[kafka-ish]

i write sometimes

masterlist (18+)

kate (she/her) | twenty-something

some things about me & my page:

- hate, discrimination, and/or the affiliation of any kind will not be tolerated. this is a safe space.

- i’m currently a college student, studying philosophy & english. ironically, i discovered my love for writing through fanfiction, which i started writing during the pandemic. i used to write for IT but now i write for any characters i feel drawn to at the moment, when the time & inspiration allows for me to.

- when i’m not writing character imagines i’m either working on research projects or original fiction/creative non-fiction.

- it takes me a while to write; i care a lot about the work i put out & i’d like for what ends up getting read to be either something i’d also want to read or at least be proud of. on top of that, this blog has sustained so many of my transitioning periods and at this point it’s more of an escape for me to seek occasionally. uploads of my own will be sporadic. of course, my inbox is always open for requests, questions, if you just want to chat

- some things, in terms of content, i won’t touch: incest, pet/pissplay, pregnancy… it’s great if you’re into that, i’m just not

- currently i write for art donaldson & patrick zweig :)

[grimsonandclover]

Pumpkin Spice Lips [patrick zweig]

"Barista Patrick who hates making Pumpkin Spice lattes but reader loves them. Very teasing, flirting banter based until they fall in love." - Anon

So happy to participate in the Challengers fic gift xchange! Whoever sent this prompt, I love you 5ever. Happy fall and spooky season <3

[sfw] [2.4k words]

⚠︎ friends to lovers, banter, coffee shop au, customer service, geese

The leaves on the tree in your front yard have started to fall, shades of apple cider and rust littering the grass and pavement. Winds turn crisp, and the honk of geese flying south passes over your head as you walk. You stop to admire their formation, envious of their biannual vacations and weightlessness, but then you turn the corner and remember being a human has its pros that geese don’t get: a little place called O’ Joe.

Every time that bell rings above your head, you want to grin like a Cheshire Cat and skip to the counter, but you usually resist that impulse. It’s only somewhat populated; there’s a much bigger Starbucks two stores down, but you still prefer the boy behind the counter and the few other regulars to consider you mostly sane when you come in every day. Today, however, you don’t hesitate to leave your sanity at the door. You grin and you skip, and the apron at the register looks up from his phone with a sigh and a sheepish smile of his own. He hates letting you know how much he likes seeing you come in, you know that.

You also know he’s obligated to give you the same greeting every time you come in (“Welcome in, let me get you a cup O’ Joe.”), but he doesn’t even get the welcome out before you slam your hands on the counter and push yourself onto your tiptoes. “G’morning, Pat. One pumpkin spice latte, por favor. Did you see the geese flying today? Very pretty.”

“I could set my clock to you.” Patrick’s lips pull up at the corners even more as he rolls his eyes, running one of his oversized hands through his hair. “We opened exactly twenty minutes ago—”

“And you start serving pumpkin spice today, I know. Give me the pumpkin spice, Pattie.” Said with love and a mischievous bite of your bottom lip.

“Don’t call me that.”

You love it when he groans like that, it never fails to stir something secret in your gut. You also love how he hates you in October, when the place sells their limited time special for the month. Sure, you could go two stores down for it instead where they serve it longer, but it’s so much better here. Plus, they don’t have an annoyed barista who practically knows you like the back of his hand. “You better tip me,” Patrick’s already taking the money from your open palm and sliding it into the register, handing another customer their freshly brewed coffee in a paper cup. “You know, for the inconvenience.”

Two bills always shoved in the bottom of your purse drop into the “for a new tennis racket” jar right as you scoff, leaning on the end of the counter as a new customer eyes the menu slowly. “I’m not the only person ordering them, Pattie— you’d have to make one eventually. And they’re not, like, hard to make anyway.”

“The spiritual inconvenience.” The elaboration slips past in a whisper by your ear as Patrick rounds the counter, a tray with two coffees and some breakfast bagels in hand. “And stop calling me that.” He sets the goods down on a table in front of a confused and curious mother-daughter duo, one you even recognize as other regulars. You pretend not to remember him telling you last year how PSLs ‘went against his religion’. He refused to name which religion that was. Before you can teasingly ask him what he means, again, the new customer mutters a weak “Excuse me,” and the little girl at the table he served spills her hot chocolate all over the table.

“Oh, fuck,” Patrick doesn’t notice the stern stare from the mom. She’s apparently taken a moment between consoling her whining daughter to silently scold the innocent barista who just swore. You reach over the counter to grab a cloth, tossing it to Patrick, who returns it with a grateful smile. It wasn’t the biggest spill, and no one was burned (and he didn’t spill it), so Patrick also pretends to not notice the mom asking for a refund on the drink. You pretend to not find it kind of funny how upset it makes her, and she never tips when she comes in, so it’s not like she’s owed it. When Patrick’s behind the counter again, the newbie speaks up. You’re still leaning against the counter, coffee nowhere to be seen or smelled— it must be his coworker Shelley’s day off. Poor sucker.

“Excuse me?”

Patrick blinks like he’s forgotten where he is, grimaces a little, and then swipes a large hand over his face. “Sorry, yeah, welcome in. Let me get you a cup O’ Joe.” You have never heard something less enthusiastically. Any surviving enthusiasm is killed the next moment anyway.

“Hi, yes, could I get the pumpkin spice latte? Is it any good here?”

Patrick’s tongue lifts to the back of his teeth, an earnest “no” balancing on the tip of it— but you swoop in to save the day, leaning closer to the guy and cutting Patrick off. “Oh, they’re fantastic. I get them every year.”

He considers your words for a moment while Patrick breathes slowly through his nose, already reluctantly inputting the order. You hear the “fantastic” he mutters. Pattie’s never been great at customer service. It’s one of his charms. That, and (as much as he hates the fact about himself), he makes a mean pumpkin spice latte.

Eventually, you do get your order. The warm paper cup is held close to your chest as you absorb its warmth. You haven’t got work today, so you hangout at the cafe and annoy the overworked barista you’ve found yourself growing attached to over the years. You can’t remember exactly when your little routine together started, but it’s been a while. He’s not from the city like you are, you know that, and you know he started working soon after moving here. Instead he’s mentioned somewhere east you can’t quite remember; it bothers you that you can’t remember a detail like that. Every time you’ve tried to bring up his home life or family, someone manages to conveniently need his attention elsewhere. You swear he’s grateful for it.

There’s a tree almost just like the one by your house that grows opposite O’ Joe. It’s positioned perfectly so that you can see the very first leaf fall of its branch, swimming down in a delicate dance to the still green grass below. It’s almost pristine down there before the very first sign of fall hits the blades. Soon enough it’ll be shades of orange and brown, just like your drink.

You like that this place sells, alongside the lattes, pumpkin spice cookies. They’re made fresh every morning by Martha in the back kitchen, shaped and iced like pumpkins. You take a bite from yours, the paper wrapping crumpling in your fist. Some more customers come in, make their orders. Some take them to the bench just under that tree, and sometimes you’ll smile politely at whoever does sit there. Martha comes out, baking done for the day, and you buy her a coffee. When you order her a pumpkin spice latte, Patrick just smiles.

He only ever complains when you do. Good.

Then his shift ends, and as much as you love warm hearted Martha, you don’t have much of an excuse to stay after Patrick lifts his apron over his head to hang it. He’s got a coffee and cookie of his own, Americano and gingerbread. He turns to walk towards his apartment down the block but you stop him, nodding towards the bench. “Let’s sit here for a bit. It’s empty.”

The two of you don’t talk too much after his shifts end. Usually you’re both tired and worn out, just wanting the familiar company and a snack. It’s been your routine for years. Get a cookie, clock out, sit in comfortable silence. Sometimes at one of your places, sometimes in the cafe, and sometimes at the bench.

Another leaf falls and joins the first, the tips of the two touching when it lands. Like it was a friend chasing after the other, not wanting to leave it alone.

“Why do you hate pumpkin spice so much?” You ask before you sip yours. It’s not a serious question, but it’s a curious one. Patrick takes a moment to think, smiling like there’s something amusing about it that only he knows. His eyes trail a passing kid on their bike as he bites down into his cookie, and he shakes his head. When he speaks, crumbs trickle from the corner of his cold and pink lips.

“I don’t hate them.” The smile grows with each word. Patrick’s always had a thing with personal space, and he’s leaning close enough that you can smell the gingerbread in his hand, but not close enough that it’s weird. “I don’t hate them, I just…”

“Hate when I order them?” It’s a tease, because you know that’s not it either.

You make Patrick laugh, then he’s leaning his elbows on his knees and his neck turns to look up at you beside him. “No, no. Nothing like that, you know that. Just…” He laughs again, a hand coming to swipe down his face like he’s trying to hide behind it, “eat your cookie.”

“No, I wanna know. Tell me why you hate it when I order pumpkin spice lattes. Is it cause you secretly love them and want them all for yourself? Cause I can share.” You nudge what’s little left in your cup towards him, and he shoves you lightly with his shoulder, fake grimacing.

“Too much sugar, and no.”

You decide to leave him to answer on his own, leaning an arm back against the bench as you watch the leaves above you move in the gentle wind. They sound so pretty, like they’re shushing you to be quiet and listen to everything around you. You do. Patrick worries that if you’re quiet enough, you could hear the hammering of his heart. “I, well to be honest, I love it. I don’t like them for myself, they’re way too sweet and I think pumpkin spice should be reserved for pumpkin pie—  but I love one thing about them.”

Patrick sits up then, turning to face you more on the bench. Then, he falls quiet again. Like he’s listening to the leaves, listening to everything around the two of you. Faintly, you can hear a squirrel chittering across a branch nearby, or the bell above the door across the street, or a kid passing by with their mom repeatedly asking “Why’s the grass crunchy? Why do the leaves change color? How long until Christmas?”

“I love that, even though there’s a dozen coffee shops and cafes in the city that are considerably closer to your house, you take the time every day in the fall to walk here and order them.”

You’re slowly chewing the last bite of your cookie, your drink somewhat forgotten as it sits next to you on the bench. You’ve suddenly found yourself transfixed.

“I love that even though you know I never pay attention to them, you always ask if I’ve seen the geese flying. You know, I never even thought about the migration habits of birds before you started. But, yeah, they do look pretty cool. I only look up on my way to work and get to see that because of you.”

Then you swallow, but you find yourself having to swallow again quite soon after because your mouth has gone a little dry. It’s October, why does it feel so hot all of a sudden? You’re in a scarf and jacket. Is he still talking? Oh, wow, he’s still talking. You’re sweating under your collar now.

“I love how you totally did have work today but you called in sick because you treat the first day we start serving them like it’s a personal holiday. And you could go home and do whatever it is you do on sick days after you get your fix, but instead you stay until my shift is over, and you spend the day with me.”

He said one thing. That’s three things. You point that out for him.

“You said one thing and that was three.”

That gets another one of his heartmelting laughs out of him, the one where the corner of his eyes crinkle in a way you can only describe like how leaves sound when they crunch. The one where his eyes almost look bluer, and his bottom lip tries to hide itself under his front teeth, and that little dimple you want to crawl into appears. Patrick nods, “Yeah, you’re right. My bad. I love three things about them. And,”

If you had to be totally honest with yourself, this is not how you expected this to turn out. Not just today, but this. You’ve had feelings for this barista for a while now— you’d have to be deaf, dumb, and blind to not know that. This was some dream scenario you had thought up a few times before; the time you finally manned up and confessed how you felt, braving the real possibility of rejection. It was safer to assume he didn’t pay attention to you like that, even if it was silly to think that way. Because it is. He’s telling you exactly how much he pays attention to you. It turns you warm and melty like the whipped cream in your drink. So, because it feels a little unfair that he’s been doing all the talking now, you speak up before he can continue.

“I love you. Sorry to interrupt, but I had to. I love you.”

His smile drops, and then your heart follows. It’s like his brain is processing your words and his lips short-circuited.

Overhead, another formation flies above. You can hear their honks but you don’t look up like you always do, your eyes set on the cute boy who’s always behind the counter at your favorite cafe. The boy who makes your favourite drink perfectly, so you tip him way too much so he can afford his tennis rackets and invite you out to watch him practice. The boy who admitted he notices the geese now, too. They might have their wings and their weightlessness, but they don’t have Patrick.

And then he smiles again. The crinkle returns, and so does the blue in his eyes, and his teeth tuck back over his lip, and the dimple resurfaces. Patrick doesn’t say it back with words. He’s said it with coffee and teasing words, and now he says it with a kiss under the falling leaves. He loves you.

[ghostgirl-22]

Kinktober 2025 ࿐ྂ。

October 10

Recording | Just the tip. Art Donaldson/camgirl!reader.

Necklace

Summary: you didn’t think anyone would find your only fans account. Least of all your hot anatomy lab partner.

cw: mdni, exhibitionism, recording, voyeurism, anachronism (technology, only fans)

kinktober 25 masterlist | taglist

It was an accident really. Art’s not some freak who just stalks only fans. He isn’t. Really! It’s Patrick’s fault actually. He had a subscription and he was signed in on Art’s laptop when Art got back from class at the end of the day. The keyboard all sticky (he’s so fucking gross!) and a note on the door saying he was gonna bunk at Tashi’s for the night. Whatever. Art was curious, that’s all. He was just gonna see what the whole thing was about and then shut the laptop and study. 

Scrolling pointlessly, vaguely aroused by images of girls with big tits and lips plump with filler. He’s about to shut the laptop and close his eyes… not to masturbate of course. But that’s when an image catches his eye. A golden pendant necklace, one he’s seen before dangling around your neck. His lab partner, shy, smart, unassuming but he’s always noticed you. 

There’s nothing else identifiable in the photo but that necklace is unique. He recognizes it immediately. You wear it everyday in class and everyday he can’t help but appreciate where it sits on your chest, just above your tits.  He asked you about it once, so he wouldn’t seem like a creep because he just was staring dumbly at your chest.

“It’s an engraving of my family tree. One of a kind,” you smiled. He nodded, the words entering some distant part of his mind as he took the opportunity to pretend to examine it while his eyes fell to your tits. You have the perfect tits but the photo cuts off before he can see what you look like topless. Without thinking he immediately hits the subscribe button, not caring that it’s Patrick’s account. 

He opens the page and the most recent video plays. The background is obscured in the blur feature but as a student he recognizes the blurred out look of a Stanford single dorm. Your face isn’t in frame, he stares at your soft thighs,  you’re wearing frilly lace hello kitty panties and they’re soaked through and messy with your slick like you’d been playing with yourself from before the video started. It’s the only explanation for how you could be so wet. Jesus, you're practically dripping.  Art sits up, the blood racing to his cock faster than he can think. 

He was right, you do have the perfect tits. The perfect size and shape, nipples erect and puffy like they’ve been toyed with. You rub each nipple lightly with your fingertips a little gasp leaving your lips. He imagines it’s his hands doing it, he imagines sitting you on his lap while he’s rolling them between his fingers, his cock filling you as he tastes the pointy little bud on his tongue. He watches your manicured fingernails slide down your perfect body to your clit, pushing your wet panties in between your folds as you start to moan. Fuck. He wants to get his mouth there too, replace your fingers with his tongue. Make you moan with those thighs wrapped around his head like ear muffs. 

He can’t get his hand around his cock fast enough.   

He watches you touch yourself, the obscene wet sounds of your fingers slipping in and out of your folds filling the speakers. You’re doing it all behind the fabric of your wet panties. “Mmh. Feels so good,” you moan. God it even sounds like you. Whispered swear words leaving your lips as you finger yourself, bringing yourself nearer to climax.  He jerks himself simultaneously, coming breathlessly in just a handful of strokes all over his laptop screen. Holy shit. He looks at it helplessly. Still staring at you through the mess, unable to focus on anything but you finishing, your breathy moans and fingers deep inside your sloppy wet cunt. He needs you, he thinks, as he’s wiping down the laptop screen. He really fucking needs you. He watches the video again. 

The problem is, he doesn’t know how to ask you without seeming like a creep. Everything about the videos looks like you but what if it isn’t you? He’s got Patrick’s password saved on his computer now so he can get in anytime he wants and watch every new session. 

Once you stopped and recorded yourself up close just out of the shower, just a thin slip of skin tone panties on. Your fingers working behind them. You were so close to the camera that as you came some of your slick wet the camera lens. He blew his load immediately. 

Once you got home right after the gym, glistening with sweat, you touched yourself through the leggings hard and fast, moaning desperately. The spandex turning damp with it. 

And then theres the special hell of anatomy lab. His dick is hard all the time now sitting next to you. When you lean over the lab bench to examine the muscle origin and insertion points on the anatomy model. He has to bite his tongue to make himself look away from the curve of your ass. Your jeans clinging perfectly, your necklace dangling above those perfectly shaped tits that he hasn’t stopped thinking about. 

“Hello Art? What do you think?” You ask. Your expression concerned.  He’s gone so red you worry he might be having a stroke. 

He swallows, “huh? Sorry I just… that necklace is so… pretty.”

You take it between your manicured fingers, the ones he watched you stroke your pussy with last night. “Thank you,” you smile. “Now rectus abdominus. What is the action?” 

“Actually I was gonna ask… can you help me study? I feel like with all my activities I’m falling behind.”

It’s the perfect in. Your room is always blurred out in the videos but he notices the colors look familiar. A blurred purple square is actually one of your pillows. The pink in the background is your curtains. He spots a tripod leaning in the corner. He figures it’s kind of a now or never situation. “Uh so… I uh… can I ask you something personal?” 

“Sure,” you watch him fidget as you pull out your anatomy notes. “Is this about my onlyfans?” You smirk at him. 

His eyes widen. 

You’re a good girl. You’re in college and you’re still a virgin, you don’t even feel bad about that. But you do feel maybe a little bad about thinking about sex way more than you should. You think about it so much you touch yourself multiple times a day. One day you stumbled upon a girl advertising that she made a lot of money on only fans doing solo content. You made an account and got really into watching videos. Then you figured you’d try it once. Making solo content just felt like a fun anonymous way to live out your dirty little fantasies on the internet, while making a couple extra bucks. You were able to quit your mall job and still have more than enough for your meal plan and spending money.

No one real was supposed to find it, you were careful. Strategically placed camera to hide your face. All identification in your dorm room turned away or hidden in the closet. The blur feature in the background for added privacy.

You didn’t think about the necklace. It’s a unique golden pendant your grandma had made when you were born. It doesn’t have your name on it but it’s got a little tiny engraving of your family tree. You never take it off and honestly you didn’t think to. Who would be paying that much attention to you anyway? Certainly not your hot, popular, tennis star slash frat boy lab partner. 

When you got the subscription notification from Patrick Zweig for 12 months a few weeks ago the name sounded familiar and when you looked it up you realized you only knew him through Art. And then suddenly Art was acting funny in your anatomy lab. Avoiding eye contact, his skin more flushed than usual. It made you a little crazy imagining him and his friend watching your videos.  It made you so crazy you started touching yourself on camera with Art in mind.

“Am I famous on the internet? Or do you just spend all day on only fans?” You tease just to watch him go redder.   

“N-no I don’t…sorry…I-I j-just—,” he stammers. 

“Relax, I’m joking.” You walk over to your tripod. “Did you want to help me shoot one?”

His eyes grow almost comedically wide and he starts nodding vehemently. “Yeah… uh yes. I’d love that.” He tries for a more nonchalant tone but you’re not fooled. 

You show him how you setup the camera to obscure your head and neck and then you start undressing in front of him. It turns you on to do it in front of the camera for strangers who can only fantasize about you. You didn’t expect how hot it would be to have him here in front of you, real. His lips parted, eyes glued to your every movement. Quiet as a church mouse, like he’s afraid if he breathes too loudly you’ll change your mind. 

