A Pathalogical People Pleaser

23, Taylor Swift, Off Campus Series, and The Sturniolo Trplets. Reqs Open

[magslikesdaisies]

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About Me

Hi I'm Mags. I'm 23. I was born on Jan 17 so I'm a Capricorn. I am a HUGE swiftie, Off Campus fan, and sturniolo fan. I am a slow ass writer so please have patience. Also please don't be afraid to interact I love talking to all of ya'll! but If you dont like me please dont interact its that simple. Love ya xoxo Mags

Master List

Sturniolo Triplets

Matt Sturniolo

Chris Sturniolo

Off Campus

Dean Heyward-Di Laurentis

Garrett Graham

John Logan

Beau Maxwell

[magslikesdaisies]

Supercut - ❤️ Garrett Graham ❤️

Credit© - @editfandom

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Word Count - 4287

Warnings - Yearning

The heavy winter freeze settled over Briar University like a permanent emotional insulation, turning the sprawling campus grounds into a jagged, bleak expanse of white and gray. The vibrant, gold-leaf warmth of autumn had been completely scrubbed away by a relentless, biting frost, leaving the architecture of your senior year looking sharp, stark, and undeniably clinical. It was a landscape that matched the interior of your chest perfectly, cold, quiet, and finally, mercifully, clear of the suffocating smoke that had trapped you for three long years. Inside the cozy, crowded sanctuary of the campus student lounge, the air was rich with the scent of toasted espresso beans and stale textbook pages. You sat in a deep, plush leather armchair tucked into the back corner of the room, your laptop balanced on your knees as you typed out the final paragraphs of a communications seminar paper. Your long, dark winter coat was draped over the back of the chair, and sitting on the small wooden side table next to you was a hot drink, not a matcha, but a rich, dark hazelnut latte that tasted completely unburdened by past associations. Sitting on the low footstool directly across from you, his long legs bent comfortably as he balanced a massive, leather-bound volume of constitutional law on his knees, was Marcus, the law student who had stood his ground against the towering, unhinged hockey captain in the middle of a crowded Italian restaurant.

Marcus didn't possess the loud, space-consuming bravado that defined the athletic department. He didn't wear a heavy, screen-printed team jacket that loudly announced his presence before he even opened his mouth, nor did he look at a room as a territory that needed to be conquered and held by sheer physical mass. He was dressed in a simple, well-fitted charcoal wool sweater, his dark eyes focused intently on the dense legal prose beneath his fingers, occasionally lifting a yellow highlighter to mark a passage with a calm, methodical precision. When he reached the end of a page, Marcus paused, his gaze naturally drifting upward to meet yours. A slow, genuine smile touched his lips, a look that carried absolutely zero performance, zero underlying subtext, and zero expectation. It was just an uncomplicated acknowledgment of your presence, a quiet, grounding anchor that didn't require you to hold your breath or steel your nerves for an impending emotional storm.

"How many pages left?" he asked, his voice a low, soothing murmur that easily slid beneath the ambient clatter of typing students and clinking ceramic mugs.

"Just half a page," you replied, your voice matching his quiet tone. "The conclusion is practically writing itself."

"Good," Marcus said, his eyes crinkling slightly at the corners as he closed his textbook with a soft, authoritative thud. "Because the snow is starting to come down harder outside, and I fully intend to walk you to the local bookstore downtown before the roads freeze over. You promised me you'd show me that obscure poetry section you found last month."

"I did," you laughed gently, a sound that felt entirely light, lacking the desperate, forced edge that had characterized your laughter for the better part of the semester. "And I don't break promises."

"I know you don't," Marcus said softly, his hand reaching across the small gap between your seats. His palm was warm, dry, and steady as he lightly covered your wrist, his thumb executing a slow, rhythmic brush against your skin. It wasn't a tactical, territorial grip designed to assert ownership over a room, and it wasn't a sudden, erratic gesture born out of a frantic need to ground himself in the middle of a panic attack. It was just a quiet, deliberate touch meant to remind you that he was entirely present, entirely focused on you, and entirely comfortable in the space you were building together.

You let your wrist turn slightly, allowing your fingers to loosely entwine with his, accepting the warmth without a single phantom image flashing across your mind. The emotional architecture you had painstakingly built brick by brick over the last month was holding its ground. You weren't measuring Marcus's calm confidence against Garrett's volatile, high-effort protection anymore. You weren't searching his words for hidden meanings, and you weren't treating your dates as a performance for an invisible audience. You were just here. You were the main event, and for the first time in your life, that felt like an absolute, undeniable sanctuary.

Two miles away, inside the deafening, fluorescent-lit caverns of the Briar Varsity Rink, the atmosphere was entirely devoid of sanctuary. The sharp, metallic scrape of hockey skates cutting into fresh ice echoed off the high corrugated steel ceilings like a series of small, rhythmic gunshots. Coach Maurice’s whistle blew, a shrill, piercing sound that violently interrupted the flow of the five-on-five scrimmage.

"Graham! What the hell are you looking at?" the coach’s voice boomed across the ice, dripping with absolute frustration. "The puck is in the neutral zone, and you’re skating toward the boards like a blind dog! Get your head out of your ass or I'm putting Logan on the first-line center for Friday!"

Garrett Graham stood frozen on the blue line, his heavy breathing catching in the cold rink air like small, frantic clouds of steam. His massive, pads-heavy frame slouched slightly, his gloved hands resting heavily on the top of his hockey stick as he stared blankly at the empty stadium seats three rows up from the glass. The seats were completely vacant. The dark blue plastic chairs stared back at him with an icy, mocking indifference. For three years, that exact spot had been a fixed point of gravity, a place where a specific smile, a small wave, or a reassuring nod could instantly reset his internal compass after a brutal shift. But now, there was nothing but old dust and cold shadow.

"Sorry, Coach," Garrett muttered, his voice rough and hollow inside the cage of his helmet. "My bad. I'm on it."

He turned back toward the face-off circle, his legs feeling like lead weights beneath his gear. He was physically on the ice, his muscles executing the drills through sheer, mechanical muscle memory, but his mind was trapped in a terrifying, non-stop loop, a relentless internal cinema that he could neither pause nor shut down. Ever since the night Hannah had walked out of his room, leaving him in a silent house that felt more like a tomb than a home, Garrett’s brain had betrayingly constructed an endless, vivid montage of his life with you. But it wasn't a realistic archive. It was a flawless, hyper-edited reel of every perfect moment he had ever shared with you, a supercut of pure magic that played behind his eyelids every single time he closed them.

In his head, when he closed his eyes in the locker room or stared at the dark ceiling of his bedroom at 3:00 AM, he did everything right. The memories didn't play back with the ugly, complicated friction of reality or the bitter fallout of his choices. Instead, they played back like a cinematic masterpiece, washed in a wild, fluorescent magic that felt entirely larger than life, wrapping around him like tight ribbons he couldn't escape. He saw freshman orientation day, but his brain completely edited out his own clumsy, apologetic panic, leaving only the breathless, laughing moment you looked up at him from the floor, your eyes bright and completely trusting. He saw the long, late-night car rides through the winding back roads of Boston during sophomore year, the truck's radio turned up so loud the bass vibrated in their chests, your head tilted back against the headrest as you sang along to an old classic rock anthem. He remembered the exact way the amber glow of the dashboard lights had caught the edge of your jaw, the effortless, violent overnight rush of realization that you were the only person who truly made the noise in his head stop.

He remembered the quiet, rainy afternoons in the library where you would lean across the table, your voice a conspiratorial, quiet afternoon crush of a whisper as you explained a philosophical concept to him, your fingers lightly tapping against his forearm to keep him focused. In those mental visions, the love was so massive, so blindingly radiant, that he couldn't understand how he had spent years pretending it was anything else. In his head, when you called him out in that rain-slicked alleyway, he didn't stammer or make defensive excuses about your standards. He didn't hide behind the cowardly, comfortable shield of being a platonic best friend. In his head, the moment you yelled at him, he caught your wrist, pulled you tightly against his chest, begged for your forgiveness, and threw away the rest of the universe just to keep you. He would have been your quiet afternoon crush, your violent overnight rush, anything you wanted, if he could just make the loop stop.

The music in his soul would whisper into the silence of the dark, begging you to come home to his heart.

But the second he reached out his hand, the second his fingers physically twitched against the composite shaft of his hockey stick, trying to grasp onto the warmth of those phantom visions, the illusion would violently shatter, leaving him reaching for nothing but cold air. There was no magic left. There was just a supercut of a life he had traded away for his own comfort, a high-definition playback of his own cowardice.

"Graham! Locker room! Now!" Coach Maurice’s voice snapped him out of the haze. "You're done for the day. Go clean out your head before you get someone hurt on my ice."

Garrett didn't argue. He didn't toss his gloves or throw a petulant tantrum like he had a month ago. The childish, territorial anger that had governed his behavior since the autumn had completely burned itself out, leaving behind a cold, heavy ash of absolute clarity. He skated off the ice, his head down, the heavy wooden door of the bench clicking shut behind him with a sound that felt terrifyingly permanent.

The locker room was dead silent, the rest of the team still out on the ice finishing the conditioning drills. Garrett sat on the low wooden bench in front of his stall, his heavy shoulder pads slung onto the floor, his head buried in his hands as the hot shower water from the adjacent room filled the space with a thick, humid steam. The door to the locker room opened quietly, the heavy click of athletic sneakers hitting the tile floor signaling the arrival of someone who hadn't been on the ice. Tucker walked into the room, a clipboard in his hand and a heavy, dark winter jacket zipped up to his chin. He looked at the captain’s slouched, defeated posture, his expression shifting from professional focus into a quiet, heavily weighed evaluation. He didn't say anything at first. He just walked over to his own locker, set the clipboard down, and leaned against the wooden frame, watching his best friend unravel in real-time.

"Coach is putting Logan on the first line for the Dartmouth rematch," Tucker said softly, his voice carrying zero malice, just the flat, unvarnished truth.

"I know," Garrett whispered, not lifting his face from his hands. "I heard him."

"He's right to do it, Garrett," Tucker continued, crossing his broad arms over his chest. "You're a liability out there right now. Your body is on the ice, but your mind is running laps around a dorm room across campus. The boys can feel it. The whole team is playing with their teeth clenched because the captain is acting like a ghost."

Garrett finally lifted his head, his wide blue eyes bloodshot, dark purple shadows bruising the skin beneath them. He looked up at Tucker, his jaw clenching, but the old, aggressive captain’s defense mechanism didn't flare up. He just looked tired. Profoundly, terminally tired.

"I can't shut it off, Tuck," Garrett said, his voice cracking slightly as he rubbed a hand over his face, pushing his damp curls back. "In my head, I keep playing this non-stop reel of us. Every single time I messed up. Every time she looked at me like she wanted me to see her, and I just... I just chose to look away because it was easier. Because having her in my pocket while I lived a comfortable life was the most selfish, cowardly thing I've ever done. I build these perfect scenarios in my mind where I say the right words, where I don't fight her boundaries, where she forgives me the second she calls. But then I wake up, and there's nothing there. It's just a playback of everything I lost."

Tucker let out a long, slow sigh, the harsh, judgmental edge in his posture softening into something that looked like genuine, older-brother pity. He walked over and sat down on the bench two stalls away from Garrett, his heavy frame settling into the wood.

"You're finally stopping the lies, then?" Tucker asked quietly.

"Hannah broke up with me," Garrett said, a sudden, self-deprecating laugh ripping from his throat, a sound that bled with absolute misery. "She stood right in my room and told me that my soul had left the house weeks ago. She told me she wasn't going to be anyone's consolation prize because I didn't have the courage to admit what I had done. And she was right, Tuck. She was completely right. I used her. I used Hannah as a shield to convince myself I was a good guy, that I was normal, while I kept using my best friend to fill every single emotional gap in my life. I wanted the exclusive privilege of her undivided attention, her softest smiles, her absolute loyalty under the table, but I wanted to go home to someone else's bed. It’s disgusting. I look at what I did, and I make myself sick."

He looked down at his trembling, tape-wrapped fingers, his voice dropping into a rough, fragile whisper.

"I stood in that alleyway in the rain, and I told her we were partners. I told her I needed her. But I didn't mean it like a friend. I meant it because the thought of her looking at another man the way she used to look at me makes me feel like my lungs are collapsing. I am completely, helplessly in love with her, Tucker. I've been in love with her since the day I knocked the wind out of her freshman year, and I was just too much of a coward to face the stakes of it. I thought I could keep her static. I thought I could leave her on the sidelines like a permanent safety net while I played the game of my life with someone else."

"Yeah," Tucker said softly, his eyes fixed on the concrete floor. "We all knew, Garrett. Logan knew, Dean knew, I knew. Even the guys on the track team knew. The only person who didn't know was you, because you were too busy enjoying the luxury of her suffering."

The words hit Garrett like a physical body check to the solar plexus, knocking the remaining air straight out of his lungs. The luxury of her suffering. It was a brutal, surgical diagnosis of his entire college existence. He had spent three years letting you carry the agonizing weight of unrequited love in the dark, letting you sit in the front row of his life while he played the hero, completely blind to the fact that his comfort was entirely funded by your heartbreak. He had taken your presence for granted, assuming that because he was Garrett Graham, the rules of time and growth didn't apply to the girl who held his soul.

"I went to her dorm a month ago," Garrett whispered, the confession tasting like ash on his tongue. "The night Hannah left. I sat in my truck in the pouring rain, and I added that old classic rock ballad to our shared playlist. I thought... I thought if she saw it, she'd come down. In my head, I imagined this dramatic, perfect scene where she throws open the front doors, runs out into the freezing rain, and climbs into my passenger seat just to tell me she forgives me. I expected her to clean up my mess because she always did. I wanted her to heal my guilt so I could feel like a good guy again."

He closed his eyes, a single, hot tear finally cutting through the grime on his cheek.

"She stood at the window. She parted the blinds, looked right at me... and then she let them go. She shut the blinds, turned off the music, and left me out there in the dark. And that was the exact second I realized it, Tuck. She didn't leave me because she was playing a game or trying to evoke a reaction. She left me because she finally realized that I wasn't a sanctuary. I was a prison sentence. And she deserved to walk away into her own life. My healthy boundaries felt like a calculated cruelty to my ego, but she was just trying to survive the choices I made."

Tucker remained quiet for a long, heavy minute, letting the absolute weight of Garrett’s realization settle into the space between them. There was no lecture left to give. The captain had finally stripped away his own armor, forced to stand naked in the wreckage of his own design, looking at the monster he had been to the person he loved most.

"So what are you going to do now, Graham?" Tucker asked, his voice steady but serious. "Are you going to keep crashing her dates? Are you going to keep throwing tantrums on the ice and acting like a toxic psycho because you can't have your safety net back?"

"No," Garrett said quietly, lifting his face to look Tucker dead in the eye, his blue gaze finally clearing of the erratic, territorial heat. "No, I'm done. I'm not going to touch her life anymore. She's seeing Marcus. I saw them at the campus diner last week. He holds the door for her, he listens to her talk about her books, and when he looks at her... he looks at her like she's the only thing in the room. He's treating her like the main event, Tuck. The exact way I should have been treating her for the last three years. If I try to pull her back now, I’m just being the same selfish piece of shit I’ve always been."

He stood up, his skate blades clicking against the rubber floor mats as he walked over to his stall to begin stripping off his remaining gear. His broad shoulders slouched, but his posture carried a new, grounded resolution, an emotional maturity that had been forged in the absolute rock bottom of his own isolation.

"I love her enough to let her go," Garrett said, his voice rough but entirely steady. "I spent a lifetime keeping her broken so I could feel safe. The least I can do now is sit in the dark, carry my own wreckage, and let her be happy with someone who actually deserves her."

The final weekend of the winter semester arrived with a sudden, dramatic drop in wind, leaving the Briar campus buried under a thick, pristine blanket of white snow that muffled the entire city. It was a Friday night, and the downtown area was alive with the warm, vibrant energy of students celebrating the completion of their midterm exams. Inside the local, independent bookstore coffee shop, the atmosphere was incredibly peaceful. The walls were lined from floor to ceiling with old, leather-bound classics, the air rich with the scent of aged paper, cinnamon spice, and hot milk.

You sat at a small wooden table near the back window, a stack of vintage poetry books resting between you and Marcus. You were laughing quietly at a ridiculous annotation someone had written in the margin of an old Victorian anthology, your fingers lightly touching his sleeve as he leaned in to read the faded ink over your shoulder.

"See?" you whispered, your eyes crinkling with genuine amusement. "I told you people in the nineteenth century were just as dramatic as communications majors."

"Clearly," Marcus laughed, his deep voice sending a pleasant, familiar warmth through your chest. "Though I think this specific poet might have been giving your seminar professors a run for their money."

He reached out, his hand sliding over yours across the table, his fingers lightly gripping your hand. The touch felt completely natural, completely safe, and completely devoid of any lingering ghosts. The shadow of Garrett Graham had finally, truly evaporated from your digital and physical space. You hadn't checked the shared playlist in weeks; you hadn't looked three rows up from the glass during the few hockey games you still attended to support Logan and Tucker; and you hadn't let the phantom image of a dark-haired hockey captain dictate how you let yourself be loved. You were moving forward into your own future, your own narrative, entirely whole.

Suddenly, the bell above the bookstore’s heavy front door chimed, a sweet, melodic sound that briefly caught your attention. You naturally glanced up toward the entryway, your hand still safely resting in Marcus’s warm grip.

Garrett Graham stepped into the bookstore.

He was alone. He wasn't wearing his varsity hockey jacket; instead, he wore a simple, dark navy winter coat zipped up to his chin, his hands buried deep in his pockets, his dark curls damp from the light snow falling outside. He looked entirely different than he had a month ago. The volatile, petulant arrogance that always seemed to radiate off his broad frame had completely vanished, replaced by a quiet, grounded calm that made him look older, more mature, and profoundly settled into his own skin. His wide blue eyes scanned the warm, lit space of the bookstore, and within a split second, they landed directly on your booth in the back corner.

You felt a small, instinctive hitch in your chest, an old, phantom reflex from a past life. Your fingers tightened slightly around Marcus’s hand. But Garrett didn't freeze. He didn't drop his jaw, and he didn't let that dark, territorial jealousy flare behind his eyes. He didn't march through the room to crash your table, and he didn't use a pathetic shield of a campus charity event to demand your attention.

Instead, Garrett just stood there by the entryway, looking at you across the crowded, warm room through the ambient glow of the bookstore lamps. He saw the way you were sitting, completely relaxed, leaning toward Marcus with a genuine, unforced smile that he hadn't seen directed at him in months. He saw the way Marcus’s hand was covering yours, an uncomplicated, respectful anchor that didn't require you to hold your breath or hide your tears. He saw that you were completely happy. He saw that you were the main event in a life that belonged entirely to you.

And then, Garrett did something he had never done in his entire three years of knowing you. He didn't try to take up space. He didn't try to win. He didn't let his immense, fractured ego dictate the atmosphere of the room.

Garrett just caught your eye, gave you a slow, incredibly soft, and genuinely sad smile, a look that carried an absolute volume of unspoken apology, profound regret, and ultimate, final release. It was a look that said I'm sorry, it was a look that said I see you now, and most importantly, it was a look that said I'm letting you go. He gave Marcus a brief, respectful nod, an acknowledgment of the man who had cleaned up the mess he had made, before he turned on his heel.

The little bell overhead chimed sweetly one last time as Garrett pushed the heavy wooden door open and stepped back out into the dark, freezing winter night. He didn't look back through the glass window. He didn't stand under a streetlamp waiting for a safety net to appear. He just slung his hands deep into his coat pockets and walked away into the falling snow, entirely alone, finally carrying the weight of his own choices so that you could be free to live your own future.

Inside the warmth of the bookstore, you watched his silhouette disappear into the white flurry of the quad. The final brick of the emotional architecture settled into place with an absolute, undeniable finality. The old version of you, the girl who would have thrown open the door and run into the rain to heal his guilt, was gone.

"Everything okay?" Marcus asked softly, his dark eyes full of quiet concern as he noticed your lingering gaze on the window.

You turned your face back toward him, your eyes clearing completely as you looked at the man sitting across from you, your fingers tightening around his with a definitive, unburdened strength.

"Yeah," you said, your voice entirely steady, a wide, genuine smile breaking across your face as you picked up your coffee mug. "Everything is perfectly fine. Tell me more about that Victorian poet."

The music in your head had finally stopped playing the loop of what could have been. The supercut was over, the screen had gone black, and as you sat in the warmth of the bookstore letting yourself be loved completely, you finally stepped into the brilliant, unscripted reality of a love story that belonged entirely to you.

Notes - Hiii their backkkkkk. ahhh im so exited for yall to see what i have in store for you!!

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays @starsdancegirl @delusionalbubbletea @missbmc94 @avengersheart

[magslikesdaisies]

Good Graces - 🩵 Dean Di Laurentis 🩵

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 2661

Warnings - nada

The light in the VIP lounge of the Black Bear Tavern was the color of a bruised plum. It was the exclusive, off-campus sanctuary where the Briar University athletic elite went to vanish from the regular student body, a place of leather booths, low ceilings, and heavy security at the door.

You sat in the corner booth, your legs crossed elegantly, your chin resting in the palm of your hand as you watched the room. You were entirely aware of the fact that you looked incredible. The dark cherry silk top you wore clung to your curves with a deliberate, lethal precision, and your hair was styled in smooth, expensive waves that caught the amber glare of the overhead pendants. You had never been a girl who hid in the shadows. You knew your value, you knew exactly how the room shifted when you walked into it, and you carried that confidence like an armor.

When you loved someone, you were all in. For the last six months, you had been Dean Di Laurentis’s absolute favorite thing. You had been sweet, indulgent, and effortlessly matching his high-octane energy. You had left little notes in his hockey gear, laughed at his terrible jokes in the middle of the night, and let him hold you like you were the only piece of solid ground in his chaotic, hyper-visible world as Briar’s star winger.

But there was a distinct line between being deeply in love and being naïve, and you had never once blurred the two.

Across the lounge, Dean was leaning against the polished mahogany bar. He looked devastatingly handsome, his massive frame filling out a tailored black jacket, his golden-blonde hair slightly mussed as he laughed with a group of boosters. He had a glass of scotch held loosely in his long, calloused fingers, his blue eyes flashing with that lazy, magnetic charm that usually kept everyone in his radius completely paralyzed.

Then, the dynamic in his circle changed.

A girl stepped into his space. She was a sophomore, a pretty, wide-eyed blonde from one of the prominent sororities on campus, someone who clearly knew exactly who Dean was and what his attention was worth. You didn't blink. You didn't shift your posture. You simply watched as Dean tilted his head down to hear her over the roar of the music, his lazy smirk widening.

It wasn't just a casual bar conversation, and it wasn't a standard, polite interaction with a fan. As the girl laughed, leaning her weight into him, Dean didn't look across the room to check for you. Instead, he openly slid his large hand around her waist, his fingers resting firmly on the bare skin of her lower back exposed by her cropped top. He pulled her a fraction closer, sliding his thumb along her hip in plain view of the entire lounge while she whispered something directly against his jawline. It was a blatant, unbothered demonstration of availability, a calculated piece of disrespect executed because he took your presence in that corner booth entirely for granted.

You didn't execute a dramatic gasp. You didn't storm across the floor to start a commotion that would make the Monday morning sports blogs.

You simply looked at him, evaluated the data, and decided that he was no longer serious enough to occupy your time.

You reached down, picked up your designer clutch from the leather cushion, and stood up. You didn't look back toward the bar as you slipped past the security guard at the door, your heels clicking a clean, rhythmic beat against the hardwood floor as you walked out into the crisp, cold Massachusetts night.

The text message arrived on your phone exactly forty-two minutes later, just as you were unhooking your gold earrings in front of your apartment mirror.

Dean: Where’d you go? Looked back and the booth was empty.

You looked at the screen, your expression entirely flat. There was no racing heartbeat, no frantic urge to demand an explanation, no tearful paragraph detailing how much his behavior had stung. You had a very simple rule for your life: if you have to explain baseline respect to a grown man, you have already lost the game.

You tossed the phone onto your velvet duvet, finished your skincare routine with total, unhurried precision, and went to bed.

The real whiplash hit Dean at exactly noon the next day.

The Briar hockey team had just finished a brutal two-hour film session, the locker room a chaotic, high-volume sea of heavy nylon gear, ice bags, and the loud, overlapping shouts of thirty exhausted athletes. Dean was sitting on the wooden bench, his massive shoulders hunched as he unlaced his skates, his mind entirely occupied by the strange, icy silence that had filled his morning.

Usually, he woke up to a text from you. Something light, something sweet, a little inside joke that made the grueling physical toll of his training schedule feel manageable. Today, his lock screen had been completely blank.

"Hey, Di Laurentis," a deep voice cut through his thoughts.

Dean looked up to see Tucker standing by the row of metal lockers. The team's star defenseman was looking at his phone, a slow, incredibly amused grin spreading across his face as he leaned back against the frame.

"What?" Dean muttered, his voice a gravelly, irritated rumble.

"Nothing," Tucker chuckled, turning the screen around so Dean could see it. "Just noticed that your girl just unfollowed you on everything. And she cleared her grid. That vacation photo of you guys in Cabo? Gone. Vaporized. Man, what did you do?"

The air in Dean’s lungs turned to pure lead.

He didn't say a word. He snatched his own phone out of his gym bag, his long, calloused fingers flying across the glass screen with a sudden, frantic speed. He opened the social apps, his brain refusing to process the data his eyes were receiving.

Tucker wasn't lying. Your profile was completely intact, your gorgeous, high-fashion photos still sitting there, looking radiant and entirely unbothered, but your following count had dropped by exactly one. Him. The photos of him cooking breakfast in his sweatpants, the picture of him holding you on the ice after the winter classic, the soft, intimate memories you had curated over half a year had been entirely scrubbed from existence.

It was a total, absolute execution.

Dean felt a hot, violent surge of panic hit his stomach, a physical sensation that felt remarkably like getting checked into the boards at thirty miles an hour. He didn't even shower. He threw a grey hoodie over his bare, damp torso, shoved his feet into his sneakers, and stormed out of the athletic facility, leaving his gear scattered across the locker room floor while Tucker watched him go with a raised eyebrow.

He didn't knock on your apartment door; he practically threw his entire mass against the wood.

When you opened it, you were wearing a crisp, white oversized button-down shirt and a pair of tailored denim shorts. You looked fresh, expensive, and entirely serene. You had a smoothie in your hand, and your eyes met his frantic, wide-eyed gaze with the casual politeness you would reserve for a delivery driver who had brought the wrong order.

"Dean," you said smoothly, leaning your shoulder against the doorframe, effectively blocking his entry. "Can I help you with something?"

Dean stared at you, his chest rising and falling violently beneath his hoodie, his golden-blonde hair completely wild from the wind outside. The sheer contrast between his internal chaos and your absolute peace was maddening.

"What the hell is this?" Dean rasped, his voice rough and breathless as he held up his phone, the screen showing your blank grid where their memories used to live. "You blocked my number? You unfollowed me? You deleted everything? Are you serious right now?"

"Completely serious," you said, taking a calm sip of your drink. "We're done, Dean. I thought the digital cleanup made that clear enough."

"Done?" Dean let out a sharp, incredulous laugh, his jaw clenching so hard the muscle ticked violently near his ear. He took a step forward, trying to use his massive frame to intimidate you into stepping back, but you didn't even flinch. "Because of last night? It was a crowded bar, sweetheart. Everyone handles everyone at the Black Bear. You're completely overreacting."

"I don't care about the layout of the bar, Dean," you said, your tone dropping into a cool, conversational frequency that made his blood run cold. "And I'm not mad. I'm just finished. I watched exactly where your hands went, and I watched how comfortable you were testing my boundaries to see if I was naïve enough to sit in the corner and look the other way while you collected an audience."

"I wasn't trying to do anything!" Dean roared softly, his hands flying to his hair in total frustration. "I love you! I'm completely crazy about you! You know how it is, people get in my space, I was drunk, it didn't mean anything—"

"Dean, stop," you interrupted, your voice quiet but carrying a sharp, absolute authority that cut his sentence right in half. "You're confusing my kindness with blindness. I was sweet to you because I wanted to be, not because I didn't have other options. I know exactly how many guys on this campus would love to sit in that booth with me. I don't waste my seconds on people who aren't serious about keeping me."

Dean’s hands dropped to his sides. The sheer, unadulterated confidence that usually defined his entire personality was completely gone, replaced by a raw, naked panic. He looked down at you, his blue eyes searching yours for any sign of the girl who used to draw hearts on his hockey notebooks and whisper vows against his skin in the dark.

There was nothing there. Your eyes were like two pieces of polished flint.

"You can't just switch it up like this," Dean whispered, his voice cracking, a sudden, terrifying vulnerability breaking through his athletic exterior. "Six months. We talked about the future. We talked about where we were going after the draft. You can't just turn it off in twelve hours."

"I can," you said, offering him a small, chillingly beautiful smile. "Nobody is better at turning love into absolute indifference than I am when I'm disrespected. You made your choice at the bar, Dean. So this cute face is saying bye-bye. It's really not that complicated."

"Please," Dean choked out, his large hand reaching out instinctively to catch your wrist, desperate to establish any kind of physical connection that might reboot your system.

You stepped back, completely out of his reach, and began to slowly close the heavy oak door.

"Have a good season, Dean," you murmured.

The click of the lock turning was the loudest sound Dean had ever heard in his life.

The next three weeks at Briar University were a living nightmare for the athletic department.

Dean Di Laurentis was completely unhinged. On the ice, his play had turned from smooth and calculated to completely vicious. He was racking up penalty minutes at a rate that had his head coach losing his mind, throwing his massive body into defensive lines with a reckless, self-destructive fury that looked less like hockey and more like an assault. He wasn't sleeping. The dark circles under his blue eyes made him look haunted, his golden-blonde hair permanently messy, his physical appearance degrading into that of a man who was entirely consumed by a ghost.

He spent every single evening sitting in his truck outside your apartment building, his eyes fixed on your window, watching the warm light behind the curtains, waiting for any sign that the ice in your chest might be thawing.

But you didn't send a single text. You didn't unblock his number. You didn't show up at the arena to watch his games. You had completely, cleanly excised him from your universe, moving on with a swift, brutal elegance that left him gasping for air.

The ultimate, catastrophic blow landed on a rainy Thursday night during the university's annual spring athletic gala.

