The ultimate derek hale x oc fic recs list that no one asked for
In no particular order:
1. The Skeptic by @alvfr - If you haven’t read this then you’re missing out. This is one GIANT of a fic, and probably the best teen wolf fanfiction I’ve ever read. I love it with all my heart, and I’m already gearing up for a re-read. If you want to read just one DerekxOC fic, then choose this one.
2. Top Wolf by Death_Cap - I read this recently and let me tell you how freaking psyched I was! This is giving Top Gun but it blends so well in the world of Beacon Hills! Explores Derek’s trauma really well, and has some really sexy moments. I also love the unexpected Derek/Jordan bff-ism. Extremely well-written and so so underrated!
3. Little Big Town by kayhi - If you want Alpha!Derek and McCall and Hale pack fusion with the vibes of those famous avengers tower fics in the 2010s and a whole lot of spice, this is the fic for you.
4. Harper's Bizarre by @daisybeats - Really unique and funny with a lot of found family feels. Ongoing.
5. love, like something tender, tender like a bruise by cheimonarose - This is ongoing? Incomplete? And just 5k words BUT don’t let that stop you because it’s literally 5k worth of ART. So so well-written with a character and setting that feels…lived in is the only term that comes to mind. Chef’s kiss.
6. Angels and Anger by RaeLa3537 - Okay, so, technically this has the oc still in high school, which I normally steer clear off. But it’s really well-written so I gave it a chance and I’m glad I did!! This is ongoing but last I checked the author still updates regularly so yay. Really good dynamic between Derek and the OC
7. Howl and Twice the Howl by Lisa Muller - (Yes, I was so desperate for more DerekxOC fics that I ventured off into Quotev.) Same case as the one above. People really like pairing Derek with people in high school. This one addresses the age gap a bit, though, which is more than some of the other fics I read. It also has a discontinued third book, but the ending of the second book is pretty satisfying already.
8. Distance by Lauren Nowakowski - This has the childhood friends maybe lovers trope and I ate it up so much !!
9. Faith, Belief, Family by LacytheSilverWolf - This is a pretty big series with over 14 (or more!) works spanning this Derek x OC pairing, ranging from multichap fics to one shots. The last book featuring s6 is incomplete and probably abandoned tho
10. Through Her Eyes by Death_Cap - Amazing Derek character study. Really really painful. Heed the tags—character death and all.
11. Mark of the Wolf by scribeofmorpheus - Vet!OC !! A really fleshed out one, too! This has some interesting world building and lore. The 2nd person POV didn’t even bother me. Has an ongoing 2nd book too.
12. A Sky Full Of Lightning by bethejerktomybitch - Some really good lore in this one too. The OC has the same name as me so that was a little weird lmao. I love that this starts in s3, because I can only read so much s1/s2 retellings 😭
13. Tape, Glue, and Sutures: Or How To Mend a Fractured Pack by augopher - This has some tropes I really enjoy: Hale pack, Derek not losing his alpha status, etc. Starts post s3A too. Has platonic sterek.
14. Meltdown by Lauren Nowakowski - Features a doctor!oc with a really colorful personality !! I think this is ongoing. I could be wrong.
15. Valiant and Incarnate by mads - If I had a dollar for every Stilinski!twin OC x Derek fics I’ve encountered, I’d be rich. This has really great banter and is really well-written.
16. Deadpool by AintThatDevine - Yes, I was so desperate that I hunted down my old wattpad account. I remember reading this one in high school so I decided to reread it, and it surprisingly still holds up! It’s not usual to find a well-written fic on this particular platform, so I feel really blessed that 15 year old me found this. Set in s4 which is a bonus—anything set in seasons other than 1/2 always get my attention.
17. come down soon and the elevator by -bronwyn - Found another good one from the orange app! who would have thought ! The second book is ongoing, but it has Isaac in s4 so it’s still worth a read !!
18. Werewolves by @witchofhellridge - The perfect fall read ! The OC is a witch and when I say witch I’m talking spells, immortality, familiars etc !! This is also really hot. Slow burn who?? This thing ignites from the get go and it’s actually so refreshing. There are some weird dialogue that I’m choosing to overlook tho.
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I desperately needed this list for myself two months ago. and now, 100+ fics read later, I finally made it, in case another twenty something adult decides to relive their childhood by rewatching teen wolf and is now dying for good derek fics.
Alright. Back to writing my own Derek x OC fic, I go…
I am once again begging people to realize that AI checker doesn’t work. it’s never worked. it’s notoriously known to have flagged human-made works as AI and AI-generated works as human-made. and by feeding it people’s works, you are feeding more works to AI, because apparently the machine itself is AI.
the only thing AI checker does is harm genuine artists and people in general too.
⊹ ࣪ ˖ summary: “I prefer my name, actually, but I know that’s a lot of syllables for you.” One of his eyebrows kicks up. But a corner of his mouth does, too, like it can’t help itself.
⊹ ࣪ ˖ pairing: billy hargrove x f!reader
⊹ ࣪ ˖ wc: 9.9k+
⊹ ࣪ ˖ warnings: they lowkey hate each other so snark and lots of it, mentions of misogyny and violence
⊹ ࣪ ˖ notes: so, fair warning, eddie kinda took over the first half of this chapter but needed to introduce some damn normality. hope you enjoy this behemoth. hope to have next part out sooner. sound if you're enjoying this so far!
read on ao3. ⊹ series masterlist.
You’re still pissed off when you get home.
Cracked pavement turns to gravel as you manoeuvre your car back into Forest Hills, trying to avoid shrieking kids kicking around a flat football despite the twilight hours. You scrubbed your hands raw in the cracked sink at the back of the shop, but a stubborn ribbon of grease under your thumbnail remains. You only notice it when you cut the engine and reach for your discarded bag. Another hit of irrational anger pulses through you at the sight.
Fucking prick, you think for the hundredth time, remembering Billy Hargrove’s sneering, amused face as you slam the car door with enough force to rattle the windows. A few heads veer in your direction, then away again. No one here has much time for other people's misery.
Forest Hills buzzes with its usual Saturday evening din: TV sets blaring through thin walls, a toddler screeching somewhere in the distance, bursts of laughter and conversation from a group of middle-aged men seated around a busted-up picnic table three trailers down from yours, kids entertaining themselves with mud and broken toys.
Your trailer sits in the middle of the lot, a bit more patched up than most because you could never let something broken be without trying to fix it. Faded tape is visible on the windowsills from where you parked, catching the dying light as you approach. The porch light flickers on as if sensing your early arrival, but the blinds inside are mostly drawn today. Another late shift at the diner means your mom won’t be back at least until midnight; until then, the trailer is all yours. It’s the type of freedom any person your age would typically adore, but all you can think about is how tired you are. How much more exhausted you’ll be when school resumes on Monday, when you’ll be balancing senior year with work, bills, and college applications.
You’re halfway up the rickety steps, key in hand, when you hear it.
“Whoa,” a voice calls out from behind you in a disbelieving drawl, “whatever did the poor door do to you?”
There’s no need to turn around to know who it is. There’s a particular way Eddie Munson’s voice carries in the air you could recognise in your sleep. His voice is as familiar to you as your mother’s is. Nestled somewhere quiet and safe, familiar and yours.
You glance over your shoulder.
He’s perched on the cinderblock near your stairs like he’s been there a while, long legs splayed, elbows on his knees, an imitation of a gargoyle. There’s a paper bag between his scuffed boots and two bottles of Cokes, long since warmed by the sweltering August evening. His Hellfire shirt looks soft and faded from too many washes, the sleeves crinkled and shoved up to his elbows, his many rings catching the porch light when he lifts the bottle in a lazy salute. His wild, dark hair frames his face, soft curls frizzing in the humid air as he offers you a crooked grin.
You can’t believe you’ve been so wrapped up in your thoughts that you didn’t notice him sooner.
Eddie stands, the bolt hanging around his throat catching the porch light, small and silver against the worn cotton—just an insignificant piece of junk to anyone but you. A lifetime ago, a boy crashed his bike outside your brand-new trailer, and you, annoyed by his loud wailing, went out and fixed it for him. It took you the whole afternoon, after which you presented the boy with messy hair and snot all over his face with a single spare bolt, for luck. By the next day, Eddie had put it on a leather string and declared you friends for life. You’ve never once seen him without the necklace since that day, same as his guitar pick.
Present-day Eddie, older but no less a troublemaker, grins up at you, dimples denting his cheeks. “Ooh. You look pissed. It’s a good thing I brought snacks.”
Snorting, you slot the key into the lock, leaning your shoulder against the door, “Do I?”
“Yeah, you’re wearing the face. It’s a rather particular and very frightening expression for when someone pisses you off enough to make you want to fight God.”
“Well, at least God doesn’t question my abilities.”
“Ah,” Eddie says, drawing out the sound, realisation sparking, “So it was a man. Colour me shocked, sweetheart. Truly blindsided by this twist.”
There’s something to be said about your shared bond over the years, because to this day, he’s the only man aside from Frank you can tolerate calling you sweetheart. Perhaps because you know Eddie says it with a genuine, uncomplicated sort of affection and not some twisted attempt to belittle you.
You shoulder the door shut again and instead sink onto the top step, your boots scarping the still-warm stone as you stretch out. You plant your boots on the step below you, resting your forearms on your knees, mirroring his earlier posture.
“What are you doing here, Ed?” you ask tiredly, even though you already know the answer. Eddie is around here more often than he’s not.
He nudges the brown paper bag with his boot, making it rustle. “Peace offerings. Celebration.” In typical, grandiose Eddie fashion, he squats down in front of you on the steps, grinning from ear to ear. “Last weekend of freedom before senior year starts, so we’re drinking Coke to the sleepless nights ahead.”
The word senior drops like a guillotine over your head, making your stomach do a strange little loop. Monday is less than two days away. New timetable awaits. A fresh future is almost within arm's reach, provided you can get there.
Instead, you reach for the Coke bottle extended in your direction. The glass is warm but still slick with condensation, the label peeling slightly at the edges. You pop the cap off with a practised hand, taking a long, greedy swallow. The heat and exhaustion of the day fold around you all at once. The fizz stings your tongue when it hits your mouth, tickling up your nose.
“You get off early?” Eddie wonders curiously. “It’s not even eight yet. I was prepared to camp for another hour at least.”
You huff a laugh, the fizz still thick in your throat. “Frank went home sick. Told me I can finish the last job and lock up early as a thanks.” Your head tips backwards, coming to rest against your front door. Strips of blue and orange sky fill your weary eyes over jutting rooflines. “Wasn’t really in the mood to stick around.”
Something in your demeanour has long since tipped him off, except this time the heaviness in your words, the slump of your shoulders, makes Eddie’s easy grin edge into concern.
“Okay, now I’m really curious,” he says, squinting. “Because you? Not in the mood to hang around the garage? That place is your temple. What heathen dared to defile the sacred grounds?”
You rub your palm over the back of your neck, feeling the dried sweat tacky under your fingers. It’s ridiculous how you’re still wound tight about this. Hargrove is hardly the first asshole to roll up with his shiny car and shitty opinions and cause you grief. It's been the norm as long as you’ve worked for Frank. But something about this instance has wormed under your skin.
“New guy,” you begin, not bothering to mask your ire, “Some hotshot from California. Came in with a ‘79 Camora and an attitude problem.”
Eddie’s brows shoot up. “Oh, that guy.”
You blink, focusing back on him. “You know him?”
“Haven’t had the pleasure,” he responds, making a face indicating he doesn’t think it’ll be very pleasurable when it does happen. “But I saw the car cruising through town earlier. Not very subtle, unlike me, of course. There’s also chatter that new people have moved in just outside the trailer park. Cherry Lane. Figured anyone driving a car like that has to be an asshole.”
You make a face, lifting the bottle to your lips. “Spot on.”
“Lemme guess.” Eddie rearranges his face, dropping his voice an octave lower and half-closing one eye, cigarette pantomimed at his lips. “‘Where’s the real mechanic, sweetheart?’”
You snort, your lips twitching around the bottle. “Stop,” you choke out. “That’s—”
“Too accurate?”
“He called me princess instead.” You can’t help but make a face as soon as the words leave you.
Eddie gasps, hand flying to his chest. “Do you have a body in the trunk we need to dispose of, or are we saving him for scientific study?”
“No,” you admit with a sigh. “I fixed his belt.”
“You fixed his… belt,” Eddie repeats, tasting the innuendo, mentally weighing if he’s going to go there. He glances up at you through his lashes, and you can see the joke brewing behind his dark eyes. The lines of his face soften into something genuine. “You okay?”
And there it is, the very thing that makes you want to hug him close and hit him at the same time: the way he sees through the armour and the anger faster than most people see you at all.
You peer down at your stained hands instead of him, at the grease still nestled in the cracks of your palms. You pick at them with your nail.
“It’s just—” Air explodes from your lips in a frustrated sound. “He did the whole song and dance, you know? The doubt, the staring, asking me if I’m sure I fixed it right. Like I’m some stupid girl playing dress up in my overalls, and somehow no one notices for years until he walks in.”
Eddie winces in sympathy. “And yet,” he begins carefully, “you did not, in fact, insert a ratchet into his eye socket. Which is a crying shame.”
“I thought about it.”
Eddie stands with a laugh, jogging up several steps until he’s beside you, dropping his weight beside you unceremoniously. “See, this is character growth.” He nudges your shoulder with his. “Old you would have slashed his tyres.”
“Old me didn’t know how much those tyres cost,” you point out dryly. “Now I know, and I couldn’t do that to the car. He doesn’t deserve that car,” you add, the injustice of it all prickling your chest again. “Ungrateful ass. I mean, who talks shit to the mechanic and then asks her to fix the problem? He’s lucky I didn’t cut his brakes instead.”
Eddie tilts his head towards the sky, tapping his chin twice. “Say no more,” he says solemnly. “I understand now. He’s beautiful, isn’t he?”
Your mouth pops open before your brain can stop it. “I didn’t say—”
“You didn’t have to. I know you.”
Eddie wiggles his eyebrows. You take another swing of your Coke instead of gracing his assumption with an answer. The glass taps your teeth, which makes you scowl. Eddie sits quietly beside you for a beat—a rarity he seems to only indulge in your presence—before rising back to his feet, offering his hand.
“C’mon. I brought you something.”
“You brought me pretzels.”
“Ah, but in addition to this gourmet feast…” He bounds down the stairs in gangly motion, almost tripping on the last step when he bends to retrieve the paper bag. “Come on.”
“Eddie.” Your protest comes out half-hearted. Truth is, you’re used to being dragged in his wake. You’ve spent most of your life being dragged in his wake and vice versa.
He doesn’t bother waiting for you to stand, twisting the doorknob and shouldering into your trailer with the familiarity of someone who’s done this a hundred times in the past. The stale, lukewarm air from inside the trailer washes over you in a gust: faint cigarette smoke, cheap laundry detergent, something vaguely reminiscent of engine oil and Mom’s cheap floral perfume clinging to the curtains.
“Make yourself at home, I guess,” you mutter as you follow him in, kicking the door closed behind you.
“Don’t mind if I do,” he croons, flipping the light switch as he breezes inside.
The living room is a tiny, cluttered space—too much life crammed into a space too small to hold it all. A ratty blanket rests draped over a sagging couch, and the TV remote balances on top of a precarious stack of TV Guide and Popular Mechanics. Your toolbox is half open under the window where light is best most days, guts of a disembowelled radio laid out in a careful row on an old, dirty towel below. A pair of Mom’s worn heels lies kicked off by the door from her shift this morning.
On the far wall, next to the shelf with the crappy turntable and a pile of mismatched records, the oscillating fan whirls in a slow, sad arc, doing almost nothing for the temperature inside.
“You’re such a mess,” Eddie says fondly, stepping over a tangle of wires. Last time he wasn’t careful, you didn’t speak with him for three days. A stretch he later described as the worst three days of my life. “An absolute menace to clear walkways.”
“This is coming from a guy whose bedroom floor is ninety percent cassette tapes and dirty socks.”
“Excuse you. That’s artistic chaos,” he corrects, heading straight for the shelf. “A lifestyle choice, really.”
You dump the pretzel bag on the table, alongside your empty Coke bottle, flopping down on the lumpy couch, stretching one arm along the back. It creaks under your weight, familiar and forgiving. From this angle, you can see Eddie’s back as he flips through the records with practised ease, lips moving silently as he reads them.
“Okay,” he says, dragging the word out, “what’s the mood, oh great one?”
“Something loud,” you reply. “Something that’ll get that asshole’s voice out of my skull.”
Eddie snorts, immediately shoving two records his fingertips were hovering over back. “So, exorcism by the way of volume. Got it.” His touch tiptoes for another minute before settling on a familiar red cover. He slides it out, glancing over his shoulder with a wicked grin. “Perfect.”
“Oh no,” you say immediately. “What are you—”
He turns the album so you can see the cover. Billy Idol stares out from the sleeve, all bleached hair and a downwards stare into the unknown.
Rebel Yell.
You groan. “You’re kidding.”
“Absolutely not.” He’s already pulling out the record from its sleeve with more care than he uses for anything else in his chaotic life, lowering it onto the turntable. “You got harassed by some dime-store James Dean, we’re deploying the nuclear option.”
“That’s insane logic, even for you,” you say, but corners of your lips twitch despite yourself.
Eddie reaches for the turntable arm, moving it with a little flourish, and the needle drops with a soft thunk onto the spinning vinyl. Static washes over the crammed space of your living room, preceded by a few crackles, and then, finally, the opening riffs tear through the tiny speakers.
You feel it in your chest at once; music lives there first, in your bones and heart, in your thoughts. Whatever tension still coils your shoulder blades loosens a fraction.
Eddie spins on his heel, already bobbing his head long to the guitar riffs, clutching the Coke bottle like a microphone. He strides to the middle of the room and plants his legs wide, shoulders rolling back, hips starting to move in some bastardised version between a rockstar and a drunk uncle at a barbecue.
“This one,” he announces over the music, pitching his voice and pointing at you with the neck of the bottle, “goes out to the lady of the shop and terror of every Californian pretty boy out there.”
You cover your face to smother your incredulous laughter, which only eggs him on further. The verse kicks in. Eddie leans into it like there’s an actual spotlight on him, eyes closed and hair wild.
“Last night a little dancer came dancin’ to my door—” he sings loudly, pointing at the front door as if the imaginary girl is right there. He swivels to you on dancer, eyes opening long enough to flick over your legs curled up under you on the couch. He smirks when your gaze narrows in response.
You’re already shaking your head. “Nope.”
He pointedly ignores you, barrelling on, strumming an imaginary guitar. “She said, ‘Come on, baby, I’ve got a license for love’—”
“Pretty sure my license expired!”
“—and if it expires, pray help from above,” he continues, throwing his head back theatrically on above. “See, this is why you need me. I’m the most fun person in your life.”
You flip him off, and he responds by doing the same with both hands. The chorus hits, and Eddie goes all out, yelling the lyrics more than singing them.
“In the midnight hour, she cried more, more, more—”
On each more he strides closer, jabbing the Coke bottle towards you like a makeshift mic. On the third one, he’s right in front of you, knee pressing against the couch cushion by your thigh, leaning over you with a grin that’s half joking, half something else.
He tips the bottle towards you. “C’mon,” he goads. “Sam needs his Frodo.”
You roll your eyes, but the beat is thumping in your ears, the guitar is in your blood thanks to Eddie, and there’s a special kind of rebellion in saying yes to little things when big ones feel so impossibly out of your reach. You grab the neck of the bottle with him and lean in as you stand, sharing the mic, shouting the last more in his face.
Your voices crash together, messy and far too loud. You both dissolve into laughter at the same time, jumping around, hair loose, and sweat gathering in the creases of your skin as your noses nearly bump.
Right now, the world shrinks down to the space between you. Eddie’s eyes crinkle at the corners when he laughs, lashes dark against his cheeks. You can see the dimple that only shows up on his left cheek, a tiny faded scar by his hairline he got when he fell off his bike years ago, back when you first met.
You’re close enough to see the threadbare fuzz on his collar, smell Coke and cigarettes and whatever cheap soap he steals from his uncle’s bathroom as you dance around, shaking your heads wildly.
The song finally fades off, and Eddie rocks back, dropping into a dramatic bow so deep his hair swings forward in one, frizzy tangle.
“Thank you, Hawkins, you beauty,” he declares dramatically.
You shove his shoulder, and he laughs, falling beside you on the couch, breathless. Sweat shines on his forehead, sticking loose strands of hair around the crown of his head. He hooks a thumb under your bolt, rolling it between his index finger and thumb. It glints in the dim light.
“You know why I failed senior year, right?”
The shift is slight, but you feel it drop between you like a rock. Music seems to fade despite how loud Eddie put it on, encasing you in new tension.
“Because your homework kept getting mysteriously lost and you didn’t sit a single exam since it didn’t involve any ‘dragons’.”
You can’t help but do air quotes around dragons because he kept insisting on it for a month when you needled him for answers.
“That’s the official story,” he says, humming, fiddling with the bolt. “Unofficially, I’m pretty sure I’m cursed.” He cuts you a quick sideways look. “Or, you know, destined to stalk these halls forever. Become the infamous Ghost of Hawkins High.”
You study his profile while he speaks. The way he says it is light enough—he’s laughing, because Eddie always is—but there’s something underneath it. Somewhere deep and private where your own fear of being stuck lives, each word manages to find home.
