Foolish One

||• GiGi • (She/Her)• 🏳️‍🌈• 🇦🇷• 19 •scorpio bitch•||

[peetahpahkah]

Three years later and my mood this year is:

No longer depressed! 😔 …It was actually just unmedicated anxiety!!!

Still as horny and still a virgin!!!

Slightly less in love with Andrew Garfield.

FERAL ABOUT SHAWN HATOSY 🫪

I’m also dying from stress because of my studies!🥰

[ttaibhse]

love this can’t believe it only has 1 like

[transformativeworks]

Why AO3 Doesn't Have an Official App

#AO3 has no official app. All AO3 apps are from third parties – please be cautious about sharing your data with them. For information about why we don't have an app, and tips to make your AO3 experience more app-like, check out our latest news post: https://otw-news.org/yckzuv3v

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[rynwrites4fun]

TILL DEATH | (TITUS DANFORTH) MASTERLIST

Mini Series

Titus Danforth x F! Wife Reader

Summary: You grew up with the Danforths; your father was Chester Danforth’s right hand man. When he passes, his twins Titus and Ursula inherit the hotel and casino resort empire, but the chair of the High Council goes to Titus. There’s one rule for Titus to claim it: he must be married. And his bride… is you.

Warning: Age Gap (No specified), Arranged Marriage/Marriage of Convenience, Swearing,

PART 1

PART 2

PART 3

PART 4

PART 5

PART 6

(Last updated 07/11/26)

[longlostx11]

Before We Knew Better | Andrew 'Pope' Cody Masterlist

Rating: 18+ MDNI

Summary: When Andrew ‘Pope’ Cody was taken into care Smurf pulled some strings and got him put in a place close to Oceanside.  That place was with you and your parents.  Something Smurf would later regret when she realised that the bond you and Andrew forged in the month he was there was never going away. The years went by and the older boy became your best friend. Your protector. Your person.   Fast forward and when Andrew gets out of prison he finds out Smurf’s hatred for you has gone to a whole other level. 

Pairing: Andrew ‘Pope’ Cody x reader 

Overall Warnings: Smut, violence, overprotective Pope, sub!Pope if you squint, angry pope, piv sex, oral sex, established relationship.

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

Part Six

Part Seven

Part Eight

Part Nine

Part Ten

Part Eleven... In Progress

[dreamedaboutitinthedark]

Series summary: After deciding to become a single mother through artificial insemination, you often find yourself asking your next door neighbor and emergency medicine doctor, Jack Abbot, for help. He doesn't mind because it beats you getting the wrong answers from Dr. Google. It also doesn't hurt that it allows for Jack to get to know his neighbor better. Over time, the two of you grow closer and closer.

Pairing: Jack Abbot x Pregnant!Reader

Content warnings: MDNI, pregnancy, smut, angst, fluff, neighbors to lovers trope, pregnancy kink, breeding kink, dirty talk, labor, childbirth (more tags for each chapter)

1. Doctor Google

2. Doctor Feel Better

3. Doctor Love

4. Doctor Biceps

5. Doctor Decision-Maker

6. Doctor Fiancé

7. Doctor Husband

8. Doctor Dad

Drabbles

Babygirl Looking Like Jack (NOT canon; just a silly “what if?”)

[konoko]

[idyllicchaos]

Writing on the Wall

Andrew "Pope" Cody x female!oc

summary: Pope wondered if she was an angel sent down to relieve him of his suffering, even if he didn't deserve it. It was the only explanation for the woman who appeared when he needed her most. Unknowingly, he dragged an angel into the dark with no plan on how to get her out on the other side. All Pope knew was, she had to survive. One way or another, she had to survive. Whatever the cost. Amina was never supposed to fall head first into another life of chaos. She was never supposed to get involved. Never supposed to fall in love. Now, she'd do anything to make sure she wasn't alone when she came out the other side. cw: MDNI 18+ (not super explicit, more waxing poetic, but I don't want minors interacting with my stories regardless), suicide ideation/thoughts, canon-typical violence & gore & manipulation (i mean, this is AK after all), canon-divergence, domestic violence, slow-ish burn, hurt & comfort, angst, trauma, ptsd, ocd, neurodivergent!pope (no one can convince me otherwise), protective!pope, obsessive!pope, season two!pope, sensitive!oc, bamf!oc, forger!oc, age difference (late twenties oc), original female character, entire cody clan, chosen family trope, third person POV, more tags added per chapter, eventual smut

a/n: This is my first time writing Andrew/Animal Kingdom, but also my first fic on tumblr. I've been over on archiveofourown, but I thought it would be fun to actually try posting on here. I've been unable to get this man out of my head and I'm incapable of writing a one shot, so here we are. This story starts during 2x12 and will diverge from there. If you want to be tagged when I upload the first chapter, please let me know!

♡ Any comments, likes, and reblogs are always appreciated. ♡

chapters (in progress)

prologue - imitation, caricature, & good business (i)

to catch a firefly (ii)

the wedge, the shield, the confidant (iii)

ophelia (iv)

bonny belle & altar wine (v)

on a random tuesday in september (vi)

more than you know and somehow never enough (vii)

thick and thin, blood and water (viii)

[matchbox20s]

Stupid Song

“dream of you from like 1:00 to 4:00 positively and truly sure nobody's wanted somebody more”

jack abbot x fem! reader

summary: dana has watched you and jack circle each other for too long and devises a secret plan to make sure you end up on a date together without either of you expecting it

tags/warning/tropes: this is pure fluff, the pitt but it’s somewhere between a sitcom and a rom-com, speaking of there are SO many references of rom-coms, jack abbot is down bad, idiots in love, don’t ask why dana robby and jack are all there at once, reader gets wine drunk a few times, jack abbot being down bad pt 2 because it’s honestly embarrassing, reader is also down bad but way cooler about it, no use of y/n, reader has no established race, brief aesthetic description of reader but it’s vague, swf as per usual

wc: 8.3k

a/n: hi bffs!!! back again with a jack abbot fic! i’m currently posting this from my phone because a storm took my power out so if anything’s weird, that’s why :( i wrote this very fluffy fic so of course, now i have to write a very emotional robby fic that’s coming soon. okay please enjoy - i love your reading your comments! thank you all who’ve been reading my fics so far! hugs and kisses!!!!!!

masterlist

⋆ ꩜ ⋆

"What would you say to a date?"

You turn to find none other than Dana Evans being the one with the absurd question. You're not even entirely sure where she came from. Suddenly she's propped up, hip against the desk, crashing your peace with that certain gleam in her eye that means trouble. 

This wasn't the first time Dana's complained about your singleness. The way your life consisted of the commute to work, the commute home, a cheesy romance movie, and bed. On the occasional wild day maybe you'd take a trip to a coffee shop, or an in-person trip to the grocery store instead of DoorDash. That is if you were feeling really adventurous. Somehow in those times though you've never managed to have some rom-com meet-cute like in all the movies you watched. 

"As flattered as I am, I was under the impression you were married!" You dodge not only the question but also her. Turning on your heels, you walk to the leftmost side of the desk, keeping your eyes down. 

Sure, a date sounds nice in theory. The same way a leading man chasing you through an airport seems nice in theory. But, if it actually happened you'd most likely pepper spray him. 

"Not me." She says dryly. "Maybe in my younger days though." 

You give her a sideways glance, which she's already giving you. The thought intrigues you more than you care to say. What you would give to know more about Dana's college days!

"I've got a guy for you."

"Dana, really I'm good. I don't have time to even fantasize about a date right now."

To you, a date was never a fantasy. They just never turned out right. Men would speak over you, or you'd intimidate them and it's a night full of awkward silences and bad company. 

However, you find the occasional times to fantasize about Jack Abbot.

Your crush on Abbot started slow and accidental really. A night off work for the first time in months. Which of course you spent doing the one thing you love most: turning off the lights, drinking wine in your pajamas, and watching whatever rom-com popped up first in your recommended tab. This night just happened to be Two Weeks' Notice. You'd seen it a thousand times and could probably quote half of Sandra Bullock's monologues. 

But, there was something different about it this time. Something about the way she was falling in love with her charmingly sarcastic boss. It seemed less like something you'd laugh at and instead it started making perfect sense to you. 

I mean Sandra Bullock is falling in love with her boss. Why can't you?

Somehow by the second glass of red, Hugh Grant's face somehow started to morph into Jack Abbott's. 

But, most of all it was the mistake of falling asleep during the fourth glass and the dreams that followed, guest starring a sexy doctor. 

As quick as this crush started, it was anything but quick to leave. No matter how much you willed it away. 

Sandra Bullock-esque rom-coms don't happen to people like you. Hot boss or not. 

"It won't kill you." Dana's arms thud against the counter as she lays them down with purpose. 

"It might." A voice that belongs to Shen interjects into the conversation you already wish you weren't having. "Have you seen how awkward she gets when hot dads bring their kids in?"

"I do not!" You half-yell. "I'm a professional. I don't think about things like that at work."

"Yeah, and that's why you eye fuck Abb-" 

"OKAY!" You yell. Prying eyes are on you immediately as your voice cuts through the ED. You give an awkward thin-lipped smile and apologetic wave to the strangers. "Okay. Point received." 

Now the only fantasy you're having at work is ripping the Dunkin cup from Shen's hand and drenching him in it. 

"Ignore him." Dana shoos Shen away. He slinks off slurping what's left of his melted iced coffee. 

You can't miss the small glint in Dana's eye as she bites back a laugh at Shen's accusation. Which is totally false!

"Dinner. That's all I'm asking." Dana pries once again. You shake your head, not even bothering to verbally answer anymore. "An hour, two max."

"Dana when I'm not here I'm sleeping or trying to get all my shit done before I have to be back here. I don't have time." 

"You have time." She responds insistently. 

It's almost impressive how she hasn't budged. 

"Fine. I don't want to make the time then."

"You don't want to go out and just have a free dinner with a handsome guy?" Dana's eyebrows shoot up.

Unfortunately, the idea intrigues you somewhere deep down. That same part of you that smiles and rewinds when the movie finally crescendos with a dramatic declaration of love. But, in reality, the movie would end differently for you. A terrible date with a guy who went to a doctor a few times and now feels confident in his ability to mansplain medicine. No love at first sight for you. 

"Sounds like hell."

You can't even remember the last time you looked at a man that wasn't on your TV. Well, I mean besides the ones you're forced to see every day. Abbot… Who apparently you REALLY look at.

Your mind trails off as he moves from room to room in front of you. That quiet confidence radiating off of him like it always does. UGH, and he's wearing those camo pants tonight. OH. You totally are eye-fucking him aren't you?!

You snap your eyes from him back to Dana immediately. "Tell me about this guy." 

No part of you really wants this, but you've got to get your mind off Abbott. Fully. You one hundred percent, unequivocally, cannot be crushing on Jack Abbot. 

"It's a guy I know. He's been single for too long. Like you." She says pointedly. "I think you'll like him. He's good people." 

"You sure you wanna do this?" It's a genuine question, not a threat. Introducing you to someone could be a bad move on her part. You're not exactly revered as a charmer. "Because, if I don't like him, I'll leave."

You we're strong willed and didn't enjoy wasting your time. There was nothing wrong with it, but some men would disagree. Apparently you could be a quote, "a real ball buster" as your college boyfriend so eloquently wrote in the very text message he dumped you with. 

As time went on, you came to realize you liked love more in theory or in dreams. You were not cut out to be a rom-com star. 

"I know." Dana draws out her words, rolling her eyes at you. "But, I have a good feeling."

"What's his name?" You give a defeated sigh. 

Dana's face lights up with that cocky closed-lip smile she gets when she's won something. She's beaten you down enough and she knows it. Success!

"No names." Leaving no room for rebuttal, she claps her hand flat against the counter to make her point. "I don't want you looking him up."

"Come on-"

"No. You and Santos do that cyber stalking thing and you'll try and find him." She's already turned on her heels before you can get another word out. 

 "It's not stalking!" You yell after her. "It's the way the world works. Get with the times Dana!"

Well, looks like you just got yourself a date you didn't really want to go on in the first place. But if all goes well you'll fall in love and never think of Jack Abbot as anything more than a boss ever again. 

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"Jack, c'mere I gotta talk to you." 

Dana surveys the floor, making sure you're nowhere in sight. Luckily for her, you're tied up in a trauma room with a very chatty guest who, based on their facial expression is not very happy with you. 

His face turns confused for a second, the wrinkles on his forehead deepening before he falls in step.

"You need a date." She says simply. 

For once in his whole life he's actually speechless. He opens his mouth, but the only thing that comes out is an offended scoff. 

"When's the last time you've been on a date?" She asks, crossing her arms over her chest. 

The offended sound comes out once again as he blunders for a second. "I don't know. A year…?"

He tried once, maybe twice after his wife passed. Someone who asked him out both times. He'd never actually pursued anything himself. It wasn't exactly that he was resisting, there was just never anyone who caught his attention first.

Then came you. But to him, that was forbidden.

"That's sad."

"I'm doing just fine for myself-"

She holds up her hand for him to stop before he says anything further. "I didn't ask about that. And, I don't believe I want to know that."

Robby laughs from somewhere behind her. Of course, listening in on the conversation. Somehow his ears seem to be everywhere at once. There's no conversation he misses in this hospital. 

"What?" Jack asks him. The tone of his voice would almost sound offended if he wasn't chuckling. 

"No, nothing." Robby shakes his head. He clasps a friendly hand on Dana's shoudler. "He's doing fine Dana. Just this morning Myrna offered to flash him." 

Alright, now they're just being mean. 