The grand ballroom of the campus hotel was packed with hundreds of boosters, coaches, and student-athletes in formal wear. Dean stood near the ice sculpture, wearing a sharp grey tuxedo that hung loosely on his slightly diminished frame, a glass of bourbon held tightly in his hand. He wasn't looking at the scouts. He wasn't talking to the boosters. His eyes were glued to the main entrance of the ballroom, a desperate, pathetic hope keeping his posture stiff.

At exactly nine o'clock, the heavy double doors opened.

The entire room seemed to experience a collective, sudden drop in air pressure. You walked through the threshold, and you had never looked more magnificent in your entire life. You were wearing a floor-length, backless gown of liquid emerald satin that clung to your hips like a second skin, the fabric catching the gold light of the chandeliers with every step you took. Your shoulders were bare, your skin glowing, and your face was a mask of total, radiant confidence.

Dean’s heart executed a violent, painful leap against his ribs. He took a step forward, his glass almost slipping from his fingers, his mouth opening to call your name across the crowded floor.

Then, a man stepped into the frame behind you, his hand extending smoothly to rest against the small of your bare back.

It was Jaxon Reed. The starting wide receiver for the football team, a towering, dark-haired senior who was widely considered the most electric athlete on campus, a first-round NFL prospect who spent his weekends breaking records and lighting up national television.

Dean froze in his tracks. His entire sensory system experienced a hard, total crash.

Jaxon leaned down, his deep voice saying something directly into your ear, and you let out a loud, genuine laugh, your eyes crinkling with a warmth that Dean hadn't seen in nearly a month. You looked up at Jaxon with the exact same sweet, angelic focus you used to give Dean in the quiet of his apartment. You didn't look at the crowd. You didn't look toward the ice sculpture where Dean was standing, paralyzed, his face turning an ashen, deathly white.

You had moved on. And you had done it with his exact favorite athlete, a man who shot his shot every single night on the gridiron and was currently doing the exact same thing with the only woman Dean had ever truly feared losing.

"Holy shit," Logan muttered, popping up beside Dean with a plate of appetizers, his eyes wide as he tracked your progress across the ballroom floor. "Di Laurentis... tell me you're seeing this. Reed is literally walking away with your girl. What did you do to her?"

Dean didn't answer. He couldn't. The sheer, suffocating whiplash of your swift departure was a physical weight on his chest, a realization that his careless hands at the bar had cost him the most amazing thing he had ever possessed. You hadn't thrown a tantrum. You hadn't made a commotion. You had simply switched it up, exactly like you said you would, leaving him behind in the dirt while you walked into the light with someone who actually knew how to stay in your good graces.

You passed within three feet of his table on your way to the dance floor. Your emerald dress brushed against the fabric of his tuxedo pants, a fleeting, electric ghost of a touch that had Dean’s knees going completely loose.

He looked down at you, his blue eyes begging, pleading, desperate for a single glance, a single confirmation that he still existed in your memory.

You looked straight ahead, your hand resting comfortably on Jaxon Reed’s broad shoulder, your smile bright and entirely unaffected as you walked right through him as if he were made of nothing but air.

Notes - hihi I wrote this after picturing dean when i heard it soo here yall go! I hope you enjoy!

Taglist - @dilaurentispuckbunny @goawaysha @mhayes777 @purplerainx1 @05gwyn @hagarsays @starsdancegirl

[magslikesdaisies]

We Can't Be Friends - 💚 John Logan 💚

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 2584

Warning - nothin

The rain in Hastings was a steady, gray curtain that reduced the brick buildings of the campus to bleeding watercolors. Inside the coffee shop three blocks from the athletic complex, the air smelled of burnt espresso grounds and damp wool. It was a neutral territory, deliberately chosen because it lacked the high-octane chaos of the Black Bear Tavern or the suffocating familiarity of the hockey house on Malone Road.

John Logan sat across from you in a low-backed leather armchair, his long legs stretched out into the narrow aisle, a cardboard cup held loosely between his broad palms. He looked exactly like himself. That was the first, most unfair realization of the afternoon: a clean break hadn't diminished his presence. He still wore that faded black Briar hockey hoodie with the sleeves pushed up to his forearms, revealing the heavy tendons and the small, familiar scar near his wrist from an old skate blade. His dark hair was slightly damp from the walk over, curling at the nape of his neck, and his gray eyes were fixed on you with an intensity that made the small space feel entirely devoid of oxygen.

"You look good," Logan said softly. His voice was a low, gravelly rasp, the exact register he used when he was trying to smooth over an argument or settle a frantic play on the ice. "The dark green suits you."

"Thank you," you replied, keeping your tone carefully leveled, your hands folded neatly over your purse in your lap.

You had spent two hours getting ready for this meeting, not out of a desire to win him back, but out of a fierce, protective need to control your own narrative. You had done your makeup with clinical precision, chosen an outfit that made you feel structured and untouchable, and practiced your breathing exercises until your heart rate remained steady under pressure. You didn't want him to see a single crack in the exterior. You didn't want to give him the satisfaction of knowing that the silence of the last fourteen days had felt like a slow, deliberate bloodletting.

"I didn't think you'd actually come," Logan admitted, his thumb tracing the rim of his coffee cup. "After everything that went down at the end of the semester... I thought you’d just let me rot in your blocked contacts."

"I wanted to hear what you had to say, Logan. We built something substantial over nine months. I felt like I owed the memory of that a conversation, at least."

Logan leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, closing the physical distance between you just enough that you could smell the familiar, sharp scent of his mint gum and the clean, woodsy cologne he always wore. It was a sensory trigger that threatened to dismantle the entire foundation of your restraint, but you forced your chin to stay high.

"I don't want us to be strangers," he said, his gray eyes searching yours with a raw, earnest vulnerability that looked completely out of place on his usually arrogant face. "That's the main thing. When we called it quits... it felt like you just pulled a shutter down. Like I was completely erased from your life. And I get it, things got heavy. We argued about the future, we argued about my schedule, we let the pressure of the draft and the scouts turn us into people we aren't. But you’re still the person who knows me better than anyone else at this school."

He took a slow breath, his jaw clenching slightly before he delivered the hook. "I want us to be friends. I want to be able to text you when I have a good game, or when my dad is being impossible, or when I just need to hear a voice that isn't wrapped up in hockey. I don't want to lose you completely. We can just be normal. We don't have to make it a tragedy. We can go to the same parties, hang out at the house with Garrett and Hannah, and just be cool."

The word hung in the air between you, heavy and distorted: Friends.

Your heart squeezed, a sudden, treacherous wave of relief washing over you. You loved him. Even with the wreckage of your final three weeks still smoking in the background, your system was desperately lonely without him. The thought of completely erasing John Logan from your life felt like chopping off a limb. If being his friend was the only way to keep him in your orbit, the only way to ensure he didn't become a total stranger, then maybe you could swallow your pride and make it work.

"Okay," you said softly, a small, tentative smile crossing your lips. "Okay, Logan. We can try. We can be friends."

The relief that broke across Logan’s face was instantaneous and dazzling. A massive, genuine smile lit up his gray eyes, and he reached across the small table, his large, warm hand covering yours for a brief, electric second. "Yeah? Thank you. Seriously. You have no idea how much that means to me."

For the first week, the arrangement felt like a fragile success.

You traded short, polite text messages about his practice schedule and your classes. You ran into him at the student union, and you managed to exchange casual, smiling small talk without your voice shaking. Logan was attentive, sweet, and entirely respectful of the new boundaries. He texted you when his dad called to yell about a bad shift, and you gave him the exact same grounding, empathetic advice you always had. You convinced yourself that you were strong enough to handle this, that you were being mature.

The shift happened halfway through the second week.

The Briar hockey house on Malone Road was hosting a massive post-game party. The air was thick with the scent of cheap beer, sweat, and loud, bass-heavy music that rattled the windows. You stood in the kitchen, a red solo cup held loosely in your hand, watching the sea of familiar faces.

Until Logan walked into the room.

He was riding the high of a multi-point game, his cheeks flushed, his dark hair damp from the post-game shower. He gave you a bright, familiar grin from across the room, shouting a quick hello over the music. But he didn't walk over to you. Instead, a sophomore from one of the campus dance teams stepped into his path. She leaned into his space, her hand resting casually on his forearm, laughing up at him with a clear, unvarnished intent.

You watched as Logan tilted his head down to hear her, his signature lazy smirk widening. It was the exact same expression he used to give you. He didn't step back. He didn't look across the room to check if you were watching. He wasn't trying to hurt you; he was just living his life, entirely unencumbered by the ghost of what you used to be.

And in that exact split second, the emotional truth hit you like a physical blow to the sternum.

A cold, suffocating realization flooded your chest. You weren't his friend. You were just an audience member. You were standing in a crowded room, editing your behavior, biting your tongue, and carefully policing your own heart just so he could keep your empathy in his back pocket while he casually explored other chapters. You were tiptoeing around his presence, hiding the raw edges of your lingering love behind a mask of casual friendliness, all to feed a monstrous fire that was actively burning you alive from the inside out.

You didn't make a scene. You didn't wait for him to catch you looking. You quietly set your cup down on the counter, slipped through the back door into the crisp, cold night, and walked home in the silence.

The text message arrived on your phone the following afternoon, just as you were finishing a workout at the student gym.

Logan: Hey, missed you at the house last night. Everything good?

You didn't reply. You showered, got dressed, and walked straight to the varsity athletic facility. You knew exactly where he would be—the player's lounge, waiting for the evening film session to start.

When you walked through the door of the lounge, Logan was sitting on one of the leather couches, flipping through a textbook. He looked up, his gray eyes lighting up with instant warmth when he saw you. "Hey! I was wondering where you went—"

"Logan," you interrupted softly, stepping into the center of the room. You kept your hands folded over your bag, your posture steady, your face a mask of absolute, quiet clarity. "We need to talk."

Logan’s smile faltered, his book sliding onto the couch as he stood up, his massive frame instantly casting a shadow over the space between you. "What's wrong? You have that look."

"I'm calling it," you said, your voice quiet, devoid of the theatrical anger of a standard breakup and replaced by something far more permanent. "The friendship experiment. It's over. I changed my mind."

Logan blinked, a sharp, incredulous laugh slipping past his lips. "What are you talking about? It's been two weeks. We've been doing great. We've been texting, we've been cool—"

"You've been doing great, Logan," you corrected him, your tone flat and honest. "I've been lying to myself. I said yes to being friends because I was scared of the silence, but sitting in your kitchen last night, watching you move on, I realized exactly what this setup requires of me. It requires me to hide. It requires me to bite my tongue and pretend I'm okay with a fraction of your attention just so you don't have to feel the heavy guilt of the ending."

"I'm not trying to make you feel like a fraction!" Logan stepped forward, his gray eyes wide with a sudden, frantic defensiveness, his hands flying to his hair. "I genuinely want you in my life. You're my person. I told you that."

"I'm not your person anymore, Logan. And I don't want to spend my senior year playing a character in a story that's already over. I don't want to argue, and I don't want to find a compromise where I have to kill my own feelings just to stay in your orbit." You looked at him, your eyes steady and heavy with the absolute truth of it. "Me and my truth, we're just going to sit in silence now. I'm letting this story die."

"You can't just switch it up like this!" Logan rasped, his voice cracking, a raw, naked panic breaking through his athletic composure. The sheer whiplash of your sudden, quiet boundary was hitting his system like a hard check into the boards. "We agreed to try. You gave me your word."

"And I learned my truth," you murmured, stepping back out of his physical radius. "We can't be friends, Logan. I'd like to just pretend we could, but we can't."

"Please," Logan choked out, reaching his large hand forward instinctively to catch your wrist, desperate to establish any kind of physical connection.

You stepped back, completely out of his reach, leaving him standing there as the heavy door of the lounge clicked shut behind you.

The next three weeks at Briar University were a slow, agonizing slide into reality.

John Logan was unraveling, but it wasn't the loud, explosive anger of a man throwing a tantrum—it was the quiet, suffocating weight of an absence he couldn't fill. On the ice, his play was mechanical, his gray eyes hollow and unfocused. He spent his nights staring at his phone, looking at old text threads, realizing that the door hadn't just been closed—it had been completely removed from the frame.

He saw you around campus, of course. He saw you walking to the library, your head held high, looking beautiful and entirely self-contained. He noticed the way you looked right through him when your paths crossed in the quad. You weren't doing it maliciously; you were simply living in your new reality, protecting your peace with a quiet, devastating discipline.

The finality of the choice settled over him completely on a rainy Thursday night during the university's annual winter athletic gala.

The grand ballroom of the campus hotel was a sea of black tuxedos and glittering gowns under the warm glow of the chandeliers. Logan stood near the edge of the room, a glass of bourbon melting in his hand, his eyes fixed entirely on the main entrance.

When you walked through the double doors, his breath caught. You were wearing a floor-length, backless gown of liquid obsidian silk that fit your curves like a second skin. You looked radiant, but more than that, you looked entirely at peace. There was no lingering anxiety on your face, no shadow of the girl who had spent two weeks tiptoeing around his social life.

Logan crossed the floor before his brain could stop him, his massive frame cutting through the crowd until he was standing right in front of you.

"Hey," he breathed out, his voice rough and completely devoid of his usual easy charm. He looked down at you, his gray eyes searching yours, practically begging for a spark, a hint of familiarity, anything. "You look... beautiful."

"Thank you, Logan," you said softly. Your voice was gentle, polite, and completely detached. It was the tone you would use with a stranger who had held the door open for you.

"I've been going out of my mind," Logan whispered, his jaw clenching as he stepped a fraction closer, his eyes bright with a desperate hope. "I think about what you said in the lounge every single day. I know I messed up. I thought I wanted space, I thought I wanted to just be friends because everything was getting so heavy with the draft, but I was wrong. I don't want to pretend anymore. I want to fix this."

You looked up at him, and for a second, a quiet, melancholic understanding passed through your eyes. You didn't hate him. You didn't want to punish him. But you knew the architecture of your own heart now.

"You can't fix it, Logan," you said, your voice barely louder than the classical music playing across the room. "You're clinging to something that doesn't exist anymore. You're waiting until you like me again, or until the timing is easy, but I'm not a daydream you can just slip back into when you're ready. I spent the last three weeks learning how to exist in the quiet. And I'm okay here."

Logan stared at you, his chest rising and falling heavily, the raw realization of his loss pressing down on him. He saw the absolute clarity in your expression, the complete lack of malice or anger. It was just a clean, quiet boundary.

You looked back at Logan one last time, offering him a small, sad nod of farewell. "Have a good season, Logan."

Logan stood completely still by the edge of the dance floor, watching the liquid obsidian fabric of your dress ripple behind you as you walked away through the crowded room. He watched you disappear into the golden light, the reality of the song finally settling over him in the silence: you had tried his way, you had felt the truth, and now you were gone for good. You could pretend to be strangers, you could pretend to be nothing, but you would never be his friend.

Notes - oof this one lowkey hurt to write for some reason. i hope you enjoy!

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays @starsdancegirl

[magslikesdaisies]

Vicious - 🩵 Dean Di Laurentis 🩵

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 2975

Warnings - lowkey evil dean

The cold air inside the Briar University ice arena always tasted like ozone and exhaust from the resurfacing machine. It was a sharp, clinical smell that usually cleared your head, but tonight, it just felt like the walls were closing in.

Up on the ice, the whistle blew, a shrill, piercing sound that cut through the cavernous room. Dean Di Laurentis was instantly in motion, a blur of dark blue and white jersey, his skates carving into the frozen surface with a violent, terrifying precision. He was smooth. He was always smooth. Watching him play hockey was like watching something dangerous happen in slow motion; he moved with a fluid, effortless grace that made people stop in their tracks just to observe the sheer mechanics of him.

When he reached the boards, he slammed his stick down in frustration, a loud, echoing crack that had the few stragglers in the bleachers flinching. His golden-blonde hair was damp with sweat, clinging to his forehead, and his jaw was set so hard the muscle ticked beneath his tanned skin.

He looked like an angel. That was the problem. Everyone on this campus thought he was a golden boy, a flawless, charismatic athlete who could do no wrong. They saw the dazzling smiles he gave the cameras after a hat trick, the easy charm he threw around at charity events, and the casual, disarming way he carried his massive frame through the athletic department.

But you knew different wording. You had spent the last twelve months carrying the quiet, heavy burden of what happened when the lights went out and the audience vanished.

One year. Ten thousand bad moments, all of them meticulously dressed up in the heated, breathless emotion of his apologies.

Dean dropped his gloves onto the bench, his blue eyes scanning the empty rows of seats until they locked onto you standing near the tunnel exit. The intense, predatory focus in his gaze didn't make your heart flutter anymore. It made your stomach drop into a familiar, cold pocket of anxiety. He closed the distance, stepping off the ice, his guards clicking loudly against the rubber floor mats as he approached you.

"You're late," Dean said. His voice was a deep, gravelly baritone, completely devoid of the smooth charm he used on the rest of the world. It was cold. It was the tone he reserved exclusively for you when he felt the slight shift in your attention.

"My seminar ran over, Dean," you said softly, keeping your voice level, your hands buried deep inside the pockets of your trench coat so he wouldn't see the slight tremor in your fingers. "I told you I’d try to make the end of scrimmage."

Dean let out a short, cynical huff, his large hand reaching up to push his damp blonde hair back from his face. He leaned his broad shoulder against the concrete wall of the tunnel, towering over you, effectively blocking out the rest of the arena. "Right. Your seminar. Because everything else takes priority when I ask you to be here."

The unfairness of the statement was a physical blow, but you didn't argue. You had learned, over three hundred and sixty-five days of trial and error, that defending yourself only caused a commotion. If you spoke up, he would twist the narrative until you were the one being cold, the one being unsupportive, the one who didn't appreciate how hard he worked. So, you stayed quiet. You kept your mouth shut and carried the weight of his irritation, acting as his private shock absorber.

"Let's just go back to the apartment," you murmured, turning toward the exit.

Dean didn't move for a second. Then, the coldness vanished from his face, replaced instantly by a soft, almost desperate vulnerability that looked so real it made your throat ache. He reached out, his long, calloused fingers catching your wrist, pulling you back into his space with a gentle, terrifying authority.

"Hey," he whispered, his tone dropping into that warm, smoky frequency that had kept you trapped in his orbit for an entire year. His blue eyes softened, searching yours with an intensity that felt like a physical weight. "I'm sorry. I'm just stressed about the playoffs. Don't look at me like that. You know I need you here."

There it was. The hook. The rapid, whiplash transition from cruel to desperate that left you completely unanchored. Your intuition was screaming at you to pull your wrist away, to walk out into the parking lot and never look back, but half of you just couldn't resist it. You loved him, even when you hated what he did to your mind.

"I know," you whispered back, hatefully aware of how easily you were letting him slide back into your graces.

Dean smirked, a slow, lazy tilt of his lips that signaled his total victory, and pressed a brief, burning kiss to the side of your neck before heading toward the locker room.

The drive back to his off-campus apartment was silent, the tension in the cab of his truck thick enough to choke on. Dean drove with one hand on the steering wheel, his eyes fixed on the dark road, completely unbothered by the heavy atmosphere he had created.

That was his greatest superpower: he didn't feel the effects of the wreckage he left behind. He could say something that tore your dignity to shreds, and five minutes later, he would ask what you wanted for dinner with total, unforced innocence. Because in his mind, if he didn't intend to hurt you, then the hurt didn't exist. He thought that as long as he wished you the best, his hands were entirely clean.

You stared out the passenger window, watching the brick buildings of Briar pass by in a blur of streetlamps. You had always considered yourself a smart person. You were analytical, logical, and capable of managing complex strategic communications for high-level accounts. But when it came to Dean, you completely neglected your intuition. You were exactly the type of person he liked to keep around: intelligent enough to understand his complexities, but compliant enough to ignore the warning signs.

When you entered the apartment, the door had barely clicked shut before Dean’s phone buzzed on the kitchen island. He glanced down at the screen, and you watched the subtle change in his posture. His shoulders squared, his eyes sharpening as he read the notification.

"Who is it?" you asked, setting your keys down.

"Just some people from the athletic board," Dean said casually, turning the phone face down. "They're throwing a mixer downtown for the draft prospects. I should probably swing by."

A cold spike of reality hit you. "Dean, we had plans tonight. We haven't had a single night to ourselves in three weeks because of your travel schedule."

Dean’s expression hardened instantly, the vulnerability from the arena completely evaporating. "It's a networking event. My agent is going to be there. I can't just skip it because you want to sit on the couch."

"It's not about sitting on the couch," you said, your voice finally rising, the exhaustion of the last year spilling over the edges of your restraint. "It's about the fact that you do this every single time we're supposed to spend time together. The second someone else offers you an audience, the second you think there's a room full of people ready to tell you how amazing you are, you run to them. You just run to whoever is winning."

Dean stepped toward you, his large frame casting a long, intimidating shadow across the hardwood floor. He didn't yell. He never yelled, which made it so much worse. His voice was a lethal, quiet hiss.

"Don't do that," he said, his blue eyes flashing with a sudden, vicious light. "Don't act like I'm the one being selfish here. I'm building a career. If you can't handle the reality of what my life looks like, that's your insecurity, not mine."

"My insecurity?" You let out a broken, cynical laugh, tears finally stinging the corners of your eyes. "Dean, last week at the sports gala, you spent two hours pretending you came alone because an executive from the NHL was sitting at your table. You literally asked me to sit three rows back so you wouldn't look 'tied down' to the scouts. You loved me in the hotel room, and then you pretended you didn't the second we walked through the venue doors."

"It was a business strategy," Dean snapped, his jaw clenching. "And I told you I appreciated you being understanding about it. But clearly, you're incapable of being private. You always have to make it a commotion."

"You wrecked my image in front of half the athletic department, Dean! People think I'm just some girl chasing after a hockey player because you refuse to acknowledge me when the stakes are high!"

Dean looked at you, his face completely blank, entirely devoid of remorse. He reached for his leather jacket on the back of the chair, slipping it over his broad shoulders with a slow, deliberate precision that felt like a final sentence.

"I'm going to the mixer," he said quietly, his hand on the doorknob. "When I get back, I hope you've calmed down. I love you, you know that. I wish the best for us. But I can't deal with this drama tonight."

The door clicked shut behind him.

The silence that followed was heavy, suffocating, and absolute. You stood in the center of his expensive, pristine living room, the tears finally flowing freely down your cheeks. He had done it again. He had cut you down to the bone, told you he loved you, and walked out the door without a single scratch on his conscience. He truly believed that because he said those three words before he left, he hadn't done anything wrong.

Why did he have to be so vicious?

The next three days were a masterclass in psychological warfare.

Dean didn't text. He didn't call. He didn't return to the apartment except in the middle of the day while you were at your corporate office, leaving behind only the subtle scent of his cologne and a few missing shirts as evidence that he still existed.

It was his favorite punishment. He loved to pretend you had died. He would entirely erase your presence from his life the second you challenged him, leaving you to twist in the wind, drowning in your own thoughts until you were desperate enough to apologize for things you hadn't even done just to get him back.

You sat at your desk on Thursday afternoon, staring blankly at a spreadsheet, your phone resting on the polished wood beside your laptop. Your screen lit up with a notification from a campus athletic blog, and your stomach executed a tight, violent twist.

It was a gallery from the draft prospect mixer from two nights ago.

You clicked through the images, your heart hammering against your ribs. There he was. Slide four. Dean was standing by the high-top tables, a glass of scotch in his hand, laughing effortlessly at something a beautiful, dark-haired girl was saying. She was a track athlete, someone whose name you had seen on the university’s sports roster. Dean’s arm wasn't around her, but his body language was entirely open, his broad frame leaning into her space with that same, intense, hunting focus he had used on you when you first met.

The words echoed in your head with a brutal, clear finality. You hadn't been special. You were just the next one in line to take his love songs as a promise. You were just a temporary harbor for his ego until he found a room that offered a louder round of applause.

Something inside you shifted. It wasn't a sudden explosion of anger; it was a cold, quiet realization that the foundation of your life had been entirely eroded by a man who didn't even notice the dust on his boots. You had spent an entire year looking for the best in the absolute worst version of a human being, and it had cost you your dignity, your peace of mind, and your self-respect.

You stood up from your desk, walked out to your car, and drove straight to his apartment.

When you arrived, Dean was actually there. He was sitting on the sofa, his massive legs stretched out on the coffee table, a video game controller held between his long fingers. He didn't look up when you walked through the door, his golden-blonde hair catching the afternoon light, his face a mask of total, unbothered indifference.

"Oh, look who decided to show up," Dean murmured, his eyes remaining fixed on the television screen. "I thought you were still throwing a tantrum."

You didn't answer. You walked straight into his bedroom, pulled your large canvas duffel bag from the closet, and began unceremoniously throwing your clothes into it. Your sweaters, your shoes, your toiletries from the bathroom counter, everything you had gradually moved into his space over the last twelve months was ripped away with a frantic, silent energy.

The sound of the game cutting off was the only warning you got.

A shadow fell over the bedroom doorway. Dean was standing there, his broad shoulders filling the frame, his blue eyes tracking the movement of your hands with a sudden, sharp intensity. The indifference was gone, replaced by a dark, volatile irritation.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" he asked, his voice dropping into that dangerous, gravelly register.

"I'm leaving, Dean," you said, your voice remarkably steady as you zipped up a cosmetic bag and shoved it into the side pocket of the duffel. "I'm completely done."

Dean let out a sharp, mocking laugh, stepping into the bedroom, his massive frame instantly making the room feel microscopic. "Leaving? Because of a photo from a networking event? Are you seriously that pathetic?"

"No," you said, finally stopping, turning around to face him fully. You looked at his handsome, perfect face, the face that had kept you trapped for an entire year, and felt absolutely nothing but a deep, hollow exhaustion. "Not because of the photo. Because of the last twelve months. Because I am tired of quietly carrying your garbage while everyone on this campus thinks you're a literal saint. I'm tired of you loving me in secret and pretending I don't exist the second you think someone more important is watching."

Dean’s jaw clenched, his eyes darkening until they looked almost black in the dim light of the bedroom. He took another step forward, his hand reaching out to grab the strap of your duffel bag, his grip so tight his knuckles went white.

"You're making a mistake," he whispered, his tone shifting into that heavy, desperate frequency again, trying one last time to pull the lever that always worked on you. "You're just emotional right now. We can talk about this. I told you I love you. I wish the best for you. Why are you trying to ruin what we have?"

"Because what we have is a wreck, Dean!" You tore the strap of the bag out of his grip, your voice finally cracking with the sheer weight of your grief. "You don't feel remorse! You don't feel the effects of anything you do! You honestly think that because you wish me the best, you haven't spent the last year crushing my heart into pieces! You're vicious, Dean. You are a completely vicious person."

The word seemed to hit him like a physical blow. Dean’s face contorted into something ugly, his upper lip curling into a sneer that entirely ruined his angelic features. He stepped back, his arms crossing over his broad chest, his posture turning entirely hostile.

"Fine," he spat, his voice cold, sharp, and entirely empty of the warmth he had used just seconds before. "Go. Run away because you can't handle being with someone who actually has a future. See how fast you find someone else who looks at you the way I do."

"I don't want anyone to look at me the way you do ever again," you whispered, the truth of the statement settling deep into your bones. "Because your look doesn't mean love, Dean. It just means you found your next audience."

You picked up the heavy canvas bag, its weight pulling down on your shoulder, and walked past him. He didn't move to stop you this time. He stood in the center of his bedroom, his golden-blonde hair messy, his broad chest rising and falling with a shallow, angry rhythm, watching you leave with a total lack of regret.

The hallway of the apartment building was quiet as you walked toward the elevator. Your hands were shaking so violently you could barely press the button, and the tears were finally falling, hot and heavy, down your face.

It was over. One year, ten thousand bad moments, finally brought to a sudden, absolute halt.

As the elevator doors opened, your phone buzzed in your pocket. You pulled it out, your eyes blurring as you looked at the screen. It was a text from Dean.

I still love you. I hope you find what you're looking for. I wish you the best.

You looked at the words, the ultimate proof of his total emotional bankruptcy. He truly believed that this message made him the good guy. He believed that wishing you well wiped away every single bruise he had left on your sanity over the last three hundred and sixty-five days. He didn't feel the effects. He never would.

You didn't reply. You deleted the thread, blocked the number, and stepped into the elevator, letting the metal doors slide shut on Dean Di Laurentis for the last time.

Notes - Ahhh soo about the sweet stuff.... I hope you enjoy!!

Taglist - @dilaurentispuckbunny @goawaysha @mhayes777 @purplerainx1 @05gwyn @hagarsays @starsdancegirl

[magslikesdaisies]

Drop Dead - ❤️ Garrett Graham ❤️

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 2177

Warnings - Internet Stalking lmao

The neon sign in the window of the diner read Open Late, but the vintage clock on the wood-paneled wall was ticking steadily toward eleven o'clock. The Friday night crowd had thinned out completely, leaving just the faint, ambient hum of the jukebox in the corner playing a soft, melodic eighties track.

You sat in the vinyl booth, your fingers nervously tracing the condensation down the side of your glass. Across from you sat Garrett Graham. He was leaning back against the bench, his long legs stretched out under the small table, occasionally taking a slow sip from his bottle of beer. Every time he lifted the glass, you secretly hoped he would never actually finish it, because the moment that bottle was empty, the date would officially be over, and you would have to return to the real world.

And right now, the real world felt a million miles away.

You had possessed a massive, suffocating, entirely unmanageable crush on Garrett for almost a year. To you, he had always been this untouchable figure on campus, the star hockey captain who moved through crowded lecture halls and campus parties with an effortless, golden confidence. You had spent months watching him from afar, collecting tiny, useless details like a hoarder. You knew the exact pitch of his laugh when he was genuinely amused, the way he adjusted his backward cap when he was focused, and how he always seemed to know the lyrics to every classic rock song that played in the campus pub.

You had spent late nights lying awake in your dorm room, completely bored, scrolling through his social media feeds just to see pictures of him smiling, completely convinced that a guy like Garrett Graham would never even notice your existence. It felt like a fever dream that you were currently sitting three feet away from him, watching the ambient amber light of the diner catch the sharp, handsome angles of his jawline. He was so impossibly pretty that a sudden wave of intense paranoia kept washing over you, making your stomach execute nervous, dizzying flips. You felt a literal punch to the gut every time he looked your way, terrified that you had somehow made him up, or that you were about to wake up to your alarm shaking your dorm mattress.

