnny looks around until he finds a telescope — short, bulky, and likely worth far more than it looks. He plucks the weighty thing in his hands as it drifts by his feet. He falters with it for a moment, struggling briefly to determine which eye to close in order to see out of the damn thing.
With furrowed brows and a single squinted eye, he peers through the lens of the telescope. He doesn’t know how to focus it, or exactly where he should be looking, so instead he marvels at the big, blurry planet looming before him — looking much closer than it did just a moment ago.
“Planet,” he concludes with a slow nod, like it isn’t plain as day in front of you.
With a practiced and half-distracted hand, you contort your wrist slightly to focus the lens for him, all without looking up from your notebook. When Johnny peers through the telescope again, everything is more distinct — the blobs from before are now craters and rocks and ridges on the billion-year-old planet.
Within the shrouds of rust-colored dust and martian stars is something more distant but still well-defined — it’s rounded like a planet, but grayer and swathed in a heavy veil of ice.
“What is that?” Johnny murmurs incredulously. “Is it like a… A ghost planet or something?”
The words feel a bit silly as they spill from his mouth, but you nod in response anyway. “Most scientists would call that an exoplanet, but sure, yeah. A ghost planet.”
“I’m a scientist!” Johnny argues, boyish features screwed in offense — not because you’re wrong, but because he feels a bit like he’s earned the title after being in such close proximity to some of the brightest scientific minds known to man. You, for one. His sister, for another. And Reed, though he would never co-sign that out loud.
“You’re an engineer who plays dress-up in his sister’s lab coat—”
“That was one time!”
You look up and nod your chin towards the window. “Look at what’s around it.”
Johnny ducks his head and squints one eye to peer through the telescope once more. With untrained hands, he refocuses the lens to see a bit clearer — the indistinct clouds there turn into more defined specks, red and dull and dying.
“Uh… Rocks,” he confirms.
You bite back a grin and nod. “Sure. Rocks and stars and dark matter,” you explain further, growing increasingly giddy in a way that makes you already embarrassed at yourself. “It’s a planet— A fossil planet.”
“…Fossil?” Johnny echoes.
“You can tell by the colors of the stars around it that it hasn’t changed or merged with any other galaxies in at least a billion years,” you ramble, gesturing wildly with the pen in your right hand. You point out the window like the strange planet is right outside and not tens of millions of kilometers away. “Which means it’s essentially frozen in time.”
Johnny just nods along. He barely understands you if he’s being honest — ‘cause he’d much rather build things than observe them — but he likes hearing you speak, so he pretends you’re speaking the same language.
Until it’s his turn to talk, that is. Then his blonde brows pinch slowly together and his ocean eyes turn to sparkling buttons. “Wait, what’s so special about a dead planet?”
“Everything,” you answer like it’s obvious, hardened gaze glinting with a newfound life. “They’re like time capsules— They can tell us everything about what our early solar system looked like. How it changed over time, how after billions of years of inhability, Earth just happened to be perfect for human life, it’s—”
The dim lights above you click suddenly off, leaving just one row of amber auxiliary lights glowing overhead. A second later and the heat whirs slowly off, too.
The comfortable warmth gives way to a heavier cold. A shiver crawls up your spine almost instantly that you fight stubbornly away. It’s Reed’s way of conserving power, and Sue’s way of saying that everyone who isn’t in bed will freeze for the night.
Johnny deflates at the interruption.
He was just starting to get you to open up again, just like you did a week or more ago, when the Excelsior first launched and you looked at him like you were discovering something. Johnny wants you to find it again. Whatever it is.
“I hate when he does,” you scowl, dull eyes losing their previous spark.
“I guess it’s a good thing you have your very personal space heater to keep you company, then, huh?” Johnny croons with a lopsided grin. Your frown deepens, and he shrugs. “What? I run hot. I always have.”
“I’m busy. And it’s late,” you deadpan and turn away again. “Good night, Johnny Storm.”
You return to your work with an admirable ease, like Johnny isn’t there at all. Your pen darts across the page in a series of swirled and smudged cursive, sounding much louder in the sudden quiet. He lingers at your side anyway, inching closer despite himself, as though the microgravity were pulling him towards you. He doesn’t say a word; tries to move too much, tries not to breathe too hard, for fear of being noticed.
You do notice him, though. You can’t help but notice everything about him.
“You’re still here,” you observe distantly.
“Well, I don’t want you freezing to death out here, Doc,” Johnny scoffs like he’s doing you some sort of service. “Just let me stay— you know, for warmth. You won’t even realize I’m here, alright? Scouts honor.”
He holds up four fingers instead of three. You turn away again and say nothing. Johnny takes it as the invitation you mean it as, ‘cause you’re no stranger to telling him to fuck off when you really want him to.
You continue your scribbling while he lingers at your side, chest pressed against your arm as he peers over your shoulder. Through the messy cursive, he manages to make out, It’s possible this exoplanet once existed in our own solar system and was later ejected; check for any potential strange orbital movements—
Your hand freezes in place when Johnny’s warm breath fans over your bare shoulder. Each rhythmic exhale through his nose brushes your skin. It makes it hard for you to think, makes all the words in your head jumble suddenly together. You don’t know why.
“You’re breathing on me,” you blurt emotionlessly, neither angry nor pleased, just observant in a way he’s always known you to be.
“Sorry,” Johnny flinches back.
His round eyes swim with a darker shade of blue as they dart over your profile. He wants you to look back at him, even if it’s with malice. He just wants you to see him.
But you keep your eyes on the journal in your lap, even though you can’t figure out what to write anymore. The only thing in your head now is the sun in Johnny’s veins and the deep, Earthy blue in his eyes.
“It’s okay…” you mumble, still detached as ever, but with a white-knuckled grip on your pen. You swallow hard and wait for him to be close again, mourning when he keeps his distance. With a weary look over your shoulder, you repeat more firmly this time, “It’s okay.”
Johnny knows it’s an invitation, but for what, he doesn’t know. His unmanicured brows furrow as his tongue darts out to wet his pink mouth. “Do you want me to… to do it again or…?” he trails off.
The soft look in your eyes turns glacial in an instant. “Don’t say it!” you scold. “Do it, but don’t— don’t say it out loud. That makes it weird.”
You look away again, inwardly cursing yourself for being so vulnerable. Johnny purses a smile to the side of his mouth, lest he look too excited for your request to come closer. He curls his arm around you and keeps a softly calloused palm on the outside of your elbow, gently tethering himself to your side as you sway together in the zero-gravity.
You feel his warm fingers against your skin and flinch on instinct. You haven’t been touched with such gentleness since early childhood. You weren’t a stranger to man or their bodies, nor what their hands could do to yours, but something about Johnny made you feel different.
It was something about Johnny.
You hated that it was always about Johnny.
But you let him keep touching you, anyway — and, in his arms, you feel finally like you belong some place. His breath feels warm and familiar as it rolls across your skin. His chest feels solid and firm as it presses against your back. When he gets closer than he means to, and his chapped lips accidentally brush the curve of your soft shoulder, you tense like he’s burned you.
Johnny’s breath hitches, too. “Sorry,” he blurts again, wide-eyed and worried that he’s ruined something.
“I liked it,” you confess, as blunt with him as you’ve always been. “I think…”
“You think?” Johnny echoes, pink lips curling. “So, you’re not sure?”
“No,” you answer plainly and spare him only a brief glance from the corner of your eye. “So you should probably try again. Just in case.”
He doesn’t know how you do it — how you manage to torment him with your feigned ambivalence and reward him with your closeness at the same time. Johnny obeys you anyway, though, ‘cause it’s in his blood to bend to your every whim. He thinks if the two of you were sunflowers, he’d face you instead of the sun.
He smooths his plush lips slowly along the expanse of your exposed skin, from the edge of your shoulder to the junction of your neck — not quite kissing you, just caressing you with his mouth. His tongue darts out to wet dry lips, and the pink brushes just over your pulse.
You hum on an exhaled breath. And in the deathly quiet of outer space, it sounds almost like a moan.
Johnny falters briefly. “…More?” he whispers against your skin.
You nod wordlessly. You couldn’t get the words out if you tried. You just know you want him to kiss you. God, you don’t want him to stop kissing you.
The entire universe spins around you when his warm lips lock more intentionally on your neck. You go dizzy in an instant without the gravity to hold you down. It makes you feel like you’re going crazy — did love make people crazy? Did love turn people into unrecognizable versions of themselves?
You figure it must.
Because the girl who turns her head to catch Johnny’s lips with her own most certainly can’t be you. The girl who abandons her life’s work, who lets her pen and paper float aimlessly next to her, who turns away from the uncharted universe in front of her to hold desperately onto the blonde boy she couldn’t stand a year ago — whoever she is, is a stranger to you now.
Your fingers twist in his freshly cleaned hair, mussing recklessly at the satin blonde tendrils. Johnny’s hand trails down your body in the meanwhile. His warm, wide palms smooth over your bare arms and across your back. He cups the back of your thighs, urging them around his waist. You lick into his mouth and lock your ankles behind him, keeping yourself tethered to him as you float aimlessly in the heavy air.
“And to think…” Johnny pants when you part from him, smiling lips swollen and rosy. “You spent all this time pretending to hate me.”
“I wasn’t pretending,” you slur with his spit on your mouth.
“Really?” he hums. “‘Cause it kinda feels like you like me a lot, actually—”
His strong hands curl around the curve of your hips, pulling you impossibly closer. Your lap sits flush against his own. Something soft and firm presses along your inner thigh. “I could say the same about you, Johnny Storm.”