"Tell him he needs a date." Dana elbows Robby. Before Jack can interject, Robby's response is immediate. 

"Ohhh, you need a date brother."

Jack's outnumbered and somehow they're also beating him at his own game. He has no defenses left. No sarcastic comments that'll stop them 

"You know what? Fine." Jack tosses his hands up. "I'll start looking for someone." 

His eyes rake across the hospital floor like he's looking for someone and before he's even made any conscious effort, they land on you. 

One day you were a thorn in Jack's side, a new resident he had to get acclimated to. But, very, very quickly you became something else. The worst part was it wasn't even because you were attractive - which you absolutely were. No, it was the first time you yelled at him during trauma. You, a resident, yelling across the table at your attending.

He was gone. 

Robby and Dana side-eye each other at Jack's obvious stare. He was never a subtle man and even less so when it came to matters of the heart. The number of times Dana's caught him acting like a giddy school boy around you was absurd.

That time you complimented his technique for a chest tube and he walked around like a God for the rest of the night. 

Or, even worse, that time he let his beard grow and asked you, Dana, and Ellis for your opinions. They both agreed it was fine. - not that they cared much either way. - But, you weren't a fan. The next day he was shaved. 

It was just something about you. Something he had never seen in someone else. You had no angle, you didn't play games or hospital politics. You came in to work every day, yelled at whoever needed yelling at, and fixed whoever needed fixing. No ass-kissing or pride involved.You had no ego; it was refreshing. If you thought he was acting like a dick you'd tell him. If you thought he was right you'd tell him. Though maybe a little awkwardly because nice feelings weren't really your thing.

"No need!" Dana says with a satisfied grin. "I've got someone for you."

Robby howls a laugh at how perfectly Dana manipulated Jack into this. 

"Who?" He asks. 

"Someone I've been wanting to set you up with."

"Set me up with? Like a date?" He says emphatically. "Like I'm twenty?"

"It'll be fine. You'll like her."

"Well, who is it?"

"You don't know her." Her face gives nothing away but for a fleeting second Jack would almost swear that seemed like a lie. 

"She's smart and beautiful, you'll like her."

"Well, I can't say I don't like those two things." A small smirk creeps up his face. Smart and beautiful was great but he knew someone who fit that description already. Doesn't much matter though, Jack can't remember a time he's seen you show interest in him. And, he was the furthest thing from a pushy man.

Plus, if you wanted him surely you would've said something by now. 

"She's a little young," Dana trails off. "That okay with you?"

Jack finds himself calculating in his head how old you were. Would that be weird? Wait. First, why would he care? Second, why would it matter? 

"I mean how-" 

"Okay, great." Dana claps her hands with a loud boom, ending his sentence for him. 

She's already exited the conversation before he can ask more of the many pressing questions he has. "What's her name?" He calls out, Robby still beside him, happy to be a non-involved third party to this shitshow. 

"Secrets." She hollers back not turning around, her hands doing most of the talking. 

"Looks like you just bought yourself an appearance on the Dating Game." Robby claps Jack's shoulder with an overjoyed smile that crinkles the skin around his eyes. 

Hopefully she isn't that young because God, they really are old. I mean the Dating Game, really?

ــــــــــﮩ٨ـ

"What are you up to?" Robby asks, narrowing his eyes onto Dana once he's managed to find her alone. 

"Just think he needs someone." She shrugs sounding a little tender, strangely. 

"Uh huh." Robby clicks his tongue. "And I'd swear I heard you giving that same advice to one of our residents earlier.

Dana gives nothing away, just a shrug. 

"Not saying it's a bad idea. Jacks clearly got it bad. It's just ballsy."

"So you'll help me?" Dana asks. 

"Whoa, no." Robby lets out a deep chuckle, shaking his head. "I didn't say that."

"All I'm asking is that you keep them away from each other tonight so they don't find us out."

"There's no us here Dana." He tosses his hands up in surrender. Always the dramatic. "I've got a hospital to run and this is your master plan." 

She gives him a look over the rim of his glasses. He knows he's too grown to be scared into submission by Dana but damn if it doesn't always work. 

"I'll see what I can do."

"Hey, why don't you ever set me up on dates?" He can't help but ask as he's already halfway leaving. 

"Because I've seen you in relationships."

ــــــــــﮩ٨ـ

Somehow as if by miracle, the ER was the Q word you'd never dare utter. So, for now you'll just say slow. It seemed brighter without so many people clogging the place up, not such a terrorizing place to spend your nights. But, on the other side of quiet and peaceful meant all you could think about was this stupid date with some (probably) stupid guy you don't even want to meet. 

Even if it was a leisurely night, there was no such thing for Dana. She paced around the giant hospital centerpiece that was the nurses' desk, doing a million jobs that somehow all belonged to her. 

You came out of nowhere, suddenly popping up on the other side of the desk. "I don't like mansplainers." 

"Okay, and I don't like the Ravens. What're you telling me for?" It always seemed like her accent had a way of getting thicker when she was stressed or angry. 

"For the date." You tap your finger to your temple in a duh fashion. "If they start mansplaining anything to me, I'll leave."

Dana doesn't give you a response, just a curt nod. Because she was definitely going around the city looking for the perfect asshole mansplainer to force you into a date with. 

"And they need to be politically sound. I can't deal with someone who doesn't care about the issues I do." 

As much as you loved Maid in Manhattan, you always found yourself disliking the leading man just a little too much. That was not a rom-com you wanted to star in, alongside a right-leaning politician. 

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph!" Dana snaps her head up, shutting you up immediately. It's terrifying when she starts cursing in catholic. "He's a non-mansplaining registered democrat. Does that satisfy you?" 

"Yes." You answer quietly tucking your lips into a thin line apologetically. 

She reaches over the desk, gripping your arm and guiding you somewhat forcefully until you're standing under the track board. 

"Work." 

Looking down at the iPad in your hand, you said your patient's name to yourself over and over again. You had this terrible habit of knowing everything you needed to know about someone and then coming face to face and forgetting everything, even down to their name. You've done this with friends and patients alike your whole life. 

"Janet Lawson." You mutter on a loop, scrolling through to see what the nurses had already done for her. 

"Janet Law— Ow." 

Your forehead is suddenly rebounding off a black T-shirt; underneath it is a weirdly muscular back that's actually managed to rattle your brain around. Of course. Who else wears a black T-shirt and camo pants to work and has this muscular of a build? 

"Doctor Abbot! Sorry." You laugh to mostly yourself, running a few fingers over your forehead. Why'd that come out like a giggle? You laugh. You don't giggle. 

"My fault. I should've known better than to stand here when you're running around." He grins.

He's so charming. 

You drop your eyes back down to the iPad, looking at him made your chest pinch. Why does it feel like you're cheating on him by going on this date tonight? He's your boss! People don't usually feel like they need to divulge their dating life to their bosses right?

"You off this weekend?" He asks, tilting his head to be able to better to see your downcast eyes. 

"Yep. Played my cards right and got two whole days."

"Got any plans?" He crosses his arms over his chest casually. He always asks about your life. This isn't weird, this is just the only time you've thought about keeping it secret. 

"Not much." The lie comes out before you can stop it. 

"Me neither."

"Cool." 

Jack Abbot could befriend a brick wall and somehow you've just managed to have an awkward interaction with him. 

"Jack!" Dana's voice echoes between you too. It's so loud and desperate-sounding that he whips his head around immediately. 

"Yeah?"

"I need you in room 3."

He looks to the whiteboard, eyes scanning over it twice. The hospital's calm tonight, what could possibly be this critical?

"No one's in room 3…"

She doesn't even turn to the whiteboard herself to double-check. "Room 4 then."

"Okay…" He agrees. "Catch you later?" He turns back to you with a sympathetic frown, waiting for your confirmation. Once you nod at him, he pulls himself and his lingering eyes away.

Like clockwork, Abbot finds himself in your orbit once again. He's nearly convinced you have some kind of magnetic force he's not aware of because there's no rational reasoning for him to be trailing after you all the time. 

Your shift is officially over and if you're not going to fall asleep behind the wheel you're desperately going to need a cup of coffee. As your hand rests flat against the break room door, you feel a much bigger and stronger hand just inches above yours.

"Together again." He laughs. He's so close behind you, you swear you feel the vibrations in your own chest. He pushes the door open, just enough that you have to duck under his arm to step over the threshold. 

"How was everything with that patient?" You ask, hoping your voice is even and trying your best to keep your face away from him until the heat in your cheeks die down. 

"Fine. Just cut and dry stress hives. Not sure what the big emergency was."

You plop down in the chair around the small table, the one leg that's off kilter shakes it back and forth for a second. "Weird." You stretch your legs up onto the second chair in front of you, resting until he's done making his coffee. 

As the coffee maker percolates in the background he considers mentioning the fact that Dana is setting him up on a date. Do attendings and residents ever share that much personal information with each other? Probably not.

What was he even hoping to achieve? That you'd imagine him out with some (probably) hot nurse friend of Dana's and lose your mind with jealousy that he's never once seen you have. 

It felt weirdly offensive to share his weekend plans with you. He's wanted to ask you out since the second week you worked at this hospital and never has. He couldn't, as the superior here and the man twice your age he wouldn't even let himself think about you too long if he thought it would be disrespectful. It'd be too weird to sit here and talk about his dating life like this. So, he opts for silence. 

You push your chair out once Abbott's done using the coffee maker, groaning from the pain that's popped up in your spine from standing all day. 

"Here ya go." He extends a full cup to you just as your feet hit the ground. 

You stare at the drink for a second. He made you coffee? Coffee you didn't even ask for. He pushes the cup towards you once more, urging you to take it instead of staring at it.

You wrap both hands around the thin cup, feeling the warmth seep through to your palms. "You know how I take my coffee?" You ask, noting the color difference in your cup compared to his. 

"Yeah, milk and two sugars. I've seen you make it enough times." Wow, the world really was never going to let this crush ease up was it? "I didn't give you any vanilla though. Keep taking it like that and you'll end up in a coma." You laugh, noticing the wide smile on your face in the reflection of your coffee. 

"Thanks." Your voice loses the harsh edges it usually has. 

He shrugs as if this was a small gesture and not something that made your entire body feel like it was on fire. He sips the coffee but never takes his eyes off yours. They have a darker look to them as the cup puts a shadow over his face. 

"Heading out?"

"Yep." You toss your bag over your shoulder. "I'm caught up on all my charts from tonight."

"Yeah, I trust you." His words come out smooth. 

You know you're so far gone when these upcoming two days off start to feel like punishment more than a much-needed break. Two days without seeing him might be bordering on eternal torture. 

This is the last time you'll see him until your date with some stranger. You're being so dramatic but it literally feels like you're some Wild West movie heroine seeing her one true love for the last time before heading to her arranged marriage.

Maybe it's just because your fantasy had to end now. You had to live your life, date (annoyingly so), and you could keep falling asleep at night and having Jack Abbot's face pop up in your dreams. It was a fantasy, that's all it was. 

Abbot likes people, not you. He liked to be friendly, wink at nurses, and flirt with the old ladies who were frequent fliers. Even if you weren't his resident, people like you didn't end up with people like him. 

Plus, if he wanted you surely he would've said something by now.

"Want me to walk you out?" He asks, always the gentleman. 

"Sure."

He reaches over and slides the bag from your arm, throwing it over his own shoulder. His arm stays on the small of your back as you pass through the crowded triage area, only dropping when you make it to your car. A small, beat-up Civic you're embarrassed to tell people the year of. 

"Have a nice vacation." He grins, setting your backpack in your backseat for you.

"Yeah, two days is one crazy vacation." 

"Well, either way don't miss me too much."

You laugh, your head lulling backwards as the sound reverberates outside in the quiet parking lot. "Might be too hard. Living in a cold, cruel Doctor Abbot-less world." 

He leans over, enough that you can tell he's not wearing any cologne as the smell of antiseptic wafts off him. And the worst part is, somehow it works. The click of your car door opening is the only thing that draws your eyes away. 

"Be safe." He says, carefully shutting the car door once you're solidly inside. "Come by if you start missing me too much." He speaks a little louder so you hear him through the sealed window. 

You give him a thumbs down as your reverse lights come on. 

He watches you pull out of the parking lot and imagines what that sight would be like more often. Your taillights pulling out of the driveway of his house every day, waving you away while drinking his morning coffee, knowing you'd be back that night. 

Oh yeah He's going on a date with another woman tomorrow. 

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This is horrible

You stand in front of the mirror in the third outfit of the night. You pull at the fabric, like a toddler. It clings to everywhere you don't want it to. You've got to have help for this.

Where's your quirky best friend sidekick that everyone in the movies has?

To: Santos From: You what do you wear on a date?

To: You From: Santos show up naked power move 

Unhelpful. 

A dress feels like too much, but dress pants make you feel like a politician. The place is way too nice for jeans. As Dana specifically told you. You don't even own anything you'd consider a blouse. And to make matters worse, you're beginning to notice you have very little color in your wardrobe. 

This is agonizing. 

The outfit you have on will have to suffice, if only because you're running out of room on your floor for discarded clothese.

The long skirt feels less dramatic than a dress but less stiff than pants. This is the nicest shirt you own and the closest thing you'd associate with fancy. All in all, you clean up pretty well. Everything is black like all the other items in your wardrobe. But, Dana requested you wear black since she told your date that's how he'd recognize you. Your mystery man will be in white tonight 

Your body collides with your bed as you toss yourself onto it like an angsty teenager. You haven't been on a date in months and the last one you went on lasted an hour before you faked and emergency and left. 

Katherine Heigl's voice blares through your apartment as 27 Dresses begins auto-playing after whatever you threw on to begin with. 