You parade around in front of him, topless in only your panties. “My friend is gonna help me today,” you explain to the camera, pulling his body into frame. “I’m a good girl, but I’m so curious. So my friend promised me he’d use just the tip so I can see what it feels like. Right friend?”

”Uh… oh…yes. Yes absolutely.” He chokes out. He stands there staring at you, goofy dreamy eyed look on his face. 

You smile, “are you gonna take off your clothes friend?”

“Oh!” He makes quick work of kicking off his shoes and his jeans and yanking his t-shirt off. And then he’s standing there in front of you looking at you so needy it kinda takes your breath away.  

You direct his movements so he can stay within frame. His hands on your waist, he’s careful but you can tell he’s eager to touch. Before long his hands move up to play with your tits, his eyes roving your body like it’s a work of art just revealed for the first time. You look down at the big tent in his boxers. You pull the waist band low and let his cock spring free. “Mm you really wanted this huh?” You breathe.

He nods his head and your heart is pounding, you feel it pulsing between your thighs. His fingers find their way there and you hear him moan at the feeling of your wetness. Its feels so much better than he imagined, his fingers sinking into your pillowy soft heat.

You should have known just the tip wasn’t gonna happen, the moment you watched him guide the thick head of his cock behind your panties. Sliding it along your folds, along your entrance, a hot hard line that made you both start moaning at the same time. 

“Fuck I need you,” he whines as he starts pressing the tip in. You hold your breath at the pressure as the head of his cock widens your walls just a little bit.  It’s like your body is getting wetter just for the idea of penetration making the give a little easier. 

You look down, dizzy at the sight of his tip inside you. You hear him panting. “I can’t stop,” he whispers, desperate. “Need you so bad.” And honestly you can’t stop either.

He presses deeper, much bigger than your fingers, impossibly big and lengthy and sliding into you, slow, steady, obscene. The thick heavy pressure of it, the aching stretch of your body to allow for it even as you clench involuntarily around it. The heat of arousal curling in your stomach. He’s whimpering in your ear. Before you realize it, he’s fully inside, gripping your body tight.

“Oh fuccckk,” he whines. “So hot. You’re so—nnngh— I-I need to—“ he starts to rock his hips and that’s when you feel the drag of it sliding back out along your clit. it comes back out all shiny and soaked in your wetness before he slides back in. Oh. Oh god. So this is the good part. 

Before long hes rocking into you at a desperate pace, the filth wet sound of his cock slipping in and out, both of you moaning. Hes so incredibly vocal, the camera picking up everything. In the back of your mind you imagine coming back just to this audio to hear him whimpering. He’s impatient and even though you’ve never had sex before you’re pretty sure it’s supposed to last longer than a minute. But it’s 60 seconds in and suddenly he’s whining, “oh my goddd oh no, no, no. It’s happening. Can’t… can’t pull out feels so so—ohmygodfuckmmmcoming.”  

He moans, going soft inside you as you caress the back of his head. 

“Whoopsie, so much for just the tip,” you giggle. 

“I’m so sorry, oh god it felt so good I couldn't stop. I'm sorry. I usually last much longer I  promise,” He cries. His skin flushed all the way down. It’s funny because he’s this big deal tennis star and president of his fraternity and you’ve pretty much reduced him to a puddle. Who knew you could have this effect on him? The idea that he finds you so hot he can’t help falling apart in t-minus 60 seconds is making you crazy. 

You let him slip out and then you use the mixture of your slick and his spend to get yourself off in front of the camera. 

He watches you with his mouth agape. His spent cock showing renewed interest. “You want to help me?” You moan and he’s quickly right there, his fingers taking over doing what yours were. Like he was studying you and exactly what you like. “Fuck, you’re so hot,” he moans as the wave of orgasm crashes over you in no time at all. 

His fingers are trembling as your cunt clenches around him. “I-I think I love you,” he blurts out. He’s an entirely unserious person.

He's hard again, you feel him pressed against your thigh and he makes you shut off the camera claiming maybe he’s camera shy. Before he invites you to the bed for another round. You’re both breathing heavy as he finishes. This time he managed a whole 5 minutes which is… an improvement. 

“I swear, it’s just… nerves.” He promises and you rub his arm reassuringly. “By the way how did you know I’d seen your only fans?" He asks. 

You laugh. “You should tell your buddy Patrick Zweig that most people don’t log in with their government names as their username.”

Art laughs, shaking his head, “he unfortunately has no shame. And apparently neither do I.”  

Taglist: @artstennisracket @nozhdyved @jesuistrestriste @disembodiedgoddess @saltburntme @diyasgarden @siren-iv @iheartinkonpaper @museboos @jordiemeow @omowitty @zweigscore @scariffs @slushfaerie @meetmeatyourworst @cha11engers @challengers4ev @melmoss @cairngorm-ard @cestdommage @bluberrychampagne @fairytrollslut @aftersnrise @reverie-and-roses @antxnxlla @ericbogey @cherryteddysblog @loverofmine99 @harringtonsbowgirl @kodzuvk

[miawal1ace]

I’m still here.

[miserymorgue]

BLIP | ft. P. ZWEIG

summary In the sweltering heat of a lost summer, Patrick Zweig, broke, bored, and clinging to the remnants of his past, finds a fleeting escape in a raw, messy fling with a younger college student.

wc 3.4k words

warnings sexual themes/language, mild age gap (mid-30s and early 20s), tiny power imbalance/older guy manipulating younger woman, casual sex, library and campus settings, use of the term ‘kid’, if that’s anything, angst?

pairing pre-2019!patrick zweig x college student fem!reader

Patrick felt like a fucking creep.

All he could do was watch.

You weren’t even doing anything—just sitting cross-legged in the library, headphones in, scribbling notes from a textbook bigger than his head.

Whatever the hell it was you were studying. Economics? Engineering? Fuck, for all he knew, it could’ve been interpretive dance theory. He never bothered asking. Didn’t care enough to.

All he could think about was how your skirt rode up every time you shifted, how your thighs pressed together under the table, the faint shadow between them. 

He shouldn’t even be here. Not like this. Not after losing, with sweat still dried salty on his skin, clothes clinging damp under his arms, hair sticking up in every direction from running his hand through it too many times. He’d walked straight off court, barely pausing to spit on the baseline in disgust, keys jingling in his pocket as he stormed off to find you.

He needed you – needed something soft to bury himself in, something sweet to erase the taste of failure burning hot and bitter in his chest. The taste of losing to some seventeen-year-old recruit with bright eyes and a perfect backhand.

Maybe there was something sad about a guy pushing his mid-thirties, unemployed and hanging around a campus library waiting for his college fling to finish studying.

But Patrick had lost worse things than dignity lately.

Like his last match, only hours ago – a brutal, humiliating defeat that left his body aching and his head throbbing with every thump of his pulse. He hadn’t even showered yet, just thrown on jeans and hoped for the best.

He’d left the court with his racket dragging on the ground, sweat soaking through his shirt, half-blinded by the sun and rage.

Now here he was, watching you, hoping you’d fix it. Hoping you’d scrape him off the concrete floor of his ego just long enough to feel like a man again.

He’d blown through most of his trust fund – dog racing bets, whiskey tabs, overpriced trainers he convinced himself would fix his footwork. His apartment was month-to-month now, his car insurance lapsed, and his last match ended with a towel over his head, forehead pressed to his knees in the locker room, listening to the sounds of his opponent celebrating two rooms over.

So.

What do you do when you’re broke, your dreams have turned to dust, your best friend is with your ex, and deep down, you know you’re one of the best to ever play the game? 

You hook up with a college student in the middle of Summer. Sticky, burning, California July.

Jesus Christ, if Art saw him now.

You were his early midlife crisis—not that scandalous of an age gap, he had, what? A decade at most? But the new scruffy beard he was trying out certainly didn’t help with the sideways looks from his neighbors when you showed up. Young, pretty, wide-eyed and curious—like you didn’t belong in his broken world, but maybe you did.

Patrick hummed under his breath as he walked over, planting his hands heavy on your shoulders. You gasped in surprise, hand flying to your mouth to stifle it, until you felt his lips press against your bare skin, dry and warm and scratchy with beard burn.

“Hey, kid,” he murmured, voice low and gravelly with sleep and old cigarettes. 

“Jesus, Patrick,” you panted, letting out a breathless laugh as you calmed down. A few people glanced over, frowning at the older guy hovering over your chair. “You scared me.”

You blinked, really looking at him now. Patrick. In a library. Eyes flicking over the sweat stains on his collar, the dark circles under his eyes. “What are you doing here?” 

Great question. What were you studying today? International Relations? Criminology? He really should ask.

“Just… was nearby,” he lied, voice light. “Thought I’d pop by. Maybe take you out to the food court. On me, huh?” He nudged your shoulder, as if he was really outdoing himself by paying for a $3.50 churro.

You scoffed softly, eyes narrowing with that knowing look that always made his chest twist uncomfortably. Like you could read him too well. Like you saw straight through to the rotting wood underneath all his charm.

“What?” he asked lightly, feigning innocence.

“Nothing. Nothing.” You paused, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. “Sure, I’d love to. Give me, like, five minutes? Just need to finish this chapter.”

Patrick slumped down into the chair beside you with a sigh, ignoring the two other students across the table giving him dirty looks.

He turned his body fully towards you, resting his chin in his palm, eyes locked on your face like he didn’t care about the awkward tension suffocating the little group. He never pursued this college life.

Never liked the lecture halls or cheap beer or pretending to care about someone’s major. But he liked watching you. That much was obvious.

You tried to push down your smile, but it bubbled up anyway, making it impossible to focus on your reading. He loved how easily girls like you got flustered by a bit staring.

“Patrick,” you mumbled without looking up.

“Mm?”

“Stop looking at me,”

He let out a long, dramatic sigh, tapping the table lightly with his palms before slinking back in the chair, legs spread out carelessly. His eyes flicked up, meeting one of the other students’ glares, and he gave them a tight-lipped, dead-eyed smile until they quickly dropped their gaze back to their notes.

It wasn’t long after that you closed your textbook with a quiet thud, slipping your headphones around your neck as you packed your bag. He tried to catch the title on the spine as you packed it away, but you were too quick. His brain flitted to the next thought quickly, uncaring.

Patrick watched every movement like he was memorising it. Like he’d forget what you looked like if he blinked too long.

“Ready?” you asked softly, slinging your tote over your shoulder.

He didn’t answer. Just stood up with a grunt, hand pressing against his knee as he rose. Fuck, when did standing up start hurting?

He slung an arm lazily around your shoulders as you both walked out into the brutal heat of the California summer afternoon.

Outside, the air felt thick and humid, clinging to your skin like sweat. Patrick’s shirt was damp at the collar, sticking to the back of his neck. He smelled like sun-warmed cotton and stale deodorant, his beard scratchy against your temple as he pressed a lazy kiss there.

“You eat today?” he asked as you both crossed the cracked concrete quad towards the food court. The sun burned down, white-hot against the pavement, making him squint.

“Not really,” you replied, squinting up at him as the wind caught your hair. “Been here since like… eight.”

“AM? Jesus,” he muttered, shaking his head as he guided you through the crowd. “What’re they feeding you, huh? Slave wages for education and all that.”

You snorted lightly, and he grinned down at you, his thumb brushing idly against the thin strap of your top where it sat against your shoulder. Then, without a word, he slipped the bag off your arm, slinging it over his own shoulder with exaggerated ease.

It was out of character for him. He never bothered with this gentleman act unless he wanted something. And you could feel it in the way his fingers lingered a moment too long on your skin – like he was trying to remind you how easy it would be to just give in.

Patrick had been around the block. Men, women – didn’t matter. They were all the same. They just wanted to feel wanted. Valuable. And he could give them that. At least, when he wanted something in return.

He carried your bag the rest of the way, glancing over at you every so often with that same sly little grin. Making sure you saw. Making sure you remembered he could be sweet when he wanted to be.

The food court was mostly empty at this hour, the lunch rush long gone and the dinner crowd not here yet. Patrick bought you both greasy churros with the last crumpled bills in his pocket, sitting across from you in the sticky plastic booth, legs spread wide like he owned the place, even though his hands were still shaking from the match. 

Even though all he could think about was how badly he needed to touch you – needed to feel your skin under his palms, warm and alive and his.

You bit into your churro as he watched you, tongue darting out to catch a fleck of sugar from your lip. His eyes followed the movement, hungry in a way that made your thighs clench together under the table. 

You both knew he wasn’t here to play the nice boyfriend, which he can play too well for your taste.

“What?” you asked, voice quiet, almost shy.

“Nothin',” he said, leaning back and stretching his arms out along the booth bench. The pose pulled his shirt tight across his chest, exposing a flash of pale belly and the dark trail of hair leading down. “It's hot, isn't it?”

Great. Now weather talk.

You watched him for a moment, chewing slowly, eyes narrowed just slightly. “You’re acting weird,” you said finally, voice quiet but firm. “Like… 'you're my boyfriend' weird.”

Patrick raised an eyebrow, feigning innocence as he licked sugar off his thumb. “How's that weird? Is that a bad thing?” A beat, as he tilts his head a bit at you. "You change your hair?"

“Oh, come on,” you replied, leaning back against the cracked vinyl seat, moving your hand to touch your hair. You hadn't done anything different. “You show up out of nowhere, kiss me like you missed me, carry my bag, pay for my stupid churro… What's your angle?”

His smirk faltered just a fraction, his eyes flicking away to the food court windows before landing back on you. For a moment, he looked tired. Older than he usually let show.

But then he chuckled softly, shaking his head. “No angle, kid.”

You frowned, studying the line of his jaw, the tired slump of his shoulders, the dried salt stain of sweat on his collar.

"Maybe I just missed you," He hums. "Hair looks good, you should do it like that more often."

You could accept a bit of that. You had missed him too, even if you wouldn't admit it to him. You knew he would use it against you in some way. And he knew you'd never use it against him.

You clear your throat, trying to hide the small smile he caused. “Well, I haven’t seen you in a while. You been alright?”

He furrowed his brows, scratching at his temple like the question physically itched. “What’re you talking about? Saw you…” He paused, thinking. “What? A week ago?”

“Two weeks,” you corrected softly. “Usually you text if you wanna see me. Just… did something happen?”

Patrick hummed low in his throat, his eyes flicking over your face before drifting away. He let out a sigh, shoulders sagging slightly.

“Nah. No. Just… felt like seeing you, s’all.” He lied easily, hand reaching out to yours where it rested across the table, thumb brushing over your knuckles. So soft, he thought distantly. Like butter left out too long in the summer heat.

You raised your brows, waiting for him to elaborate. When he didn’t, you let out a quiet scoff. “Okay…” 

He sensed the shift instantly—the way your hand stiffened under his, your back straightening against the vinyl seat. He chewed at the inside of his cheek, eyes darting away for a moment. 

“How’re exams?” he asked, the question sounding foreign in his mouth. Small talk. Fucking pointless. But wasn’t that what guys your age did? Asked about classes, essays, your future.

Be the good boyfriend, he told himself. Pretend you care.

You shrugged, fingers drifting to your necklace, twisting it idly. The chain dipped low between your collarbones, catching his eye for a long, unashamed moment. His gaze lingered there before dragging slowly back up to meet yours. You noticed, of course you did. But you didn’t call him out on it. You never did.

“Fine. Stressful,” you sighed, your voice softer now. “I’ve been needing a break. I’m… glad you’re here. I didn’t mean to be… accusatory, or anything.”

He let out a short breath, somewhere between a scoff and a sigh, rolling his shoulders like he was shaking off your words. “Don’t worry about it. Forgiven.”

You're aren't exactly sure what you're forgiven for.

He doesn't elaborate, just leans back in the booth. A silence settled between you, thick and pulsing, your unspoken wants buzzing just under the surface.

His patience was wearing thin. He didn’t care about your exams, your readings, your neat little colour-coded notes. That wasn’t what he was here for.

“C’mere,” he said after a moment, voice dropping lower.

You frowned, confused. Your eyes flicked around the deserted food court, noting the underpaid student workers had retreated to the back. “Patrick…” you warned softly.

“C’mere,” he repeated, firmer this time.

You slid out of your seat, slipping into his side of the booth. He angled his body towards you immediately, hand coming up to cup your cheek as he kissed you, slow and deep. You tasted cinnamon sugar on his tongue, felt the coarse scrape of his beard against your jaw as he tilted your head back to get better access.

His other hand slipped under the table, fingers skimming up the inside of your thigh. You gasped softly against his mouth, eyes fluttering closed as heat coiled low in your belly.

“Lost today,” he rasped against your lips, voice thick with exhaustion and something desperate. His thumb brushed slow, heavy circles along your jaw, grounding himself. “Played like shit. Couldn’t stop thinking about you. Couldn’t… focus. Just wanted…” He trailed off, pressing his forehead to yours, his breathing ragged. You felt him tremble – just slightly – under your fingertips where they curled into his thigh.

You swallowed, your breath hitching as he tilted your chin up to look at him properly. His eyes were bloodshot, rimmed pink with sun and sweat and something you couldn’t name. 

“Think you can… help me out, huh?” he rasped, the edge of a smirk playing at his lips as his fingers skimmed higher up your thigh. “Be good for me… make it all go away, yeah?”

You let out a shaky breath, pulse hammering so loud in your ears it drowned out the hum of the fluorescent lights above. He had you exactly where he wanted you. That was the thing about girls like you – and you knew it, god, you knew it too well – all it took was him saying he wanted you. Even if it wasn’t really you he was thinking about at all.

Because this was humiliating. Your friends were right when they called you stupid for hanging around him – some sweaty, unemployed, uneducated older guy with dark circles and dog-eaten sneakers. A man clinging to the last flicker of something he used to be. 

But for Patrick, you were just a blip.

An easy detour on the way back to Art and Tashi, a stop-gap to scratch whatever itch he refused to name. And for you… you weren’t sure what he was. A distraction. A secret. A sweaty summer sin that made you feel raw and alive and so, so ashamed. 

But when his thumb hooked under the thin cotton of your panties and he pressed closer, smelling like cheap soap and stale deodorant, all you could think about was how good it felt to be wanted like this.

Even by someone like him.

“Yeah,” you whispered, your voice cracking in the middle. “Yeah… okay.”

Patrick smiles at that, that shit-eating grin. “Yeah?”

You nod, maybe too quickly.

As you got up, he followed, his hand drifting down to your ass with a lazy confidence, like he couldn’t help himself, as he guided you to your dorm room.

You felt the sun on your back as he guided you across the quad, his palm splayed warm and rough across your ass like it belonged there. He didn't bother to carry your bag this time. He got what he wanted. The heat rose from the pavement in shimmering waves, making you dizzy. 

You could smell the sweat on him now – sharp and salty, cut with cheap soap and stale deodorant – and your thighs clenched involuntarily with each step. 

He walked half a step behind you, his fingers slipping under the hem of your skirt every chance he got, the pads of them tracing circles on the tender skin there. People passed by. Students. Workers. 

Nobody looked twice. 

He bent down, lips brushing your ear as you reached your dorm steps. “Gonna let me fuck this loss outta my head, yeah?”

You swallowed hard, fumbling with your keys. “Yeah… yeah, okay.”

You’d see him for the rest of August. He’d come by after games, after drinks, after whatever the hell else he filled his days with. Always sweaty, always tired, always pressing kisses to your neck before you could even ask how he was.

When he won, he didn’t really see you at all. He’d scroll through his phone endlessly, thumb flicking up and up and up, waiting for a text from Art. Or maybe a call from Tashi, just to hear her say “Good game.” Just to feel, for a second, like it still mattered. Like he still mattered.