“You’re not cursed,” you say with such finality in your voice, he risks another nervy glance at you, shoulders curving downwards. “You’re just…” You wave a hand, searching for a word that won’t give the wrong impression. “Selective.”
Eddie’s mouth curves, a small o forming. “Selective. I like that. Makes it sound all intentional.” He raps his knuckles against his damp temple. “I only absorb knowledge about important things. Dragons, for example. And engine oil, by osmosis, from you.”
Your eyes narrow, your finger shooting out to stab him in the cheek. “You did flunk on purpose,” you accuse, twisting your finger. “Didn’t you?”
Eddie’s eyes bulge. “What? How did you get flunked on purpose from my heartfelt speech meant to bond us?”
“You totally did.” You poke his cheek again, despite him trying to swat you away. “You absolutely tanked something. Trig? English Lit? So you could be in my year.”
“Wow,” he says, playing at offence. “Talk about a narcissistic reading of these tragic events in my life, your majesty.”
“That’s not a no,” you sing-song, matching his earlier tone.
Eddie splutters, shoving you, but there’s such gentleness in the way his hand curves around your shoulder. “Oh my God, first of all, rude. Second, you give me way too much credit here. You think I could orchestrate something this complex? I can barely orchestrate a trip to the grocery store without forgetting why I’m there.”
“And that’s still not a no.”
He throws his hands in the air, laughing. “Why would I want to repeat senior year?” he demands despairingly. “Who wants to be stuck in that fluorescent-lit hellscape for another twelve months? What kind of masochist—”
“You,” you cut in knowingly.
“—okay, yes, me—”
“Someone who didn’t want to graduate without his best friend,” you add, quieter, and there it is, blunt and in the open between you.
Eddie falls quiet beside you. Where his voice once was, there’s now Billy Idol. The fan creaks faintly over the music as it makes another laborious turn. Eddie peers down at his hands, at the bolt pitched between his fingers. The metal has a little groove in it now from how frequently he fusses with it.
“Yeah, well,” he says, softer, almost shy, “that part might have been, you know, a factor.”
Something warm twists inside your chest, making you ache. “You’re such an idiot.”
There’s no heat in your words. Eddie shrugs, mouth tilting upwards when he peeks at you over his hair. “What, you thought I was gonna let you do the victory lap solo? Graduate and leave this glittering metropolis all by your lonesome, abandon me to the wolves and the freshman band kids? Please. I’m clingier than that, sweetheart.”
Your expression softens. “Terrifying.”
“Also,” he adds, “someone has to keep an eye on you. Make sure you don’t get into a fistfight with the new guy in the parking lot on day one.”
You can’t help but laugh, rubbing your brow with your thumb. “Noted.”
He bumps his knee gently against yours. “Hey. For what it’s worth? If he gives you any shit at school, you tell me. I’ll… dunno. Write an aggressively mediocre song about him. And when I’m famous, I’ll tell everyone there was this Camaro asshole back in school who inspired it. Eternal shame.”
The image he conjures inside your mind is so ridiculous you can’t help but laugh softly, a warmth inside your breast spreading.
“I can handle him, Ed,” you reassure him, bumping his knee with yours. “Handled him today just fine.”
“I know you can,” Eddie says without hesitation, the bolt slipping from his fingers and falling back against his chest. “You always do.” He looks at you, squarely in the eyes, all the play-acting gone for a moment. “Doesn’t mean you have to do it all alone.”
He’s not talking about one rotten egg coming to the shop, and you both know it. Heaviness collects inside your ribcage, smothering the brief joy you felt dancing and singing with him. Swallowing, you ignore the sudden tightness in your throat.
“I hate it,” you admit abruptly, words half choked out. “That I’m still… surprised, I guess. That it still gets to me. That every time some jackass walks and looks right through me and asks for the man in charge I still get this—” You make a wild gesture around your chest. “—whatever the hell this is. Like I’m twelve again, and the men are laughing at me when I ask to help around the shop. I wanted to learn, and they said I’m pretending to be a boy.”
“Hey,” he says, gently, and his hand comes down on your wrist, warm and careful, slight tingle from his rings shooting up your nerves. His thumb rubs a little line over tender skin. “You’re not pretending.”
“I know,” you say, and you do, most days. The only problem is that knowing doesn’t always sink all the way down like it should. “It’s just—some days it’s easier to forget. Then somebody like Hargrove walks in, and it’s like… of course you don’t belong here, what were you thinking, go back to the front desk and smile pretty.”
Eddie’s fingers tighten around your wrist, just enough force to feel the calluses on the pad of his thumb. “Well, I call bullshit. You belong anywhere you damn well decide,” he insists vehemently. “Garage. Front row at a Metallica concert. NASA, even.”
An incredulous huff escapes you. “NASA?”
“Why not?” He shrugs with one shoulder. “Rockets are just a different kind of machine, right?”
“That’s not how rockets work.”
“Eh, close enough,” he presses without missing a beat. “My point is, this is what you do.” He taps his fingertips across the back of your hand. “You walk into rooms full of shitheads who don’t want you there and still fix their broken shit. And yeah, sometimes those morons don’t catch on how good they have it. That’s on them, though. Not on you.”
Those words blanket you, a cocoon of warmth so potent your throat closes up despite your best attempt to keep your expression schooled. He’s always believed in you, just like your mom, so despite the eternal critic in your ear, his words manage to cut through the noise. You watch his hand and how it rests around your wrist, rings flashing when he moves, dull silver and brass, but all Eddie. He’s always been more comfortable touching you than you are acknowledging you like it; shoulder bumps and nudges, an arm thrown around you at the movies, his head ending up in your lap halfway through a late-night TV rerun.
He squeezes your wrist once, giving you more comfort than he could ever fully understand, then lets go, folding back into his sloppy sprawl beside you.
He props his chin in his hand. “So. Senior year.”
“Don’t remind me.”
Your groan is exaggerated, but there’s relief in threading back towards safer waters, normal teenager topics.
“We’ll survive, Mr Frodo,” he intones gravely. “We have a kickass plan.”
“Do we?” you ask skeptically, confusion evident on the planes of your face.
“Of course.” He ticks off on his fingers one by one. “Step one: avoid Principle at all costs.”
“Obviously.”
Another finger pops up. “Step two: you pass your classes with flying colours, get showered with scholarships from all the fancy schools, build a spaceship in your spare time, leave us all behind.”
“Wait a sec—”
“And most importantly, step three,” he barrels on, ignoring you, “I, a humble second-time senior, finally scrape together enough extra credit to get the hell out of here with you.”
“You’re gonna pass this time?” you tease, leaning in conspirationally.
Eddie clutches at his chest, head falling back against the couch. “You wound me. I’ll have you know I’ve been doing my summer reading.”
“Coming books don’t count as summer reading, last I checked.”
“Tell that to Watchmen, heathen.”
You chuckle despite yourself, curling your legs under yourself.
His head tilts in your direction, scrutinising you over his fingers. “What about you?” he wonders. “Do you have, like… an actual plan? Outside of this place, I mean.”
The vast collection of college brochures under your mattress springs to mind, corners all bent from how many times you’ve taken them out and put them away again. Going over them again and again, allowing yourself to dream. Of the engineering programs circled in red, the acceptance rates scrawled in margins, the pile organised by how impossible each school is. Your thoughts drift towards the closet where you keep the crinkled wads of money from each paycheck stuffed away, for the hope that those crinkled bills will one day pay for your way out.
“Maybe,” you admit slowly.
“‘Maybe,’ she says,” Eddie huffs with a roll of his eyes, pointing at you. “Woman of mystery.”
“You’ll find out when you fail senior year again,” you shoot back teasingly. “I’ll be sure to send you a postcard from wherever.”
He covers his face with both hands, his muffled groan louder than the music. “You’re so cruel.”
“You love it, really.”
“Unfortunately,” he mutters, the word so quiet you almost don’t catch it.
The record winds down, guitars and drums easing off. The needle bumps gently in the run-out groove, crackling.
Eddie is up on his feet before you can move, crossing the room in several strides, lifting the arm and setting it back at the start. The opening riff kicks in again. You realise, as he does this, that he timed the whole thing so your conversation about you leaving didn’t end with the room going quiet. He always does this, in his own little ways. Patches the lonely silence so it doesn’t swallow either of you. Just two trailer park kids in an indifferent world.
He comes back and drops down next to you again, this time a fraction closer. Your knees touch now, solid and warm.
“So,” he begins deliberately, as the verse starts up again, and there’s mischief back in his voice. “About this California guy. What’s his name? If he’s going to be your new nemesis this year I need to know what to call him in my notes.”
You hesitate for half a beat, then sigh. “Billy Hargrove.”
“Billy Hargrove,” he repeats like he’s introducing a wrestler. “I can see it so perfectly. Big hair? Tight jeans?”
Your head swivels in his direction. “How did you—”
“California,” Eddie says knowingly, nodding his head sagely, as if that alone explains it all. “They look like surfers or serial killers. Sometimes both.”
A snort spills from between your lips, sharp and unattractive, but Eddie only grins, tongue tracing over his teeth in private victory.
“You know what they say about guys like that, right?” Eddie leans in closer, like sharing a secret, eyes bulging slightly.
Ignoring his theatrics, you hedge, “That he’s juvie bound?”
“Well, yeah, obviously,” he concedes with a slight chin dip. “But also: peak in high school. You, on the other hand…” He gestures at you, up and down, like he’s unveiling something big on The Price is Right. “Peak wherever and whenever the hell you want.”
“That’s so cheesy, Ed.”
“It’s true,” he counters.
The second chorus sounds through the speakers again. This time, Eddie doesn’t stand up to dance or do a show. He just sings along under his breath, less of a performance and more of a habit from countless times you’ve looped Rebel Yell together, lips forming the words without needing the volume.
“In the midnight hour, she cried more, more, more…”
On the last more, he peers at you from the corner of his eye, like he can’t help himself. As if he’s dedicating it on purpose while pretending he isn’t.
You feel it, uncomfortable and sweet, the same way it always does when things almost tilt into a place you’re not sure how to name. You’re not ready to go there. A part of you is not sure you ever will be, not in the way he deserves.
So instead, you reach for the pretzel bag and aim one at his face. He catches it with his mouth without looking away from you, chews it, swallows, then beams, with a few crumbs still on his lower lip.
“I’m a genius. I should take this talent on the road.”
“I’ll miss you terribly,” you tell him dryly. “Every time I open my cupboard and see fewer pretzels.”
His hand slaps back over his heart, gripping till the cotton crinkles. “You would miss me for more than my pretzel-catching skills.”
“Would I?”
“Um, obviously,” he replies, a definitive note there. “Because who else is gonna come over here on a Saturday night, fill you with carbonated sugar water, and remind you that you are, in fact, terrifyingly competent and not, as certain California imports might suggest, a helpless princess?”
You want to argue, but realise you can’t.
“Fine. I would miss you. A little.”
“A little,” Eddie sniffs. “But fine, I’ll take it. Because I’m so kind-hearted.”
He leans back again, sliding lower on the couch until his head rests against the cushion right next to your shoulder. His hair brushes your arm, a tumble of wild curls, still warm from your earlier dancing. Without thinking, you reach up and slick a strand away from your face.
He goes very still for half a moment at the touch, then relaxes into it. Like this—you, together—is the most natural thing in the world.
And maybe it is, you think, relaxing into him. For you two, it’s always been this: a messy tangle of limbs and jokes and music and late nights. It’s the only thing in your life that feels like it’s been there longer than the weight of getting out, than the sting of being left behind once already.
You wake up with Rebel Yell still stuck in your head.
It’s your song—yours and Eddie’s, a lot lighter than his regular repertoire and yet so infectious you both know the lyrics by heart. This happens every time you do a session together. A night where you get to forget the reality of your crappy life and just have fun together. On Saturday, it was direly needed.
You get out of bed with a groan, your toes wriggling on the old carpet. Still clad in your worn t-shirt and shorts, you pad to the bathroom, then the kitchen, putting on the kettle as you go. Your mom’s keys lay on the counter, so you pull out a mug for her. Coffee, two sugars. The clatter of the mug on the laminate echoes too loudly in your thin-walled kitchen. The park around you is waking up with an energetic buzz in the air. Scent of burnt toast, cheap coffee, and tobacco smoke wafts through the cracked kitchen window. September again, and you slept like shit.
Every time you closed your eyes last night, you saw blue eyes. Cutting across you, lazy and sharp, the way he called you princess, then had to stand there and watch you fix his stupid car anyway. You still feel the phantom weight of his burning gaze at the back of your nape, the way it prickled when you bent over the hood, hot and assessing, even as he pretended to be bored with the whole thing.
Asshole.
You stir your mom’s coffee like you can drown the memory of his smirking face in it. The spoon clinks aggressively against the ceramic, scattering your thoughts. Out of the tiny square window above the sink, Eddie’s trailer catches your eye; the sagging porch, the empty lawn chair Wayne often sits on with a beer after a shift, the shabby curtains Eddie never closes right, leaving them perpetually crooked.
His van isn’t there.
You absently check the time on the shitty microwave clock. It blinks a tired 7:02 in sickly green, and you know there’s a good chance it might be wrong—power outage from last week your mom mentioned in passing springs to mind—but your gut says it’s close enough based on the light. Eddie probably went ahead to beat the traffic, which is hilarious every time he uses that excuse, because there isn’t any traffic in Hawkins. Not unless every tractor in a ten-mile radius decides to take a field trip all at once.
You scribble a quick note on the back of an old envelope for your mom—going to school, coffee is ready, love you—and leave it on the table next to the salt and pepper.
Stepping outside, the September air hits you all at once, sinking past your thin flannel. It’s going to be another hot, sunny day, but a part of you senses a shift in the air. Not properly cold just yet, but the air is full of promise. The sky is a flat sheet of murky cloud for now, the kind to make power lines appear like pencil lines scratched across a blank page. Forest Hills smells like it does every morning: wet earth, gasoline and someone’s stale cigarette smoke.
Your car awaits where you left her last night, a faded, boxy thing that Frank likes calling a “shitbox” with an affectionate sort of contempt. But you know better. The paint might be sunburnt and peeling, sure, the body a patchwork of old dents, but she runs smooth. You make it your mission to keep her that way; it’s practically a point of pride to you. As long as she starts every morning and doesn’t leave you stranded on Route 13, you don’t give a damn what anyone thinks of her.
You slide into the driver's seat, the cracked vinyl groaning under your weight, and turn the key. The engine coughs once, spluttering, then settles into a clean, even idle you built with your own hands. For a breath, you sit there, fingers curling around the rim of the wheel, your eyes closing.
A quiet part of you can’t help but wonder if Billy Hargrove took his car elsewhere after you embarrassed him on Saturday. Some older man, some “real mechanic” out of town just so he wouldn’t have to come back and see you again.
An angry hiss leaves your lips, and you roll your eyes, rubbing the heel of your palm across your forehead. Enough already. You had the last laugh by making him look stupid. It’s enough.
You slam the gearstick into reverse like it personally offended you and pull out.
Hawkins High looks exactly like it did back in June when you last saw it.
The massive block of brick squats at the end of the cracked asphalt like a genuine eyesore. Banners still cling to the chain-link fence: GO TIGERS in peeling orange font, HOME OF THE STATE CHAMPIONS! even though that was three years ago, but, you suppose, it’s too much effort to take it down now.
Despite it being the first day back, the parking lot is already filling up—rows of Chevys and Fords and rust-bucket beaters like yours. And, of course, the occasional nicer car all but screaming my daddy is rich. It’s a chaotic but familiar blend of engines revving, someone’s boom box spilling some popular synth-pop track through the open window, a group of sophomores giggling and chatting animatedly because one of them acquired a new perm.
You roll in towards the back as you’ve done for your entire high school career. You’re not the front-row kind of girl. You like the quieter edges, the places where people forget to look. It’s so much easier to observe everything from there.
You’re halfway to your usual spot, eyes eagerly scanning for Eddie’s van, when you hear it.
Low at first, drowned under the noise. Then the sound rips through like a knife, overbearing and cocky, throaty in a way that’s trying far too hard. It’s a roar that doesn’t match the speed limit or the appropriate noise level, especially not at Hawkins. Everything about this engine noise screams look at me.
You don’t have to look up to know. Your hands clench the wheel, your pulse leaping with annoyance.
“Oh, gimme me a break,” you mutter spitefully.
The Camaro swings into the lot like an overly aggressive shark cutting into a school of small fish. It’s the same, gorgeous navy blue from the shop, buffed and gleaming to perfection in the morning light. He takes the corner tighter than he needs to, tyres squealing just enough to make the cheerleaders cluster near the entrance squeal too, half-scared and half-impressed.
Of course he parks front and centre.
He slots neatly into a spot he probably plans to claim as his indefinitely, nose out, all show. When the engine cuts out, the silence it leaves behind is almost as loud.
He steps out like he’s been waiting for this moment his whole life.
Billy Hargrove is all tanned skin, denim and careless aggression. Tight jeans, white tank under an open jacket, chain glinting around the tight tendons of his throat. He rakes a hand through his curls—too long for Hawkin’s boys, sun-streaked in a way that says California, not Indiana—and you swear for a moment the entire lot holds its breath.
Then the reactions roll across the area like a tidal wave. Girls smoking by the smoking area elbow their friend, like moths to a flame. Some jock pauses mid-story, eyeing the car like a territorial dog. A handful of junior boys are openly staring. The air shifts, all at once, like someone dropped a stone in a still lake. You feel Hawkins High rearranging itself around a new centre of gravity in real time.
You hate it.
Not because he doesn’t warrant attention—objectively, he’s handsome, in that dangerous, cigarette ad type of way—but because of how painfully predictable it is. The whole performance. The roles are already settling in: the mysterious new guy, girls who want him, guys who want to fight him, the teachers who will write him off in the first week.
And beneath all that, there’s a private little fact that makes you want to grin: you know exactly how his car runs now. You know what you fixed. You know how long it took.
And you know damn well it bothers him that you know.
You finally cut the engine, parked near the treeline. It’s hardly a glamorous position, but it means you don’t risk some idiot door-dinging your baby, and you can leave fast if you need to.
Students stream past towards the building, some jogging excitedly towards their friends, some dragging their feet like they’re being led to an execution. You catch sight of Eddie’s van near the band room side entrance, a familiar white box with his hand-painted Corroded Coffin logo flaking off the back doors. There’s no sign of him, but you’re not worried. He’ll find you before the first period, or he’ll try to spook you at your locker later.
You throw your bag over your shoulder. It digs into the muscle there, heavy with textbooks, the metal buckle cold against your collarbone.
You lock the car, out of habit more than any real necessity, and start towards the school.
You don’t look at him. You don’t. It lasts for maybe ten steps.
Something in you—curiosity, self-destructive streak, both—pulls your gaze towards the front of the lot again. Just a glance, you tell yourself. Recon, as Eddie would put it. Know thy enemy and all that.
He’s lighting a cigarette.
One hip hitched against the Camaro, shoulders relaxed in a way that’s all deliberate. He cups the lighter from the wind, flame flaring against the protective curl of his hand. The gesture makes the chain around his wrist glint. His eyes are half-lidded, his mouth soft around the filter, ready for the pleasure of the first drag.
Two girls drift by, deliberately slowing their gait. One of them tosses her hair—the kind of fluffed, sprayed thing that takes serious commitment each morning—and says something you can’t hear from this distance. He doesn’t really look at her, but he does this lazy smirk thing with one side of his mouth, exhaling smoke through his nose, which is apparently enough to make them both giggle.
Heat flares somewhere beneath your ribs, sudden and prickly.
You’re halfway between your car and the safer anonymity of the side entrance when your engine ticks. It’s a tiny sound, metal pinging as it cools. A completely normal thing you’ve heard a thousand times. But Billy’s head angles in your direction like he’s heard it too.
Shit.
He sweeps across the lot, over the moving bodies, and snags on the square shape of your car like it’s a magnet. Then cuts upwards, and you feel—
Blue finds you.
It pins you, sharp and assessing under the thick fringe of his lashes. There’s a beat where the rest of the parking lot blurs, dulls around the edges, like someone turned the saturation down on everything not in your line of sight.
You make yourself walk, because if you hesitate, you lose, and you decided yesterday you’re not losing this. Not to him. You flick your eyes away, adjust your grip on your bag like you didn’t even notice him. You make it exactly three more steps before you hear the gravel crunch.
“Hey, princess.”
You close your eyes briefly. Feel your molars grinding into dust. So this is how it’s going to be. You should have known he wouldn’t leave you alone, not after your confrontation.
You turn, plastering a bored sneer on your face.
He’s closer than you expected. He must’ve pushed off the car the second he decided to bother you. Strides eating the distance between you like it’s nothing, cigarette balanced between his fingers, smoke trailing back over his shoulder like a veil.
Up close, he’s far worse.
Your memory of the shop was good, you realise, aghast. Accurate to the last detail. Yet there’s something different about him in daylight. He’s broader than you thought, wide shoulders making the denim jacket sit snug across his back. The bruised-purple shadows under his cutting eyes look more like eyeliner today, making the blue stand out unnaturally.
“Don’t call me that,” you say instinctively.
He huffs out a laugh through his nose, tipping his head like he’s considering it. “Right, right, you prefer ‘mechanic’, right?” He gives the word a certain edge, like it could be an insult if he pushes it.