What the hell is with these movies and falling in love with your boss?

Rolling onto your back, you're fingers start typing Jack Abbot into the Instagram search bar before you even know what you're doing. It only takes the letter J for his account to come up. You've for sure done this too many time. Maybe Dana's right. This is totally stalking. 

He has three posts and none of them are his face. He's got a picture of Robby and Dana at some fancy hospital event and two pictures of some scenic locations he visited. He's such an old man. The only thing you can see him in is his profile picture. Much to your dismay, you screenshot and zoom in. 

He's so handsome and this is such weirdo behavior.

The more you zoom in, the blurrier the photo gets. Right now, you're essentially looking at pixels that vaguely resemble Jack Abbot and even then he's otherworldly handsome. Some selfie from a terrible angle that he no doubt took the moment Instagram prompted him for a profile picture. 

You scream as the name pops up on the top of your screen, tossing the phone on your bed like it burned you. For a second you actually believe he somehow knows your cyber stalking him right now, but there's no way. On your feet now from the scare, you timidly reach over and in one quick motion flip the phone face up. 

Abbot: Have fun on your vacation while the rest of us are working our asses off. 

You've got to stop reacting to everything he does like some school girl experiencing their first crush. You're more giddy from this stupid text than you are about this date. This is what you're actively trying to avoid!

You click the side button stuffing the phone into your skirt pocket. Yeah, the skirt has pockets. You give yourself one more look in the mirror, closing your eyes and taking three deep breaths to clear your mind. 

No more Jack Abbot tonight. 

ــــــــــﮩ٨ـ

This place is nice just like Dana described. An Italian restaurant that you had to take a taxi to reach. The outside has a deep maroon awning where people waiting on tables are congregating. It's not crowded but there's way more people here than you want to experience a first date in front of. 

The inside is even nicer. Dark walls and romantic lighting. There's even a band playing from somewhere you cant see, but you recognize the sound of live instruments. The tables are all covered in white cloths. This is far from the restaurants you usually eat at where children color on those paper table runners. 

"Hi," You approach the hostess more timid than usual, clearing your throat. "I'm meeting someone…"

Your eyes scan over the many people in the room. Theres way more people seated than you'd hoped. Great, all these people may witness your biggest humiliation tonight. Theres a small, even fancier dining room that's walled in and you wonder if your mystery man is in there. 

The maitre d responds but your ears are suddenly filled with nothing but the sound of your own heart beat. Your eye's zero in on someone, someone sitting in front of the giant burgundy curtains that drape from floor to ceiling. 

A very familiar face.

No. Fucking. Way. 

"Doctor Abbot?" You say standing beside the empty chair at this table for two. 

His eyes shoot up so fast you're afraid he's going to hurt himself. He looks like he wants to say something, but nothing comes out of his barely parted lips. You're mirroring the same expression back to him. Shock and horror. 

He stands up from his chair so fast, the table rocks and sends ripples through the expensive water glasses. "What are you doing here?" He asks, hands flat on the table like he needs to prop himself up. 

"Me?" You say back, clutching the purse strap over your shoulder. "What are you doing here?" You want to dissolve into dust in the huge fancy restaurant that suddenly feels much smaller. This can't be happening. 

"Oh fuck." 

You both speak at the same time. Your sentiment is much more verbal than Abbot who had the decency to whisper under his breath. 

You two go back to staring at each other for another moment. Completely still except for the twitch around Abbots eye. You know your eyes are wider than usual and probably frighteningly so, but you can't make them close. To make matters worse the trumpet crescendos into something romantic from wherever they're playing from. You're a little too busy to look right now. 

How could this happen?

"I think Dana uh—" The words die in your throat as soon as they start. You gesture vaguely hoping to fill in the blanks. 

"Yeah." He speaks gruffly. 

"Yeah." You parrot the same word back, unsure of what else there even is to say. "I could go." You gesture back to the grand entrance of the restaurant. 

That's all it took to shake Jack from the shell shocked state he was in. He reaches out before he even thinks much about it. Not a pull, just his palm flat against your forearm making sure you don't bolt.

"No. Were already here." He shrugs like it's simple. "Plus, I need you to stay and help me plan on how to get Dana fired."

You laugh, your shoulders easing finally, dropping from where they were pulled up so tight. The immediate horror of this situation is beginning to dissipate between the two of you. Despite the knot in your stomach, you actually feel a little giddy. I mean, you've dreamed about this for a long, long time. Maybe it wouldn't be awful of you to at least try and enjoy yourself. 

"We might as well stay and eat." He picks up his menu and gestures to the chair that's meant to be yours. 

"Might as well?" You repeat back with a sarcastically sensual tone. "Well, with an offer that romantic how could I refuse?"

He walks around the table, eyes on you the entire time. He pulls out your chair without even looking at it. When he puts his arm on the small of your back to guide you onto the seat, your actually worried your knees might buckle. 

"You know what I meant." The breath from his nose tickles your ear as leans in close to tuck your chair in. 

"Can I get you two started with anything?" The waiter appears from the kitchen, dressed just as nicely as half the patrons in here. Jack gives him a polite just a second gesture. You've both been far too distracted to look at the menu.

"You want wine?" He asks, flicking his eyes from the menu to you. "I mean… we are on a date." Theres a small smile in the corner of his mouth when he says it, almost humorous like he's enjoying saying that in the presence of the server.

A date. Officially a date.

"Yeah, I'll do a glass."

"A bottle of the house red." Jack speaks to the waiter. A bottle? Big spender! 

The wine the waiter returns with is in expensive glassware. The stems are crystal thin and make you feel like you're back in the OR holding a delicate medical instrument.

Jack makes a polite declining gesture as the waiter goes to fill his glass. "None for me, thanks."

"You're not having any?" You ask, lowering the glass from your lips, suddenly feeling embarrassed of the large sip you've already taken. 

"I've got work tonight. Not everyone has the weekend off like you." He laughs. Oh yeah. It was only 5:30 of course he'd be heading to work after this. Always saving lives. 

"You didn't need to order all that then." You gesture to the still mostly full bottle the server left behind. "I'm not gonna drink a whole bottle myself." Not in front of him at least!

"Take it home then." He shrugs. Damn that's sexier than it needed to be. He orders one of the nicest bottles of wine, doesn't have any for himself, and then tells you to keep it. "I know how much you like your wine. 

"You look nice." He crosses his arms on top of the menu resting on the table so there's nothing that could possibly distract him from you. His words are genuine but a little stiff. He hasn't complimented someone on anything outside of a medical context in a while.

"Thanks " You actually smile. looking down at the fancy outfit you were so hyper critical of in the mirror. "I wouldn't get used to it though."

"You clean up nice yourself." You force out. Not because it wasn't true, it very much was. But, it's always felt awkward to you to compliment someone. 

"Feels weird." He tugs at the black tie resting on top of his white dress shirt. It was quite the site. Under the warm lights of the dining room, at certain angles the muscles under his shirt were highlighted perfectly, especially his arms.

Jack however is more caught of guard by your new look than you are of his. Your hair is fixed and resting on your shoulders in waves instead of pulled back and frizzy from a scrub cap. I mean, you looked beautiful the other way, but he didn't know this was an option. And your clothes. It was few and far between that he saw you in anything but scrubs and certainly never anything fancy like this. Your scrubs were loose and unflattering. These clothes were tight and highlighted all your features well. You'd been hiding all this? But, maybe that's for the better because he wouldn't be able to survive this look day to day. 

"Would you judge me if I had another glass?" You have a small smile just on the corner of your mouth. Your stemware was getting emptier and emptier as the conversation went on.

"I'm not your boss tonight." He chuckles, filling up the glass for you. He holds your eyes when he says it, like it's important to him that you remember that.

"Alright. Let's be honest with ourselves." You finally laugh out, shaking your head. "This is weird." The wine coursing through you is making it a lot easier to say whatever you're feeling. Plus the small drink you had back home to pre game that you're not going to bring up. 

Thankfully, he laughs too. "Yeah. I didn't imagine I'd be sitting in front of you tonight."

"Yeah. I certainly wasn't expecting Doctor Abbot." You gesture widely towards him. "… I should probably drop the "Doctor" on a date right."

"Yeah probably." He nods. "Just Jack is fine." 

You're stomach flips. It's silly, something as simple as a name change getting you this worked up.

"Jack." You test it out, turning the name over in your head a few times. It just felt so intimate for some reason. You've known him as Doctor Abbot for so long, now you get to learn Jack.

"So, Jack" You laugh, using the name one more time now that you've been awarded the permission. "I was expecting Dana to set me up with an Orthopedic surgeon I'd hate or something." You laugh. If your relationships with the Ortho team at work was anything to go on, that date certainly wouldn't have gone well. 

He laughs loudly in the dining room full of people talking softly below the music. "Yeah, God help us all if she did that. I was expecting a nurse or a lawyer or something. Not my resident."

"But, I'm glad she didn't." He says at a lower register.

"Wait!" You completely skip over the romantic thing he said, your brain already locked onto a minute detail you just thought of. "You texted me before I left the house." 

"Yeah? So?"

"So?!" You scoff at him, but you're laughing too much for it to be perceived as upset. "So, you texted me before you thought you we're going on a date with some woman."

He just shrugs. "I was thinking about you."

Your cheeks burn hot and you have to roll your eyes to try and get some of your cool demeanor back. "That's crazy."

"Well, it doesn't matter now does it."

Being on a date with Jack is even nicer than you imagined it could be. You've barely lifted a finger tonight. He pulled out your chair for you, he refills your glass for you. 

Yes, you're now a quarter through your third.

From anyone else, you'd probably get a little annoyed with this, but there's something romantic about the way Jack does it. He's not smothering or chauvinistic about it, just someone who wants to care for you. 

He really is like a man from a movie. 

By the time they drop your food off at the table, you're enjoying yourself more than you ever have on a date. He cuts into the steak while telling you the story of the first patient he ever had, which actually makes you snort. 

"My first patient at PTMC bit me." You laugh, nodding emphatically as you do. The third glass of wine has definitelyloosened you up. Enough to even reach across the table and put your hand on his arm when you laugh.

"Oh yeah! The one with the suppository." He points the end of his fork in your direction as he remembers. 

You make a sound of dissatisfaction between your teeth, scrunching up your face. "Let's avoid saying suppository on a date."

"Fair enough." He laughs, covering his mouth with his napkin. "Man, I thought you were gonna kill that guy." 

"I remember telling Robby when you first started, you we're gonna drop the night crews patient satisfaction scores by half." He shakes his head fondly.

"What?!" You laugh, dropping your mouth open with a jokingly offended expression. 

"You have a real mean streak to you." He shrugs truthfully, but he smiles when he does. He loves that about you. 

"I do not." You roll your eyes, the mean streak showing through clearly. "And, I could say you're not as charming as you think you are." 

He doesn't miss a beat. "Yeah I am." 

Yeah he is. 

You pretend to care about his accusations some more, but he can see the smile you can't wipe off your face. "I can't believe you talked shit about me to Robby." You shake your head. "And to think I actually liked you when I first started. You were my favorite Attending." 

"Yeah?" He quirks his eyebrow up, somehow looking even more handsome with that smug sideways smile. 

"Yeah I did."

"Did it wear off?" He asks, leaning back, tilting his head as he looks at you. 

"Nope."

The words hangs there a moment too long. You expect him to make a joke, tell you that you have good taste, or that he was the obvious choice, but he doesn't. Instead he just looks at you, his smug grin changing into something much softer. 

"Good to know." His voice is maybe as tender as you've ever heard it. Like your statement meant more to him than he's letting on. 

Jack's already reaching into his pocket for his wallet before the check hits the table cloth. In fact, he doesn't even let it sit there. He takes it from the waiters hand so there's no argument about who's paying. 

"I can cover my half." You offer anyways, hand digging around in your purse under the table. This would not be the first date a man expected you to go dutch on.

"No you can't." He rolls his eyes. He knew you'd offer no matter how obvious he made it that you weren't paying this bill. It was just in your nature to be fiercely independent. But, he was here now. "I don't make a habit of asking women out and making them cover the bill."

"Technically you didn't ask me out… Dana did." You raise your eyebrows in a challenge. 

He makes a sound somewhere between a huff and a laugh. "Either way, you're not paying."

Jack opts for cash, pulling out a few bills that you try and count up so you total how much he's spent on you tonight. You can't make out if a few pieces are twenties or fifties, but based on the wad alone it must be a lot. 

"Fine. I'll get the next one." You're eyes widen a little as you catch what you said, your words coming way too freely with your tipsy-ness. "I mean… not, or, If- you know." You flubb, your hands moving quickly in front of you.

"No you won't. But, you can offer, again."

He stands first, extending his arm to you like the gentleman he's been all night. The sleeve of your jacket catches the chair as you stand making you wobble on your already slightly uneven footing. "Alright, let's get you out of here before you hurt yourself." He laughs. His reassuring hand stays flat against the small of your back, guiding you through the beautiful dining room and into the cool night air. 

Jack stands under the awning with you, shoulder to shoulder as he waits for your ride to arrive. Before he has to drag himself back to work and away from you. Through the window, you can still hear the bands instruments playing, on the high notes it rattles the glass just barely. 

"I love this song." You gasp, leaning against the wall and physically feeling the song course through you. Jack listens intently for a second, making out what you're hearing. He jogs his memory and remembers having heard the songs a few times. Something by Louie Armstrong; there was no mistaking that voice. La vie en rose that was it!