You shift slightly, and Johnny realizes how hard he is. His cock strains against his sweats and the tighter boxer-briefs he wears beneath them. Feeling distantly overwhelmed and half-embarrassed, his pale cheeks flare pink. “Sorry…” he grimaces.
“Don’t,” you squint, slightly demeaning but somehow still playful. “I like it… I think.”
You kiss him again, deep enough to steal the breath from his lungs, wet enough to feel your spit on his chin. You wrap your legs tighter around his lean waist until his stiffening cock is sandwiched between your bodies, pressed intently into your own warmth.
Johnny gasps through his nose. He almost thinks he can feel the lines of your clothed cunt against him, hidden folds embracing the most sensitive parts of him. It makes him wonder if you’re wearing anything under your thin pajama bottoms as your hips rock back and forth over his own.
Your mouth is equally as unforgiving. You kiss him like you’re searching for heaven in his mouth, like you can taste stars on his tongue. His lungs burn for air, but still he never parts from you. You’re killing him, with your mouth and with your hips, but Johnny throws himself deeper onto the blade, anyway. He pulls you that much closer, kisses you that much deeper — until he worries he might bleed out.
Your lips smack in protest when he parts from you. “We should stop,” he frets through panted breaths, eyes dilated and heavy-lidded.
“Please, don’t—” you beg and fall back into him again.
Johnny falters. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen you beg. He doesn’t think you’ve ever had to before. You never have to beg for anything; all you have to do is take.
A groan sounds deep in his throat when your hips grind over his own in a slow and practiced rhythm. “It’s gonna be too much,” he slurs against your mouth.
“What?”
“I’ll…” he sighs breathlessly and trails off. He can’t figure out the words to say without sounding like a total teenager; he only knows he should probably get them out before he bursts in his boxers and has to explain to Sue why he’s wasting water on a second shower.
“ I’ll cum,” he confesses finally, fingertips digging bruises onto your clothed thighs in a feeble attempt to stop your merciless movements.
Your lidded eyes dart over his form. His tousled blonde hair, his glazed-over ocean eyes, his flushed cheeks, his kiss-swollen mouth. He’s pretty and pathetic. You want to take care of him and ruin him all at once.
“I want you to cum,” you say. You plead. You command.
Johnny loses himself in your assurance. His slow and languid kisses turn sloppy — full of tongue and teeth and swapped spit. The fingers that once restricted you now fight to keep you close. His hands twist into the fabric of your pants as he guides your hips back and forth against him.
A pretty whimper sounds in your throat every time your clit catches the bulbous tip of his clothed cock, and the exhaled breath fans over his cupid’s bow.
His boxers dampen from his drooling pre-cum as he twitches in the confines of his underwear. He wonders if you feel it, too. He figures you must, if your erratic thrusts and choked back whines have anything to say about it.
“Johnny—” you whisper like a warning to him, voice breaking as your inevitable orgasm twists in your belly.
“I know,” he pants through rapid nods. “Fuck, baby— I know.”
He adjusts you on his waist with a pair of wide hands around your thighs. The harsh and sudden movement sends the two of you spiraling, spinning softly together in the open air like two orbiting planets. The new angle opens you wider for him, keeps your throbbing clit pressed intently to his aching cock.
Johnny feels the way your pussy pounds like a heartbeat for him as it rubs up and down his lap. A whine grumbles deep in his throat.
“I’m cumming,” you whimper against his mouth. Foreheads pressed together, eyes squeezed shut, nails digging crescent shapes into his shoulders. Your sensitive clit catches the ridge of his cock over his sweats, and you gasp. “Oh, fuck, Johnny— I’m cumming.”
The blonde boy holds you tighter. He curls one strong arm over your back and towards your shoulder; his other cradles the outside of your clothed thigh in a bruising grip. He keeps you spread open and pressed mercilessly against him while his hips rut with a sporadic sort of rhythm.
“C’mon,” he grunts in panted breaths against your chin. “C’mon, c’mon, c’mon—”
You tense in his hold, trembling when you cum for him. Your thighs clench around his waist. Your fingers ball his thin shirt in your fists. Your face screws as you fight back a moan. A whimper rises and dies in your throat instead, as a warm feeling of honeyed release blooms in the pit of your stomach.
“Yeah, that’s it,” Johnny praises in vague mumbles while you twitch in his hold. His hips stutter as his boxers grow sticky with a premature release. “That’s it, baby… Shit. I’m cumming, too— Gonna cum so hard for you, baby. Fuck—”
His voice breaks with a pathetic whimper. He chokes back a louder groan and tilts his heavy head back towards the ceiling.
Through heavy eyes clouded with a lingering pleasure, you watch Johnny’s orgasm rack through his body. His chiseled jaw clenches. His adam’s apple bobs in his throat. His skin flares a faint pink color.
Even through the layers of clothes separating you, you feel his cock twitching with each rope of cum it spits into his boxers. Johnny grunts through each one of them, hips stuttering against your own, slow to come back down again.
You just stay like that for a while — limbs entwined, twirling slowly, floating together in every sense of the word. Johnny buries his face in your neck. He presses wet kisses to your burning skin, while you keep your heavy eyes trained on the cupola. You blink slowly at the stars and distant planets there, forgetting until that moment that there’s a whole world out front of you.
An entire universe you spent your whole life dreaming about, gone momentarily forgotten in Johnny Storm’s arms.
“Do you think we’re the first astronauts to orgasm in space?” you wonder aloud in a distant whisper.
It makes Johnny laugh. The warm breath of it fans across your shoulder. His body trembles with it, too. “Yeah,” he scoffs. “You gonna write about me in that book of yours? See what other firsts we could do up here?”
He presses one last innocuous kiss to your neck before parting from you. He lifts his heavy head, lips curled into a crooked smile, and finds you scowling at him in return. “Don’t push it,” you deadpan.
“Sorry,” he grimaces, ‘cause he can never quite tell where the line is — how close you’ll let him get before you’re pulling away again. Apparently, cumming in his pants will only get him so far. “I still get to take you out for that coffee when we get back, though, right?”
“Yes,” you nod in your usual deadpan, though something about your detachment seems different now. Maybe because you’ve still got your thighs wrapped around his waist. “I plan on doing a lot with you when we get back.”
It sounds almost like a threat as it spills from your monotone mouth.
In a blink. In a flash of a bright light. In a searing storm of daunting blue and purple.
On the early morning of the dissent back home, you warned Reed of heightened solar activity. Johnny barely understood a word of it then, but he heard the distant worry in your voice when you told the older man about the strange eruptions of plasma pulsing from the sun, which you feared would disrupt the journey back to Earth.
“Our shielding isn’t strong enough, Reed— We can’t get caught in that flare.”
“We won’t,” he assured, voice strangely even for such an anxiety-riddled man. “You’ll keep an eye on that radar, and Ben will keep us outta the line of fire. We won’t get pulled into that magnetic field, Doc, I swear—”
“It’s not that I’m worried about.”
And you were right not to be.
It was strangely poetic, in a dark, sadistic way, how the thing you dedicated your whole life to learning about ended up killing you in the end.
You’d alerted Reed of the increasing cosmic rays coming in ripples from an aggravated magnetic field. And when Ben hit turbulence, worried that the ship wasn’t strong enough to take it on, the older man told the panicked pilot to push onward. Not because of his own hubris, but because there wasn’t any other choice. There was no going back then — either you laid there and took it, or you pushed the Excelsior to its limits and prayed you escaped unscathed.
Johnny only remembers darkness. And his sister’s screaming. And your strange silence. Then he remembers fire — a big burst of a bright orange flame that engulfed the shuttle as it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere, snapping in half just before plummeting into the Atlantic.
The Saturn Five did not return to the Earth the same way they had left it.
Ben’s lean, white body, for one, is now covered in bulky calluses that make him a hundred times stronger than the average man, totally unrecognizable from the human he was before. Reed reaches across the aisle for his slumped-over wife, and his arm stretches abnormally to fill the distance between them. Sue, seemingly subconsciously, disappears at random in a flicker of refracted light — as easily as someone turning off a light switch. Johnny burns from the inside out, glowing orange from the wildfire raging inside of him.
And you…
You didn’t return at all.
That’s all Johnny can think about when they’re air-lifted back to the Baxter Building. Press hound the halls outside while ANSA doctors scatter about, unsure of what to make of the suddenly superpowed Saturn Five. He paces back and forth all the while, clenched fists bursting into flame at random, ash burning on his tongue.
“We have to go back out there,” Johnny decides firmly, made stern with his sorrow.
He does not cry for you. His grief is made out of something much more discreet than that, as silent as blood spilling from a weeping wound. Your absence pierces him like a thread through a needle. The thought of finding you again is the only thing keeping him stitched together now.
“With what ship?” Ben calls to him.
“We can build another ship— We’ve done it before!”
Sue pushes through the doctors crowded around her, stumbling towards her baby brother despite the blood matted in her hair. “It wouldn’t do any good, Johnny,” she tries her best to calm him despite the tremor in her own voice.
“We can’t just leave her out there!” the blonde boy shouts, teary eyes wide and crazed. He gestures wildly with his hands, and Sue flinches at the flame he holds within them.
“Johnny—”
“We can’t!”
“Johnny, she’s gone!” Sue shouts over him.
She puts her pale hands to his chest, feeling his rapid heartbeat beneath her palm. Her mouth opens to speak, but the words die on her tongue when her fingers start to disappear on their own accord. She balls the fabric of his shirt into her fists and tries to focus.