What you didn't know, what you were entirely blind to as you sat there trying to play it cool, was that Garrett was currently battling the exact same frantic panic.

Garrett Graham did not get nervous around girls. He was the captain of the hockey team, completely accustomed to high-pressure situations and intense scrutiny. But tonight, his hands were practically sweating against his beer bottle. He had been harboring a quiet, intense crush on you for months, ever since he saw you laughing with your friends in the student union building back in the winter. He had dropped subtle hints for weeks, engineering casual run-ins at the library, lingering by your desk after seminars, and silently hoping you would look his way. When he finally gathered the courage to ask you out, he felt like he’d just won a championship game.

And now that you were standing, or rather sitting, right here, he felt completely overwhelmed by how alive he felt just breathing the same air as you.

"The diner's closing soon," Garrett said softly, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that sent a sudden rush of heat straight up your spine. He looked down at his nearly full beer, consciously slowing his pace. "But honestly, I'm not really ready to call it a night yet. If you aren't."

You swallowed hard, your heart executing a violent, erratic leap against your ribs. "I'm definitely not ready either."

Garrett smiled, a genuine, breathtaking expression that completely stripped away his usual guarded, athletic persona. He slid a few bills onto the table to cover the check, slid out of the booth, and waited for you to grab your jacket.

When you stepped out of the diner, the cool June air hit your face, carrying the fresh, damp scent of a recent evening rain. The campus sidewalks were dark and quiet, illuminated only by the faint, buzzing yellow glow of the streetlamps. You started walking toward the campus dorms, your shoulder occasionally brushing against his broad upper arm. The proximity was intoxicating, a sudden, suffocating rush of adrenaline that made you feel incredibly lightheaded.

You had been dropping subtle hints all through dinner, shifting your posture, leaving your hand exposed on the table, silently begging him to just take the hint and hold your hand. The anticipation was driving you completely crazy.

"So," you said, breaking the quiet of the night, trying desperately to keep your voice steady so he wouldn't hear the absolute roar of your pulse. "Since we're walking the long way around, I feel like there's a bunch of stuff I still need to know about you. Like, professional athlete aspirations aside, what's on your actual bucket list? Have you ever traveled outside the country? Gone to Japan or taken a train through Europe?"

Garrett chuckled, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket as he looked down at you, his dark eyes sparkling under the yellow streetlights. "No Europe yet. Hockey keeps me pretty locked down during vacations. But Japan is actually at the top of my list. My dad went there years ago for an exhibition game and brought back all these stories. What about you? Are you a big traveler?"

"I want to see everything," you admitted, looking up at his handsome profile. "I want to take that Eurostar train from London to France just to see the architecture. I used to look at pictures of the palace walls in Versailles when I was stuck studying for finals, thinking about how insane it would be to actually stand there."

"You'd look perfect there," Garrett murmured, the comment slipping out of his mouth before his brain could filter it. He cleared his throat, a sudden, faint pink color touching his cheeks. "I mean, the architecture. It suits you."

Your face grew instantly hot, a brilliant, breathless smile breaking through your lips. You reached into your pocket, pulling out a small pack of chewing gum to give your hands something to do before you completely lost your mind from his compliments. "Want a piece? It's mint."

"Yeah, definitely," Garrett said, stopping his stride completely.

You stopped too, turning to face him under the shadow of a large oak tree near the edge of the quad. You handed him a piece of gum, your fingers briefly brushing against his palm. The tiny, electric contact felt like a left hook straight to your solar plexus.

Garrett popped the gum into his mouth, but he didn't start walking again. He stood right in front of you, his towering, athletic frame completely dominating your field of vision. He slowly took his hands out of his pockets, his gaze dropping to your hands, which were currently fidgeting with the wrapper.

Before you could offer another word or let your anxious thoughts take over, Garrett reached out. His long, calloused fingers slid effortlessly through yours, his large palm wrapping securely around your hand. His grip was firm, warm, and possessively tight, slotting against your skin as if it had been designed to fit there all along.

A soft, sharp intake of breath escaped your lips. You looked down at your joined hands, then back up to his dark, expectant eyes. The sheer, unadulterated relief of his touch completely shattered the last of your nervous defenses. Your feminine intuition had been right all along; you two went together perfectly, a flawless alignment of stars that felt entirely permanent.

"I've been wanting to do that since seven o'clock," Garrett confessed, his voice dropping into a rough, quiet whisper as he stepped a fraction closer, pulling your hand up slightly between your chests. "Actually, if I'm being completely honest, I've been wanting to do that for about six months."

You blinked, your eyes widening in total shock. "Six months? Garrett, you didn't even know my name six months ago."

"I knew your name," he corrected softly, his jaw tightening with a sudden, raw honesty that left him completely exposed before you. "I knew your major, I knew which table you sat at in the library on Tuesdays, and I knew exactly how loud your laugh was when your friends made a joke. I was completely terrified to talk to you because I thought someone as amazing as you would see a hockey player and just assume I was an idiot. I spent half the semester staring at you, entirely convinced I was making up a scenario where you'd actually want to go out with me."

The revelation hit you like a physical force. All this time, while you were hiding in your room scrolling through his profile and feeling entirely invisible, Garrett Graham had been sitting across the campus burning for you in the exact same way.

"I used to stay up late looking at your pictures," you confessed, the admission tearing out of your throat in a raw, bleeding whisper as the absolute absurdity of the situation made a small, emotional laugh escape your lips. "I thought you were completely untouchable, Garrett. I thought this whole date was just some weird stroke of luck."

Garrett went entirely rigid, his dark eyes widening as the reality of your words crashed through his brain. The confidence, the athletic armor, the easy smiles, all of it completely evaporated, leaving him entirely defenseless under the amber light.

"Luck?" Garrett repeated, his voice thick with a sudden, breathless wave of understanding. He stepped completely into your personal space, his chest practically brushing against your jacket, his free hand rising to gently cup the side of your neck. His thumb rested right against your pulse point, feeling the frantic, erratic thumping of your heart. "Sweetheart, if you let me stay with you tonight, I swear to God I'm never going to leave. I want to go steady. I want to tell the whole campus how much I care about you. I'm so tired of pretending I'm unbothered."

The proximity was sudden, suffocating, and entirely too beautiful. You could smell the crisp cedar of his cologne, the faint mint of the gum, and the warm, heavy heat of his skin. You felt so alive, so entirely consumed by the fierce intensity of his gaze, that you genuinely believed if he leaned down and kissed you right now, you might actually drop dead from the sheer perfection of it.

"Promise me we can go real slow," you breathed, your hands automatically rising to grip the front of his jacket, your fingers tightening against the fabric as you tilted your face up to his.

"I promise," Garrett murmured, his dark eyes tracking the movement of your lips before snapping back to yours with a fierce, protective devotion. "We can go exactly as slow as you want. As long as you're mine."

And then, with perfect, quiet timing against the soft falling of the summer mist, Garrett slanted his head down and captured your mouth with his own.

The kiss was everything the months of agonizing, secret pining had promised, intense, chaotic, and completely overwhelming. It was a total override of your senses, a sudden, blinding rush of heat that shot straight up your spine and shattered the last of your fears. He didn't rush you; his lips moved against yours with a slow, lingering reverence, a deep, unyielding devotion that completely stole the air from your lungs. He pulled your body flush against his, his large hand anchoring the back of your neck to keep you close, his other arm wrapping tightly around your waist to support your weight as your knees went entirely weak.

You wrapped your arms tightly around his neck, pulling him closer, matching his slow, deep intensity with a reckless, frantic hunger of your own. In the dark sanctuary of the campus path, the invisible thread between you tightened until it was completely unbreakable. Every bad review, every nervous doubt, and every late-night fantasy completely dissolved into the reality of his mouth against yours.

When Garrett finally pulled back a fraction of an inch, his forehead resting gently against yours, his breath fanning across your skin in short, ragged gasps, a bright, beautiful smile broke through his lips. His signature, handsome smirk was completely gone, replaced by a raw, triumphant happiness that made his eyes shine.

"Come on," Garrett breathed, his fingers slotting back through yours, his grip unyielding as he started walking toward the lights of your dorm building. "Let's get you inside before we both freeze out here."

You looked down at your joined hands, then back up to his dark, expectant eyes. The paranoia was gone, the secrets were out, and as you walked into the warmth of the lobby together, you knew the long era of watching from afar was completely over. You were exactly where you belonged.

Notes - I thought i should give yall something sweet before I attack yall with more angst lmao

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays @starsdancegirl @delusionalbubbletea @missbmc94 @avengersheart @snowtargaryen

[magslikesdaisies]

Tears - ❤️ Garrett Graham ❤️

Credit© - @aesthetic-packs

Word Count - 3419

Warnings - SMUTTY MDNI - Fingering, P in V

The Domestic Metric of Desire

The off-campus hockey house was generally a monument to collective male negligence. On any given Thursday, the air in the entryway was heavy with the scent of damp leather, stale cedar-spiced deodorant, and the ghost of whatever takeout had been ordered three nights prior. The kitchen counter was usually a tactical minefield of empty protein shakers, rogue skate guards, and a stack of mail that hadn't been sorted since the first week of the spring semester.

It was a chaotic, loud, entirely undisciplined environment that you had learned to navigate with a sense of fond exhaustion. You loved Garrett deeply, completely, and with a fiercely protective loyalty that made the minor inconveniences of his living situation easy to ignore. He was the star captain of the Briar team, a man who could command an entire ice rink with a single, sharp whistle and navigate a high-stakes third period with absolute composure.

But at home? At home, Garrett Graham was a creature of lazy, comfortable habits. He was the guy who left his hockey bag in the middle of the hallway like a massive, obstructionist boulder, who regularly forgot to check his student portal until a deadline was screaming at him, and who possessed an almost impressive ability to look right at an overflowing trash can and think, Yeah, that can hold one more pizza box.

You had accepted it. It was part of the package deal of loving a twenty-one-year-old athlete whose entire life was consumed by puck drops, film reviews, and academic eligibility requirements. You didn't expect him to be a pristine, meticulous homemaker.

Which was why the sudden, radical shift on a rainy Tuesday evening in late April caught you entirely off guard, hitting your nervous system with the force of a physical breakdown.

The rain was coming down in steady, heavy sheets against the kitchen window, blurring the lights of the campus quad into soft, glowing smudges of yellow and gray. You had spent the last four hours locked in your bedroom, your brain entirely fried from a grueling, relentless study session for an upcoming economics seminar. Your shoulders were tight, your neck ached, and your mind was a dull, thumping fog of data points and aggregate supply curves.

When you finally pushed open the door and walked down the short hallway into the kitchen, you were fully prepared to navigate the usual baseline level of hockey house disaster. You expected to find a mountain of dirty dishes, perhaps a stray teammate or two sprawled across the living room couch playing video games, and an empty refrigerator that would force you to order expensive, greasy delivery.

Instead, the kitchen was quiet. The only sound was the low, rhythmic hum of the refrigerator and the soft, steady rush of running water.

Garrett was standing at the sink.

He had his back to you, his broad, powerful shoulders stretching the fabric of an old, faded gray t-shirt that had seen far too many trips through the industrial athletic washers. His dark hair was slightly damp at the nape of his neck, curling just a fraction against his skin where he had clearly taken a quick shower after his evening skate.

He didn't notice you enter. He was entirely, completely focused on what he was doing.

His massive, calloused hands, the ones that wore heavy leather gloves on the ice and were lined with hard, athletic scars, were currently covered in a thick, frothy lather of white dish soap. He was holding a large, stainless-steel frying pan, his thumb working a green scrub sponge over the surface with a slow, deliberate, and entirely thorough pressure.

You stopped dead in your tracks, your hand freezing on the edge of the doorframe.

To your left, the kitchen counter, usually a disaster zone of rogue crumbs and empty energy drink cans, was entirely bare. It had been wiped down. The white laminate surface was so clean it actually caught the reflection of the under-cabinet lighting. The massive mountain of dirty coffee mugs and breakfast plates that had been accumulating since Sunday morning was completely gone, replaced by a neat, orderly row of inverted glass bowls and silverware drying on a clean, folded towel.

Garrett rinsed the frying pan under the hot stream of water, his forearms flexing violently beneath the skin as he lifted the heavy metal, letting the water sheet off the clean surface before setting it perfectly onto the drying rack.

A strange, sudden warmth bloomed right in the center of your chest, a heavy, liquid pulse that shot straight down to your core with a terrifyingly sharp intensity.

It wasn't a standard, sweet appreciation for a helpful gesture. It was a visceral, chemical reaction. The sight of Garrett, the golden-boy captain, the guy who usually had to be reminded three times to take his laundry out of the dryer, spontaneously exhibiting a total, unprompted level of household responsibility was doing something entirely unhinged to your body.

Your throat went dry. Your pulse executed a sudden, erratic leap against your ribs.

Garrett reached for a yellow dish towel, wiping his large hands dry as he finally turned around. The moment his dark eyes caught yours, his hard, handsome face softened into a familiar, lazy smile that usually made your heart melt. But tonight, it didn't melt. It tightened.

"Hey," Garrett said, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that vibrated pleasantly in the quiet room. He tossed the towel over his shoulder, leaning back against the edge of the newly scrubbed sink, crossing his arms over his chest. "You're finally out of the cave. I was starting to think I was going to have to come in there and drag you out by your feet."

You swallowed hard, your eyes tracking the heavy, clean line of his jaw, then drifting down to the pristine counter space behind him. "Garrett... what is all this?"

He blinked, looking back at the clean sink as if he had forgotten what he'd spent the last thirty minutes doing. "Oh. The kitchen? It was looking a little wild after Logan made breakfast this morning. Tucker left his protein shakers everywhere, too. Figure you'd be exhausted when you finished studying, and the last thing you want to look at is a bunch of greasy plates while you're trying to make tea."

He said it so casually. Like it was just a natural, logical sequence of events. You were tired, so he took care of it.

Your breath hitched completely in your throat. A sudden, heavy sensation flooded your lower stomach, a warm, slick rush of heat that made your thighs press together instinctively beneath your sweatpants. It was an almost embarrassing reaction to a man doing basic housekeeping, but the sheer, unprompted thoughtfulness of it, the total execution of a boring, responsible adult task specifically to protect your peace of mind, was the most attractive thing you had ever seen in your life.

"You... you just did it?" you whispered, your voice coming out a little weaker than you intended. "Nobody asked you to?"

Garrett let out a soft, amused chuff, shaking his head as he walked toward you. His heavy, bare feet made a soft slapslap sound against the clean linoleum. "Nobody asked, babe. I have eyes. I saw it needed to be done, so I did it. It's not a big deal."

He stopped right in front of you, his massive frame completely blocking out the rest of the kitchen. He smelled like clean rain, mint toothpaste, and the faint, sharp tang of the lemon-scented dish soap. He reached out, his long, warm fingers gently cupping the side of your jaw, his thumb smoothing over your cheekbone with a tenderness that made your knees feel loose.

"You look tired," he murmured, his eyes scanning your face with a deep, protective focus. "Go sit on the couch. I already cleaned the living room, too. I'll bring you some tea."

You stared up at him, your hands rising to grip his forearms. The muscle beneath his t-shirt was rock-hard, warm, and comforting, but your mind wasn't on comfort. Your mind was on the fact that he had cleaned the living room. Unprompted.

"Garrett," you breathed, your fingers tightening against his skin as you took a deliberate step forward, pressing your chest right against his broad torso. "Shut up."

Garrett's eyebrows shot up, a sudden, surprised spark of heat lighting up his dark eyes. "Excuse me?"

"You're being so responsible," you murmured, your voice dropping into a low, breathless frequency as you tilted your head back, looking directly at his mouth. "It's... it's completely unhinged."

A slow, knowing smirk began to curl the corner of his lips, his grip on your jaw tightening just a fraction as his other hand came down to rest heavily on the small of your back, pulling your hips flush against his. "Is that right? The dishes turn you on, sweetheart?"

"Don't mock me," you gasped softly, a sudden, desperate shiver running straight down your spine as his large palm shifted, his fingers digging into the denim of your sweatpants with a possessive, heavy strength. "Seeing you actually take care of things, remembering to look after the house without me having to manage you, it's the hottest thing you've ever done."

Garrett let out a low, rough growl of pure, male satisfaction, his eyes darkening until the pupils were completely blown out. The lazy, comfortable boyfriend was gone in an instant, replaced by the sharp, focused alpha who knew exactly how to take advantage of an opportunity.

"Well, fuck," Garrett whispered, his breath fanning hot against your lips as he slanted his head down, his forehead resting against yours. "If I knew all it took to get you this worked up was some dish soap, I would've fired the cleaning lady months ago."

He didn't give you a chance to respond.

Garrett captured your mouth with a sudden, bruising intensity that completely stole the air from your lungs. It wasn't a sweet, gentle kiss to thank you for the compliment; it was a hungry, demanding claim that matched the sudden, volatile heat running through both of your veins. His tongue slid into your mouth with a practiced, heavy rhythm, tasting like fresh mint and absolute certainty, pulling a soft, ragged whimper from the back of your throat.

Your hands flew up his chest, your fingers tangling desperately into the damp hair at the nape of his neck, pulling him closer until there wasn't a single inch of space left between you. The absolute, unyielding solidness of his body was a perfect anchor against the chaotic rush of desire flooding your system.

Garrett didn't break the kiss as he moved. He simply slid his large hands down to the undersides of your thighs, lifting you off the kitchen floor with a terrifyingly effortless strength. You wrapped your legs around his waist instinctively, your frame locked tightly to his as he walked back toward the clean counter space.

He set you down on the edge of the white laminate, right next to the neatly organized drying rack. The cool surface of the counter sent a sharp, electric jolt through the skin of your thighs, contrasting violently with the burning, possessive heat of Garrett's body as he wedged himself firmly between your knees.

He pulled back just a fraction of an inch, his chest heaving with short, ragged breaths as his dark eyes locked onto yours, burning with a fierce, protective devotion. His hands remained firmly anchored on your hips, his thumbs tracing slow, heavy circles against your skin.

"So," Garrett murmured, his voice thick and rough with desire. "You like a guy who handles his responsibilities, huh?"

"I like you when you're being a grown-up," you corrected breathlessly, your hands resting on his broad shoulders as you tried to steady your breathing. "It's just... it means I don't have to carry the mental weight of it all, Garrett. It means you're looking out for me before I even have to ask. That's... that's incredibly hot."

The absolute sincerity in your words seemed to strike something deep within his chest. The lazy smirk faded, replaced by a soft, uncharacteristically serious expression as he looked down at you. He reached up, his long, warm fingers gently tucking a stray lock of hair behind your ear, his touch surprisingly light for a man of his size.

"I want to look out for you," Garrett said softly, his voice dead serious, completely devoid of his usual athletic bravado. "I know I can be a total disaster sometimes, babe. I know I leave my shit everywhere and forget things. But I never want you to feel like you're the only one keeping this whole thing running. You work too hard. You carry too much weight. If I can take a few things off your plate, I'm going to do it. Every single time."

The sheer, unprompted respect and emotional maturity in his voice hit you like a physical wave. It was one thing for a guy to do the dishes to get what he wanted; it was an entirely different thing for a man to understand the invisible, emotional burden of household management and actively step up to fix it because he loved you.

A sudden, intense rush of emotion flooded your chest, so powerful it made your eyes sting. And beneath that emotion, the physical desire flared into a roaring, uncontrollable bonfire. Your clothes felt entirely too tight, your skin prickling with a desperate, heavy ache that demanded to be answered right that second.

"Garrett," you choked out, your hands sliding down his chest to grip the hem of his gray t-shirt. "Take this off. Right now."

Garrett let out a sharp, breathless laugh, but he didn't hesitate. He pulled the shirt over his head in one fluid, powerful motion, tossing it blindly onto the clean floor behind him. The sudden reveal of his bare torso, the broad, muscular chest, the deep cut of his abs, and the heavy line of his collarbone, made your mouth go completely dry. He was beautiful, a perfect specimen of athletic dedication, but right now, the muscle was just a bonus. The brain behind it was what had you completely ruined.

He leaned back in, his bare skin pressing against yours as his lips found the sensitive spot right beneath your jawline. He sucked softly against your skin, pulling a loud, uninhibited gasp from your lips as his large hands slid beneath the waistband of your sweatpants, his warm fingers finding the slick, burning heat that had been building between your thighs since you first walked into the room.

"God, you're so wet for me," Garrett growled against your throat, his fingers moving against you with a slow, deliberate knowledge that had your head tossing back against the cabinet doors. "All because I wiped down a counter, sweetheart?"

"Shut up," you cried out softly, your fingers digging into the hard muscle of his back as a violent, trembling wave of pleasure shot straight down your spine. "Just... please, Garrett."

"I've got you," he whispered, his voice rough and possessive as he pulled back to look at you, his eyes wide and dark with an absolute, unshakeable devotion. "I've always got you. Let's go to the bedroom. I already changed the sheets this morning, too."

You let out a soft, defeated laugh, completely overwhelmed by the sheer, relentless onslaught of his competence. "You changed the sheets?"

"Freshly washed," Garrett grinned, his eyes gleaming with an absolute, triumphant delight as he hooked his arms under your knees again, lifting you off the counter and carrying you down the hall toward his room. "Like I said, babe. Responsible."

The bedroom was dark, save for the soft, amber glow of the streetlamps cutting through the rain-slicked windowpanes. True to his word, the bed was neatly made, the crisp, clean scent of fresh laundry soap filling the air as Garrett set you down in the center of the mattress.

The rest of the evening dissolved into a slow, heavy, and completely consuming haze of domestic intimacy. There was no rush, no frantic scramble under the covers; Garrett took his time with an absolute, disciplined patience that mirrored the care he had taken in the kitchen. He stripped away your clothes with a slow, reverent focus, his eyes tracking every single inch of your exposed skin with an intensity that made you feel like the most valuable thing in the entire world.

When he finally moved over you, his heavy, muscular frame settling between your thighs with a grounding, comforting weight, he didn't just take what he wanted. He leaned down, his forearm resting next to your head as he looked directly into your eyes, his hand sliding up to frame your face.

"You good?" Garrett whispered, his voice rough, but his eyes incredibly gentle. "You're not too tired?"

"I've never been more awake in my life," you breathed, your legs wrapping tightly around his hips, pulling him down until the heat of his skin was completely burning against yours. "Please, Garrett. Now."

He sank into you with a slow, deep, and entirely unyielding stroke that made a loud, broken sob escape your lips. The pleasure was instant, a sharp, white-hot override that shot straight to your core, but it was accompanied by a deep, profound sense of safety. This was Garrett, your boyfriend, the captain, the man who was completely capable of holding the world on his shoulders so you could finally let go of yours.

He moved within you with a steady, rhythmic power, his breath coming in short, harsh gasps against your ear as his fingers locked through yours, pinning your hands to the mattress. The crisp, clean scent of the fresh sheets surrounded you, a constant, tangible reminder of the effort he had put into making sure you were taken care of. Every single thrust felt like a continuation of that promise, a heavy, physical manifestation of his respect, his care, and his absolute devotion to your happiness.

You climbed together, the tension building in the dark room until the steady drumming of the rain outside was completely drowned out by the sound of your shared breaths and the rough, desperate murmurs of his voice against your skin. Garrett didn't let go of your hands, keeping you anchored to him as the final, violent wave of completion broke over your body, sending a brilliant, blinding rush of warmth straight down to your toes. He followed you just a second later, his jaw clenching hard as he let out a low, rough groan, burying his face in the crook of your neck as his body shuddered against yours with a final, consuming release.

Later, when the room had grown cold and the rain outside had slowed to a gentle, rhythmic patter against the glass, you lay wrapped tightly in the fresh, clean blankets.

Garrett was lying on his side, his large arm wrapped securely around your waist, pulling your back flush against his broad, warm chest. His breathing was slow and steady, his fingers mindfully tracing a soft, lazy pattern against the bare skin of your stomach.

The exhaustion from the study session had finally returned, but the tight, anxious knot that had been sitting in your shoulders for weeks was completely gone. You felt light, warm, and entirely cared for.

"Hey," Garrett murmured into the dark, his voice a sleepy, gravelly vibration against your shoulder blade.

"Hmm?" you hummed, shifting slightly to press closer into his warmth.

"I was thinking," he whispered, a small, amused chuckle rumbling in his chest. "Tomorrow morning, I'm going to get up early, sort all the mail in the entryway, and then I'm going to fix that squeaky hinge on the bathroom door."

You let out a soft, sleepy laugh, your hand reaching down to cover his fingers on your stomach. "Garrett... are you trying to kill me?"

"Just keeping up with my responsibilities, babe," he murmured, his lips brushing a soft, lingering kiss against the back of your neck as he pulled the blankets up over your shoulders, securing you tightly within his hold. "Just looking out for my girl."

You closed your eyes, a deep, beautiful sense of peace finally taking over your mind as you drifted off to sleep, knowing that the kitchen was clean, the sheets were fresh, and the man holding you was exactly where he was supposed to be.

Notes - This is my first time writing anything remotely smutty so please be gentle but do tell me what you think! Lova ya MUWAHH

Taglist -  @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays @starsdancegirl @delusionalbubbletea @missbmc94 @avengersheart @snowtargaryen

[magslikesdaisies]

When did you get hot? - 🩵 Dean Di Laurentis🩵

Credit© - @iconsfabric and @iconsoffcampus

Word Count - 5014

Warning - SMUTTY MDNI - Fingering, p in v

The last time Dean Di Laurentis had occupied your working memory, he was fourteen years old, a minor character in the background of your high school years, and completely consumed by an aggressive argument about luxury watch brands on your parents’ manicured lawn in Greenwich.

Back then, you had far too much on your plate to pay attention to your younger brother Beau’s rotating circle of wealthy, hyperactive friends. Between your own intense varsity tennis schedule, prep courses for the Ivy League, and the suffocating social expectations of Connecticut’s elite, the boys tracking mud through the foyer were just background noise. You knew Dean’s family, of course, everyone in the country club circuit knew the Di Laurentis name, but Dean himself was just a scrawny kid with a floppy bowl cut and a permanent smirk, always rushing off to some elite youth hockey league.

When you packed your life into designer luggage and left for university, Dean had been an afterthought. You vaguely remembered him standing by the hedges, wearing an oversized prep-school blazer, offering a polite, casual nod as your car pulled out of the driveway.

Seven years was a long time in the grand scheme of human biology.

You had completed your undergraduate degree, spent three grueling years grinding your way up the corporate ladder of a fast-paced marketing firm in Chicago, and officially settled into the cynical, hyper-scheduled routine of a twenty-five-year-old professional. Beau had stayed on the athletic track, eventually landing the starting quarterback position at Briar University, turning into a massive, golden-boy campus celebrity whose games your parents traveled to see every autumn.

Dean had followed the ice instead of the gridiron, occupying a completely separate social circle as the star winger for Briar’s powerhouse hockey team. You saw his name occasionally in the family group chat when your mother clipped society pages or sports headlines, but in your mind, he remained frozen as the rich, annoying teenager who used to leave his expensive hockey sticks leaning against your father's vintage car.

Then came the Briar spring alumni weekend.

The post-game mixer at the off-campus athletic house was a chaotic, high-volume sea of red and white jerseys, premium liquor catering stations on the back porch, and a dense, humid cloud of expensive cologne mixed with ambient body heat. The bass from a massive speaker setup in the corner was vibrating right through the soles of your leather boots, a steady, thumping rhythm that matched the low, ambient roar of a hundred twenty-something athletes celebrating a double-victory weekend. Beau had thrown his arm around your shoulder the second you walked through the door, proudly parading his older sister through a gauntlet of offensive linemen and athletic directors like a prize trophy.

"Hey, hold on," Beau barked into your ear, his loud, deep quarterback voice easily cutting through the noise of the crowd. He navigated you toward the wide archway leading into the kitchen, his large hand steering you past a group of cheerleaders. "There’s some guys from the ice rink you haven't seen since we lived in Connecticut. Hey! Di Laurentis! Get over here!"

You adjusted the strap of your shoulder bag, preparing yourself to smile politely at whatever ghost from the past was about to stumble out of the kitchen pantry. You expected a polite handshake, a brief inquiry about your corporate job, and maybe a casual nod toward your shared Greenwich roots.

The crowd shifted. A tall, broad-supported man stepped through the threshold, a premium drink held loosely between his long, heavily calloused fingers.

The smile died instantly on your face. Your fingers froze against the leather strap of your bag.

It was a total, violent chemical override of your entire sensory system.

The scrawny, uncoordinated kid from the driveway had vanished entirely from the mortal plane. In his place stood a six-foot-two monument to athletic perfection, a man whose presence seemed to warp the very air pressure in the room. His hair wasn't a floppy, tragic bowl cut anymore; it was a thick, messy crop of bright, golden-blonde strands that looked effortlessly styled, a few loose pieces falling over a forehead that was smooth and tanned.

But it was the sheer size of him that caused your brain to execute a hard, catastrophic system reboot.

Dean’s shoulders were massive, a wide, terrifyingly solid shelf that filled out a crisp, dark green linen shirt with a precision that felt almost predatory. The top three buttons were left casually undone, revealing the heavy, clean line of his collarbones and a glimpse of a broad, hairless chest that looked like it had been chiseled out of granite by a classical sculptor. His waist was narrow, tapering down into a pair of dark, tailored jeans that clung to thighs so thick and powerful they clearly belonged to a man who spent his mornings pushing sleds across concrete and skating through defensive lines at thirty miles an hour.

He didn't just look different. He looked like an entirely new species.

"Holy hell," you whispered under your breath, the words slipping past your lips before your professional filter could intercept them. Your eyes did an involuntary, frantic double-take, tracking the hard, clean line of his jaw, the sharp, aristocratic slope of his nose, and the intense, piercing blue of his eyes as they locked onto yours.

Dean stopped right in front of you. A slow, lazy smirk spread across his face, his blue eyes dropping down to take in the sight of you in your tailored skirt and silk blouse before rising back up to meet your stunned gaze. The sheer, unadulterated confidence radiating off his skin was a physical force, a smoky, high-stakes charm that made your lower stomach execute a sudden, heavy drop.