He never got anything, of course. But that didn’t stop him from waiting for it, staring at the screen like it owed him something.

You were there for the losses. That’s what you were for.

Nobody got his wins. Those he kept close, selfish, private – like if he shared them, he’d lose whatever little power he still clung to.

But when he lost? When the rage roiled under his skin, bitter and hot and ugly?

That’s when he’d come to you. That’s when he’d push into your room without knocking, drop his bag on the floor, and pull you into his chest so hard it almost hurt.

That’s when he’d kiss you like he needed to feel anything at all.

And you let him. Every single time.

Because there was still that part of you – the lonely, hungry part – that liked being needed. Even if it was only for this.

If you tried to tell him about exams, he’d just hum distractedly, hands already sliding under your clothes, murmuring into your skin, “Yeah?… Smart girl. 'Ts why I like you.”

And for a moment – just a flicker – you almost believed it was enough.

You’d fall for it every time. Because what else were you supposed to do when he was looking at you like that, touching you like you were the only soft thing left in his rough, crumbling world?

Then one evening, as August wilted into September, he sat you down on your own bed – the bed he’d fucked you in a dozen times without ever really seeing you.

He sighed, rubbing a hand over his face, eyes darting anywhere but yours. “Listen, kid… you know this wasn’t gonna be forever, right?”

Your stomach twisted. You opened your mouth, then closed it. Nodded instead. Because of course you knew. You’d known since the first time he kissed you like you were a secret he planned to bury.

“It’s not you,” he said softly, reaching out to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear, his thumb brushing your cheek with practiced tenderness. “It’s me. I’m… I’m just in a real fucked-up place right now. You deserve… y’know. Someone better. Someone your own age.”

He smiled then – that crooked, pitying smile – like he was doing you a favour by leaving.

You tried to speak, but he was already standing up, grabbing his bag from where he’d dumped it by your door. He didn’t look back as he left, just raised a hand in a half-hearted wave, saying over his shoulder,

“Take care, yeah? Don’t work too hard on all that… whatever it is you’re studying.”

The door clicked shut behind him. You sat there, staring at your open textbook, the words swimming as tears pricked at your eyes.

(part 2)

notes: seconndd time posting. how vvv fun. i love writing i miss it so much. im tryna not overthinking everything and just post when i feel like it. . ALSO to me he def fucked around manipulated the fuck outta people and moved ON. pls let me know if i missed out on any particular tags/warnings! i never know how to end this things lol thx for reading:)

[kafka-ish]

Ohhhh fuck him

[m4riaa-bonita]

Out of Play - Art Donaldson

summary: art gets benched for three months after he injures his arm. with patrick busy on tour and tashi being a star in campus, he ends up with too much time on his hands and starts wondering, what is he without the sport he has built his life around? then he meets you.

pairing: standford!art x fem!reader

tags: meet-cute, friends to lovers, hurt-comfort ish?, fluff, angst, happy ending, just art being restless and reader being head over heels for him over everything but tennis!!! two idiots in love!!!

"Good news is you don't need surgery. Bad news is you're done playing for a while. No tennis for at least twelve weeks, assuming physical therapy goes well".

Art stared at him for a seconds that felt like hours.

"Three months?"

"Minimum. You shouldn't push it before that, or you'll be risking a temporary injury into a permanent one".

The doctor hands him a brown paper bag with medicine he's supposed to take like clock-work. Naproxen every six to eight hours. He has done much more with much less, he thinks. Back in boarding school he used to feel this type of pain and just sucked it up, put ice on the swelling and it healed up after a week or two. Three months for a labral tear is ridiculous.

"What if I only hit backhands?"

"No".

"What if I don't serve?"

"No".

"What if I-"

"Art, if you'd stopped six weeks ago, we'd be talking about a few weeks of rest. Now we're talking about months. No tennis."

He leaves the office and has to restrain himself from slamming the door on his way out. The instructions to treating his injury keep circling in his mind: ice pack, pills, rest, and therapy every three days. And no tennis. He almost huffs out loud as he walks to his dorm. Maybe if he wasn't such a coward and just sucked it up as he usually did, he wouldn't have gone to the doctor and his coach wouldn't have explicit orders to give him mandatory rest.

Three fucking months.

What was he even supposed to do?

The answer arrived at six thirty the next morning. His clock going off, the incessant beep-beep-beep of his alarm filling the empty room. He opens his eyes slowly, still a little groggy from sleep as he stares at the ceiling. He doesn't reach to turn the thing off. Not yet.

Because for as long as Art Donaldson could remember, waking up and getting the day started had been easy: Practice. Class. Training. Repeat. He didn't have a place to be this morning. Class didn't start until 9am and he usually had a quick breakfast with his teammates once practice was over.

Beep-beep-beep-beep. Regular people didn't wake up this early unless they had class, right? Maybe he should go back to sleep. He doesn't even try after a few seconds of careful consideration — he knows he won't be able to, something about his inner clock. Patrick used to make fun of him for it. Freshman year, Art had shown up at five in the morning ready to practice because he'd woken up and couldn't think of anything else to do. After a month of that, they'd both agreed that mercy was moving their schedule a few hours later.

Beep-beep-beep-beep. Tashi was probably in practice right now, so getting breakfast with her wasn't an option. Patrick is in Japan of all fucking places. His teammates are doing what he should be doing, had he not been so negligent to his shoulder pain a month ago. He checks his phone, only a text from his mom asking how his doctor's appointment went and a text from Patrick.

"don't let them amputate it"

He scoffs. In other circumstances he would answer with something like "already picked out a hook" or something equally stupid. Not today. He throws the phone in the mattress, beside him. Beep-beep-beep-beep. Three months. He's not in the mood to humor Patrick.

Beep-beep- he slams his hand on the off button hard enough to make it squeak and sits on the edge of the bed, staring at his tennis bag that's currently propped up beside the door. For a moment he considered grabbing it. Just grabbing it, walking to the courts and pretend yesterday never happened. The thought lasted all three seconds. His coach had already been informed. So had the athletic department. If Art showed up to practice, he'd be sent right back to his dorm with a lecture he had no interest in hearing.

He was supposed to do nothing.

With a deep sigh he got on his feet and walked to the shower.

Every movement became a test. Reaching for the shampoo. Rolling his shoulder back. Scrubbing at the back of his neck. He paid attention to each one, waiting for that familiar pinch beneath his shoulder blade, the dull ache that had followed him around for weeks. The hot water beat against his skin as he lifted his arm again. Slowly. Carefully.

Did it hurt less today?

Maybe.

Maybe not.

It was impossible to tell.

Art squeezed a handful of chamomile-scented shampoo into his palm and worked it through his hair. The motion felt awkward now that he was thinking about it. Everything felt awkward now that he was thinking about it. He raised his arm again. Still there.

The ache wasn't sharp anymore, just stubborn. He wondered if this was what the next three months would be like: standing in showers, stretching in front of mirrors, taking pills and trying to convince himself he was healing.

None of it felt anything like tennis.

None of it felt anything like cracking a serve down the T or catching the sweet spot of his racket on a clean forehand.

The doctor had said rest.

Art wasn't sure what to do with a body that wasn't allowed to do anything.

When he steps out into campus he notices it's still half asleep. It’s around 7:15 and anyone who isn’t already in class is in bed. He hates it. He hates the morning light reflecting on the dorm building’s windows with that searing light. He hates how people clutch their coffees as if someone would try to steal it from them. He hates feeling cold when outside is also cold; he’s used to be sweating by this hour.

He shoves his hands into the pockets of his sweatshirt reading "STANFORD" and keeps walking. The original plan had been to grab breakfast after practice. No practice meant no plan. Art wandered past the athletic center, deliberately and trying really hard to keep his eyes fixed on the sidewalk. He didn't need to see the courts. He definitely didn't need to hear them.

Somewhere ahead, a machine hissed. The smell of coffee hit him just a second later. Coffee. He didn't drink coffee, he wasn't particularly fond of the stuff. Patrick drank coffee. Tashi drank coffee. He didn't drink coffee and even prided himself, secretly, in not doing so. He didn't need caffeine to function so much as Patrick did, he didn't have a single vice.

Still, it was warm.

More importantly, it was somewhere to be.

Immediately, a wave of heat washed over him.

The bell from the store rang overhead when he stepped in. There were only a handful of people scattered around the room: students hunched over laptops, someone asleep on a textbook in the corner, a girl arguing with someone that clearly wasn't listening on the phone. Normal people.

Art had never felt further away from them.

Patrick ordered americano, right? But that had always smelt too strong and he didn't want to waste a whole three bucks on something he wouldn't particularly enjoy. He orders a latte and carries it to the nearest empty table.

The coffee was still too hot to drink. Not that it mattered.

He sat there for a few minutes, staring out the window and pretending not to think about tennis. It wasn't going particularly well since he could still hear the hard thwack of the ball in the courts.

The bell above the door chimed again. Art looked up automatically.

A girl walked in carrying enough books to qualify as a workplace hazard. Three hardcovers pressed against her chest, a canvas tote bag slipping off one shoulder, and a notebook tucked awkwardly beneath her arm. One of the books hit the floor before she even made it to the counter.

"Shit."

Nobody looked up.

She sighed, crouched to retrieve it, and immediately dropped another. She gave up, and walked to the window table, dropping everything then going back to retrieve the book that was still on the floor.

After ordering and within thirty seconds she'd spread out two novels, a yellow legal pad, three highlighters, and enough loose papers to cover half the table. Art watched her underline a sentence, flip a page, underline another sentence, then immediately cross out whatever she'd just written.

She looked deeply unhappy. Which was strange, considering she was voluntarily reading for fun. English major, he guessed.

A minute later she groaned.

Not sighed.

Not huffed.

Groaned.

The sound was loud enough that three people glanced up from their laptops but she didn't mind it, just glared at her blank page as if she could intimidate it into giving her the answers she needed.

Art had looked up too.

The girl crossed out an entire paragraph, stared at it for a moment, then dropped her forehead against the table with a soft thud and a defeated sigh.

Art snorted. Her head immediately lifted.

"Something funny?"

He should've looked away and pretended none of this interaction happened. Let her be miserable with her stack of books and apparent hatred of whatever she was reading.

Instead he said, "You look like you're being tortured."

She stared at him. Then at the stack of books.

Then back at him with a little smirk.

"That's because I am."

"What class?"

"Victorian literature."

Art blinked slowly.

"That sounds made up."

"That's because you're probably an athlete majoring in economics."

"Business, actually."

"See?" she smirks, a little giggle escaping her lips, gesturing vaguely in his direction, as if that proved her point. "Meanwhile, I decided to dedicate four years of my life to decoding what dead people were trying to say."

"Sounds awful."

"It is." But she doesn't seem like she means it. She seems almost fond.

"Then why do it?" God he's already in whatever this is, might as well keep the conversation going.

"Because I'm stupid enough to major in my passion with a field that isn't hiring."

That got an actual laugh out of him. The first one that morning.

"How'd you know I'm an athlete?" He stirred his latte absently, his mind drifting towards backhands and serves and match-points briefly.

"You have shoulders like a fridge."

Art looked down at himself.

He supposed she wasn't wrong.

The gray Stanford sweatpants were enough to give him away on their own, but even without them, there wasn't much mystery to solve. Years of training had settled into him in ways he rarely thought about anymore. Broad shoulders. Strong arms. The kind of posture that came from spending half his life on a court with a racket in his hand.

He used to like that. No- He still liked it.

He liked looking like the result of all those early mornings and aching muscles and hours spent hitting the same shot over and over until it was perfect. He liked that people could look at him and know, immediately, that he was good at something.

But sitting here with a cooling latte and a shoulder that throbbed whenever he forgot not to move it, the certainty felt a little fragile.

Athlete.

Twenty-four hours ago, the word would've felt right. Now it felt like something he was borrowing. Like a shirt he'd forgotten he would eventually have to take off. His gaze lingered on the Stanford logo stitched into the fabric of his sweatpants.

Tennis.

The word followed him everywhere. Across campus. Into classrooms. Into doctor's offices. Into coffee shops where strange English majors compared him to kitchen appliances. For a brief, ridiculous moment, he wondered what she would've guessed if he wasn't wearing the sweatpants.

If she would've looked at him and seen something else.

Then again, Art wasn't entirely sure there was anything else to see.

"A fridge?"

"A very athletic fridge."

"That's not better." He smirks.

They spent the rest of the morning talking. His latte lays forgotten in the table, half drank through. An hour into the conversation, she closed her books with a dramatic sigh and pushed them aside. Because after the fridge comment, tennis or athleticism isn't brought up any more. It felt weird. Not the conversation itself. Art could talk to people. He gave interviews. Talked to sponsors. Made polite conversation at donor dinners and alumni events with people triple his age and quadruple his money.

This felt different.

Easy.

The kind of easy that sneaks up on you. One minute they're arguing about whether books should be allowed to end sadly, and the next he's checking the time and realizing nearly two hours have passed.

Two hours. Time for class now.

And he hadn't thought about tennis once after the fridge comment. The realization hit him so suddenly that he almost looked toward the courts. As if his thoughts might be waiting for him there. They came rushing back a second later, of course.

The injury.

Practice.

Three months.

But for a little while. For an hour and fifty-three minutes, according to the clock above the counter, he'd forgotten.

"Oh fuck" she gasps softly as he glanced at the clock.

8:57.

"Late?"

"Very."

She started shoving papers into folders with all the urgency of someone who'd forgotten time existed in this little bubble of conversation with a pretty blonde and pathetic man.

"That's what happens when you spend two hours insulting my major."

"I think I was defending literature." He smirks, passing her the pens and papers that were still scattered around.

"You called Dickens a loser."

"He had nine hundred pages to prove me wrong and all he did was prove me right."

"Goodbye, Art."

He blinked.

"I never told you my name."

She paused.

Then pointed at his sweatshirt. Right. Stanford Tennis. Art Donaldson.

Embroidered directly over his heart.

"See you tomorrow," she said with a wave.

Then she was gone.

Tomorrow?

Art knows better than to get ideas over that word. It was a simple, absentminded, meaningless word of goodbye people said all the time. Yet, he couldn't help but take it as a promise. Tomorrow. Tomorrow he would come here and talk with this girl he just met and spend two hours not thinking about tennis or his shoulder or his shoulder keeping him away from tennis. Hope.

The next morning, Art showed up with a sandwich.

Yesterday's latte had been a terrible breakfast. Somewhere between arguing about useless majors and defending the existence of sad endings, he'd forgotten to eat. By the time he got to class, he'd been hungry enough to consider chewing on his notebook.

He wasn't making that mistake again.

The sandwich sat in a paper bag under his arm as he pushed open the café door. The bell chimed overhead. Art glanced automatically toward the table by the window. The table by the window wasn't empty.

She was already there, now actually getting some work done. A stack of books sat beside her coffee, though there appeared to be fewer of them today. Art hated how relieved he felt. They won't sit at different tables today, he decides and so sits in front of her.

She smiles.

Tomorrow turns into many tomorrows. And in that time, Art learns she takes her coffee with too much sugar. She learns he peels the paper sleeve off his cups when he's thinking. They learn each other's schedules. Somewhere along the way, Art realizes he likes rainy mornings. Not because they cancel practice—he's always hated canceled practice. Just because the coffee shop gets quieter.

He realizes he likes listening to people talk about things they care about, even when he doesn't understand half of what they're saying. He realizes he likes sitting by the window. He realizes he likes sandwiches more than protein bars.

He realizes he likes making her laugh.

That one sneaks up on him.

The first morning she wasn't there, Art assumed she'd overslept.

He arrived at the coffee shop with enough time to spare before class, sandwich tucked under his arm and latte already ordered. The chair across from him remained empty, but that wasn't unusual. Sometimes she arrived first. Sometimes she didn't. Sometimes she spent ten minutes waiting in line because she couldn't decide between coffee and tea.

So he sat down and waited.

The bell above the door chimed.

Not her.

It chimed again.

Still not her.

After twenty minutes he pulled out his phone, texting with Patrick more out of boredom than anything else, and spent the rest of the hour pretending he wasn't checking the entrance every time someone walked in.

The next day she wasn't there either.

That was unusual.

By the third morning, he knew something was wrong.

Not wrong wrong. Not emergency wrong. Just enough wrong to leave a hollow feeling in the center of his routine. A text arrived halfway through breakfast.

dying

have been murdered by a cold

if i don't survive tell mr. wilson i hated him

Art stared at the message for a second before laughing into his coffee. The relief came embarrassingly fast.

Not dead.

Just sick.

He typed back before he could overthink it.

tragic

Three dots appeared immediately.

thank you for your sympathy

it means a lot

The conversation lasted less than a minute. Somehow the coffee shop felt emptier afterwards. It took him another day to understand why. Because the problem wasn't that he was bored, or that he missed tennis. The problem wasn't even that he missed talking.

The problem was that he missed her. The realization arrived quietly.

No dramatic lightning strike. No sudden revelation or epiphany. Just Art sitting beneath a tree near the lake one afternoon, staring at a sandwich he'd bought fifteen minutes ago and still hadn't touched.

A month ago he would've spent this time practicing.

A month ago he would've known exactly what to do with himself.

Now he found himself noticing things, which was something like it. The way sunlight reflected across the water. The old man who fed birds every afternoon at almost exactly three, she had noticed and told him. The freshman who spent entire lectures asleep on the grass. The smell of cut grass after the groundskeepers finished mowing.

Tiny things. Pointless things. Things that didn't improve his backhand or his ranking or his serve percentage. Things he would've dismissed as distractions before.

Sometimes he brought one of the novels she'd abandoned on the coffee shop table and forced him to borrow. The books themselves weren't really the point. Half the time he wasn't even sure what was happening. But every few pages he'd stumble across a sentence she'd underlined, a note she'd scribbled in the margin, a sarcastic comment squeezed between paragraphs.

And suddenly he could hear her voice again. It made the campus feel less empty. That realization bothered him. A lot.

Because recovering from a stupid shoulder injury was one thing. Recovering from missing somebody felt considerably less straightforward.

By the time she came back the following week, pale and armed with enough tissues to survive a natural disaster, Art had accidentally built an entire routine.

Morning coffee. Class. Walks around campus. Reading exactly five pages before giving up and staring out a window. Lunch. Physical therapy. The lake. More coffee.

It wasn't much. It certainly wasn't tennis. But it was something. And for a little while, that was enough. Until one afternoon it wasn't.

They'd taken their drinks outside to escape the noise inside the café.

The weather had finally begun warming up, sunlight stretching across the courtyard and filling the campus with students who had collectively decided studying was much less important than existing outdoors.

She was talking. Something about a movie. Or a professor. Or maybe both. Art wasn't listening. Across the quad, faint but unmistakable, came the sharp crack of a tennis ball.

His head turned automatically.

A serve.

Another.

Then another.

The rhythm lived somewhere deeper than thought. Muscle memory. Instinct. Home. His stomach tightened. The courts sat partially hidden beyond a line of trees, but he could imagine everything perfectly. The smell of hard court paint warming in the sun. The squeak of shoes. The familiar weight of a racket handle against his palm. The feeling of striking the ball perfectly. God he hadn't touched his racket in weeks.

Weeks in which he'd managed to avoid thinking about it. Not because he'd stopped caring but because he'd gotten distracted. Now the reminder stood directly in front of him.

A life continuing without him. Some freshman was probably taking his place in practice right now. Improving. Getting better. Moving faster. While Art sat here drinking coffee and discussing nineteenth-century literature, that freshman was closer to getting an actual career in tennis than him. Something ugly settled in his chest. Jealousy. Frustration.

Grief.

Whatever it was, it made him feel restless beneath his own skin.