“If the fire didn’t kill her, being sucked into the atmosphere would’ve, and you know it! It would’ve crushed her, Johnny—”
The boy shakes his stubborn head. “You don’t know that, Sue,” he chokes.
“But she—” Sue pauses to swallow down her own sob, then flashes her brother a more assured, glassy-eyed look. “But she didn’t suffer, Johnny.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do know it. I do. It was quick. It was over before she knew it was happening—”
“Not that,” Johnny snaps and stumbles back. His pale skin glows a faint orange color under the weight of his rage. He softens only at the fearful look in his sister’s eyes. “We don’t know if it killed her at all, Sue…”
The woman sighs, almost sympathetically so. “Johnny…”
“Look at us, Sue!” he shouts, voice ringing through the white and blue med bay.
He gestures around him with fiery hands — at the personified rock that used to be Ben Grimm, at the abnormally flexible limbs of Reed Richards, at the rainbow waves of light dancing around his sister and turning her invisible at whim.
“How do we know that something didn’t happen to her, too? Something that might be keeping her alive out there?”
“There wouldn’t be enough oxygen, Johnny,” Reed comments with an apologetic sigh from where he slouches on an exam table. His words are weighed down with an obvious regret that paints his weathered face. “Even if something did happen, we only had enough air supply for the trip. She’d be running out of oxygen—”
“Don’t!” Johnny snaps with an accusatory finger pointed his way. Reed cowers under the flame in his hand, and the red rage in his dark eyes. “You don’t get to speak right now, Reed— ‘Cause what happened to us out there? That’s on you.”
“It’s on all of us,” Ben says in a feeble attempt to quell the palpable tension.
“It’s on you!” Johnny repeats and storms out of the room, despite the distant calls of his name.
The muffled chatter outside the med bay doors bursts into a symphony of a thousand voices when Johnny rushes into the hallway. He pushes past the press waiting there, dodging questions and camera flashes, as he makes a beeline for the elevator.
“How’s it going in there, Johnny Storm?” he hears a deep-voiced reporter ask.
“How do you think?” the blonde boy bites in response.
His non-answer succeeds only in producing a hundred more questions in return. The choir of unfamiliar voices turns into a buzzing sort of drone as he steps into the lift. Johnny squints at the never-ending flashes and incessant yelling that pervades his inevitable migraine.
“Care to make a comment, Mr. Storm?”
“What happened to Ben?”
“Where’s the Doctor?”
“Are you okay, Johnny Storm?” a younger newswoman, no older than him, calls from the front of the crowd. The only difference in her prying is that it seems almost genuine, as her made-up face screws softly with concern.
“Yeah…” Johnny sighs and presses the button for the main floor. The elevator doors ding as they close ahead of him. “I just… I had a date.”
to the brave souls who made it this far: thank you and i love you and i'm sorry for making you read something so long hahah. but i hope you liked it!! just know i'm giving all of you a virtual kiss on the forehead right now ily!!! (▰˘◡˘▰)
Pedro Pascal x Reader
2.9k words
Author: completely inspired by this TikTok, just pure Pedro admiration with a dash of smut bc my writers brain had a mind of its own, not proof read pls forgive me
Pedro looks...different under the light of your friend's kitchen. Or maybe it's the effects of the white wine that dances on your tongue, swirls in your glass. He's dressed simply, casually even. A long sleeve cream henley rolled up to his elbows and a medium wash jean. It perfectly fits the occasion, so why does it feel all too much when his forearm braces himself on the counter and flexes under his weight?
You push yourself off of the wall you've been leaning on, walking the short distance over to him. It's a simple get together, just you and friends. Only six of you all together, laughing and drinking, yet you still find your way to his side. A move that surprises no one but yourself. Everyone is still talking, crowded around the kitchen island. You put your now empty glass on the counter, and he pulls out of the conversation like you tugged a rope.
His voice is a low, heavy timbre, cheeks pink from his glasses of wine or maybe the beer he shared with some of the guys earlier. "Red or white?"
Your eyes meet his, deep, brown, endless. If the light catches it just right, you see things you shouldn't in them. Things that involve you and him and a lifetime that has yet to exist. Your eyebrow arches, a teasing smile across your lips. "Do you have to ask?"
He laughs, "Guess not." His firm hands grip the neck of the expensive white wine he had brought (you tell yourself it was for you). He holds it properly, like a server in a high end restaurant, bottle resting on his bare forearm as the liquid pours into your glass. Your eyes travel up the waterfall of wine, up his strong arms and firm shoulders, up the veins of his neck and the scruff of his chin. He looks special in this light--holy, even. Maybe it's the wine, but the light behind him casts a halo over his head. You hear things that aren't there. A harp, violins, songbirds and the morning breeze. "Madame," he bows his head and offers you the wine glass with both hands like he's making an offering to a goddess.
Your hands touch when you take it. "Thank you. Glad to see there's still faithful servants these days."
His smile is infectious. You hide yours behind the glass. "Anything for you, my liege." He tips his head, and you find yourself distracted by the curls that seem just a little lighter than before. It's times like this when you know this can't be your first life together. There had to have been hundreds where you've loved him just as much as now. Only when you're this drunk, can you admit it to yourself that you're in love with him. And you think he knows. In fact, you don't think he minds.
You look over to your friend who calls your name and begs you to tell the story of that guy in the bar last weekend because you just tell it so much better than I can! And when you talk, you can feel his eyes on you. Maybe you imagined it, but you can feel the heavy weight scan your face, the way you animatedly talk with your arms before spilling a bit of wine and putting it down with a laugh, the white slip dress that drapes over your frame, your bare legs.
Pedro laughs loudly, face balking in surprise at the joke you'd made about this poor guy in the bar who would always be a source of entertainment for your friend group. He laughs so hard that he lightly grabs your waist and tries to muffle himself in your hair as you fondly glare at him and swat his shoulder for interrupting your story. But when the laughing subsides, he's still there. He's behind you now, big, warm arms wrapped around your frame as the conversation switches to his latest press release. You can feel the vibrations of his chest against your back as he talks, head rested on top of yours. You take a rather large gulp of wine at his proximity, the sweetness coating your mouth and clouding your vision. Your dress is so thin, and he's just so warm. You feel a strange sense of satisfaction. Pedro Pascal, with his fan girls and interviews, is pressed against you. He chose to be here with you. And maybe it doesn't mean anything.
But then again, maybe it does.
Eventually the group disperses, some grab one of the wine bottles and slump on your couch with the promise of a card game, one begs for directions to the bathroom, you and Pedro make your way out to the terrace. It's a cool night, the wind blows lightly enough to raise goosebumps but you’re not sober enough to feel it.
“Guess what I grabbed?” He looks at you with a thinly concealed smirk. His hands are behind his back, the veins from his arms travel down—or up, you suppose.
You laugh lightly, leaning against the railing, the city and stars behind you, moonlight casting down. The wine glass in your hand sparkles under this light. “I don’t know.”
He reveals a bottle of wine. “The last of the white. I hid it under the counter.” He places the bottle down on the metal table with a soft clink and sits down on the chair next to it.
“I expected nothing less,” You’re already over to him, standing in front of his spread legs, and examining the label on the bottle. From the corner of your eye, you examine him. His large, muscular thighs are spread apart, hips shifting every so often. His hair ruffles in the breeze with the end of your dress. A shiver runs up your spine.
“Cold, baby?” His voice is almost gravelly, rough with words that get caught in his throat. You’re not sure if your shiver was the result of the wind or him, but still you nod. His large hands hold your waist lightly. “Well, c’mre then.”
You allow him to pull you closer, perching you on one of his legs. You can feel his warmth through your clothes. His thigh feels muscular under you, and you lean back—head and back pressing against his chest. You take another mouthful of wine and say simply, "I missed you when you were gone." It’s not a big deal. Just a fact. Just a friend to a friend. You offer the glass back to him. He takes a sip and holds it on his other thigh. Everything feels entirely too romantic. Maybe it’s the wine.
His hand that had been resting on your thigh draws lazy shapes that make you see things that have never happened. “I missed you too. Always do. I think of you a lot when I'm gone."
The glass is passed back to you. The message is simple. A wine glass in your hand. A ball in your court. Your turn. "I'm glad. I feel like," you pause as if searching for the right wording, "I can feel when you're gone. It's like a hole or something. Does that make sense?" He hums in a way that lets you know that absent feeling is mutual. You clear your throat, because this is uncharted territory with him in so many ways, and hand the glass back. "How was it really? Press tours seem…a lot.”
Pedro sighs, curls tickling his forehead, “They are. It was fine, really. Just somedays I get sick of the constant questions and professionalism. Some days I just wanted to be Pedro, not Pedro Pascal. Does that make sense?”
You nod like you understand what it’s like to have so many people asking so much of you. “It makes sense. Suppose it just comes with the movie star terf,” you jest, poking at him. “Doesn’t mean you can’t be sick of it.”
He hums again in response. He hands you the glass and, just because you can, you place your lips exactly where his seems to have been. It's still warm. You hold the glass now, gazing out at the stars. It’s hard to see them in the city, with all its busyness and light pollution, but eventually your eyes adjust. And for a moment, it’s almost like you’re back home.
“What do you see up there, baby?” He asks, fingers playing with the end of your dress and dancing over your thighs. He looks down at you over his strong nose with an expression you don't see but probably couldn't decipher anyway.
“Orion’s Belt,” you reply, pointing at the three stars that create a line. You feel his head cock to the side, eyes following the line your arm makes.