Your chin juts out. “I prefer my name, actually, but I know that’s a lot of syllables for you.”
One of his eyebrows kicks up. But a corner of his mouth does, too, like it can’t help itself. He raises his cigarette, taking a long drag, watching you through the grey-blue smoke.
He flicks his attention over your shoulder, taking in the car behind you. “So this is what a mechanic drives.”
You feel the urge to step sideways, to physically block him from seeing your car, like he’s some kind of threat to her feelings. You don’t move despite how tightly your fingers strangle the strap of your bag. “Careful,” you warn lowly. “She’s sensitive.”
“That so?” He takes another drag, exhales slowly, throat muscles working as smoke drifts around you. “Looks like it would fall apart if I blew smoke near it.”
And there it is. The beginning of the joke you already suspected was coming—the dig at your ride, how poor you are, your trailer park lot.
Only—
He trails off with a thoughtful sound.
Billy’s eyes narrow, losing the lazy, performative squint they had a moment ago. His attention sharpens and shifts, no longer on the sorry state of the faded paint or the rust, but listening. You know that look. It’s the same one you get when you’re trying to diagnose a problem by sound alone.
His gaze slides sideways, towards the front of the car. You imagine he’s replaying how it sounded when you cut the engine. The idle, tick, purr of the fan.
The corner of his mouth flattens.
“Actually,” he begins slowly, “sounds better than you’d expect.”
You fold your arms, fighting to keep your smugness to yourself. “That’s because it is better than you’d expect.”
His attention slides back to you, over the defensive curve of your crossed arms, the smudge of grease on your jacket forearm your cheap soap couldn’t get out. “You did that?”
“Who else?” You jerk your chin at the car. “Pretty sure my fairy godmother doesn’t know how to change a timing belt.”
He snorts, tongue teasing over his bared teeth. Perfectly straight because of course they are. “Timing belt, huh.”
It’s impossible to miss the way he says it, like he’s testing to see if you’ll flinch. If you actually know what you’re talking about, or if you’re just repeating words you heard in a commercial.
You’ve heard that exact tone from plenty of guys before. You’ve learned how to step around it, dance on top of it, then shove it back down their throats. With pleasure no less.
“Yeah.” You shrug. “Swapped it last month. Re-tensioned it myself. She was squealing like a pig in a slaughterhouse before. Now? Now she purrs.”
Billy takes one last drag, then flicks the butt to the ground and grinds it out with the ball of his boot.
“Well.” He blows the last of the smoke out the side of his mouth. “Could’ve fooled me, looking at it.”
“Yeah, that’s the point.” You shift your bag higher on your shoulder, transferring your weight from one leg to another. “You think I want anyone in this town to know I’m driving something that actually runs?”
That earns you a real laugh. Not the forced, showy kind he gave the girls by his car—a rough, surprised sound that seems to get dragged out of his chest against his will. It’s gone almost as soon as it sounds, but you feel weirdly victorious.
He rakes over you again, from your scuffed boots to your jean jacket and stains. There’s a question there now, under the evaluation. Something like: where did you come from?
“Forest Hills, right?” he asks like he’s confirming a suspicion.
You mock gasp. “Don’t tell me. You can smell the poverty on me?”
“Relax. I live right next to the park. Trailer are hard to miss.”
Right. You knew that. You saw his Camaro nose-in near the park entrance last night when Eddie left, a shortcut to get him home rather than go around the whole set of plots.
“Thought someone like you is too pretty for our side of the track.” It comes out more honest than you meant it to, edged with something that might be resentment, might be… something else.
There’s a flicker at that—a shutter behind those blue eyes. Then the mask slides back into place, well-worn arrogance.
“Don’t let the hair fool you, princess,” he drawls, each word cutting. “Trash comes in all sorts of packaging.”
You shift your weight again, suddenly becoming aware of the student traffic eddying around you. People are starting to notice now. Not just the new guy, but the way the new guy has peeled away from his prime parking lot throne to walk over and talk to the freak girl from the trailer park with grease under her nails.
You catch hushed snippets as they pass.
“—that the girl from the garage?”
“—heard she works on cars, like, for real—”
“—is he into her?—”
The back of your neck prickles. You hate being watched when you’re not in control of the show.
“So.” You slant your head, forcing a smirk. “You track me all the way across the lot just to insult my car, Hargrove? Gonna be late for your ‘I’m new, please love me’ orientation speech.”
He shakes his head with a snide little smile. “They don’t make pretty boys do those where I’m from.”
“Oh, my mistake.” You widen your eyes in mock horror. “Do they just hand you a fan club and a parking spot up front instead?”
His jaw works. It’s tiny, a micro-movement, but you spot it. “Jealous?”
“Of what? The parking spot or the fan club?”
“Either.”
You step towards him.
It surprises you, a little, that you’re the one who closes the distance between you. But you’re tired, and restless, and Eddie’s stupid faux-microphone performance is still echoing in your ears. You’re tired of feeling like you’re three steps behind this guy when you technically met him first, when you’re the one who made sure his precious Camaro doesn’t fall apart on his way to school.
You stop close enough to see the flecks of darker blue near the centre of his irises. Close enough to smell the soap under the smoke. Close enough that if either of you leaned just a fraction—
“You know what I learned,” you say quietly, “working at the shop all these years?”
He’s not backing off; he’s not even surprised you’re getting in his face. If anything, he looks ravenous. “Enlighten me.”
“The louder something is, the more broken it usually is underneath.” You let your gaze flick pointedly towards the gleaming Camaro, then back to him, doing a similar sweep. “The same is true for cars and people.”
His eyes flash, brief and threatening, something like real anger spiking like an electric shock between you. His body goes still in a way that means movement is coming. You half-prepare yourself for it, for the worst version—a shove, a snarl, some handed-down violence you’ve seen plenty of men use growing up.
Instead, he surprises you by laughing.
It’s not a pleasant sound. It’s not the accidental one from earlier, either. It’s tight, jagged and a little hollow, but it’s laughter.
“Cute,” he drawls. “You came up with that all by yourself, or does your boss feed you lines between oil changes, princess?”
A hot mass twists inside your gut, crawling upwards. Billy’s gaze drifts, for a split second, over your face. Your eyes, your mouth, the little scar you forget until someone stares at it too long. You practically feel him filing each detail away. Something glimmers under the surface, a thing you have no name for. Twisted up and smouldering between you, a taut line moments before you drop a match in gasoline.
Then he looks away, bored. Like nothing just transpired.
“Besides, I didn’t want you to get a big head about fixing my car. Might start changing me more.”
Huffing, you force out, “Please. You could barely handle my hourly rate as it is.”
That earns you a flash of teeth. “You overcharged me.”
“I saved your ass from blowing a gasket on the highway,” you insist hotly. “That was a discount, sweetheart.”
The nickname slips out before you can bite it back.
“Oh?” His voice drops, an openly amused purr. “We doing pet names now?”
You feel heat crawl up your neck. “Don’t get overexcited, Hargrove. I call everyone sweetheart when they’re being an idiot.”
“Guess I’ll have to work hard to keep earning it, then.”
The ease of the line doesn’t quite match the way his throat moves around those words. He scratches his jaw, still boring holes into your face.
“Hey!” a voice calls.
You both turn.
Eddie jogs across the lot towards you, curls caught in the breeze, denim vest flapping around his Hellfire Club shirt. His hand is lifted in an exuberant wave. The battered bolt on the leather cord around his neck flashes once, catching the light.
“Morning, my favourite mechanic!” he yells, waving as he closes the distance. “You ditching me for the first pretty boy you find, huh? I’m wounded.”
Your stomach does a stupid little swoop, but for a different reason this time. Relief. Anchour. The sight of Eddie is a homecoming, always.
You don’t miss the way Billy’s eyes narrow, just a hair, as they track Eddie closing the distance. Evaluating, categorising him. Threat or joke, or both.
Eddie skids to a stop a couple of feet away, breath puffing from his lungs. He smells like coffee and cheap deodorant and the faint musk of weed clinging to his denim.
“Well, well, well,” Eddie begins, planting his hands on his hips and giving Billy an over-the-top once-over. “If it isn’t Mr Camaro himself. You break anything this time, or you just here to bask in her awesomeness?” He jerks his thumb at you.
You roll your eyes. “Ed.”
“What?” He grins, toothy and genuine. “Just establishing the pecking order. Guy shows up with a fancy muscle car, thinks he’s hot shit. People need to know who really keeps this joint running.” He taps his temple, then points at you. “Brains and brawn, baby.”
Billy’s gaze flicks between the two of you. There’s a brief, ugly flare of something territorial there, and you’re not even sure who it’s about.
“Didn’t realise you had a guard dog,” Billy says flatly, a certain dismissiveness in the way he says guard dog.
You bristle, but before you can open your mouth, Eddie throws his arm around you like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
“Who, me? Nah, man. I’m more like—” He pauses, searching for whatever term pleases him. “Like the narrator. The guy in the back is going ‘ooh’ when something dramatic happens.”
He squeezes your shoulder, brief and affectionate. You feel the weight of him beside you, solid and familiar. There’s no precarious drop with Eddie. Just warmth.
He glances sideways, eyes glinting knowingly. “So, uh.” He gestures vaguely between you and Billy. “You two have fun trading insults or whatever, but we’re gonna be late to homeroom at this rate, and Miss O’Donnell already hates my guts, so—”
“You make it too easy,” you say.
His hand lands on top of your head, causing you to squirm. “Cruel.”
Billy watches the entire exchange with deadly calm, tracking each movement and word, then focuses back on your face. “You always let him talk for you?”
Smiling sweetly, you say, “Only when I’m busy deciding if someone’s worth the breath it’ll take to tell them to fuck off.”
Billy’s mouth curves. “And verdict?”
“Jury’s still out,” you reply breezily. “Try not to run anyone over with your ego in the meantime.”
The bell shrieks then, high and shrill, cutting off any response from Billy. There’s a collective sound of groans from the student body around you.
“And that’s our cue,” Eddie declares, tapping your arm.
Involuntarily, your focus slips back to Billy, who peers at you with something like calculation. “See you around, mechanic.”
The way he says it, this time, is different.
Less mocking and more… a promise. Or a threat.
You square your shoulders. “Not if I see you first.”
It’s childish, but it makes his smile widen, slow and wolfish. He edges back, dragging his stare over you one last time, committing something to memory, then turns away, heading back towards his front-and-centre throne.
Eddie hums Rebel Yell under his breath, obnoxiously loud. You elbow him, following him wordlessly towards the building.
There’s no need to look for Billy. The lot, the school, the whole of Hawkins is already tilting, just a fraction, around a new axis. You hate it. But in a dark, honest part of yourself, you’re also looking forward to seeing what happens when something finally tilts back.
an: thank you everyone who read part 1 and showed this little project support! any feedback or thoughts 💭? let me know! I would love to chat :)
⊹ ࣪ ˖ warnings: in true enemies to lovers fashion they don't like each other at all, some misogyny because reader is a mechanic, set in early s2.
⊹ ࣪ ˖ notes: out of all the characters to find interesting I just had to pick the worst mf... but he is the worst and I wanna dissect his brain like he's my personal science project so strap in lads, it's gonna be a bumpy ride.
read on ao3. ⊹ series masterlist.
The garage is already hot when you clock in.
August in Hawkins always feels like someone draped a wet towel over the sun and called it a day, but today is notably worse. Almost sticky with humidity, each gulp of oxygen in your lungs feels meagre and insufficient. The big bay door sticks halfway up, and you have to wedge your shoulder under the metal and shove until it rattles open with a groan loud enough to wake the dead. Or at least the raccoon that keeps trying to break into the parts room. With some moderate success, too.
You wipe sweat off your forehead with the back of your wrist and taste the stale, metallic air. Same old routine. Same old town. Same old ache in your chest, reminding you that you’re smart enough to get the hell out of here but too broke to leave.
You flick on the radio with one hand—crackling static, then Bon Jovi—and use another to shove your bag in a dusty corner, tying your jumpsuit sleeves around your waist, and get to work.
Your boss, Frank, won’t get in till late noon to take over, and so you allow the dizzying heat to envelop you, working methodically on your list of tasks. Grease under your nails. Oil on your palms. It’s grounding. Always has been, even when you were young—when your interest in metal and engines was considered “cute” and not “unfitting for a young lady”.
By eleven, you’ve reconstructed a carburettor and almost finished reorganising the socket drawers, drinking half a jug of lukewarm water that tastes faintly like rubber to keep yourself awake and functional.
It’s then that a car rolls up.
You hear it before you see it: a low, satisfying rumble that does not belong to any Hawkins resident who brings their rust bucket in for “a funny noise” that’s actually catastrophic engine failure in disguise. This one is tuned and tuned well. Cars like these pass through town on a rare occasion and rarely stay for longer than a glimpse.
You stride out from the back, wiping your hands on an old rag while your eager gaze searches for the owner, and that’s when you see it—
A ’79 Camaro pulls up with a growl. Metallic blue. Chrome glinting in the sunlight. California plates stark in the bright glare of the sun. Everything about this car is loud. Impactful, meant to be seen and appreciated.
And then you see him.
The door swings open in a smooth arc, and a boy climbs out—no, not a boy, not really. A guy, similar in age to you by your general estimation, though your mom’s always told you that you’re good at faces and even better at estimations. He’s all broad shoulders, curls bleached by the sun, and a denim jacket over a tighter-than-necessary shirt.
He nudges his sunglasses lower down his nose, and even at this distance, you can tell he has bright eyes, the same shade as his jacket. He glances around the building like it offends him, his expression wrinkling briefly with contempt. Then his eyes land on you.
You watch his expression shift like a carousel at work—brief surprise, then scepticism when he notes your work attire and the wrench still gripped in your hand, then something that should have no place on his face at all.
A smirk.
You feel your spine lock in place. Great. Another one.
He saunters toward you, spinning his keys around his finger. Everything about him screams cocky. Dangerous. Looking for an audience. You’ve seen a hundred different versions of him, except this aura of arrogance is somehow thicker on him, like a shroud of egotistical magnificence he likes encasing himself in is integral to him. Your eyes flick to the California plates again, two and two coming together in your mind.
“Hey,” he says, voice smooth and sharp in equal measure. “Someone around here actually works on cars, or is this a lemonade stand?”
You blink once, your brows lifting slowly towards your hairline. Then let your eyes slide deliberately down his Camaro, across his boots, back to his smug face.
“Let me guess,” you say, each word as dry as dust. “Your brain rattled loose from all that horsepower, and now you don’t know how doors work? Because inside is this wild thing called a shop.”
His smirk widens, even though he clearly didn’t expect you to bite back. He looks you up and down again, more blatantly this time, and your jaw clenches to the point of pain.
“Cute.” He leans an elbow on the counter like he’s at a bar and you’re the bartender here to amuse and serve him. Skin around your knuckles strains from how hard you’re gripping your wrench. “Didn’t expect the mechanic to be—”
He pauses. You watch the gears turn as he searches for the proper expression. He chooses the wrong word.
“—you.”
“Huh,” you begin blandly. “And I didn’t expect a Camaro owner to be an asshole, but guess we’re both disappointed.”
At the back of your head, you can feel Frank shaking his head and reprimanding you for mouthing off to potential customers. You’ve been reported for “unseemly” conduct multiple times by men who don’t like a woman—one still in high school, at that—telling them about their car like you know better than them. Except you do.
Your words land like a slap, mainly to the blonde’s fragile pride. His jaw flexes, something hot flickering behind his eyes. It’s only then that you notice how starkly blue they are; blue like a clear, open sky, and twice as beautiful. And it’s not pure anger he’s looking at you with. No, it’s something more feral. More eager. Far more treacherous than a typical insulted man demanding to be seen by a real mechanic would be.
This is a guy who enjoys a fight. Who seeks it.
“Well.” He clicks his tongue, drawing the words out slowly. No smirk this time. “Aren’t you a little spitfire.”
“Don’t call me that.”
Like a shark scenting blood, he leans in marginally. “Why not? Fits.”
“It doesn’t.”
“You sure?” He taps his fingers on the worn wood, rings glinting in the light, rolling his eyes as he takes off his sunglasses and clips them to his shirt. “Because your attitude is right on the nose.”
He thinks he’s charming. Guys like him always do. In school, he likely has girls eating from the palm of his hand, and expects the rest of the world to follow suit. He’s not charming. Not even a little bit. Not to you. Just annoying.
There is something, though. He’s not leering, he’s not puffing up and demanding to be seen by your boss. Yet. He’s compelling in the same way a lit match falling into gasoline is compelling.
You turn your back on him and grab the intake sheet, folding the weathered pages back till you locate a blank one.
“Name?”
A brief silence, then, “Billy.”
Of course it is. He even says it like he expects some sort of reaction. You write it down. “Last name?”
“Hargrove.”
As expected. Not a local.
“Reason for visit?”
He makes a vague gesture toward his car. “Engine noise.”
Pen still on the sheet, you cut a glance his way. “That’s descriptive.”
“It’s a noise. Coming from the engine.” He drawls with a shrug, looking equal parts bored and vindictive, like he’s relishing your annoyance. “You’re the supposed mechanic. Figure it out.”
You stare at him. He stares back. You’re the one who breaks the silence, primarily so you don’t stab him with a pen. Frank is unlikely to react well to hearing you assaulted a potential customer, even one as irritating and smug as this one.
Placing the clipboard back on the desk, you step around the counter. “Pop the hood.”
He saunters towards the car and does as you asked, but not without tossing you a look over his shoulder. As if he’s making sure you’re watching. As if he expects you to be impressed by his back muscles and swagger.
You refuse to give him the satisfaction.
Shoving a dirty rag in your back pocket, you grab your light and stride over. Billy steps aside, but only barely—close enough that your arms brush when you lean over.
He smells like cigarette smoke, heat, and some clean, sharp cologne that doesn’t belong in Hawkins—a California scent. The ocean seems to lap at his feet, and you think, briefly, that this guy should be cutting up waves and chatting up girls, not lurking in your shop, eyeing you with a detached sort of boredom, like a bored animal on a prowl.
You hate that you notice these things about him. He’s not deserving of it. Shaking off your thoughts, you flick on the light and start inspecting.
He watches you. Far too close to be comfortable. And while dubious stares and mumbles are nothing new to you, this is something different.
After several minutes, he says, “So what’s the verdict, princess?”
You don’t even look up. “It’s ‘mechanic’ to you, actually. And the issue is your alternator belt.”
“Oh yeah?”
Your shoulder blades tense in an attempt not to bristle at his tone. “Yeah.”
“You sure?”
You straighten up slowly. “Do you want me to fix the damn car, or do you want to keep doubting me until someone else tells you the same thing and you have to pay twice?”
His jaw locks again, and it’s more evident than ever that he’s not used to being challenged like this. The leverage is in your hands, however, because he needs the car running and running well. To him, this vehicle is no doubt a status symbol, something that will set him apart from others, earn him cool points. Whatever dark, ugly thing that may slither past his thoughts has to retreat. If only for now.
“Fine,” he mutters after a long beat of silence. “Fix it.”
You dip your chin once, satisfied, and move towards the toolbox to gather what you need. This is hardly the first time you’ve had to talk a man into letting you touch their precious engines. Except this one follows you, a shadow you didn’t ask for or need.
Huffing a breath, you snap, “Do you mind?”
Billy only grins faintly, a meanness to the edges of his full lips, if it can even be considered a smile. “Just making sure you’re not gonna slip and break a nail.”
If there were justice in the world, he would combust from the heat of your glare. But you’re not quite so lucky. So, over your shoulder, you spit out a venomous, “Try saying that again. I dare you.”
Much to your chagrin, his grin only spreads at your retort. Growing like a flower after rain. Wicked and brimming with promise. He likes your fire. It’s evident all over his face, even if it pisses him off, too.
“You’re fun,” he says simply, and you can tell by the way his expression twists that the admission surprises even him, “I thought everyone in this shithole town was a goody two-shoes.”
“You have no idea who I am.”
Worryingly, that seems to please him more. “You’re still fun.”
“Go bother someone else then.”
“No.”
You stare at him, aggravated, heat rising up your neck that has nothing to do with the shop’s temperature. Billy stares right back, infuriatingly relaxed, arms crossed over his chest like this is prime entertainment for him. A big city boy suddenly winding up in Hawkins must be driving him crazy. Good, you think spitefully, hopefully he goes crazy, does something idiotic and ends up rotting in juvie.
You mutter something obscene under your breath and get back to work. Billy keeps watching; every twitch, every action, every breath. It gets to a point where you’re genuinely unsure if he’s protective of his toy, interested in what you’re doing or just trying to unsettle you.
At one point, you start to feel the weight of his attention even when you’re not looking his way. Not leering. Not mocking, exactly, which would be far easier to deal with than this.
Just… intent.
Like he’s memorising the way your hands move.
You try to ignore it, but find yourself faltering now and then.
Twenty minutes later, you wipe your brow and step back from his Camaro like you can’t be done with this job fast enough. Which is a shame, really, because it’s a stunning piece of machinery, the type you would like to rummage inside of all day if you could.
“There,” you announce, hating how haggard you sound. “Your belt was loose. It’s fixed now.”
Billy circles the car like he’s inspecting a crime scene, mouth pursed in a thoughtful line. He glances at you. Then back at the engine. Then you again. You have to bite back the urge to flip him and his suspicion off. He has no right to look vaguely surprised that you actually did it.
He gets in without a word and starts the car.