"Art?"

"What?" The word came out sharper than intended. She blinked and frowned softly.

Immediately he regretted it. But not enough to apologize. Not yet.

"Nothing." She said and sounded a little hurt. The conversation stalled.

Students passed around them and she fell quiet, fidgeting with a loose string on her sweater, suddenly very interested in it. Laughter drifted through the courtyard. Somewhere in the distance another tennis ball cracked against strings.

Art clenched his jaw.

"I said nothing."

"Yeah, I heard you." she said softly, a little defensive but more hurt.

After a beat, she studied him for a moment. Not offended. Not angry. Just patient. Which somehow made everything worse. Because patience implied understanding. And understanding implied she could see straight through him. Finally she glanced toward the courts.

Then back at him.

"Oh." Just that. Oh. No lecture. No questions. No attempt to fix it.

She simply understood.

Art looked away first, clenching his jaw at the realization of how pretty her eyes looked in the sunlight at this particular time of day and someone cheered in the courts and his eyes sharpened. The silence that followed wasn't uncomfortable. It settled between them softly.

Like shade.

Like forgiveness. A few minutes later she nudged her untouched cookie toward him. He stared at it like it called him a failure. Then at her like she called him sane.

"You know that's not going to solve anything." he scoffs, a slight roll of his eyes not at her but at the whole situation.

"No." She took a sip of coffee. "But you're less annoying when you're eating, and it's easier to pretend we're silent because you have a cookie mouthful instead of the actual reason, which is your toxic wife, tennis, making you grumpy".

Against his will, he laughed and she smiled.

The sound surprised both of them. And just like that, some of the tightness in his chest loosened.

Not gone.

Never gone.

Just lighter.

Manageable.

For the first time since the doctor's office, Art realized he didn't always need someone to fix things. Sometimes he just needed someone willing to sit beside him while they hurt.

Patrick comes back on a Thursday afternoon with two suitcases, three new stories, and exactly the same amount of self-preservation he left with.

Art almost doesn't go pick him up.

Not because he doesn't want to see him. Because physical therapy had run late and traffic was awful and he had spent half the morning trying not to think about the fact that he was still weeks away from touching a racket again.

Still, he goes.

Friendship, apparently, required effort.

The drive back is easy. Familiar. Patrick talks enough for both of them, filling every silence with stories from Japan, complaints about airports, and increasingly ridiculous claims about things that definitely did not happen but are somehow still entertaining. Art laughs more than he means to. The shoulder injury has made everyone around him unbearably careful. Coaches. Trainers. Teammates. Even his mother, somehow, has developed a talent for sounding worried through text messages.

Patrick remains blessedly immune to concern.

By the time they reach campus, Art almost feels normal again. Almost.

The next morning, Patrick wakes up just after seven and finds Art already dressed. He slept in his room because Tashi hates his kicking in sleep. Art has never minded.

Art's already dressed. That part isn't unusual.

Art has always been awake before everybody else. Patrick once described him as a retired sixty-year-old trapped inside the body of a college athlete. Art had considered that rude. Patrick had considered it accurate.

What is unusual is the fact that Art is putting on shoes instead of grabbing his tennis bag, he usually doesn't give a fuck about injuries and just sucks it up... but this time he's actually resting? Patrick watches from his bed as Art checks the time. Then checks it again. Then picks up his phone. Then puts it down. Then checks the time one more time.

A slow smile spreads across Patrick's face.

"Where are you going?"

Art glances up. "The coffee shop."

Patrick frowns. Not because he's confused. Because he's trying very hard not to laugh.

"The coffee shop?"

"Yes?" Art frowns, almost annoyed, what's so weird about a coffee shop? "Does Japan not have coffee shops?"

"The coffee shop where?"

"The one by the humanities buildings."

Patrick props himself up on one elbow. "You don't even like coffee."

Art shrugs.

"I like the sandwiches."

Patrick has known Art Donaldson for years. He knows when Art is nervous before a match. He knows when Art is lying. He knows when Art is pretending not to care.

Most importantly, he knows Art has never once in his life voluntarily traveled across campus for a sandwich.

The realization lands all at once.

Oh.

Oh, this is going to be fun.

The walk across campus confirms every suspicion. Art walks faster than necessary. Not enough for anybody else to notice, but enough for his best friend to notice. Every few minutes his gaze flicks toward the clock tower. Toward his phone. Toward the path ahead. He's excited.

The idiot is excited.

By the time they reach the coffee shop, he has to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from smiling. The bell above the door chimes. The smell of espresso and baked bread fills the room. And then Patrick sees her.

She's sitting by the window exactly where Art said she'd be. Books scattered across the table. Pen between her fingers. Hair falling into her face as she reads. The fascinating part isn't her.

The fascinating part is Art.

Because the second she looks up, something changes.

It's tiny. Almost invisible. His shoulders loosen. The tension leaves his face. Something warm settles into his expression so naturally that Patrick would have missed it if he didn't know him so well. Like somebody opening a window in a stuffy room. Like relief.

She smiles. Art smiles back. Neither of them seem particularly aware they're doing it.

Patrick nearly loses his mind.

Because suddenly every weird thing from the past month makes sense.

The coffee shop.

The sandwiches.

The mysterious improvement in Art's mood.

The fact that he'd stopped talking about tennis every five minutes.

The way he'd seemed less angry. Less restless.

The answer had apparently been sitting in a coffee shop reading Victorian literature. "You're late," she says. Patrick watches Art pull out a chair. "I had to pick Patrick up." Her eyes shift toward him for the first time. Recognition flickers almost immediately. Which he finds offensive. Patrick extends a hand.

"Patrick."

"You're Patrick."

The wording makes him pause.

Not nice to meet you.

Not I've heard about you.

Just: You're Patrick. As if she's been hearing about him for weeks. Patrick turns toward Art slowly. Art suddenly finds the table incredibly interesting. The little traitor. Something starts to bloom inside Patrick's chest. Not jealousy. Not annoyance. Something far more dangerous. Affection. Because for the first time since the injury, Art looks happy.

Not distracted.

Not coping.

Happy.

The realization hits Patrick with surprising force.

For years, Art's entire world has been built around tennis. Around practice schedules and rankings and tournaments and expectations. Every decision leading toward the next match. The next win. The next goal. Then his shoulder gives out. Everything stops. And somehow, in the empty space left behind, somebody wandered in carrying too many books and started teaching him how to live when he wasn't playing.

Patrick watches them fall into conversation without effort.

Watches Art laugh.

Watches him listen.

Really listen. Like there isn't somewhere else he'd rather be. And for one brief, horrifying moment, Patrick realizes something before Art does: Art Donaldson is absolutely screwed.

The conversation starts because Tashi notices.

Of course she does.

Patrick notices because Patrick notices everything. He collects information the way some people collect souvenirs, storing away every embarrassing detail he can weaponize later. Tashi notices because she pays attention to things that matter.

Which means Art should have known he was doomed the second both of them ended up at the same lunch table.

The dining hall is loud around them. Trays scraping against tables, conversations overlapping into an indistinct hum, somebody dropping a fork somewhere across the room. Normally Art likes the noise. It reminds him of tournaments. Of airports. Of movement.

Today it feels like background music to his own execution.

Patrick has spent the last ten minutes watching him with the barely-contained excitement of somebody waiting for a surprise party to start. Tashi has spent the last ten minutes watching him the way a coach watches an athlete making a preventable mistake.

Neither expression bodes well.

Art stabs his fork into a piece of chicken. Immediately regrets sitting down.

"So," Tashi says eventually. The word is perfectly innocent. Art still feels his stomach drop. "No."

Tashi blinks. "I haven't asked anything."

"You were about to."

A smile flickers across Patrick's face. The bastard actually looks proud.

Tashi leans back in her chair, folding her arms. Sunlight from the tall cafeteria windows catches in her hair and turns the edges gold. She studies him for a moment.

Not unkindly. Just thoughtfully. Like she's trying to solve a problem.

"How's physical therapy?"

Art exhales slowly. A trap. Definitely a trap.

"Fine."

"And your shoulder?"

"Fine."

"Recovery?"

"Fine."

"Tennis?"

The word lands differently than the others. It always does. For a second Art's attention drifts. Past the cafeteria windows. Past the crowds of students moving across campus. Toward courts he can't see from here but can still imagine perfectly.

Tashi notices immediately. Of course she notices.

"You've been watching your old matches, right?"

Art takes a drink before answering. Not because he's thirsty. Because it buys him time.

"Sometimes." The lie hangs between them.

Not a huge lie. Not an unforgivable one. Just enough of one that Tashi recognizes it immediately. Her expression changes. The slightest narrowing of her eyes. Disappointment.

Not in him, he hopes. In the answer. Art knows that look. She's already imagining all the things he could be doing.

Breaking down old footage. Studying technique. Analyzing weaknesses. Improving strategy.

Even injured, Tashi believes improvement should never stop. The difference between them has always been that Art wants to win. Tashi wants to understand why people win and replicate it.

"Art." His name leaves her mouth with the same exhausted patience she'd use on a child refusing medicine.

"You have months of recovery. You could be studying every match you've ever played."

Patrick makes a noise that sounds suspiciously like a laugh. Tashi ignores him.

"You could be analyzing technique. Looking for patterns. Identifying weaknesses. You could come back better than before."

Art rubs a hand over his face. The speech feels familiar. Not because she's wrong. Because she isn't. That's the problem.

Somewhere beneath all the frustration and resentment and self-pity, he knows she has a point. A few months ago he would've been doing exactly that. A few months ago the thought of wasting time would've made his skin crawl. Now, somehow, entire afternoons disappear.

Coffee turns into conversations. Conversations turn into walks.

Walks turn into evenings spent sitting on campus lawns discussing books he has no intention of reading. The realization feels oddly embarrassing. Patrick finally stops pretending to stay out of it.

The grin spreading across his face is positively demonic. "Tell her."

Art closes his eyes. "No."

"Tell her why."

"No."

"Tell her why you've stopped watching tennis." His fucking tone is like a kid pressing another into doing something reckless that'll get them into trouble.

"I haven't stopped."

"You absolutely have." Patrick has the audacity to laugh, mockingly.

"I watched a match last week."

Patrick looks delighted.

"Oh, good! One match"

"It was a long match."

"It was one set."

Art hates him. Truly. Deeply. With his entire soul.

Across the table, Tashi is beginning to understand. Art can actually see it happening. The pieces clicking together. The sudden shift in her expression as she reaches the correct conclusion.

"A girl? Are you serious, Art?"

Patrick lights up immediately. "Oh, she got there."

Art considers throwing his drink at both of them.

"You've got to be kidding me."

"You like her?" The words are spoken so casually that for a second they don't even register.

Then they do. Art immediately scoffs. Not because he's offended. Because the alternative is acknowledging the heat suddenly creeping up the back of his neck.

"She's my friend." Patrick actually laughs. Not a polite laugh. A genuine one. The kind that makes him lean back in his chair.

"Oh my God."

"Shut up."

"You've been spending every morning with her for weeks!"

"We drink coffee, we're not holding hands or- or fucking or-"

"You've read books." That laugh again.

"Parts of books." Art scoffs, rolling his eyes and dropping his fork to stare daggers at Patrick.

"You voluntarily attended a poetry reading, Art-"

Art points a finger at him.

"That was an accident."

"It lasted three hours."

"I didn't know it was a poetry reading."

"What a bullshit excuse! You didn't notice it was a fucking poetry reading when they snapped instead of clapping-"

Tashi watches the exchange unfold in silence. Then something catches her attention. Her gaze shifts beyond Art's shoulder. Toward the entrance. Immediately Patrick follows. Then both of them stop talking. The silence is so abrupt that Art notices. He turns.

And sees her.

She's standing near the cafeteria doors, pushing hair behind her ear as she looks around the room. For a moment she doesn't seem to find whoever she's looking for.

Then her eyes land on him.

The change is immediate. A wide smile spreads across her face.

Huge. Soft. Effortless.

The kind of smile that exists before somebody even realizes they're smiling. Art feels something warm unfold inside his chest.

Relief. Recognition. Happiness.

Whatever it is, it arrives so naturally he doesn't think about it. He simply smiles and waves back. Nothing else happens. No dramatic moment. No conversation. No grand gesture.

Just two people spotting each other across a crowded room. A second later she's being pulled toward another table by her friends. The moment passes. Art turns back around.

Patrick is staring at him.

Tashi is staring at him.

Neither says a word. Neither has to.

Because for the first time, Art understands exactly what they saw. The way his entire mood shifted. The way the tension disappeared from his injured shoulder. The way seeing her felt like finally exhaling after holding his breath all day.

His stomach drops.

Oh.

Across the room she's laughing at something her friend said. Completely unaware that his life has just become significantly more complicated. Patrick's grin grows impossibly wider. Tashi pinches the bridge of her nose.

And Art, for perhaps the first time since his injury, finds himself facing a problem he has absolutely no idea how to solve because suddenly it occurs to him that they've never actually gone anywhere. Not really.

Coffee shops. The quad. Campus benches. Library steps. Always Stanford. Always between classes. Always tomorrow. The thought settles heavily in his chest.

Because wanting to see her tomorrow feels very different from wanting to see her on purpose. And for the first time, those two things no longer feel the same.

The next morning, Art arrived before she did. He tried not to think too much about what that meant. The coffee shop had become familiar enough now that he barely noticed it anymore—the hiss of the espresso machine, the warm smell of coffee and baked bread, the students half-asleep over textbooks. A month ago he felt trapped here. Restless. Like every minute spent sitting still was a minute stolen from something more important.

Now he found himself checking the door every few seconds. The realization should have embarrassed him more than it did. He wrapped both hands around his drink and stared out the window, pretending to watch people crossing the quad. In reality, he was counting. Three minutes. Five. He'd cry if she had a cold again. Eight minutes.

Then the bell above the door chimed. The shift inside him was immediate. Embarrassingly immediate. Before he even fully registered it was her, some part of him already knew.

She was carrying too many books again. Not enough to drop this time, but enough to make him wonder if she experienced the world under a permanent avalanche of paper and ink. The oversized sweater she wore today swallowed her whole. One sleeve hung slightly over her hand as she adjusted the strap of her bag. Her hair looked messier than usual, as if she'd left in a hurry. There was a faint crease pressed into one cheek from a pillow.

Art stared. Not because she was doing anything remarkable. Because she existed. Which somehow felt remarkable. The problem wasn't that she was pretty. He'd known she was pretty for weeks. The problem was that once he'd admitted to himself he liked her, he suddenly became aware of how much attention he'd been paying all along.

He knew which rings she wore most often. Three silver bands. One plain, one slightly twisted, and one with a tiny stone set into it. He knew she preferred sweaters to jackets even when the weather clearly called for a jacket. He knew she tucked loose strands of hair behind her left ear but never her right. He knew she always ordered before sitting down, even when the line stretched halfway through the shop. He knew her laugh changed depending on what she found funny. There was a polite laugh, a sarcastic laugh, and a genuine one that arrived so suddenly it seemed to catch her by surprise.

The terrifying thing wasn't noticing.

The terrifying thing was realizing he'd already memorized all of it.

Without trying. Without meaning to. Like his brain had quietly decided she was important weeks before he'd caught up.

She looked up from the line and spotted him. Immediately she smiled. And just like that, his entire morning improved. The simplicity of it almost made him angry. Months of discipline. Years of training. Endless hours spent learning how to control his body under pressure.

Yet apparently all it took to completely derail him was his girl smiling from across a coffee shop. His girl? Jesus fucking Christ.

She sat down a few minutes later and launched into a story about a professor who had somehow managed to spend forty minutes discussing symbolism without ever explaining what the symbol meant. Art listened. Or at least he tried to.

The problem was that Patrick had ruined him.

Ever since lunch, ever since the cafeteria, ever since watching her walk through those doors and feeling something in his chest rearrange itself, Art couldn't stop seeing her differently.

Not differently. More honestly. He noticed the movement of her hands when she spoke. The way she grew animated when she was passionate about something. The way her eyes widened before she made a point she was particularly proud of. The way her mouth curved when she knew she was right.

And Christ that wasn't helping either. Because she'd always been beautiful. He knew that. What he hadn't allowed himself to acknowledge was that she was hot.

Not in the distant, objective way people described celebrities. Not in the casual way college students pointed out attractive strangers.

Hot in the deeply inconvenient way that made him suddenly aware of the shape of her mouth while she was talking. Hot in the way that made his gaze linger too long before he forced himself to look away. Hot in the way that made him think things he absolutely should not be thinking at seven-thirty in the morning.

The realization nearly made him choke on his coffee.

Which was unfortunate because she immediately noticed.

"Are you okay?"

He coughed into his fist. "Fine." Fuck, fuck, fuck.

She narrowed her eyes. "You don't look fine."

"I'm fine."

She kept staring. Art looked away first. A tactical retreat. The only one available. Unfortunately, retreating didn't solve the problem. Because now he was painfully aware of the fact that he wanted more.

Not more coffee shop mornings. Not more accidental meetings. More her.

The whole thing. The afternoons. The evenings. The parts of her life that existed outside the two-hour window they'd carved out for themselves. The thought settled into his chest with surprising weight.

Because suddenly it occurred to him that despite everything they knew about one another, they had never actually spent time together on purpose. Not really. The coffee shop had happened by accident.

Every morning after had happened because of habit. Because routine. Because convenience.

Yet somehow he knew what she ordered for breakfast and what kind of books she liked and how she laughed when she forgot to be self-conscious. He knew all that.

And still had no idea what a day with her looked like. The realization lingered. Growing heavier. More persistent. Until eventually he stopped hearing whatever story she was telling and simply found himself looking at her.

Really looking.

Trying to imagine her outside this place. Trying to imagine what she'd be like when there wasn't a class waiting afterwards. When there wasn't somewhere else she needed to be. When there wasn't an excuse.

She paused mid-sentence. The expression on her face shifted. Slowly. Suspiciously.

"What?"

Art blinked.

"What?"

"You keep staring at me."

Heat immediately climbed up his neck. Not ideal. Especially because she was right, he had lost track of time thinking.

"I wasn't staring."

"You absolutely were."

She leaned back slightly. Studying him now. The irony wasn't lost on him. For a second neither of them spoke. The coffee shop hummed quietly around them. Students coming and going. Espresso machines hissing. Morning sunlight spilling across the table between them.

Then, before he could lose his nerve, before he could overthink himself into silence, Art heard himself ask:

"Are you busy today?"

And the second the words left his mouth, he knew.

This wasn't coffee anymore.

This wasn't habit.

This wasn't routine.

This was on purpose.

The thing was, Art didn't have a plan.

People always assumed he did. Coaches, reporters, teammates. Even Patrick liked to joke that Art approached life the same way he approached a tennis match: calculate, prepare, execute.

Usually that was true.

Not today.

Today he'd asked her if she was busy and somehow found himself walking off campus with no destination in mind and no desire to find one.

The morning was cool enough to justify a sweater but warm enough that the sun lingered pleasantly on their skin. Students hurried around them carrying backpacks and coffees and obligations. Art should have felt guilty about skipping class.

Instead, he felt strangely light. Like he'd forgotten something important and couldn't quite bring himself to care. They wandered into a bookstore first. Not because either of them had planned to. Because they passed it and she stopped mid-sentence to stare through the window.

"Oh."

Art followed her gaze. Books. Thousands of them. He looked back at her. The excitement on her face made him laugh. "You already own books." he smiles

"I know." she replies looking at him sheepishly

"You have too many books."

"I know."

"You complain about carrying books." he giggles

"I know." she giggles

Yet five minutes later she was standing between shelves holding three more. Art spent most of that time following her around and pretending he wasn't enjoying himself. The place smelled like paper and dust and old wood. She drifted through the aisles as if she belonged there, running her fingertips lightly along spines and occasionally pulling one free just to show him a passage she liked.