“I don’t see anything. C’mon, show me.” He gently takes the glass out of your hand and sets it near the unopened bottle of wine. His hands tenderly lift your hips up, bringing you to a tipsy stand. He rises behind you, hand on your lower back as you approach the railing.
Your stomach presses against the railing as you point again, doing your best to describe the positioning of the stars.
“Ahh, I see it now. It’s those three, right? With the bright one in the middle?”
You turn to face him, entirely pleased. “Yeah,” you begin, put your breath catches on your throat at the way he’s looking down at you. The moon is behind him, casting him in shadows but you in perfect light. His eyes slowly dance down your face, across your chest, and to your shoulder where the strap of your dress has fallen down your arm—displaying more of your chest than he’s ever really seen.
His breath is warm against your fingers as he steps closer and slowly slips his finger under your strap. And for one sick, incredibly fucked up second, you hope that he’ll pull it down. But, ever the gentleman—though you desperately wish him not to be—, he brings it back over your shoulder. His finger slides out but doesn’t pull away. It lightly travels dangerously close to the top hem of your neckline, and wanders down your arm. Goosebumps rise in the wake of his finger, cutting through you like a ship through the sea. Parting for him without a real choice.
“Cold, baby?” This time it’s lithe, almost teasing.
This time you don’t nod. You look up into his coffee eyes, energizing you with just a glance. And maybe it’s the wine. But you say, “No.”
His hand has made it down to yours. He searches your eyes, imploringly, questioning. He’s giving you a chance, you realize. To pull away. To walk away. To forget this happened. To act like he isn’t staring at you with such emotion and softness.
He’s holding your hand now, staring intently until something changes. It’s minuscule, but you notice. He tugs your hand, bringing you impossibly closer. His other hand cups your jaw and cheek. And he pulls your lips to his. You react immediately because this is all you’ve really wanted for a long time.
His heat. His breath. His mouth. Him. Him. Him. That’s all the really matters. The years of waiting. The years of wondering. The years between you. None of it matters. It all makes it worth it.
His lips are soft, imperceptibly soft. They ensnare your senses. You thread your fingers through his hair, pulling at the soft root and—god, he groans into your mouth. Pedro’s other hand wanders up to your face, both hands cradling it so passionately. And maybe it’s the wine, but he kisses you like he’s in love. Like he has been for a while.
You’re not sure which one of you pulls back first, but your foreheads are pressing together. His deep, forest eyes are staring into yours like he’s scared you might disappear. But when he finds what he seems to be searching for in them, he pulls you even closer than before. His lips find your neck, immediately finding that spot that makes you squirm under him like he’d studied it. Pedro looks up at you with hooded eyes. The moonlight paints your face like a spotlight as you throw your head back at his movements. A moan rumbles through his chest and suddenly you’re pressed against the railing, pulling his mouth to yours feverishly. His hands slips down and down, tracing the outline of your breasts and the expanse of your stomach before dragging down your side and gripping firmly on your dress. He hikes it up just enough to pull back and stare at your smooth thigh. He grips it tightly, holding it at his waist as you moan out at the contact.
You and Pedro have been close in many ways, but never like this. This had always been reserved for dreams in late, lonely nights or perhaps nights like these with a bit of alcohol and someone with a similar demeanor.
The door to the terrace opens. He pauses and it’s all you can do to look over his shoulder. Your friend is staring at you, the last of the red wine in hand, mouth wide open but an even bigger satisfied expression takes hold. She takes in your hiked up dress, the red spots already forming on your neck, the leg wrapped around Pedro. “Holy shit! Finally!”
You groan, burying your face into his chest as he gently sets your leg down. “Please, don’t-”
But she’s already begun, words she doesn’t have control over tumbling out. “Holy shit! You’ve wanted to fuck him for like ever, but I didn’t think you’d actually do it!”
A laugh rumbled through Pedro and you feel your face becoming hot. “Oh no-”
“And you-and he! Holy shit! I totally interrupted didn’t I? I am so sorry! I’ll leave! Just, god please continue doing what you’re doing I can’t take this tension anymore! We can’t take the tension anymore!”
You lift your head just enough to resister everyone else staring through the windows with knowing smirks and an occasional thumbs up.
“You know what, we’ll just go! We were um, we had something that we were doing on the other end of the house right guys?” Everyone immediately shouts affirmatives and tries to scramble away. “Just uh, have fun! There’s an extra bedroom if you guys wanna-”
“Stop it!” You shout, as Pedro laughs so hard it shakes you.
“Right, sorry!” The door slams shut and you hear several sets of feet scurrying away.
Pedro smirks down at you, all handsome features, seductive eyes, and a mocking tone. “So, you’ve wanted to fuck me for like ever?”
You pinch your eyes shut and groan in embarrassment as you shove past him to the table and drink straight out of the wine bottle. "This is quite possibly the most embarrassing thing that has ever happened to me, so I would appreciate it if-"
"Me too." You go speechless, borderline dumb. What..? "I've been thinking about it for years." Oh. You open your mouth but only gape at him like a fish, stumbling into the chair behind you. But he knows, because he knows you in ways nobody else ever could or ever cared to. He kneels before you like a man at the altar, gently taking the wine bottle out of your hand before taking a rather large swig himself. "Might need a little more liquid courage for this."
You laugh, loudly. It's still him, still Pedro, and his stupid joke in the most stressful situation you've ever been in just proves that. The bottle clinks on the floor, and you're still laughing not really comprehending just what he could need the liquid courage for. You don't know until he gently cradles the back of your shin and brings it to his lips. He kisses the constellations up, up, and up. His facial hair brushes your inner thigh and you tense at the sensation. He looks up at you from between your legs with those big, doe eyes. "I'll stop if you want me to, baby. Just say the words."
"God, don't stop." He smirks against your skin like he knows you wouldn't say no and is entirely pleased.
"I won't, baby. I won't," Pedro assures voice thick with something heavier than lust yet somehow lighter. He continues pressing soft kisses up until he's just under the hem of your dress. You feel his hot breath between the apex of your thighs. He pushes the end of your dress up and you lift your hips obediently to make it easier for him to get closer to you in any way possible. "I've wanted to taste you for so long. I know she's sweet, please? Will you let me?"
"Yes," you reply, breathless.
His hands run up the length of your legs and softly grip your hips. He hooks his fingers under the waistband of your underwear. The cool air hits you immediately, but then his mouth is on you. You gasp out as he nearly buries himself in you. His groan vibrates your pussy and you grab onto the metal table. "Fuck, baby. Even better than I imagined."
And even though there's so many words left to be said and so many things to straighten out and clarify, when he looks up at you through hooded eyes something tells you that everything will work out exactly how you dreamed it would.
BAD REVIEWS (a Bad Reviews by Sabrina Carpenter inspired fic)
you've heard more than your fair share of bad reviews about theo nott. that doesn't stop you from becoming the newest addition (theo nott x reader) [best viewed in dark mode]
a/n - i did NOT realise this fic was turning out this long which I think speaks to how much fun I was having writing it, planning it out carefully and setting the slow burn justtt right ahh I truly think this is one of my best pieces of writing ever? at least I rlly like it hahah so enjoy :))
Little Miss Formerly Delusional
★★★★☆
He’s charming. Too charming.
He will reel you in just so he can ruin your life. I gave him my time, my life, my youth, and where do I end up? Crying in his shower - NEVER. AGAIN. He's so good at making you feel special. Scratch that - he's so good at getting what he wants.
It started at a picnic.
The kind that got cobbled together last minute with leftover snacks and a secondhand deck of cards, bodies strewn across the grass in lazy clusters, all chatter and sunshine and no plans beyond the hour.
You hadn’t planned to stay long. You almost left twice. But then someone pulled out a pack of cards, and everyone had gotten paired up for a game - you with Theo Nott, of all people - so you stayed.
You were seated opposite each other, cross-legged on some thin picnic blanket, knees knocking every so often every time one of you leaned over the card deck between you. Some slap-happy mess of a game that had rules no one followed properly but left everyone’s hands red and stinging from all the shouting and reflexes gone wrong.
Theodore Nott - teasing, long-limbed, annoyingly pretty - watched you with his sleeves rolled at the elbow, tie loosened. His eyes locked on yours with a lazy kind of intent. You'd seen him around plenty, and heard about him even more, but this was the first time you'd actually talked to him. Up close, he was worse. His vacant grin too self-assured with a rich, arrogant voice that promised all sorts of unscrupulous things.
Theo flirted, of course, in the way boys like him always did - bold, rehearsed, shameless. Fixing you with unabashed, unrelenting eye contact. Leaning over to you closer than what was strictly necessary. Playing the role of injured loverboy for every round he lost.
You rolled your eyes through most of it.
You'd heard the stories. Everyone knew the way he moved from girl to girl, leaving miserable shells in his wake like it was nothing. That boy didn’t even have a heart to break.
Three rounds in, he spoke up when you won. Again.
“You’ve got quick hands.”
You shrugged, sweeping up the cards.
“You’ve got a slow reaction time.”
His grin widened. “So modest.”
You finally deigned to return his gaze, your face as impassive as ever. “I don’t usually play nice.”
“I don’t mind,” he said. “I like girls who make me work for it.”
You suppressed the urge to roll your eyes. Was that supposed to flatter you? Impress you?
"Do you?" you mumbled instead, dealing the cards out once again. When Theo didn't move to pick up his, still intent on watching you, you gave him a look and sighed.
“Look. You don’t even know me.”
“I’m trying.”