The engine purrs. Perfection. You don’t need to check anything else; it’s all in the sound.
He knows it too, because he looks up at you through the windshield, eyes narrowing slightly, as if recalibrating his entire opinion of you in real time.
He gets out unhurriedly.
“Alright,” he declares. “Not bad.”
You arch a brow, your blood singing with triumph even while you keep your face blank. “Not bad?” you echo, equally as nonchalantly.
“Yeah.” He shrugs, but it’s the forced kind of casual. “You did good.”
You blink. Is that…supposed to be a compliment?
Before you can respond, he adds, “For a girl.”
And there it is.
“You know,” you say, voice dipping towards frigid, “for someone with such a pretty car, you’re shockingly stupid.”
He laughs. Actually laughs. A low, rough sound that hits something in your gut you refuse to name.
“Relax, Hellcat. I’m teasing.”
A sound whistles past your teeth. “What did you just call me?”
He steps closer—too close, every cell in your body suddenly screams that he’s far, far too close, that you’re alone with no one else around. Against your will, you smell him again: smoke, ocean breeze, and trouble. Like dynamite in human form, just waiting for a spark.
“Hellcat,” he repeats with another goading tweak of his mouth. “Figured it fit. You got claws.”
A scoff escapes you. “Try using that again, and I’ll show you where I can put those claws.”
“Oh?” He tilts his head, eyes dragging over your face like he’s trying to weigh up how sincere that threat is. “Is that a promise? I thought you small-town girls are all meant to be prudes.”
You shove the clipboard at his chest.
He grabs it, fingers brushing yours, and you yank your hand back, half a snarl twisting your face.
“Sign,” you order.
He does, scrawling his name like he has all the time in the world and no respect for yours. You try to keep your composure by imagining how good it would feel to beat him with that clipboard till he loses that damned smirk—and several teeth.
Billy hands the pen back, along with the cash, leaning in just enough for his voice to drop—
“See you around, mechanic.”
You roll your eyes. “Do me a favour. Don’t.”
There’s a secretive, dangerous glint in his eyes when your gazes meet, then he turns and heads for his Camaro. Before he gets in, he pauses, one hand on the door. He twists to face you again.
And says, with that insufferable twinkle in his eyes: “I never got your name.”
“That’s because I never gave it.”
He considers that, then: “Shame. You did such a great job, Hellcat.”
Saccharine sweet. Fucking prick.
You open your mouth—something sharp ready to fly—but he’s already slipping into the driver’s seat, revving the engine as if challenging you to scream over the roar.
Then he peels out of the lot, the smell of burnt rubber filling your nostrils.
You glare at the empty space he leaves behind. Your pulse races annoyingly fast in your ears, but your whole body feels wired, like someone just hooked you up to a live circuit.
You hate him. You really, truly despise him.
But God help you—
There’s an unmistakable, unwelcome spark in your chest, too. One you don’t dare to dwell on.
You toss the rag aside, exhale through your teeth, and mutter to yourself:
“Shit.”
Because you know, somehow, deep in your bones, that this isn’t the last time Billy Hargrove will walk into your shop.
Or get under your skin.
an: everyone who wants to see more say ayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy! or don't : (
PAIRING: Dad's bestfriend!Hannibal X Bratty!reader
CONTENT WARNING: smut (18+, mdni), dubcon, dark hannibal, age gap (reader is nineteen), mentions of patriarchy, unprotected sex, degrading, humiliation, spanking, impact play, messy kissing, hair pulling, perv hannibal, choking, breath play, exhibitionism.
SYNOPSIS: Your dad had always been the type to invite his friends over to attend glamorous dinners and everything you appeared dull, least interested in engaging with his old fellows. Too boring for you and always being told to be on your best behavior around them always irritated you but when another one of your father's guests arrive, you're left quite speechless. Handsome, charming and all the more enticing. You feel yourself drawn to him — but your bratty mouth makes things worse.
“Don't go around talking back to his guests.”
Was what you had always been told. The problem did not lie in you talking back to them, it was you putting them in their place everytime one of the old geezers commented about your behavior and how you were an exact replica of your mother. Your behavior, lack of discipline all came from her and you only wished to punch them in the face.
Fucking old people thinking they could get away with disrespect until you opened your mouth and showed them your true nature.
Today was one of those nights where your father had made your mother prepare a flourishing dinner, a grand one at that. It did not matter to him that she would grow tired, that she would sweat to the point of dehydration in the kitchen, as long as his fucking guests were content and full.
You hated them for that reason.
They could turn down the offer, but no.
You knew they were not at fault but you disliked each and every one of them.
Hearing the small knock on the door, your father ushered you to open it and you stood up from your seat, a big frown etched on your features. Upon opening the door, you were met with a much more handsome man that you'd expected. He was tall, evidently and his frame was larger than yours ever could be.
Hair a deep shade of golden and body draped in what appeared to be an expensive grey suit. His face carried a polite smile and all you could do was stare at him, enthralled by the amount of beauty this man possessed. The clearing of his throat caught you off guard, bringing you back to the real world.
“Hello, Dear. You must be his daughter.”
You nodded, at a loss of words. You stepped aside from the door, allowing the man in and he entered. In his hand was a black box and through the transparent sheet in the box you managed to catch a cake in there.
Precisely a chocolate cake.
Your favorite.
You almost smiled when the man handed the box to you, his fingers accidentally brushing over yours. It made you feel different, which made you realize how wrong all of this was. You couldn't be feeling this drawn to your father's friend — especially one that was nowhere near your age.
A decade older.
You shook your head, a feeble attempt to rid your head of thoughts regarding the mysterious man. He shook hands with your father as you eyed him, battling the allure this man had. Out of all your father's guest, this one apparently had the most grandeur dinner prepared for him. You did not like him already, as handsome as he was.
“Fucking ass.” You muttered to yourself, arms crossed over your chest and when your father signaled you to go over to the kitchen where your mother was practically slaving away under the pressures of a patriarchal household, you rolled your eyes and obliged.
Only because she most definitely needed your help.
Upon entering the kitchen, you were met with your mother who with the back of her one hand wiped away the perspiration from her forehead while with the other, whisked up some sauce. Her food was the best you'd ever tasted but this talent of hers played as a curse rather a blessing.
You sighed, reaching over and taking the whisk from her fingers. Copying her actions, whisking up the sauce for the goose laid before on tray. “I've got it. You should put the cake in the refrigerator.”
Your mother looked over to the black box you'd placed on the side of the counter and nodded, picking it up and heading towards the fridge. Just when you were done with the sauce, satisfied with its thick consistency, you poured it over the goose.
Your mother had prepared goose, beef along with shrimps. You were already starving and you knew she was too. Ever since you both had woken up, you were subjected to constant labor in the kitchen. Even after advising your father against your mother preparing dinner, taking out his guest being a better idea.
Of course the man was relentless in making his food connoisseur of a friend taste your mother's delicious food and rate it. Thus, your newfound irritation for the man was born.
Everything was done and when your mother fried the shrimps, decorating them beautifully on a pale plate, you were handed them in a tray to take outside. Your body was clumsy and everytime your mother would give you a task, she would also follow it up by a ‘be careful.’
You made your way out, thankfully wearing a short sundress which did not get in the way of you when you took the tray to the dining room. Your father's friend was already situated, gossiping about something unnecessary. You placed the tray down and lifted the plates, setting them in the middle.
You could feel his gaze upon you.
Upon looking up, you were met with him. Dark eyes focused on you, a smile causing lines in his cheeks and eyes. You quickly finished and walked back inside the kitchen with the tray in your arms, your platform heels clicking against the marble floor. Your mother was already waiting to hand you another tray, the second last and you repeated the same actions from before.
Placing the tray down — lips in a thin line, face stoic and eyes focusing on the plates you lifted. You were a clumsy girl and no matter how much you concentrated at a task at hand, you found yourself failing. As you picked up a glass, it slipped right from between your fingers.
The man reached over, to pick it up before you could, fingers brushing over yours in the process. “Be careful, Dear. You wouldn't want to break it now.”
You snatched the glass from underneath his loose grasp, placing it down on the table and smiling at him. “Don't worry, mister. I got it. This isn't my first time serving my father's rather useless friends.”
You'd whispered those words to him, with a evident fake smile on your lips. Hannibal was taken aback by your hostile behavior but he did not let it affect him — rather left him intrigued. You had a mouth to you and he enjoyed the mouthy ones, as long as they were pretty.
You had a certain allure to you.
How your hips swayed as you walked out of the kitchen, how your lips twitched in what he assumed irritation whenever your gaze captured him, bangs hovering over your forehead concealing it. Beauty had been bestowed on you and Hannibal was an admirer of art.
Even if it was forbidden.
Your father obviously was too busy smiling to even hear what you had said to his guest. You walked back inside, brought back another tray and this time your mother followed behind. Her apron untied and left on the kitchen counter and after the table was decorated, all of you sat down.
“This is a lot,” Hannibal said, very much impressed with the grandeur of the beautifully decorated dinner table. “I don't believe I would be able to stomach it all, really. You have tired yourself out, miss.”
You rolled your eyes but then, at least he'd taken his time to appreciate your mother's efforts unlike all the other guests. You still were not pleased with him and everyone began serving themselves. You watched as with each bite of the goose meat, Hannibal closed his eyes as if to really savor the taste of it.
“God, this is truly spectacular.” He praised, chewing onto the meat. “You are blessed with talent for culinary, miss.”
Your mother nodded, round cheeks flustered as she acknowledged the man's praise. Your father seemed the happiest, as if Hannibal’s validation meant everything to him. “Hannibal, I'm glad you're enjoying the food.”
So that was his name.
Hannibal Lecter.
You knew his last name since that is how your father had ordered to address him but his first name was unknown to you. Hannibal smiled, nodding his head while sliding off the meat from the fork, his lips puckered and plump. You swallowed, gaze lingering over the man's features.
Your father caught the almost empty glass of Hannibal and then looked over to you, placing his fork down. “Be a dear and pour Hannibal a glass of wine, girl.”
Your fingers tightened around the fork, placing it down and standing up. He was more than capable of pouring his own fucking wine but of course your father had to make you play little waitress — it is exactly what your mother had given birth to you for. Hannibal read your body language like it was an open book, understanding the annoyance swirling in your eyes.
You walked around the table to his side and grabbed the bottle rather roughly, aiming it over his glass and pouring the wine. In your anger, you filled his glass to the brim and accidentally spilled a few drops over his perfectly ironed suit. Your father gasped but Hannibal smiled.
“It is alright.” He reassured. “Accidents happen, may I know where the bathroom is?”
Your father, irritated, looked at you.
You nearly groaned. “I can lead you, if you'd just follow me.”
Your tone was venomous as you began walking into the direction of where the bathroom was, not waiting for the man to follow you up. Though his heavy footsteps were enough to tell you that he was right behind you. The bathroom was further into the house, down the hall in the corner and upon reaching it, you pointed at it rudely.
Hannibal tilted his head. “Help me clean this.”
“Excuse me? You're a grown man. First you fail to pour your own wine and now you expect me to clean this?” You scoffed at his expectations, losing restraint of your sharp tongue.
Hannibal stepped closer to you, locking you against the wall and you stared at him with panic filled eyes. He was too close, for his own good and your breath hitched. “Listen to me, little girl. I do not know what one sided problems you have with me nor do I care for it but you better mind your tongue.”
You stepped up, shrinking the distance between the two of you. “Or what, old man?”
He raised a brow in amusement, a smile crossing his features. Eyes locked with you, he stepped closer causing his chest to brush against yours. His breath, wine and rosemary, mingling with yours. Hannibal was not intoxicated, you knew that for sure.
“Little girls like you think they can go around disrespecting anyone.” He breathed on your face, tingles dancing over the bridge of your nose. “Wait until someone puts you in your place, then you won't be running your mouth.”
You laughed in his face. “Oh please. You're my father's guest, expect him to lick your fucking balls, not me.”
You tried walking away from him, but two steps in and his hand had already found its way around your arm. Hannibal pulled you back, your small frame colliding against the wall and a thudding sound broke through. A gasp fell from your lips and the endeavor to leave was proven futile when Hannibal wrapped a hand around your throat.
“Keep quiet.” He ordered and long gone was that sweet smile, replaced with a sharp look in his inundating gaze. “You're lucky you have a pretty face and I have an obsession with art.”
Your breath hitched in your throat. Hannibal’s grip on your throat tightened, watching as you struggled in his hold. Petite hands punching at his wrist, but to no avail. You sputtered and tried to inhale some oxygen but the man had cut off your air supply tenaciously, not allowing you a whiff of the air.
Tears welled up in your eyes and at this point you could not even call out for your parents, as Hannibal had constricted your vocal chords from being used. Your pearly tears streamed down, face evolving into a deep hue of purple and that is when he released you, pushing you into the wall from the force.
You coughed, tears and drool everywhere.
Your desperate attempts to inhale some air into your expanded lungs was deemed adorable by Hannibal and he expected you to finally show some obedience. Your hands circled around your throat, a searing sensation spreading beneath the skin.
Your body shuddered at what this man was capable of. How under the veil of politeness and gentleness lurked darkness and tenacity.
“Clean the mess you’ve caused.” By that he meant the wine on his suit and you nodded, rushing inside the bathroom with him behind you.
You ran a wet towel underneath a running faucet and then turned to him with shaky fingers, clearly traumatized and afraid of what he was capable of. He noticed the tremor in your fingers, how you missed his thighs by an inch while trying to clean up the spilled wine.
“There.” You said, tossing the towel aside.
Your brattiness still had not left you and Hannibal smiled, knowing it would be fun to break a girl as adamant as you. It was obvious that you only needed time to recover from the brutality of his grip and you'd be back to disrespecting him.
“You're so pretty when you're obedient like this.” He praised, reaching out to run a thumb over your chin. You froze at the touch, lips trembling and the close proximity made you quiver in front of him like some little kitten, lead astray by someone evil. His touch now was in contrast to his monstrosity, what he'd done to your throat.
It was soft, like he meant it.
Like he traced your chin to embed his mind with it.
You wanted to stay silent but your damned tongue. “I wish I could say the same about a man as incapable as you are.”
Those words caused the soft trace of a thumb across your chin into a harsh, searing grasp. You whimpered when he tugged your whole body forward with little to no force, holding you in place. You saw him lean in, with sheer determination to capture your lips in a kiss and he did.
No amount the struggle, resistance and fight you showed.
He took your lips like the pair belonged to him. Hannibal encircled an arm around your waist and pulled you into him, your perfect little ass pressing into his crotch. His lips savored yours, sucking and biting and all you could do was struggle against his bone crushing hold.
Hannibal had lost his grip on morality, if it even existed. When his dear coworker invited him over for dinner, he never thought he would be engaging in such sinful acts with his daughter. The same daughter he'd seen pictures of, shown to him and the other coworkers by your father. You were such a pretty lamb, perfect face and luscious hair but what he did not expect was for you to have such a foul mouth.
He pushed his hips into yours and you felt something hard, perched on the curve of your small ass.
The more you struggled, the more it worked to arouse Hannibal. His golden strands hovered over his forehead as he somehow managed to pry open your mouth, harshly entering your mouth. His tongue wrapping around yours, fucking your mouth and all you could do was struggle.
Sounds of clothes bustling and kissing filled up the bathroom but thankfully the water running silenced your sounds. Hannibal’s other hand moved to grab a fistful of your perky tits through your dress and he groaned upon feeling them without a bra.
Fingers pinching and twisting your nipples rather roughly.
The kiss, once broken, left you completely light headed. A string of saliva trailing from his lips to yours, testament to what he had done to you. Your teary eyes were wide with shock as Hannibal continued drilling his bulge into your ass.
“Please,” You whimpered, palm half the size of his trying to push at his bicep. “my father will find out.”
Hannibal broke from you, not wishing to raise suspicion. He left you deserted in the bathroom and made his way back to the dinner table. You took time to stare at your disheveled reflection in the mirror — straps of the pale dress loosely sitting around your arms and purple prints on your throat intimidated you.
Your skin was tainted and you released your hair from the ponytail they were in, covering the sides of your throat with it. Hannibal had put most pressure around your throat, not directly on it.
You pursued him too and found your parents engaging in a conversation with him. His gaze met yours, with a subtle warning as you sat down on the couch. You should've told your parents about the heinous act, but you didn't and you didn't know whether it was because you lacked the courage or because you simply liked it.
How rough he was, how inhumane.
The dinner soon came to an end and Hannibal was forced to stay back by your parents. It was obvious that he also wanted to stay back, maybe for you and the thought made your stomach flutter with butterflies.
“Delicious cooking, miss. I truly enjoyed each and every dish.” Hannibal once more praised your mother and she flourished, murmuring a thank you.
Your father lead him to the guest room which was on the first floor while your room was at the top second one. You helped your mother clean the table and washed the amount of dishes which had piled up in the sink. You took your time while everyone else went to sleep — your arms sore from the amount of cleaning. It was truly tiring but there wasn't much you could do. Your mother’s tiredness was written all over her face and you could not bring about to ask her to help you.
But at least now everything was peaceful.
You'd put on light music in the background to help you clean around the kitchen, soapy hands rubbing the sponge over the tray as you moved your hips to the music. This time of the hour made you the happiest — no one to boss you around or interrupt you, bother you or irritate you.
“Having fun, aren't you?”
Your feet moved, leaping as you turned around to face the owner of the deep Lithuanian accent. “Mr. Lecter.”
Your blood ran a little cold upon recalling the events from a fee yours ago, shoulders stiffening and Hannibal, an expert at reading body language caught yours. Your little dress was soaked around your stomach from the water being splashed, exposing your taut stomach.
“Burdening a little girl with such hardwork, you deserve a reward for this.” He walked over and leaned against the counter. You noticed the change of clothes — suit and vest long gone, only left behind was his button up shirt and his dress pants. His sleeves were rolled up to expose his arms and you glanced at the protruding veins embedded underneath the skin.
You let out a laugh. “Like I said, nothing new. I'm quite used to cleaning after my father's useless guests.”
You closed your eyes, knowing you'd once again lost control of your tongue. But you did not feel bad. You felt the man move, his ever looming presence towering over you and tou sucked in a harsh breath.
“Bratty little girl.” He whispered, large hands sitting atop your waist, rubbing up and down.
You whimpered at his touch, subconsciously pressing your ass deeper into his crotch, awakening his restless cock. Hannibal thought he had you, right where he wanted but he was wrong. You'd grown a liking to his rough behavior and how easily he put you in your place.
“Did you come here for dinner or to prey on your colleague's young daughter? If he finds out, he would surely be disgusted by what a perverted man you are.” You shamed him for his sickly desires, shaking your head in disappointment.
Hannibal’s fingers dug into your sides. “Do you take me for a creep?”
“You're worse. Probably have done this to other girls and now I'm next on your line. A woman your age surely would not want you, seeing how fucking desperate you are.” Your words ignited a burning fire within him and he turned you around, pushing his hips into your concealed mound.
The visible tent in his pants only growing and your breath broke when you felt him push deeper into you. His hand moved to your hair, grasping your roots and tugging on them making you wince. Your whimpered was swallowed by Hannibal as he devoured your lips, his other free hand tugging at the thin spaghetti straps of your dress.
Unveiling your perky tits to him, he broke the kiss and started to litter kisses down the trail which connected your neck and jaw. You tried to push him off, punching at his broad chest but god, you were fucking helpless and pathetic against him.
Chills danced across your spine, maneuvering path to your pulsating cunt. Your heart beat rapid, lips falling apart to let out the prettiest of sounds.
Hannibal tore himself from you, with too much power and in the heat of the moment dragged you towards the dinner table. He pulled out a chair, sat down on it and then bent you over his lap. You couldn't make much noise of struggle as you didn't wish to disturb the peaceful sleep of both your parents.
His large hands moved your dress all the way up to your waist, exposing your sweet cunt and bare ass to him. The cold air made goosebumps protrude at your skin and you cried out, trying to move away from his lap.
“Stop, please.” You whined. “Let me go, please sir. Leave me!”
“Shut the fuck up.” He snapped, striking down his palm across your ass causing you to yelp and flinch. “You wouldn't want to wake up your parents now, do you? Their slut of a daughter managed to seduce their guest.”
You pouted but the moisture in your pussy was proof that you relished this.
He slammed his hand back down again and the sound reverberated in the confinement of the kitchen. Burning sensation flooded into your skin as he delivered another tight slap to your ass, the impact forcing you to surge forward.
“Such a perfect little ass.” Hannibal compliments, running his palm over the fat piece of globe. Your skin was so supple and soft, it drove him insane and he couldn't want to fully sink inside your little cunt. From how you behaved, you were probably a virgin.
You winced when he squeezed the flesh and then went back to hitting you, causing your skin to burn a deep shade of red. Tears had welled up, and with each hit, streamed down in rivulets. Your ass incinerated and your cunt throbbing, clenching around nothing but emptiness. “I-It hurts, Mr. Lecter, p-please. I promise, I-I won't talk back to you again.”
“Oh quiet now.” He slapped your ass again, watching the flesh jiggle with force and his cock felt like it would burst open. “Your little cunt is twitching and throbbing. You're enjoying this like the whore you are.”
You tried shaking your head to disagree but Hannibal ran his fingers across your slick, glistening folds, bringing it to show you.
“Yeah? Still going to deny that you're getting off this?”