Not the whole passage. Not enough to bore him. Just a sentence. A paragraph. A line she'd underlined years ago in another copy that she had back at home with her parents. Every single time she handed him a book she looked hopeful.

Like she genuinely wanted to know what he thought. As though his opinion mattered. That alone was enough to undo him. The first time he realized the coffee shop version of her wasn't the whole story happened outside.

A little boy stood on the sidewalk beside his mother crying with the kind of complete devastation only children seemed capable of achieving because his ice cream had fallen. One scoop sat upside down on the pavement. The tragedy was apparently immeasurable.

Art barely registered him. Kids cried. Ice cream melted. Life went on.

She stopped walking immediately. Her expression softened. Then she crouched down beside him. Art stayed where he was, watching. The conversation was too quiet for him to hear. Whatever she said made the boy pause.

A few moments later he laughed. Actually laughed. Still sniffling and sticky-faced but laughing.

When she stood up again, she looked pleased with herself. Not proud. Not self-congratulatory. Just happy he'd stopped crying. As though that alone had made the interruption worthwhile. Art found himself staring. She noticed.

"What?"

"Nothing."

The answer came too quickly. She narrowed her eyes. Clearly unconvinced and curious as to why he was acting so strange today. Then moved on.

The moment lingered on Art as everything with her apparently did. Not because it was extraordinary but because it wasn't. That was the problem. She hadn't helped because anybody was watching. Hadn't helped because it benefited her. She'd helped because somebody was upset. And apparently that was enough.

The rest of the afternoon unfolded the same way. A hundred tiny discoveries. A hundred tiny surprises. At one point she stopped to pet a golden retriever tied outside a café.

Not a quick pat. Not a polite hello.

An entire conversation while she looked into its eyes and made exaggerated expressions when talking to it. The dog seemed delighted. So did she.

Twenty minutes later she was talking to a cashier she'd never met before as though they'd been friends for years. Then she spent ten minutes pointing out architectural details on buildings Art had walked past hundreds of times without noticing.

The shape of windows. The carvings around doorways. The strange little gargoyles perched above rooftops.

"How do you even see these things?" he asked with a laugh. She looked genuinely confused.

"How do you not?"

That answer stayed with him. Because she seemed to notice everything. Not in a critical way. Not in a judgmental way like Tashi did. In a curious way. Like the world was constantly offering her things to discover. And she accepted every single one with open arms and a gentle disposition.

By the time they ended up in a movie theater, Art already felt slightly overwhelmed. Not by the day. By her.

The movie itself was good, or at least he assumed it was. He spent most of the first half distracted. The second half held his attention better.

Until he heard a sniffle followed by another.

Art glanced sideways. She immediately pointed at the screen.

"Don't, s-shut up."

"I didn't say anything." he snickered, a mix of worry and amusement in his tone.

"You were going to." she whispered yelled, cleaning her face.

"I wasn't."

"You absolutely were."

Her eyes were suspiciously shiny. A tear escaped. She looked betrayed as she pouted and tried holding them in as she stared in wonder at the screen. Betrayed as though her own face had turned against her.

Art laughed. She glared. Which only made him laugh harder.

By the time the credits rolled she was openly wiping her eyes.

"I just think people should communicate." she offered in a tiny hiccup

"They did communicate."

"They communicated too late." she groaned, and Art wondered if she actually understood people on screen were actors and not real people.

"That's the entire plot."

"I know."

The earnest frustration in her voice nearly killed him. Outside, they spent another ten minutes discussing alternate endings. As though fictional people had personally wronged her. Art listened and contributed to her little fantasy. Smiling like an idiot.

At some point they stopped for dinner. The restaurant wasn't fancy. Neither of them cared, they were used to sandwiches and lattes that weren't even that good.

Halfway through the meal she interrupted herself. Mid-sentence. Mid-thought. Mid-breath. Everything stopped.

"Oh my God."

Art blinked. "What?" A hair in her food? After everything today he swore he'd personally annihilate whoever was at fault if she was displeased with her food-

"This." She pushed her plate toward him. "You have to try this."

No hesitation. No self-consciousness. Just immediate certainty. Ah.

As though sharing was the most natural thing in the world, Art took a bite.

Immediately understood. The food was good and yet that wasn't the point. The point was the way she watched him while he tasted it.

Waiting.

Hopeful.

Wanting him to enjoy something simply because she enjoyed it. The gesture lodged itself somewhere deep inside his chest. The deeper they got into the day, the more it happened.

Tiny moments.

Tiny kindnesses.

Tiny pieces of her.

By sunset, Art felt as though he'd spent the entire day discovering rooms inside a house he'd mistaken for a single door. The coffee shop version of her had always felt complete. Funny. Smart. Beautiful. He'd thought that was the whole picture.

Instead it turned out she'd barely fit inside the frame he'd built for her.

There was so much more. Kindness that seemed instinctive. Curiosity that touched everything. A way of moving through the world that made ordinary things feel worth noticing. And perhaps worst of all, every new thing he learned only made him like her more.

By the time they were walking back toward campus beneath a sky streaked pink and gold, Art felt strangely overwhelmed. Not because he'd spent the entire day with her. Because it still didn't feel like enough. Because tomorrow suddenly seemed too far away. Because he could already feel himself wanting another day.

And another.

And another after that.

The realization settled quietly into his chest. Heavy. Certain. Terrifying.

He was in love with her.

Completely.

Hopelessly.

And judging by the way she was laughing beside him, completely unaware of the crisis unfolding in his head.

By the time they reached her dorm, the campus had quieted considerably.

The rush of students heading to classes and dining halls had long since faded into the background. Most windows glowed warmly against the darkening evening, scattered rectangles of yellow light tucked between old brick and ivy. Somewhere in the distance, somebody was playing music badly enough that Art couldn't identify the song. The air had cooled just enough to justify the sweater she'd tied around her waist hours ago and forgotten to put back on.

Neither of them seemed particularly eager to acknowledge they had arrived. The conversation had slowed naturally during the walk back. Not because they'd run out of things to say. Quite the opposite; Art felt as though they could have continued talking until sunrise.

She stopped at the foot of the steps leading toward her dorm entrance and shifted her bag higher onto her shoulder. For a moment neither moved. Neither spoke. The day settled softly between them.

The bookstore.

The movie.

The dinner.

The countless tiny moments Art knew he would replay later. A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "I had a really good time today."

The words shouldn't have made his heart pound that harshly. They did anyway.

Art looked at her. Really looked at her.

At the way the fading light softened the edges of her face. At the faint flush still lingering in her cheeks from laughing. At the familiar rings glinting beneath the campus lights. He thought about the last few months.

About the injury.

About the coffee shop.

About every morning that had followed.

About all the ways she had quietly become the best part of his day. Then he thought about how unbearable it suddenly seemed to leave.

"Oh." The sound escaped before he could stop it.

She laughed softly. "What?"

Art rubbed the back of his neck. Immediately regretted it. Because now he had to say the thing. The realization was terrifying.

He'd played championship matches with less anxiety for Christ's sake.

"Okay."

Her smile widened. "Okay what?"

Art exhaled slowly. "I'm going to do something."

She blinked with a laugh. "What kind of introduction is that?"

"A necessary one!" He groaned, nerves on edge

"That doesn't answer my question."

"It will in a second just- listen!"

The amusement in her expression deepened. God. He was gone. Completely gone.

"If you hate it," he continued, "you have full permission to punch me into next year and never talk to me again, I-I'm serious."

She stared at him. Then laughed. "Art—"

He kissed her.

Not because he was brave.

Not because he was confident.

Mostly because if he waited another five seconds, he thought he might pass out. For one terrible, horrifying fraction of a second, his brain supplied every possible worst-case scenario. Then she kissed him back.

The relief nearly knocked the air from his lungs. Her hand found his sleeve first. Then his shoulder. Carefully. Always careful with that shoulder. The realization hit him with almost painful tenderness.

Even now.

Even here.

She remembered.

The kiss deepened naturally, neither of them particularly interested in being the first to pull away. When they finally did, Art found himself staring. Again.

Apparently that was simply going to be a permanent condition now. Her cheeks were pink. Her smile was impossible.

"You know," she said quietly, "that would've been significantly more romantic without the threat of physical violence."

Art laughed. The sound surprised both of them. Then she kissed him again. And somehow that felt even better.

Exactly one week later, Art found himself standing outside her lecture hall trying not to bounce on his heels.

The three months were over. Officially. Completely. Finally.

The physical therapist had cleared him that morning. Limited training. Careful progression.

No heroics.

But cleared.

The words still felt unreal. She emerged from the building bidding goodbye to one of her friends. Art smiled immediately.

She smiled back. Immediately, every time. Without fail.

The consistency of it still made him ridiculously happy.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothing."

"That's a lie."

"Probably."

She narrowed her eyes. "What are you plotting, Art?"

Art considered his answer. Then decided honesty was easier. "Would you come to practice with me?"

She blinked. "Practice?"

The confusion was genuine. Completely genuine. Not polite. Not pretend.

Actual confusion.

Art opened his mouth. Then paused. Because for a second he'd forgotten. Forgotten that there had been a time before the coffee shop.

Before them.

Forgotten that the person standing in front of him wasn't part of the Stanford tennis ecosystem. "Tennis," he said. "Practice. The doctor cleared me this morning."

Her entire face brightened. "Oh!" Not because of tennis. Because he was happy. The distinction struck him immediately. "Oh my God, Art." She threw her arms around him. Nearly knocking some papers out of her own hands. "That's amazing!"

"I know." He answered with a grin, blushing.

"I knew you'd be okay."

"I wasn't exactly dying." He giggles as she kisses his forehead.

"You were very dramatic about it." She smirks, ruffling his hair softly

"I was injured." Art laughs trying his best shot at mock offense.

"You were dramatic."

Art rolled his eyes. She grinned. Then, after a moment:

"Of course I'll come." The answer arrived so quickly it caught him off guard.

"Really?"

"Obviously!"

The word settled somewhere warm inside his chest. Obviously. As though there had never been another possible answer. As they started walking, another realization slowly followed. One he couldn't quite ignore.

"You know," he said, "it's weird."

"What is?"

"You forgot."

She looked up. "What?"

"Tennis."

She frowned. "I didn't forget tennis."

"You forgot I played."

Art stared. She laughed harder. "I'm sorry."

"No, seriously."

"I am being serious!"

"You forgot."

"I didn't forget."

"You looked genuinely confused."

"Because when you said practice, I thought you meant physical therapy." Art stopped walking. She stopped too. The campus moved around them. Students hurrying to classes. Bikes passing. Leaves rustling overhead. None of it mattered. Because suddenly he understood something.

All those mornings.

All those conversations.

All those weeks.

She'd never cared about Stanford Tennis.

Never cared about rankings. Or scholarships. Or campus fame. Or any of the things people usually attached to him before learning his name.

To her, tennis had simply been... a thing. Something he did. Not who he was. The realization felt strangely emotional.

"Then why do you like me?"

She stared at him. As though he'd asked why the sky was blue. "Art."

"No, seriously."

A smile slowly appeared. Soft. Affectionate. Dangerously fond.

"You really don't know?"

He didn't.

Or maybe he did and just wanted to hear it. The books shifted slightly in her arms. She adjusted them before answering. "Because you're kind." Art immediately scoffed. She ignored him. "You're kind," she repeated. "You pretend you're not because you think kindness has to be loud to count."

"That's not true."

"You spent twenty minutes helping me carry books after we met and acted like it was an inconvenience the entire time."

"I was being polite."

"You remembered my coffee order before I remembered yours."

Art opened his mouth. Closed it.

She continued.

"You're patient. You listen. You care about people even when you pretend not to."

"I do not pretend not to."

"You absolutely do."

The certainty in her voice made him laugh. She smiled. Then softened.

"You work harder than anyone I've ever met." His chest tightened. "And you're brave." Art immediately looked away.

"No."

"Yes."

"Definitely not."

"Art."

The way she said his name stopped him cold. Simple. Certain. Like fact. Like truth. "You spent your whole life building something," she said quietly. "Then you lost it for three months and still figured out how to be yourself without it." The words landed harder than anything else. Because she didn't understand. Or maybe she understood perfectly. The injury had felt like losing himself. And somehow, without meaning to, she'd helped him find himself again.

She smiled.

Small.

Warm.

The same smile from the coffee shop.

The same smile from the first day.

The same smile that had ruined his life in the best way possible.

"And," she added, "I think you're funny."

Art stared. "That's your final argument?"

"It's a very strong argument."

"I hate you."

She laughed. "I know."

Then she slipped her hand into his. As naturally as breathing. As though she'd been doing it forever. And for the first time since the doctor had told him three months, Art realized he no longer measured his life in tennis seasons or tournaments or rankings.

Not first. Now he measured it in mornings. In conversations. In tomorrows. And in the girl who had accidentally taught him there was more to him than the game he'd built his entire life around. ♡

⏔⏔⏔⏔♡⏔⏔⏔⏔ ୨୧ ⏔⏔⏔⏔♡⏔⏔⏔⏔ ୨୧ ⏔⏔⏔⏔♡⏔⏔⏔⏔

author's note: this is my first fic after a while, I'm surprised it ended up being this long lol I hadn't written any fanfiction since 2023 so excuse this if it's a little rusty. thank you so much for reading! i hope you enjoyed. -L.

[bobdylanyaoi]

biting the hand that feeds me but im also sucking on the fingers a bit

[kafka-ish]

obsessed | a.d.

patrick has a new girlfriend; art has a new obsession

word count: 2.7k

warnings: fem!reader, toxic!art, general nsfw content (18+)

-

"yes, yes, yes. god, tashi you feel so good."

"pat," you manage in between thrusts.

"that's not my name. and you know it." art punctuates the point in which he wants to make by sliding his dick even deeper into your cunt.

"patrick," you moan again. this time, earning yourself the promise of an orgasm. when art gets turned on he can't stop, can't turn it off. not until he's done. and he almost is. you can tell by way of his movements that are getting sloppier by the second. he's about to finish, whether or not he has a say in it, whether or not he can help it — of course, he can't and now he's about to bring the both of you the release you’ve so been craving.

he's the same when he plays tennis, you've noticed. all that pent up emotion and energy needs an outlet. it's what allows him to demolish his opponents.

and you, at the moment. he's rutting into you the way rabbits do to make babies, the way a puppy would against a pillow before getting neutered or spayed. he's an animal with pure, unadulterated adrenaline running through him and you can feel it. it’s as if he's transferring it to you just from being inside, using your pussy to pump his cock, not even bothering to fully pull out and ram back in without giving you time to adjust. instead he humps you, fast. slides in, in, in until his dick is kissing your cervix.

"i'm close, pat. i'm close."

“i know. can feel it. i am too,” art pants. “fuck.” he isn’t even able to pull out in time, too wrapped up in the feeling of you wrapped around him, the heat of the situation, what this new dynamic is doing to him.

okay, maybe it was a little sick. roleplaying like this. but it’s what art wanted. he was the one who made the proposition; you were just going along with it.

patrick has a new girlfriend. tashi duncan. she’s stunning — all legs and elegance. has the ability to take your breath away with just one look at her image. she's also really fucking good at tennis.

as if art didn’t have enough problems. already, he'd been skipping lectures to work on his serve. now his best friend was prancing up to him, telling him about the date he scored with his favorite girl on the court.

“you’re joking,” art says with his mouth open.

“you wish.”

yeah. art does wish. he wants this whole conversation to be a standup routine that his friend is trying out on him, wants any inkling of the prospect that patrick could be going out with tashi duncan to go away under the guise of some cruel prank. but it doesn’t.

“i asked her out after her game and she said yes. we’re going to some italian place.”

“which one?” art’s eyebrows are raised. he doesn’t even get to process this information by himself, alone, in private. which is what he wants right now so he can get off to his new playboy that just came in. instead, he has to hear about the details of patrick’s date and how long, he wonders, it’ll take for him to get to third base.

“this new spot in L.A. …think she’ll like it?”

“yeah. that sounds nice,” art manages, swallowing down any hint of jealousy his friend might detect on him.

“great.” patrick slaps art on the back. “and hey, tell you all about it later?” he’s wiggling his eyebrows as he says this.

“yeah. great.” art nods, like he’s equally into it. like it doesn’t take everything for him to not strangle his friend. he would tell him to have fun, but he doesn’t. he doesn’t want to wish his friend luck and the furthest thing he wants is for either tashi or patrick to have fun. instead he walks off, making up some excuse about how he has homework for one of his classes and he just remembered but yeah, tell me all about it after.

he’s pissed, still, even after the walk to his dorm. and it’s as if things couldn’t get any worse until they do, when he reaches for his keys in the pocket of his shorts only to realize he either left them on the court or locked himself out of his own home.

he doesn’t go to the front desk, doesn’t bother trying to text his RA to tell them what happened. doesn’t even go back to the court to check if that’s where he left them.

he gets a call. it’s you, his doubles partner. what the hell, sure. he answers.

“hey,” your voice breathes.

"hey," he says, almost a sigh of frustration.

"jeez, donaldson. you good? i didn’t catch you at a bad time, did i?" and you're always so conscious, so observant of other people and how they're feeling, even if they don’t say anything. when the two of you are playing, you're the one to ask if he needs a break. you let him have the snacks you have saved. started bringing extras just for him. you fill up his water bottle when it looks empty. even after having crushed the team you played against, you tell them good game and mean it. "art? i can call back if-"

"no, it’s okay. what's up?" and he realizes how much of an idiot he looks like, standing outside his own door, on the phone. hand in his pocket like if he keeps feeling around the lining it will summon the key he’s missing.

"i was wondering if you'd be down to hit the gym. get some sets in?"

"funny, i just got back from doing exactly that."

"oh. that's fine. we can-"

"actually, can i come over?"

art's question catches you off guard. you've never hung out with each other alone for reasons other than hitting a ball with a racket. you don't even think he's been to your dorm before this.

"oh, um. yeah. sure."

"okay. cool. great. i'll call you when i'm there." and he's about to hang up when he hears your voice come through the other end once more:

"art?"

"hm?"

"do you need my address?" you giggle into the speaker.

and it only takes five minutes for art to confirm that he’s true to his word. he calls you when he reaches the front of your building and you dash down the stairs to let him in.

“hi,” you say, shy upon seeing his face. he’s gorgeous, as always. even when he’s all sweaty from practicing his backhand. his curls are all messy and he’s trying to hide how irritated he is.

“hi,” art repeats.

you let him in; he follows you upstairs and into your room where he wanders in without waiting.

“so this is it,” you tell him, a little abashed when you open your door for him, now able to see the inside of your being, it seems. especially while he drinks in all the details of your arrangement: the posters you pinned up, the way your sweaters are sorted in your closet. your textbook is laid open to the chapter you were in the middle of reading; on top of it sits your notebook. your handwriting is haphazard, messy.

“sorry, i didn’t have much of a chance to clean,” you tell him, closing the notebook. “i didn’t realize you were so close.”

art doesn’t say anything and you wonder if you should be worried.

“do you want to watch a movie? i just got Bring It On on DVD.” you’re about to go get it from one of your drawers until he stops you. his hand takes yours before you can turn. he catches your jaw with his free palm. traces the distance from your neck to your chin with his thumb; his mouth is on yours before you can say something.

and you’re not sure if this is actually happening. if you’re actually kissing art donaldson. this past hour has been a whirlwind but you figure you should take it because he’s patrick’s best friend and maybe this will be the closest to him you’ll ever get.

his lips on yours feel desperate, a hungry attempt for salvation. but also, like he needs this. and maybe you need it too. so you lean into it. let him have this moment. melt into his touch, just a little, though it isn’t especially hard considering.

but he pulls himself off once you’ve gotten used to the feeling of your mouth working against his.