You looked bored.
“And why is that?”
“Because you look like you’ve already decided I'm not worth your time.” He rested his chin on his hand, unbothered. “Now I need to know if you’re right.”
You hesitated. That was...unexpected.
But you recovered almost immediately.
“Well,” you said, eyes flicking to the deck, speaking quickly, “I'll have to warn you. I’m not the kind of girl who gets affected easily.”
“‘Affected,’” he echoed, amused. “That's adorable.”
It wasn’t what you actually wanted to say. What you meant was: I’ve heard what you do to girls. I’ve seen the aftermath. And I’m not anywhere near stupid enough to be next.
But you didn’t say any of that. You just kept her expression level and glanced at the cards, seeing what Theo had missed. You slapped your hands on his.
“4 - 2,” you said, with a thinly veiled smugness.
Theo looked at your hands, then up at you, and smiled slow.
“You like this, don't you?"
“I like winning.”
He didn’t let you win the next round. Or the one after that. Or the one after that.
Later, when everybody was cooling off with some iced butterbeer, peeling grass off their sleeves, Theo glanced your way with a look that gave you a bad feeling in your gut.
He raked a hand through his hair with a careful air of nonchalance that was fooling no one, and said offhandedly, "You know, I let her win one of the early rounds, by the way.”
For a moment, you gaped at him and his slimy audacity. Then you sat up, affronted, nearly upsetting your butterbeer. “You what?”
He gave you a lazy blink. On another day, you might have considered him somewhat endearing. Today, he was getting on your last nerves.
“Thought it might soften you up.”
“You did not let me win," you said hotly, a strand of hair stuck to your uncomfortably sticky cheek. "You just couldn’t keep up.”
“Didn’t say you weren’t good. Just not as good as me.”
Oh, you could punch him. “The score was six to three - ”
“Yeah, and that third one? That was a gift.”
You turned to the others, scandalised. “He’s l - liar. Liar. He’s lying, I sw-.”
Theo just sipped his drink effortlessly. “I thought you didn’t get affected easily?”
That shut you up immediately. You turned away, face hot with something dangerously close to flustered. You'd walked into that one. Hard.
They'd only formally met a couple of hours ago and he somehow managed to already get under your skin. Just a little.
And he knew it.
When he leaned in a little closer to murmur something to someone beside him, you swore he was still smirking.
You weren't supposed to be caught off guard. Not by him. You knew boys like Theo Nott. Knew their tricks and charms and the revolving door of names on their lips.
Unfortunately, knowing didn’t make you any less curious.
Little Miss Territorial by Proxy
★★★☆☆
He’ll be possessive. And you'll like it.
It feels flattering at first. I mean, why wouldn't it? Who doesn't luvvv being loved? It's always nice to feel wanted.
That's not what this is, though. Theodore Nott, erm, 'wants' in the way a hunter 'wants' a deer head stuffed and mounted on the wall.
The courtyard had that lazy kind of energy that lingered on warm afternoons - bodies stretched out, butterbeer bottles dusty and half-empty, faint music straining through the thick, heavy afternoon air from someone’s wireless. It was easy. Drowsy. Like no one wanted to be anywhere else.
Theo was already there when you arrived.
You noticed him from across the throng, lounging in one of the stone archways, a little separate from everyone else. He met your gaze. You looked away. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to.
Eventually, someone pulled out a deck of cards again. Out of the few of you who could tolerate the smacking and getting smacked on such a hot day, you partnered up with a Ravenclaw named Liam - broad-shouldered, painfully chatty, cursed with the unfortunate affliction of not being as funny as he thought he was.
When you beat him - again - he let out an exaggerated groan and slumped back dramatically.
“Alright, alright. Clearly I’m no match,” he said., as he poorly reshuffled the cards. Over the deck, he shot you a smarmy look that left you feeling icky all over. “Maybe you could teach me sometime.”
The line was lame. And obvious. You picked up the cards he dealt, not bothering to look up.
“Sorry. I don’t usually train the hopeless.”
Liam winced. “That’s cold.”
You shrugged. “It's true.”
Laughter buzzed through the few who were listlessly paying attention. Theo didn’t laugh. Didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Only stared.
His eyes had sharpened the moment Liam started talking. He hadn’t said anything yet, but you could feel the heat of it - the weight of his stare digging between her ribs.
You shifted slightly. You took a sip of your butterbeer to cool off and calm down. The saccharine drink had begun to sour in the relentless heat.
Liam nudged your foot with his own - light, playful. Theo straightened and sat up.
“Careful, mate,” he said, voice steady and too smooth. “You’re one bad joke away from a nosebleed.”
A few chuckles sputtered. Nervous ones. It didn’t sound like a joke. No one knew whether to laugh or move on.
Liam blinked, uncomfortable now.
“Relax, yeah? Just playing.”
Theo tipping his bottle at him languidly. “Just warning.”
Before it could stretch into something uglier, he abruptly shifted focus.
“I’m in,” he said suddenly, "the mood to play now.”
There was a shuffle as the group moved up a little to make room for Theo where they were all scattered across the floor.
You didn’t hesitate. You switched your partner to Theo before anyone else could move. Your knees bumped. His smirk twitched higher.
The game began. Slaps. Feints. Barely restrained grins. She won the first round. He won the next. By the third, she was half a beat faster. Or maybe he was just a beat slower.
He let her win. Or maybe she let him.
When he looked at you afterwards, head tilted, lashes low, he gave you a look of some quiet approval. Like you’d passed a test you hadn't even known you were taking.
You looked away first. Unexpectedly, you felt a flicker of pride. From there sparked an obsession with this most cursed type of validation, one that you had never known to be greedy for.
You took another sip of you drink, relishing the way your face warmed in the heat of the day under the intensity of his stare. Still, you should have known what you knew now - those days in the sun would only last so long. Not even a week later, the fights began.
Little Miss Made Excuses For His Anger Issues
★★☆☆☆
He plays dirty, so it's only fair you do too.
When the fights begin - god, they'll never stop. He'll never listen to you, you'll go blue in the face trying to get him to change, he'll whine about you never getting off his back, you'll snap at him for breathing too loud, it's nuts.
Okay, fine, the last one wasn't exactly provoked. He was just in too good of a mood that day and it was pissing me off. But honestly? I was so valid for that. He needed to learn to shut the fuck up once in a while.
It wasn’t even about the cigarettes.
At least, not just about them.
You were poring over your books in the deserted Slytherin common room, trying not to think about Ivy had been telling you about a girl Theo had been getting pretty close to - some Romilda Vane. He lit one the second he walked in - like it was a reflex, like he was doing it on purpose. You could feel the now-familiar irritation bloom in your chest the moment the smoke hit the air, bitter and acrid and reeking of bad memories.
“Really?” you muttered, not bothering to look up from your notes. “In here?”
Theo exhaled slowly, deliberately.
“I'll open a window.”
“That’s not the point.”
He leaned against the window frame, posture relaxed, jaw tight.
“Then what is?”
You huffed irritatedly and slammed your book shut.
“The point is, you said you’d stop. Five days ago. In the hallway. After that disaster of a duel. Or did you forget that too?”
He had the audacity to sigh like you were being difficult for even bringing that up.
“For fuck's sake, Y/N, it’s one cigarette.”
“It’s your third.”
Now he looked at you properly, something dry and tired in his gaze.
“You're keeping count now? Are you keeping tabs on me?”
Maybe I should, the angry thought flashed in your mind. Who the hell was Romilda Vane anyway? You gritted your teeth. “I wouldn’t have to if you didn’t go through them like water.”
“It’s not a crime,” he muttered, but he stubbed it out anyway - carelessly, more like a challenge than a concession. “There. Better?”
“Sure. Until the next one.”
He laughed humorlessly.
“Sorry, Mother.”
That did it.
You stood suddenly, the legs of your chair scraping piercingly across the floor.
“Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Turn me into some controlling shrew just because I care about your health - ”
"Oh, so now I'm supposed to thank you for breathing down my neck all the time?"
You seethed. “Is that supposed to be funny? Because it isn't. It's not. It's really not.”
“I’m not the one making a scene over a cigarette.”
“Forget the bloody cigarettes. That's not the point.”
“No,” he said, standing now, tone flat. “I think I get the point just fine. You’ve had a shit week, and I’m the easiest thing to pick on.”
The corners of your mouth tightened.
“You think I like picking fights?”
“Sure seems like it.”
You could hardly hear or think coherently over the sound of blood roaring in your ears. “You’re unbelievable.”
“And you’re relentless,” he shot back. “It’s always something with you. First it’s me leaving my notes in the common room, then it’s how I ‘don’t take things seriously,’ and now it’s - ”
“Oh, I’m sorry - am I not supposed to care when you act like nothing is worth your attention?”
He scoffed and looked away, as if dismissing you, as if you weren't worth any more of his Wednesday night. You gathered up your books with more aggression than was strictly necessary, feeling embarrassingly close to tears with how crazy Theo drove you.
"I don't know why I bother with a degenerate like you. You always do this. I bring something up, and you turn it against me, or you twist it into me being dramatic, or overbearing - ”
He exhaled a cloud of smoke.
“Well, if the shoe fits...” he muttered.
“God, fuck you.”
He never seemed more unattractive you than he did in that moment - caustically insensitive, sarcastic and selfish. You spun on your heel, grabbing your bag off the floor before storming out of the room without so much as a backward glance.
Theo didn’t follow. He just stood there for a beat, unmoving in the silence of the night. Then he leaned against the windowsill and lit another cigarette.