You whimpered when he shoved his fingers into your mouth, making you suck on them. Your cheeks full and round as he moved your hand, making you take his fingers and gag on them like some whore. You were panting, bubbles of drool all around his fingers and your mouth. Your eyes fluttered shut and more tears fell.
Hannibal pulled his fingers out of your mouth and grinned, plunging them both at the same time in your soaked cunt. You cried out but buried your face into his thigh, concealing the echo of your moans. The burning stretch in your untouched cunt was nothing as there was more yet to come. You writhed on his lap but he held you in place, fucking his fingers into you.
“You're sucking in my fingers like its a damn cock, little girl. Do you like it, my fingers buried to the hilt inside this greedy pussy of yours?” Even he was breathless and you whined, shaking your head but Hannibal knew better than to believe your adamant responses.
He curved his fingers, pushing them deeper and you sobbed endlessly, a mess you'd become. “P-Please.”
Your pleas had fallen upon deafened ears as Hannibal quickened his pace, with determination to pull a hot scorching orgasm out of you. His fingers managed to push into your sensitive spongy spot and your back arched off his lap, face cladded in foreign pleasure. His lips broke into a smirk as he repeatedly delivered harsh thrusts to that spot.
Your stomach tightened, thighs twitching and Hannibal figured your release was probably dancing around you. “I feel it— oh my god. I feel it, please slow down. Please fucking slow down.”
He didn't care.
Squelchy sounds paired with your muffled whines filled up the entirety of the kitchen, elevating the room with tension. Hannibal's repeated hits caused your stomach to tighten, eyes disappearing back into your skull and your orgasm taking full control of your twitchy little body.
It was all powerful, sucking the energy out of you when hot white pulsed through your veins and you unraveled right on his fingers.
Shoulders twitching, sensitive whimpers escaping your lips. Your cunt had gripped his fingers like a vice and he could only imagine what you would do to his cock. The thought drove his hunger, heightened it and when Hannibal pulled out of you, his fingers grazing against your wet walls made you whine.
He grabbed you, standing up and your wobbly legs made you give up. Lower body spent but this was merely the beginning. Pushing you up against table, he sat you down on it and parted open your legs to expose your pink cunt to him. Swollen, spent but still had more to offer.
“I'm gonna fuck this cunt of yours now. It'll feel much better than my fingers.” He whispered to you, hastily unbuckling his pants and retrieving his cock. Your hooded eyes enlarged upon witnessing the sheer size of his manhood — cock head leaking with pre cum and veins embedded in the length of it.
You shook your head. “I-I’ve never done this before. It won't fit, please. It won't.”
“I'll make it fucking fit.” He snapped at you, slapping you across the face. As beautiful as you were, the ability to annoy someone to the point of insanity was deeply rooted in to you and Hannibal could only handle so much. “Be a good girl and hold open your cunt for me, invite me in. Beg me to fuck you.”
You shook your head as you wept. “No.”
“Don't fucking test me. Do you want me to hit you again?” His threats made you reach for your pussy, spreading apart your glistening folds with your fingers and exposing the pink gaping hole to him. Because you had already have released, it only made you more sensitive and your untouched clit throbbed.
“And the begging?”
“P-Please fuck me, Mr. Lecter. Please, put your cock in me.” You were a sobbing, sputtering mess. Incoherent words everywhere and Hannibal realized he had truly broken you, not that it mattered to him.
He aligned his cock with your hole, looking up at you. “Hold it open like this for me. You only let go when I allow you to, understood?”
You nodded.
Hannibal landed a slap to your right cheek. “Use that bratty mouth of yours, baby.”
“Yes, mister.” You whispered, getting used to his harsh hits as brusque as they were.
Hannibal prodded at your hole, finally pushing his cock into you. He didn't let you get used to him, sinking fully into you and you muffled your cries by biting down on your lower lip. The force of it so harsh and potent, enough to draw out blood. Your hands ached to grab a hold of him, cling to him for dear life but he had not allowed you to let go of your cunt.
“Oh,” Hannibal groaned, chest rumbling with unbridled desire. “such a tight little cunt. If I knew he was keeping such a beautiful little girl here, I would've come sooner to attend his dinners.”
You sobbed, quietly, tears and drool making a mess on your face. Lips glistening from saliva as Hannibal buried himself inside your wet walls to the hilt.
“P-Please, wanna hold you. It hurts, please sir.” You begged, hoping that it would work to melt him and it did. Hannibal gave you a nod of approval and you were quick to cling onto him, small arms wrapped around his nape as he drilled his cock into you.
Rapidly thrusting in, hips stuttering and pelvis meeting yours. Your bare cunt made him hungry, a starved mad man who knew he would come begging for more. Looking down, he saw crimson coating his cock in the form of a ring — a testament that he had defiled a beautiful girl like you. Not that it mattered. He would do it again.
Both hands pressed against each side of you on the table, Hannibal used it to support himself while bruising your cervix. Your wails of oversensitivity were muffled by his lips as he drank them, his own growls a threat to this rendezvous. His pace was relentless, full of vigor and you could not keep up anymore.
Letting him use you like some toy, face buried in his chest.
“Beautiful girl,” he praised, heart fluttering at the sight of you so small in his hold. “with a sweet little addicting cunt. Can't wait to fill you up.”
You whined in his chest as his balls throbbed and cock head pummeled into your swollen cunt. Hannibal felt himself near, his peak around but he wanted to make you come. The second time, knowing it would be more intense than the first one.
Your stomach was taut — full of butterflies and your thighs convulsed in anticipation, heart pattering like wild rain drops over a stone. Your fingernails dug into the skin of his nape when your second, searing orgasm tore through you and your lower body immediately gave out. Loud sobs suppressed as Hannibal brutally took you like a hound.
“Sir, sir. Oh my god, It's so— I can't. Can't please.” You begged endlessly, forehead sweaty. You pulled your head from his chest, looking up at him, tits bouncing with each thrust.
He looked as disheveled as you. Shirt messily unbuttoned, not all the way, only a few buttons. Forehead drenched in sweat, golden ringlets glued to it. His lips panted and eyes shut as his hands found their grip on your small waist, drilling his cock at an animalistic pace at you.
Hannibal finally broke, reaching his high. He spilled inside you, balls hot and throbbing leaving you gasping when you felt his hot seed paint your walls. Reaching as far as your womb. “Yes. Fuck, oh god. Such a tight little pussy, a fucking whore you are.”
You were breathless and so was he, growling like an animal.
Hannibal soon pulled out, watching as your gaping hole sputtered out his seed. Pink tainted with white, and some remnants of crimson. You were spent, body falling back on the table.
“That was amazing.” He whispered, staring at you.
You were too fucked out to even say anything and Hannibal almost felt bad. Though he didn't. He picked you up, into his arms and took you to his room down the hallway since leaving you on the kitchen table sprawled out like that would put him and you both in trouble.
Your head buried in his chest, holding onto him.
This was, hands down and no doubt, the best dinner of his life.
after @gutsby 's recent disappearance, i decided to compile all of her fics that i could find, originally for my own reading purposes because i, too, loved her fics. in light of all of the distraught posts and comments that have followed, i have decided to create and post this list for easy access (through compiling already existing findable reblogs, i haven't copied, downloaded, or reposted anything, i'm just putting everything in one place). discovering that you're suddenly unable to reach a favorite blog or never got to finish a well written fic sucks, so i hope y'all are able to find what you're looking for here. if you have any fics of hers reblogged that i've missed feel free to send them my way so i can add them here.
please note these might only be expandable/readable on desktop.
another note for those that are concerned: this list has gutsby's approval.
Waiting Game: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Extras More Extras Even More Extras Another Extra
chapters 1-8 can also be found on her ao3 which is still up!
Make It Stick: Prequel Part 1 Part 2 More Old!Joel Even More Another
🌸 Seeing Pink: "Joel steals more of your innocence every day. Fortunately, you love to give as much as he loves to take."
📺 My Body, His Choice: "After a long day, Joel just needs some relief."
🌡️ Cabin Fever: "Joel saves your life, but help comes at a price."
💧 Brighter Times: "You've always been Joel's favorite. Always."
🚸 Love Tap: "Old habits die hard with your husband–touching you at inappropriate times is one of them."
📚 Wants and Needs: "Bills are high; your dad's boss wants to help. How you pay him stays between you and him–for now."
🍼 Cry, Baby: "Joel fucks you to the point of tears. That's all."
🧺 Who's Your Daddy?: "You get stuck in the washing machine. Thankfully, your stepdad is around to help you out."
🍑 Just Peachy: "Joel's got a jealous streak and a bold idea."
🍺 Cowboy Killers: "On a mission to find–and fight–your best friend's lying, cheating boyfriend at the bar, you end up throwing your drink in the wrong face and landing in a sticky situation with Joel Miller, who never plays fair."
💵 Easy to Please: "Months pass, and you can't make rent–again. You find another way to pay your sleazy landlord. Again."
🍍 If You Like Piña Coladas: "You secretly make Joel a profile on Hinge. Then he shows you exactly why he doesn't need one."
⚾️ Heavy Hitter: "A kick in the dick is a strange way to get a man's attention, but Coach Miller doesn't mind at all."
🎬 Too Close for Comfort: "You've been babysitting Sarah Miller forever. One day, you're surfing the web on her dad's computer, and you find some...unusual things in his search history."
Series summary: after you move into his house, Joel finds himself possessed by the idea of having you. Trying to quench his lustful thirst he decides to get his hands on your nudes. To his surprise he finds something even better.
Series warnings: 18+ mdni, smut, step-cest, Joel's pov, dub con but reader's into it, legal age gap (reader is in college), dark!Joel, perv!Joel, obsessed! joel, darkish!reader, unprotected piv/dvp, sex toy usage, blackmail, sex audio recording, creampie, premature ejaculation, rough sex, anal, object insertion, degradation, slutshaming, praise kink, daddy kink, f/m masturbation/oral, mention of food play/anal, slapping, cum eating, swearing.
🔥A STEP INTO HELL || pt 1 || 3k
🔥A HELL OF A MORNING || pt 2 || 4,2k
🔥ALL THE GOOD GIRLS GO TO HELL || pt 3 || 4,7k
🔥 GIVE ME HELL || pt 4 || 1,9k
🔥HALLOWEEN NIGHT || 500 words
🔥MOVIE NIGHT || 650 words
This is more of a smutty collection of stories rather than a series. If you have any thots about these two, send an ask and I might get inspired to write more<3
Two negatives make a positive.
Or, two people, both alike in loneliness, fall in love where they shouldn’t.
my masterlist!
pairing: professor!dave york x f!student!reader
tags/warnings: 18+ (MDNI), professor!dave york AU, dave is not a hitman, teacher/student relationship (and the power imbalance that accompanies this), divorce, obsessive!dave, jealousy, age gap (reader is early 20s/dave is 40s), yearning and pining and longing etc., what do you expect from me by now, dom!dave, so much sexual tension that it morphs into melodrama, seriously i was on something here, forbidden romance on multiple levels, deeply enthusiastic consent from both parties, f! and m!masturbation, reader has no physical descriptions and is able-bodied, law firms get their own warning, fingering, sexting, sending dirty pics, phone sex, pussy pronouns, light light spanking, some free use, dirty talk, liberal use of "sir"
word count: ~ 15.5k
a/n: hi friends! just wanted to say that there are likely a million conflicts of interest in this fic and none of them are good and also please don’t fuck your professors. that being said, i love you all and i hope you enjoy!! this is just a one-shot for now, but i love these freaks so much that maybe i'll continue writing for them in the future!! thank you as always to @cavillscurls for being my incredible beta and matching my freak xoxo
By mid-September, at least twenty students have dropped the course.
Your designated seat is in the second row. The windows in the cavernous lecture hall filter greyish light into the room. Dust particles float in the air and it smells of rainwater. People are shaking off their umbrellas as they pour inside, grumbling to their friends, shuffling to their seats. Every now and then, someone walks in wearing heeled shoes, and the click-clack, click-clack echoes throughout the room.
You see eye bags and yawning mouths and slumped shoulders and you straighten your posture, aligning your pencil parallel to the lines in your notebook. The seats on either side of you have been empty since the second week of classes.
Whispers crescendo as more students enter the lecture hall. How do you think you did on the test? That was fucking brutal. Do you think the midterm will be as bad? Should we start, like, a class group chat so we can all trade notes? When’s the deadline to drop a course again? Do you think you could ask the professor for an extension on the paper? God, no, I’m not talking to him if I can help it—are you crazy? You hide your printed paper underneath your notebook and tune them out to the sound of the rain pounding against the windows.
Silence chokes the room as Dr. York strolls in, sliding his bag off his shoulder and unpacking his books. A stack of worn, yellowed texts on God-knows-what. Most times, he doesn't even consult them. You suspect he likes to keep them around for decoration, to intimidate the students. Maybe they're a security blanket.
“Good morning,” he says without looking up. He turns to the chalkboard as he always does and begins to write a series of websites and books in list order. He never uses the projector that hangs from the ceiling. “I know a lot of you are on the pre-law track, but a lot of you also can't seem to write a grammatically correct sentence to save your lives.”
A nervous smattering of chuckles. He doesn't appear to be joking.
“Copy these resources down and study them. You're in university; you should know how to write and how to cite a source. If you're going to stay in this class, don't expect me or my TAs to be lenient.”
The sound of scribbling pens deafens the rainfall outside. Dr. York shucks off his jacket—the facilities management workers have finally turned on the heat in the North building—and rolls his shirtsleeves up with two measured flicks of his wrists. There's a Cartier watch on the left one which he never takes off. When he's reading a passage from one of the weekly case studies, he puts on a pair of glasses. His dark hair is always combed back and rarely gelled. A permanent frown has seared a wrinkle between his brows. He sits on his desk while he lectures. His Ferragamo loafers could pay your rent for a month; they're scuffed at the toe.
A few girls behind you snicker to one another. You calmly open your books. Dr. York’s voice, rolling darkly over the room like oncoming thunder, sits heavy in your chest as he gives his lecture. He speaks clearly and quickly; stray even a few seconds behind and one will find themself scrambling to catch up to the present moment, sneaking glances at their neighbour’s notes. He goes to the wire and by the time the second hour is over, the sound of the students around you packing their bags is lethargic and winded. You shrug your bag over your shoulder, covering a yawn, and make your way to Dr. York’s desk at the front of the room.
You wait for a line of brave students to clear from the queue, a great number of them looking dejected. Subconsciously, you adjust your sweater as you step up to the plate. He turns around, assesses you quickly as if he can uncover your reason for approaching with just one clinical sweep up and down your body, and speaks before you can open your mouth.
“I’m not providing extensions on this assignment, so unless you have a broken wrist or the Black Plague—”
“I’m not asking for an extension,” you cut in, more than a little wounded by his judgement, sliding your paper from between the pages of your notebook and placing it, title page facing skyward, on his desk. “I’m finished.”
He frowns, somehow deeper than usual, and his eyes flicker up to yours at last. “Are you sure?”
You lift your brows. “I’m sure. Law school applications are due soon, so I’d like to focus on those.”
He leans back against his desk and folds his arms over his chest. “Most schools’ deadlines aren’t until November. Sometimes December. Your definition of soon is a little skewed compared to other students in this class.”
“I work my best when I have plenty of time to prepare.” You don’t know why you feel so ready to defend yourself. Perhaps it’s his too-righteous-for-thou attitude.
“You won’t always get plenty of time in the real world,” he says, and oh, your pride prepares a winding swing in retaliation at that.
Your smile is a brief violent slash across your face. “It’s a good thing I work well under pressure, too.”
Should I show you my resume, Dr. York? I’ll glue my internships and volunteer efforts and research assistantships to your smug face.
He doesn’t speak for a moment. Rubbing his fingers over his mouth, he observes you with that infernal stare, the pools of his eyes black under the awning of his lashes. He’s stone still for a long while. He hasn’t so much as glanced at the paper on his desk.
“Is this sufficient?” you ask, indicating your assignment, code for Can I please leave now, for the love of God? “Stapled on the left.”
He’s trying to scare you off. In his eyes, you’re just another overeager student trying to land a networking opportunity by way of his good graces. You’re fairly certain Dr. York wouldn’t know good graces if they kicked his dog, but you’d prefer not to make him hate you before the first month of the school year is over. He probably knows many powerful people who could make or break your chance at a good career. It’s best that you keep your interactions with him to a minimum.
“In my experience, early papers are sloppy and rushed,” he says.
Does he try to diminish every single student he comes across? Does he have to duck his head when he enters a room to keep from bashing his ego on the frame? You level him with your chilliest stare.
“I’m confident with my work, Dr. York. I don’t really have the time to tuck my tail and run off to go fix whatever you think is wrong with it.” Your bag is starting to weigh on your shoulder. The spare change you have in your pocket designated for your morning coffee still jingles around, unused.
He finally looks down at the title page of your neatly-printed essay and picks it up with the rest of his things. “All right,” he says. “I’ll have feedback for you before the end of next week.”
You blink. That’s it?
You’ve already wound up your throwing arm for a professionally-worded parry against his next underhanded comment, but it never comes. Instead, he turns, slides his books—with your paper—into his bag, and leaves the lecture hall. You’re left standing alone in the room until the motion sensor lights dim to a slow death.
“OH MY GOD!” you shout. “Ohmygodohmygodohmy—”
A fist pounds on your bedroom wall from the other side. “Can you shut the fuck up in there? Some of us are trying to have sex—not that you’d understand.”
Not even your roommate and her new conquest will dampen your spirits—not when you’ve opened your email to a shiny new internship offer.
Your eyes skim the bulk of the text, gathering the important information first. We here at Gladwell Family Law seek to uphold an enthusiastic and challenging work environment… Please enter the building through the side door to avoid ongoing construction on Fifth… Fatima will meet you in the lobby to give you a key to the building… You will be working closely with your supervising lawyer John Gladwell on his current case… We look forward to seeing you Monday…
Your hand is glued to your mouth as you continue to scan your eyes across the screen. In the next room, you hear your roommate’s headboard knocking rhythmically against the wall.
You've organized your entire schedule around this internship, leaving your Monday, Wednesday, and Friday nights free so there would be no class or extracurricular conflicts that could reflect negatively on your time management skills. You've meticulously designed your LinkedIn to tailor to their interests. You've suffered through weekend nights, sipping coffee and drowning out your roommate’s cries of Oh, yes! Fuck me harder! so you could practice every possible answer the interviewer would throw at you. All so you could snatch this position at Gladwell.
Another email crowds your inbox and your pulse spikes. Maybe you should keep a blood pressure monitor handy.
From: Dave York
Re: Feedback
You sigh, your cursor hovering over the attachment labelled “Feedback.docx.” Creative.
Leave it to Dr. York to sour your mood. Dread twists you in your seat as you debate opening the file. It looks like your only bottle of wine will remain corked another night.
You wince as you click on the attachment. Scrolling through the many track changes to the bottom of the document, you see his final comments in red. A.
A. He gave you an A.
I’m impressed with your work. See my marginal comments for details on how you can improve for your next assignment.
— DY
The dread uncoils in your stomach and you can feel it well up with frustration. No apology for how condescending he was this morning. You aren't surprised. He’ll forget about you by tomorrow. You just hope he's a little ashamed that he thought so little of you.
You reply just as coolly: Thank you for the quick feedback. I will take your suggestions into account and look forward to the next assignment. Feeling a little high off your academic success, you add, I hope you have a great weekend.
After all, he must be equally antisocial, grading a student’s paper on a Friday night instead of drinking stale beer at a bar and crunching peanut shells underfoot. A shard of sympathy sings in your chest.
You decide to uncork your bottle of wine in the end.
Georgia Gladwell’s stern face peers down her glasses at you from her framed picture in the lobby. She sits above your new desk, her arms folded, surveying your every move as you methodically unpack your bag and settle into the swivelling chair behind the receptionist’s desk.
A shiny new key to the building jingles on your ring. When you aren’t shadowing your supervising lawyer John on his case, you’ll be manning the phones at the front desk, familiarizing yourself with the firm’s clients, environment, and routine. Everything is pristine, sterile, and faintly smells of eucalyptus. Smooth jazz pours slowly from the speakers. The effect it has on you is instantaneous: having missed out on your morning coffee trying to decide on the perfect First Day outfit, you feel your eyelids drooping. Perhaps it’s a psychological tactic—to imitate a spa day so that the stressed parents in custody battles and angry ex-spouses will feel disarmed.
You twirl a pen in your hand as you finish reviewing your contract. The pay is typical of a work study, but your scholarship has assured that you won’t need to work three jobs to make it through the rest of your undergrad. At least the other baristas don’t bother you much; they seem a little afraid to approach you most days, in fact. But friends are a luxury good these days and you can’t seem to find one to save your life. You suppose it’s mostly your fault.
Signing your name, you slide the pen through the clipboard with a finalistic flair and rise to find John in his office. Failing to calculate an appropriate walking speed, you nearly barrel right into someone’s back as he emerges from an office nearby, clapping his hand in another man’s for a firm handshake. You gasp, stumbling backward to avoid a collision course as you come face-to-face with Dave York in the narrow hallway.
The sound of the office door closing makes you jump out of your skin. The plaque on the frosted window reads:
John Gladwell, Esq.Family Law Attorney
Shit.
You clutch the clipboard close to your chest and give him your most polite smile. “Sorry, Professor.”