“sorry, that was… sorry.” he’s shaking his head, ashamed of what he’s just done. his grandmother didn’t raise him to not ask permission.

“no, that was-”

“patrick’s going out with tashi. tonight.” the words come out of art’s mouth like that. a slip. he has no control over his actions or anything he says.

“oh.” you wonder if your crush on his best friend is that obvious; if that’s why art asked to come over in the first place. to tell you. the kiss was just to soften the blow. padding for the inevitable, terrible.

but you also know about the crush your doubles partner has been harboring. you see the way he looks at tashi when she’s about to send her opponent into oblivion. the way he looks at her from across the court, preparing for her matches. he’s her number one fan, not patrick.

“yeah,” art breathes back. a similar note of disappointment hangs in his verbiage.

neither of you say anything following the hurt sentiment. you can’t. not with your lips newly attached to his. he’s taken aback at the fact that you’re the one to initiate it, surprised he’s even still here, surprised you haven’t kicked him out yet.

and it’s different from the first one you shared with him. it’s soft, gentle. an apology and a requiem all at once. already, he misses your touch even though the two of your lips are still locked and your body language hasn’t said anything else. you’d pull apart only to say sorry, that was sudden but you don’t because you’re not.

his teeth find your flesh and they bite down on the fullest part of your lip, hard. any more pressure and he’d be drawing blood, you think. but he doesn’t and you like it, opening your mouth for him to thrust his tongue in. he licks over your teeth, wanting to explore every inch of the inside of your cheek.

and before either of you realize it, your back is flush against your twin XL mattress. he’s on top, pinning you down, still trying to find relinquishment, trying to rid himself of the ugly feelings about tashi and patrick that are still clinging onto him through the harsh action. it doesn’t even feel intimate. like just another one of your shared workout sessions. his hips are grinding into yours and while both of you revel in the friction the movement offers it’s not enough, still.

“tashi,” he moans. he doesn’t even register the fact that the name he calls out isn’t yours.

but for some reason, it doesn't bother you. at least, not as much as it should. maybe because you both are hurt; you both are using each other. art just isn't beating around the bush.

so it made sense in the moment. it made sense for you to call him patrick instead. it made sense to art too, when he hears his best friend's name fall from your lips. and neither of you stop to think about how wrong this is. rather, you relish it. this unspoken agreement has you wetter than you ever anticipated, has art harder than he would be if it were actually tashi under him.

finally, your hand finds purchase on the elastic of his waistband. you don't waste any time trying to tease him, dragging jersey down with a sense of immediacy. think you'll die if you don't get to see him — feel him — immediately.

you tug his boxers down with them and replacing the feeling of fabric is your grip on him. he's smooth, bigger than you expected. the tip of his dick is weeping and it's the prettiest thing you've ever seen.

you remove your palm for a brief second. spit in it, then resume the position it was in.

“fuck,” he seethes at the contact. uses the hand that’s not holding him up to trail the opening of your shorts and push aside your panties. his thumb runs against your soaked cunt as — “fuck,” — he tries to find your clit to press and rub circles on.

the two of you keep at that position: hands on each other, getting off one another with your clothed bodies pressed together. you finally find a pace that’s satisfying for you both. this is until art removes his hand from your shorts to take yours, wrapping around his girth.

“need to feel you,” he groans, voice barely above a whisper.

you brush your fingers against his lips while he tries pressing a kiss onto yours. he’s in the middle of pulling down your shorts but you want him to taste himself first.

and now you’re the one to groan. the sight of his mouth around your fingers. the feeling of his tongue tracing them. the thought of him lapping up his precum. it's all too much. almost has you coming undone all at once. art senses this from your facial expression and says, “c’mon tash, just a little longer. you can hold out, yeah?”

you nod lamely but the only thing you can think of is how much you need him. all you can feel is your cunt aching. you grind your hips against his in a futile attempt to get him to notice, to try and relieve yourself with something.

and he does. “you want it?” he teases, dragging his dick against the slick of your swollen pussy. his breaths become more uneven and for a split second you wonder if he wants it more and he’s just putting on a show, going through the motions of what he’s seen on porn.

but you’ll humor him; you think if he doesn’t put it in you might explode.

“yes,” you tell him breathlessly. the syllable squeaks out in between labored inhales.

“how much?” he’s nudging the tip against your entrance. it’s as if he’s a vampire and can’t enter unless you invite him in, give him permission.

“please, patrick. need you so much.”

it only takes that first thrust for you to feel your climax building. but you both are athletes; art, especially, has the stamina of one. it’s almost impressive, considering your previous hook ups.

each pump is deeper than the last, still keeping with the rhythm in which he rocks you on his dick. your eyes flutter at the sensation, the feeling of every inch stretching you out, eventually penetrating your sweet spot.

it’s not until you feel art’s fingers pull your chin to meet his face. until he tells you, i want to see that pretty face when you finish. until you’re trapped under his ice cold gaze that you realize he’s being serious, which allows yourself to cum around him.

and he takes that as his signal. pulls out. finishes from stroking his dick over your stomach. fluid spills onto the exposed part of your abdomen but he doesn't bother getting up to clean it off — not yet. he makes sure to paint your lips with the residue caught on his fingers.

you open up your mouth once you realize what he wants. attach your lips around his digits, the same way you would if you were to blow him. your tongue traces along the indentations of his index and middle finger and he uses this as an opportunity to shove them down your throat further.

you wrap your leg around his waist, drawing him into yours where he collapses. the two of you stay like that, silent. neither of you want to address what just happened. but it'll happen again because you need this. and maybe it's sick but so is the thought of tashi dating patrick.

[zweiginator]

Ive so been thinking about best friend Patrick overhearing reader masturbate… he swears he hears her say his name & maybe he gets kind of shy about it at first but it’s Patrick… obvi he’s gonna do something about it

This and you have to live with Patrick for a few months because your lease ended earlier than you thought and you don’t have enough money to put down the deposit for a new place. You’ve been best friends forever and you’ve never really had the time or the reason to think of Patrick as anything but that. A friend. But living with him has been different in that he’s so caring and domestic. Doting to your needs. Knows you’ve been stressed with work and classes and that money is tight so he buys you dinner most nights and is happy to help you with your laundry.

One night you get back from your bartending job and you’re so pissed off at the world and exhausted but you realize that Patrick is the only real, positive constant in your life. That he has taken away so many of the external stressors that had made your cortisol spike and your sleep worsen.

And, as tired as you are—you can’t quite fall asleep. Patrick can’t either; it’s the height of summer and his AC needs replacing. He tosses on the couch, watching old reruns of ER and trying to read a book you recommended to him months ago. Something about womanhood.

You try to be discrete and pull out your pink vibrator, a small bullet that’s somewhat innocuous and easy to hide under your pillow. You also bought it because the box said it was soundless. So, you trust that warranty and put it on the highest setting, desperate to cum and go to sleep and forget about the day.

Patrick is dozing off when he hears the buzzing.

“What the fuck—“ he’s confused as he sits up, holding his page in his book with his thumb before just tossing the paperback to the floor: he’s only on page 4. No use. Patrick thinks it’s something strange with the AC and he’s about to kick the unit before he realizes the sound is getting stronger, louder. It seems to ebb as he moves away from your bedroom but grows increasingly louder as he moves toward it.

And then he hears it: your small gasps and whimpers, muffled as you cover your mouth.

“Fuck—“ you whine. Patrick grows hot. “Pat, I—“

He stops in his tracks and winces as the wood panel beneath him creaks and whines itself.

Did you just? There’s no way. Patrick shouldn’t even be listening to this; it’s not the AC so it’s fine and he should mind his own. It’s not like he doesn’t jerk off most nights.

But you say it again. It’s more desperate and drawn out this time, your voice small. He can tell you’re cumming and he wouldn’t be able to hear it if he wasn’t practically pressing his ear against the door.

The next morning: Patrick stirs his coffee with the last clean spoon before diluting it with more of your coconut milk creamer he always makes fun of you for buying.

You’re in a better mood than he’s seen you lately, maybe because you’ve admitted to yourself that you can be friends with patrick and think about him when you masturbate and he never has to know. Except Patrick does know. He could let it go, but he’s never been good at that.

“Someone’s happy.” Patrick smirks over his steaming mug.

“Slept good.” You shrug.

“Yeah, I always sleep well after.”

You peep your creamer sweating on the counter. “After what?”

“After I jerk off.” Patrick winks and you want to crawl into a fucking hole. It’s one thing for him to hear you playing with yourself—it’s another for him to hear you panting his name like you’re in heat. But maybe he didn’t hear that part. Still a possibility.

He pierces the silence after a bit. “You know, I’m right here. No need to dream about it when the real thing’s right outside your door.”

[frey-williams]

When every virgin reader is a petite, white sundress, childish, pigtailed, ‘doe eyed’ innocent girl

[jordiemeow]

COMPRESS / REPRESS.

DECEMBER 24TH ❆ ADVENT CALENDAR

synopsis: in which patrick gets very turned on by the fact his best friend has a thing for his girlfriend while lingerie shopping. surprise surprise.

tags: 18+ mdni, patrick x girlfriend!reader, art x reader insinuated, kind of mild degradation, fingering, creampie, patrick talking about art as dirty talk, mentions of artrick

wordcount: 3.3k words

notes: ok so this is not at all on my original advent list but it was floating around in my head and it was the only thing i've felt inspired to finish. merry christmas n i'll try to catch up on posts after tmrw :P also will probably write a part 2 to this if anyone cares bc it was supposed to have patrick letting reader fuck art in the lingerie he picked out but i don't have time to edit that rn

HAD IT BEEN anyone else dragging Art through a mall to buy Christmas presents for their girlfriend, he would’ve told them to get fucked.

And yet, here he stands, trailing behind Patrick as he strides ahead of him, all long limbs and misplaced confidence. The store they’re in is absolutely fucking ridiculous. The stench of perfume is making him dizzy, and he’s staring very hard at a display of silk robes he absolutely does not want to be processing. Everything is red—red fabric, red signage, red lighting—and he’s half convinced the display exists to make him feel guilty for reasons he can’t even articulate properly.

Patrick, meanwhile, looks like he’s having the time of his life.

“This place rules,” Patrick says as they halt in front of the display, spinning on his heel to flash Art a cheeky grin. “Don’t look like such a fucking prude, Donaldson,” he continues when he’s levelled with a flat look. His hands come up to cup his own chest, giving a mocking squeeze. “Capitalism with tits. How fun is that?”

Art grimaces. “Can you not say that?”

Patrick laughs shamelessly, loud and bright, slinging an arm around Art’s shoulder to steer him further into the racks of bras and panties before Art can escape. “Relax, man. It’s a store, not a strip club.”

“This is worse,” he mutters, ducking his head. “There’s teenage girls in here, man. It’s weird.”

“You’re so dramatic,” Patrick dismisses with an eye roll.

They stop in front of a wall of neatly arranged lingerie sets. Patrick squints, tilting his head like he’s actually thoughtful now. It’s a little weird to see him put thought into anything, even if it’s a lingerie set for his own amusement. Art’s never seen him actually put effort into buying a gift for a girlfriend before.

He refuses to acknowledge the way his stomach twists with jealousy. Or arousal.

“So,” Patrick says. “Red or black?”

Art stiffens beside him, eyebrows pulling tight together. He tears his eyes away from the wall, shooting his friend a look as he shifts uncomfortably on his feet. “Why are you asking me?”

Patrick blinks. “Because you’re here?”

“That’s not a reason, asshole.”

A slow grin blooms on the brunette’s face, the kind that makes Art’s heart sink. “C’mon. You’re good with opinions,” Patrick insists. “You love opinions.”

Art exhales through his nose. “Not about my—about your—about this.”

Patrick’s grin only widens wickedly. “Wow. You didn’t even say her name. That’s impressive repression.”

“Don’t,” Art says around a clenched jaw.

Patrick holds his hands up in mock surrender. “I’m just buying my girlfriend a Christmas present, man. Jesus.”

“I know that,” Art snaps, then immediately softens his tone. “I know. It’s just—“ He gestures vaguely at the gaudy display. Every time he looks at a bra, all he can picture is the way your tits would look spilling out of the lace cups. Jesus, this is a disaster. “I shouldn’t be involved in this.”

“Why not?” Patrick tilts his head innocently.

“Because it’s… personal, Pat.”

All he gets in return is an unconvinced hum. Patrick reaches out and plucks a black lace set from the rack, holding it up between them. Art’s eyes flick to it on instinct and then away just as fast, ears burning an adorable shade of red. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen a thong so small.

Patrick notices, of course. “Oh, this is great,” he laughs. “Is Artie embarrassed by a pair of panties, hm?”

“No,” he protests immediately, ducking his head when a few shoppers glance in their direction. “Don’t be a dick.”

Patrick ignores him, much to his chagrin. He considers the fabric, turning it slightly. “You think this is too much?”

Art groans, lifting his eyes to stare at the ceiling. “I think you should buy whatever she likes.”

“That’s such a non-answer.”

“Because I’m not answering.”

Patrick lowers the lace and looks at his friend properly now. There’s something sharp behind his eyes—amusement, yes, but also awareness. He’s always been good at reading the space between things. Between people, more accurately.

“I know you’ve got a thing for her. You don’t have to be weird about it,” he says, far too casually.

Art’s heart drops straight into his fucking shoes. “I—“ He tries, then stops to suck air into his lungs. He forces himself to breathe before continuing. “That’s not—“

Patrick cuts him off with a half-assed shrug. “It’s fine.”

“Fine..?” Art echoes lamely.

“Yeah. Fine,” he repeats, easy. “I’m not mad.”

“You should be. I mean, hypothetically, if I did. Which I don’t.”

Patrick snorts. “Why? Because ‘hypothetically,’ you’re plotting on how to steal her from me in the middle of a Victoria’s secret?”

Art winces. “Obviously not. But—“

“Look, man, you’ve always had good taste.” Patrick grins—so unapologetic it’s almost disarming. “It tracks.”

Art’s gaze drops to the floor, jaw tight. “Right. I get it. I have no discretion whatsoever. You don’t have to be an asshole about it.”

“Don’t I? Kind of my brand,” Patrick dismisses. He turns back to the wall, grabs a red set this time. He holds it up next to the black one to display them side by side. “Okay. Help me out. Which one says ‘I’m about to get laid?’”

Art lets out a helpless, humourless laugh. “Jesus Christ.”

His gaze flicks between the two sets. Neither of them leave much to the imagination, but the black set has a much more sheer bodice. The kind that leaves your nipples poking through the fabric. On the other hand, the red is a more solid colour bra and panty. He has to resist the urge to adjust himself, pretending like he's not stirring in his jeans at the thought of you in either set.

“Red,” he finally says, defeated. “Red’s… more her.”

Patrick’s eyebrows lift. “Yeah?”

Art realises what he’s insinuated a second too late. Before he has the chance to scramble and elaborate, Patrick beams. “Perfect. Red it is.” And yet he hands both sets to a passing sales associate. “We’ll take these.”

“Both?” Art blinks.

“It’s Christmas.” Patrick claps him over the shoulder in a patronising gesture. “You did great.”

“Fuck off,” Art mutters under his breath. 

He watches Patrick saunter up to the counter to pay, confident and infuriating and completely sure of his place in the world. Art hates him a little right now. He exhales heavily, forcing himself to trail after him.

He should’ve stayed home.

—

Patrick barely celebrates the holidays. Or so he told you last year, back when you were hooking up and it seemed like a valid enough excuse to not bother sending you a text to wish you a Merry Christmas. Thus, it should be suspicious that he, of all people, suggested you watch a Hallmark movie.

You reason that he just wants to make fun of it. You’re sprawled on his bed, half-watching some shitty holiday romance you’ve both been roasting for twenty minutes, when Patrick disappears into his closet with suspicious enthusiasm.

“Okay,” he says, voice echoing slightly. “Close your eyes.”

Immediately, you’re suspicious, gaze snapping up to where his head is poking out of the open door to make sure you’re following instructions. “Patrick, if this is another stupid prank—“

“Eyes,” he warns, laughing. “Jesus, you’re so uncooperative.”

You’re expecting something stupid, but you close them anyway, smiling despite yourself. You hear rustling, followed by the unmistakable crinkle of a gift bag.

“Alright,” he says, clearing his throat. “Open.”

You do—and immediately your breath catches in your throat. He’s standing there with a small red bag held out in front of him, grin sharp and pleased (and maybe a little unhinged. You’re right to still be suspicious.) The tissue paper poking out of the top is a deep red.

“I don’t like when you smile at me like that,” you accuse when he hands you the bag. “Makes you look like you’re up to something.”

“That’s because I am,” Patrick says easily, lopsided smirk bearing down on you as he nods at the bag. “Go on. Don’t be a pussy. It’s just a present.”

You roll your eyes, deciding not to dignify that with a response. You lift the paper out to peer inside, and your stomach swoops at the sight. Lingerie. Red. It looks soft, delicate in a way that feels intentional. Thoughtful, even, not just some skimpy set to get you out of at the first opportunity he gets. It’s pretty.

“Oh,” you say intelligently.

Patrick watches your face closely, eyes bright like he knows something you don’t. It’s unsettling in a way that makes your thighs clench together. “Too much?”

“No,” you deny quickly. “No, it’s—wow. It’s really… wow.”

He grins, pleased. “Good.”

You pull it out a little more, examining it, heat creeping up your neck to burn your eyes. “This is not what I expected. Though if you were to get me any present, lingerie seems fitting.”

That’s probably a jab, but Patrick sinks down next to you, undeterred. “Yeah, well, I wanted to get you something you wouldn’t buy yourself. You always avoid those stores at the mall.”

You grimace. He’s not wrong. You’re not above flaunting a nice set of lingerie, but the process of buying them is so awkward, and you’re too afraid of running into someone you know and awkwardly fumbling over why you’re buying a thong.

You glance at him. “You put thought into this?”

“I resent how shocked you sound.”

You huff a laugh under your breath, looking back down at the lace. “I just—when did you even have time? I thought you were swamped with training.”

Patrick’s grin turns slow and dangerous. “Oh,” he says. “Funny story.”

You squint. “Patrick.”

“Art helped me pick it out,” he continues casually. “We went after training one day.”

Your head snaps up. “You took Art lingerie shopping?” You demand. “For me?”

The thought of Art, always so sweet and afraid to look you in the eyes, picking out lingerie for you makes your heart stutter in your chest. You want to hit Patrick for putting him through such a thing. You can just picture it. A pretty pink blush on his cheeks as he’s surrounded by mannequins drowned in silk, listening to Patrick speak obnoxiously loud about tight-fitting underwear and bras that are easy to take off.

You groan, covering your face in mortification. “Why would you do that to him?” You peek at him through your fingers.

Your boyfriend shrugs. “Because it’s funny.” And then, more lightly: “And because he’s totally got a thing for you.”

Your stomach drops. “Patrick—“

“What?” He says, just as innocently as when he’d brought it up to Art a few days prior. “I’m not mad.”

“That’s not—“ You stop, exhaling as your hands fall back into your lap. “That’s weird. You can’t say that.”

“I can,” he replies. “I just did.”

You stare at him, searching his stupidly handsome face for jealousy, tension—something. But Patrick just looks amused. Confident. Annoyingly secure.

“I got you two. But he picked the red,” Patrick adds, nodding at the set now laying beside you. “Didn’t even hesitate.”