Little Miss "He Knows I Can Take It"
★☆☆☆☆
He'll Make You Feel Special Enough To Tune Everyone Else Out
The man's arrogant enough to act like he's God's gift on Earth and he's shameless enough to act like the yelling and the screaming and the shit he gives you is a blessing. But after a while, if you're not careful, you'll go right on believing him. Twisting his abuse into some fucked up declaration of love because man does he sell the pipe dream of being his favourite punching bag well.
And the thing is - you're not his favourite. You never will be. That won't stop you from making an arse out of yourself trying anyway. The things I did? Ugh, embarrassinggg. Skipping parties, for what? Giving him all my time, for what? Cutting out the friends he didn't like, for what? A guy who needed a training broom till he was ten?? Be soooo fucking for real right now.
You didn't notice the glance Ivy and Melissa exchanged when you walked into your dorm. Your bag slid off your shoulder with a dull thump onto the floor, your shoulders aching.
“Hey.” Melissa said from her spot near the desk. “You missed lunch.”
You distractedly tucked a lock of hair behind your ear. “I was revising,” you muttered, toeing off your shoes. “Didn’t realise the time.”
Ivy wrinkled her nose from where she was sprawled on her bed. “Merlin, you’re one of those. Don’t go all Ravenclaw on us now.”
You gave a faint smile. You hadn't realised how little you had seen of your friends over the past week. You missed them. “Too late.”
There was a pause. Melissa twirled a strand of hair between her fingers. You stilled, recognising that nervous tic of hers.
“Were you with him?” she asked casually. “Theo?”
You hesitated. So what if you were? “Yeah. So?”
“Right,” Ivy said, not unkindly. “He wouldn't have anything to do with you disappearing every other day now, would he?”
You were at a loss of words.
“...I’ve just been busy.”
They didn’t say anything.
You glanced up, feeling the air shift into something more worried, anxious.
“I don’t want to do this right now,” you muttered.
“We’re just talking,” Melissa said gently.
You shot her a look. You weren't dumb. Ivy sat up a little straighter. You could feel the both of them closing in on you.
“Look,” she said carefully, “I know you don’t want to talk about him. But Melissa and I think we should. You’ve changed. And it's...not good.”
“I’m fine,” you said tightly.
“You say that a lot lately,” Melissa said sadly. You scoffed. “It’s getting harder to believe.”
You exhaled sharply, massaging your temples.
“Can we not do this now?”
“You never let us do this,” Ivy said, brows drawing together.
Your stomach twisted.
“Because it’s none of your business,” you snapped. Your friends looked taken aback.
“I just - ” Ivy blinked. “We're not trying to - ”
“I know what you meant,” you cut in, voice rising. “You don’t like him. You think he’s bad for me. You think I’m stupid for being with him.”
“No one said that,” Melissa said slowly, frowning. “No one's saying that. We’ve just never seen you like this. We're not the enemy, Y/N.”
It sure felt like it. Melissa reached out, and in that moment of blind rage, you couldn't tell if it was to hug you or hurt you. You flinched out of her reach. You didn't miss the brief flicker of hurt that passed over her face. Even Ivy looked mystified.
“Y/N," Ivy said, getting up now. "Enough of this. We’re worried about you. He’s getting to your head, and you're so wrapped up in him that you can't even see it.”
You crossed your arms.
“I'm not a child, for Merlin's sake. I know he’s complicated. I’m not blind.”
“Then why are you defending him like he’s perfect?”
“Because you’re making it sound like he’s evil,” you snapped. “Like I’m too dumb to realise I’m being treated badly.”
You opened your mouth to continue, but no words came. Just heat. Frustration. Guilt twisting into something bitter.
“I’ve never seen you like this,” Ivy said quietly. “Not over anyone.”
Looking at your friends, their hostile postures and mutinous faces, you felt terribly alone. “Well,” you said, “maybe I’ve changed.”
Melissa stared at you, looking angrier than you had ever seen her. “Yeah. You have.”
You sighed.
“I don’t need a lecture right now.”
“And we’re not trying to give you one,” Ivy said. “But you’re making it really hard to not say something when you’re hurting yourself like this.”
“I’m not - ” you started, but stopped short.
Because you were hurting. You knew it. You’d known it for a while now. But hearing it sfrom someone else's lips made it feel like an accusation.
“We’re just trying to help you,” Ivy said, quieter now.
“I don’t need help," you said, chest tight. "I need you to back off.”
A listless kind of quiet descended in the room. Melissa’s jaw tensed. Ivy uselessly smoothed down her sheets.
Melissa wasn't as forgiving. “Whatever. It's your life to ruin, L/N.”
She drew her hair up into a ponytail. "Dinner, Ivy?"
The silence they left behind was deafening. You refused to dwell on the fight. You refused to acknowledge how damning their condemnations felt.
And still - when the dust settled, like a woman possessed, your thoughts drifted back to Theo. To that lopsided grin. That lazy smirk. Pulling you in, and in, and in, and in.
Little Miss Fool Me Twice, Shame on Me
★★★★★
He always knows when he's about to lose you
And that's when he's the sweetest. He'd have to be - it's his last ditch attempt to distract you. He'll have you wondering how you could ever think of him as selfish or mean-spirited or anything other than the world's most-loving, most-devoted boyfriend. Boyfriend? HA!
It started the way most things with Theo did - loud, dramatic, and entirely unnecessary.
You stepped out of the Transfiguration exam room, clutching your wand, still mentally arguing with yourself over you shaky answer to question seven, when someone near the doors let out a sharp, disbelieving laugh.
“What the hell - ?”
Students were crowding toward the entrance of the castle, whispering, staring. You followed the noise, shielding her eyes from the sudden sunlight. And then you saw it.
A car. A bright red, shiny Muggle convertible, parked just off the stone steps, looking entirely out of place in front of Hogwart's gothic architecture. And leaning against it like he'd walked straight off the poster of some pretentiously obscure, too-slick indie film was Theodore Nott - sunglasses perched cockily in his curls, sleeves rougishly pushed up, charm turned on.
“Oh, my god,” you muttered under your breath, walking faster now, heat creeping up the back of her neck.
He caught sight of you and grinned. Not a smirk, not his usual self-satisfied half-smile. A grin.
Like he hadn't been a complete dick to you just two nights ago.
“What's all this?” you asked as you stepped up to him.
Theo straightened with a practiced laziness. “It’s a getaway car.”
You blinked at him.
“Weekend trip,” he clarified. “We need a break. You need a break.”
“I have two exams left.”
He shrugged. “Two is practically nothing.”
“Theo.”
Before you could continue your protests, he took your hand and kissed your knuckles in full view of half of your year, completely unbothered.
“Your stuff’s in the boot. Packed it this morning.”
Your mouth dropped open. How did he manage to get into the girls' dormitories?
“You what—?”
“There’s snacks,” he continued, unrepentant. “I even charmed the glove compartment to keep your disgusting fizzy drinks cold." Traces of the Theo you knew started resurfacing. He sounded pretty damn proud of himself. "You’re welcome.”
“You’re mental.”
“And you’re exhausted.” He leaned closer, lowering his voice. “Come on, Y/N. You can revise in bed with me and a view of the sea. There’s a fireplace. I booked the biggest suite they had.”
He pressed a chaste kiss to your palm. Your face burned.
"Please? For me?"
You should’ve walked away. You meant to walk away.
But he had that look again - the one he used to reel you in after every fight. The one you couldn't bear to tell off. That soft-eyed, unwittingly innocent look like he wasn't even capable of doing anything wrong, let alone on purpose. Behind him, the sunlight hit the car just right, glinting off the chrome like some surreal, too-good-to-be-true movie scene.
It was stupid. And ridiculous. And maybe that was the point.
So you went.
On the drive down, Theo's hand casually resting on your thigh, wind whipping through your hair, you told yourself you weren't impressed.
But then you saw the room - two floors, a balcony, a charmed bath bigger than her dorm - and you maybe slightly let it go to your head.
He ordered room service like you were royalty, feeding you chocolate-covered strawberries by the tray, worshipfully kissing the tips of your fingers like he’d never once raised his voice or made you feel small.
He lit candles. Bought you a new jumper at one of the quaint, homey shops by the pier when you'd offhandedly mentioned feeling a little chilly. Got up to make you tea in the mornings and made it right - not the way he liked it, but the way you always complained about no one ever remembering it.
He let you pick the station on the wireless. Spoilt you relentlessly. Had the nerve to call you pretty in the midst of you lounging in the utter bliss of what was turning into the most indulgent heaven.
Maybe it was the wine. Or the way the fire flickered inches from you where you laid tangled up on the rug, breathing slow and even and in sync, like the world where you were constantly at each other's throats never existed.
Or maybe it was just the way he was looking at you again. Like you mattered. Like you were special. Like he was choosing to be good. Like he was choosing to be good for you.
You caught yourself smiling at nothing. You let him pull you into his lap. Let him press kisses down your neck, murmuring all the right things.
On the last night, your head was resting on his chest, his fingers tracing slow, thoughtless circles into your back. You should've been long asleep, but you couldn’t stop thinking about how different he felt like this. Like this version of him had always existed, but you were only just now being allowed to see it.
“I don’t get you,” you said, barely above a whisper.
Theo glanced down at you.
“What’s there to get?”
You propped yourself up on your elbow, looking down on what little you could see of his face not obscured by the dark or his soft curls. You tilted your head, considering.
“You’re just…different, sometimes.”
His hand paused.