Jack stays silent, listening to the song alongside you. He doesn't close his eyes like you do. To be honest, he's far more interested in you than the song. This was what he's thought about so many times. Not this exact scenario, but things like it. You in domestic situations, calm, happy. With your eyes still shut, he roams his eyes over every part of your face without fear of being caught. 

The slope of your nose, down to the curve of your lips. You had a prominent cupids bow that made your lips look sharp in a way he could never stop thinking about. Your eyelashes that now fluttered along your under eye. He wasn't sure in this moment if you've ever looked more beautiful. 

"You know," He says quietly, making sure you we're still able to hear your song over this words. "all thing's considered I think this was a pretty good date." 

You peek one eye open, flickering it over to him with a smile. "So we are calling it a date?"

"Yeah." He grins back at your silly looking one-eyed expression."I mean that's what it was wasn't it?"

"Just making sure." You relax again, back to closing your eyes. You can hide the gleam in your eyes by shutting them, but you can't hide the smile on your face. 

"But," Jack starts his sentence quietly, devoid of that usual sarcasm he carries through every word. "I was always under the impression good dates usually end with a kiss."

Both your eyes open now, quickly. You stay leaned against the wall, putting a few fingers over your mouth to try and cover the stupidly giddy grin. You coyly nod, eyes looking back and forth like you're thinking hard. He crosses his arms over his chest as he waits for whatever response this could possibly lead to. 

"That does check out." You laugh, one finger tapping on the side of your mouth in fake thought. "That's usually how all the movies end."

"Yeah?" He mutters close to your mouth, settling his hands on either side of your face. You floss your lip in between your teeth, not even that hiding the grin. "Yeah." 

La vie en rose crescendos in the background as Jacks lips finally connect with yours. It's perfect. It's like a movie. Like a really perfect rom-com. He's not careful, but he's not aggressive. You can feel how long he's wanted to do this in the way he swallows every breath that leaves your mouth. Your hands trail up his arms, finally feeling how toned they actually are after wondering what they'd feel like under your fingers every time they flexed in the OR. 

You're sure you're getting stares from a few concerned citizens along the sidewalk but you couldn't care less. You feel that same smile grow on his lips as you press a hand to his chest. You're reminded of the scene in The Princess Diaries and swear your leg almost kicks up just the same.

He pulls back for no other reason than breathing which he's almost sure he could live without if he could do that a few more times. But, before he can go too far you chase him for one more peck which he reciprocates with just as much enthusiasm. Your hand is still on his chest and now white knuckle gripped against his tie.

"Yeah pretty good date." You repeat the sentiment, any ability to form new thoughts left your head the moment he kissed you. You smooth down his tie with one hand, straightening out the wrinkles your fist caused. He stops you, enveloping your one hand with both of his, pressing his lips along your knuckles. "I'm glad it was with you."

Once your taxi pulls up, you feel like lying and claiming you never called for it. But you have no choice, Jack's got work and you're under strict doctors orders (Doctor Jack Abbot) to rest and enjoy your one weekend off. 

"Text me when you get home." He says, shutting the taxi door with you on the other side, painfully. "And, swing by the hospital if you have any more wine. We may need to get you on a saline drip." You laugh way too loudly in the enclosed space of the cab. You hold the wine bottle by the neck, showing it off. 

"Goodnight Jack." You say elbow resting on the sill of the rolled down window, smiling up at him. Jack. Not Doctor, just Jack. 

You're phone vibrates in your pocket a few minutes down the road into the silent cab ride. The notification disrupts your staring out the window with a smile that was starting to hurt your cheeks. You figure it must be Jack, way too worried about you commuting home alone and already checking in, but it's not.

To: You From: Dana So… Did you like him?

[rosierecs13]

𝜗𝜚 Dr. Jack Abbot Recs

⭒ Masterpost ⭒ 06/05/2025 | Updated: 07/25/2026

⭒ Part 01 ⭒ Part 02  ⭒ Part 03 ⭒ Part 04 ⭒ Part 05 ⭒ Part 06 ⭒ Part 07 ⭒ Part 08 ⭒ Part 09 ⭒ Part 10 ⭒ Part 11 ⭒ Part 12 ⭒ Part 13

⭒ The Pitt

Because Of You: | @bullet-prooflove

Boston | @/bullet-prooflove

Snapband | @/bullet-prooflove

Kaleidoscope | @science-hoes

Jack likes to find his peace and quiet on the roof of the hospital, but someone interrupts his morning routine.

Early Spring Snow | @/science-hoes

The Reader learns some surprising news after taking a fall that lands her back in the Pitt after her shift.

You Are In Love, part 2, part 3, part 4 | @/science-hoes

Jack needs the reader to help him with a VIP patient, but she soon learns about his chosen family.

Send Me An Angel, part 2 | @kilojulietsierra

The darkness didn’t just go away because he was home, especially after a night like that, but it did start to feel a little less heavy. Eventually.

I Don’t Have A Best Friend | @/kilojulietsierra

The universe put them together in this hell hole and they made the best of it. They are like brothers/best friends… that doesn’t mean they always have to be happy about it. Especially when Jack’s wife decides she needs to set Robby up with a cute nurse friend.

So, now what? | @/kilojulietsierra

Back a Ways, Part Two | @youvebeenlivingfictional

It’s not the first time that someone has made that assumption—thought you and Jack were together, or had a past. But the fact of the matter is, you don’t think that the man’s ever seen you as anything more than his brother-in-arms’ little sister. He’s been around for a long time—since the first time your brother came home for Christmas break from the academy.

Don’t Go where I Can’t Follow, part 2 | @at-this-point-i-dont-even-know

You join Jack at the hospital after waking up alone, and the activities of the day bring up bad memories as the shooter closes in on the hospital

4th of July | @/at-this-point-i-dont-even-know

Strip Her | @quickestgold

Amidst a mass casualty event, Jack’s medical instincts clash with his personal life when the woman he loves risks her own life to save another. Is he about to watch you die?

Say It First | @/quickestgold

Jack has grown used to the emptiness in his heart, a quiet companion that has kept him safe for too long. But when you finally speak your truth, he realizes the hardest battles aren’t fought on the field or in the chaos of the ER, but in the silence between two hearts longing for each other.

Someone New | @/quickestgold

After witnessing the fallout from Jack's failed marriage, Dana and Robby have been skeptical of his new relationship. But when a freak accident forces them to see the depth of Jack’s feelings, their perspectives shift.

Still Alive | @/quickestgold

Delivery complications during the birth of your son leave Jack caught between grief and hope, life and loss. In the stillness that follows, those who witnessed it begin to confront their own silent trauma, navigating recovery, healing and bonding with a newborn.

Semper Fi | @asxgard

You’re the ray of sunshine to Jack’s rain cloud. What do they say about opposites attracting?

Cast | @/asxgard

After an incident at baseball practice, you and your son end up in the ER.

Any Excuse | @/asxgard

in the wreckage | @/asxgard

don’t leave me here without you | one | @lunarcowgirl

dr abbot finds your resume and thinks you are leaving the pitt - absolute disgusting and pathetic behaviour ensues, its all very endearing.

who you let in | @eddiesfaerie

Jack has a soft spot. He didn’t expect you to be the one to find it.

Valkyries and Betting Pools | @nocapesdahling

The staff of the Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital’s Emergency Department bet on everything. One of the most popular and secret betting pools is focused on what’s going on with you and Dr. Abbot. The bets range from everything under the sun, but who’s going to win?

bitter/sweet | @millers-girl

when a stubbornly charming chef keeps showing up in his ER, Dr. Jack Abbot finds it harder and harder to ignore the pull toward something—or someone—he didn't plan for…

Fallout | @/millers-girl

you and your sister plan to spend the day at Pitt Fest but instead spend the night in the hospital, and Jack is left to pick up the pieces.

Busy Bee | @mercvry-glow

you and your son take a trip to the pitt after an encounter with a bee. unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, your husband’s working.

love me hard love me soft | @/mercvry-glow

jack abbot isn’t a soft man, but he’ll learn for you.

All that glitters | @/mercvry-glow

jack isn’t a materialistic man, and you try your best not to be spoiled—but when your man gets flirted with, maybe it’s time to flaunt the rings?

Hey Lover | @/mercvry-glow

break in the system | @/mercvry-glow

Stop making this hurt | @/mercvry-glow

jack knew he didn’t want to go to pitt fest, instead suggesting you take a few of your girl friends on your day off. little does he know that decision leads to you experiencing the worst day of your life without him.

all that gleams | @/mercvry-glow

everyone seems to be hitting on you tonight, and your husband doesn’t seem to appreciate all of the attention you’re getting

The Abbot Family - Pittfest, Part 2 | @fioreimagines

When he is at work, Dr Abbot keeps his life private, and keeps his head focused on being an attending of the Pittsburg Trauma Medical Center. No one knows what he does at home, until Pittfest happens.

imagine | @spaceyaemonds

you and dr. abbot have a lot to discuss, and this is just the beginning.

Coffee Swap | @tedmustache

It starts with coffee. Then it becomes something more.

Adrenaline | @/tedmustache

In the nonstop chaos of The Pitt, two ER doctors find something dangerously steady in each other. Between late shifts, locked doors, and close calls, they navigate a secret that’s as thrilling as it is fragile—because in a place where nothing stays quiet for long, hiding how you feel might be the riskiest move of all.

Healing Wounds | @/tedmustache

When an attack shakes Dr. Y/N Abbot, Jack helps her heal while she questions her medical career.

In sync | @/tedmustache

Two doctors work in perfect sync, sparking curiosity among new interns. After shift, subtle truths begin to surface.

Chocolate Bars and Injuries | @nineteenninety-six

Jack unintentionally bonds with a young patient and then somehow even more unintentionally, falls for his older sister.

Masterlist | @abbotsanatomy

taking care of each other in the ER | @/abbotsanatomy

 HEART IN YOUR THROAT | @/abbotsanatomy

PROTECTING THE HIVE | @/abbotsanatomy

Seeing Green | @/abbotsanatomy

(I’LL BE WATCHING YOU) | @/abbotsanatomy

FLUFF ALPHABET !  | @/abbotsanatomy

REALLY VERY BAD DAY | @/abbotsanatomy

TODAY’S SPECIAL | @/abbotsanatomy

First meetings, Part 2, Part 3 | @eden031

Meeting Jack Abbot twice for the first time was not on her bucket list, especially not after how their unoffical first meeting ended.

Sweet boy | @/eden031

When her son is having a rough patch, she asks her attending to come to his games, just as a temporary arrangement, of course. Though sometimes something temporary becomes normal.

Just In Case | @/kilojulietsierra

He had given Robby so much shit about Collins. “Really brother? One of your residents?” Then you had put in a request to move to the night shift and Robby had fucking signed off on it.

Boy-dad!Jack | @/mercvry-glow

Married life | @/eden031

When Jack‘s wife is it hit by a patient a worried Jack only comes close behind.

on the line | @/millers-girl

Jack takes a six-week placement across the country. Four specific FaceTime calls—full of banter, longing, and everything unsaid—hold you two together until he comes home.

a little sliver | @/millers-girl

the fear of being diagnosed with the very disease that took your mother's life keeps you away from the hospital – until a cut on your hand brings you in, and a certain ER cowboy keeps you coming back

No. of fics: 55

[guerrillatech]

[aflo]

posting this on twitter will get you put into witness protection

[truestoriesaboutme]

The magic of childhood is that you were constantly encountering new things. The best way to feel that way again is to fill your life with new experiences.

[terminallyonlinecat-deactivated]

The magic of childhood is that you were constantly encountering new things. The best way to feel that way again is to fill your life with new experiences.

[abbotsmyhabit]

Show Me Where It Hurts Masterlist

With Lena struggling in school after the loss of her mother Baz hires a tutor to manage Lena for him, you. Andrew 'Pope' Cody finds himself infatuated.

contains: MDNI! no use of y/n, smut, violence, fluff, angst, violence, death, editing of canon

♥️smut 💗fluff ❣️angst 💖sexy

Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 1 ❣️💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 2 💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 3 💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 4 ♥️💖❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 5 ♥️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 6 ❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 7 ♥️❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 8 ♥️❣️💖 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 9 ♥️❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 10 💗♥️💖❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 11 ♥️💗❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 12 💖❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 13 ♥️💗❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 14 ♥️❣️💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 15 ♥️💗❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 16 ❣️💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 17 ❣️♥️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 18 ♥️❣️💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 19 ♥️❣️💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 20 ❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 21 ♥️❣️ Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 22 ♥️💗 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 23 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 24 Show Me Where It Hurts: Part 25 Show Me Where It Hurts: FINALE (Part 26) Show Me Where It Hurts: EPILOGUE (Part 27) Show Me Where It Hurts: Father's Day (Bonus Chapter) ♥️💗💖 Show Me Where It Hurts: The Birthday (Bonus Chapter) 💗❣️💖

[rosierecs13]

𝜗𝜚 Shawn Hatosy Masterlist

⭒ Masterpost ⭒ 03/17/2026

⭒ Actors Masterlist

⭒ Jack Abbot ⭒ Part 02  ⭒ Part 03 ⭒ Part 04 ⭒ Part 05 ⭒ Part 06 ⭒ Part 07 ⭒ Part 08 ⭒ Part 09 ⭒ Part 10 ⭒ Part 11 ⭒ Part 12 ⭒ Part 13

⭒ Andrew ‘Pope’ Cody ⭒ part 02 ⭒ part 03

⭒ Titus Danforth

Sammy Bryant

Easy Choices, | @agnireed 

You and Sammy have been best friends since middle school and you’re both struggling to find room for your friendship within his marriage

Good Man, | @/agnireed

moving in with your older sister tammi, you develop an odd fixation on her husband

Resisting Temptation, | @/agnireed

sammy is beyond tested when nate’s new babysitter gains interest in him

Kissing Away Tears | @angelitairis

The Right Thing | @dollsonlyhurt

One reckless decision. One traffic stop. One officer who should've walked away. After answering yet another manipulative call from your toxic ex, you make the mistake of driving home buzzed—only to find yourself pulled over by Officer Sammy Bryant. Expecting judgment and handcuffs, you're met instead with an unexpected kindness that neither of you is prepared for. 