A suit jacket is draped over his forearm and his silver watch gleams at you, the rising sun reflected in its face. His shirtsleeves are rolled to his elbows and his hair is dishevelled, as if his fingers have spent a good amount of time abusing it. His lips part, his brows drawing together as he assesses you, something circling the pupils of his dark eyes that you can’t extract. He’s handsome in this light, unkempt and a little golden, and maybe it’s your imagination, but he smells of eucalyptus.
He clears his throat, courteously dips his head, and your spine locks.
You aren’t sure why his vacant frown stings, but you look down and curl your fists around the clipboard as if to squeeze some of your pride from the cork. He doesn’t remember you.
It’s all right, you tell yourself, bitterness oozing. It’s only been an entire weekend. He probably sees a hundred students a day.
“Was it helpful?”
His deep, rasping voice chills you. When your eyes flick upward tentatively, testing the waters of how much of your embarrassment to give away, you feel his gaze peel you apart, layer by layer. It feels less like he’s trying to remember your face and more like he’s trying to dig his way inside it.
“I’m sorry?” you say weakly. Twice now you’ve apologized to him for nothing.
“My feedback,” he says, and your bones feel like they could melt under the temperature of his voice. There’s a distinct melody to it; it recedes from the tide and pushes back in, always coated in the warm, sticky nighttime one feels on the coast. It’s humid and it sits on your skin like dew. “Was it helpful?”
You swallow. He remembers. “Oh. Yes. Very helpful, thank you.”
“You write well,” he says. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to see you here.”
He sounds so close to conversational, to pleasant, that your neck begins to ache from the whiplash. “I’ve wanted this internship for months,” you reply. “I’ve pretty much organized my entire life around it in the hopes I’d get to shadow an attorney here.”
He loosens his tie slightly and you notice that he doesn’t wear a wedding ring. A bullseye tattoo sits between his thumb and forefinger.
“And…” You lick your lips, anxiously tapping your fingers on the back of the clipboard. “It looks like I’ll be shadowing yours.”
He rubs his hand over his jaw and you notice the beginnings of a beard he has yet to tame. “I’d prefer if you didn’t say anything about this. Don’t really need all my students knowing their professor can’t hold a marriage together, let alone a class.”
You’re taken aback by the fractal of vulnerability lodged in his expression, the slight wince accompanying his request. “I don’t have anyone to tell,” you say earnestly. “And I wouldn’t if I did.”
Something inside you hums at the way his eyes flicker across your face, up and down your body, as if scanning lines upon lines of print. What does he see when he reads you this way? “Thought you’d have more friends than you can count.”
Your face feels hot under his scrutiny. “It’s mostly just me. I’m busy, so… you know. I mean, there’s my roommate, but she’s occupied most of the time. And she’s sick of me playing my study music until three a.m.”
You swear that’s a smirk on his face. “Studies show sleep is actually good for your health. You should try getting some.”
You tsk at him. “Don’t think I haven’t caught you micro-napping at your desk during class breaks, Dr. York.”
“Call me Dave,” he says. “While we’re here, at least.”
You hesitate. It’s bad enough that your supervising lawyer is handling your criminal law professor’s case; if you make even one misstep, it could mean your chance at a career. “I don’t know if that’s appropriate.”
His frown morphs into something softer, and it makes the hair on the back of your neck rise. His intense gaze should frighten you. It should turn you on your heel. Instead, you want to lean your ear in and hear more of his voice. You want to open your eyes wide.
“I’m sorry.” The words tumble out of your mouth before you realize where they’re heading. “About your divorce. It must be hard.”
“I’m sorry, too,” he says, and it sounds close to a question, as if the words sit too heavily on his tongue and he’s trying to swirl it carefully around them. “I thought you would be different. And I judged you.”
You shake your head. It's nothing. You haven't figured out what about him makes his presence so suffocating. “I have to get my contract to John, so…”
Wordlessly, he steps out of the way, and you feel distinctly like prey being eyed by a lion as you knock on John’s door.
“You deserve to be here,” says Dave. He's close enough that his breath wraps its warm fingers around your neck. You cannot suppress a shiver. “Don't forget that.”
“I won’t,” you say, your back to him. And you won’t let anything compromise this.
You learn things about Dave York over the next two weeks.
He's rarely jovial; you’d go so far as to call him a grump. He has no patience for latecomers and even less tolerance for whisperers. He writes on the chalkboard because he seems averse to all kinds of technology. His cell phone flips open like a jewellery box and fits in his breast pocket. He gesticulates with his hands as he talks and rarely sits still. He's an engaging lecturer. It's no wonder his course has a reputation.
The sound of laptop keys clicking irritates him and the sound of pen scratching across paper soothes him. He rarely strays from a black or blue suit, though you think he'd look charming in brown. He plays with his cuff links when he's thinking. His soon-to-be-ex-wife is Carol. She rarely stops by the firm, but when she does, her own lawyer in tow, she makes her meetings with Dave and John quick. You keep to yourself in the corner of the room, scribbling notes in your own shorthand.
Carol seems lovely, but there's a chill between her and Dave. Neither of them seem inclined to show affection; if you didn't know they'd been married six years, the polite handshake they share at the beginning of every joint meeting would never give it away.
He has no children. Carol has two daughters, and they had been living with their father until she realized she’d fallen in love with him again. If Dave thinks she's been unfaithful, he doesn't seem broken up about it.
No love lost, you wrote in your notebook, underlined in bold red pen.
As for Dave, he keeps his distance from you, mostly. He chews on the inside of his cheek or bounces his leg when he's feeling restless or impatient. He doesn't speak to you, the shadow, during his meetings with John. You do a decent job of making yourself invisible.
Sometimes you watch him from afar, your notebook balanced in your lap or the phone tucked under your chin. It's so strange, you think. He's perfectly polite to everyone in the office and he treats John as one would any colleague. But he seems so detached. He can glance at every single face in the room and it feels like he's sizing them up to swallow them whole.
It's hard to picture him in love.
“What the hell are you still doing here?”
You jump at the sound of his voice and scramble to gather the papers you scattered across the table. Night fell some time ago, and you really don’t have much of an excuse for staying so late in the office when half the city is already asleep.
Dave leans against the doorframe to the conference room, jacket folded over his arm (does he ever wear the goddamn thing?) like a waiter’s towel. His frame is illuminated by the dim hallway light, which occasionally flickers out when it senses no bodies nearby. You can hardly see his face in the darkness, but you know yours is starkly lit by your screen, your features on display for him to take apart piece by piece.
“I should be asking you the same thing,” you reply. “John left hours ago.”
He prowls toward you and lowers himself into a chair, leaning forward on his knees. “I was planning tomorrow’s lecture, actually.”
“Don’t you have somewhere else to be? Like, home?”
His mouth twists and your eyes are helplessly drawn to it. “Don’t you?”
“You’re down to the wire, Professor.”
“Mm. I like the thrill.” Your pulse hastens and you have the sudden urge to button your blouse to your throat. “Doesn’t seem like you enjoy it so much,” he adds, glancing at an unfinished personal statement on your laptop screen. The cursor has been blinking at you from the left margin for nearly twenty minutes now.
“My LSAT wasn’t as hard as this.” You rub your brow. “I should be wowing them with my achievements, but I’m stuck wondering if I have anything meaningful to say about myself at all.”
He frowns. “You’re an exceptional student.”
“Can you repeat that on record for me?” you say miserably. “It’s just… I’ve spent my whole life working toward the next goal, winning the next scholarship, getting the best grades. None of them would want me if they knew how little of a life I really have.”
He studies you for a moment, his thumb gliding across his mouth, his dark eyes inscrutable. Leaning toward you, he folds your laptop shut and the room is bathed in darkness. The only light to be seen filters upward through the floor-to-ceiling windows from the streetlamps outside. Even the jackhammering and shouting has stopped. For a moment, you catch his scent as he pulls away, cologne and leather, the bridge of your nose stinging with him.
“Not like this,” he says softly. “Not now, and not tonight.”
“Dave…”
He shuts you up with a look, his brows lowering, his eyes burning you to the spot. It’s infuriating. You can’t seem to reel even a sliver of him into you. He’s impossible to study. You try to cast your line once more and your hook is caught in the air between you.
“You have a life,” he says, “and you’re gonna do incredible things with it. But you’re not sleeping. You’re living on coffee. This isn’t how you get there.”
You fold your arms over your chest. Has he been watching you, too? “You don’t know me.”
“I know me,” he says. “I know working myself to the bone and letting the work swallow me alive. I ruined my marriage before it even began.”
Your heart squeezes. You can hardly imagine this Dave reaching for his wife’s hand, cupping her face, laughing with her, kissing her. You wonder if he used to bring her flowers or arrange picnics or pay for her shopping trips. Did they have an all-consuming love? Did they fall into one another’s arms and kiss in the pouring rain and dance in the middle of a crowded restaurant the way they do it in the movies? Does he mourn what he could have had? Does he regret the small, sweet things he never did for her?
“Are you… still in love with her?”
He shrugs, leaning back in his chair. “We were friends for a long time. When she left Rob, I was there. And she loved me as hard as she could, until I stopped being there, and she couldn’t anymore.” He traces the contours of the wooden table, his eyes downcast. “I don’t blame her for any of it. How could I?”
You shake your head. “Maybe it just wasn’t meant to be. Maybe you weren’t made for one another.”
“You think?” He scoffs like it’s a ridiculous thing, to think for even a second that he isn’t guilty. “You believe in meant to be?”
“I think if you believed it, you would have tried harder to keep her,” you tell him, and his head slowly tilts, considering, watching you so closely that you wonder if he can sense the minute shift in your breathing.
“And you?” he says. His voice rattles your ribs. “Have you ever been in love?”
You pull your lip between your teeth and he doesn’t miss it. “I’m hard to love,” you tell him.
A muscle twitches above his brow and you wish you could know what it means. “Then nobody’s tried hard enough.”
Pressure stings behind your nose and you hurry to gather your papers before he can see your eyes well with tears. You try to say something like, I should be on my way home, but you don’t make it past the first couple words before you’re choking on the rest.
You shrug your bag over your shoulder and Dave’s hand curls around the strap. “Let me take you home,” he says. “It’s late.”
“I’ll take a taxi,” you say, with more bite than you intended. “Thank you, Dr. York.”
He takes a step forward and it’s too close. Too warm. Your coat scratches like wool and the hairs on the back of your neck rise as he slowly slides the bag off your shoulder. “It’s late,” he says, and it’s stern, cool, but you’re burning up under his gaze, a popsicle abandoned on a hot pavement.
“Okay,” you whisper. You can’t manage much more than that.
The seats are leather and you’re afraid to touch anything in case you scuff the interior of his car. He closes the passenger door after you and you're suddenly overcome with the panic of being caught inside your professor’s vehicle. You hug your bag close to your chest and refuse to touch a single control on the dash. Dave settles into the driver’s seat and turns on the ignition.
You begin to laugh and he eyes you quizzically. “You listen to the Pet Shop Boys?”
He turns down the volume. “Is that disturbing?”
“I took you for… I don't know, a Hadyn or Grieg sort of guy.”
He pins you with a look. “Not everyone over forty listens exclusively to classical music.”
“You're telling me you don't have a CD collection hidden in this car somewhere?”
He chuckles and pulls away from the curb. “No comment.”
The ride back to your apartment is quiet. Occasionally you provide him with a Turn right up here or a Left at the next light, and he makes the turn with grace, his watch ticking away the minutes. Your head lolls to the side as you watch the city pass by outside the window, bars lined up around the block and grates steaming and streetlights glowing red. Your heartbeat slows to the steady purr of the engine and your panic ebbs. You're safe. Here, in the dark, covered in a coat of night and smelling his cologne, the world feels like something you can conquer. Maybe it won't swallow you after all.
“Up here, on the right,” you tell him, and he pulls up to the curb outside your brownstone. “Thank you, Dr. York. I mean it.”
“Dave,” he says again. “You're not the most difficult passenger I've had.”
You laugh. “No. I’d put money on Colin.”
“Yeah?”
“You haven't noticed him digging through the trash bin each night to see if someone accidentally dumped an important receipt?”
“No,” he says, shaking his head as if doesn't know whether to laugh it off or check his pockets for an important receipt. “I can honestly say I’ve never noticed that.”
A passing car bathes his face in light and it dances in his eyes. For a moment, you're struck by the fact that you can see him so clearly. He isn't obscured in the shadows or giving you that impenetrable stare. He looks deeply human, maybe for the first time, wrinkles at the corners of his eyes and a scar on his nose and a five o’clock shadow.
Your hand trembles as you reach for his arm and gently squeeze. His eyes follow a path from your shoulder to your fingers.
“I know you’ll figure it out,” you say. “Everything with Carol. You're a smart man.”
He swallows, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “Tell me something.”
You don't know why you agree so quickly. “All right,” you say, your fingertips tingling. His jacket is rumpled where you touched him.
“Why did you take my class?”
You smile. “Because I need the credit.”
His grin is lopsided, almost boyish, and it makes you flutter. “Good. An honest lawyer.”
It feels like his eyes are writing his name into your skin. “You never answered my question, you know. You never told me if you still love her.”
“I figured you'd think I’m an asshole,” he says, “if I told you I never did.”
Frankly, you're surprised to learn he thinks anything of your opinion at all. You open the passenger door. “That's not why I think you're an asshole, Dr. York. I’ll see you in the morning.”
You know he's watching you the entire walk up to your door, but you don't turn back to look.
The weeks chug forward, overcast and gloomy, and midterms are fast approaching. The libraries are overcrowded from morning through evening and nothing much has changed about your dismal sleep schedule. Only now, you meet Dave outside his office every Friday after class and he drives you both to Gladwell.
He chipped away at you until you were nothing but flesh and bone, even though you'd put up a fight. I can take the bus, Dr. York. I really don't mind.
Well, I do, he replied. It can be dangerous.
You sound like my father.
He levelled you with a glare. Defiant, you folded your arms in front of your chest. We're going to the same place, he said. Stop being so proud.
My pride is my proudest feature.
He just opened the passenger door and stared you down. If we keep arguing, we’ll be late.
That convinced you. You slid into the passenger seat of his Audi and begged him to let you pay for coffee. All was well until he slid his card in front of the machine while you were making small talk with the barista.
Dave, you protested, I don’t want to owe you any more than I already do.
He took your coffees from the barista with a curt nod and shouldered the door open for you. You owe me when I say you owe me. A coffee and a car ride aren't going to set me back.
Must be nice, you grumbled, plucking your latte from his hand. Your fingers brushed as you touched the cup and the contact nearly jolted you into dropping it.
Ever since Dave caught you in the height of your writer’s block in the conference room that night, the air has felt different around him. Charged. You don't know what to make of it. The pair of you have been perfectly skirting the edges of professional, ignoring one another during lectures, tolerating the quiet during the drive to Gladwell. But your skin electrifies when he draws near. You lean forward from your shadowy perch in the corner of the office when he speaks, your pen drooling ink through the pages of your book. He asks you about your day and you stumble over your words, where you’d once been cool and composed in the face of his righteousness. Your pulse spikes when you pass one another in the hallway or when John CCs you on an email to Dave.
It’s the smallest moments that slot together into this jagged, confounding image of him. It’s him pulling a pen from the inside of his jacket when you sheepishly admit that you’ve forgotten yours. It’s him offering to read the first draft of your personal statement just because he thinks you’ve got a real shot, that you have what it takes. It’s the silence of just sitting with him in the conference room, the Newton’s cradle on the long glass table tick-tick-ticking away, lulling you to sleep or insanity, listening to him typing on his laptop while you study until your eyes melt off your face. He makes it easier, somehow.
It’s Monday now, and you’re yawning widely as you step off the bus. It lets you off a stop early thanks to the construction and splashes you as it drives off for good measure. The cold rain pelts your umbrella as you hurry down the block. You have two minutes until you're officially late.
The muddy rainwater soaking through your pants is starting to make you shiver as you wait at the crosswalk. Someone bumps into you from behind and you grit your teeth, holding onto your umbrella for dear life as the wind picks up and nearly carries you to the other side of the street.
Outside the firm, you pick through each of the keys on your ring until you find the right one and practically shove the door open. The lobby is peaceful and quiet and your ears pop as you shut the door against the torrent outside. You store your umbrella with the others, take off your waterlogged coat, and pat your pockets for your wallet.
Panic zips up your spine as you dig your hands into each of your pockets only to find a gum wrapper and lint. Your wallet was in your coat pocket. You're sure of it. You always keep it where you can easily—
Recalling the stranger who bumped into you at the crosswalk, you feel your blood freeze over. “No,” you croak. “Nonono. Fuck, fuck, this can't be happening.”
“Hey.”
The gentle rumble of his voice startles you. Ducking your head, you squeeze your eyes shut and hope he will go away. You're too humiliated to turn around and face him.
“Hey,” he says again, his voice achingly soft. “You're shivering.”
You sniffle, hugging your arms close to your middle. “Just cold.”
“C’mon.” You could melt under the heat of his palm, your body guided by his hand on your elbow. He takes you in as you shamefully meet his gaze, his frown deepening at the sight of your tears. “You’ll catch a cold like this. Come with me.”
His soothing rasp beckons you forward. Your feet carry you to John’s office and Dave shuts the door, grabbing his jacket from the back of the chair and draping it over your shoulders. His fingers curl gently around your arms, rubbing them up and down through the soft material of his jacket. The gesture is tender, so giving, and this couldn’t possibly be the cold, detached Dave York who spends his Friday evenings grading papers, who drove his wife away because work always came first. He swipes the pad of his thumb under your chin to nudge it upward, to make you meet his eye.
“Tough day at the office?” he teases.
A weepy laugh stumbles its way out of you. “You could say that.”
He clicks his tongue, his eyes scouring your body. “Vivian keeps spare clothes in the lounge. If you don’t mind advertising for Gladwell Family Law.”
“I’ll advertise anything if it means getting out of these clothes,” you tell him, your fingers trembling as you pull his jacket taut around your shoulders. It smells like his cologne and you’re hit with a dizziness that forces you into the closest chair. Dave returns with a pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt emblazoned with the Gladwell crest, and he stretches his hand toward you, palm-up, an offering.
Your fingers glide along his lifelines, his calluses, closing at last around his knuckles. His brow wrinkles, his eyes fixed to where your hands meet, following the road back to your face. You feel your lips part subconsciously, searching for something to say, but the cold and the wet bleed the energy from your bones.
You think of how this must look, and the urge to pull your hand away is quelled by the tender way he pulls you to your feet, steadying you with his other hand on the small of your back. For a moment, your faces are so close that you can count the freckles on his jaw—there's another tattoo just behind his ear—and your head feels stuffed with him, smell and sight and touch.
A shiver starts at the apex of your spine and hits every knob on the way down. Dave’s head moves, his strong nose inches from your temple, and you're reminded of a lion sniffing at its prey, nudging its way around the body. You could claw at him, fight back, but you're frozen, deerlike, and you aren't sure you even want to run.
He abandons the kill, stepping back with a sharp inhale and squeezing your hand. “Bathroom,” he rasps. “You can change in there.”
Right. You hurry past him, taking the change of clothes from John’s desk, your hand slipping from Dave’s. Locked safely in the bathroom, you peel yourself out of your clothes and step into the freshly-laundered sweatpants. The methodical act of dressing is a welcome distraction from the fact that soon you'll have to emerge from the bathroom and face Dave York once more, knowing that for a moment, you'd thought about kissing him.
Stupid. The weight of his big, warm hand on your back still lingers, severing you at the waist, dismantling you for parts. If John had been in his office, none of this would have happened. And if John had walked in on the two of you, you could say goodbye to your internship. You're upset, and stressed, and Dave was there. He always seems to be there. But this—whatever this is—cannot continue. You cannot let it. You’ll cut your feelings at the roots and let them wither underground. Dave York is not an option, for more reasons than you can count.
You freshen up in the bathroom and meet him back in John’s office, your soiled clothes bundled into a damp ball. “Hi.”
He takes his hands out of his pockets and stops pacing, turning to face you where you stand cautiously in the entrance. “You look…”
“Professional?” you offer, performing a halfhearted twirl.
He rubs his jaw and there's something burning in his eyes that you can't—don’t want to—unravel. “Warm,” he says.
You swallow hard. The air is sinking over your head and beginning to choke you. “I guess… we should wait for John.”
“Yeah.” His voice has retreated into his chest and the low rumble makes your skin break out in goosebumps. “Listen, I—”
“Dave,” you say weakly, hugging your old clothes to your chest, “let's just… I shouldn't have…”
“Honey,” he says. Your heartbeat is throttled into submission as he steps forward and takes the bundle of clothes from your arms. “Just tell me what happened.”
And you're so grateful for the change of subject that you sigh, lowering yourself into a chair. Dave sets your clothes next to his bag as if he expects to take them home with him.
“Someone stole my wallet,” you tell him, looking down at your folded hands. The embarrassment sings through your cheeks. “God, I need to cancel all my cards, replace my ID… I even lost the keycard for this building.”
Dave leans on John’s desk, towering over you, his forearms taut with muscle. You wet your lips.
“I’ll handle it,” he says, and fuck, you want him to. You want to crawl into bed and sleep for days and let him handle everything. He'd field your calls, order you brand-new cards, pick them up himself. He'd intimidate the goddamn mugger himself into giving you back your wallet if he could. You know it. You know he would.
But you're shaking your head, wrenching your shears around the root. “I wasn't careful, and I’ll take care of it. You've done enough for me, Dave.”