Then he shifted, rolling you both over gently, lips brushing against your jaw, collarbone, shoulder.
“Maybe you just make me better,” he murmured.
You almost laughed.
Because it was such a good line. But that's exactly what it was - a line.
You drew Theo closer to you almost anxiously. He obliged, hands wandering to your hips. Distantly, you wondered if you carved open his heart, would you find anything remotely genuine inside?
It was late. You were tired. It made your head hurt to think of such depressing things.
So your eyes fluttered shut, and you let yourself succumb to Theo's ministrations. Let yourself believe it.
For one more night.
Little Miss Egg on My Face
★★☆☆☆
It Never Lasts
It's almost a slap in the face, really - he could do it all for you, and more. He just doesn't want to. He doesn't care enough to even be halfway decent, especially once the glow wears off. So a week later, he goes back to his old ways, drinking and philandering, and you - well, you stayed, didn't you? Now who's the idiot?
For a few days, it almost felt like things truly had changed.
Theo had stayed soft, sweet, attentive. He sat with you during meals without you asking. Laced your fingers together under the table in study hall. Let you sleep in his bed, no questions asked, when you showed up exhausted after a double-length Potions exam. He even gave you his last chocolate frog during a study break and shrugged, saying you needed it more than he did.
And you started to believe it. That maybe the trip really had saved their relationship from ruin. Maybe this time, he meant every kiss, every touch.
But, like all good things, it didn’t last.
By midweek, you started noticing it again, despite your best efforts.
The way he brushed you off in the corridors with a distracted nod, not even slowing his pace. The way he left your group hangouts without saying goodbye. The way he started treating you like an accessory he wanted only sometimes.
It was subtle. Like he was slipping out of a persona.
One night, you watched him lean towards another girl a few tables over, heavily wrapped up in whatever riveting conversation they were sharing, all low laughs and half-lidded glances, his mouth tugged up at one side. The same smirk he’d used on you—only now it felt recycled. Contaminated. Revolting.
He didn’t even glance your way as you left the Hall.
You waited until you were alone. You found him near the back stairwell, the one they used to use to sneak up to the Astronomy Tower. He was lighting a cigarette. Of course. Something about this was beginning to feel destructively futile.
Your voice was quiet at first.
“Hey.”
Theo glanced over, eyes unreadable in the gloom of the night. “Hey.”
You hesitated.
“Can we talk?”
He exhaled a thin stream of smoke, then shrugged. “Sure. Talk.”
There was a beat of silence. Then she said, softly, almost apologetically, “You’ve been different. Since we got back.”
Theo looked away.
“Have I?”
You could feel him beginning to shut you out. You panicked. “I’m not trying to start anything," you said, hurriedly. "I just…noticed.”
“You always do,” he muttered, flicking ash onto the stone floor.
You frowned. “I’m not accusing you.”
“Not yet, you're not.”
Something about the way he said it - flat, unaffected - made you feel ridiculous. A laughingstock. Overly emotional. Wholly irrational.
Still, you pushed on. “You were great this weekend, Theo. Really. Till now, I didn’t want to say anything because I liked that. I liked you. And now - ” You swallowed. “Now I don't."
He raised a brow.
“Because I sat at a different table?”
“It’s not just that.”
“Then what is it?”
You worried your bottom lip.
“You’re pulling away again.”
Theo laughed condescendingly.
“Well, forgive me if I don’t feel like being your emotional support boyfriend every minute of every day.”
You stared at him.
“Is that what you think I want?”
“Sure seems like it.”
You stepped back, your frustration mounting.
“God, you’re unbelievable. I’m trying to talk to you, and you’re acting like I’m some clingy, nagging -”
“Well, aren’t you?”
Your mouth dropped open. “Are you serious?”
“I’m serious that this, is getting old,” he said, not even bothering to look at her now. “The whining. The melodrama.”
You hated the way your voice was beginning to shake.
“You always do this, Theo. Every time we get close, you run the other way. You pretend none of it ever happened.”
He turned to you now, finally meeting your eyes with that cold, dead gaze of his.
"We had a nice weekend. We had one nice weekend. Newsflash, princess - it's not that deep."
Your chest tightened, your breath catching in your throat.
He didn’t stop there. “You act like I’m supposed to worship you like some lovesick puppy all day every day. Don't you get exhausted by how much you want all the time? Do you really need to be wanted that badly?”
There was a long pause.
Then you exhaled, sharp and cold.
“Fuck you.”
He didn’t blink. “That’s more like it.”
All this while he'd been trying to buy your infatuation. Meanwhile, you couldn't pay him to offer you a shred of respect.
You shoved past him, your nails digging crescent moons into her palms as you walked far, far away from him. The echo of your footsteps hit the walls too loud, too fast, like you couldn’t get away from him quickly enough.
He didn’t follow. Not that you expected him to. But the worst part was that it hurt exactly the way she knew it would that afternoon you first laid eyes on him. Because he didn't care - not really. Not enough for it to actually mean anything.
Still, some sick part of your heart pulsed with the worry that you'd go back. That you weren't strong enough to truly stay away from him. That you'd go crawling back to him on some cold, miserable night.
When your hands stopped shaking. When your voice stopped cracking. When you convinced yourself again that maybe he half-meant it that one time. That maybe he could change. That maybe he already had.
But for now, all that you could do was walk, and walk, and walk, until the halls swallowed you whole. Until he was little more than smoke curling in the wind.
The only thing heavier than your silence was the weight of still wanting him.
It’s always worse at night.
When the castle halls are quiet. When your bed’s too big. When there’s no fight left in you to battle the waves of want.
It was late—so late that even the stars seemed like a distant memory, hanging somewhere far beyond reach. It was a stupid hour, one where you should have been asleep, or at least pretending to be. But you weren't. You never could sleep the same without him anymore. Not when he’d been the one to fill the void inside you, even if it was with something corrosive. You hated it. And yet, there was no escaping it.
You missed him. How could you not? Despite everything, despite his flaws, his temper, his habits you loathed, you missed him. Even when he was the last person you wanted to think about, your mind wandered back to the way his lips felt against your neck, the way his eyes softened when he thought you weren't looking.
That stupid half-smile. The ominous smell of smoke clinging to his collar. The way his voice softened when he said your name like it was something precious meant only for him.
It was exhausting. This back and forth. The way he could make you feel like the most important thing in the world one minute, and a burden the next. Every time you thought you had him figured out, he flipped it. Changed the rules. Changed the game.
And still - still, you chose to love him.
You were too tired to care about what was “right” anymore. You'd been walking around in this fog of longing and resentment, trying to convince yourself that you deserved more, that you needed more. You needed to be more.
But you weren't. Not without him.
You'd told yourself you wouldn’t do this again. Had said it out loud, even. Had whispered it like a promise into your pillow the night you walked away. But the resolve didn't hold under the weight of your chest caving in from the loneliness.
You tried everything - busy days. Cold showers. Long walks. None of it worked. You couldn't help slipping.
And tonight, you're slipping fast.
Your bare feet carry you down the corridor before you can think. You don't react to the chill of the floor. Your head is vacant of any plans, any rational thought - just the sharp pulse of want, of need, of him.
You hesitate outside his dorm. But it's too little, too late. The time to turn back was months ago, when he was little more than a stranger on a picnic blanket you had enough sense to not get involved with.
The door creaks open.
He’s awake. He doesn’t say anything. You don't leave. He doesn’t ask you to.
He lifts the covers. Makes room for you without question.
You climb in.
His arms wrap around you like muscle memory. Like forgiveness he didn’t earn.
And you let him.
Because the thing about loving someone like Theodore Nott is, it’s never a fair fight. It's an affliction of the worst kind. It's a habit you can't quite quit. It’s knowing better. And choosing him anyway.
You closes your eyes and shift closer, pretending you don't know how this ends.
Little Miss Disillusioned
★★★☆☆
Would Not Recommend
But Merlin...I always come back.
Poe Dameron x Reader
1.8k Words
First Part
Author: yearning poe my beloved, I'm addicted to him I just couldn't keep him and the reader apart. this is unedited but I hope everyone enjoys.
You saw Poe Dameron in every single thing. In the reflections of the lake outside the inn you were staying at, his smiling face in every ripple along the surface. In the cocky smirks of the pilots across the cantinas. In the kindness of the old woman who charges you only half rate at her inn. The weight around your neck, the sun on your skin, the smell of your cockpit. The list went on and on until everything led back to him, and it was in everything you did.
The first two months were the worst. Every reminder of him ached through your chest, through your choice. It burned and ebbed and screamed and scratched at the inside of your chest, attempting to claw its way out.
Claw its way back to him.
It never got easier in the following months. It still hurt, still ached, but in a dull and unending way. A way that told you this would be your life. You would always ache and yearn and dream.
Some nights you got caught up in it. Got caught up in how your dreams used to be the stars, danger, and glory. Now they seemed almost bland. A house, a lake, children, and him. His love, his laugh, your life.
Some nights you pushed it to the side, smiling lightly at other cocky pilots with dark hair and deep eyes who bought you drinks in the cantina. That was as far as it ever went. Maybe one day you would try to totally lose yourself in the intimacy of another, but that day wouldn't come anytime soon. Not when it felt so unfinished. He was in your head, his mother's ring around your neck. How could you move on when it was an ache so deep? When it was never over?
By the time it had been six months apart, six months of exploring the galaxy and gathering intel, you did an act so selfish you wished someone would shake some sense into you. There was a wooden chest at the end of your bed, always cold and stuffed with things you didn't use with a mix of some you couldn't bear to look at.