Coming Home To You | @moodyabbott

Test The Theory | @/moodyabbott

Iced Lemonade | @/moodyabbott

Story About Love | @/moodyabbott

City Limits | @in-ky

when you're called to the site of a murder, you realize the two bodies are on opposite sides of the city line. being a new detective, your supervisor sees this as a perfect opportunity for you to get some mentorship from LAPD detectives. unfortunately, the case is not as open-and-shut as you thought, and over the course of the investigation, you find yourself falling for one of the detectives you're supposed to be learning from. 

So Glad We’re Acquainted | @hotdocsandcowboys

Sammy is attracted to the cute student who was witness to a crime in the morning, and discovers she's someone very different in the night.

Sweetheart | @unhoelyplaces

Long Day | @/unhoelyplaces

Got No Game | @pittrabbit

The Better Woman | @annsfics

now happily married to the kind of woman sammy could only dream of before, he's a very satisfied man. but... something seems to be bothering you tonight. once you're finally in bed together, you divulge the reason for your quiet disposition this evening. afterward, you prove to him yet again just how smart he was for wedding you.

Bet Gone Righ | @fangirl-dot-com

Watermelon | @groovyangelkisses

Pulled Over | @/groovyangelkisses

Safety | @rynwrites4fun

After witnessing a murder, you become entangled in Detective Sammy Bryant’s investigation. His big heart and deep concern for your safety make it hard for him to maintain professional boundaries.

Nobody’s Son | @not-neverland06

You've been his partner for years, but one fight with his wife and he's willing to throw it all away just for a brief night of relief. Now, your life is ruined and you don't want to ever see him again. But the death of your friend brings you back together and suddenly, you're backed into a corner you don't know how to escape from.

Never Getting Laid | @/not-neverland06

You knew it was a risk, dating a cop and all, but Sammy is different. Or, he was, at least. He was probably the best boyfriend you've ever had, the only one you ever saw yourself getting serious with. But then, he had to go and make buddy-buddy with the assholes in his department. Now your sweet boyfriend is gone and you're left picking up the pieces.

Out Of His League | @romantic-insomniac

Husband Sammy | @medusasfics

Growing Pains | @woodelf-writing

When Love joins the LAPD’s Drugs and Narcotics Division, she expects violence and chaos—not to fall for her married colleague, Sammy Bryant. As lives unravel, secrets become weapons and the job takes its toll, their growing feelings threaten to destroy them both.

Boyfriend | @lovaeir

Having Sammy pretending to be your boyfriend to get a creepy guy at your job off your back

Short Circuits | @/lovaeir

Sammy Bryant who sits on the toilet lid while you’re taking a bath, he’s talking about his day at work as he just watches you and yaps. Until you start touching yourself and his brain short circuits.

His House | @/lovaeir

Thinking about Sammy taking you in after your house was robbed and it’s not safe to stay there anymore, and he starts cheating on Tammi with you while you’re staying at his house cause you make him weak.

imagine | @lostalioth

Sammy pretending to be nonchalant when he’s actually extremely down BAD for you

Last Chance | @/lostalioth

sammy is beyond desperate for your forgiveness and he is willing to do whatever he can to earn it.

Unthinkable | @carriebradshaw0003

Second Chances | @thatsthatbridepresso

Sammy Bryant didn’t think he deserved a second chance at happiness. Not after Tammi.

Brett Richards

Man’s Duty | @annsfics

after the death of your husband 2 years prior, you've withdrawn and become a shell of your former self due to grief. one man was there for you during that time, until you eventually pushed him away and broke his heart too. when you arrive on station 42's doorstep one afternoon during an absentminded afternoon walk, you run into their new battalion chief. and soon thereafter, the two of you fall into bed together. unable to ever let yourself move forward, however, you leave the following morning... until the results of a small plastic test brings you back.

That's My Girl | @thatfanficstuff

The new recruit says something stupid when you come to visit

Inferno | @glamorizethechaos

It started with a drunken dare—one impulsive ring of the doorbell at Station 42 that should’ve been nothing more than a funny story the next morning. From the echoing halls of Fernwood Elementary, to the roaring engines and restless nights at the station, an unexpected wildfire ignited between you and Brett Richards. But wildfires don’t stay contained. As boundaries blur and emotions deepen, you’re forced to confront what happens when a spark becomes a blaze—one that could warm you for a lifetime… or burn everything you thought you knew.

Stan Rosado

Kiss It Better | @the-shedevil-writes

After getting dragged to a party to get over your stupid ex, you meet Stan Rosado. It goes well... until said ex suddenly shows up.

Princess Protection | @agnireed

You’re convinced the boy next door is your soulmate and the feeling hasn’t faded even after ten years apart

Grant Reilly

Dinner’s On Me | @/annsfics

grant reilly. authoritative head chef of the infamous michelin-star restaurant north & vine, army vet... and middle-aged man who's hopelessly in love with you, who he only knows from his employee's—your roommate's—instagram posts. then the fateful night arrives when grant finds you standing inside his kitchen and the two of you finally meet in-person. same as any other chef, once he gets a taste of something sweet, he can't help but want for more.

Elvis Schmidt

In The Shadows | @/agnireed

Elvis knows he’s a fool for obsessing over the rich girl from high school but he can’t help but think it’s fate when he runs into you again.

Clayton Emerson

Out Of Touch | @starlithatosy

Clayton Emerson is in need of a house sitter while he's off on business on one of the other islands. Who better for the job than his much younger situationship?  

[rosierecs13]

𝜗𝜚 Shawn Hatosy Masterlist

⭒ Masterpost ⭒ 03/17/2026

⭒ Actors Masterlist

⭒ Jack Abbot ⭒ Part 02  ⭒ Part 03 ⭒ Part 04 ⭒ Part 05 ⭒ Part 06 ⭒ Part 07 ⭒ Part 08 ⭒ Part 09 ⭒ Part 10 ⭒ Part 11 ⭒ Part 12 ⭒ Part 13

⭒ Andrew ‘Pope’ Cody ⭒ part 02 ⭒ part 03

⭒ Titus Danforth

Sammy Bryant

Easy Choices, | @agnireed 

You and Sammy have been best friends since middle school and you’re both struggling to find room for your friendship within his marriage

Good Man, | @/agnireed

moving in with your older sister tammi, you develop an odd fixation on her husband

Resisting Temptation, | @/agnireed

sammy is beyond tested when nate’s new babysitter gains interest in him

Kissing Away Tears | @angelitairis

The Right Thing | @dollsonlyhurt

One reckless decision. One traffic stop. One officer who should've walked away. After answering yet another manipulative call from your toxic ex, you make the mistake of driving home buzzed—only to find yourself pulled over by Officer Sammy Bryant. Expecting judgment and handcuffs, you're met instead with an unexpected kindness that neither of you is prepared for. 

Coming Home To You | @moodyabbott

Test The Theory | @/moodyabbott

Iced Lemonade | @/moodyabbott

Story About Love | @/moodyabbott

City Limits | @in-ky

when you're called to the site of a murder, you realize the two bodies are on opposite sides of the city line. being a new detective, your supervisor sees this as a perfect opportunity for you to get some mentorship from LAPD detectives. unfortunately, the case is not as open-and-shut as you thought, and over the course of the investigation, you find yourself falling for one of the detectives you're supposed to be learning from. 

So Glad We’re Acquainted | @hotdocsandcowboys

Sammy is attracted to the cute student who was witness to a crime in the morning, and discovers she's someone very different in the night.

Sweetheart | @unhoelyplaces

Long Day | @/unhoelyplaces

Got No Game | @pittrabbit

The Better Woman | @annsfics

now happily married to the kind of woman sammy could only dream of before, he's a very satisfied man. but... something seems to be bothering you tonight. once you're finally in bed together, you divulge the reason for your quiet disposition this evening. afterward, you prove to him yet again just how smart he was for wedding you.

Bet Gone Righ | @fangirl-dot-com

Watermelon | @groovyangelkisses

Pulled Over | @/groovyangelkisses

Safety | @rynwrites4fun

After witnessing a murder, you become entangled in Detective Sammy Bryant’s investigation. His big heart and deep concern for your safety make it hard for him to maintain professional boundaries.

Nobody’s Son | @not-neverland06

You've been his partner for years, but one fight with his wife and he's willing to throw it all away just for a brief night of relief. Now, your life is ruined and you don't want to ever see him again. But the death of your friend brings you back together and suddenly, you're backed into a corner you don't know how to escape from.

Never Getting Laid | @/not-neverland06

You knew it was a risk, dating a cop and all, but Sammy is different. Or, he was, at least. He was probably the best boyfriend you've ever had, the only one you ever saw yourself getting serious with. But then, he had to go and make buddy-buddy with the assholes in his department. Now your sweet boyfriend is gone and you're left picking up the pieces.

Out Of His League | @romantic-insomniac

Husband Sammy | @medusasfics

Growing Pains | @woodelf-writing

When Love joins the LAPD’s Drugs and Narcotics Division, she expects violence and chaos—not to fall for her married colleague, Sammy Bryant. As lives unravel, secrets become weapons and the job takes its toll, their growing feelings threaten to destroy them both.

Boyfriend | @lovaeir

Having Sammy pretending to be your boyfriend to get a creepy guy at your job off your back

Short Circuits | @/lovaeir

Sammy Bryant who sits on the toilet lid while you’re taking a bath, he’s talking about his day at work as he just watches you and yaps. Until you start touching yourself and his brain short circuits.

His House | @/lovaeir

Thinking about Sammy taking you in after your house was robbed and it’s not safe to stay there anymore, and he starts cheating on Tammi with you while you’re staying at his house cause you make him weak.

imagine | @lostalioth

Sammy pretending to be nonchalant when he’s actually extremely down BAD for you

Last Chance | @/lostalioth

sammy is beyond desperate for your forgiveness and he is willing to do whatever he can to earn it.

Unthinkable | @carriebradshaw0003

Second Chances | @thatsthatbridepresso

Sammy Bryant didn’t think he deserved a second chance at happiness. Not after Tammi.

Brett Richards

Man’s Duty | @annsfics

after the death of your husband 2 years prior, you've withdrawn and become a shell of your former self due to grief. one man was there for you during that time, until you eventually pushed him away and broke his heart too. when you arrive on station 42's doorstep one afternoon during an absentminded afternoon walk, you run into their new battalion chief. and soon thereafter, the two of you fall into bed together. unable to ever let yourself move forward, however, you leave the following morning... until the results of a small plastic test brings you back.

That's My Girl | @thatfanficstuff

The new recruit says something stupid when you come to visit

Inferno | @glamorizethechaos

It started with a drunken dare—one impulsive ring of the doorbell at Station 42 that should’ve been nothing more than a funny story the next morning. From the echoing halls of Fernwood Elementary, to the roaring engines and restless nights at the station, an unexpected wildfire ignited between you and Brett Richards. But wildfires don’t stay contained. As boundaries blur and emotions deepen, you’re forced to confront what happens when a spark becomes a blaze—one that could warm you for a lifetime… or burn everything you thought you knew.

Stan Rosado

Kiss It Better | @the-shedevil-writes

After getting dragged to a party to get over your stupid ex, you meet Stan Rosado. It goes well... until said ex suddenly shows up.

Princess Protection | @agnireed

You’re convinced the boy next door is your soulmate and the feeling hasn’t faded even after ten years apart

Grant Reilly

Dinner’s On Me | @/annsfics

grant reilly. authoritative head chef of the infamous michelin-star restaurant north & vine, army vet... and middle-aged man who's hopelessly in love with you, who he only knows from his employee's—your roommate's—instagram posts. then the fateful night arrives when grant finds you standing inside his kitchen and the two of you finally meet in-person. same as any other chef, once he gets a taste of something sweet, he can't help but want for more.

Elvis Schmidt

In The Shadows | @/agnireed

Elvis knows he’s a fool for obsessing over the rich girl from high school but he can’t help but think it’s fate when he runs into you again.

Clayton Emerson

Out Of Touch | @starlithatosy

Clayton Emerson is in need of a house sitter while he's off on business on one of the other islands. Who better for the job than his much younger situationship?  