He assesses you, sizing up your stubbornness, calculating how far it will go. You can see it play out in his face, all the way to the end. He knows you'll never budge. “All right,” he says at last. “Then come out for a drink with me.”
You blink up at him, dumbfounded. “I’m sorry?”
“A drink,” he says, “after I’m done here.”
Your mouth goes dry. “Is that… appropriate, Dr. York?”
He tilts his head to the side, and your body reacts under his gaze, your posture straightening, perspiration tingling on your temples. His eyes flicker down to your mouth and there’s so much intention in his lowered eyes that you free your bottom lip from between your teeth. “It’s just two colleagues,” he says, so quietly you can barely hear, “getting drinks together.”
“Just two colleagues,” you echo, and you may as well be in a trance, watching him rise from the desk and stand a mere two feet from where you sit. You crane your neck backward to look him in the eye and he seems pleased.
“Meet me at the front desk.”
The gentle command blooms from your core, warm and sap-sweet, and you’re beginning to worry that the roots have multiplied beyond your control. You nod your head and rise from the chair, your eyes catching the watch on Dave’s wrist.
“John will be here soon.” You’re leisurely in your visual pursuit up his muscled forearm, his broad shoulders, the angle of his jaw, his nose, the plush softness of his mouth. “You didn't have to get here so early. Why did you?”
He isn’t subtle in the way he watches you, either. There’s something voyeuristic about his eyes dipping between your collarbones, catching the hard peaks of your nipples under the fabric of your borrowed shirt. It’s more than wanting to undress you. You’re halfway convinced he wants to eat you alive.
His nostrils flare and you’re more than convinced you’d let him sink his teeth into you.
“Do you want me to answer that?” His voice rumbles deep in his chest.
Yes. Please, yes.
Tell me all the ways you want me. Tell me how much it’s killing you not to touch me. Tell me you show up early each day because you’re hoping to catch a glimpse of me.
“No,” you say, your voice breaking. “Not yet.”
His tongue darts out across his lower lip. “Good,” he says. “You’re a good girl.”
Impulsively you nod again, more desperate in this moment to please him than to get far, far away before John walks in on you both. “I’m not dressed for the bar,” you say, and it feels pathetic before you can even finish the sentence.
The corner of his mouth twitches up into a smirk. He can barely get out a syllable in response before John opens the door and steps into his office, briefcase in hand. “Good morning,” he says breezily, frowning at the bundle of clothes on the floor next to Dave’s bag. “Everything okay in here?”
Your blood chills as reality rudely intrudes into the space between you and Dave. You’re being astronomically stupid, letting him stand so close to you, letting him say the things he does. Letting yourself fall into him like he’s some bright star, when you know giving in will only ruin everything.
“All good,” you say pleasantly. “Got splashed by the bus on the way here.”
You retreat to the shadows with your notebook and pen and promptly ignore him for the rest of your work day. He and John are beginning to close in on agreements with Carol and her lawyer, which means that soon he’ll no longer be tied to Gladwell. And you’re happy about it. You’ll be glad to see him free of the stress that’s been straining his brow. But a part of you aches at the thought of having to part ways with a cordial smile and a handshake. A part of you wonders if he’ll just slip away someday without so much as a syllable. Maybe whatever exists between you, whatever green thing has started to poke its knotty fingers through the earth, will be killed by the frost. It will be winter soon.
He’s wearing his glasses now, flipping through a paperclipped pile of papers from the bank, thighs spread wide in his chair. Your body hums at the sight and your pen quivers in your hand. You can’t let this continue. You can’t.
But God, you revel a little in his attention and you hate yourself for it. Every time you yawn, stretch, give your input to John, ask him to clarify something, Dave’s hand curls around the arm of his chair. He clears his throat, adjusts himself in his seat, watches you when John isn’t looking, the tip of his pen chewed to mulched plastic. He watches as you leave the room and he watches as you return.
His desire is warm and it’s sunny and you can’t help yourself but stretch yourself out in it, filling every little nook and cranny.
He meets you in the lobby, opens your umbrella over your head to shield you from the rain, and guides you into the passenger seat of his car. By now, you’ve filled it more times than you can count. It’s second nature to meet him out in the staff parking lot every Friday and settle into the cool leather. But you hold yourself more reserved now, his blazer draped warmly over your shoulders, refusing to fiddle with his air conditioning or the volume of his music.
One afternoon, you were digging through the CD collection in his glove box on the drive to Gladwell. And what is this, Dr. York? you said, triumphantly holding up a burned disc upon which Dave has scrawled in his neat handwriting, Mozart.
He snatched the disc from your hand. Show me a university professor who doesn’t listen to this shit to calm down.
Oh, yes. Of course. You laughed. You have such tough students, after all.
Yeah, I’m looking at one of ‘em.
Sonata No. 16 is trilling softly through the speaker system now. You glance at him and though he doesn’t look your way, the corner of his mouth twitches. The ride to the bar is quiet, and you like it this way. You've never needed to fill empty space with him.
The bar, Ricky’s, is a couple blocks away. Inside, the tables are dusty and the grey daylight filters lazily through the windows. A couple regulars—you assume they must be, kicking their feet up and watching the tiny televisions that are broadcasting the Cubs game—keep on minding their business when you and Dave walk in.
“It's quiet,” you point out.
He chuckles. “Expecting an authentic club scene at four o’clock in the afternoon?”
“I guess I thought a guy like you would like something a bit more along the lines of a… well, I don't want to say speakeasy—”
Behind you, he dips his head to whisper in your ear. “How old do you think I am?”
You shiver at the feeling of him so close to you. “Do you want me to answer that?”
“What can I get you folks?” says the bartender as she wipes down a beer tap.
Dave orders a beer and you play it safe with a rum and coke. His foot rests on the bar of your stool, keeping you close, and you can't tell if it's the relaxed lighting or the muffled noises of traffic outside, but he looks more at ease than you've ever seen him. And he's so handsome like this: sleeves rolled to his elbows, a couple buttons undone on his shirt, his large hand choking the neck of his beer as it sweats over his knuckles. His hair is tousled from the wind. When he smiles or drinks, little creases appear next to his eyes, and you find yourself leaning closer to him to see all these details.
“So,” you say tentatively, “what made you ask me to get a drink with you, Dr. York?”
He takes a tactical swig of his beer and Jesus, his mouth fits so nicely around the lip of the bottle. “What made you agree?”
You roll your eyes. “Apparently, I’m a people pleaser.”
“I know,” he says. “I know you work overtime because John asks you to and you can't say no even if you have ten other things on your plate.”
“I always have ten other things on my plate. One more doesn't hurt.”
“You think it doesn't,” he says softly, “but you're running on steam. Adrenaline. I know a little bit about that.”
“Yeah, well, I can't afford to rest.”
“That's right,” he says, clearly amused. “You wanna catch the bad guys.”
You turn your chin up a little. “That first day I came up to you with my paper, I thought you were a total jackass.”
He hums, unaffected. “And I thought you were some try-hard who would get a B-minus at best.”
“And you're still a jackass,” you say, taking a sip of your drink.
“But you're nothing like how I thought you'd be,” says Dave. “You're different. Every time I look at you, it's something different.”
“You look at me a lot?”
He takes another swig and pride bubbles up into your throat.
“Carol always said I never made enough friends. I didn't go out enough.”
You lift your brows. “And is that what we are now? Friends?”
His eyes perform a daring swoop over your body. “I’m not very good at friends.”
“But you're so warm and welcoming.”
“Mm. And you’re so funny.”
But he’s smiling, hiding it behind the drink he takes, and it's charming enough to make your cheeks warm.
“I’m going to ask you a question,” you tell him, “and I want you to answer honestly.”
He watches you expectantly and you feel consumed by his attention, your back ramrod straight, your palms clammy. “Did you ask me here so nobody could walk in on us?”
He runs his tongue over his teeth and you imagine kissing him. “I can be selfish,” he says, setting his bottle on the bar. He won't quite meet your eye. “I've been selfish with my money, my things, my work. I’ve taken things I didn't deserve because I didn't want someone else to have it. I fought hard for my job at that school even though I knew it would take me away from Carol, and I was already losing her. I just kept driving in the nail.”
He turns to face you and the black of his pupils seems to pool outward, drowning his irises.
“And I’m selfish with you,” he says. “Your time. Your attention. I can’t get my goddamn fill of you.”
His words are dizzying. “Dave…”
“Come here,” he says.
His stern tone is fucking intoxicating. Thrilling. You're in public, out in the open, and any pair of prying eyes could stray toward you. They could find you standing between your professor’s thighs, his hand cascading down your spine until it rests, content, on the small of your back. You're caged, trapped, on all sides by him, and you're drunk with the smell of cologne.
He lifts his other hand, his thumb ghosting over your bottom lip. You let him, and you're fucking pleased to, enjoying the way he carefully explores you, dancing around the real taste you know he wants.
“Maybe I asked you here so nobody could see,” he says, and you're melting into his touch, gooey and warm where his knuckle traces the shape of your jaw. “But maybe I want them to.”
You gasp as he hooks his fingers at the nape of your neck, holding you like a kitten by the scruff. His mouth inches closer and you want to beg him, plead on your knees, to finally kiss you. But you're at his mercy like this, and your mind is delightfully empty for once in your life.
“Maybe,” he says softly, cradling your head like it's more precious than gold, “I’m just some dirty old man, and I want what I shouldn't take.” His thumb slides around your throat and presses gently into your pulse. “But your heart’s beating like crazy.”
“Maybe I’m afraid,” you say, your head dipping back into the weight of his palm.
He hums, his other hand toying with the hem of your shirt. “Are you?”
“Yes,” you say, your eyes contemplating the line of his jaw, the slope of his mouth. “But not of you, Dave.”
His brow furrows. A lion releasing the wounded deer from its jaws. He's applying pressure to the small of your back, the slightest push, and you're floating closer to him.
“Well, I’m afraid of you,” he says.
You shake your head. “Don't be ridiculous.”
“You're smart, you're driven. You're more than I’ve become in twice your lifetime.” He swipes the pad of his thumb over your chin. “I could follow you from a speeding train and never catch up. And Jesus, I don't want to. I want to keep following you forever. And where does that leave me?”
And God help you, but it doesn't feel selfish. There's nothing selfish about the tension lining his mouth as if he's trying to pull away from you before he makes a severe mistake. There's nothing selfish about the way his eyes squeeze shut when your fingers gently trail down his neck.
You think he'd let you sink your teeth into him.
“Maybe I’m afraid,” you say hoarsely, “because you can fuck up my whole future.”
“And you can't risk it.”
You swallow hard, your head tilting as you lean toward him. “And I can't risk it.”
He leans in too, and you can smell the beer on his breath, the cologne on his collar. You can see the black of his eyes swell as he nears your mouth and your lips are nearly touching when his cell phone begins to ring.
He pauses, and you pull away altogether, your fingers hovering over your mouth. Oh, God.
You almost kissed him. Your fucking teacher.
You back away and stumble into your stool as Dave, clearing his throat and scratching the nape of his neck, fishes frantically for his phone. Your eyes are drawn to the large bulge in his pants and your cunt clenches. Fuck, you almost kissed him. The phone rings into the din of the bar and you consider fleeing. You consider hanging up the phone for him. You consider dragging him to the bathroom, dropping to your knees, and taking his cock in your mouth.
Instead you stand, frozen, as he finds his phone and answers the call. As he speaks to John, his voice taut, syllables clipped, his eyes don't leave you for a heartbeat. It feels so filthy, so wrong that for a moment you contemplate quitting on the spot, but oh, he's devouring you whole and it tastes sweet. You sit on the stool, rubbing your thighs together to relieve some of the tension in your core, and his chest is heaving as he watches it all. You feel dirty. But you can't stop. You don't leave. You sit, prim and proper, and something in his starving gaze tells you that you're being good. A good girl.
And you'll be good for him.
So when he hangs up the phone and demands that you hand him yours, you give it over without a moment’s hesitation.
“When I drop you off at home,” he says, sounding out of breath although he's only just had the briefest of phone conversations, “I want you to get in bed and touch yourself until you come. Can you do that for me, baby?”
You open your mouth and find you're equally short of breath. Your heart keels over at the sound of him calling you baby. “Yes.”
“And when you’re done, I want a picture,” he continues.
Your knees are trembling. “Yes, sir.”
His nostrils flare and you like this. You like making him crazy. He gives your phone back with his number in your contacts. He’s put his name as “David” and for some reason it makes your heart flutter. Another small piece of himself you get to keep tucked in your pocket.
“You could get in trouble,” you say softly. For so many reasons.
“I’m already in it,” he replies.
By the time Dave pulls up to the curb outside your apartment, you're so dizzy you can barely look him straight in the eye. The lust is consuming you from the inside, severing your sensibility, eating you to bones.
“I want you to know,” he says, his voice velvet-dark, “how good you are. I need you to know it. I’m not going to fuck this up. Not you. Not the way I did before.”
“Dave,” you say. “You're a good man.”
He looks your way and there's a melancholic curve to his mouth. “Just didn't meet the right person the first time around, huh?”
“Yeah.” You give him a smile and he echoes a sliver of it. “Doesn't make you bad.”
He reaches across the console and squeezes your thigh, so you place your hand atop his. He scans your face, fondness evident in the care he takes to do it, and you're a puddle of water in his palm. “You trust me?” he asks.
“I trust you.”
His hand trails further up your thigh and you squirm in your seat as you watch your own hand follow. “Trust me enough to play with this pretty pussy?” he muses, his eyes fixed between your legs. When you don't respond right away, too busy trying to level your breath, he gives your thigh a smack. “Answer me, sweetheart.”
“Yes,” you plead. “Yes, sir.”
“Say it.”
You've never been so aroused in your fucking life. “I trust you to play with my pretty pussy. I want you to. Please.”
“Oh, baby,” he says, a mocking tone of pity colouring his voice, “I will. But I want to see you play first. Go on inside.”
Feverishly, you open the car door and gather your things, slipping out and hurrying up the stairs to your door. You risk a glance behind you, and Dave’s there, watching you intently through the car window. He rubs his hand over his mouth as you wiggle your fingers at him in farewell.
Two can play, Professor.
Dave's phone buzzes in his pocket before he pulls in the driveway.
His back is aching as he locks the front door behind him and tosses his keys and bag onto the bench. The thud echoes down the hallway. The walls of the spacious living room are cold and bare since Carol left with her myriad of artwork. The thermostat is set to a chilly sixty-eight because he tends to overheat. There are three bedrooms and he only uses one. It's empty and it's serviceable and he mostly despises it.
He can't help but wonder how you'd fill the space. Your bare feet padding on the cold tile. Your body sprawled across the couch in front of the 85-inch television he rarely turns on except to let it scroll through dynamic screensavers. Your shampoo and your perfume clouding his head all hours of the day. He’d bend you over in front of the bathroom mirror and watch himself take you, your throat cradled in the nest of his palm, his every nerve falling keenly into you, bending to your will.
His cock is already straining uncomfortably against his zipper as he wrenches his tie from around his neck and rubs the sore muscles there. Sitting at his desk, Dave pulls his phone from his pocket and finds a message waiting for him.
His cock swells at the sight of your name alone. Yanking off his belt with one hand, Dave opens the attachment you've sent him.
“Fuck,” he hisses. Your simple cotton panties are pulled to the side as if you couldn't wait to slip your hand inside and touch your pussy. Your fingers spread your lips apart so he can see your pearly, swollen clit, your slit wet and messy with the arousal that webs between your fingers.
‘all for you, sir’
His thighs flex as he practically tears off the button of his trousers in his haste to unzip his fly. His cock, heavy and leaking, curves up against his belly, and he can't help himself as he squeezes the base for relief.
‘Call me,’ he types.
He only needs to wait a few seconds for you to obey his command. “Hi,” you say softly, your voice tinny and a little out of breath.
“Did it feel good, baby?” he says hoarsely, spitting into his palm and wrapping his fingers around the head of his cock. “You give that pretty pussy what she needed?”
Your little gasp oozes down his spine and his cock twitches in his grasp. “Are you touching yourself?” you ask him.
“Yeah,” he says, his head lolling back over the edge of the chair as he begins to drag his fist over his length. “Fuck, yeah. Sent me such a pretty picture, sweetheart. Couldn't—fuck—couldn’t help myself.”
“Dave.” There’s desperation in your voice now and he squeezes his eyes shut, picturing you on your knees at his feet. “It felt so good. Felt so fucking good, thinking about you licking my pussy.”
“Jesus,” he grunts, precum dribbling from his tip, his thumb smearing it over the head, his brain clogged with the sound of your filthy words. “Bet she tastes so sweet. My sweet fuckin’ girl.”
“Want you to taste me,” you say, and fuck, you're touching yourself. He can hear it in the hitch of your breath, the muffled rustling of your bedsheets. “I want you so badly.”
Dave’s grip is ironclad around the phone as he fists himself, his teeth bared as he imagines sliding his cock over the flat of your tongue, feeding himself to you inch by inch, working you up on his terms. Making you plead for it.
“So goddamn impatient,” he growls. “Close your eyes.”
“Yes, sir.”
That's his favourite sound. Your obedience, your trust. You’re so quick to pour yourself into any cast he decides. He’s going to have fun with that.
“Play with your tits,” he commands, and he knows it slides down your throat like warm honey. “You don't touch your pussy ‘til I tell you to. Understand?”
You whimper, the sound melted butter in his ears, and he can see you pinching your nipples, your naked hips writhing for the touch he can't give you. “That's it,” he says, his fist sliding up and down his cock, the obscene sound of it echoing off the walls. “Such a good listener. Always so smart.”
Your heavy breathing is almost enough to make him explode on the spot. “Wish I could touch you. Wish I could suck your cock, sir. Wanna show you how good I am.”
He’s blind with lust, his cock angry red at the tip and begging to slide inside something warm. Oh, he'd fit so nicely between your thighs. You’d swallow him whole and beg for more still.
“You wanna take my cock in your mouth, sweet girl?” he says, and the vision is decadent: your eyes blinking up at him, tears streaming from the corners as you hollow your cheeks around the girth of him, taking him so slow, your mouth hot, spongy, drooling for his cock. “Is that what you touch your pretty little pussy to? Sucking your teacher's dick? Hmm?”
“Yeah,” you whine, and he knows you're on the verge of begging. Just where he wants you. “Wanna be your best girl. Your only girl.”
And God help him, his heart squeezes at that. His cock likes the sound of it too, throbbing in his fist, so desperate for release that he’s beginning to feel lightheaded.
“My best fuckin’ girl,” he grits out. “The only fuckin’ girl I want. You’d let me stuff you full, wouldn't you?”
“God, yes. Yes, I want you inside me. I'd let you do anything to me.”
“I know,” he says. “Now rub your clit for me. Nice and slow.”
The moan he hears when you obey his order makes his balls pull up and goddammit, he doesn't want this to be over so soon. “Fuck,” you gasp. “Oh, fuck, that feels so good.”
“Yeah? That feel nice, sweet girl? Go a little faster.”
He's got seconds left and he’s going to make them fucking count.
“Dave… fuck, I’m gonna… I’m gonna…”
“Let me hear it, sweetheart. Give it to me.”
You cry out his name, and he groans low and loud, opening his eyes to watch his cock pulse in his hand, cum spilling over his hand and onto his belly. Every moan he hears from your mouth urges more from him, and it doesn't fucking end. It's sticky, filthy. And he doesn't feel guilty about a second of it.
“Fuck,” he says, his heartbeat pounding against his ribs. “I was gonna take things slow.”
You laugh, a little delirious with pleasure, and pride simmers low in his chest knowing he's taken your mind off things, even if it's just for a while.
“Thank you, Dave.”
He’d do any-fucking-thing to hear that again. To make you feel good.
“You busy tonight?” he says.
You hum, and the flirtation in your tone makes him feel twenty years younger. “Why do you ask?”
“Because I decided I want to see you again,” he replies, “and I’m an impatient guy.”
“Are you inviting me into your home, Dave York?”
“Are you saying yes?”
“Of course I’m saying yes. I’m incapable of saying no, remember?”
And he’ll work on that. But he likes it when you go easily to him. “I’ll come pick you up. We’ll have dinner.”
“Dave, you were just here. I’ll take a cab.”
“You know I love arguing with you, baby, but I’m feeling generous.”
“Well, sure you are. Orgasms will do that.”
He chuckles. “I’ll be outside in twenty.”
You're practically skipping to his car when he arrives. The drive back to his place is serene. Idle chatter fills the space as you discuss your week: the assignments piling up for each of your classes, your dentist appointment that isn't fully covered and the extra shifts at the café you'll need to pick up, the days getting shorter. Your fingers toy with the cuff of his leather jacket and his hand rests, contented, on your thigh. It's hard to believe you made each other come over the phone not half an hour ago. These moments in between, when everything falls quiet, are the peace he rarely gets.
“When you meet with Bentley tomorrow,” he says, “don't let him intimidate you into being his research assistant. He’ll talk up the position, but you'll get paid dirt and he’s a shitty boss.”
“Really? How do you know?”
“Because he was my boss for a summer, and it nearly made me quit law altogether.”
You laugh. “Well, maybe my constitution outweighs yours, Dr. York.”
“I know for a fact it does,” he says, “but I’d rather not have anyone else try to monopolize your time. That's my job.”
“Yeah? You’re gonna have to start paying for my time.”