"Well, look who finally decided to come back to the minor leagues," Dean said. His voice was a total shock to your ears. It wasn't the cracking, high-pitched tone of a teenager; it was a deep, gravelly baritone, a low, smooth vibration that seemed to hit you right in the center of your chest, sending a hot, liquid shiver straight down the inside of your thighs. "Hey there."

The plot, as it turned out, had thickened to a point that was entirely unmanageable.

For the first twenty minutes of the conversation, you were completely incapable of processing actual language. Beau was standing next to you, loudly recounting a specific play from the third quarter, his hands gesturing wildly through the air, but your entire cognitive capacity was anchored entirely to Dean’s mouth. Every time he took a sip from his glass, the hard, definition-heavy muscle of his forearm flexed beneath his rolled-up sleeves, the thick veins mapping a path across his tanned skin that had your throat going completely dry.

You had spent three years in Chicago around corporate executives, high-end clients, and polished, well-dressed men, but none of them had ever made your pulse spike with this kind of raw, visceral panic. Dean was looking down at you with a look that was entirely inappropriate for someone who used to be a background character in your life. It was a lazy, hunting look, a slow, appreciative assessment that made you acutely aware of the fact that your clothes suddenly felt entirely too tight.

"You're quiet," Dean murmured, leaning his shoulder against the wooden doorframe, effectively cutting off the rest of the kitchen traffic until it was just the two of you locked in a tight, high-tension pocket of space. Beau had already drifted away to greet a group of boosters, leaving you entirely defenseless. "What's the matter? Did the corporate world take away your tongue?"

"I'm just... trying to reconcile the data," you said, your voice coming out a little sharper than intended as you took a deliberate sip of your white wine, desperate to clear the sudden dryness in your throat. You looked him up and down, making no effort to hide the absolute bewilderment on your face. "Dean, when did you... when did this happen?"

He let out a low, rumbling laugh that vibrated pleasantly against your ribs. "When did what happen?"

"Don't be dense," you snapped softly, a sudden flush of heat rising up your neck as his smirk widened. "The last time I saw you, you were just one of Beau's country club friends running around the tennis courts. You look like you could lift my sedan with one hand now. It's ridiculous. It's a complete evolutionary anomaly."

Dean’s blue eyes gleamed with a sudden, vicious delight. He leaned down a fraction of an inch, his broad frame blocking out the light from the hallway, his crisp, expensive cologne filling your lungs until you couldn't think about anything else.

"It's called a division one strength and conditioning program, sweetheart," he whispered, his tone dropping into a confidential, gravelly frequency that made your knees feel alarmingly loose. "Plus, you know, I grew up. Some of us make improvements when we hit twenty-one. You like the upgrades?"

"I think you're an arrogant jerk who needs to step back about six inches before I tell Beau you're harassing his sister," you lied, your heart hammering against your ribs like a trapped bird.

"Beau's too busy celebrating to notice anything," Dean murmured smoothly, his eyes dropping down to your lips for a fraction of a second before returning to your gaze with a terrifying level of confidence. "And you don't look like you want me to step back."

He was entirely, infuriatingly correct. The sheer, animal magnetism of his new form was doing something catastrophic to your moral compass. You were twenty-five, an adult with a retirement account and a spreadsheet for your monthly groceries, and you were currently standing in a college town, experiencing a total, baseline physical breakdown because your brother's blonde childhood friend had turned into a literal god.

The mixer eventually spilled out into the backyard as the midnight air cleared out the humidity of the house. You spent the next hour trying to maintain a respectable distance from Dean, embedding yourself in a group of Beau's football friends, trying to focus on their loud, overlapping stories about training camp and team pranks.

But it was an exercise in total futility.

No matter where you stood on the grass, you could feel Dean’s eyes on you. He was standing by the outdoor fire pit with a group of hockey players, his massive frame silhouetted against the orange glow of the flames. He was wearing a dark leather jacket now, his large hands shoved casually into his pockets, his golden-blonde hair catching the light of the fire like a halo. Every time you glanced over, he was already watching you, a slow, unbothered smirk permanent on his lips, as if he knew exactly what kind of chaotic, high-volume debate was raging inside your head.

"Hey," a soft voice broke your concentration. You turned to see one of the football trainers, holding two fresh drinks. She handed you a hard seltzer with a sympathetic smile. "You look like you're about to pass out from sports overload. Beau can be a lot when he wins."

"It's not Beau," you admitted, taking the cold can and pressing it briefly against your flushed cheek, desperate for any kind of temperature regulation. You leaned closer to her, your eyes drifting involuntarily back toward the fire pit. "Hey... who is the blonde guy over there? The one next to the goalie?"

The girl looked over, her eyebrows lifting into a knowing, amused line. "Oh. That's Dean Di Laurentis. He's the starting winger for the hockey team. Why? You interested?"

"No, he's... he's one of Beau's friends from back home," you stammered, the text of your cover story falling apart under the sheer pressure of your panic. "I haven't seen him since high school. Back then I was too busy with tennis and AP classes to notice any of Beau's friends, but he definitely didn't look like that."

The trainer let out a loud laugh, shaking her head as she took a sip of her drink. "Well, he definitely changed. Dean is famously the most dangerous guy on the sports side of campus. Half the Greek system has spent the last three semesters trying to get his phone number, but he treats everyone like an amusement park ride. He's completely unhinged, but honestly? Look at him. Can you blame them?"

You looked. You couldn't blame them at all.

Dean was currently laughing at something his goalie had said, his head throwing back, the long, powerful line of his throat fully exposed to the night air. The absolute, unshakeable ease with which he carried his new body was the most frustrating part. He wasn't awkward about his size; he moved with the precise, lethal grace of an apex predator who knew exactly how much damage he could do in a room.

"He's a menace," you muttered, your eyes tracking the way his leather jacket pulled tight across his back as he reached down to stir a log in the fire pit.

"He's a masterpiece," the trainer corrected with a grin. "If I were you, I'd go over there and remind him that you used to ignore him. Guys like Dean love a girl who isn't intimidated by the jersey."

"I'm not intimidated," you murmured, your thighs pressing together tightly as a sudden, heavy throb of pure, unadulterated desire hit your system. "I'm just... experiencing a lot of cognitive dissonance."

By two in the morning, the party had finally begun to wind down. The alumni had retreated to their hotels, the liquor bottles were mostly empty, and the massive athletic house was quiet save for a few stragglers clearing out cups from the living room.

Beau had completely crashed on the armchair, his massive quarterback frame sprawled across the fabric, snoring softly with his head tilted back. You stood by the front door, your jacket over your arm, waiting for the rideshare app on your phone to find a driver in the crowded college town.

"The app's going to glitch out," a low, gravelly voice said from behind you.

You turned around to see Dean. He had his keys jingling between his long fingers, his leather jacket unzipped, his golden-blonde hair slightly rumpled from the wind outside. He looked tired, but his blue eyes were still intensely bright, fixed on your face with a terrifying, total focus.

"It's alumni weekend," Dean continued, stepping into your personal space until you could feel the heat radiating off his bare chest through his open shirt. "Every driver within twenty miles is currently surge-pricing the business majors downtown. You'll be standing on this porch until sunrise."

"I can handle a wait, Dean," you said, your voice trembling just a fraction despite your best efforts to maintain a cool, professional distance.

"I'm driving Beau's truck back to his apartment," Dean said, tilting his head toward the driveway where the massive black vehicle was parked. "I can drop you off at your hotel. It's on the way."

You looked at the phone screen, which was currently spinning a continuous, frustrating loading circle. Then you looked back at Dean. The thought of being locked in the cab of a truck with him, smelling his expensive cologne, listening to that deep, gravelly voice in the quiet of the night, was an absolute recipe for a moral disaster. But the thought of standing on a cold porch was worse.

"Fine," you sighed, slipping your phone into your pocket. "But if you play any terrible hockey locker room music, I'm jumping out at the next red light."

Dean let out a low, delighted chuckle, his teeth flashing white in the dim light of the entryway. "Deal."

The cab of the truck was warm, the heater humming a steady, quiet rhythm against the dark windowpanes as Dean navigated the empty, tree-lined streets of the Briar campus. The rain had started again, a soft, misty drizzle that turned the windshield into a blur of red and yellow tail-lights.

You sat tight against the passenger door, your knees pulled together, your eyes fixed firmly on the road ahead. But it was impossible to ignore the sheer mass of him sitting just two feet away. Every time Dean shifted gears, his long leg moved against the console, his thick thigh muscle flexing beneath his jeans, his broad shoulder brushing against the leather seat with a heavy, solid authority.

"You're still doing it," Dean said quietly, his eyes remaining on the dark road ahead.

"Doing what?"

"Looking at me like you're trying to figure out if I'm a hologram," he murmured, a small ghost of a smirk touching his lips. He turned the steering wheel with one hand, his large palm effortlessly controlling the massive truck with a lazy, practiced competence. "You haven't stopped looking at my face since eleven o'clock, sweetheart."

Your cheeks burned instantly hot in the dark cab. "I am simply stunned by the sheer level of genetic restructuring, Dean. It's like my brain refuses to accept that the kid who used to hang around our house in Greenwich is currently occupying a six-foot-two frame and driving a commercial vehicle. I honestly never paid attention to you back then."

Dean let out a low, gravelly huff, pulling the truck up to a stoplight. He turned his head slowly, his blue eyes locking onto yours in the dim, green glow of the dashboard lights. The playful, arrogant smirk was completely gone, replaced by a heavy, volatile intensity that made the air in your lungs turn to pure glass.

"Do you want to know a secret?" Dean whispered, his voice dropping into a register so low it sent a violent, liquid ache straight down between your legs.

"What?" you breathed, completely unable to break eye contact.

"I spent the last four years praying to God you'd come back for one of these games," Dean confessed, his long fingers tightening against the steering wheel until his knuckles went white. "Beau used to have a family photo on his desk freshman year. I used to sit in his room, looking at you in that picture, thinking about how you completely ignored me every time I was over at your place. You were always too busy, always tracking your own goals, totally out of reach. I swore to myself that the next time you saw me, I wasn't going to be just some kid in the background."

Your breath hitched completely in your throat. Your heart executed a loud, thumping beat against your ribs. "Dean..."

"I worked for this," he murmured, his eyes dropping down to track the line of your throat before rising back to your gaze with a fierce, possessive clarity. "Every hour in the weight room, every sprint on the ice, in the back of my mind, I was just waiting for the day I could stand in front of you and look you up and down the exact way you just did tonight. I wanted to see that look on your face. The one where you realize exactly who I am now."

The raw, unadulterated honesty of his confession completely shattered your defenses. It wasn't just a sudden physical glow-up; it was a calculated, years-long campaign of desire, an obsession that had been building in the dark while you were busy working in Chicago. The background character from your teenage years had spent seven years turning himself into a weapon specifically designed to break your sanity.

The light turned green. Dean didn't press the gas. He simply sat there in the quiet cab, his breath coming in slow, heavy expansions of his broad chest, waiting for your response.

"Dean," you whispered, your fingers digging tightly into the leather of your purse as a total, overwhelming wave of desire crashed through your system, wiping away the last remaining threads of your twenty-five-year-old restraint. "If you don't take me back to your place right now, I am going to lose my mind in the passenger seat of this truck."

Dean’s eyes flared with a sudden, violent heat, his jaw clenching so hard the muscle ticked near his ear. He didn't say a single word. He simply slammed his foot down on the accelerator, the massive truck roaring to life as he executed a sharp, perfect U-turn across the empty wet asphalt, heading straight toward the off-campus hockey house.

The front door of his apartment had barely clicked shut before Dean threw his keys onto the counter and turned on you with the force of a total physical takeover.

The lights were off, the living room illuminated only by the gray streetlamps outside the window, but you didn't need light. Dean’s large hands found your waist in the dark, his long, powerful fingers digging into the fabric of your blouse with a possessive strength that lifted you right off your feet. He slammed your back gently against the solid wood of the front door, his massive frame pinning you to the surface until you were completely encased in his warmth, his cologne, and his absolute hunger.

"Say it again," Dean growled, his voice thick and rough against your lips, his golden-blonde hair brushing against your forehead as he stared down at you in the shadows. "Tell me what you want, sweetheart."

"You," you gasped out, your hands flying up his broad chest, your fingers tearing at the buttons of his green shirt until the fabric gave way, allowing your palms to slide over the hard, burning muscle of his chest. "I want you, Dean. You're so hot it's actually making me sick. I can't think about anything else."

Dean let out a low, ragged sound, a mix between a laugh and a groan of pure, unadulterated triumph. He slanted his mouth down, capturing your lips with a bruising, desperate intensity that completely erased any remaining memory of the past.

The kiss was everything the seven-year wait had promised, intense, hungry, and completely overwhelming. His tongue slid into your mouth with a heavy, practiced rhythm, tasting like clean rain and absolute dominance, pulling a sharp, high-pitched whimper from the back of your throat. He pulled your hips flush against his, his thick, powerful thighs wedging firmly between yours, forcing you to feel the hard, unyielding line of his desire pressing right against your core through your tailored skirt.

You wrapped arms tightly around his neck, your fingers tangling deeply into the golden strands of his hair, pulling him closer until your chests were completely fused together. The absolute ferocity of the way he held you made you realize with a sudden, blinding rush of certainty that the old dynamic was truly dead and buried. This was a man, a division one athlete who knew exactly how to use his size to get what he wanted, and right now, all he wanted was to ruin you for anyone else.

Dean didn't break the kiss as his large hand slid down the length of your thigh, his fingers gathering the fabric of your skirt, pulling it up until his warm, calloused palm was resting directly against the bare skin of your upper leg. The contrast between his rough, athletic hand and your soft skin sent a sharp, electric jolt straight down your spine, causing a heavy, slick rush of moisture to coat your thighs beneath your underwear.

"God, you're shaking," Dean murmured against your mouth, his thumb smoothing over your inner thigh with a heavy, deliberate pressure that had your head tossing back against the door. "Look at me."

You opened your eyes, your breath coming in short, ragged gasps as you looked up into his handsome, desperate face. His blue eyes were completely dark with desire, his chest rising and falling violently against yours.

"I've been waiting seven years to do this," Dean whispered, his long fingers sliding beneath the lace of your underwear, finding the soaking, burning heat that had been building since the second you saw him in the kitchen. He let out a low, rough purr as his fingers moved against you, pulling a loud, uninhibited cry from your lips. "You like the new improvements? Tell me how much you like them."

"Dean, please," you begged, your fingers digging into his broad shoulders as your knees completely gave out under the sheer, relentless onslaught of his touch. He caught your weight effortlessly, his large arm wrapping around your lower back to keep you pinned to the door as his fingers continued their agonizing, perfect rhythm against your core. "You're perfect. You're completely perfect. Just... please."

"Not yet," he growled softly, his lips brushing against the sensitive skin of your jawline, his teeth biting gently into your earlobe. "We're going to take our time. I want you to remember every single second of this when you go back to Chicago. I want you sitting at your corporate desk, looking at your spreadsheets, thinking about exactly how my hands feel on your skin."

He carried you into his bedroom with that same, terrifyingly effortless strength, setting you down in the center of his massive, unmade bed. The room smelled like him, crisp, clean, and intensely masculine, and the moment your back hit the mattress, Dean moved over you like a shadow, his heavy torso settling between your knees with a grounding authority that left no room for escape.

The rest of the night dissolved into a volatile, high-stakes blur of pure physical consumption. Dean was relentless, his athletic endurance turning the encounter into a grueling, beautiful marathon that pushed your body to its absolute limits. He stripped away the rest of your clothes with a slow, deliberate focus, his eyes tracking every single curve of your frame with a fierce, protective devotion that made you feel like the center of the universe.

When he finally sank into you, his large hands locking through your fingers, pinning your wrists to the mattress, the sheer, unyielding solidness of his body was a total override of your senses. Every single stroke was deep, heavy, and completely overwhelming, pulling loud, broken sobs from your lips that echoed through the quiet apartment. He moved with a rhythm that was entirely disciplined, a perfect, lethal execution of desire that had your body arching off the mattress, chasing the white-hot peak that was building right at the center of your chest.

"Look at me," Dean commanded softly in the dark, his face just inches from yours, his golden-blonde hair damp with sweat as he looked down at you. "Who owns you? Tell me who's in your head."

"You," you cried out, your head tossing against the pillows as a sudden, violent wave of completion broke over your body, sending a brilliant, blinding rush of heat straight down to your toes. "Dean... it's you. It's always been you."

Dean let out a sharp, ragged groan, his jaw clenching hard as he delivered a final, devastating thrust, his entire body shuddering against yours as he surrendered to his own release, burying his face in the crook of your neck as the final, heavy pulses of pleasure broke through both of your systems.

The next morning, the rain had cleared, leaving the bedroom flooded with a bright, clean New England sunlight that warmed the white sheets.

You woke up slowly, your body aching in a dozen different, delicious places, your mind clear and remarkably peaceful for the first time in years. You shifted slightly, your hand sliding across the mattress to find the space beside you empty.

A sudden, sharp panic flared in your chest, the corporate professional suddenly remembering the reality of the situation, before the soft sound of a guitar strumming from the kitchen caught your attention.

You pulled Dean’s large, green linen shirt over your bare shoulders, the hem falling down to your mid-thighs, smelling strongly of his citrus cologne and the heat of the night. You padded quietly down the short hallway, your bare feet silent against the hardwood floors.

Dean was sitting on the kitchen counter, his long legs dangling off the edge. He was completely shirtless, wearing only a pair of grey sweatpants that hung low on his hips, his wide, muscular chest fully exposed to the morning sun. He had an acoustic guitar resting on his thigh, his long, calloused fingers casually picking a soft, melodic tune that vibrated pleasantly through the quiet room.

He looked up as you entered, the melody stopping instantly as a slow, familiar, and entirely lazy smirk spread across his handsome face. He looked you up and down, his blue eyes resting on the sight of you wearing his shirt with a deep, male satisfaction that had your pulse executing a familiar, erratic leap.

"Morning," Dean murmured, his voice a low, gravelly morning rumble that shot a sudden, liquid warmth straight back down between your thighs.

You walked over to the counter, wedging yourself firmly between his knees, your hands rising to rest on his bare, muscular hips. "You play the guitar now? Seriously, Dean? Is there any cliché metric you didn't decide to completely conquer while I was gone?"

Dean let out a low, rumbling laugh, setting the guitar down on the counter behind him. He reached out, his long, warm fingers gently cupping your jaw, his thumb smoothing over your cheekbone with a tenderness that completely erased the lingering traces of your corporate cynicism.

"I told you," Dean whispered, leaning down to press a soft, lingering kiss against your lips, his bare chest warm against your front. "I spent seven years making improvements. I had to make sure that when you finally came home, the plot was thick enough to keep you here."

You let out a soft, delighted laugh, your fingers digging into the hard muscle of his back as you tilted your head up for another kiss. "The plot is definitely thick, Di Laurentis. Congratulations on the upgrades."

"Good," Dean smiled against your mouth, his grip on your waist tightening with a heavy, possessive certainty. "Because I'm not letting you go back to Chicago without a fight."

Notes - AHHHHH I kinda really like this but idk. tell me what yall think! MUWAH

Taglist - @dilaurentispuckbunny @goawaysha @mhayes777 @purplerainx1 @05gwyn @hagarsays @starsdancegirl

[magslikesdaisies]

Actually Romantic - 🩵 Dean Di Laurentis 🩵

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 4616

Warning - Lowkey asshole dean lol

The third floor of the Briar University social sciences library was universally acknowledged as the place where GPA dreams went to die in agonizing, fluorescent-lit silence. It smelled permanently of damp rain, decades of decomposing binding glue, and the sharp, chemical tang of the industrial espresso machine from the lobby.

You sat in the corner study carrel, the one with the cracked wood veneer and the view of the gray, rain-slicked quad below. It was a miserable Tuesday afternoon in mid-February, the kind of New England winter day where the slush on the sidewalks turned into a treacherous gray mush by three in the afternoon. Your fingers were wrapped tightly around a teal highlighter, frozen mid-stroke over an impossibly dense chapter on international trade theory.

Across the worn oak table sat Dean Di Laurentis.

He was not highlighting. He was balanced precariously on the back two legs of his heavy wooden chair, a silver pen spinning with mindless, rhythmic perfection through his long, calloused fingers. Every fourth rotation, the clip of the pen hit his knuckles with a sharp, metallic click that vibrated right through the center of your forehead.

"The teal is an abomination," Dean murmured. His voice was a low, gravelly vibration that barely carried over the hum of the ancient radiator beneath the window, but it was perfectly calibrated to break your concentration. "Blue is for primary sources. Green is for methodology. The teal just means you have an identity crisis and a lack of structural discipline, Barbie."

You did not look up. You deliberately kept your eyes fixed on a paragraph about tariff structures, though your jaw clenched so hard the muscle ticked.

"My name is not Barbie, Dean," you said, your tone perfectly level, cool, and entirely unbothered. "And if you spent even a tenth of the time reading the syllabus that you spend monitoring my stationery supplies, you might actually clear a C-minus on the upcoming midterm instead of relying on the group project to keep your academic eligibility afloat."

Dean let out a low, soft huff that was dangerously close to a laugh. The front two legs of his chair hit the floor with a loud, deliberate thud that drew a sharp glare from a senior studying three tables away. He leaned forward, resting his broad forearms on the table, invading your personal space with the lazy, practiced ease of a guy who was entirely accustomed to people moving out of his way. He smelled like expensive, crisp citrus cologne and the cold winter air. It was an aggressively loud scent for a library.

"Ouch," Dean said, his dark eyes dancing with an absolute, venomous delight. "Vicious. Truly. You know, Garrett told me you spent three hours in the computer lab yesterday re-formatting the entire shared bibliography just so I wouldn't find a single comma out of place. I have to say, the obsession is almost flattering."

"I did it so your total lack of academic competence wouldn't drag my perfect GPA down into the dirt," you snapped, finally lifting your gaze to meet his.

Dean just smirked, tilting his head to the side, his silver hoop earring catching the harsh white glare of the fluorescent bulb above. He looked exactly like what he was—a privileged, golden-boy athlete who treated life like an open buffet and found your rigid, disciplined existence to be a personal affront.

This was the war. It had been raging since the second week of January, and neither side had shown any sign of offering a truce.

The animosity between you had not been born out of a misunderstanding. It was a pure, unadulterated clash of principles.

During the first seminar of the spring semester, the professor had asked for an analysis of a classic political science text regarding state sovereignty. Dean, who had cruised through his first two years at Briar on a wave of natural charisma, a wealthy family name, and the collective leniency the faculty extended to the star hockey team, had offered a lazy, smooth-talking summary that amounted to absolute nonsense wrapped in high-class vocabulary.

You had not let it slide. You had stood up, looked directly across the seminar table, and pulled his argument apart thread by thread, quote by quote, until he was left sitting there with a stupid grin and an empty notebook.

Dean Di Laurentis did not do well with being publicly corrected. He certainly did not do well with being corrected by a girl who didn't care about his hockey stats, didn't care about his handsome face, and looked at his lazy charm like it was something dirty she needed to wipe off her shoe.

Since that day, he had turned hostility into an art form.

He did not just ignore you. He actively sought you out. He found ways to engineer run-ins at the campus coffee shop, always managed to claim the exact study carrel opposite yours, and consistently showed up to the dining hall at the precise hours you ate. He spent his time finding tiny, specific ways to make your life difficult. He scoffed at your multi-colored planners. He made loud, sarcastic remarks to his hockey friends whenever you walked past them in the quad.

At a massive, crowded house party three weeks ago, when he was thoroughly brave from drinks, he had loudly referred to you as "Boring Barbie" to a group of freshmen, making sure his voice carried right over the music to where you were standing. Worse, when your awful, cheating ex-boyfriend had walked into the same party, Dean had gone out of his way to walk over, high-five the guy, and loudly proclaim that he was glad the guy had ghosted you because surviving your daily lecture schedule deserved some kind of military medal.

He even wrote a completely unhinged satirical song about your rigid study habits, scribbling the lyrics on the back of a greasy pizza box during a team mixer, and had Tucker leave it leaning against your dorm room door the next morning. The lyrics had claimed that the mere sight of your highlighters made him physically sick to his stomach.

It was petty. It was relentless. It was an absolute campaign of academic harassment.

By late February, the slush outside had turned to thick, brutal sheets of black ice. You were sitting in the campus diner with a couple of girls from your major, trying to eat a plate of fries while reviewing your notes for the mid-term presentation.

Two booths down, Dean was sitting with Logan and Garrett. He wasn't eating. He was leaning over the back of his seat, his dark eyes fixed on the back of your head, occasionally tossing a balled-up straw wrapper toward your table with perfect, annoying accuracy.

"He's doing it again," one of your friends muttered, her fork hovering over her salad as she glared past your shoulder. "I swear to God, someone needs to report him to the athletic board. The guy is completely obsessed with tormenting you. It's like he has a psychological defect."

"He's just an arrogant jerk who can't handle the fact that a girl is smarter than he is," the other agreed, shaking her head as she reached over to intercept a stray straw wrapper before it could land in your ranch dressing. "Seriously, how do you not throw your hot tea in his face? He literally spent twenty minutes yesterday in the seminar lobby telling everyone that your thesis statement looked like it was written by a middle-school debate club."

You took a slow sip of your tea, your eyes drifting to the small, scratched mirror on the wall of the booth. Through the glass, you could see Dean. He was currently watching you with an intensity that was almost terrifying. He wasn't even listening to whatever Logan was saying; his entire focus was anchored to the movement of your shoulders, his jaw tight, his silver pen spinning endlessly.

And that was when the strange, quiet realization finally clicked into place.

"You know," you said softly, setting your mug down on the formica table. "He really puts a lot of effort into it."

Your friend blinked. "Into being an absolute monster?"

"No, just... into me," you murmured, a tiny, thoughtful frown touching your lips as you watched his reflection. "Think about it. Dean Di Laurentis famously misses team practices because he can't be bothered to set an alarm. He hasn't checked his student email since last year. He forgets his own skates half the time. But he knows exactly what time my seminar ends. He knows my exact highlighter preferences. He remembered a quote I used in an essay four weeks ago just so he could write a three-page satirical poem about it and slide it under my door."

The girl across from you paused, her eyebrows furrowing. "Okay... so he's a very dedicated bully."

"No," you said, a slow, bizarre sense of amusement suddenly washing over your chest, replacing the cold weight of the winter stress. "It's not bullying. It's too specific. It's too hyper-focused. Some people would be offended by the 'Boring Barbie' comments, but honestly? It's wild. The amount of hours he has dedicated to hating me is staggering. No man has ever given me this much undivided attention in my entire life."

She stared at you as if you had just started speaking in tongues. "Are you losing your mind? The guy high-fived your ex-boyfriend. He wrote a song about how much he hates your face."

"I know," you said, a small, genuine smile finally breaking through your lips as you looked back at your notes. "But he wrote a song. He sat down, found a pen, thought about my face for an hour, and composed lyrics. It's precious. It's like a tiny toy chihuahua barking at me from inside a designer purse, trying to convince me it's a wolf. He thinks he's being vicious, but it's actually adorable. It's honestly... kind of romantic."

"You've officially succumbed to academic delirium," she declared, reaching over to feel your forehead. "The hockey captain is trying to ruin your sanity, and you think he's being sweet."

"I'm telling you," you laughed softly, picking up your teal highlighter with a newfound sense of total, unshakeable power. "It's the most effort any guy has ever put into me. It's actually romantic."

You didn't say it to Dean. You wouldn't dare give him that satisfaction.

Instead, you simply let the realization sit in your chest like a warm, hidden secret through the rest of February and the entirety of March. Every time he launched a new attack, the bite was completely gone. You didn't get angry anymore; you just felt a deep, private sense of amusement.

When he showed up at the library and loudly complained that your typing speed was a violation of the Geneva Conventions, you just smiled and offered him a piece of mint gum. When he spent ten minutes during a group study session mocking the color-coded tabs in your textbook, you just leaned back, crossed your legs, and watched the furious, desperate way his dark eyes tracked the movement of your throat when you swallowed.

The insults still sounded nasty, but the underlying frequency had shifted. It didn't feel like hostility anymore. It felt like a man who was burning alive from an obsession he didn't know how to code into words, resorting to the language of a playground bully because the truth was too terrifying to admit.

But while you kept your mouth shut around him, you didn't stop talking to your friends. And campus, as it turned out, was a very small ecosystem.

"She thinks it's what?" Logan asked, his fork freezing halfway to his mouth as he stared at Garrett across the kitchen counter of their off-campus house.

It was a late March evening, and the hockey house was quiet for once, the rain drumming a steady, heavy beat against the dark windows. Dean was upstairs in his room, presumably plotting his next academic campaign, completely unaware of the conversation happening downstairs.

"Romantic," Garrett repeated, shaking his head with a mixture of disbelief and pure entertainment. "One of the girls in her seminar told me today. She said they were at the diner, and her friend literally looked at the pizza-box song Dean wrote and said it was precious. She thinks he's like a toy chihuahua barking from a purse."

Tucker let out a loud, booming laugh from the living room couch, throwing his head back. "A toy chihuahua? Oh my God. That is the best thing I've ever heard. Dean thinks he's this dark, menacing alpha rival, and she thinks he's an adorable little lap dog putting on a show."

"She told them that no man has ever given her this much attention," Garrett added, leaning against the counter with a grin. "She thinks the fact that he monitors her study schedule and knows her favorite coffee order is sweet. She literally told them that Dean is completely in love with her, he's just too stupid and stubborn to realize it."

Logan let out a low whistle, a slow smirk spreading across his face. "Wow. She completely flipped the script on him. He thinks he's making her life miserable, and she's just sitting there feeling flattered by the courtship ritual."

"Should we tell him?" Tucker asked, his eyes gleaming with mischief.

"Are you kidding?" Logan smiled, leaning back against the refrigerator. "Absolutely. But we have to time it perfectly. The guy has been a total train wreck for three weeks. He sits in his room staring at her thesis drafts like he's trying to decode a message from outer space. He hasn't slept a full night since February because he's too busy coming up with counter-arguments for a presentation that happened two weeks ago."

The information didn't reach Dean as a direct confrontation. It leaked out slowly, a series of subtle, agonizing drops of water designed to break his resolve.

It started the next morning in the kitchen. Dean was standing by the coffee maker, dark circles under his eyes, his silver pen spinning between his fingers out of sheer, restless habit. Logan walked in, grabbed a banana from the counter, and gave him a long, measuring look. "You heading to the library today, Dean? Got some fierce barking to do?"