At the bottom sat a cold, metal disk. It remained unused unless you had something to report. The brisk night air drifted through the open window of your room, the odd insects chatting under the stars. Your bare feet crossed the room until you were slumped on your knees, digging through the chest like it contained something you had always been searching for. You thought, in a way, it did. The disk glared at you, challenging your will. Questioning if your selfishness was worth more than your sacrifice.
The hologram of an older woman sprung to life, eyebrows furrowed. "Is something wrong, Agent?" Her voice was authoritative with an undertone of motherly instincts that never quite go away. You were many things these days. Rebel. Pilot. Commander. Agent. Spy. Townsfolk. But she had known you before she had given you any of these titles. She had known you when you were naive and young. Before the war had aged your mind. Before love had changed your perspective.
"General, I am formally requesting to be discharged." You were shocked how much you meant the words. But she wasn't. Leia Organa is rarely surprised.
Her harsh eyebrows soften, though her voice remains strong. "Are you quite sure about this? This is a classified mission and the war greatly depends on your intel. This is a serious thing to request. Some people may see it as desertion."
You had so many titles, adding deserter didn't bother you as it once would have. Not when you deserted something so much more important. Something that made the war worth it. "I'm aware of the weight of my request."
Then something shone through on her face, a mother's smile. "Then come home, Agent. Discharge granted, you'll be reinstated on Red Squadron. I have a feeling there are people on base who have grieved your absence greatly." She fades out of transmission, but it doesn't matter. You're already on your feet, gathering your small collection of belongings and leaving enough money on the nightstand for the woman who owns the inn to gasp and smack you upside the head.
You're running, like you've done your entire life. But it's different now. For the first time you're running towards something. Something finite yet infinite. Something bigger than the stupid war. Something warm and close, despite the distance.
Your ship leaves in the dead of night, rising above the lake and the inn and the town and all their smirking pilots and odd insects. You hit hyperspace before you even make it out of the atmosphere.
Poe Dameron saw you every single night. In every dream, you're there with your arms open, and he's running back to you. He tells you he should have never let you leave and you tell him you never will again. It's a bit of selfishness he saves for himself, because he's been rather selfless these days. So much so that it's boarding on reckless and Leia had to sit him down and question why he seems to be so hellbent on taking one for the team.
But she knows why. And he still bothers to lie.
The days are the same. Early wake up, drills that have his squadron glaring at every order, an occasional mission, and then his nights belong to you--like they once did many months ago. On the weekends, he goes a bit insane. With not much to do, he haunts the grounds of the rebel base.
He jumps in the lake under the light of the moon, the dark waters pulling him under. It's peaceful for a few blissful moments. The water muffles the sounds of the forest, and the worries of the day, and the images of you that drown him on dry land. He tries to let it go, let you go. Poe urges your stupid smile and strong mind away every time he goes under. He tries to jump a bit further each time, like it will propel him past the nights you spend together and the days you dreamed of each other.
He sits blankly in the mess hall, surrounded by his squadron and closest friends. He blindly walks to your sleeping quarters, falling asleep amongst the sheets that your smell still clung to.
He nearly always has his back turned to the sky when he's in the hanger. Almost like it pains him to look at the last spot where he saw you. It's summer now, the sunlight warming his back the way your hands used to, as he tinkers with BB-8. Even his droid has sensed the way Poe has changed in the past few months.
"Buddy, you gotta stop taking corners so fast. You're damaging your metal," Poe sighs. BB-8 beeps at him indignantly while he continues to polish his droid's small, metal body.
Poe eventually gets around to repair his X-wing. It's something he's never neglected before, but things are different now. Oil is caked under his finger tips as he sorts through some faulty wiring that's made his hyperspace gear bring him nearly 200 coordinates south of his original ones.
"Commander Dameron, we have a report." Black 5 is standing stiffly beside Poe's ship with a few other members of the squadron, his helmet under his arm. Poe slides out from under his ship, slightly grateful for the distraction. But he's grateful for any distractions these days.
Poe rises to his feet, authoritative build easily showing his leadership. His strong arms fold over his chest as he listens to the report from his squadron, legs slightly widened. The summer sun slowly fades from his back, leaving him with the same coldness he's felt ever since you left.
Black 5's eyes catch on something over his shoulder, "The rebel ships made it out bu-" His eye catch on something over Poe's shoulder again, like he didn't quite believe it the first time. "Holy Kriff.."
Poe turns around faster than his brain can register. Here he stands, just as handsome as when you lost him, perhaps a bit more melancholy. But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because you're home, and he's always been like stepping through the door.
And you're just like his dreams, expect you're running to him. Running and crying and apologizing, but one sight of you, of that ring around your neck, and he can't bring himself to care about any of it because it doesn't matter anymore. It doesn't matter that you left, all that matters is that you're here and--
Maker, it hits him like a X-wing when he finally has you in his arms. One minute you're only in his head, so distant he thinks he may have imagined you all together. The next you're running back to him, the sun setting behind you and painting you in a near halo. And he's running back to you, the sunlight that you didn't manage to fully soak up reflecting off the tears on his face like it used to reflect on the stupid lake outside of the inn on a planet that doesn't matter now.
You're warm, like he remembers. His arms wrap around you so tightly, and a weight you've been carrying for months drops as you sob in relief. You're home. He's home. The word had never been so heavy before you realized all it means.
"I am so so sorry, and I love you so much," you cry, gripping his shirt like he might fade with the last of the sunlight painting him in a golden hue that only he can be seen in.
But he doesn't care about any of that. Not when you're here. Not now. He pulls away, and you almost sob, thinking that you've truly lost him. Blindly grasping for him, because that's all you really know how to do. His hands cradle your face in the gentlest touch you think you've ever received. His calloused finger pads rub your cheeks as he takes in every bit of your face, every part he may have forgotten. You faintly register his smell. Oil, fuel, pine, a fire at the hearth, a warming in your heart. And because he knows you, just as much as he did all those months ago, because he knows you in ways you haven't figured out yourself, he says, "Baby, I don't care that you left. I only care that you came home. And I, Maker, I love you."
His lips are on yours, and for the first time in months both of you feel whole. The sun finally disappears beyond the horizon and the lake you both used to swim in, but you feel impossibly warmer than ever before.
Poe Dameron x Reader
751 Words
Second Part
Author: a little poe angst that i thought of in the shower
Poe stands in front of you, looking everywhere but your eyes. Your jaw clenches. A part of you wants him to be a man and look you in the eyes. Another part of you gets it entirely.
He had known from the first day you arrived--a wild glint in your eyes and a thirst to prove yourself--that you wouldn't settle. But god, he had hoped you'd settle for him. He had prayed he'd be enough. So here he stands now, a foot away from you yet unreachable.
"Poe." It was stern, like he expected. "Poe?" This one was soft, which is unexpected. Unexpected enough that he finally meets your eye.
And here you are, breaking his fucking heart--tearing it out of his chest, holding it carelessly as it bleeds in your hands. And he wasn't even asking you to stay.
"Poe. Please. Say something," you sound desperate. You've never felt like this before--not with him, at least. The two of you had always seen eye to eye. Had always understood each other without words. That's how he knows you're not coming back, even if you promise. But you think that if he asked, you'd stay.
"I'm happy for you. If this is what you want, then I am so incredibly happy for you." His voice is so genuine, it makes your heart clench and twist uncomfortably. "I think you deserve the universe, you know that. So go get it." He just smiled that Poe Dameron smile. If you knew him any less, you would think he doesn't even care.
But you knew him better than he knew himself most days.
You put your hand on his arm. It's tense. "I'll stay if you ask me to."
He knows you would. He also knows you would silently resent him for it. He shakes his head slightly. His firm chin waivers, and he becomes very interested in his shoes. "You know I'd never ask you to do that."
You nod. You do know. You know him better than you know yourself. He thinks he knows you better than he knows himself, but then again he doesn't understand why. Why you're leaving him. Why he's never the first choice. Why he's not enough. Why you won't come back. He just knows you won't. He's not sure if it's thrill, or the need to prove yourself, or the fear of being in one place for too long. He has no clue why staying with him is never enough. There's always some other thrill. Some other reason you can't just be with him.
But the pilot in him understands as no one else does. Because how is he any different? He flies around into dangerous, uncharted territory. The need to prove himself is in his blood as it is yours. But I'd come back to you, he thinks.
He clears his throat, the chain around his neck branding his skin. He was going to give you that ring, now he fears he'll never get to. But he's a realistic man. He knows the ring has belonged to you since you challenged him in the X-wings on your first day. He knows it'll belong to you long after you're gone, just as it did long before you came. So, with shaking hands, he lifts the necklace over his head and places it in your hand, cupping his around yours.
His heart pangs. This may be the last time he feels your hands.
You stare up at him, shock painting your features. "Poe..." You're at a loss of words. You feel like you've only said his name throughout the entire exchange because you just don't quite know what else to say. "This is your mother's. I can't-"
His warm hand is still on yours and your chest still leaps like its the first time he's ever touched you. Like you haven't explored each other's bodies and mapped every surface. "And now it's yours. Don't be a stranger." It's said jokingly but you can hear the desperation. He'd recognize you blind, and now he fears it's his last chance to stare into your eyes.
He places a kiss on your forehead, and you close your eyes on instinct. When you open them, you only see his retreating figure.
Bile builds in your throat. What had you expected? I expected him to ask me to stay, you think. I would've stayed if he asked.
Ring clenched in your fist, you turn to your X-wing and climb into the cock pit.