“Happy to,” he says. “What's your price?”
You study his face as he turns into the driveway and parks his car. “I haven't decided yet.”
He turns off the ignition and darkness falls heavy and silent. Still, he can see the glow of your eyes through the black and he's momentarily stunned by the fondness softening your gaze. It’s so warm and sticky that for a moment he's disarmed into believing he's earned it.
“Hungry?” he asks the darkness. You incline your head.
His skin hums for a real taste of you. Dave offers his hand to you as you climb out of the car, and he doesn't miss the way your eyes follow the line of his arm down his chest and torso. Always so observant. Slipping your hand into his, you rise, and his cock twitches at the scent of your perfume drifting breezily toward him in the crisp air.
He doesn't let go of your hand. Instead he laces his fingers through yours and guides you toward the door, locking it behind him so he can turn around and press you up against the cool wood.
Your soft gasp sends a shockwave down his spine. “Dave.”
“I couldn't wait,” he says, his other hand sliding achingly slow down your spine, letting himself luxuriate in the softness of your sweater, the feeling of drawing closer and closer to its hem. He presses his palm into the small of your back, where he knows you'll curve so sweetly against him, and already the haze is descending over your eyes. It's fucking exhilarating to watch you slowly give yourself over to him, to let your thoughts spill from your mouth where it whispers his name.
“Tell me I can't kiss you.” His eyes are fixed to your mouth, looming over it like a starving, circling hawk. “Tell me you don't want this, and I’ll stop.”
“I can’t.” Your brow furrows and he wants to press his mouth against the point of tension and feel it melt away. “I should shove you away. I should have stopped this a hundred times. But I can’t. I don't want to.”
“You want me to kiss you,” he says, unfolding his hand from yours and splaying your palms flat against one another. “Say it, sweetheart. Say it and it'll feel so good.”
“Yes.”
And you can barely begin to say it before Dave is crowding you, slanting his mouth to fit yours, the permission still echoing off the cold, dead walls.
Your soft whine makes his ears ring. He knows he's practically suffocating you but you seem all the more eager to crush his body into yours, one hand encircling his bicep, the other sliding your fingers through his hair. The tingling sensation of your nails along his scalp makes him growl into your mouth.
It's heaven to answer your little pleading moans with another kiss, to oblige your wants even as you crumble completely under his touch, to mold his perfect girl to the shape of him. It's so easy to take your bottom lip between his teeth in a teasing bite. It’s so easy to catch whatever piece of you may fall and slot it back into place.
Dave coaxes your mouth open so he can lick his way inside, and your arms wind around his neck to bring him closer. His hands wander, bunching up the hem of your sweater so he can drink in your soft skin, clenching the fabric around his fists, willing it away. You taste like coffee and mint and he folds himself into you, the door frame creaking with his weight.
Your fingers grasp greedily at his hair and the sting of it goes right to his cock. Your needy hips push against his and he groans at the thought of fitting himself between your thighs, settling in at your molten core like he was made for it. He thinks he may be.
Dave’s hand coasts up your back and cups your throat lightly, tilting your head back. Nipping your chin, he guides his nose along your jaw, his mouth puffing hot breath over your skin, letting it bloom, letting you writhe as he continues his careful exploration. He kisses and bites at the spot below your ear and answers your breathy little moan with a gentle squeeze of his fingers around your throat.
“So fucking beautiful,” he says, his lips ghosting down your neck and back up again, planting himself in every pore, ensuring it's his mark that’s left behind. He bares his teeth and sinks them playfully into your shoulder.
“Dave!” you gasp, your nails carving half-moons into the back of his neck as you keep him fixed to you.
He shuts you up with another kiss, prying you open, tipping himself inside, his hand applying a little pressure to the sides of your throat, getting you nice and warm and pliant for him. And fuck, it works like a charm. Your whimpers knock on his ribs. They slither into the grooves of his brain. He’s a goner. He was a goner from the moment you walked up to his desk that first day.
His watch beeps on the hour and he reluctantly pulls away from you. He smirks at the way you follow him for a moment after his mouth leaves you, and he brushes his knuckle under your chin to get you to meet his eye. And Jesus, your pupils puff up when you look at him, panting, your tongue darting out to wet your lips. It seals his fate then and there.
He nudges his nose against yours. “You with me?”
You pout, and he swoops down to nip your protruding lip in reproach. “It's getting late,” he says. “And I promised I’d feed you.”
You shake your head as if in a trance. “I don't need dinner right now,” you say, trying to pull him toward you for another kiss.
Dave chuckles, pressing a kiss to the tip of your nose instead. “I decide when we eat,” he says firmly. “You’re not gonna argue with me, are you? When I’ve been so nice?”
Your hand trails up his bicep and he needs to be vigilant or he'll give into your every single whim. “No, sir.”
He lifts your hand to his mouth and kisses the inside of your wrist, your pulse throbbing tenderly under his lips. For a moment, you stay just like this, the both of you orbiting one another, trading atmospheres, your quiet breaths mingling in the dark of the room.
It's so hard to remind himself that this is wrong. When he looks into your eyes and puts his mouth on you and feels your body sing under his touch, he's never felt more certain about anything.
You're wearing his favourite sweater today.
You file into the room and float to your seat without so much as a glance his way, and he can smell your perfume. Curling his fingers around the edge of his lectern, Dave distracts himself with his notes. But the scent of you circles his head like little butterflies, and you’re still embedded in his fucking skin.
Carol was at Gladwell yesterday and he could feel you skirting around him because of it. All day, Dave itched to get you alone, to find a quiet little corner where he could have a taste of you, but you kept it so professional he was almost convinced he'd dreamed all of your time together.
He knows you're afraid of being found out, of throwing away your career and his too, but now that he knows how it feels when your body melts into him like candle wax, he's struggling to let it go. And a day without your attention is practically giving him the shakes.
You ended up staying late at his place Monday night. He made space at the dining table for you to spread out your work and continue to fine-tune your personal statements and application letters. Every so often you asked him for advice and he leaned over you, his thumb massaging a knot in your shoulder. You hummed happily and he held your jaw so he could kiss you.
When he decided you'd worked for too long, he sat at the opposite end of the table and patted his knee. You closed your laptop, his silent command carrying you, and lowered yourself into his lap. He lost track of how long he kissed you that night.
You're chatting with the student beside you, some kid he doesn't recognize, and Dave works his jaw. Impulse wins. Fishing his phone from his pocket, he sends a text.
You pull your phone out of your bag and squirm in your seat, struggling to pay attention to the conversation you're having. Dave’s chest puffs up a bit.
Time ticks down to the hour and he gestures for the class to quiet down. A hush gradually descends over the room, and he begins.
You bite your lip when you write. Sometimes, you'll pause for a moment, look up at him through your lashes, and quickly avert your gaze when you find him already staring back. He's memorized your penmanship from your ‘A’s to your ‘Z’s. He knows the shape of the loops in your ‘Y’s. He knows how fast you type and he knows that you can only work when there's white noise churning in the background and he knows that John wants to keep you around at Gladwell after your contract is up because you're more competent than half their team. (“But don't tell her yet,” said John.)
He knows the way your eyelids droop when you're sleepy and he knows how your voice pitches up when you try to convince him you're wide awake. He knows the pace of your inhales and exhales. He knows your pulse better than he knows his own.
He tries to keep his sweeping gaze from stuttering when it falls on you. But he's drawn to the tilt of your head and the movement of your pen. He likes the way his heart spills through the bars of his ribs when your eyes meet.
You’re so goddamn attentive to every word he says that he's inched his way behind his desk to continue his lecture so nobody will see how hard he is.
You yawn from your seat, blinking hard as you try to focus on your notes. You haven't been sleeping well. Last night, he turned up the thermostat by two degrees so you wouldn't have to bury yourself in layers and blankets next time.
Next time.
Yeah, he thinks. I’m fucked.
Dave clears his throat. “Any questions?”
“What about smothering my grandma to death with a pillow if she's already got terminal cancer?” pipes up some kid from the back of the classroom. “Like, hypothetically, obviously. My grandma’s fine.”
Dave schools his face into a cool mask of anticipation. He's used to outlandish hypotheticals and typically leaves it up to the class to answer them for him. “Anyone?”
You raise your hand and answer, “People vs. Brackett.”
He smirks. “Year?”
“1987.”
That’s my girl, he thinks. Instead he gives you half a nod and says, “Good.”
You bite your lip and give him the most wicked smile and Christ, he nearly forgets where he is in the middle of explaining the case. By the time the hour is up and everyone is hastily packing their things, his cock is greedily stealing all the blood from his brain.
A gentle knock sounds on the other side of the door not long after he's back in his office. “Come in,” he says, adjusting his pants as he best he can from where he sits.
You poke your head inside and his heart swells with fondness. The sweet smile you give him sends his pulse skittering.
“I got your message,” you say, dropping your bag by the door.
“Lock the door,” he says plainly, and you obey, turning the lock until it clicks. He leans back in his chair to take in all of you as you approach, standing between his spread thighs.
He slides his hands up your hips, fingers fiddling with the hem of your sweater. “Missed you yesterday,” you tell him, your fingers scratching at the nape of his neck.
He can practically hear himself purring under your touch. “Yeah? Have I been neglecting you, sweetheart?”
“No, sir,” you sing. “Just… missed you.”
“Looks like you made a new friend today,” he says, his tone practised.
“Hm? You mean Kevin?” you say airily. “No, he's just a classmate. He wanted to ask if I was still tutoring.”
He squeezes your hips possessively, heating up under his collar. “And is Kevin offering a good rate?”
You give the back of his head a gentle smack. “Are you jealous, Dr. York?”
“Please. Of that kid?” He scoffs. “Wouldn't know what to do with you if he tried.”
“And do you know what to do with me?” You crowd him, your body heat singing through him, and he cranes his neck back to look up at you. “Why'd you ask me here, Professor?”
Oh, your boldness is intoxicating. Dave guides his hands up your waist, dipping beneath your sweater, and cups the soft swells of your breasts in his hands. You exhale, a sharp little puff of air, and he unclips your bra with a flick of his wrist.
“I asked you here,” he says gruffly, “because I wanna play with my toys. Turn around.”
You obey, and he vocalizes his pleasure, ordering you to take your bra off under your sweater. It lands in his lap, a pretty blue thing he knows you wore just for him because he's seen it in the pretty little pictures you send him late at night. ‘your favourite colour, sir.’
Dave tucks it into his bag. Coasting his hands over your thighs, he gives your ass a swat and you yelp.
“Gotta be quiet, baby,” he says. “Don't want anyone to hear us, do you?”
He reaches for your zipper and slowly slides your pants down your thighs, exposing the matching blue panties covering your ass. You shiver in the cool air of his office and his cock twitches at the sight of you so exposed. His windows overlook the entire campus. If he wanted, he could press you up against the glass and take you for everyone to see.
Your pants pool around your ankles and Dave admires the sight, grabbing a handful of your ass. Already, a dark spot blooms on your panties, your pretty pussy soaked for him, and he's so hard he can barely see. “On my lap,” he commands.
And you go so easily, lowering yourself onto him, looking over your shoulder to catch a glimpse of him. But he grasps your jaw between his thumb and fingers, clicking his tongue. “Did I say you could peek?”
“No, sir,” you gasp, your hips writhing, your core making sizzling contact with his hard cock, separated by the fabric of his slacks. You whine, but Dave just smacks your flank.
“You do what I tell you,” he says, sliding your hips toward him, “and you take what I give. You understand me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“That's right.” He's enjoying his exploration, squeezing your ass, teasing his thumbs over your stiff nipples, his nose nudging your temple, guiding your head back onto his shoulder. It lolls against him, your sleepy eyes fluttering. “You like this, don't you? You like me touching you when you know anyone could be walking by outside that door.”
“Please,” you whimper. “Please, Dave…”
“Shhh,” he coaxes, pinching your nipple and rolling it between his fingers. “Relax, sweet girl.”
Your laboured breathing is thunderous in his ears. Dave slides his hands down your body, one easing your thighs apart while the other plays at the waistline of your panties. You grasp his hand and he thinks he hears you whisper, “Fuck.”
Dave nips your jaw as he dips his fingers inside your panties, just enough to feel you writhe, to feel your heartbeat this heavily under his mouth where his lips rest over your pulse. To hear your breath hitch in your throat at the mere promise of his touch.
He’s fairly certain his cock has never been so hard in his life, and yet the thought of taking any pleasure from your body flees his mind before it can take root.
“You’re so fucking good,” he says, coasting his palm over your pelvis and cupping the warm heat between your thighs. “You feel so goddamn good.”
“You haven't even… touched me,” you pant.
He presses his mouth into your cheek, his lips curved into a mocking pout. You turn your head toward him to try and capture his mouth in a kiss, but he grasps your jaw and tuts. “You speak,” he says, “when I tell you to speak. Open your mouth.”
You do, dropping your jaw as you bat your eyes expectantly. Dave slowly spreads your folds with two fingers and drags them through your wetness. Your whole body shudders into him. His cock throbs under your ass.
He lifts his fingers and hooks them on your tongue. Obediently, you close your lips around them and swirl your tongue, tasting yourself on his skin.
“That's right,” he hums. “That's what this pretty mouth is good for.”
As you clean him off, he slides his other hand under your panties and circles your entrance with the pad of his middle finger. You whimper, your mouth stuffed with his fingers, and he slides in to the knuckle.
You cry out, your fingers curling around the arms of his desk chair. Bucking your hips, you try futilely to squirm, but he grasps your jaw tighter and you take the command to stay still. Dave curls his finger, pressing his palm to your needy clit, and drinks down the sound of your heady moan.
“Shh, shh,” he scolds lightly. “Quiet, sweet girl.” To make it harder on you, he adds another finger, stretching you out on him, pumping in and out, in and out.
You're a fucking wreck, the slick sounds of your pussy music to his ears, his hand and wrist covered in your pleasure, his eyes fixed to the junction of his fingers and your mouth. Your eyes are drooping, your neck glistening in sweat and mingling with the tears of your efforts to stay quiet. He wants to spool every thought from your pretty head until his name is all that's left.
Dave’s fingers circle your clit and your thighs instinctively jerk closed, shying away from the pleasure with a sweet little whine that nearly has him coming in his pants. But he scolds you with a soft Tsk, tsk and you ease your legs open once more, your muscles trembling.
“So good,” he says, rewarding you with a slow kiss along your jaw, his lips tracing its shape until he finds your mouth. He removes his fingers so he can turn your head toward him and kisses you long and sweet.
He lets you grab him by the back of his neck, your nails scratching just hard enough to send small shockwaves to his cock. He rubs your clit as you kiss him, a little sloppy, teeth and tongues clashing, and he grins against your mouth.
My good girl, he thinks, and maybe he mumbles it all the same, losing himself in the daze of All mine, my sweet girl. You're writhing now, bucking your hips to meet his fingers, and he knows you're close as your mouth freezes open. Your lips slide along his cheek as your body stutters. Dave captures your jaw, sliding his hand over your mouth, and holds you firm to him as you come.
“That’s it, baby,” he coos in your ear. “I've got you. So good, sweetheart. You did so good.”
Your cry puffs out against his palm, your fingers curled in his hair, your eyes rolling back. He coaxes you through it, his fingers slowing and dragging up your body. Your skin erupts in goosebumps where his touch strikes your nerves. Cupping your breast, he feels your heartbeat slow gradually under his warm hand. For a moment, he feels as if he's sharing it with you.
You both bask in the silence for a long while. Dave’s ears begin to ring as his head lolls back against the chair, his hands pulling you into him.
Your laugh rings out through the quiet like bells. Turning around in his lap, you hook your arms around his neck. His hands slide up your back beneath your sweater. “This a first for you?” he teases.
You lift a brow. “Is it not a first for you?”
He smirks. “Not if you count my dreams.”
“Oh, please,” you purr, leaning down to nip his bottom lip. “Flattery gets you nowhere, Dr. York.”
“Really? I think it got me…” He gives your ass a firm squeeze. “Everywhere.”
You roll your eyes fondly. “Are you gonna give me back my panties?”
He pouts up at you. “I thought those were a present.”
“Just this once,” you say, and your kiss tastes sweet as candy.
“You feel good?” he says, running his hands along your arms.
You incline your head. “I feel good.”
“And your work?”
“Hmph. A guy fingers a girl in his office and he doesn't wait two minute before putting his professor cap back on.”
“Well, I've got energy for more,” he says, nudging his nose into yours. “Do you?”
You laugh. “I think my applications are all lined up. Just need to…”
“Pull the trigger,” he finishes. “You're gonna get it, baby. All of it’s there for you.”
“You don't know that.” But you're already slipping, your eyelids drooping, and Dave reaches up to grasp your jaw between his thumb and fingers.
“I know,” he says, “how smart you are. And I know you need to trust me when I tell you.”
You shrug. “But I like it when you keep telling me.”
“I heard John put in a good word.”
“He was generous,” you say, biting your lip. Dave brushes his thumb across your mouth and you press your lips to the pad in a lingering kiss. “I’ll spend tonight reviewing everything, and then I guess there's nothing left for me to do.”
“A fun Friday night,” he says. “My wild girl.”
Your hands come to rest on his shoulders. “Wherever I go,” you say, “whatever happens… This'll have to end, won't it?”
He frowns. “Why should it?”
“Dave, it's too risky,” you say quietly, as if the words are fighting your tongue. “My whole career could explode in my face if we… if this doesn't work out.”
“Hey,” he says, pulling you closer with his hands on your hips. Your eyes are fixed on his tie. “Look at me. C’mon, baby.”
Tentatively, you meet his gaze. “My life just feels so real now.”
“And this isn't real?” he counters, slipping his fingers through yours. He places your palm to his chest. “Feel my heartbeat? Feel how goddamn crazy you make me?”
You draw in a shuddering breath. “Someone’s going to find out.”
“You think I’d let that happen? You think I’d let anyone hurt your chances at the life you deserve?”
“That isn't up to you. If we get caught…”
He shakes his head, turning your palm up so he can put his lips to the heel. “We won't,” he says. “We won't.”
Tears glitter like jewels in the corners of your eyes. “I'm not easy to love, Dave.”
It wedges firm in his heart, a chisel poised to hammer away at the rock. “That's the problem, sweetheart. It's too easy. It’s too fuckin’ easy.”
You shake your head, your thumb smoothing the wrinkle in his brow. “I like who I am when I’m with you. I don't need to be more than myself.”
Dave’s heart swells so big it lurches out of its cage to catch you inside it.
“And what if I don't know who to be when I go out into the world?” you wonder.
“You will be you”—he cups your face in his hands and gives you a little shake—“because you are smarter and better and stronger than anyone else who'd tell you different. And wherever you go, I’ll be following behind, running to catch up even though I never will.”
You let out a teary-eyed laugh. “You will?”
“I'd follow you,” he says, “even if you pushed me off the fucking train. You can't shake me, baby.”
“Good,” you say firmly, “because you owe me a pair of panties.”
No minors, please! My stories are 18+.
Hello there, I’m Arizona, peddler of soft, fluffy, and spicy fics. I will take the grumpiest of boys and make them the softest, sweetest, most lovingly devoted partners. This is my Pedro Pascal Masterlist, but I have a ton of MCU fic on AO3.
Thank you for reading! If you’d like to be added to my taglist, please fill out the form or DM me!
My DMs and ask box are open, so feel free to interact! I know it can be scary talking to writers but I promise I’m friendly and love talking to people. Requests are welcome, it’s just not a guarantee on how quickly it will be written.
I reply to comments with my side blog, @wheresarizona-writes.
Reader Inserts unless otherwise indicated.
E: Explicit, M: Mature, T: Teen, G: General
Learning to Live (E)
You met Javier Peña in a grocery store of all places, the man a bit lost as he tries to figure out his life after the DEA and Colombia. Sparks fly the moment you meet, and it’s the beginning of something truly incredible. Or Javier Peña getting the love and happiness he deserves.
Status: Ongoing (400k+ words)
One Shots:
Javier Peña NSFW Alphabet
Terra Incognita (E) (f!Virgin Reader)
Don’t Come Yet (E)
Just Ask (E)
Quiet (E)
You Doing Okay? (E)
Caught (E)
September (E)
Joel Miller was the love of your life, your plans to spend the rest of your days with him derailed by the world ending. You got separated on the day of the Outbreak and never saw him again, not knowing if he survived until you find out the smuggler Marlene hired to bring an immune girl to your research hospital is none other than the man you thought you'd lost forever.
Status: Ongoing (60k+ words)
But I Would Die For You in Secret (E)
The relationship you have with Joel Miller is… complicated, and you’re not entirely sure what to even call it. There’s the fact no one can know, so his kid doesn’t find out, and you’re pretty sure he’s ashamed of your age difference—he’s not your boyfriend, but you only fuck each other; this thing started months ago, and Joel does not like it when men give you attention, because he wants you all to himself. But again, he’s not your sexy, older boyfriend.
Well this is 1 of my all time favourite masterlist!!! Arizona can write, let me tell you!!! You can conjure up all the images she has in her mind very clearly when reading her fics. Learning to live is 1 of my fave Javi P after Narcos fics m it’s so damn good, Javi and his Cielito are just perfection. Then my space hubby Din is sexy AF in A Mandalorian Walks Into a Bar series…the rest Joel M, Marcis P the other Marcus and all the rest are just fabulous too. I highly, highly recommend everything on this list!!!!!