Dean paused, his pen stopping mid-air. "What?"

"Nothing," Logan said smoothly, taking a bite of the banana as he walked toward the door. "Just checking. Make sure you don't forget your purse on the way out."

Dean's brow furrowed into a deep, angry line. "What the hell does that mean, Logan?"

But Logan was already down the hall, leaving Dean standing in the kitchen with a sudden, uneasy knot forming in his stomach.

Two days later, it happened again during a team meeting. They were looking over game tape, and Coach was lecturing them about defensive positioning, telling them they needed to maintain a tight, aggressive guard on the opposing forwards. Garrett leaned over to Dean, whispering under his breath, "Yeah, Dean. Real aggressive. Like a toy chihuahua. Make sure she knows how much it hurts."

Dean's head snapped around so fast his neck popped. He stared at Garrett with an intensity that could have melted ice. "If you don't tell me what that means right now, Graham, I'm going to put you through the locker room wall."

"Ask the library girl," Garrett whispered back with a lazy, unbothered grin. "I hear she thinks your short fuse is just adorable."

The words hit Dean like a physical blow to the chest. The library girl. He didn't say another word through the rest of the meeting, his mind spinning into a frantic, chaotic loop. They knew something. You had said something. He spent the entire afternoon pacing the floorboards of his bedroom, his chest heaving with heavy, frustrated breaths as he tried to piece the clues together.

You weren't angry. You weren't intimidated. You weren't even complaining about the notes or the song or the high-five.

She thinks it's adorable.

The realization arrived in his brain like a freight train, completely shattering his defenses, leaving him feeling raw, exposed, and entirely defenseless. All the effort he had put into hating you—all the late nights spent reading your favorite texts just to find a flaw, all the hours spent sitting across from you in the quiet library just to breathe the same air—you hadn't seen it as a war. You had seen it as an entry. You had seen it as an absolute, desperate form of adoration.

And the worst part, the part that made his throat tighten until he could barely draw breath, was that you were entirely right.

He didn't hate you. He had never hated you. He had been completely, desperately, and utterly obsessed with you since the second week of January, and because he was Dean Di Laurentis—a guy who didn't know how to handle a real, terrifying emotion that he couldn't charm away—he had turned it into a conflict. He had been barking at you from a tiny purse because he was too terrified to look you in the eye and tell you that you had completely ruined him for anyone else.

By mid-April, the spring thaw had finally arrived, replacing the snow with a soft, relentless April rain that kept the campus grounds damp and smelling of fresh earth.

It was a Thursday night, just after eleven o'clock. The library was nearly empty, the third floor dead quiet save for the steady, rhythmic drumming of the downpour against the large glass windows. You were sitting in your usual carrel, your books stacked neatly to the side, your fingers wrapped around a warm mug of chamomile tea. You were tired, your shoulders aching from a long day of study, but you hadn't left yet. You were waiting.

You had been waiting for an hour, but for the first time all semester, the seat across from you was completely empty. Dean hadn't shown up. A sudden, sharp sense of disappointment had taken root in your chest, a quiet, unhappy realization that maybe the game had finally run its course. Maybe he had gotten bored. Maybe the toy chihuahua had finally stopped barking.

You let out a slow, heavy sigh, closing your textbook and reaching into your bag to retrieve your jacket.

A sharp, sudden movement at the end of the aisle made you freeze.

Dean stood there.

He wasn't wearing his usual backward cap or his comfortable hockey hoodie. He was just in a dark gray t-shirt, his hair damp from the rain outside, a few loose strands clinging to his forehead. He looked entirely different. The lazy, arrogant smirk was completely gone, his jaw set in a hard, tight line, his dark eyes wide and wild as they locked onto your face.

He walked down the narrow aisle between the bookshelves, his long, heavy strides cutting through the silence of the library until he was standing right at the edge of your table. He didn't sit down. He just stood there, towering over you, his chest rising and falling with deep, frantic breaths.

"You've been talking to Garrett," Dean said. His voice wasn't its usual smooth, gravelly murmur. It was rough, raw, and bleeding with an intensity that made the hairs on the back of your arms stand up.

You kept your posture relaxed, leaning back against your chair, though your heart executed a sudden, violent leap against your ribs. "I talk to a lot of people, Dean. You'll have to be more specific."

"The diner," he snapped, leaning forward, slamming both of his large palms flat against the oak table with a sound that echoed through the empty floor. He brought his face down to yours, his eyes burning into yours with a volatile, desperate heat. "February. You told them that I was precious. You told them that my song was adorable, and that no man has ever given you this much attention."

You felt a sudden, hot rush of blood touch your cheeks, but you refused to back down. You looked right into his furious, handsome face, your lips tilting up into a small, knowing smile. "I did say that. Yes."

"Why?" Dean growled, his jaw clenching so hard a muscle ticked violently near his ear. "Why would you say that? I spent four months trying to make you hate me. I high-fived your ex-boyfriend. I called you Boring Barbie in front of half the Greek system. I've been trying to ruin your life, sweetheart."

"But you didn't," you said softly, your voice perfectly calm, steady, and entirely unyielding in the quiet room. "You didn't ruin anything, Dean. You just spent four months monitoring my schedule. You spent four months learning my habits, reading my thesis drafts, and making sure you were always in the exact same room as me. You think you were being vicious, but it was just... effort. The kind of effort a guy only puts in when he can't think about anything else."

Dean stared at you, his breath hitching completely in his throat. The raw, unadulterated shock of your total self-awareness seemed to strip away the very last of his arguments. He looked like a man who had brought a knife to a gunfight, only to realize you had already disarmed him before he even walked through the door.

"You think it's sweet?" he whispered, his voice cracking just a fraction, the dangerous edge completely draining out of his muscles.

"I think it's the most romantic thing anyone has ever done for me," you admitted honestly, standing up from your chair fully.

The movement brought you just inches away from his broad chest. You could feel the heat radiating off his skin, the crisp, rain-damp scent of his cologne filling your lungs. You reached down, your fingers sliding over the polished wood of the table until they were just a fraction of an inch away from his long, calloused fingers.

"You're an idiot, Di Laurentis," you murmured, your eyes locking onto his lips. "You spent an entire semester waging a war because you were too proud to admit that you just wanted to talk to me."

Dean let out a sharp, ragged sound, a mix between a laugh and a groan of pure, unadulterated defeat. He shook his head, his fingers trembling just a fraction as he finally reached out. He didn't ask for permission. He simply let his long, powerful fingers slide around the back of your neck, his large palm anchoring your frame to his with a possessive strength that completely stole your ability to breathe.

The touch was a total override. His palm was burning hot against your skin, and the moment his thumb pressed against your pulse point, your heart spiked violently beneath his touch.

"Shut up," Dean murmured, his voice thick with an emotion he had been suppressing since January. He slanted his head down, his forehead resting gently against yours, his dark eyes wide and deep with a fierce, protective devotion. "Just shut up and listen to me. I'm done with the bickering. I'm done with the rules."

You stared up at him, your hands automatically rising to grip his forearms, feeling the hard, steady muscle beneath your fingers.

"I lost my mind when it came to you," Dean confessed, the words pouring out of him in a desperate, breathless rush, completely bypassing his usual filter. "Logan and Garrett have been torturing me for days, and they're right. I'm a complete train wreck. I sit in my room every single night, looking at your old essays, thinking of exactly what to say to you because I was too terrified that you'd look at me and see a dumb hockey player who didn't belong in your world. I didn't want to hate you. I just wanted you to look at me, and I didn't know how else to make you do it."

The love confession hung heavily between you, raw, chaotic, and completely overwhelming. The mutual understanding that had been building in the dark behind insults and library carrels had finally fractured the surface, leaving both of you completely exposed under the harsh library lights. You looked up at his handsome, desperate face—the star athlete who always had a witty comeback, currently begging you to let him care—and the last of your quiet amusement dissolved into a deep, consuming warmth.

"I've been looking at you the whole time, Dean," you whispered, a bright, beautiful smile finally breaking through your lips as your hands slid up from his wrists to tangle deeply into the damp hair at the nape of his neck.

"Good," Dean growled softly, his grip tightening on the back of your neck as his other hand came up to cradle your jaw, forcing you to look directly into the absolute sincerity of his dark eyes. "Because you're stuck with me now, sweetheart. I'll be your boyfriend, I'll be your study partner, I'll use whatever color highlighter you want. Just don't ever tell Garrett I said that."

You let out a soft, delighted laugh, but the sound was instantly cut short as Dean leaned down and captured your mouth with his own.

The kiss was everything the months of fierce, argumentative tension had promised—intense, desperate, and completely overwhelming. It was a total chemical override that shot straight down your spine, erasing the memory of the cold winter and the library rules. He didn't hold back; his lips moved against yours with a burning, reckless hunger that had been building since the second week of the semester. He pulled your waist tightly against his hips, his arms wrapping around you and lifting you slightly off your feet, anchoring your frame to his with an unyielding strength that completely stole your ability to think.

You wrapped your arms tightly around his neck, pulling him closer, matching his frantic, breathless intensity with a hunger of your own. The absolute ferocity of the way he held you made you realize with a sudden, blinding rush of certainty that the war was over, and you had both won.

When Dean finally pulled back a fraction of an inch, his breath fanning across your lips in short, ragged gasps, his lazy, handsome smirk finally returned to his face, though his eyes were still dark with a fierce, possessive heat. He let your feet slide slowly back to the floor, but he kept his hands resting heavily on your hips, keeping your frames locked together.

"So," Dean murmured, his thumb tracing a slow, heavy circle against your hipbone. "Just to be entirely clear... you're mine now? No more telling your friends I'm a lap dog?"

"You're definitely still a lap dog," you teased, a small, tired laugh escaping your lips as you rested your head against his broad shoulder, letting his familiar, grounding warmth take over your senses. "But you're my lap dog."

"Fine," Dean chuckled, the low, rumbling vibration warming you from the inside out as he buried his face in the crook of your neck, his lips brushing against your skin in a slow, lingering caress. "As long as I get to keep you in my room."

You laughed softly, your fingers sliding down his chest to trace the line of his collarbone, the exact domestic gesture that had started this entire disaster in the first place. But this time, there were no boundaries left to cross. The bad reviews were gone, the effort had paid off, and as Dean helped you pack your books into your bag, his long fingers slotting effortlessly through yours, you knew you were exactly where you belonged.

Notes - Heyyy I had funny with this so i hope you like it! Love Ya!!

Taglist - @dilaurentispuckbunny @goawaysha @mhayes777 @purplerainx1 @05gwyn @hagarsays @starsdancegirl

[magslikesdaisies]

Bad Reviews - ❤️ Garrett Graham ❤️

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 2828

Warning - nada

The living room of the off-campus hockey house was loud, sticky, and smelled faintly of cheap beer and damp June rain. A massive post-game party was in full swing, the bass from the speakers vibrating right through the floorboards and rattling the glass windows. People were packed shoulder to shoulder, laughing, drinking, and spilling out onto the front porch.

You sat on the edge of the kitchen counter, a half-empty red solo cup held loosely in your hand, watching the crowd. You weren’t really paying attention to the chatter around you. Your eyes were locked entirely on the center of the living room, where Garrett Graham was currently surrounded by a group of freshman girls laughing at something he’d just said. He looked effortlessly handsome, wearing a backward Briar cap and a soft charcoal t-shirt that clung to his chest. He had that signature, confident smirk on his face, the one that usually meant he knew exactly how much power he held over a room.

He was a walking warning sign. Everyone on campus knew it.

"You're doing it again," a sharp voice muttered beside you.

You blinked, tearing your gaze away from Garrett to look at your friend, who was crossing her arms and giving you a deeply disapproving look.

"Doing what?" you asked, trying to sound completely unbothered as you took a slow sip of your lukewarm drink.

"Staring at Graham like he's something you can keep," she sighed, leaning in closer so her voice wouldn't get swallowed by the bass. "I’m serious. We've talked about this. You know his reputation. He doesn't do serious, he doesn't do committed, and he leaves every single girl he hooks up with completely devastated. The guy has a trail of broken hearts from here to the campus gates. It’s a terrible idea."

"It's just a fling," you replied smoothly, your voice perfectly level. You even managed a small, careless shrug. "We’re just having fun. I’m not some naive freshman who thinks she’s going to change him. This isn’t my first rodeo."

Your friend let out a frustrated breath, shaking her head. "That’s exactly what the last three girls said. He’s charming, he plays the part perfectly, and then he just checks out when things get real. You’re playing with fire, and when you get burned, don't say I didn't warn you. All the bad news about him is true."

You didn't answer. You just offered a tight, polite smile and looked back toward the living room.

On the surface, you were the picture of absolute self-awareness. You knew exactly who Garrett was. You had heard all the rumors, read the figurative bad reviews, and received a dozen warning speeches from well-meaning friends. You knew he had a short fuse when it came to hockey, that he was fiercely competitive, and that his life was structured around sport and strategy, leaving very little room for emotional vulnerability. You weren't blind. If you looked closely enough, his red flags were glaringly obvious.

But you were intentionally careless. You had been single for so long, feeling detached and isolated on campus, that when Garrett had first pulled you into his orbit three months ago, you had willingly thrown out any semblance of good judgment. He was a thrill, a brilliant, intoxicating distraction. Whenever you were alone with him in his room upstairs, away from the noise and the rumors, you deliberately closed your eyes to the reality of the situation. You twisted the warnings in your head, convincing yourself that you were too smart to get hurt, too experienced to let a hockey player break your heart.

You just wanted to feel wanted by someone, even if that someone was entirely incapable of holding onto you.

Across the room, Garrett suddenly turned his head. His dark eyes cut right through the crowd, ignoring the girls talking to him, and locked directly onto yours. The confident, easy smile on his face shifted into something heavier, more intense. He gave you a slow, deliberate nod toward the hallway leading to the stairs.

Your heart executed a sudden, violent leap against your ribs. The gut feeling, that little voice in the back of your mind telling you to turn around and walk out the front door, flared up instantly.

But you ignored it. You set your red solo cup down on the counter, slid off the edge, and began navigating through the packed room, leaving your friends behind without a second thought. You were cutting loose the warnings, refusing to admit that you might be wrong about your ability to handle him. You couldn't bear the thought of losing him, even though he wasn't even your boyfriend to begin with.

The upstairs hallway of the hockey house was significantly quieter, the thunderous bass of the party muffled by the heavy wood of the doors. You walked toward the end of the hall, pushing open the door to Garrett’s bedroom.

The room was dark, save for the faint amber glow of the streetlights filtering through the rain-streaked window. It smelled like cedar, clean laundry, and the faint, crisp scent of his cologne. You stepped inside, the door clicking shut behind you, and leaned your back against the wood, letting out a slow, shaky breath.

A moment later, the door handle turned. Garrett stepped into the room, closing it firmly behind him. He didn't turn on the lights. He just stood there in the shadows, his tall, athletic frame instantly dominating the small space. He took off his baseball cap, tossing it onto his desk, and ran a hand through his dark, messy hair.

"Hey," he said, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that sent a sudden rush of heat straight down your spine.

"Hey," you replied quietly, keeping your posture relaxed, trying desperately to maintain the cool, experienced persona you wore like a shield. "Tired of your fan club downstairs?"

Garrett let out a soft, amused chuckle, walking over to where you stood. He stopped just inches away, his broad shoulders blocking out the rest of the room, trapping you between his body and the hard wood of the door. The heat radiating off him was overwhelming, a stark contrast to the cool June rain beating against the glass outside.

"They're not my fan club," Garrett murmured, his dark eyes tracking the movement of your face in the dim amber light. He reached out, his long, calloused fingers sliding gently under your chin, tilting your face up to meet his gaze. "And you know exactly who I was looking for."

The touch was a total chemical override. Every single warning your friends had given you, every bad review you had ever heard about Garrett Graham, completely evaporated from your mind. You looked up at his handsome, confident face, and for a split second, you deliberately chose to believe that this was safe. You chose to believe that you were the exception.

"You're a distraction, Graham," you whispered, your voice trembling just a fraction despite your best efforts to keep it steady.

"Am I?" he asked softly, a lazy, dangerous smirk playing on his lips as his thumb traced the line of your jaw. He leaned down, his breath fanning warm against your skin. "You didn't seem to mind the distraction last week."

"That was last week," you muttered, your hands automatically rising to rest against his chest, feeling the steady, powerful thumping of his heart beneath the cotton of his shirt. "My friends think I'm an idiot for even being up here right now. They say you're going to break my heart."

Garrett's movements stiffened slightly. The smirk faded from his lips, replaced by a sudden, serious expression that made his jaw tighten. He stared down at you for a long moment, his dark eyes searching yours with an intensity that made it difficult to breathe.

"Is that what you think?" he asked, his voice dropping into a quieter, more guarded register.

"I think you have a reputation," you replied honestly, forcing yourself to look him dead in the eye, refusing to back down. "And I think I'm smart enough to know what this is. We're a fling, Garrett. No strings. No expectations. I'm just here for the fun."

You thought the words would sound empowering. You thought stating the rules out loud would protect you, would prove to him and to yourself that you were in total control of your emotions.

But instead, the words felt heavy, bitter, and entirely unhappy. The realization that you were actively settling for pieces of him because you were too scared to ask for the whole thing sent a dull, throbbing ache straight through your chest.

Garrett didn't say anything for a long time. He just stood there, his hand still cupping your jaw, his thumb smoothing over your skin in slow, agonizingly tender circles. The silence stretched between you, thick, suffocating, and heavy with everything you were both actively trying to hide.

"Right," Garrett finally muttered, his voice rough and entirely stripped of its usual confident veneer. He let out a sharp, frustrated breath, his hand dropping from your face as he took a half-step back, creating a sudden, freezing pocket of air between your bodies. "No strings. Just fun."

He walked over to the edge of his bed, sitting down heavily and resting his elbows on his knees, staring blankly at the floorboards. The easy, untouchable star athlete was gone, replaced by a quiet, brooding frustration that you had never seen before.

You stood by the door, your arms automatically crossing over your chest as a sudden wave of panic washed over you. The cool, unbothered wall you had spent months building felt incredibly fragile.

"Garrett?" you asked softly, taking a hesitant step toward the bed. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he snapped, his short fuse momentarily flaring before he caught himself. He pinched the bridge of his nose, letting out a long, ragged sigh. "Nothing is wrong. I'm just tired. Tough practice today."

"You're lying," you said, closing the distance between you until you were standing right in front of him. You looked down at his broad, hunched shoulders, the feeling of absolute misery radiating off him making your own heart ache. "You always do this when you get stressed about a game. You check out. You pull away."

"I'm not pulling away," Garrett said, his head snapping up to look at you. His dark eyes were wide, intense, and completely stripped of any defensive guard. The raw honesty in his expression caught you entirely off guard. "I'm sitting right here. I'm always right here when you want to drop by after a party or text me when your dorm gets too quiet. I've been playing by your rules for three months."

"My rules?" you repeated, your brow furrowing in confusion. "Garrett, you're the one who doesn't do relationships. You're the one with the bad reviews."

"Because it's easy for people to say that when they don't know anything!" Garrett shouted suddenly, standing up from the bed fully. His towering frame instantly closed the distance between you, his chest practically brushing against yours as he looked down at you with a fierce, volatile frustration. "I don't care about the rumors. I don't care about what your friends are telling you in the kitchen. I care about what's happening in this room. And for three months, I've been watching you act like I'm just a temporary distraction, like I'm some dangerous mistake you're making until you find someone better."

You froze, your breath catching sharply in your throat. Your mind spun in a frantic circle as his words echoed in the quiet room.

"I'm not acting," you whispered, your voice cracking as the protective armor you had worn for months began to splinter completely. "I was trying to protect myself, Garrett. I've been alone for a long time, and I didn't want to be another girl who fell for the star hockey player and got left behind. I was trying not to care."

"Well, you failed," Garrett growled softly, his face tilting down until his forehead was resting gently against yours. His breath was shallow, hot, and frantic against your skin. "Because I failed too. A long time ago."

He reached out, his long fingers tangling into the hair at the nape of your neck with a sudden, possessive strength that completely erased your ability to think. He anchored your frame to his, his large hand resting flat against the small of your back, pulling your hips flush against his.

"I don't want to be a fling anymore," Garrett confessed, the words tearing out of his throat in a raw, desperate rush, completely bypassing his usual filter. The absolute shock of his admission hit you like a physical blow. "I'm tired of playing the cool, unbothered guy who doesn't care if you walk out that door in the morning. I sit in this house, listening to the guys talk about their futures, and the only thing I can think about is you. I don't want anyone else looking at you, and I swear to God, I don't want you going back to that dorm thinking you're alone."

Your heart hammered so violently against your ribs you were certain he could feel it through the fabric of his shirt. The mutual yearning, the hidden feelings that you had both been suppressing behind strict rules and false reputations, had finally fractured the surface.

"Garrett..." you breathed, your hands automatically rising to grip his forearms, your fingers digging into his muscles as the tears of frustration and intense relief finally pricked at the corners of your eyes. "You mean that?"

"I mean every single word," Garrett murmured, his dark eyes tracking the movement of your lips before snapping back to yours with a fierce, protective devotion. "I'll do whatever you want me to do. I'll be your boyfriend. I'll be serious. Just stop trying to look for a reason to leave."

The last of your resistance, the defensive walls, and the echoing warnings of your friends completely dissolved into the quiet of the June night. You looked up at his handsome, desperate face, the boy who supposedly broke hearts, currently begging you to let him hold onto yours.

"Okay," you whispered, a bright, breathless smile finally breaking through your lips. "No more flings."

"Okay," Garrett repeated, a sudden, beautiful wave of relief softening the sharp lines of his face.

And then, with cinematic timing against the steady drumming of the rain against the window, Garrett leaned down and captured your mouth with his own.

The kiss was everything the months of intentional carelessness had promised—intense, desperate, and completely overwhelming. It tasted like the cool night air, sweet distraction, and a burning, reckless hunger that had been building in the dark for three long months. He pulled your body fully against his, his arms wrapping tightly around your waist and lifting you slightly off your feet, anchoring you to his frame with an unyielding strength that completely stole the air from your lungs.

You wrapped your arms tightly around his neck, pulling him closer, matching his frantic, reckless intensity with a hunger of your own. The absolute ferocity of the way he held you made you realize with a sudden, blinding rush of certainty that you were never going to let each other go. The bad reviews didn't matter. The warnings didn't matter. In the dark sanctuary of his room, the invisible thread between you tightened until it was completely unbreakable.

When Garrett finally pulled back a fraction of an inch, his breath fanning across your lips in short, ragged gasps, his signature, handsome smirk finally returned to his face, though his eyes were still dark with a fierce, possessive heat. He let your feet slide slowly back to the floor, but he kept his hands resting heavily on your hips, keeping your frames locked together.

"So," Garrett murmured, his thumb tracing a slow, heavy circle against your hipbone. "Just to be entirely clear... you're mine now? No more listening to your friends in the kitchen?"

"I'm not listening to anyone but you," you muttered, a small, tired laugh escaping your lips as you rested your head against his broad chest, letting his familiar, grounding warmth take over your senses.

"Good," Garrett chuckled, the low, rumbling vibration warming you from the inside out as he buried his face in the crook of your neck, his lips brushing against your skin in a slow, lingering caress. "Because I'm not letting you go, sweetheart. They can write whatever reviews they want."

You laughed softly, your fingers sliding down his chest, the exact gesture that had started this entire disaster in the first place. But this time, there were no red flags left to hide. The warnings were gone, the rules were broken, and as Garrett pulled you toward the mattress under the quiet cover of the rain, you knew you were exactly where you belonged.

Notes - Heyy guys this is just a little something i wrote for yall while i work on part 4 of the homewrecker series. I hope you enjoy MUWAHH

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays @starsdancegirl @delusionalbubbletea @missbmc94 @snowtargaryen

[magslikesdaisies]

Close To You - 💚 John Logan 💚

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 3092

Warning - Nothing!

The Friday night rush at Malone’s was a predictable, chaotic beast.

By nine o'clock, the air inside the pub was a smoky, dark, crowded room where the scent of spilled draft beer, frying food, and damp rain from the Hastings streets outside clung to the wood-paneled walls. It was early June, and the sticky summer heat was just starting to settle over the campus, filtered through the open windows of the bar. Above the central island of the bar, neon signs cast a faint, pulsing pink light across the vinyl booths, giving the entire packed establishment a hazy, almost cinematic atmosphere.

You balanced a heavy tray of burger baskets on your shoulder, navigating the narrow paths between tables with the practiced ease of someone who spent twenty hours a week earning textbook money. On the surface, you were completely unbothered. You were the cool waiter who never dropped a glass, never mixed up an order, and never let the rowdy Briar University hockey team get under your skin.

But it was a total, absolute lie.

Your entire focus was being held hostage by table four.

John Logan was currently sitting in the corner booth, surrounded by his teammates. He was wearing a backwards baseball cap, his dark hair curling slightly at the nape of his neck, and a faded charcoal Briar Athletics sweatshirt that made his broad shoulders look impossibly wide. He was leaning back against the leather cushion, laughing at something Colin Fitzgerald was saying, his sharp jawline shifting under the dim pink glow of the neon.

You had a massive, suffocating, entirely unmanageable crush on him. It had started three months ago as a minor inconvenience, but by now, it had grown into an all-consuming fire.

Yet, you were convinced you were entirely invisible to him. To you, he was the star athlete who lived in a completely different universe. You were certain that if he even noticed you, it was just as a nameless fixture of his Friday nights—someone who brought him his chicken tenders and kept his water glass filled. You thought he had absolutely no idea who you were, and the idea of your feelings being reciprocated felt like a total impossibility.

So, you watched him in secret, collecting tiny, useless details about him over the months. You knew he always ordered his wings with the sauce on the side because he hated getting his fingers sticky. You knew he tapped his fingers in a specific, rhythmic sequence against his glass when he was distracted, and that he always wore the same faded gray sweatshirt after a tough practice. You knew the exact shade his dark eyes turned when the pink neon light hit them. You burned for him, but you kept that hunger locked away, hiding behind a mask of total professional indifference.

What you didn't know—what you were entirely blind to—was that across the room, Logan was doing the exact same thing.

The moment the hem of your apron brushed the edge of the booth, Logan’s laughter completely cut off. His entire frame went rigid, his dark eyes snapping away from Fitzgerald to track your movement across the floor. He didn't just look; he studied. His gaze followed the line of your shoulders, the way your hair was tied back, the deliberate, graceful stride of your sneakers against the sticky floorboards. His jaw loosened slightly, his red plastic cup hovering halfway to his mouth, entirely forgotten. He knew the exact moment your shift started by the sound of your sneakers hitting the floorboards. He knew you preferred working the side sections because it gave you more room to move, and he knew you always tucked your order pencil behind your left ear, never the right. He knew your name because he’d overheard the manager call it out weeks ago, and the word had been burning a hole in his tongue ever since.

But he was entirely convinced he didn't stand a chance. To him, you were completely unbothered by his existence. Every time you approached the table, you were so cool, so professional, and so perfectly guarded that he assumed you saw him as just another annoying, loud hockey player. He thought your heart was completely closed to him.

"Oh my God, someone put him out of his misery," Garrett groaned, leaning his head back against the booth and rolling his eyes toward the ceiling. "Logan, you are literally drooling. It’s pathetic. Just say something to her."

"I can't just say something," Logan snapped, his voice dropping into a rough, low growl as he finally ripped his eyes away from your retreating back, his cheeks flushing a faint, dark crimson under the pink light. He took a hasty gulp of his beer. "She doesn't look at me like that. Did you see how she handed me my menu earlier? Total ice queen. She doesn't have a single problem with me, because she doesn't even think about me. I'm just a table number to her."

"Logan, you are an idiot," Colin Fitzgerald muttered, shaking his head. "You know everything about her shift schedule, you know her name, and you literally freeze up every time she breathes in your direction. You have zero chill."

"It's a chemical override," Logan muttered defensively, leaning his elbows on the sticky table and staring at the kitchen swinging doors where you had just vanished. "I swear to God, when she's in the room, I lose my mind. It's like ultraviolet light. I can't look away even if I want to. But she doesn't care. She has no idea."

Inside the kitchen, you stood by the order window, completely unaware of the debate raging at table four. You took a deep breath, pressing your palms against the cool stainless-steel counter to steady the sudden, frantic flutter in your stomach. You needed to get a grip. It was June. You couldn't spend the rest of the summer burning for a boy who didn't even know your heart was breaking every time he smiled at someone else.

"Order up, table four," the line cook shouted, slamming a fresh basket of fries and a plate of wings onto the ledge.

You swallowed hard, your fingers automatically tightening around your order pad. Great. Back into the den.

You picked up the plates, balancing them expertly on your forearms, and pushed through the swinging doors back into the smoky, dark atmosphere of the pub. You told yourself to stay cool. You told yourself to look at the table, not at him. You walked over, your sneakers making no sound against the floorboards, and stepped up to the edge of the booth.

"Here we go," you said, your voice smooth, even, and perfectly professional as you began sliding the plates onto the wood. "Extra ranch for the wings, and the basket of fries for the table."

"Thanks," Tucker said, quickly pulling the wings toward him.

You reached down to place the final plate, your posture relaxed, entirely locked into your customer-service persona. But then, all of a sudden, you made a mistake. You shifted your gaze just an inch to the left, intending to check if Logan's water glass needed a refill.

You saw him look at you.

He wasn't looking at the food. He wasn't looking at his friends. He was looking directly up at your face, his dark eyes wide, intense, and completely stripped of any defensive guard. The proximity was sudden, suffocating, and entirely too close. For a single, fracturing second, the entire noise of Malone’s—the clinking glasses, the shouting college students, the thumping jukebox—completely faded into dead silence. The pink light caught the sharp angles of his cheekbones, and you caught the exact moment his breath hitched in his throat.

Your hand trembled. Just a fraction. The small plastic cup of ranch dressing on the edge of the plate wobbled, threatening to tip over.

You snapped your eyes back to your tray, your heart executing a violent, erratic leap against your ribs. Your face grew instantly hot. He saw you look. The cool, unbothered wall you had spent months building completely collapsed overnight. You felt exposed, caught in the act of burning for him under the neon lights.

"Anything else I can get for you guys?" you asked, your voice a little faster now, the professional mask slipping just enough to betray the absolute panic roaring through your veins.

"No, we're good, thank you," Garrett said, his eyes darting amusedly between you and Logan, who was currently frozen in place like he’d just been hit by a puck mid-ice.