[erwinsvow]

𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐦𝐲 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦 𝐲𝐨𝐮 — 𝐚.𝐜.

summary: against better judgement, you send a letter to a man at folsom with very sad eyes. against even better judgement, you send letters every week for years until he stops replying one day. and against everything you know, when he shows up at your door, you invite him inside.

pairing: prison letters reader x andrew cody

word count: 12.4k

tags: reader is silly and does things i do not recommend. kids do not write letters to prisoners and fall in love with them. unless it's andrew cody obviously. lots of context no one asked for. nurse!reader, descriptions of wound (andrew cuts himself to get into your work because why wouldn't he!), descriptions of wound handling, smut (oral - f receiving and mating press and the tiniest hint of breeding). takes place in season one, but just imagine he's got season two's hair. you have to fully immerse yourself in the fact that it's andrew cody and then ask yourself—wouldn't you take him home too? it's not her fault!

author's note: here she is! thank you for the patience ♡

you honestly had signed up as a joke. the club was known through your campus to be run by a couple of bleeding hearts. no one had thought the school would approve their activities—letters to prisoners. it was a recipe for disaster.

you should have known better.

but a friend of a friend was involved, and you knew it would make your nursing school application look better, and honestly, you didn’t think anything would come of it. a couple of letters here and there. you had thought it’d be all anonymous, messages of motivation and prayers signed with a first name only.

until your friend—bleeding heart and hopeless romantic, trying to appeal to those very same qualities in you—had shown you the website. that’s when you should have realized it wasn’t just a recipe, it was going to be a disaster.

the prisoners recorded videos—thirty seconds, short and sweet. a name, a couple of sentences about them, hometown and hobbies. underneath the video you could see what they had been arrested for. only the ones who were in for petty crimes—drugs and robbery, things where no one else had really gotten hurt, were allowed to partake. that was good at least. didn’t need any murderers sending letters to pretty co-eds.

your friend picked the guy she thought was the cutest. you watched his video—he was handsome, you couldn’t deny it. but the more videos you watched, the less you wanted to write a letter. you could almost see it, the desperation behind their eyes. it seemed like every man had nefarious intent. like your prettily written letter would not be used for motivation and prayers of a better life outside.

you decided not to send one. you’d rather have an empty slot on your application than a bad feeling in your gut for the rest of the semester. it’s not like the prison was across the country—it was just a couple of hours away.

she asked you to give it one more chance, watch a couple more videos. just pick a cute one, she’d told you. when you’d made a noise of disapproval, she had rolled her eyes.

“okay, pick whoever seems the nicest, then.”

so you had.

the video had been labeled andrew cody. first degree robbery.

the man in the video had been incredibly genuine. you don’t remember exactly what he had said—just bits and pieces. you knew he was from oceanside, born and raised from the way he sounded. he said he had a lot of brothers and a sister back at home. that he spent his time working out and reading books to distract himself from how noisy it was inside. the first thing he’d do when he got out was go to the beach and listen to the waves and breathe in the clean salty air.

and deep down inside, you knew you were just as much of a bleeding heart as the rest of your friends. you had folded instantly.

but it wasn’t just that. you spent the next several nights thinking about him. sad eyes, a singular half-smile at his own joke and then a real one when he mentioned going to the beach once he was released. he’d followed it up with—not that it’ll be any time soon. that made you sad, in turn. you thought about what he was like before prison—did he smile more? was he always so sad?

you thought about a lot of things. more than whatever your friends did, telling you how they had sent their letters, flirty yet inherently professional, so as not to get in trouble with the advisor.

you took a while to send yours. first you couldn’t think of what to write—everything felt so stupid compared to what he must be going through. andrew would hardly want to hear about the mundaneness of your daily life, or the struggles of trying to get into the nursing program.

you thought about not sending a letter at all after the first few times you tried to put pen to paper.

and then you thought about how sad he must feel, how lonely and scared, how terrible it would be to see all the other prisoners get letters besides him.

so you drove to the beach. you surprisingly had more in common with andrew cody than you even realized when you selected him. there was nothing you loved more than the beach, which is why you had even picked your college to begin with. and now, four years later about to graduate, you couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.

you caught the sunrise. you brought your little notebook with you to the water after setting your bag down on the bench. the seagulls were flying around, a couple of other beach-goers walking along the border where the sand met the ocean. it was a day like any other.

there were two sides of you—a hopeless romantic inside of an inherently logical girl. one side argued how stupid it was to send letters to a stranger. the other wondered if this would be the day that changes your life. you push away the thought and focus on writing the damn thing.

you thought andrew might like if the letter smelled like the salt-water. the stupid idea felt a lot less silly when you were attempting it, bringing your notebook all the way down to the water and hovering it. a slightly bigger wave caught you by surprise, the corners getting wet where it splashed up.

cursing to yourself, you walked back to the bench with sandy feet. and then you started writing.

dear andrew, and then you paused. fuck. you got out some of the introductory stuff—your first name, that you were a nursing student. it took a while to get the rest of the page filled, until you stopped for a moment and thought about what you would tell the man with the sad eyes if he was sitting next to you.

i came to the beach to write this letter. i’m sorry if the corners are wrinkled when you get it, i almost dropped it in the water trying to get it to smell like the beach so you had a little piece of home with you. i’m not near oceanside but it’s still the pacific.

i can’t imagine how hard it must be to grow up near the water and then be so far away for so long. but at least you know it’ll always be waiting for you when you get released. they want us to write motivational things but i’m not sure how motivating it would be for you reading this letter about my silly life. so i thought i’d write about the beach instead.

it’s about seven in the morning. the weather isn’t too cold and sky is pink and orange right now. the waves were calmer an hour ago when i got here but now it’s getting more intense. there’s a couple with their dog, and another man running on the sand. i’m on a bench writing this, but i’ll walk along the water again before i leave. i would try to send you a shell but i’m sure they’d take it away. maybe sand?

i love the sound of the waves too. my school isn’t close enough to hear it, but i have one of those machines that makes the noises. it helps a lot when i’m trying to sleep. maybe you can get one when you get out too.

you fill up a page, and then another page. when you fold up the letter and slip it into the envelope, you take a couple grains of sand and drop it in there. a little piece of home for him.

then you mail the letter, and think that was that.

+

two weeks later, you get a letter in the mail. you’d heard some of the other girls had also gotten responses—some had been mildly wholesome, while others had been more along the lines of what are you wearing?

but you weren’t worried when you opened yours. andrew didn’t seem the creepy type to you, it felt more like… like he would be glad to have someone to talk to.

you read it in bed, holding an old stuffed animal tightly. his handwriting is stiff and neat, the evenness of the letters and dotted i’s and crossed t’s makes you smile. the way he wrote your name, with bleeding ink like he had pressed too hard into the paper while doing so, made you smile wider.

the first line—thanks for the sand—made you laugh.

andrew writes of the book he’s just read, how the beach you described sounds just like the one in his hometown, and a request that you tell him more about your life in the next letter. his letter isn’t as long as yours, which makes sense to you. he couldn’t have that much to write about. but the last line is what really gets you—thank you for the letter. it’s nice to talk to someone.

you blink away tears, unsure when you had started crying. you reread the letter twice over the next day and a half, deciding to head back to the beach early in the morning to write the next one.

and you’ve always been bad at this. your friends have always called you a hopeless romantic—but maybe you’re just in too deep. it was the product of having been alone for your entire life, not having the dreamy, intense love that so many of your friends had already gone through once or twice at this age. the result had manifested in how you treated the world around you. every door someone held open, every nice response, every lingering gaze could mean something more. that this could be the person, that this could be your soulmate.

you knew it was stupid. nothing could be stupider than assuming that a prisoner, for god’s sake, would be anything more than just that—a prisoner you write letters to. but your heart still beats faster each time you reread the letter, and when you think of his pretty, sad eyes and earnest expression, the urge to write another letter haunts over your entire body.

dear andrew, thank you for writing back. thank you again for writing back and not being creepy (like the responses some of my friends got). i could tell you more about my life but i really wasn’t lying—it’s pretty silly and mostly boring, but since you asked so nicely i’ll try for you. right now i’m getting ready for graduation. i bought a white dress last week. i’m waiting to hear if i got into the nursing program here. i majored in nursing so I just need to do one more year and then after that i can go work in the hospital. i’m thinking about labor and delivery since i think it would be so nice to see babies all day, but one of my friends said the emergency room is always hiring. she thinks it would toughen me up. but I’m not so sure i want to be tough. just incase all of this school talk is boring you, i’ll just tell you about my day on the condition that you'll tell me about yours. yesterday i woke up early and went on a walk. i made breakfast and went to class, and then studied in the library. my friend showed me a creepy response from one of the fellow inmates (by the way, thank you again for not being creepy.) i walked to get a chai—i don't really like coffee. and then i studied, watched the bachelor. it was terrible! my favorite contestant got sent home :(. and had dinner, then I went to sleep early because i woke up early to come to the beach today to write this for you. so i went to sleep thinking about this letter and woke up thinking about it too.

you add a little bit more about your routine this time, just so he has something to read about. you try to make yourself sound interesting where you can—but you’re really not. and you don’t want to force it, make your letters sound grand and full of lies.

you don’t know why—it’s not like you’ll ever meet him. but lying to andrew feels wrong, you guess.

stupid. you’re stupid for adding the last part—but something in your heart flutters reading the line again, because you did. andrew’s sad eyes are in your mind all the time, and you know it’s just a silly infatuation, that he’s a prisoner and you’re a random student and more likely than not, he’s not going to respond to this letter. but you still keep it in.

and so you send the letter. and what’s worse—the one you get back makes your heart swell. he says that you describe your routine so well he can almost see it happening in his head like a movie. he says that he could describe his day-to-day but that it might make you sad. you’re sure it will. he seems to know a lot about you from just a handful of letters.

you reply. he sends another. you reply. and before you can even discern what’s happened, this has been going on for the better part of a year and a half.

andrew gets all the life updates—your nursing school acceptance, how the first year goes. early morning clinicals, the mean preceptor who made your life hell for a month, the baby you got to help deliver, the cat you’re thinking about getting. and the not so great stuff—despite the nursing shortage, it seems the only available job at the hospital you like is in the emergency room.

you don’t give him names but he figures it out well enough. the program you sent the letters through was smart enough not to include the university’s name in the return address, but dumb enough to use a p.o. box in the same city. and in that city, there’s only two colleges, and only one of those has a nursing program.

these are the things he uses to figure out where you are after he gets out—not that you need to know any of that just yet.

after you get the job, the letters are stamped with the mark of the local post office. you must not know that they’re doing that, now that you can’t send the letters through the school anymore. that’s the last piece of the puzzle, figuring out which emergency room you had been working in.

he keeps those letters. they’re his sanctuary—pages and pages about your life. the highs and lows of an innocent girl who thought it would be a good idea to send letters to a prisoner. letters where you asked about him, how he was feeling, how he was doing. how much time he had left, how he thinks the next parole meeting will go, how that annoying guard has been recently. how’s your family, andrew?

if he closes his eyes, he can almost see you. you’re a faceless entity, a glowing angel with a halo hovering in his mind when he really needs you. you’re too perfect to be real—and he knows you would be outside too. if you can care this much through letters, go out of your way to send them even after you graduate, he can only imagine how you’d be if you stood in front of him.

the other students who sent letters stopped after one or two. he’s likely the only one who’s still getting them, and when someone questions who they’re from, he tells a story about his girl, waiting for him outside. a nurse—smart and pretty and devoted and who never fails to send him a weekly update. lives too far to drive up here but he’ll be there one day.

and then he gets sent to solitary.

he doesn’t like to think about it, if he can avoid it. sometimes the noises of the world get to him, brings him back to days and hours he wish he could wipe from his memory. the sound machine you recommended in your very first letter helps some. but the day he goes free, there’s only one sound he knows will calm him down—your voice, the first time he’ll get to hear it.

he has to go home first. he needs a car, the internet, a couple of phone calls to make sure he’s going to the right place.

days turn into weeks. unfortunately—very unfortunately. the only thing andrew wants is to finally see you in person, to finally hear what your voice sounds like. what color is your hair? what color are your eyes? he knows you like yellow—what would he find if he saw you? yellow hair clips? painted nails? how about your apartment? would the walls be yellow?

no, probably not. you rent. you wouldn’t do anything that wouldn’t get you your security deposit back. you’re too good for that, too safe.

yellow sheets, maybe. blankets, pillows. if he closes his eyes, he can imagine himself in it.

he tries to leave after the first job but there’s too many watchful eyes, too many moving pieces. he needs to get everything together—his truck, cash and some cards, a plausible excuse. he needs to make sure no one comes following him, needs to make sure that in his quest to come find you, he doesn’t get you tangled into the web of his family instead. he’s stuck somewhere between figuring out how to keep you safe and the realization that the safest you’ll ever be is right now, before he comes for you.

but fuck, if it doesn’t haunt him. the fact that he’s finally so close to you. that you’re a car ride away. that somewhere out there is the girl who, one day, realized another letter wouldn’t be coming.

had you cried then? been upset? wondered what had happened? bothered to find out if he was dead or freed or living without you? he hates that he couldn’t get you another letter to explain himself, but he figures explaining in person would be easier, and better. in all those years, you never once wrote him about a date or a boyfriend or anything in that realm.

the way your last few letters were, it were almost as if he was your boyfriend. (he lets the thought linger inside him for a few seconds, if that. any longer and it would possess him like a demon and he’d be rendered useless. unable to work, unable to think, unable to breathe. just him and the idea that he was that important to someone else.)

+

and then one day, a couple days after a job and after being fed up with the entire world being scared of him, he leaves to find you.

that’s just the thing—no one understands him. all his life, he’s been the unstable one, the one others are worried about, frightened of. but no one understands that there’s nothing to be afraid of.

no one, except maybe you.

so he says he’ll be back in a week, and he drives down to the hospital where you work.

he hasn’t gotten a real look at you yet. he spent the first night in the parking lot of the emergency room. he watches hordes of nurses go in and out, and no one stands out. he spends some time doing research—nurses only work three times a week.

his odds of seeing you for the rest of the time he’s in town are fifty/fifty. it feels like he should be able to pick you out from a crowd, with the way he knows you so intimately, but he can’t. he keeps an eye out for yellow water bottles or shoes or lunch bags, but he doesn’t see any for two days.

so he decides that he needs to get inside.

pope keeps a pocket knife on his person, and another one hidden in the car in case of emergencies. that’s what he uses to slice his palm open so he has an excuse to get inside. not too deep—he’s not stupid. just deep enough to need stitches, shallow enough that he can still feel all his fingers and wiggle them around.

and then he goes inside, and he waits.

each time the doors open, a different nurse steps out. some are too old, others too young. no one has anything yellow on them, or the personality that he knows could only belong to you. cheery, but serious. empathetic to a fault. you would probably cry if you saw a kid crying, just like how you used to write to andrew, telling him you had cried thinking about a patient you lost and their family, cried thinking about him alone in prison.

you’ve shed tears for him. a man you’ve never even met. he has to recognize you when he sees you. he knows he will—the two of you are bonded in more ways than one. through ink and blood and tears.