Your face burns, eyes darting down to the fabric. “He did not.” Now, it makes sense why it’s not something obscenely skimpy. You have no doubt whatever else Patrick picked out will wreck your self esteem.

“Said it was ‘more you,’” Patrick hums.

You groan, dropping back onto the bed and staring at the ceiling. “I’m never looking at him again. You need to find a new friend. Preferably one you haven’t picked out underwear for me with.”

Patrick leans over you, hands braced on either side of your head as he stares down at you with that shit-eating grin of his. “Relax. It’s kind of flattering.”

“For you, maybe.”

“For both of us,” he says. “I mean, look at you. You’re hot. And I know you’re into it.” Your mouth opens to protest, but he beats you to it. “Don’t lie. You’re a little freak.”

He ducks his head, planting a kiss right by your ear just so he can breathe into it. “Turns you on knowing he’s got a thing for you.”

“I told you, that’s weird.”

“So? You are weird,” he reasons, giving your lobe a playful bite. “It’s okay. I’m into it too.”

“You are?” You reply sceptically, head lolling to the side to catch his eye.

“Mmm. I get to fuck what he can’t have. Why wouldn’t I be into it?” He says, kissing his way down your jaw, low words murmured against your skin in between presses of his lips. “Poor Artie, pining for my girlfriend. I bet he thinks of you all the time.”

Patrick’s hand snakes down, cupping you roughly over your pyjama pants. You don’t have time to stifle a gasp of surprise.

“You think?” You reply weakly.

He smiles to himself, tongue flicking out to taste your neck as he works his way down. All it takes is a few choice words and he’s got you. Hook, line and sinker.

“Uh huh,” he confirms, fingers rubbing lazily over your throbbing heat. You’ve never resented a pair of shorts more for getting in the way. “He’s got plenty to imagine, right? Like that time in Boston when we won the semis. Bet he was going crazy in the room next door listening to you cry on my cock.”

Your face flushes, and you squirm weakly against his hand. “The walls weren’t that thin.”

Patrick kisses his teeth in disagreement. “Afraid they were, babe. He could hardly look at me the next day. I wonder why. Do you think he touched himself? Got off to the sound of my girlfriend being fucked like a slut?”

“P-Patrick—” You whine. It’s hard to tell whether you’re protesting about the fact he’s talking about his best friend masturbating over you or because he still hasn’t touched you properly.

“Bet he did,” he muses, teeth grazing against your neck. Finally, he has mercy—mostly because this little fantasy is already turning him on too much. His fingers push your shorts to the side, sliding between your folds. You’re embarrassingly wet for someone who’s pretending to be upset about this line of discussion. “Pictured himself in my position. How’d we do it? Doggy? I’m sure he heard the headboard rattle.”

Two thick fingers sink into you without warning, and your back arches up off the mattress with a moan. Patrick’s an expert at taking you apart, regardless of whether he’s feeling patient. Judging by the erection pressed against the inside of your thigh, he’s probably not.

“And the other day,” he continues, fingers pumping into your tight cunt lazily. “You should have seen him picking that out. Redder than a tomato. I know he was picturing you in it.”

“Art’s not a pervert, Patrick. He’s not like you, having some fantasy in the middle of a Victoria’s Secret—” His fingers curl, and you break off into a breathy whine. 

“Art’s the biggest fucking pervert I’ve ever met,” he laughs, kissing his way back up your neck until his face hovers above you. He watches the way your face twists with pleasure, jaw going slack and eyes hazy. “He’s just better at hiding it.”

“Can you just stop talking?” You plead breathlessly. “Just fuck me already.”

“Aww. Poor thing. Are you that turned on thinking about it?” He teases, fingers withdrawing—though he gives your pussy a playful slap for good measure just to watch you jerk. 

“It’s not a… displeasing line of thought,” you admit reluctantly with the hopes that it’ll hurry along his teasing. It seems to work as he sits back on his heels, pushing his pyjama pants down to his knees. Your mouth dries at the sight of him—always so intimidating being presented with his cock like this. You wonder what Art’s looks like. Is he as big? As girthy? Does he have as much hair as Patrick does curling around the base, or does he manscape? Is it—

Fuck, you’re awful for even thinking about it. Patrick’s an awful influence on you.

His eyes twinkle down at you, mischievous and knowing, as his large hands hook under your thighs and drag you closer to him. “No? And here I thought you said it was weird,” he teases, hitching your legs around his waist.

“I stand by that. It’s kind of insane that you’re about to rearrange my guts and we’re talking about— haah.” Your words cut off to suck in a sharp breath as the blunt head of his cock presses into you in an agonisingly slow glide. Patrick watches himself disappear into you, smirk faltering as he groans at the tight warmth of you squeezing him.

“What’s a little dirty talk between partners?” He says, his own voice a little breathy.

That’s the most unreasonable excuse you’ve ever heard, but Patrick’s already fucking into you in earnest. The bed creaks underneath you, your heels pressing against his back as his cock splits you open. 

“He’s not as big as me, you know,” he says, and you’d roll your eyes at the brag if you hadn’t been fantasising about what Art’s dick looked like a minute ago. “But I’ve heard he’s pretty good with it. Picks up a lot of girls with that pretty face. Nice body, too, I guess, if I was a girl—”

“Are we talking about you wanting to fuck Art now?”

“God, no.” He laughs, a bit stilted, and you want to press on that further. But Patrick’s fingers slide through your folds, gathering the creamy slick at your entrance that gushes around his length to wet them. Then he drags them back up, rubbing at your clit. “But you’d— shit, just like that, baby— you’d fuck him, right? If we weren’t together?”

“He’s— nghhh, fuck— pretty,” you gasp out in affirmation. “I guess I would.”

I guess is an understatement. Patrick laughs, a rough sound broken up by grunts of effort. His balls slap against your cunt with each snap of his hips, bottoming out with each thrust and leaving you breathless. You can feel the ridges of his cock dragging along your walls every time he moves.

“Yeah? How would you do it?”

You try to think about it. Distancely, your brain is able to conjure up an image of you perched atop him, his head tipped back in ecstasy as you bounce on his cock. Or him nestled between your thighs, mouthing at your pussy like a drowned man finding air.

“Ride him, I think,” you manage in between moans.

“You want him to be your good boy?” Patrick smirks down at you, and a particularly hard thrust has you crying out. “Tired of getting fucked like a slut? Want a little action on top?”

“Please,” you manage to grit out. You don’t have much ground to stand on considering you’re clawing at his back while he ploughs into you, but you try anyway. “As if I’m not on top of you all the time.”

“But we both know who’s calling the shots,” he shoots back. 

“Fuck, I hate you,” you whimper, the approach of your orgasm silencing any other argument. “Right there, Pat, m’gonna cum—”

“Then show, baby, don’t tell.”

Patrick fucks you through it when it crashes over you, his name spilling off your tongue in a cry of pleasure. Your cunt flutters around his throbbing cock, squeezing him as your back bows in pleasure. Shame lingers in the back of your brain about the fact you’re getting off on something so disgusting, but the feeling of his length grinding so deep you swear the head presses against your cervix drowns it out.

Then, with a grunt, he bottoms out one final time. “Fuck, that’s it, ah—” 

You feel the heat of him spilling into you, pulse after pulse, and despite everything said in the last ten minutes, it still manages to leave you feeling claimed. At the end of the day, you’re still his girlfriend, regardless of whatever the fuck you just talked about.

He doesn’t bother pulling out—not yet, at least—and braces his hands by your head again, ducking his head to give you a kiss. You breathe heavily into his warm mouth as his tongue dips into yours.

“Hope you like the lingerie,” he murmurs against your lips. 

You laugh weakly, because how is that relevant right now?

“Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

advent taglist: @lexiiscorect @gracelynnx @m4lodr4ma @blondewhoresworld @deltamel @tiffysdeath @wlwroan @pittsick @i-t0ld-ya @scariffs @gelotime @elsieblogs @challengers4ev — join here <3

[pittsick]

⋆˙⟡ tinder dates: patrick zweig x afab!reader.

summary: patrick zweig isn’t searching for a relationship, Hell no. not when his tinder bio specifically says he wants a quick fuck and a place to sleep, sometimes. when he texts you, you block him (he’s a weirdo). so why do you end up being fingered by him in his shitty car?

cw: +18. mdni. fingering. tease!patrick. praise. semi-public (car sex). overstimulation (very slightly). reblog is a creator's best-friend, thank you! + this is a repost from my previous blog, not a steal!

taglist: @duncanatorr @userhotd @angeldoll1e @i-t0ld-ya @stargral @nekkiotine @222col @fawnettewinchester @grimsonandclover @museboos @nozhdyved @gelotime @prismozo @lvve-talks @bluberrychampagne @artstennisracket @kathh01 @jclolz22 @dumbbandpoetic @hisfavoriteweepingangel @i-cant-stfu @bluestrd @challengers4ev @coochiemama3000 @eepwtf @domingodeaan @peachyparkerr @jiminie-08 @obsessweverything @rafeswriter @stqrfirez @pervyangelz @iheartrosalia @cxlt-lamb1 @rafespeach @kill3ill ( to be added )

Patrick wasn’t searching for love; he wasn’t searching for the butterflies in his stomach nor for a wedding, a house and a dog. No, fuck no, he didn’t want a relationship, all the problems that came with it; commitment, responsibilities, doing stupid shit for someone else. Once again, fuck no.

Of course Patrick knew he could be crude and disgusting at times, was it really his fault? His Tinder profile said it all – quick fuck, he liked blowjobs, wouldn’t say no to semi-public and threesomes? A dream. If people wanted something serious and long term, he wasn’t made for them.

He liked to fuck. It was a stress-reliever for Patrick, something he did to forget about his shitty life, about his shitty family, his shitty friends and obviously, his shitty-self. Fucking was human, anyway, right? At least, he was honest to people; because playing them wasn’t really his style. A simple hey, I’m not going to take you on any fucking dates, but I’ll fuck you in my car seemed to be enough.

And it was actually enough for most people to understand how Patrick worked; they either liked his honestly or blocked him (he could care less, he’d find someone else to fuck, anyway).

You were one of those people at first; Patrick’s first hey, wanna fuck? :) text had made you cringe, and you had immediately blocked him – you wouldn’t be caught going out with that weirdo. But the more you looked at his profile, the more you thought why the hell not? He wasn’t ugly by any means, seemed a bit rugged but you could care less about that detail.

You weren't especially looking for a relationship either, but you aren't as straight-forward as him either. It seemed you liked more of a nice conversation instead of just a place and time for a quickie. But again; life was stressful and you needed to let go.

That’s how you ended up in his car; it smelled like sweat and weed in there, the windows rolled down in an empty parking lot at night. It was awkward because Patrick wasn’t one for discussion; there was nothing he could say to make the moment better, anyway. How was your day? He didn’t care. Cool shirt. Yeah, you already fucking knew that. I can’t wait to be inside you. Shut up.

“Have you ever done that in a car?” The sound of his voice broke the silence suddenly while one of his hands grabbed a bunch of shirts from the floor of the car to throw them in the back, unbothered. He readjusted himself in the driver seat, pulling on the fabric of his shorts at the crotch as if it was uncomfortable already. “There’s not that much space, hope you don’t mind.”

Because he was a cheap fuck and not even capable of booking an hotel room for the night – he didn’t care if you thought you deserved that. He had loved to see the grumpy look on your face when you got to his car, earlier; realizing it was it. He’d fuck you here. And the thought alone makes him smirk again, as he grabs a cigarette from an almost empty packet.

Patrick wished to be more than that sometimes; more than just a quick sex in a car, in a bathroom stall, in the dark alleyway of a pub at one in the morning. He wished to give more; to be allowed to express feelings without the fear of being abandoned (again), of being mocked for them (again), of being ignored (again).

So sex, it was; pain and pleasure, tears and screaming, like a fight with naked bodies. He knew that by heart now.

His hand not holding the stick cancer moves to your thigh, and your reflex was to open your legs for him. “Can I?” He asks and you nod your head at him, not trusting your voice to not waver if you replied with words. The silence in the car isn’t as awkward as it was before when his fingers brush over your inner-thigh, smoke of the cigarette hitting your face. You hold yourself from coughing. What an ass, though.

“I don’t think we can do much here, yeah? Bit tight.” He adds and you understand the sexual innuendo in his words, especially when he looks at your face like he wanted a reaction from you. The only one you can give him is a sharp inhale for air when his fingertips brush over the fabric of your underwear, just under the denim of your skirt. It's almost damp and you can't help but feel embarrassed at that.

His fingers tease, they are warm, they are here and you can feel them rubbing where it matters. Patrick feels cocky already; you search for his touch and he’s not even started with you yet. He wonders how it’d feel to have you on top of him in that car, not caring for the lack of space; hitting your head on the roof while bouncing on his cock.

The thoughts alone are enough to wak his soft cock; creating a tent in his shorts, and he grunt.

Perhaps what Patrick prefers in this all is the anticipation of it, the thoughts running through his mind, the vivid images of naked bodies, what he could make someone feel for a while.

His attention goes back to you when he hears you groan, your legs shaking for more; you look at him like you’re about to murder him. “Sorry, sorry. Impatient, I see.” He teases again, before pushing your panties to the side with his fingers, making you gasp as the cold air hits your damp pussy. Patrick almost wishes to capture your face at that moment; lips parted and eys glossy.

At that point, he decides you’re more important than anything; even than his cigarette that he puts off in the ashtray of his shitty car. His body turns onto the driver seat and he almost hits himself in the ribcage with the steering wheel before finding a comfortable position. His eyes, wide of focus, stay on your face at all times; he doesn’t want to look away from you. He needs to drink your expressions.

“Fuck—” Patrick can hear the curse coming from your lips as his fingers circles around your pussy; not yet touching the folds or your clit. He thinks teasing is better than the act itself, or maybe he just wants to see your eyebrows furrow and the pout of anger on your face when you scream at him to finger you, finally.

He can’t help but chuckle, grunting when his lower body moves which makes him realize how painful hard he is. But he’s too focused on you, so it doesn’t matter—nothing matters but the pleasure he can bring to you.

And when both his middle and ring fingers finally decide the teasing is over and brush along the slit of your pussy to part the lips, he can hear the trembling of your voice when you call his name. “Come on, don’t be an asshole.” He hears you say, and it makes him chuckle. His second hand moves between the headrest of your seat and your neck to support your head, and mostly to turn it in his direction.

“Look at me while I finger you, I wanna see your face.” He tells you, eyes to eyes.

The only noises in the shitty car are your loud breathing, Patrick’s fingers rubbing your wetness around your folds, and the cracking of the seat as your hands hold onto the fabric. Is it leather? Nylon? Your thoughts are broken by the intrusion of Patrick’s finger inside you; the middle one first to let you adjust; and you gasp at the feeling, awkwardly shifting on the seat for a second. It’s cold.

You can feel his thumb from his other hand on your jaw, brushing the skin there – you never thought of Patrick to be so gentle. Like the Tinder bio said, he wanted quick fucks, in, out and go; not some kind of touches that made you question everything. At least he wasn’t the ass you thought he was (not so much anymore).

“Can I add the other one? You good?” He asked, eyes looking at your face for any indications that you wanted everything to stop; but he didn’t find anything. Your thighs actually closed onto his hand, hips rolling to feel his finger before he added the second one. A shiver ran through your body at that point; and your eyes looked to the window of his car, not fogged yet.

His fingers stretched the walls of your pussy; fingertips rubbing against the gummy walls as they just waited there, making your walls mold around them.

“Can you move? Your fingers are cold,” you said to him, looking at him like he had asked you to before. Patrick hummed at the words and you felt his fingers curl up inside you finally before they moved. His thumb found your bud of nerves and he brushed against it, wondering what kind of reactions he’d get from you. It was nothing but gentle, and you only whimpered his name like a demand.

Patrick seemed to understand as his fingers inside you brushed against the rough skin of your spot, and your body squirmed; his pace wasn’t that fast and you wondered if it was a way of him to tease or torture you. “That’s how you want it?” He asked you but no words could leave your mouth as he rubbed against that spot again, his thumb finally rubbing your clit.

You felt your wall clench around his fingers as he thrusted them in and out of your soaked pussy, leaving your juices to drip down onto the seat of his car. Your angled your hips so he'd be able to get deeper. You couldn't even reply to his question but hummed at him.

“I guess I’ll do it however I want, yeah?” he added and your head only rolled against the headrest of the seat, your breathing labored. You could feel your thighs clenching around his hand, keeping him where it was warm, and Patrick smirked just at the action from you. “Just a bit faster, please,” you finally begged him.

And as much Patrick just wanted to be a dick and tease you again, you had asked so politely that he felt the obligation to give you what you wanted. His middle and ring fingers rolled in and out faster like you asked, making sure to brush onto the right gummy spot while his thumb pressed slightly harder onto your slick clit. Loud squelching noises could be heard from inside the car, your pussy soaked.

Your hands previously holding onto the seat moved away to grab Patrick’s wrist, your moans echoing inside his car to create a melody. He decided at that moment the melody was probably the prettiest thing he had ever heard before.

His hand at your jaw moved to your hair, brushing the sweaty strands away from your forehead and he shushed you. “Don’t be so noisy, what if someone drives by and hears you?” He joked, but the words made you bite down on your lower lip. Patrick licked his lips. “No, don’t do that, I want to hear you, actually.” And you listened, because you could at least give him that while he ignored his hard-on for you.

Little moans and whimpers of his name made Patrick pick up the pace again, the stimulation of your clit and his fingers inside you were making you feel dizzy; your hips rolling with the movements of his hand between your thighs. You clenched your cunt around his fingers, sucking them in when he fucked you with his digits.

“You’re doing so good.” He whispered to you like it was a secret, praises falling from his lips while he moved, and Patrick swore he had felt your walls fluttering around his fingers at the words. “I’m close– Don’t stop,” you gasped out, eyebrows furrowed to focus on the pleasure he was bringing to you. Knowing you felt that way because of him made a smirk appear on his cocky face.

His body shifted closer to yours, his free hand moved to your chin to turn your head to the side, just so he could look at you as you came on his fingers. Your walls fluttered, the knot in your stomach suddenly breaking as your orgasm hits you strong. Your juices leaking down his fingers, sticking them and creating even louder squelching noises in the car.

Your voice was louder than it had been before, calling his name so sweetly that his fingers kept moving even when you were getting down from your high; which made your body squirm and thighs tremble. One of your hands moved to his shirt and you tugged him closer, head falling on his shoulder.

Only a few seconds later, Patrick pulled his fingers from inside you; sticky with your cum, and warm. “That was good, uh?,” he asked, looking at you as he moved his middle and ring fingers to his lips, licking them clean while you blushed from the action.

Your legs felt heavy as they fully rested against the seat once more, and Patrick smiled at you. “I’ll book a room next time.” He said and you scoffed at him, shaking your head as you watched him search in the backseats for tissues so you could clean yourself up.

“Who said anything about the next time?”

[kafka-ish]

Omg there better be a next time

[pittsick]

Remember when u said u wanted to lick arts sweat..you should make something where we lick the sweat off his abs who said that

summary: alone in a sauna with your boyfriend art and he doesn’t expect you to be all excited by his sweaty-body? yeah, okay. he should have known better.

pairing: art donaldson x partner reader.

cw: +18. mdni. 1.2k words. sweat-licking. praising. dirty talk. handjob. messy kissing. switch art x switch reader.

taglist .ᐟ @blastzachilles, @lvve-talks, @jordiemeow, @strfallz, @222col, @soulxinxthexsky, @diyasgarden, @jinxedbambi, @lexiiscorect, @religionlost, @bluestrd, @jclolz22, @magicalmiserybore, @destinedtobegigi

The heat clung to your skin like a second layer, thick and stifling, the scent of cedarwood and sweat filling your lungs. You sat on the lower bench of the sauna, towel draped over your thighs, the soft cotton already damp against your skin. Across from you—on the upper level, one leg stretched out, the other bent with a casual arm slung over his knee—was Art.