"Perfect. Just let me know," you muttered. You turned on your heel and practically bolted toward the safety of the bar island, your chest rising and falling with shallow, panicked breaths. You grabbed a clean rag and began wiping down the already spotless wooden surface of the bar, your fingers shaking so hard you had to grip the fabric tightly. Stupid, stupid, stupid. You stared right at him.

Back at table four, Logan slowly let out the breath he had been holding, his hand dropping to his chest as if he were checking for a heartbeat.

"Did you see that?" Logan whispered, his voice frantic, his eyes locked on you as you furiously wiped the bar across the room. "She looked at me. She actually looked right at me. And she got flustered. I swear to God, her hand shook."

"Yeah, because you were staring at her like you wanted to eat her alive, Logan," Garrett hissed, leaning across the table. "You pulled the trigger on the gun the second she walked up. You have zero chill."

"I don't care," Logan said, a sudden, manic wave of determination washing over his face as he stood up from the booth, completely ignoring his friends' protests. He tossed a crumpled stack of cash onto the table to cover his share of the bill. "I'm not going home tonight without finally saying something. I'm tired of sitting here like a ghost. I'm waiting for her shift to end."

"Oh, this is going to be a train wreck," Fitz murmured, settling back into his seat to watch the show as Logan started walking toward the exit.

When the clock finally struck eleven, your shift was officially over. You untied your striped apron, hung it on the hook in the back breakroom, and grabbed your denim jacket. The pub was finally emptying out, the loud crowd thinning into a quiet hum. You pushed open the heavy back exit door, stepping out into the cool, damp alleyway where the summer rain was just starting to mist through the air.

You pulled your jacket tighter around your shoulders, taking a step toward the street—and then you stopped dead in your tracks.

Standing under the dim, buzzing amber light of the alleyway lamp was John Logan.

He was leaning against the brick wall, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his jeans, his backwards cap damp from the light mist. He wasn't with his friends. The rowdy hockey team was nowhere to be seen. He was completely alone, waiting in the quiet of the night, his broad shoulders squared against the chill. When the heavy metal door clicked shut behind you, his head snapped up instantly, his dark eyes locking onto yours with a sudden, breathtaking intensity.

Your heart executed a violent, erratic leap against your ribs. "Logan? What are you doing out here? The bar closed."

Logan didn't answer right away. He slowly pushed himself off the brick wall, his heavy boots crunching against the wet pavement as he closed the distance between you. Without the barrier of the bar or the safety of the crowded room, his size was overwhelming. He stopped just two feet away, his towering frame casting a long shadow over you, his breath fanning out in faint, warm plumes in the cool night air.

"I was waiting for you," he said, his voice rough, low, and entirely stripped of his usual confident veneer.

You blinked, a defensive, panicked laugh escaping your lips as you looked up at his handsome, serious face. "Waiting for me? Why? Did you leave your credit card at the table or something? Because I can check the lost and found tomorrow—"

"No," Logan interrupted, stepping even closer until his chest was practically brushing against your jacket, his dark eyes burning down into yours with a raw, agonizing yearning. "I don't care about the card. I waited because I couldn't go home tonight without finally saying it. I'm tired of being a ghost to you."

"A ghost?" you whispered, your throat feeling incredibly dry as the proximity sent a total, absolute chemical override through your veins. "Logan, you're not a ghost. You're the star player on campus. Everyone knows who you are."

"But you don't," he shot back, a sudden, frustrated honesty breaking through his tone, his jaw clenching hard. "To you, I'm just table four. I'm just the guy who orders extra ranch and taps his fingers against his glass when he's stressed. You look right through me every Friday, and it’s driving me completely crazy."

You froze, your breath catching sharply in your throat. Your mind spun in a frantic circle as his words echoed in the quiet alleyway. He knows I look at him.

"You... you noticed that?" you breathed, your voice trembling as the protective armor you had worn for months began to crack.

"Of course I noticed," Logan growled softly, taking another step into your space, completely dominating your field of vision under the amber light. "I notice everything about you. I know you hate the front section because the draft from the door makes you cold. I know you wear your hair up when you're stressed, and I know you tuck your pencil behind your left ear. I've spent three months watching you, burning for you, entirely convinced that you didn't even know my name, let alone care that I was alive."

You stared up at him, your eyes wide, your heart hammering so loudly against your ribs you were certain he could hear it. The sheer, unadulterated shock of his confession hit you like a physical blow. All this time, you had thought the flame was entirely one-sided, a secret agony you carried alone while he lived his golden life.

"I thought you didn't know who I was," you confessed, your voice dropping into a raw, bleeding whisper, the tears of frustration and relief finally pricking at the corners of your eyes. "I thought I was just a face in an apron to you. I've been losing my mind every Friday, keeping my distance because I thought you were entirely untouchable. I thought it was completely unrequited."

Logan went entirely rigid, his face turning pale under the amber light. He stared down at you, his chest heaving with heavy, shallow breaths as the reality of your words finally crashed through his brain. The arrogance, the fear, the low trust—all of it completely evaporated, leaving him entirely defenseless before you.

"Unrequited?" Logan repeated, his voice thick, a sudden, breathless wave of understanding softening the sharp lines of his face. "Are you kidding me? If you had asked me to, I would have given up everything just to be close to you. I would have broken my own heart and started a fire just to have you look at me for real."

Before you could offer another argument or let the toxic, defensive walls take over again, Logan reached out. His long, calloused fingers slid gently around the back of your neck, his large palm anchoring you to his frame with a possessive, unyielding strength that completely erased your ability to think. His thumb rested right against your pulse point, feeling the frantic, erratic thumping of your heart.

The touch was ultraviolet, a sudden, blinding rush of heat that shot straight up your spine and shattered the last of your resistance. You let out a soft, sharp intake of breath, your hands automatically rising to grip his forearms, your fingers digging into the gray fabric of his sweatshirt.

"You should be mine," Logan murmured, his voice dropping into a deep, gravelly register that left absolutely no room for debate. He slanted his head down, his dark eyes tracking the movement of your lips before snapping back to yours. "I'll sign every dotted line. I don't want to see anybody else, and I swear to God, I don't want you to look at anybody else. Just let me be close to you."

"John," you breathed, the name leaving your lips like a quiet vow, entirely stripped of your usual cool persona.

And then, with cinematic timing against the soft falling of the summer rain, Logan leaned down and captured your mouth with his own.

The kiss was everything the months of agonizing yearning had promised—intense, chaotic, and completely overwhelming. It tasted like cool rain, wintergreen, and a desperate, burning hunger that had been building in the dark for three long months. He pulled your body flush against his, his hands tangling in your hair to tilt your head back as he deepened the kiss with a fierce, protective devotion that completely stole the air from your lungs. It was an otherworldly high, a sudden, violent release of all the tension, the low trust, and the secret glances across the smoky room of Malone's.

You wrapped your arms tightly around his neck, pulling him closer, matching his intensity with a reckless, frantic hunger of your own. In the dark sanctuary of the wet alleyway, away from the prying eyes of his teammates and the rumors of the campus, the invisible thread between you tightened until it was completely unbreakable.

When Logan finally pulled back a fraction of an inch, his forehead resting gently against yours, his thumbs tracing slow, heavy circles against your jaw, you both knew the truth. The agonizing era of watching from afar was completely over.

"Come on," Logan breathed against your lips, his lazy, handsome smirk finally returning, though his eyes were still dark with a fierce, possessive heat as he grabbed your hand, his fingers slotting effortlessly through yours. "My car is parked down the street. Let's get out of the rain."

You looked down at his long fingers woven tightly through yours, then back up to his dark, expectant eyes. You gave him a slow, compliant nod, letting the final defenses melt away into the quiet of the June night.

"Okay," you whispered, a bright, breathless smile finally breaking through your lips. "Let's go."

Notes - Hii More fluffy stuff for ya'll! I hope you enjoy!! Love Ya!!

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays

[magslikesdaisies]

Earrings - 🩵 Dean Di Laurentis 🩵

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 2972

Warning - Feelings ig, angsty to fluffy dean

The silence inside Dean Di Laurentis’s bedroom was punctuated only by the rhythmic, distant hum of the campus transit bus rolling down the street outside. It was raining, a miserable, relentless early June downpour that blurred the streetlights into hazy smears against the glass of his off-campus house.

Dean sat on the edge of his mattress, broad shoulders hunched forward, staring blankly at the polished hardwood floor. The house downstairs was unusually quiet, a rare break from the usual chaos of living with Logan, Tucker, and Garrett. But Dean wasn’t appreciating the peace. He was thoroughly unhappy, and the worst part was that he had no one to blame but himself.

Slowly, his hand moved over his face, fingers sliding up into his thick hair before trailing down to his jawline. His gaze drifted to his nightstand, specifically to the small obsidian tray where he usually kept his watch, his silver rings, and his favorite pair of heavy silver hoop earrings.

Except the tray was empty. He knew exactly where they were, currently sitting somewhere beneath the sheets of your bed in the campus dorms across town.

He’d realized they were missing the exact second he walked back into his own room last Tuesday morning, his fingers reaching up to his earlobes only to find the skin bare. In the past, under the old rules, he would have texted you immediately. A casual joke, a lazy open invitation to come back over and retrieve them.

But he couldn't text you. Not about the earrings. Not about anything. Because you weren't talking.

The arrangement had started out so beautifully simple. Friends with benefits. No strings, no expectations, no messy emotional boundaries to navigate between his grueling hockey schedule and your own classes. For months, it was the perfect ecosystem. You would take the transit bus over to the hockey house after the guys settled down, or he would drive over to your dorm with late-night takeout, and the chemistry between you would do the rest. It was effortless, and Dean was entirely in his element, attentive enough to keep you coming back, but detached enough to keep his heart safely behind his ribs.

Until he completely blew it.

Dean wasn't even sure when the shift happened. It was a gradual, terrifying override. Suddenly, he wasn't just looking forward to the physical side of things; he was looking forward to the twenty minutes afterward when you would lie with your head on his chest, talking about a professor who annoyed you. He found himself noticing the way you took your tea, the specific melody of your laugh, and the fact that you always kicked your left foot out from under the duvet when you got too warm.

He’d started paying too much attention. He started caring. And because Dean possessed the subtlety of a freight train when he actually liked someone, he had let it slip.

It was a small thing, a casual comment about next semester, a lingering kiss on the forehead before you left his room, or a possessive grip on your hip in the kitchen when one of his roommates looked a fraction too long. He’d caught feelings, heavy and unmistakable, and you had noticed instantly.

And true to your own strict boundaries, you had immediately ended it. Clean, precise, and entirely devastating. “We’re crossing lines, Dean,” you had said softly, standing by his doorway last week before heading back to campus. “This was supposed to be simple. Before it gets messy, we need to stop.”

He’d tried to play it cool. He’d shrugged, flashed his trademark grin, and told you it was no big deal. Another total, absolute lie.

Ever since that conversation, you had drifted entirely out of his reach. You didn't text, you didn't drop by the house, and the silence between you felt like a physical wall. He was stuck in a state of quiet, miserable frustration, entirely trapped in his own head. He would sit at his desk, pretending to look over game tape, but his mind would be composing elaborate, agonizingly honest messages to you. He’d think of exactly what to say, how to tell you that he didn't care about it being simple anymore, that he wanted the mess, that he wanted you, and then he would stare at the flashing cursor on his phone screen for ten minutes before deleting the entire thing.

He was terrified of the finality of a real rejection. As long as he didn't say the words out loud, he could pretend there was still a chance. But the silence was killing him.

A sudden, sharp knock on the front door downstairs broke through the quiet of the house, followed by the heavy thud of footsteps on the stairs. Dean braced himself for Garrett or Logan to barge in, already preparing the mask of casual arrogance he wore like armor.

But when his bedroom door creaked open, it wasn't one of his roommates.

You stood in the doorway.

You were wearing an oversized gray sweatshirt that he recognized with a sharp, painful jolt as one of his own, one he’d left at your dorm weeks ago. Your hair was a little damp from the rain, a few loose strands clinging to the side of your neck, and your cheeks were flushed a faint pink. In your hand, you were holding a small velvet pouch.

Dean’s breath hitched completely in his throat. His heart executed a violent, erratic leap against his ribs, but he forced his body to remain perfectly still, leaning back against his headboard with a lazy, practiced nonchalance that felt like pure agony to maintain.

"Hey," you said softly, your voice hesitant as you stepped into the room, the door clicking shut behind you.

"Hey yourself," Dean murmured, his dark eyes tracking your movement as you walked over to the edge of his bed. He tilted his head, a small, artificial smirk playing on his lips. "To what do I owe the pleasure, sweetheart? Missed the drive off-campus?"

The joke fell completely flat. You didn't laugh. You just looked down at him, your eyes wide, serious, and completely stripped of the casual indifference you’d been maintaining all week.

"You left these," you said quietly, reaching out and dropping the small velvet pouch into his open palm.

Dean looked down. He untied the string, tilting the pouch until the two silver hoop earrings slid out onto his skin. They were cool against his palm, heavy and unmistakable.

"Found 'em under the extra pillow this morning when I was changing my sheets," you explained, crossing your arms tightly over your chest, taking a half-step back. "I figured you'd want them back. You usually wear them every day."

Dean stared at the hoops in his hand, his jaw clenching hard. The silence stretched between you, thick and dripping with unsaid words. He could feel the terrifying, familiar urge to say something stupid, something safe, to save the real truth for another day and let you walk out that door.

"Yeah," Dean muttered, his voice rougher than he intended as he tossed the earrings onto the obsidian tray on his nightstand with a sharp, metallic clink. "Thanks. Couldn't find 'em anywhere. Thought they were gone for good."

"They were just under the pillow," you said softly. You shifted your weight, your eyes darting toward the door. "Anyway... that's all. I should probably head back to the dorms."

You turned to leave.

It was happening exactly the way he feared. You were going to walk out, the door would close, and the distance would become permanent.

"Why didn't you just text me?" Dean asked suddenly.

The question left his mouth before his brain could stop it, raw, impulsive, and entirely unprompted.

You stopped, your back stiffening under the gray sweatshirt. Slowly, you turned around to face him again, your brow furrowing slightly. "What?"

"You heard me," Dean said, pushing himself up from the bed. He stood up fully, his towering frame instantly dominating the space between you, closing the distance until he was standing just a foot away. The smooth-talking charmer was completely gone, replaced by a dark, volatile intensity. "Why didn't you text me? It takes two seconds. 'Hey, found your hoops.' But you didn't. You waited days, put 'em in a bag, and drove all the way over here like you were delivering a package to a stranger."

You blinked, your own defenses instantly flaring at his tone. "Because we aren't texting, Dean. We made a deal. We ended things, remember? I was trying to respect the space."

"Space?" Dean let out a harsh, mocking laugh, shaking his head before snapping his eyes back to yours. "Is that what we're calling it? You've been treating me like a ghost for a week. You don't text, you don't call, and now you're acting like sending a text message is a violation of some treaty."

"Because it is!" you shouted back, your voice cracking with a sudden, raw mix of frustration and exhaustion that completely shattered your cool exterior. You stepped right into his heat, your face tilting up to meet his furious gaze. "I had to end it, Dean! You know why I had to end it. It was getting messy. You were starting to do things, to say things..."

"To say what?" Dean challenged, his voice dropping into a dangerous, gravelly register as he stepped even closer, his chest practically brushing against yours. "Tell me what I said that was so terrifying, sweetheart. Go ahead."

"You were acting like you cared!" you screamed, the admission tearing out of your throat, your chin trembling slightly despite your best efforts to look tough and untouchable. Tears of frustration finally pricked at the corners of your eyes. "You were kissing my forehead when you thought I was asleep. You were looking at me like you wanted more than just late-night drives. You were breaking the rules, Dean. And I couldn't let myself get attached to a guy who treats relationships like a joke. I had to pull the trigger before you broke my heart!"

The words echoed through the dark room, vibrant, devastating, and completely unexpected.

Dean went entirely rigid. His dark eyes widened, his jaw loosening as the sheer, unadulterated shock of your confession crashed through his brain. He stared down at your flushed face, at the tears trembling on your lashes, at the way his own sweatshirt was rising and falling with your shallow, panicked breaths.

He thought you were entirely unbothered. He thought you were the one who had walked away without a single scratch, leaving him to be the only miserable one, drowning in his feelings alone.

"You think I treat this like a joke?" Dean whispered.

The anger completely drained out of his muscles, replaced by a raw, bleeding honesty that stripped him entirely defenseless before you. He took a slow, hesitant step forward, his hands lifting from his sides, his fingers trembling just a fraction as he reached out. He simply let his long, calloused fingers slide gently around the back of your neck, his large palm anchoring your frame to his with a possessive strength that made your breath catch sharply in your throat.

The touch was a total override. His palm was burning hot, and the moment his thumb pressed against the sensitive skin of your neck, your pulse spiked violently beneath his touch.

"Dean..." you breathed, your hands automatically rising to grip his wrists, but you didn't pull away. You couldn't. The proximity was too heavy, too magnetic to fight anymore.

"Shut up for a second," Dean murmured, his voice thick with an emotion he had been suppressing for weeks. He slanted his head down, his forehead resting gently against yours, his dark eyes locked onto your lips with a fierce, protective devotion. "Just shut up and listen to me. I'm not playing a game with you. I haven't been playing a game for months."

You stared up at him, your heart hammering so loudly against your ribs you were certain he could feel it through the fabric of his sweatshirt.

"I lost my mind when it came to you," Dean confessed, the words pouring out of him in a desperate, breathless rush, completely bypassing his usual filter. "Logan and Tucker think I'm a complete train wreck. I sit in this room every single night, staring at the door, thinking of what to say to you because I was too terrified that you'd look at me and tell me I was crazy. I didn't want the space. I hated the space. I don't want to see anybody else, and I swear to God, I don't want you to look at anybody else."

Your breath hitched, your eyes widening as the reality of his words finally registered in your brain. Dean Di Laurentis was completely miserable without you. Because of you.

"Dean, you don't mean that," you whispered, a desperate, defensive wall trying to rebuild itself in your chest. "You're just... you're just used to getting what you want..."

"I mean every word," Dean growled softly, his grip tightening on the back of your neck as his other hand came up to cradle your jaw, forcing you to look directly into the absolute sincerity of his dark eyes. "I'll sign every dotted line, sweetheart. If you want a boyfriend, I'm your boyfriend. If you want the mess, give me the mess. I'm so tired of watching you walk away from me. Just let me be close to you. Please."

The love confession hung heavily between you, raw and completely overwhelming. The mutual yearning that had been building in the dark behind strict rules and off-campus boundaries had finally fractured the surface, leaving both of you completely exposed.

You looked up at his handsome, desperate face, the star athlete who always had a witty comeback, currently begging you to let him care, and the last of your resistance completely dissolved.

"Okay," you whispered, the word leaving your lips like a quiet vow.

"Okay?" Dean repeated, his voice breathless.

"Okay," you said again, a bright, tearful smile finally breaking through your lips as your hands slid up from his wrists to tangle deeply into the hair at the nape of his neck. "No more rules, Dean. I'm tired of them too."

And then, with cinematic timing against the steady drumming of the rain against the window, Dean leaned down and captured your mouth with his own.

The kiss was everything the days of unhappy silence had promised, intense, desperate, and completely overwhelming. It tasted like salt from your tears, the cool night air, and a burning, reckless hunger that had been building since the moment you tried to walk away. He pulled your body flush against his, his arms wrapping around your waist and lifting you slightly off your feet as he pressed you back against the heavy wooden door of his room, anchoring you to him with an unyielding strength that completely stole your ability to breathe.

You wrapped your legs around his hips instinctively, pulling him closer, matching his frantic, reckless intensity with a hunger of your own. The absolute ferocity of the way he held you made you realize with a sudden, blinding rush of certainty that you were never going to let each other go.

When Dean finally pulled back a fraction of an inch, his breath fanning across your lips in short, ragged gasps, his lazy, handsome smirk finally returned to his face, though his eyes were still dark with a fierce, possessive heat. He let your feet slide slowly back to the floor, but he kept his hands resting heavily on your hips, keeping your frames locked together.

"So," Dean murmured, his thumb tracing a slow, heavy circle against your hipbone through the fabric of the gray sweatshirt. "Just to be entirely clear... you're mine now? No more disappearing back to campus without a word?"

"I didn't disappear," you muttered, a small, tired laugh escaping your lips as you rested your head against his broad shoulder, letting his familiar, grounding warmth take over your senses. "I was just completely miserable."

"Good," Dean chuckled, the low, rumbling vibration warming you from the inside out as he buried his face in the crook of your neck, his lips brushing against your skin in a slow, lingering caress. "Well, not good that you were miserable. But good that you felt it too. You're stuck with me now, sweetheart."

You laughed softly, your fingers sliding down his chest to trace the line of his collarbone, the exact domestic gesture that had started this entire disaster in the first place. But this time, there were no boundaries left to cross.

"Come on," Dean breathed, detaching his hands from your hips just long enough to reach over to his nightstand. He picked up the two silver hoop earrings from the obsidian tray, sliding them into his pocket before grabbing your hand, his long fingers slotting effortlessly through yours. "My bed is already made, and I believe you have some of my property currently occupying your dorm wardrobe."

You looked down at your joined hands, then back up to his dark, expectant eyes. The distance was gone, the heavy mood was broken, and as you let him pull you back toward the mattress, you knew you were exactly where you belonged.

"I'm keeping the sweatshirt, Di Laurentis," you whispered, sliding under the heavy duvet as he climbed in beside you, his long arms immediately wrapping around your waist to pull you securely against his chest.

"You can keep whatever you want," Dean murmured against your lips, his voice full of a deep, triumphant satisfaction as he kissed you again, slow and lingering under the quiet cover of the June rain. "As long as I get to keep you."

Notes - hihi I have been meaning to write this fic for a hot minute so here you go!! Lova ya tell m what yall think!

Taglist - @dilaurentispuckbunny @goawaysha @mhayes777 @purplerainx1 @05gwyn @hagarsays

[magslikesdaisies]

She's Always A Woman - ❤️ Garrett Graham❤️

Credit© - @editfandom

Part 1 Part 2 Part 4

Word Count - 4498

Warning - uhhh just angsty

The ambient noise of the Italian restaurant, the gentle clinking of silverware against porcelain, the low, melodic murmur of couples laughing in the amber glow of candlelight, felt entirely disconnected from the cold shock vibrating through your nervous system. You sat back down in the plush booth, your fingers trembling slightly as you smoothed the fabric of your dress. The damp chill of the alleyway still clung to your skin, a phantom layer of moisture that made the warmth of the dining room feel stifling, almost artificial.

Across the table, the law student was looking at you with a mix of quiet concern and intense, focused evaluation. He didn't demand an immediate explanation. He didn't launch into a series of defensive, fragile questions about the massive, unhinged hockey captain who had just upended your dinner. Instead, he reached across the white tablecloth, his palm warm and steady as he slid his fingers over yours, offering an anchor in the middle of a storm he didn't understand.

"Are you okay?" he asked softly, his dark eyes searching your face. "We can leave right now if you want. I can pay the bill, and I'll walk you back to your dorm. You don't have to stay here."

The kindness in his voice was a physical ache. It was exactly what you had been searching for when you decided to throw yourself into the Briar dating pool: a clean, uncomplicated respect that didn't require you to decipher hidden meanings or navigate the volatile, unspoken rules of a locker room. He was treating you like the main event. He was offering you a safe harbor.

But as you looked down at his hand covering yours, a devastatingly clear realization settled deep into your chest. Garrett hadn't stopped you from moving on in that alleyway. He hadn't fought for you, and he hadn't muttered the words you had spent three agonizing years waiting to hear. But he had stained the night. His dark, suffocating shadow was still lingering over the candlelit table, an invisible third partner in a booth that was supposed to belong entirely to you.

"No," you said quietly, forcing a small, fragile smile past the tightness in your throat as you gently squeezed his hand. "No, let's stay. I'm not letting him ruin the pasta."

It was a lie, of course. The food tasted like paper, and the easy, unforced laughter that had filled the first hour of your date was gone, replaced by a polite, careful performance. You asked him about his torts professor, you listened intently as he mapped out his summer internship plans, and you gave him every ounce of the intellectual engagement he deserved. You made a silent, ironclad vow to yourself right then and there: you were done playing a game. You weren't going to use these men as shields or weapons to evoke a reaction from a boy who was too cowardly to hold your heart. If you were going to survive senior year, you had to move on for yourself, completely independent of the wreckage Garrett Graham left in his wake.

By the time he walked you back to your dorm, the rain had stopped, leaving the campus quad gleaming like obsidian under the stark amber streetlights. He kissed you gently on the cheek outside the heavy wooden doors of your building, a polite, lingering touch that promised a future if you wanted it. You watched him walk away, his hands shoved deep into his trench coat pockets, before you turned and walked up the stairs into the deafening silence of your room.

Across campus, the front door of the hockey house swung open with a violent, heavy thud that rattled the framed sports jerseys hanging in the entryway. Garrett stepped into the kitchen, the plastic takeout bag from the restaurant dangling loosely from his white-knuckled grip. He was drenched, his dark curls plastered to his forehead, his heavy team jacket dripping small, rhythmic puddles onto the hardwood floor.

The kitchen was still alive with the chaotic, loud energy of a Thursday night. Logan was sitting on the kitchen island, a controller in his hand, screaming at the television screen in the adjacent living room where a video game tournament was underway. Tucker was standing by the sink, a dish towel slung over his broad shoulder, washing the massive copper pot he had used to prep dinner.

The second Garrett walked in, the atmosphere in the room shifted instantly, the temperature dropping as if someone had left a rink door open. The absolute fury that had propelled Garrett across the quad had completely evaporated, replaced by a hollow, stunned silence that tobacco-stained his usual baseline confidence.

"Took you long enough," Logan grumbled, not looking up from his screen. "Hannah’s been in your room for twenty minutes. She said she was starving. Did you stop to buy out the entire place or..."

Logan cut himself off, his thumbs freezing over the joystick as he finally caught sight of the captain's face.

Garrett didn't look angry. He looked entirely hollowed out, his wide blue eyes staring blankly at the counter as he set the soggy takeout bag down with a strange, mechanical precision. His jaw was clenched so tight a muscle in his cheek was vibrating violently, but his eyes were completely bare, reflecting a profound, terrifying confusion that none of the boys had ever seen on him before.

Tucker turned off the faucet, the sudden silence in the kitchen heavy and loud. He wiped his hands on the towel, his gaze locked onto the dripping water falling from Garrett’s sleeve.

"Garrett?" Tucker asked, his voice dropping into that quiet, older-brother tone he used when someone on the team was dangerously close to a breaking point. "What happened? Did you get into it with someone?"

"She was there," Garrett whispered, his voice incredibly rough, the syllables cracking as they fought their way past his throat. He didn't specify who she was, but he didn't need to. There was only one person on this campus who could reduce the most ruthless, calculated hockey captain in the league to a shivering, broken ghost. "She was with him. The law student."

Logan slid off the counter, his goofy, teasing demeanor completely vanishing as he exchanged a dark, heavy look with Tucker. "Graham... tell me you didn't do something stupid."

"I crashed it," Garrett said, a sudden, sharp laugh ripping from his chest, a sound entirely devoid of humor, sharp and bleeding with self-inflicted misery. He rubbed a trembling hand over his wet face, pushing his curls back. "I walked right up to their table. I told him to back off. I told him I was her best friend and that I’d known her for three years."

"Jesus Christ, Garrett," Tucker muttered, slamming the dish towel down onto the counter in absolute frustration. "Are you completely out of your mind? You have a girlfriend upstairs! A gorgeous, perfect girl who treats you like the center of the universe, and you're running around downtown acting like a possessive, toxic psycho over a girl you claim is just your friend?"

"She's not just my friend!" Garrett roared, his voice exploding through the quiet kitchen, a raw, terrifying sound that brought the noise from the living room to an instantaneous halt. He slammed his fist against the refrigerator, his chest heaving under his damp jacket, his face flushing a violent, angry red. "She’s not just my friend, Tucker! I stood there in the rain and she looked at me... she looked at me like I was a stranger. She told me I gave her away. She told me I was splitting myself in half and using her to fill the gaps while I went home to Hannah’s bed every night."

The confession hung in the air like a suffocating fog.

Garrett dropped his head, his shoulders bowing as he gripped the edge of the counter, his breathing shallow and frantic. The platonic lie, the comfortable, safe armor he had been wearing for three years to protect his own ego, had been completely stripped away in a dark alleyway, leaving his truest, most hidden feelings entirely exposed to the elements. He hadn't been acting out of a protective, older-brother instinct. He had been acting out of a desperate, terrifying romantic jealousy. He was completely, helplessly in love with you, and the realization was currently crushing his lungs because he had realized it far too late.

"She's right," Tucker said softly, the anger draining from his voice, replaced by a profound, heavy pity that felt worse than any lecture. "You've been keeping her on a short leash, Graham. You wanted her to stay in your pocket forever, sitting three rows up from the glass, giving you her softest smiles and keeping your secrets, while you got to build a comfortable, uncomplicated life with someone else. But she’s a woman, Garrett. She’s growing up, she’s realizing her worth, and she’s leaving you behind because your comfort is costing her her sanity."

Garrett didn't answer. He couldn't. He just stood there, staring down at his damp hands, listening to the rain start up again outside, his mind completely trapped in the memory of the tears cutting through the makeup on your cheeks.

The weeks that followed were a masterclass in psychological warfare, a slow-burning torture that Garrett had to endure while locked inside the cage of his own making.

You didn't disappear from the hockey house. You fiercely refused to let his presence rob you of the boys who had become your lifeline, so you still showed up for study sessions and Sunday dinners. But the psychological distance you established between yourself and the captain was absolute.

You became an expert in preemptive spatial awareness. During a crowded Tuesday night film review in the living room, you didn't wait around for him to try and slide into the space next to you on the sectional. The second you saw him walk down the stairs, towel drying his hair, you smoothly relocated to the carpet, sitting cross-legged between Logan’s knees while he braided a section of your hair, completely immersed in a loud, theoretical debate about Mario Kart tracks.

When Garrett walked into the room, his eyes instantly locked onto the sight of Logan’s fingers tracing through your hair. The air left his lungs in a sharp, audible hitch. He stood frozen at the edge of the rug, his duffel bag slung over his shoulder, a dark, territorial heat flaring behind his eyes. He wanted to rip Logan’s hands away. He wanted to pull you up by your wrists and demand that you sit where you belonged, right next to him, where your shoulders could brush and he could anchor himself to your scent.