“david?” a voice calls out. so lost in his thoughts, he’d not realized the doors had opened again or the name he’d given them. he looks up, making eye contact with the nurse, his nurse, and she walks closer. “david?” the voice repeats, and he raises the non-bloody hand.

you are just like he thought you’d be. your hair is pulled back, which is a shame. he wants to see what it looks like when it’s down, what it smells like when you get close enough. pieces in the front fall out from behind your ear. his finger twitches momentarily.

and, he thinks with a pleasant sort of smugness, there is yellow—the plastic band around the stethoscope, the badge reel with a smiling cartoon on it, the pens tucked neatly in your scrub top pocket.

“hi david, i’m going to be your nurse today,” you start, looking at him in the eyes. your eyebrows furrow a little, like you’re trying to remember why this man looks so familiar—it’s not like he had expected it. his hair isn’t the same anymore, longer than the video you had seen of him. if that was your benchmark, he certainly looked somewhat different. he doesn’t fault you for not recognizing him right away. in fact, it’s better this way. “if you’re ready, i can take you back now.”

you smile at him, beautifully. a bright, wide smile, like there’s nothing in this world you’d rather do than take david back, and have a look at whatever’s bothering him. it’s genuine, it’s safe, it’s warm. how do you do it? he thinks briefly to himself, how do you make everyone feel like they’re the most important person in the world? just with a smile and a couple of sentences you must say a thousand times a shift.

andrew’s not one for many words, but his thoughts run rampant—he’s always thinking. he can’t get his brain to turn off, not now, not ever. even putting pen to paper was hard for him, even for you. but you seem to understand him, just like you did back then. without words, without talking, without touching or knowing. you just know him.

you take him to a bed behind a curtain and start rattling off a list of rehearsed questions. first name, age, date of birth. the more he says, the more you seem to get a step closer to recognizing him, but he doesn’t push it.

you come closer to the bed and gesture to his wrapped up, bleeding hand.

“may i?”

“yes. yes,” andrew says, unsure of how it’ll be to feel your hands on him for the first time. you start slowly, unpeeling the layers of gauze that he had brought with him from home as a just incase. he doesn’t flinch or wince, but you still speak up.

“i’m sorry, i know it’s not very comfortable.” you apologize without needing to, and he’s sure it’s because you want him to feel better about it. “how did this happen again?” you ask, staring at his wound closely. you’re not very far from his face. he can feel your breath even against his skin.

“accident. was cutting something.”

“well, you should be more careful, david.” his middle name has always felt foreign to him, though somehow, it doesn’t seem that way coming from your lips. andrew briefly feels like there’s nowhere else he’d rather be than here, no one else he’d rather be than david, getting his hand tended to by you.

“yeah. i should.”

“well i’m going to go ahead and get this cleaned up. just to be sure, any drug allergies?” he shakes his head. “great. we’re gonna clean it and then the doctor will be in here to stitch it up and we’ll get you on your way back home. does that sound okay?”

you look at him earnestly. as if on the off chance he said it didn’t sound okay, you’d have an answer ready to go. nothing to shame him, nothing to make him feel bad. just to comfort him and make him feel better. like there’s nothing more important than getting him back home with aid instructions for the rest of the week.

memories of your letters wash over him like a warm wave over soft sand. you’ve known from the jump that you were meant for this, but it all suddenly makes sense. how kind you are, how gentle you are with him, how you’d be with anyone.

you were meant for this, just like how you were meant for him.

“that sounds okay.”

you sit on a stool at the level of his hand. you dab with the cleaning solution and tell him you’re sorry about the sting. it’s half a dozen apologies in the short time he’s known you, and he sits and wonders, staring at your pretty hair and the undoubtedly smooth skin of your neck, that he’ll have to work you out of that habit.

you shouldn’t be apologizing for anything, much less helping people the way you do.

he stares at you while you think of another question to ask him to distract him from the pain of cleaning his wound.

and your patient is nothing if not a starer. when you got up to add something to the chart and stopped to chat with a fellow nurse and friend of yours about how long it might take the doctor to see him—calling him by his nickname, mister sliced hand in bed four—she interrupted you half way through the conversation.

“the one who’s staring at us right now?” you turned your head too quickly to see what she was talking about, and were faced with sliced-hand david, looking at you and the other nurse.

not in a creepy way, like some other past patients of yours. he’s just…looking. like he’s waiting for you to come back. his gaze doesn’t leave you, you notice. he watches your friend as though he’s watching over you.

the thought is almost… sweet.

and then you shake your head and turn around, breaking the eye contact. you have a bad habit of doing this—turning every interaction, every look into your eyes and held-open door into something more than it was.

your new friends at the hospital also call you a hopeless romantic. you knew that you were just sort of an idiot when it came to these things. it was the long-standing result of still never having been in a real relationship. you’d never felt the fireworks, never known the rom-com sort of true love and happy ending. you had never even gotten to the angst-filled third act breakup.

so maybe you were still a bit of a projector—projecting every single interaction into something more than it was. a patient with a staring problem became a man who was looking out for you, worried for you, love at first sight.

and you shake your head again. snap out of it. you had a problem, seriously.

the closest you’d even come to anything remotely related to love at first sight was the insane amount of letters you’d written to a prisoner a few years ago, and even then—

stop. it. you barely knew what the guy looked like, and yet, you found yourself wondering all the time what had happened to him. if today would finally be the day you’d find out. he could be the stranger next to you in the coffee shop. the person buying fruit next to you in the grocery store.

for all you know, he could be the next guy who walks into your life, and yet—

“you are seriously such a goner,” she says with a laugh, playfully shoving your shoulder.

“what? i-i just got lost in my thoughts.”

“a guy could blink at you and you’d be imagining your embroidered towels and baby names-”

“that is not true-”

“right, i know. you’re right. you’re just gonna hold out for mister prisoner until you’re an old lady with a bunch of cats-”

“hey! i have one cat and he is adorable, okay-”

“yeah, yeah. that’s how it always starts. one cat.”

“i’m going to go take care of my patient now.”

“don’t let him blink at you.”

you roll your eyes and make your way back to bed four, where david stares up at you with pretty, sad eyes. eyes that seem a little familiar, but it’s hour eight of twelve and you’ve taken care of half a hundred people so far. your tiredness seeps through your pores but you still smile and sit on the stool.

“sorry about that, david.”

“are you okay?” he asks, incredibly earnestly. you blink at him dumbly. once, then twice.

“yes?” you reply slowly, unsure of what he means. maybe you’re more tired than you thought. “is everything okay?”

“i saw her push you.” you blink again.

“oh. oh. no, no, she’s my friend. that was just, um-” you blank momentarily. his concern is so palpable you can feel it in the air. “-a joke. she was joking.”

“oh. okay.” david goes silent but his eyes are still on you. you decide the best course of action is to change the subject.

“so! david. this might be hard but no going in the water for at least a couple days. maybe more, depending on what the doctor says.”

“sure. can i.. can i still go sit on the beach?”

“yeah. that should be fine.” you clean out the wound further, but he doesn’t wince. “do you do that often?”

“yes. it calms me down.”

“me too. something about the sand and the waves. the air is just-”

“cleaner.” for the first time that night, david interrupts you. your eyes leave his hand to look up at his face.

“yeah,” you agree, slowly, wondering why his words feel so familiar to you. “cleaner.”

there’s a brief pause, and david doesn’t say anything. you look back down at his hand, continuing your work. but something inside of you stirs, curiosity poking and prodding at your memories. you’ve heard that before, somewhere, and even then you had thought about how no one had ever used that word to describe the ocean air before, when—

“i thought you wanted to deliver babies. do you not want to do that anymore?”

as if it was in slow motion, you retract your hands away from his. you move your head to look up at him and your jaw falls open a little—you had known david looked a little familiar, but when you had seen that thirty second video of him, his hair had been short and his skin had been a little paler, and the man sitting in front of you now—

well he wasn’t cute anymore.

he was handsome now—dark brown curls grown out. he looked like he’d spent some time in the sun, recently. his eyes—sad and pretty as they were—seemed a bit softer now. and your gaze on him made them even softer, like he was trying his best not to frighten you. how someone takes care of a skittish animal, ready to bolt at any second.

you swallow, and then bring your hands back to his, keeping the piece of soaked gauze on top of his wound gently

“i-i do. want to. this was just the only job opening when i-” you pause, sucking in a deep breath. he already knows about this—andrew. it was in one of your letters. “when i finished school.”

you feel his hand move under your touch, and then his other hand, the unwounded one, over yours. his grip isn’t tight, but it’s tense. hard. like he wants to make sure you can’t just disappear like sand between his fingers.

“i thought you might have found another job by now.”

“it-it’s hard. you get used to something and it’s hard to leave.” you pause again. there’s a million and one questions storming through your mind, but you stare into hazel eyes and they all go quiet, one by one. “you said your name is david-”

“i wanted to see if you would recognize me.”

“i’m sorry, i-”

“don’t apologize.” andrew, like his letters, speaks concisely. you should have guessed. you would send him pages just to get a few paragraphs back—and he would always say it’s because he didn’t have much to talk about, that learning about your day to day was much better than whatever he could tell you.

it was the first time your heart fluttered with the knowledge that out there, somewhere, is a man who wants to hear about your day. the closest you had ever gotten to the semblance of a real relationship. a man who cared about you, even if he never said as much. it was always clear to you, through his carefully chosen words and the things he wrote you about and how much he said he liked hearing about you.

he used to ask you questions about things from a dozen letters ago. remember to follow up after some big exam or a really hard week at work. asked you what you did to feel better. tell you what he would do to help you feel better—nothing creepy, never creepy. if you were supposed to be scared of him, you never were. he never gave you any reason to.

“are you okay?” andrew asks, and you blink yourself out of your thoughts.

“yes. yes, sorry. i just-” it’s a little ridiculous.

you’re a smart girl. you’ve always been a smart girl. you don’t do stupid things—you don’t drink yourself silly at bars and go home with random men. you don’t say yes to dates with strangers, despite how much you believe that a stranger can become a soulmate in an instant. you don’t put yourself in situations you can’t get out of.

but when it comes to andrew, you haven’t listened to a single one of your own rules. you sent him letters for ages after the other girls in your class had stopped. you had opened up about your life and wanted to learn about his life in exchange.

and despite every greater instinct, you had fallen asleep for years thinking about the day he might walk back into your life.

“did you ever get my last letter, andrew?”

you’re not even sure where the words came from—that’s the last thing you should be saying right now. how did you find me? when did you get out of prison? why are you here right now? should have all come before.

but something inside you burns, like it has for years, with the knowledge that he never sent you another letter. and you need to know why.

andrew sits up a little straighter, taking heavy breaths and staring at you. it’s the first time he’s heard you say his name, his real name. you two haven’t moved an inch, his hand still on yours. he blinks slowly at you and you don’t realize it, but you’re holding your breath.

“i did. i-i was in solitary. they don’t let you write letters there.”

“oh. i’m so sorry,” you say, and it’s second nature. you hate what andrew went through, and seeing him in front of you brings you back to the first letter you ever got back from him. how polite he was in it, how sweet the whole thing seemed. it was never meant to get this far, but it had, and you—

you are nothing if not a believer of soulmates and fate.

“that’s okay. not your fault.”

“but still. that must have been really hard.”

“i wanted to write back. i-” he stops, pulling out something from the pocket of his button-up shirt. he unfolds a piece of white notebook paper—and the breath you were holding leaves you quickly. that’s the paper you used to write him letters on.

“is that my last letter?” when andrew moves to look at you, he’s expecting it. a nervous lilt to your voice, fear in your eyes. like he’s crazy, like you’re scared.

instead he glances over hesitantly and you’re beaming up at him.

“you carry around.. my last letter?” the words come out as a smile forms on your face—pretty and genuine and sincere. you stare at him expectantly, and he doesn’t know how to respond.

“i…” the words falter. “i just wanted to ask you about it. did you, did you get that cat?”

“i did!” it comes out louder than you meant it, drawing the attention of some other nurses around you. you turn briefly, using your free hand to push the curtain so it’s closed around you two. “sorry. i did, yes. he’s so cute. i don’t have my phone or i’d show you the pictures-”

“that’s okay. you-you can show me later.”

“but i didn’t say i was getting a cat in that one. i just said i was thinking about it,” you feel breathless.

“but there was another one before that. you mentioned it then too. i figured you’d get it since you were thinking about it so much.”

“yeah. yeah, exactly.” your brain can’t seem to compute what’s going on. any fear that had been in you, if there was any of it to begin with, has completely melted away, replaced with a warm, glowing feeling in your chest, slowly spreading out to your limbs.

you had been thinking about getting a cat for ages—a thought you had mentioned to andrew maybe twice. and your justification had been just as andrew said, because you were thinking about it so much.

how did he know that?

and then the curtain opens behind you, and the doctor comes in to stitch up andrew’s hand. you have to pull away from his hand and andrew thinks you’re leaving, eyes following you and his expression shifting, but you don’t leave. you go to the cabinets to pull the supplies and help the doctor and and keep your eyes focused on the wound while his hand gets stitched up. eight stitches and not a single wince of pain or discomfort.

and though the thought makes butterflies emerge and fly around your stomach, when you finally look up at andrew, he’s been staring at you the entire time.