He looked like a painting left out in the sun too long. Glossy with sweat, chest rising and falling slow and even, blonde curls damp and pushed back from his forehead. The towel wrapped low around his waist was threatening to loosen with every lazy shift of his hips. And he knew it. You could see the corner of his mouth twitch each time you looked a little too long.

"You’re staring," Art murmured, voice low and sticky from the heat. His eyes flicked over to you, glinting with amusement. "Not that I mind. Makes me feel kinda hot."

"You already are hot," you said, your voice hoarse, made heavier by the heat and by the way your pulse had started to thrum in your throat.

He chuckled, cocky but sweet, like he didn’t fully know what to do with the compliment. “Thanks. The whole sweat out your sins thing working on me?”

You shrugged, watching a bead of sweat trail down from his collarbone, along the swell of his pec, over the cut lines of his abs. “I don’t know if it’s purifying you or just making me impure.”

Art's brows lifted, and he exhaled a laugh. “Damn. That’s kinda hot.”

You shifted slightly, your thighs pressing tighter together. The steam made everything feel hazy, your thoughts softened, heavy. But your focus was razor-sharp: him. The slope of his chest. The shine of sweat sliding down his stomach. The way he was watching you now—eyes hooded, pupils dilated.

"You gonna come up here," he drawled, tapping the bench beside him, "or just keep making eyes at me from down there like you’re in a confessional booth?"

Your body moved before your brain caught up. The wood was hot under your palms as you climbed to his level, sitting beside him but not touching—yet. Art turned slightly, stretching his arm across the back of the bench behind you. He smelled like salt and cedar and heat, intoxicating. You were dizzy with it.

“Been thinking about this?” he asked, voice softer now, more intimate. His knuckles brushed your shoulder lightly. “Me, like this. Sweaty. Half-naked. You watching.”

You licked your lips, heart hammering. “Yeah. Kinda hard not to.”

Art smirked, leaning closer. “Tell me what you see.” You turned your head, lips barely an inch from his. “Your chest,” you said quietly, voice catching. “All that sweat. Your abs. I can’t stop looking.”

Art's breath hitched, and his smile turned sharp. "Then do something about it."

Your lips crashed together in the next breath. It was messy from the start—hot, open-mouthed, teeth clashing, your hand sliding up his slick chest to cup the side of his neck. Art groaned into your mouth, one hand gripping your waist, the other fisting in your towel as he pulled you flush against him.

The kiss was wet, uncoordinated, needy. Tongues tangling, breaths stolen. The heat of the sauna felt tame compared to the fire between you. His skin was burning, every inch of him damp and flushed under your fingertips. When your hand slid across his chest, it slipped easily over the sheen of sweat, and he shuddered.

“Fuck,” he muttered, lips brushing your jaw, “you touching me like that—gonna melt.”

You kissed along his cheek, then down to the corner of his mouth, to his throat, tasting salt and heat as you went. Your tongue darted out, licking the sweat from his collarbone, and he hissed, hips jolting forward slightly. "You like that?" you whispered, lips at the base of his throat.

Art nodded, swallowing hard. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s—fuck, that’s hot. You licking me like you’re starving.”

You moaned against his chest, then flattened your tongue and dragged it slowly up the line between his pecs. His skin twitched under your mouth. You sucked at a droplet that had gathered just above his nipple, then moved lower, painting long, wet strokes with your tongue across the lines of his abs.

His head tipped back, hand gripping your thigh now. "Jesus Christ, you're so good at that. Fuckin' worshipping me like this."

You hummed, nipping at the edge of the towel wrapped around his hips. He was already half-hard under it, the fabric doing a poor job of hiding how much this was getting to him.

“I wanna make you feel good,” you murmured. “Wanna see you fall apart like this.”

Art looked down at you, dazed, lips parted. “You’re already doin’ a hell of a job.” Your hand slid under the towel slowly, teasing the line of his hip before wrapping around him. Art cursed, his hips jerking up into your hand.

“God—your hands. They’re—fuck, they’re perfect.” His voice cracked on the last word, breath catching as you began to stroke him, slow and firm.

You watched his face as you worked him—how his brows furrowed, how his lips fell open, how the muscle in his jaw jumped every time you twisted your wrist just right. He was sweating even more now, breath coming in sharp, stuttered gasps. You leaned in and licked up the middle of his stomach again, tasting the salt there, then kissed the dip between his ribs as you pumped him steadily.

“Look at you,” you whispered. “So sensitive. You’re so fuckin’ sexy like this, Art.”

His hips stuttered again, and his hand clamped around your wrist for a second, like he was trying to ground himself. "You saying shit like that’s gonna make me blow like a teenager."

"That bad?" you teased, tightening your grip just a little. Your thumb swiped across the tip, smearing the leaking precome across the head, and Art choked on a groan. "That good," he corrected, biting down on a moan. “You’re killing me. You’re so good, baby. Your hands—shit, you feel so good.”

You kissed across his chest again, licking sweat from his skin like you couldn’t get enough of the taste. He was panting now, muscles tight under your touch, his whole body humming like a live wire.

"Close?" you asked, kissing just below his nipple before giving it a lick.

He nodded, jaw clenched. “So fuckin’ close. Don’t stop, don’t—ah, fuck—” You pumped him faster, hand slick with sweat and precum, your lips still brushing his skin as he bucked into your grip. The towel slipped completely off his lap, forgotten on the bench.

"Come for me, Art," you whispered against his chest. "Wanna see how pretty you look when you fall apart."

That did it. With a strangled moan, Art spilled over your hand, hips twitching, eyes squeezed shut as he gasped your name. His whole body trembled, chest rising and falling like he’d just sprinted a mile.

You kept stroking him through it, gentle now, then pulled your hand away and kissed his stomach one last time. Art slumped back against the wall, totally wrecked, cheeks flushed, curls plastered to his forehead.

“…You tryna kill me in here?” he asked, voice ragged, grinning breathlessly.

You laughed, wiping your hand on the edge of the towel before draping it back over his thigh. “Just trying to make the sauna experience memorable.” Art pulled you close, pressing a slow, sweaty kiss to your lips, tongue dragging lazily against yours. “Oh, I’m not forgetting that any time soon.”

He smiled against your mouth. “Round two’s definitely happening. But next time—my turn.”

[poppy-metal]

had a thought of fwb patrick calling you to let you know he fucked someone else (he is SO good at communication if he cares about preserving a relationship) and being like “i kept calling them your name but they didn’t feel like you :/ ”

crying because you're probably the one who said you should see different people - scared of getting attached to patrick and inevitably getting your heart broken - but you know you can't resist him either, not when he speaks to you in that voice and looks at you with those eyes like he's already thinking about being balls deep inside you and is just letting you have your little moment till it happens, so yeah. walls are put up. you'll let him bounce you on his cock in the back of his van, but you wont be exclusive with him.

it kinda backfires on you because you're the one who finds it hard to actually fuck other people, so insistent that you wanted to - and yet whenever you're with another man it just feels wrong when he puts his hands on you. you purposely refuse to think about patricks side of things. you're not special. thats why you made the fucking rule. you knew that from the start.

so when patrick calls you drunk and he starts to tell you about this girl he was just fucking - you're ready to hang up - ready to try and brush it off and pretend it doesn't hurt, you dont care, its what you expected, this is why the rules were in place anyway, dont fucking cry - but then his voice reaches through you through the receiver, all scratchy and rough when he tells you - "s'not the same, though."

and you furrow your brows. curious enough to not hang up just yet. still sick at the knowledge he was with someone else, maybe this is self punishment - hearing the gritty details will detach yourself from him further. which is what you need. "what wasn't the same? pussies pussy, isn't it."

patrick makes a sound on the other end of the line. one of obvious disagreement. "no." he says, seems to collect himself to say something more - you hear faint background sounds. something metallic. his keys maybe? the creak of his mattress. he just got home probably. is getting into bed. "there's pussy and there's your pussy."

you find yourself also getting into your own bed. settling against your pillows. you try not to react to that, press the phone closer to your ear. "uh huh," you say, going for sarcastic. you want him to elaborate.

and because patricks a fucking talker, he does exactly that. "you've totally fucking ruined me for other women. i mean, unless someone is cool with me being balls deep and saying another womans name. that woman is you, by the way. fucking mood killer."

you hear the switch of a lighter being flicked on. you can imagine him lounging back in his bed after a night out - he's probably just in his boxers - maybe even naked - lazily pulling drags from a cigarette as he talkes to you. phone balanced between his cheek and shoulder.

"do you want me to feel bad for you?" you tell him, and there's perhaps a smile in your voice. perhaps. "poor patrick."

"you should." he tells you, voice scratchy like how it is right after he took a hit. you hear the exhale as he lets the smoke out. patrick looks unfairly good with a cigarette. even though he should quit. you wonder if hes holding it between his fingers or if its trapped between his lips as he fiddles with something else. "considering its your fault. your pussy gave me whiskey dick for other girls."

you try not to let that mean anything. fail. you bite your bottom lip.

"so you were thinking of me?" you hate the note of hope in your voice. god, you're pathetic. you feel the power of the situation slipping from you.

the bed creaks again from his side as he readjusts. picturing him isn't helping. half dressed or nude. half dressed or nude. how unkempt is his hair right now? you wish he was in front of you. "i was going down on her," he starts and you frown.

"ugh-"

"shut up. i was going down on her and she was making these sounds right? and i just kept thinking-" he says your name. over and over again. "- and 'her pussy feels better than this'. had to fuckin. close my eyes and imagine that shit - that last time i fucked you? when you sank down on my shit and just - fucking bounced on it - d'you remember that? no one fucks my dick like you do. shits insane. anyway, i was thinking about that - and i guess i said your name or something - she's slapping the shit out of me out of nowhere. kicked me out." he lets out a long suffering sigh. "this is a fucking problem."

you roll over onto your stomach. kick your feet in the air behind you. "oh, its a problem, huh?" you pout out your bottom lip. "poor patrick. so pussy whipped he cant slut himself out. im crying for you."

"oh, fuck off." he grunts. "like you dont think about me when you're getting pounded by some pencil dicked bitch."

"and how do you know their dick sizes? maybe im getting 'pounded' by monster cock every weekend."

"nah." is patricks simple reply.

you glare even though he cant see you. "the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

"it means." patrick says, deliberately. "that if you were taking cock from anyone with a big dick your cunt wouldn't be as tight as it is."

you swallow. vulgarity from patricks lips shouldn't sound as good as it does.

"vaginas dont work like that, stupid."

"baby." he says it condescendingly. a gush of wet soaks your pussy. fuck. his voice. he shouldn't be allowed to call you that. new rule. that you'll impose later. "you're as tight as a virgin down there. I'm not saying you'd be loose, but - i definitely wouldn't have to pin you down." if you're slipping your hand under yourself to touch yourself, no you're not. "- and fucking bully my cock into you."

you tremble a little. "you have an unnaturally big cock its -" you swallow "- its not any indication of the men i sleep with."

"sure." he tells you. he doesn't believe you. fucking smug asshole. "so you're saying you dont think of me?"

you lie, "that's what im saying."

its quiet on the other side of the line. your hand comes out of your panties, you look down at your phone but he hasn't hung up.

"huh." he says eventually.

"what?" you sit up.

"it's just interesting."

"what about it is interesting?"

"nothing." he replies. his tone is unreadable. you cant tell if hes amused or pissed or just doesn't care. you wish you could see his face. when he's irritated, his jaw works back and forth. when he's entertained, his lips are quirked. you wonder what his hands are doing too. if he's fidgeting with his fingers to show anxiety, or if his knee is bouncing with contempt. "i wanted to tell you I'll be out of town for a few weeks."

you blink. this is - startling. sudden. whiplash. you open and close your mouth like a fish.

weeks. plural. the longest you've gone without seeing patrick is three weeks. and that's when you're both busy. anxiety enters your chest. a fissure of it.

"oh?" you try to sound casual. "how long?"

"dont know." he exhales through the receiver. "its just some tennis shit. I'll be in florida for a month."

"oh."

he says your name again.

"yeah?" your mind is drifting. a strange feeling. like you already miss him when he's not even gone yet. a month without patrick zweig... without his hands and his face and his lips and body on yours -

"I'm gonna miss you." he says. he sounds deeply sincere. like, intensely so. your heart thumps in your chest, a wild thing. you feel like suddenly, your response is very important. you lick your lips. the urge to tell him you'll miss him too on the tip of your tongue -

you say - "you'll miss my pussy, you mean."

silence for a beat.

then he huffs a laugh. "yeah. yeah, i will." he doesn't sound amused though. "gonna pass the fuck out, i think. night."

"nigh-" you start but the line clicks.

he hung up.

[vanesawye]

tashi duncan, u.s. open juniors championship 2006

[kafka-ish]

part 2 of your latest work? 🙏🏽🙏🏽

part 1!!

To be fair it was Art’s fault really. He was the one who told you to talk to Patrick… or not talk to him. He was the one to suggest you all move in at the beginning… But he didn’t know you’d take it the wrong way. He should’ve been more blunt, stated things more clearly. But was too late. Now he has two roommates who walk around the house in practically nothing because of something he said.

But it doesn't start out like that. At first you’re just wearing Patrick’s band tees. He doesn’t catch on to what you’re doing until he’s missing some t-shirts from a pile he keeps on the floor. It’s not long until he sees where they went to. He catches you in the living room watching the news and he just stands in the hall, smirking.

“Is that my shirt?” He asks one day.

“Is it? I never see you wearing one.”

“Funny. Give it back.”

“No, Patrick. I washed it.”

“I bought it.”

“No, Patrick. Your dad bought it.” God you get under his skin. He wants to rip his shirt off that you have on but you’re already walking away.

You don't hate Patrick you just hate how entitled he is. You hate that he's just there... like a fly on the wall or a mascara stain. Just won't go away. Always hogging the couch, either manspreading or laying down, taking up all the space. Always facetiming his girlfriend loudly, not bothering to go in another room or put in earphones. And it's not regular conversation. They're always arguing. Patrick, are you smoking again? No, he'll say, slipping his vape into his sleeve, ghosting the hit he just took. But mainly, you hate his dad's bank account. You wish he'd get cut off, or at least get a part time job. You tell him the mall's hiring and don't worry, macy's hires felons.

"I'm not a--"

"Well there was that one time," Art says, now that he thinks about it.

"Okay but it wasn't like I was arrested."

It's summer and the ac isn't working. Maybe that's what started it. You lounging around in strappy bikinis all day. Trying to get back at Patrick for the whole time you've lived with him, and if you were honest, his attention.

"I'm going to the beach later, I just wanted to get ready."

"Yeah, sure. Later was five hours ago."

"Patrick, please. It's so hot. It's killing me." It's killing him too. You’re stretched out on the couch. You finally have it to yourself. Sweat beads from your forehead. Your neck. Your collarbone onto your chest. Patrick watches this while Nancy Pelosi talks about the affirmative action movement.

“What’s with you and politics?”

“Some of our lives actually depend on it.” You look at Patrick. It’s such a pity. He has such a great face yet nothing good to say.

One day you actually do go to the beach. You need someone to apply your sunscreen and normally Art would do it but he’s out, playing tennis or with friends. You have to ask Patrick. Any other day, you'd mind, but it's 110 outside, hotter in the house. Feels like you're on the sun. Besides, you want to catch a tan and lately you like how predictable Patrick's behavior has been. You always know where he is. He keeps people from breaking in.

"Can you get my back?" you ask, turning around for him.

"Gave your servant the day off?" He's referring to Art. Nonetheless, he stands up. Starts with your shoulders. His calloused hands rub the lotion into your skin like he's giving you a massage.

"Figured he deserves one." Patrick chuckles. At least you can see the bias his own best friend has for you too. His hands get lower and it takes everything you have to not fall into him. "Finally going to the beach? Not just here to tease me?"

"Your hands aren't the only thing that need watching. You're such a perv."

"C'mon, you're just mad 'cause you've never been touched there." He starts playing with one of the strings before you can pull away. You reach in your purse, pull out a mini linen dress. Slip it on and get some satisfaction out of depriving Patrick of something. Make a jab about covering up so you won't have to worry about getting taken advantage of by boys like him. He says something like, "just because I have a big dick doesn't mean I am one."

"Yeah, okay. Just ask your dad to pay for the ac."

[kafka-ish]

Being Art and Patrick’s roommate… OMG

I feel like you all have known each other since high school or maybe you and Art roomed together in college and Patrick was always hanging around your guys’ dorm so after you graduate you decide why not? It’s comfortable. You all know each other. But you don’t realize how fucking awkward it is until Patrick’s roaming around shirtless in his boxers. Eating cold pizza for breakfast straight out of the fridge with a left over beer to go with it.

You get up one morning and see him lounging around the living room like he owns the place and you’re just like seriously? And he’s just like yeah, deal with it.

“Yeah but, Ren and Stimpy?” He wishes you were ogling him instead, even though he has a girlfriend who hates the fact that you live with him but it’s fine because so does Art. Not like anything’s gonna happen…

And, yeah, part of you also wants to eyeball his abs and draw over his v-line with your tongue. Not to mention the bulge that’s poking out of his—

It's only natural. But he’s basically your older brother so you tell him to go put on a shirt.

“Sorry, babe, laundry day.” Or sometimes he’ll say, “you wish you were lucky enough to get a paid subscription to this.” And you try to pass it off. Hope he doesn’t see you blush. Brush his skin when you try to take the remote from him.

“You should be more like Art.” He hates when you say this to him. He doesn’t know what the hell that means; if you mean it or not. Patrick’s always been good with girls but he can never pick up on your sarcasm or when you’re being deadpan because the only interactions you have are petty fights over the food you had saved, the dishes, how messy he is. Basically your whole living arrangement. And you never chastise Art. Sometimes make it a point to tell him how much you love how he organized the spices in alphabetical order while Patrick was on the couch watching re-runs of shitty reality tv shows that he was never really interested in. You thank Art for the fact that you never have to pick up after him. Say things like at least someone got dressed today.

Patrick just rolls his eyes. Says he’s going to the gym later so he’ll be out of your hair, or okay mom, or since when are you in charge?

And as much as Patrick tries not to let it get to him, it does. He confides in Art about it. “Dude… I think she’s pissed.”

“Yeah, well… You can be messy sometimes, Patrick.”

“I think she hates me.”

“She doesn’t hate you. She lives with you.”

And even though Art’s sworn to secrecy, he tells you anyway. He can’t keep his mouth shut and he wants to make things right. You guys are roommates.

You’re in your room. Art’s inside you and this is the only thing the boy hasn’t blabbed about to anyone. It’s just casual sex. It started in college but it just kept… happening.

“Patrick thinks you hate him.”

“What? I never said that.” Art shrugs, still shoving his cock inside you.

“That’s what he told me.” He groans. Grips the flesh of your hips. Thrusts become deeper and his forehead bumps into yours. “Fuck. You’re, like, tighter each time we do this.”

“I think that’s just a myth.”

He reaches the hilt of your pussy. Moans loudly when he finishes. Stays inside for a minute.

He pulls out and his blonde curls flop onto the pillow next to yours. Messy, sweaty, spreading out in every direction. His breath is heavy. “Anyway, I think you should talk to him.”

“What would I say?”

“Actually, maybe don’t say anything.”

You make a confused face at the ceiling, contemplating. Art sees this. Kisses your cheek.

“Want me to go down on you?”

[kafka-ish]

Reposting just bc I’m continuing the series😀