Instead, he had to sit across the room on the single armchair, his arm tightly wrapped around Hannah’s waist as she leaned against him. He pulled Hannah against his side with an aggressive, performative intensity, burying his face in her neck as if trying to drown out the sight of you. But over her shoulder, his blue eyes remained obsessively fixed on the floor, watching the way you laughed at something Logan muttered, your smile wide and unforced, the exact smile he hadn hadn’t seen directed at him in over a month.

The duality of his existence was driving him entirely insane. He was actively trying to force himself deeper into his relationship with Hannah, trying desperately to use her presence to silence the screaming realization in his chest. When they went out to the diner, he held her hand over the table in plain view of everyone. He bought her flowers, he took her out on meticulous, high-effort dates, and he whispered declarations of affection against her skin in the dark.

But it was a performance, a frantic attempt to rebuild a crumbling wall. Every time he kissed Hannah, his mind violently flashed back to the rain-slicked alleyway, the taste of ozone on his tongue, and the devastating echo of your voice telling him that he had given you away. He was splitting himself in half, trying to love a girl who was entirely perfect for him while his soul remained stubbornly tethered to the girl who had finally stopped waiting for him.

His performance on the ice deteriorated rapidly. During the Friday night home game against Dartmouth, Garrett was a ghost. He missed three clean passes in the first period, his timing completely off because every time he cleared the puck behind the net, his eyes automatically drifted three rows up from the glass.

You were sitting there, exactly where you had always been. But you weren't looking at him. You were leaning over, laughing at something the track athlete was showing you on his phone, your fingers lightly touching his forearm to steady yourself.

When Garrett saw that touch, a white-hot flash of absolute fury blinded him. On the very next shift, he threw a massive, illegal body check against a Dartmouth defenseman that sent the player crashing into the boards, earning Garrett a five-minute major penalty and an immediate ejection from the game. He didn't even look at the referee as he stormed off the ice, slamming his stick against the locker room wall until the composite blade shattered into jagged pieces.

The true breaking point arrived on a Tuesday evening, nearly a month after the incident at the restaurant.

The hockey house was unusually quiet, the rest of the boys having gone out to a team dinner downtown that Garrett had skipped, claiming he needed to watch tape. In reality, he had spent the last two hours sitting on the edge of his bed in the dark, staring at the ceiling, his mind spinning in the exact same torturous circle it had been trapped in for weeks.

The door to his bedroom clicked open quietly, a sliver of warm light from the hallway cutting across the hardwood floor.

Hannah stepped into the room, her hair falling softly over her shoulders, her fingers curled around the strap of her tote bag. She didn't look angry. She didn't look like a girl who was about to launch into a dramatic, tearful confrontation. She looked exactly like she always did: deeply intelligent, grounded, and possessed of a quiet, terrifyingly perceptive grace. She didn't cross the space into his personal bubble; she stayed near the threshold, a clear boundary already drawn between them.

"Garrett?" she asked softly, stepping entirely into the room. "Do you have a minute? We need to talk."

Garrett shifted, sitting up on the edge of the mattress, his broad shoulders slouching as he rubbed his palms over his face. "Yeah. Yeah, Han. Sorry, I was just... thinking. I can turn the lights on..."

"No, don't," she interrupted gently, her voice steady, completely devoid of malice but sharp with an underlying finality. She took a slow, deep breath, her gaze locking onto his wide blue eyes in the dim light. "I'm going to make this very easy for you, Garrett, because I think you've been carrying a weight that’s about to break your back, and I refuse to let you drag me down with it."

Garrett froze, his heart slamming against his ribs like a puck hitting the boards. "Han, what are you talking about? If this is about the restaurant, I told you, I was just worried about her standards..."

"Stop lying to me, Garrett," Hannah said, her tone cutting through his defensive excuse with a sharp, undeniable authority that left him completely speechless. She stepped closer, her expression full of a quiet, heartbreaking clarity. "And more importantly, stop lying to yourself. You are physically in this room with me, Garrett. You’ve been physically in my bed, you’ve been holding my hand at the diner, and you’ve been trying so hard to play the part of the perfect boyfriend. But your soul left this house weeks ago."

"Hannah, I swear to God I care about you," he stammered, his voice rising in a frantic, desperate attempt to pull the mask back up. He couldn't admit it. If he admitted what Hannah was saying, his entire world would fracture. He would have to face the fact that he was the villain in his own story. "You're amazing. You're everything I want. I'm completely invested in us."

"You want to be," Hannah corrected gently, a small, sad smile touching her lips, a display of self-worth that made Garrett feel smaller than he ever had in his life. "You want to be invested because 'us' makes sense. It's safe. It's easy. But you aren't looking at me when we're together, Garrett. You're looking past me, watching the door, completely terrified of the fact that she isn't waiting for you anymore."

"That's not true," he insisted fiercely, his jaw clenching as he shook his head, desperately defending the comfortable lie he had built. "She's my best friend. Of course I'm stressed that things are weird between us right now, but that has nothing to do with how I feel about you. I love you, Hannah."

Hannah looked at him for a long, quiet moment, and the sheer volume of pity in her eyes made his breath hitch. She saw right through the armor, past the captain's bravado, straight into the terrified, selfish boy underneath.

"I love you too, Garrett Graham," she whispered, her voice cracking for the very first time, a single tear slipping down her cheek. "I really do. But I am nobody's consolation prize. And I am definitely not going to sit in the front row of your life while you spend every single day staring out the window, waiting for your person to come home. You don't have the courage to admit what you're doing, because admitting it means you have to face the wreckage you made. But I'm not going to let your cowardice keep me in a relationship where I'm only getting half of a man's heart."

"Hannah, please," he muttered, reaching a hand out toward her, but the gesture was weak, hollowed out by the absolute truth of her words.

"I'm letting you go, Garrett," she said, stepping back out of his reach. Her posture remained entirely dignified, an incredible testament to the strength you had always respected in her. "Not because I'm angry, and not because I hate you. But because I deserve to be loved completely, the same way you secretly want to love her. Go figure out how to live with your choices. But you don't get to use me as a shield anymore."

She turned on her heel and walked out of the room. The heavy wooden door clicked shut behind her, the sound definitive, sharp, and final.

Garrett didn't follow her. He stayed rooted to the mattress, his head falling into his hands as the silence of the empty house rushed back in to bury him. He had refused to admit it out loud, he had fought the truth until the very last second, but standing in the quiet of his room, he couldn't deny the terrifying, hollow ache in his chest anymore. Hannah was gone, his safety net was completely dismantled, and he was entirely, completely alone.

Late that night, the rain returned to Briar with a violent, rhythmic fury, drumming heavily against the glass pane of your dorm room window.

The space was dark, illuminated only by the soft, ambient glow of your laptop screen sitting on your desk. You were curled up in the middle of your bed, a thick blanket pulled tightly around your shoulders, a steaming mug of matcha sitting untouched on the nightstand beside you. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, the heavy, suffocating weight behind your ribs felt lighter. The constant, physical ache that had defined your daily routine for months was finally beginning to transition into a dull, manageable thrum. You were moving on. You were succeeding.

You pulled out your phone, the screen casting a harsh white light over your face. You clicked into Spotify, your thumb hovering over the interface. On your home screen, sitting right at the top of your recent list, was the old shared playlist Garrett had made for you during your freshman year, titled with a hyper-specific inside joke about his giant water bottle that only the two of you understood.

You had spent weeks secretly hoping the slow, melancholic songs he added to that list were meant for you. You had stayed up until 3:00 AM listening to them on repeat, building a fragile tower of hope out of every lyric until the day you heard Hannah humming one of those exact tracks under her breath.

Now, you were finally ready to clear the slate. You didn't want to delete the memories entirely, but you needed his presence out of your digital space. Your thumb pressed down on the screen, preparing to duplicate the playlist so you could delete the shared link and remove his name from your profile forever.

Suddenly, the screen blinked.

The interface glitched for a split second as the green refreshing icon spun in the corner. A small, bold notification popped up at the bottom of the app, sending a violent spike of adrenaline straight through your veins.

Garrett Graham added a song • 1 minute ago.

Your breath caught in your throat, your fingers freezing over the glass. You stared at the screen, your heart slamming against your ribs with a sudden, terrifying force that made you feel like you were drowning all over again. He hadn't touched this playlist in months. He hadn't added a single track since the day Hannah had moved her things into his room.

Slowly, your thumb scrolled to the very top of the list, your eyes straining in the dark as you read the title of the newly added track.

It was an old classic rock ballad, a slow, piano-heavy melody about a woman who could kill with a smile, wound with her eyes, and ruin a man's faith with her casual lies. A song about a woman who was frequently kind and suddenly cruel, someone who took care of herself and was entirely nobody's fool.

The dual reality of the choice hit you like a physical blow to the solar plexus.

You clicked on the track, the quiet, melodic opening chords of the piano swelling through the silence of your dark room. You listened as the vocals came in, smooth and melancholic, mapping out a narrative of a man who was bleeding from a self-inflicted wound, blaming his misery entirely on the woman who had finally learned how to stand on her own two feet.

Garrett was projecting his pain onto you. To him, your healthy boundaries, your polite distance, and your refusal to let him take up space in your life felt like a sudden, calculated cruelty. He was standing in the wreckage of his own design, looking at your independence as a weapon you were using to punish him, completely blind to the fact that you were simply trying to survive the choices he had made. He was viewing you as a thief, an enigma, someone who could take him or leave him, because his immense, fractured ego couldn't handle the reality that you had finally chosen to leave.

A sudden, low flash of headlights cut through the darkness of your room, reflecting off the wet glass of your window and throwing long, distorted shadows across the ceiling.

Your breath hitched. You slid out from under the blanket, your bare feet hitting the cold hardwood floor as you walked slowly toward the window. You reached out with a trembling hand, parting the heavy blinds just an inch to look down into the dark campus lot below.

Parked directly beneath the single streetlamp, its engine idling with a low, rhythmic rumble that you could feel in your teeth, was Garrett’s heavy black truck. The windshield wipers were sweeping back and forth against the pouring rain, clearing the glass just enough for you to see the dark silhouette sitting behind the wheel.

Even from three stories up, through the misty drizzle and the dark, you could feel the gravity of his presence. He was leaning his head back against the headrest, his phone a glowing white square in his hand as he stared straight up at your lit window. He looked smaller than he ever had, his massive athletic frame completely bowed under the weight of a profound, crushing realization he had refused to admit to anyone else, but could no longer run from in the dark.

He didn't get out of the truck. He didn't turn off the engine, and he didn't make a move toward the heavy front doors of your building. He knew he had no right to knock on your door anymore. He had lost the perfect, uncomplicated life he had tried to force with Hannah, and he had broken the heart of the only person who had ever truly known him inside and out. He was trapped in his own prison, left with nothing but a slow rock ballad playing on a loop to explain the depth of his regret.

You stood there for a long, agonizing minute, the piano chords from your phone continuing to swell in the dark room behind you.

For a split, pathetic second, the old version of you, the girl who had spent three years sitting on the sidelines, waiting for him to look twice, wanted to throw open the window. She wanted to run down the stairs, step into the freezing rain, open his passenger door, and climb into the warmth of his truck just to tell him that she forgave him. She wanted to heal his guilt because she loved him too much to see him bleed.

But as you watched him stare up at your window, expecting the safety net to appear, you realized that some wounds weren't yours to clean up.

He had to carry it. He had to sit in the dark, and he had to learn how to live with the fact that his own cowardice had cost him everything. You had spent a lifetime loving him in pieces from the sidelines while someone else got the whole version, and you were finally done being a supporting character in his narrative.

Slowly, deliberately, you let go of the blind. The plastic slats clicked back into place, cutting off the light from his headlights and plunging your room back into a safe, protective shadow.

You walked back to your bed, picked up your phone, and locked the screen, bringing the music to an instantaneous, silent halt. You didn't text him. You didn't run down. You pulled the thick blanket back over your shoulders, turned your back to the window, and closed your eyes, finally letting yourself be the woman who walks away into her own future, leaving the captain entirely alone in the rain.

Notes - Heyyy we got part three!!!! I hope ya'lll enjoyyy!! Love Ya MUWAH

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays @snowtargaryen

[magslikesdaisies]

Boyfriend - 💚 John Logan 💚

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 3435

Warning - Toxic Reader and Toxic Logan. Not a healthy relationship!!

The air inside the off-campus hockey house was a suffocating cocktail of cheap vodka, warm beer, and too many bodies crammed into a space meant for half the volume. The bass from the speakers in the living room was vibrating straight through the floorboards, rattling the frames of the windows and thumping heavily against your ribs. It was the kind of party where everyone was looking for an escape, yet nobody wanted to leave.

You stood near the edge of the kitchen counter, your fingers tightly wrapped around a plastic cup of lukewarm soda, your eyes scanning the crowded room. You were a train wreck tonight, and you knew it. Your thoughts were spinning in a destructive circle, fueled entirely by the heavy, magnetic pull of the boy currently sitting on the arm of the sofa across the room.

John Logan.

The situation between the two of you was a masterclass in emotional volatility. On paper, there was absolutely nothing official binding you together. He wasn't your boyfriend. You weren't his girlfriend. It was a wordless, chaotic arrangement that lived entirely in the dark, fueled by an insane, otherworldly physical chemistry that felt almost lethal whenever you were in the same room. When things were good between you, it was intoxicating, a breathless, addictive high that made the rest of the world completely fade into background noise. But when it was bad, it was an absolute war zone. Your stress was permanently high because the trust was deeply low, creating a volatile cycle of bad vibes the second the initial fun ran out.

Right now, it was very bad.

You watched through the haze of the party as a tall blonde girl from the club soccer team leaned in close to Logan, laughing loudly at something he had just muttered. Logan was sitting back, a lazy, unbothered smirk playing on his lips, his dark eyes fixed on her face as he idly spun a red cup between his fingers. He looked effortlessly handsome, his broad shoulders filling out a casual gray crewneck, his sharp jawline highlighted by the flickering neon lights of the living room.

He didn't seem to give a single fuck that you were standing less than twenty feet away. In fact, he looked entirely too comfortable. As the blonde girl laughed, she reached out, her fingers casually brushing against Logan's forearm—a lingering, slow touch that made your blood instantly run hot. Logan didn't pull away. He just tilted his head, his smirk widening slightly as he leaned in closer to whisper something directly into her ear, his eyes half-lidded in a way you knew all too well.

He was doing it on purpose. He knew exactly where you were standing in the kitchen, and this was his sick way of punishing you for an argument you’d had over text earlier that afternoon. He wanted to see how much pressure it took to break you, playing a casual bachelor right in front of your face just to remind you that he wasn't technically yours to lose.

A sharp, hot spike of jealousy flared deep in your chest, instantly souring the air in your lungs. You didn't want to be too much, and you hated how much power he held over your mood, but watching him give his attention to someone else made you lose your mind. The hypocrisy of it was staggering. Logan was fiercely, terrifyingly possessive when it came to you; he didn't want you to see anybody else, he didn't want you to touch anybody else, and he became an absolute monster if another guy even breathed in your direction.

Two could play that game. If you couldn't have what you wanted, he wasn't about to have a peaceful evening either. If he wanted to play toxic, you would show him exactly how reckless you could get.

Turning your back on the kitchen counter, you slammed your plastic cup into the sink and marched straight onto the crowded dance floor. The music shifted into a heavy, grinding beat, the heat of the bodies pressing in around you instantly. You didn't care who was looking; you just needed to erase the image of Logan from your brain and replace it with pure defiance.

It didn't take long to find a distraction. A guy from the club lacrosse team—someone whose name you vaguely remembered as Tyler—was already moving to the rhythm a few feet away. When he caught your eye, his face lit up with immediate, predatory interest. He stepped into your space, and instead of keeping a polite distance, you stepped right into his heat, a predatory smirk of your own tilting your lips.

You threw your head back as you began to dance with him, making sure your movements were deliberate, fluid, and completely visible to anyone looking across the room. You didn't just dance near him; you turned your back to him, pressing your spine flush against his chest. Tyler let out a low breath, his hands immediately clamping onto your hips, his fingers digging in tightly as you arched your back, deliberately grinding your hips against him in time with the heavy, pulsing bass.

You leaned your head back against Tyler’s shoulder, slanting your eyes toward the sofa out of the corner of your vision to ensure Logan was watching. You wanted him to see every single inch of contact. You moved your hands up to tangle in Tyler's hair, pulling him down slightly as you laughed at a joke you didn't even hear, your hips rolling against him with a slow, heavy friction that was blatantly sexual, entirely designed to incinerate whatever control Logan had left. Tyler's grip tightened, pulling you even closer until there was absolutely no space between you, his hands sliding up the fabric of your shirt.

The reaction was instantaneous.

Across the room, Logan’s lazy smirk vanished as if it had been struck from his face. His entire frame locked up, his broad shoulders squaring instantly as his dark eyes locked onto you and Tyler. The casual, unbothered athlete was gone in a fraction of a second, replaced by a dark, volatile intensity that made the blonde girl next to him stop talking mid-sentence. Logan set his red cup down on the end table with a sharp, controlled thud, stood up from the sofa, and began cutting through the packed crowd like a blade.

You felt a thrill of toxic satisfaction ripple through your veins. You kept dancing, your hip brushing against Tyler’s leg, intentionally pushing the boundary just to see how far the thread would stretch.

A second later, a massive, calloused hand clamped around your wrist with a grip of absolute iron.

The heat of Logan’s palm was instantly recognizable, a sudden jolt of electricity that shot straight up your arm and shattered the artificial rhythm of the dance floor. He didn't just step into the space; he entirely dominated it, his towering frame casting a long shadow over you and Tyler.

"She's with me," Logan barked, his voice dropping into a low, gravelly register that left absolutely no room for debate. He didn't even look at Tyler, his eyes fixed entirely on the crowd behind the guy's shoulder, his posture radiating a dangerous, physical promise that made the lacrosse player instantly raise his hands in a defensive gesture.

"Hey, man, no trouble," Tyler muttered, quickly backing away into the safety of the shifting crowd, leaving the two of you stranded in the center of the floor.

You snapped your wrist out of Logan’s grip, your chest rising and falling with fast, shallow breaths as you glared up at him. "What the hell is your problem, Logan? I was dancing."

"Like hell you were," Logan sneered, stepping even closer until his chest was practically brushing against your shoulder, his dark eyes burning with an unhinged, territorial fury. He didn't ask for permission. He simply reached out, his large hands clamping firmly onto your hips, anchoring you to his frame with a possessive strength that made your heart hammer against your ribs. "You don't dance with other guys. You know the rules."

"We don't have rules!" you shouted over the booming bass, a bratty, defiant smirk tilting the corner of your lips as you looked up at his handsome, enraged face. You intentionally kept your posture rigid, refusing to move with him as the music continued to thud around you. "You don't own me. You're not my boyfriend."

"Don't play that semantic bullshit with me tonight," Logan growled, his grip tightening on your hips until it was almost bruising, forcing your body to sway slightly against his legs. The sexual chemistry between you was roaring to life, a thick, suffocating heat that always made it impossible to think clearly whenever he was this close. "You think I didn't see what you were doing? You were looking right at me."

"Maybe I was bored," you shot back, tilting your chin up, your tone dripping with an artificial sweetness meant to drive him completely over the edge. "Maybe I wanted to see if someone else could actually keep my attention for more than five minutes. The soccer girl seemed to think you were fascinating, so I figured you were occupied."

Logan’s jaw clenched so hard a small muscle jumped violently in his cheek. He let out a low, dangerous growl, his eyes tracking down to your lips before snapping back to yours. "We are going outside. Right now."

"No," you said stubbornly, planting your feet.

Logan didn't argue. He simply dropped one hand to your wrist, turned on his heel, and dragged you through the packed living room with a single, unyielding pull. You stumbled behind him, your shoulder bumping against several drunk students who quickly cleared the path when they saw the expression on the hockey player's face. He pushed open the heavy wooden front door of the house, pulling you out onto the wide, shadow-drenched front porch before slamming the door shut behind you, cutting the volume of the music down to a low, muffled thud.

The cool night air hit your skin instantly, a sharp contrast to the suffocating heat of the house, but it did absolutely nothing to cool the volatile temperature between the two of you.

You yanked your arm back, successfully freeing your wrist this time, and took two steps away from him, your boots clicking loudly against the wooden floorboards of the porch. "Don't touch me! You have absolutely no right to pull me out of a party like I'm some misbehaving child."

"Then stop acting like one!" Logan shouted, turning to face you fully, his hands shoving deep into the pockets of his jeans as he pacing the narrow width of the porch like a caged animal. "You went out there with the sole intention of starting a fight with me. You didn't want that guy, you just wanted to see me lose my mind."

"And you did!" you screamed back, your voice cracking with a raw, ugly mix of frustration and profound exhaustion. "Because you are a hypocrite, John. You sit there on the sofa for an hour letting some random girl stroke your ego, but the second I even look at another human being, you play the territorial caveman. It is exhausting. You want all the perks of having me, but you don't want the title. You want the control, but you got issues."

Logan stopped his pacing, his large frame freezing under the dim, yellow glow of the porch light. He let out a harsh, mocking laugh, shaking his head as he looked down at the floorboards. "I got issues? Look at yourself. You're a motherfucking train wreck tonight. You think I was flirting with her? She was asking me about the schedule for the charity game next weekend. I was being polite."

"You were smirking!" you accused, crossing your arms tightly over your chest, your chin trembling slightly despite your best efforts to look tough and untouchable. "You love the attention. You love keeping me waiting, wondering where the hell I stand with you. I try to open up, I try to love more, and you just push back until I feel like I'm losing my mind."

"Because every time I try to open up, you build a wall!" shot back Logan, stepping into your space again, his voice rising to match yours, raw and entirely stripped of his usual confident veneer. He stood directly over you, his chest heaving with heavy, frustrated breaths. "You think this is easy for me? On the surface, everyone thinks I'm just some unbothered hockey player who doesn't give a fuck. But I lose my mind when it comes to you. I take time with the ones I choose, and I chose you. I don't want a smile if it ain't from you."

The admission hung heavily in the cool night air, thick, terrifying, and entirely unexpected.

You stared up at him, your breath catching in your throat, your anger briefly faltering as the honesty of his words hit you. But the toxic, defensive armor you both wore was too thick to dissolve with a single sentence.

"Then make me your girlfriend, Logan," you challenged, your voice dropping into a quiet, dangerous whisper that cut through the silence of the yard. "If you don't want me to see nobody else, if you don't want me to touch nobody else, then stop keeping us in the dark. Give me a reason to trust you."

Logan went entirely rigid, his face turning pale under the amber light. He looked away, his gaze tracking out toward the dark, empty street, his jaw tightening as the familiar, suffocating panic of commitment took hold of his throat. He wanted you—he wanted you so desperately it scared him to death—but the word itself felt like an anchor he wasn't ready to drop.

"You know I can't do that right now," he whispered, his voice rough and hollow. "With the season, the draft scouts, my dad... everything is too complicated. I can't guarantee that by myself right now."

"Then you don't get to tell me who I dance with," you snapped, the rejection stinging so heavily it felt like a physical blow to your chest. You turned away from him, your hands gripping the wooden railing of the porch as you stared out into the darkness, hot, angry tears finally spilling over your eyelashes. "I can't have what I want, and neither can you. That's the deal we made. So stop playing the boyfriend when it suits your ego."

Even though you weren't his, the absolute ferocity of the way the two of you fought made you honestly feel like you were just in love. It was a sick, twisted reality; the anger was just an extension of the insane passion that lived underneath the surface, a constant, volatile storm that kept you both bound to the same thread. When push came to shove, you were both train wrecks, destructive elements that crashed into each other because the fire was too bright to walk away from.

Logan didn't answer for a long time. The only sound on the porch was the distant hum of the bass from inside the house and the rustle of the wind through the oak trees in the front yard.

Slowly, the heavy crunch of his boots sounded against the wood as he moved closer. He didn't pull you back into an argument. Instead, he stepped up directly behind you, his massive chest pressing gently against your back, his warmth instantly shielding you from the cool night breeze. He reached out, his long arms sliding around your waist from behind, his large hands overlapping against your stomach as he pulled you back securely against his frame.

You stiffened, your hands tightening on the railing, your instinct telling you to push him away, to be bratty, to keep the fight alive because the anger was safer than the vulnerability.

"Don't," you whispered, your voice breaking.

"Shut up for a second," Logan murmured against the crown of your head, his voice entirely devoid of anger now, replaced by a deep, bleeding exhaustion that matched your own. He buried his face in the crook of your neck, his warm breath sending a light, involuntary shiver down your spine. He squeezed his arms around your waist, holding you so tightly it felt like he was trying to fuse the two of you together. "Just let me hold you for a minute. Please."

The fight completely drained out of your muscles. You let your head fall back against his shoulder, your eyes closing as you let his familiar, grounding weight take over. It was a toxic loop, a constant swing between extreme hostility and absolute, otherworldly comfort, but in this specific moment, the touch was your birthright.

"We are so stupid," you whispered into the dark yard.

"I know," Logan breathed, his lips brushing against the sensitive skin of your neck, a slow, lingering caress that made your hands release the railing to cover his own against your stomach. "We are an absolute disaster. But I swear to God, if I saw that guy touch you for one more second, I was going to throw him off the porch."

"He was a terrible dancer anyway," you muttered, a small, tired laugh escaping your lips.

Logan let out a low, rumbling chuckle against your skin, the vibration warming you from the inside out. He turned you around slowly within his hold, keeping his hands on your waist until you were facing him fully. He looked down at you, his dark eyes tracing the tracks of the tears on your cheeks, his expression full of a fierce, protective devotion that he only ever showed when the rest of the world was locked out.

"Baby, we ain't gotta tell nobody what we are," Logan murmured, his thumb reaching up to gently wipe the dampness from your cheekbone, his touch incredibly tender. "We don't need the campus talking about us. We don't need their opinions. It's just you and me. It's always been just you and me."

"But it hurts, Logan," you said softly, looking up into his eyes with a raw, bleeding honesty. "When the fun goes, the bad vibes are too much. I want to kiss you, I don't want to miss you, but we have too many issues."

"I know," he whispered, his face dropping lower, his breath fanning across your lips. "But look at me. I'm not going anywhere. I'm a train wreck too, but I'm your train wreck."

Before you could offer another argument or let the toxic defenses take over your brain again, Logan leaned down and captured your mouth with his own.

The kiss was everything the situationship was—intense, chaotic, and completely overwhelming. It tasted like sweet soda, cool night air, and a desperate, burning hunger that had been building since the moment you entered the party. He pulled your body flush against his, his hands tangling in your hair to tilt your head back as he deepened the kiss with a possessive, unyielding strength that completely erased your ability to breathe. It was an otherworldly high, a sudden, blinding rush of dopamine that made all the screaming, all the jealousy, and all the low trust completely worth the price of admission.

You wrapped your arms tightly around his neck, pulling him closer, matching his intensity with a fierce, reckless hunger of your own. In the dark sanctuary of the front porch, away from the prying eyes of the crowd and the rumors of the campus, the invisible thread between you tightened until it was unbreakable.

You weren't his girlfriend. He wasn't your boyfriend.

But as Logan finally pulled back a fraction of an inch, his forehead resting against yours, his thumbs tracing slow, heavy circles against your hips, you both knew the truth. Neither of you was ever going to let the other go. You were bound to the wreck, trapped in a beautiful, volatile dance that drove you completely crazy, totally smitten and entirely incapable of walking away from the fire.

"Come on," Logan breathed against your lips, his lazy, handsome smirk finally returning as he grabbed your hand, his fingers slotting effortlessly through yours. "My car is parked down the street. Let's get out of here."

You looked back at the heavy wooden door of the house, then back to his dark, expectant eyes. You gave him a slow, compliant nod, letting the bratty defiance melt away into the quiet of the night.

"Okay," you whispered. "Let's go home."

Notes - Hi hi I am trying to work on more fics so I am going to be doing to big drops where I drop like 4-7 fics at a time. tell if yall love or hate that!!

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays

[magslikesdaisies]

Go Go Juice - 🩵 Dean Di Laurentis 🩵 + 🩷 Beau Maxwell 🩷

Credit© - @iconsoffcampus

Word Count - 2522

Warning - Creepy men.

The line between a harmless night out and total, unadulterated chaos was usually measured in fluid ounces.

When you had officially called time of death on your most recent casual fling earlier that afternoon, you had full intentions of handling the rejection like a mature, well-adjusted university student. You were going to go to your room, listen to a melancholy playlist, and perhaps treat yourself to a massive iced matcha. But a broken heart apparently did not care about rational blueprints. By the time the clock struck nine in the evening, your roommates had successfully dragged you to Blackout, the absolute loudest, most suffocatingly crowded basement bar near the Briar University campus.

The bass was rattling the cheap neon signs on the brick walls, the air smelled heavily of spilled vodka and sticky floors, and you were currently nursing your third glass of what the bartender called the house special juice. It was a neon pink concoction that tasted exactly like melted popsicles and pure octane, and it had completely erased your ability to make sound executive decisions.

A girl who knew her liquor was almost always a girl who had just been dumped. As you sat in a cramped booth while your friends tore up the crowded dance floor, you pulled your phone out of your pocket. The whole week had been brutal. You were entirely done sitting around waiting for a text back from a guy who couldn't commit, and a sudden, manic wave of liquid courage told you that it was time to find a distraction. You weren't trying to go to a club or wait for a party invitation. You were quite literally just drinking to call someone.

Your thumb hovered over your contact list, your vision doubling slightly as the pink juice did its work. Ain't nobody safe when you were a little bit drunk. It could be John, it could be Larry, gosh, who was to say? Or maybe you were feeling a little bit toxic, ready to scroll straight down to the names that caused a little bit of trouble.

You clicked on the first name that made your chest twist with a familiar, dangerous thrill: Dean Di Laurentis.

Your previous arrangement with Dean had been a masterclass in sharp wit and heavy friction, a whirlwind of late-night visits and intense soccer-style banter that had ended entirely because both of you were too stubborn to admit you were falling. You pressed the call button, leaning your head back against the sticky vinyl cushion of the booth, waiting.

"Hello?" Dean’s voice cut through the line after two rings, instantly sounding sharp, alert, and thoroughly suspicious. He was clearly sitting in his quiet off-campus house. "Why are you calling me at eleven on a Friday? Are you okay?"

"Deany," you cooed into the microphone, a giant, sloppy smile spreading across your face. "How have you been? What's up? I miss you and I think about you every single minute. Do you still love me?"

There was a long, stunned pause on the other end of the line, followed by the distinct sound of Dean sitting up fast in his bed, the sheets rustling loudly. "Are you slurring your words? Where the hell are you right now? It sounds like you're standing inside a jet engine."

"I am sipping on my go go juice, Dean, I cannot be blamed," you giggled, waving a hand in the air to an invisible audience. "Should we hook up? If you are still disinterested in me, well, whatever. I am just having some good old-fashioned fun to numb the pain."

"Give me your exact location right now," Dean demanded, his voice dropping into that lower, commanding register that usually made your knees weak. "I am coming to get you."

"No way, Deany!" you laughed, already scrolling through your contacts with a blurry thumb. "I am a free bird. Bye!"

Before he could protest, you hung up the phone and immediately tapped the next name that promised a beautiful distraction: Beau Maxwell. Beau was the star quarterback of the Briar football team, a towering force on the field who had been Dean's absolute best friend since their childhood days growing up together in Connecticut. He briefly turned your life upside down last semester with his easy, athletic charm and a fiercely protective streak that ran just as deep as his loyalty to Dean.

You pressed call, bouncing on the vinyl seat as the phone rang.

"What's going on?" Beau’s deep, confident voice echoed through the speaker, instantly recognizable. "Who is this?"

"Beau baby!" you cheered, leaning into the microphone with a conspiratorial whisper. "Answer me, baby, are you in town? I miss you. You're the best quarterback in the country, and I just think we should hook up again. What do you think?"

"Are you drunk?" Beau asked, his tone shifting instantly from relaxed to heavily alert. He could clearly hear the booming bass of the bar through the line. "Where are you? Who are you with?"

"I am at Blackout, sipping on the juice," you told him proudly. "But don't worry about it. I am just trying different numbers, didn't think that you'd pick up."

"Stay exactly where you are," Beau snapped, the sound of his car keys jingling loudly over the speaker as he clearly bolted out the door. "I am ten minutes away. I am coming to get you right now."

"Absolutely not!" you shouted cheerfully. "You guys are entirely too bossy."

A stroke of absolute drunk genius suddenly hit your brain. Instead of letting them come after you separately, you decided it was time for a masterclass in efficiency. You pulled the phone away from your face, hit the button to add a call, and successfully initiated a three-way group call, patching Dean directly back into the line with Beau.

"What is happening now?" Dean’s sharp voice cut back in, his tone instantly dropping into an icy, competitive register the second he recognized the line was active again. "Who else is on this call?"

"Di Laurentis?" Beau barked, his confusion instantly softening into an easy, synchronized understanding as he realized exactly who was on the line. "What are you doing on her phone? Is she with you?"

"No, she's at Blackout," Dean intercepted quickly, completely bypassing any hesitation. They both knew your history, and quite frankly, neither of them minded sharing your attention when it came to the other guy. "She's completely hammered, Beau. I am already out the door. I know exactly what bar she's at."

"Alright, I am already heading down the street," Beau shot back, the sound of his engine roaring to life over the speaker. "I will meet you at the entrance. Don't let her wander off."

"Listen to me," you said, suddenly feeling very brave as you held the phone up high. "I said no. Both of you are being way too serious. I don't need a babysitter, I need to dance. Bye, it's me, love you, hang up!"

You slammed the red button on your screen, cutting off the coordinated instructions of both boys, and slid the phone securely into your back pocket. If Dean and Beau thought they could just swoop in and ruin your night of self-medication, they were entirely mistaken. You finished the last sugary drop of your neon pink drink, stood up from the booth with a slightly wobbly posture, and marched straight onto the packed dance floor.

The crowd was a shifting, sweating mass of bodies moving to a heavy electronic beat. You pushed your way into the center, throwing your hands in the air, letting the music wash over your thoughts until the lingering ache of your recent breakup was entirely buried under the noise.

But the safety of the crowd vanished a few minutes later.

You were moving to the rhythm, your eyes closed, when you suddenly felt a heavy, unwanted pair of hands grip your hips from behind. You snapped your eyes open, stumbling slightly as a guy you had never seen before pulled himself flush against your back, his breath smelling heavily of stale beer as he leaned down toward your ear.

"You're dancing all by yourself, beautiful," he muttered, his grip tightening on your waist as he tried to force you to move with him. "Why don't we get out of here and find somewhere quieter?"

"No, thank you," you said, your drunk brain suddenly flooded with a sharp wave of discomfort. You tried to pull away, but the dance floor was too packed, and his hands remained firmly locked onto your hips, anchoring you in place. "Let go of me, please."

"Come on, don't be like that," the guy smirked, entirely ignoring your protest as he pulled you closer, his posture aggressive and entirely too suffocating. "You were having a good time a second ago."

Before you could scream over the music or push him away with your full weight, the atmosphere on the dance floor completely fractured.

A massive, leather-jacketed arm materialized out of the neon fog, grabbing the creepy guy by the front of his shirt and violently ripping him backward away from you. The guy stumbled over his own feet, crashing into a group of nearby students as Dean Di Laurentis stepped into the clearance, his broad shoulders squared, his face twisted into an expression of absolute, terrifying rage. His dark eyes were burning, a dangerous, volatile energy radiating off his frame as he stood guard directly in front of you.

"She told you to let go of her," Dean growled, his voice carrying over the booming bass with a lethal clarity that made the surrounding crowd immediately back away to create a wide circle.

Before the creepy guy could even recover his balance or mount a defense, Beau Maxwell materialized from the opposite side of the crowd. Beau’s massive football frame completely blocked the guy's exit path, his jaw set in a hard, dangerous scowl as he stepped up right beside his childhood best friend, looking down at the stranger like he was a minor inconvenience on the field.

"If you even look in her direction again, I am going to personally throw you through that brick wall," Beau muttered, his deep voice entirely devoid of warmth.

The creepy guy took one look at the two towering varsity athletes flanking him, turned completely pale, and instantly vanished into the shadows of the exit corridor without saying a single word.

The immediate danger was gone, but the heavy, protective tension in the air didn't dissipate. Dean turned around slowly, his chest rising and falling with heavy, ragged breaths as his dark eyes locked onto your face. The unbothered, arrogant mask he usually wore for the campus was entirely gone, replaced by a raw, furious worry that made him look completely unhinged.

"Are you out of your mind?" Dean demanded, stepping right into your personal space, his large hands coming out of his pockets to firmly grasp your elbows. He pulled you up against his chest, checking you over for any signs of harm with a frantic, desperate intensity. "We told you on the phone we were coming to get you. Why the hell did you walk onto the dance floor alone?"

"Deany," you mumbled, your adrenaline suddenly fading and leaving your knees feeling like absolute jelly. You slid right against his chest, your hands automatically tangling in the fabric of his jacket for balance. "And Beau. You both made it. You look so handsome when you're playing the hero."

"Relax, Dean, she's alright now," Beau said smoothly, stepping in close and wrapping a large, comforting hand around the nape of your neck, his thumb caressing your skin with total ease. He didn't care at all that you were flush against Dean; in fact, the shared proximity felt incredibly natural for both of them. "Come here, sweet girl. Let's get you out of this crowd."

"She is an absolute menace when she's like this," Dean muttered, though the anger completely bled out of his voice, replaced by a rare, soft warmth as he looked down at your messy hair. He effortlessly slotted his fingers through yours, anchoring you between his chest and Beau's massive frame.

"Wait, wait," you giggled, your head swinging back and forth between them like you were watching a movie. The go go juice was still swirling in your system, making the entire dramatic rescue feel incredibly funny. You reached out with a shaky finger, poking Beau directly in the center of his chest. "Beau is the quarterback. He has a very big arm. We should all go together. We can get more juice."

"Absolutely not," both boys murmured in unison, though this time it was accompanied by a pair of fond, knowing smiles.

"See? You're bonding," you cheered, completely entertained by the sheer comfort of the situation. You leaned your full weight back against Dean’s sturdy frame, your fingers idly messing with the collar of his jacket, while your other hand remained securely held in Beau's broad palm. "You both care about my safety so much. I love it."

Beau let out a low, breathless laugh, sharing a lingering, amused look with his best friend over your head. "We're taking her back to your place, right?"

"Yeah," Dean nodded, his chest vibrating against your back as he adjusted his hold. Without a single hint of hesitation, he easily swept his broad arms under your knees and lifted you entirely off the ground in a classic bridal carry.

You let out a loud, delighted shriek, instantly wrapping your arms tightly around his neck as he held you against his chest. "I am flying!"

"I've got her phone and her keys," Beau said easily, grabbing your dropped plastic cup to toss it in a nearby bin before falling into step right beside Dean. He kept a protective hand resting on your lower back as Dean carried you toward the heavy exit doors, ensuring the crowded bar parted for the three of you like the Red Sea.

"You're not going to puke on me, right, baby?" Dean asked, looking down at you with a sudden, worried squint as he pushed through the exit doors into the cool night air.

"I am going to sing," you announced proudly, burying your face in the crook of his neck, completely safe and content.

As the cool wind hit your face, you let out a long, happy sigh. The heartbreak from earlier that afternoon was entirely gone, completely numbed by some good old-fashioned fun and the chaotic, fierce, and entirely united protection of the two best guys from Connecticut. You turned your head slightly, kissing Dean’s jawline lazily, before looking up to flash Beau a bright, sleepy smile.

"You're both so vain," you mumbled into Dean's skin, your eyes finally fluttering shut as the go go juice victory lap came to a peaceful end. "You probably think this night is about you."

Dean just shook his head, a real, breathless laugh leaving his chest as Beau opened the passenger side door of the car for him. "Just go to sleep, you absolute lunatic."

Notes - Heyy I have more Beau stuff coming soon I swear!! Anyways I hope you enjoy 💖💖

Taglist - @dilaurentispuckbunny @goawaysha @mhayes777 @purplerainx1 @05gwyn @hagarsays

[magslikesdaisies]

How did it end? - 🩵 Dean Di Laurentis 🩵

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 3368

Warning - Just sad shit (I don't why it is marked as mature bruh)

The campus did not mourn in silence. It conducted a public autopsy, picking through the remnants of what had belonged to you and Dean Di Laurentis with a sharp, clinical curiosity.

When a relationship of that magnitude collapsed under its own weight, the aftermath was rarely left to settle in the dark. Instead, it became common property. For three weeks, you had navigated the hallways of Briar University feeling less like a person and more like a crime scene, walking through crowded lecture halls where the whispers followed you like a physical shadow.

The worst part of it was the sheer imbalance of the scrutiny. Nobody questioned Dean. He was the brilliant, untouchable hockey legacy with a sharp edge and a permanent armor of unbothered arrogance. When Dean walked into the varsity athletic center, his teammates didn't press him for details, his coaches didn't look at him with heavy, pitying eyes, and casual acquaintances didn't corner him by the coffee machines to dig for information. He was granted the luxury of total privacy simply by virtue of being who he was. He was allowed to put his head down, play his game, and exist in a vacuum of silence.

But you were left entirely exposed to the empathetic hunger of the crowd.

Every single day felt like a gritty exercise in evasion. The collective appetite for the details of your heartbreak was bottomless, and people you hadn't spoken to since freshman year orientation suddenly became deeply invested in your emotional well-being. They cornered you in the library, lingered by your locker in the music building, and slid into your direct messages with a faux-concerned tenderness that tasted like ash.

We must know, their eyes begged whenever you paused in the quad. How did it end?

The narrative had quickly split into two distinct, equally suffocating factions. By the second week, the rumors had taken on a life of their own, dividing the campus into camps that required a villain.

There were those who chose to make Dean the monster. They were the ones who slipped into the seat next to you in the dining hall, pitching their voices low, their faces twisted into expressions of intense solidarity.

"Everyone knows what hockey guys are like," a girl from your advanced theory class murmured on a Tuesday afternoon, leaning across the table while she idly stirred her tea. "He was always too loud, too reckless. A guy like that doesn't know how to keep his hands to himself or hold onto something gentle. He probably just woke up one day and decided he wanted his freedom back. You’re so much better off without him."

You had sat there, your fingers gripping your plastic water bottle so tightly the crinkling sound echoed in the quiet space, forcing yourself to give a lukewarm, tight-lipped nod. You didn't defend him, but the words felt like a violation. They didn't know the Dean who stayed up until four in the morning helping you memorize historical dates for an exam, or the Dean whose voice dropped into a quiet, grounding register when the rest of the world became too loud for you to handle. They took his public persona and used it to paint a caricature of betrayal that felt entirely foreign to the boy you had loved.

But the alternative narrative was infinitely more damaging. The other half of the campus had decided that you were the one who had ruined the golden boy.

"She was always too much for him," you overheard a group of varsity cheerleaders whispering near the campus store, their voices carrying clearly over the rows of sweatshirts. They didn't realize you were standing just a single aisle away, frozen against the display rack. "Dean was totally focused on the draft, and she just couldn't handle the pressure of being with someone who had a real future. She probably gave him some massive ultimatum and blew the whole thing up because she couldn't handle his schedule. Some people just don't know how to support a guy at that level."

The words had hit you with the force of a physical blow, leaving you entirely breathless in the middle of the crowded shop. You had dropped the notebook you were holding, stepped out of the aisle, and walked out into the cool morning air, your head spinning as the sweat broke out across the back of your neck.

You were walking in circles through the campus paths like you were completely lost, your boots crunching against the gravel as you tried to outrun the voices. The crowd would eventually go home to their normal lives, totally secure in their own relationships, completely smug because they knew they could trust their partners. But before they left, they would feverishly text their friends, passing along the latest updates on your misery like currency. Guess who we ran into at the shops? Didn't you hear? They called it all off.

And the bitter, agonizing truth at the center of your chest was that you couldn't even defend yourself because you didn't have the answers.

If someone forced you onto a stage and demanded the absolute truth, you wouldn't be able to give it to them. You didn't understand how it had ended. There had been no massive, screaming fight in the driveway, no dramatic betrayal that left a clear trail of wreckage, and no single moment of sudden clarity where the illusion shattered.

It had been a slow, agonizingly subtle deflation of a dream.

You had simply woken up one morning and realized that the steps to the dance had changed. You were both looking at each other through a glass wall, the touch that had once felt like an absolute birthright suddenly feeling formal, rigid, and entirely foreign. The maladies in your relationship were quiet, internal things that you couldn't cure, growing in the spaces between his long road trips and your grueling hours in the music studio. You had lost the game of chance by a fraction of a millimeter, falling victim to unforeseen circumstances that neither of you had the vocabulary to name. The death rattle of what you shared had been a silent, gradual silencing of the soul, leaving you completely bereft, reeling, and entirely in the dark.

Every night, you sat in the quiet of your room, staring at the ceiling, keeping company with nothing but your beloved ghost, completely unable to pretend that you understood the final diagnosis.

Across campus, in the off-campus house he shared with his teammates, Dean Di Laurentis was experiencing his own version of purgatory, though his walls were entirely soundproofed by the silence of his friends.

Practice had ended an hour ago, but Dean was still sitting on the wooden bench in the varsity locker room, his hockey bag unzipped between his feet, his fingers idly spinning his rolls of stick tape. The rest of the team had already showered and left, their loud laughter fading down the concrete corridor, leaving him alone with the echoing drip of the shower heads.

Tucker walked back into the room, his jacket zipped up to his chin, holding two protein shakes. He took one look at Dean’s rigid posture, the tight line of his jaw, and the dark circles under his eyes, and let out a quiet sigh. He tossed one of the bottles onto the bench next to Dean’s thigh.

"You've been staring at that wall for twenty minutes, Di Laurentis," Tucker said, his voice entirely devoid of its usual locker-room teasing. "You need to get out of your head. The coaches noticed you were half a second behind the play during drills today."

Dean didn't look up. He just kept his eyes fixed on a scuff mark on the locker opposite him. "I'm fine. Just tired."

"Bullshit," Tucker muttered, leaning back against the metal lockers, crossing his arms over his chest. "Look, nobody is asking you questions because we know you don't want to talk about it. The guys are keeping their mouths shut. But you're carrying yourself like you're trying to pick a fight with a brick wall."

Dean finally let out a ragged breath, his shoulders dropping by a fraction of an inch. "I heard some people talking in the training room today before the ice session."

Tucker’s expression shifted, a sudden, protective tension locking up his frame. "What did they say?"

"They were talking about her," Dean whispered, his voice rough, gravelly, and completely stripped of the confident veneer he wore like armor on campus. He squeezed the roll of tape in his hand until the plastic core cracked under his fingers. "They were saying she couldn't handle my life. They were making it sound like she was some insecure distraction who couldn't handle the reality of the draft, like she was the one who walked away because she was weak."

Tucker went quiet, looking down at his boots. He didn't deny it, because he had heard the exact same rumors circulating through the athletic center all week.

"And Garrett told me he saw her yesterday by the library," Dean continued, his jaw clenching so hard a small muscle jumped in his cheek. His eyes were dark, burning with a volatile mix of intense anger and profound helplessness. "He said she looked like she was walking in circles, totally lost. He said some girl from her department came up to her and started drilling her with questions right on the sidewalk, and she just stood there looking like she was about to completely break down in front of everybody."

He stood up suddenly, slamming the tape down into his bag, the noise echoing sharply against the concrete walls. He paced the narrow aisle between the benches, his hands shoving deep into the pockets of his track pants, his chest rising and falling with heavy, frustrated breaths.

"They're treating her like a villain, Tuck," Dean said, his voice cracking with a raw, desperate emotion he had been suppressing for weeks. "Or they're making me out to be some unhinged animal who broke her heart for fun. They're picking at her every single day, demanding she give them a story, demanding she explain how we got to this point."

"So do something," Tucker said quietly. "Go talk to her."

Dean stopped pacing, his entire frame freezing in the middle of the room. He turned his head slowly, looking at his friend with an expression of such hollow, absolute defeat that it made Tucker instantly regret the suggestion.

"I can't," Dean murmured, the admission costing him everything. He looked down at his empty hands, his fingers twitching with a pathetic, instinctive urge to reach for a phone he had no right to use anymore. "That's the whole point, Tuck. We're ended. I don't have the right to slide into her space and play the protector when I'm one half of the reason she's hurting in the first place. If I walk up to her on the quad to defend her, it just creates a bigger scene. It gives them more fuel for the fire. The best thing I can do for her right now is keep my distance and let the silence cover her, even if it's killing me to watch her go through this alone."

He sat back down on the bench, his head dropping into his large hands, his dark hair falling over his forehead. He had spent his entire life learning how to control a game, how to read a defense, and how to protect his territory with physical force. But facing the brutal, lingering aftermath of this collapse, Dean Di Laurentis was entirely powerless. He had to sit in the quiet of his empty house, listening to the rumors filter through the walls, completely unable to fix the damage because the door had already been closed permanently between you.

The climax of the public trial arrived on a Thursday evening in the music building.

Malone’s was hosting a small reception for the performing arts department, and the lounge was packed with students, professors, and casual guests. The air was thick with the scent of cheap wine, floral arrangements, and the suffocating, low hum of dozens of simultaneous conversations. You had tried your best to stay hidden in the corner near the piano, holding a glass of water, counting down the minutes until it was socially acceptable to slip out the side exit.

But the crowd was relentless.

Within ten minutes of your arrival, a shadow fell over your corner. You looked up to find an older student from the graduate program standing in front of you, holding a plate of appetizers, her eyes wide with that familiar, predatory empathy that always signaled an interrogation.

"Hey," she said, her voice dripping with an artificial sweetness that made your stomach instantly turn over. "I've been meaning to catch up with you all night. I just wanted to say I was so incredibly sorry to hear about you and Dean. It must be so difficult, especially with everyone talking."

You forced your mouth into a flat, practiced line, your fingers tightening around the glass of water. "Thank you. I appreciate it."

"It’s just such a shock," she continued, leaning in a fraction closer, her eyes gleaming with the hunger for a fresh detail. "You two seemed completely solid. But I guess a guy like that... it’s always hard to know what’s happening behind closed doors, right? Did he just realize he couldn't commit? Or was it something during the away games? We were all saying it felt like a sudden death rattle, just completely out of nowhere."

The phrasing felt like a physical blade turning in your chest. The death rattle.

"We just decided to go our separate ways," you whispered, your voice trembling slightly despite your best efforts to keep it locked down. You could feel the eyes of the people at the nearest table cutting toward you, their conversations slowing as they tried to catch your response.

"But there has to be a reason," she pressed, her brow furrowing with a faux-puzzled expression that felt entirely mocking. "You don't just call off a whole year of absolute consistency without something happening. Did you two even try to talk it through? Or did he just leave you completely in the dark? Everyone’s trying to understand how it actually ended."

The room seemed to shrink, the walls closing in on you as the noise of the reception blurred into a deafening, chaotic roar. You could feel the heat rising to your cheeks, a sudden, panicked surge of adrenaline making your heart race so fast it rattled against your ribs. They wanted an answer. They wanted a specific diagnosis, a tidy little conclusion they could wrap up and carry away to their friends.

And you didn't have it.

"I don't know," you said, your voice rising slightly, breaking through the polite murmur of the corner. The admission felt heavy, terrifying, and completely raw. "I don't know how it ended."

The girl blinked, entirely startled by the sudden honesty, her mouth parting slightly as she stepped back.

Without waiting for another syllable, you set your glass down on the edge of the piano with a sharp clink, turned on your heel, and pushed through the crowded lounge. You ignored the surprised looks from your classmates, ignored your friends calling your name from the doorway, and flew down the long, carpeted hallway of the music building until you pushed through the heavy glass exit doors into the cool, dark night air.

You ran down the concrete steps, your breath coming in short, ragged gasps as the tears you had been suppressing for three weeks finally broke free, scalding your cheeks. You walked blindly toward the edge of the campus, your feet carrying you toward the quiet, shadow-drenched rows of the botanical gardens where the crowd rarely traveled after dark.

You found a secluded stone bench under the canopy of a massive oak tree, collapsing onto the cold surface, your knees pulling up to your chest as you let the sobbing take over your entire frame. You buried your face in your hands, the deflation of your dreaming leaving you entirely empty, sitting in the dark with nothing but the ghost of a boy who used to hold you until the world felt safe.

A pair of heavy boots crunched slowly against the gravel path a few yards away.

You stiffened instantly, your hand flying to your mouth to stifle the sound of your crying, your posture locking up as a sudden, defensive anger took over. You couldn't do this again. If another person had followed you into the dark to ask you for a post-mortem, you were going to completely lose your mind.

You snapped your head up, your eyes blurry with tears, ready to scream at whoever was standing there.

But the words died in your throat.

Dean was standing under the dim, amber glow of the courtyard streetlamp at the entrance to the garden path. He was wearing his black varsity jacket, his hands shoved deep into his pockets, his broad shoulders hunched against the cool night wind. He wasn't moving toward you. He was staying firmly rooted at the boundary line of the path, respecting the distance, his dark eyes locked onto your face with an intensity that made the breath catch in your throat.

He looked completely stripped bare. The unbothered, arrogant mask he wore for the campus was entirely gone, replaced by a hollow, bleeding exhaustion that mirrored your own. He had clearly seen you leave the music building, his protective instinct drawing him after you into the dark, but he was holding himself back with a visible, agonized restraint.

You stared at each other through the dim light, the silence between you heavy, terrifying, and full of everything you couldn't say aloud.

He didn't offer a witty comeback. He didn't demand an explanation, and he didn't try to cross the gravel to pull you into his arms, because he knew he had lost the right to hold the pieces together. He was just standing guard in the shadows, letting his presence be a shield against the empathetic hunger of the rest of the world, even as his own chest rose and falling with heavy, ragged breaths.

"I still don't know," you whispered into the quiet space between you, the words barely carrying over the wind, but you knew he heard them. Your voice cracked, a fresh wave of tears spilling over your lashes. "Dean, I still don't know how it ended."

Dean’s jaw set so hard a sharp line formed along his throat. He closed his eyes for a long, agonizing second, his fingers clenching inside his pockets until the fabric strained against his knuckles. When he looked back at you, his eyes were shining with a profound, helpless sorrow that told you everything you needed to know.

He didn't know either.

You had both learned the right steps to entirely different dances, blind to the circumstances that were pulling you apart until the music simply stopped playing. There was no villain to blame, no neat little summary to hand over to the crowd at Malone's. There was only the quiet, devastating reality of two people who loved each other completely, sitting on opposite sides of a gravel path in the dark, watching the dream deflate until there was nothing left to salvage.

Dean took a single, slow step backward, keeping his eyes on yours until the very last second, before he turned and walked down the path, his tall frame disappearing into the campus lights.

You sat alone on the stone bench, the cool night air clearing the heat from your face, the phantom weight in your chest finally settling into something permanent. The public trial would continue tomorrow, the whispers would follow you through the quad, and the campus would keep demanding its answers. But as you sat in the quiet of the garden, watching the space where he had been standing, you finally stopped trying to find the words.

The game of chance was over, the soul had left the room, and the post-mortem was officially complete.

Notes - I'm sorry for being to depressing recently I do have some less sad soon...I think. I hope? lmao sorry guys! Anyway Love Ya'll!!

Taglist - @dilaurentispuckbunny @goawaysha @mhayes777 @purplerainx1 @05gwyn @hagarsays

[magslikesdaisies]

Invisible String - 💚 John Logan 💚

Credit© - @editfandom

Word Count - 1000

Warning - none, pure fluff

The rain had been drumming a steady, peaceful rhythm against the glass of Logan’s off-campus apartment for hours, blurring the campus lights into soft smudges of yellow and amber. Inside, the world was entirely quiet. The usual chaotic energy of the hockey house had cleared out for the weekend, leaving behind a rare, heavy stillness that felt almost sacred.

You were curled up on the oversized fabric sofa, wearing a worn-out Briar University sweatshirt that belonged to him, your knees pulled up to your chest. Logan was sitting right next to you, his long legs stretched out ahead of him, one arm draped casually over the back of the cushions behind your shoulders. His thumb was tracing slow, absentminded circles against the fabric of your sleeve, a gentle habit he always slipped into whenever he was completely relaxed.

Blending the sharp, quick-witted charm he carried on the ice with the softer, deeply protective warmth he usually kept hidden from the world, Logan looked entirely at peace. There was no pressure to perform, no game tape to analyze, and no campus rumors to dodge. It was just the two of you, wrapped in the quiet comfort of a rainy Saturday night.

"My mom sent me a massive digital album this morning," you murmured, breaking the silence as you leaned your head back against his shoulder. "Just a huge dump of random childhood photos and old memories she found while cleaning out her old hard drives. I was scrolling through them earlier while you were at practice."

Logan let out a low, amused chuckle, the vibration rumbling pleasantly against your back. "Let me guess. You found some embarrassing middle school phase you tried to scrub from the internet?"

"Worse," you laughed, shifting slightly to look at him. "I found a photo from a random road trip when I was eleven years old. We got a flat tire on our way to Cape Cod, and our car got towed to a garage in a tiny town called Hastings. In the photo, I’m standing on the gravel lot, wearing neon green shorts, looking absolutely miserable because it was ninety degrees outside."

You paused, your voice softening as you looked at his profile in the dim light of the living room lamp. "Logan, I zoomed in on the background of the photo today. The sign on the building says Hampton & Sons Auto Services. And sitting right underneath it, on a faded wooden bench by the bay doors, is a skinny kid with dark hair, grease on his face, and a massive scowl, wearing a giant teal shirt."

Logan froze. His thumb stopped its movement against your shoulder as his dark eyes locked onto yours with sudden, intense focus. "Wait. You're kidding."

"I'm completely serious," you said, a soft, breathless laugh escaping your lips as the sheer impossibility of it washed over you. "I completely forgot that town even existed until I saw the photo today. I never put it together until this morning. Logan, that kid on the bench was you."

Logan stared at you, a look of pure wonder washing over his handsome features. A low, disbelieving laugh left his chest, and he shook his head slowly.

"I remember that summer," he whispered, his voice dropping into a quiet, reverent register. "I was eleven, which means my mom had just packed up and left. My dad was completely falling apart, drinking heavily in the back office, and he basically forced me to sit outside the bay doors all day just to watch the lot while he passed out. I spent that whole July wearing this horrific, oversized teal promotional shirt, absolutely hating the world."

He reached out, his large, warm hand sliding down to wrap around yours, his fingers tangling effortlessly with your own. The contrast of his rough, hockey-calloused palm against your skin felt grounding, a familiar anchor in the middle of a sudden, mystical realization.

"We were in the exact same gravel lot," you murmured, leaning your cheek against his chest, listening to the steady, reassuring thud of his heart. "Six years before we ever met in the library at Briar. You were having the worst summer of your life, and I was just a random kid complaining about a flat tire."

"Time is a curious thing," Logan said softly, his chin resting gently on the top of your head as he began to stroke your hair. "It gives you absolutely no signs, no compasses, no clues. We were breathing the same air, completely oblivious to the fact that our lives were eventually going to crash right into each other when we grew up."

A comfortable silence settled over the room again, but it felt different now, charged with a beautiful, secret weight. The rain continued to slash against the windowpane, but inside the small apartment, the space felt infinitely warmer. Logan’s hold on you tightened, wrapping all of his heavy childhood memories, your old heartbreaks, and your collective doubts in something soft and protective. He was the golden thread that had pulled you out of all the wrong directions, straight into the quiet sanctuary of this room.

"Isn't it just so pretty to think," you whispered into the quiet, "that all along, there was some invisible string tying you to me?"

"Yeah," Logan breathed, his voice rich with an emotion he rarely let show, a perfect blend of his protective nature and total devotion. He leaned down, pressing a soft, lingering kiss against the crown of your head. "It’s a really cool thought, baby. Hell was the journey for both of us back then, but it brought me right here. And I wouldn't trade where we landed for anything."

You closed your eyes, shifting your hand until your fingers were laced tightly with his, feeling the absolute truth of his words settle deep into your skin. The invisible string had done its work perfectly, pulling the two of you through the dark until the sky finally turned into a beautiful, permanent pink.

Notes - I thought I would start my first John fic with some fluff yall have earned with all my writing recently!

Taglist - @05gwyn @purplerainx1 @mhayes777 @hagarsays