+

you have a tiny apartment in a shitty neighbourhood. it doesn’t feel safe at all, save for the fact that one of the houses down the street is owned by a rookie cop and his wife. there’s not that much crime, but the area inherently feels bad.

maybe it’s just that way to him—since he doesn’t want you living in a place like this.

it’s fine for now though. he’ll get you a better place soon enough. it’s by the water, and when he closes his eyes, he can hear the waves crashing on the sand. the sound alone might be enough to justify why you’d live here.

he keeps his eyes shut, just for a half dozen heartbeats, when he pulls up against your curb. he just wants to hear it before he says goodbye—it’s getting late, almost dark, and you must be exhausted. you’ve been at work all day and though you act like you’re completely fine, he knows how intense it is. there’s other letters, safely stored away, where you told him about how breaks are far and few in between, how you barely get time to drink water and eat a snack because of how busy it gets. he offered to stop and pick you up something to eat but you refused, saying you had food at home that you shouldn’t waste.

you sit in the passenger seat of his truck, staring around it as if you’re looking for some more information about it. anything would help you—half-empty drinks or gum wrappers or extra clothes in the backseat, but there’s nothing. the truck looks like he just got it yesterday, no sign of use or anything branding it as andrew’s car.

“can i walk you to your door?” you snap out of your thoughts.

okay—maybe it wasn’t the smartest idea in the world to let a virtual stranger drive you home. but when his hand was taken care of and you give him the paper instructions with way too many sample packets of antibiotic gel, all he said was that he’ll wait for you.

“wait for what?”

“to make sure you get home safely.”

and, really, what are you supposed to say to that? no, i’m good, thanks. you’d be even stupider than you already are to say that to someone who is just trying to be nice to you.

(he’s more chivalrous than any guy you’ve ever talked to, and probably more than any guy your friends have ever complained to you about. and more than that, it’d be rude to say no, especially once he realized you wait for a shoddy-at-best bus to get you home because you don’t have a car and it’s too dark to walk. he wouldn’t take no for an answer after that.)

and more than that—he waited another two hours for you to get home. every time you’d step out to bring back another patient, you’d see him, sitting there, waiting patiently for you. glancing up when the door would open to get a glimpse of you, of the small smile you shot his way before taking back whoever’s turn it was.

and he’s not a real stranger, a voice in the back of your head keeps reminding you. you’ve known him for longer than some of your coworkers have known their fiancees and husbands. and in all the time you’ve known him (meaning all the letters you’ve sent and received), you’ve never gotten a creepy word or even a fragment of a sentence that frightened you.

so you think the least you can do is let him drive you home and walk you up the two flights of stairs.

“of course. thank you, for-” your sentence gets interrupted. andrew gets out of the car and you turn to do the same, but then you see him—walking around the front of his truck, coming to your side and then opening the door for you.

oh.

your heart thuds dully in your chest at the very idea of andrew opening his car’s door for you to get out. after driving you home and politely asking to walk you up. whatever inhibitions you had melt away and you briefly think that whatever he asked of you, you’d do it in a heartbeat, no questions asked.

if that made you stupid, then so be it. you’d gladly be the stupidest girl on the planet if you get to feel whatever it was that andrew cody has made you feel for the last couple of hours.

his truck is jacked up tall, and he gives you his hand, the one without the cut, to help you get down, and you accept. he closes the door for you and lets you lead the way up the stairs.

silently, you two walk up the creaky steps together. hands brush together for all of seconds and he briefly wishes seconds lasted longer, until you’re standing in front of your door.

you’d once had a cute spring-themed wreath on the door, bought on clearance from the local store after easter, and a matching door mat. your elderly neighbor had told you to get rid of it because it was basically an invitation to criminals that a young girl lived here alone. you’re stupid, but not that stupid.

and now your front door looks barren and empty. there’s a few plants you can see from the window sill but the curtains are drawn and there’s an extra dead bolt a fellow nurse from the hospital’s husband had helped you install.

you look up silently at andrew and he looks back at you. this is it—it’s supposed to be goodbye. any normal girl would know that this is where the night needs to end, that you need to process what all of this means and if you had any friends you trusted with this information, calling them and asking what to do.

but you don’t want to call your friends, because you know what they’d say—to lock your door and get a restraining order and burn andrew’s letters, the ones you kept in a cute box under your bed and reread much too often for anyone’s comfort.

and you’re not a normal girl.

“do you want to stay for dinner?”

there’s not much to study on andrew’s expression—he keeps it stern and serious for the most part. his eyes are soft when they look at you and they soften even further when you say those words.

“yes. yes, thank you.”

you think maybe he wasn’t expecting it. you think that you weren’t expecting it either, not exactly sure where the words had come from. but you still lead andrew inside, showing him the only slightly comfortable couch you had to get delivered since you didn’t have anyone to help you lug a used one up the stairs. the squeaky door that leads to the bathroom, the tiny space you called your kitchen. your bedroom is behind a closed door and andrew stares at it when you go inside to change out of your scrubs and come back out in the kind of clothes that you sleep in.

and then he stares at the shut door even after you leave, before realizing that you’ve already made your way to the space between the living room and kitchen, a narrow expanse with a small round table and some placemats with flowers on them. you set down your backpack and take your hair out of the clip that holds it back for you at work and suddenly, he’s staring again.

it’s just a little too close to everything he’s been dreaming about for years.

“i’m really sorry. i was supposed to go grocery shopping but i hate bringing everything up-”

“don’t apologize.”

“also, i’m-i’m not really a good cook. i’m sorry-”

“i don’t think anything you make can be worse than prison food.”

“i really doubt that. you’ve never had my cooking.”

you glance back him and he meets your eyes at the same time, and you both start laughing. it’s nothing crazy—andrew didn’t seem like the kind who laughs easily anyway, but he cracks a smile and the noise is indelible—all you can think of is how you can get him to laugh again.

“do you like spaghetti?”

+

if someone had told you yesterday that this time tomorrow, andrew from your letters would be sitting across from you at your dining table, eating spaghetti that you made while rushing, looking so in place in your tiny home that your heart hurts, you think you would have passed out.

you watch him while he eats, absentmindedly swirling your own noodles on the plate, unable to focus on eating when he’s really in front of you. after countless dreams and days spent wondering what had happened to him and if he was okay and if he ever thought about you. he’s… bigger than you thought he would be. shoulders broader than you had realized from that tiny video. his mannerisms interest you more than they should—how quiet he is, but how he seems to latch onto every word when you go on and on. just like the letters, it seems he’s still a listener.

(it doesn’t help matters when he tries to clear the table and wash the dishes after—you have to wrestle the plates out of his hand and tell him to go sit down, that he can’t get his bandage wet. jostling against his iron-hard body was not on the list of things you thought you’d get to do today, and the very realization that andrew is twice as strong as you on his worst day does…things to you. things that do not need to be named or explored right now. he’s still a stranger, you try to remind yourself. no he’s not.)

but it seems that he can’t sit still. he wipes down the counter and then comes back to help you dry your yellow dishes and when you both finish up, with you still smiling at him and unsure of what excuse you can conjure to get him to stay, he finds it all by himself. you tell andrew to go sit on the couch while you finish up and he does, and when you follow him out there, he’s standing in front of it. he turns his head to look at you and then back at the couch.

your cat is perched on his usual spot, and you go over to him, scratching the top of his head between his ears and making extremely childish, stupid-sounding noises at him.

“andrew this is wardy,” you say, picking him up and bringing him closer. “he’s really friendly. i promise.”

“hello, wardy.” when he says it, you look up at him with a look he can’t find words to describe. as close to love as you can get it when it’s a technically a stranger. the way he greets your cat and helps you clean and knows more about you than some of your friends and coworkers do.

there’s no words for it. it just is.

so you sit on the couch next to andrew, your cat between the two of you, and you wait for him to tell you that he wants to leave. you flick on the television, settling for whatever silly romance movie is playing on your netflix account, sitting in the almost-silence with andrew and wondering why still, it doesn’t feel necessarily uncomfortable.

eventually andrew reaches out to pet wardy, and he curls up into his touch, settling comfortably against his forearm. (his huge, thick, veiny forearm, you think briefly, before chasing the thought away with a broom. and then another one—no wonder he had bled so much at the hospital. with veins like these.)

“this area’s not the best,” andrew says, speaking as though you need to be reminded of it, to know that he doesn’t approve.

“i know. but it’s cheap and it’s near the beach.”

“but you live alone. it’s dangerous.”

“but-” you glance over at him. he takes up most of your couch, wardy’s head resting against his thigh now, while he continues petting him. he looks over at you and it’s clear—this isn’t an argument. “you’re right. but i mean, how bad can it be? if you’re here now?”

you pause. stupidly, you’ve just revealed whatever thoughts have been rattling around in your head. like the fact that you’re assuming he’s going to be here more often, when the truth is that you have no idea if that’s true.

why would it be true? you tried, in earnest, to make sure your life never seemed anything more than it really was in your letters. but andrew drives a brand new truck and wears an expensive watch and you have absolutely no idea what he was robbing or why he was doing it—and you never asked. the assumption that just because he found you, meant that he was going to keep you was completely insane. a misgiving on your part, because surely, whatever’s waiting for him back home is better than your crappy cooking and a tiny apartment and a cat that you—

“sorry, i’m sorry. that’s such a jump. we just met. i’m so sorry, i can-” you stand up, and so does andrew.

“why are you apologizing?”

“because i just.. i don’t know.” you try to pace around your apartment but you only get a few steps away before you have to come back. “this is crazy. we’re both crazy.”

you feel it in the air before you hear him say it. it gets tenser, quieter, more serious. like what you’ve both been dreading for the last few hours is about to happen.

“do…do you want me to leave?” you turn to face him quickly.

“no! no, i don’t. that’s why this is crazy. people are going to think we’re insane. i don’t want you to go. i want you stay. i want you to tell me everything i missed in the last year and a half. i want to know what you did with my letters. i want to know-”

and when andrew reaches forward to grab your forearm—gently, not meant to hurt you—you freeze in your tracks. staring up at him, all the words in your brain, every stupid thing your friends ever told you about this make-shift relationship you had concocted in your head melting away.

“i want that too.”

“oh. well, i just thought-”

and this time, he doesn’t let you finish, leaning in for a kiss that makes your knees give out. andrew’s mouth—wet and hot and on fire—kisses you like you two were made for each other.

as cheesy as the thought feels, you swallow it and wrap your arms around his neck. it’s every stupid romance movie you’ve ever seen coming to life, your life. all because of him. he doesn’t break the kiss, not even to breathe. you feel his tongue poke into your mouth and you accept it gladly. you fall back on the couch and the movement of it makes wardy scamper off, and you move your head just for a second to see where he runs off too, but andrew doesn’t stop. he lines kisses along your cheek and your jaw until you turn back and he gets your lips again.

you feel his weight on top of you, and briefly, you wonder if you should tell him.

countless nights spent wondering what this would feel like, how he would kiss you, all the things he would do to you. you have to keep reminding yourself, you’re just a stupid girl—it’s not your fault that a few nice letters was enough to make you head over heels for the last few years.

because somewhere deep down inside, you knew. you knew that it would be like this, that it would be perfect, that it would be everything you wanted. that he would take care of you and want you as badly as you want him. your crown title of hopeless romantic had finally paid off.

another thought stirs as he keeps kissing you. it’s feverish and hot and makes you warm all over—how long it’s been since he’s had someone, how he kisses you like he’s out of practice. his mouth is so hard against yours it almost hurts, but you welcome the pain. it’s like he’s proving to you that he’s really there now, that nothing can tear him away from you.

but then he does pull away. you catch your breath, hands traveling to his face and running your fingers through his hair. andrew’s pretty eyes close and you cherish it—that you made him feel like that. he leans into your touch, head resting against your hand while you both take long, heavy breaths.

andrew leans in, pressing your foreheads together.

“i-i’ve wanted to do that,” another breath. you feel butterflies continuously emerge and flutter around your chest and your stomach, all the way down to between your legs. “since your first letter.”

and then you can’t resist—leaning back in for another hard, wet kiss. you feel him shift, strong hands on your hips, but staying firmly there, not traveling despite how much you wish they would. he’s been polite again, you think. waiting for you to give him permission.

“you can-” you start, but andrew keeps pressing kisses against your neck that make it hard to finish your sentence. “you can touch me.” you expect his hands to spread—grope and grab and tease until you’re begging for more. for him to be impatient and hungry and not stop until he’s inside of you.

“i can’t believe you’re real,” he says quietly, one hand moving up to your waist and touching the soft skin there gently. he traces up your arms and then down before intertwining his fingers with yours. you stare up at him, stupid as ever. every time you think you know anything about andrew, he proves you wrong.

“i can’t believe you are, either,” you say, tilting your head up for another kiss. a short, chaste one this time. “you’re just as nice as i knew you’d be.”

“you think i’m nice?” he asks, voice low. you nod in response, words escaping you. you settle to answer with another kiss, hands going to his shoulders to steady yourself, tugging and pulling on his bottom lip with your teeth.

you push up until he understands, and he uses two huge hands to get you into his lap, sitting up with his back against your couch. you straddle him, trying your hardest to not lose your train of thought as you realize how hard he is against you.

“i think you’re too nice,” you tease, unsure where you’re finding the confidence. under you, andrew looks spacey and flushed and all kissed out, but you don’t plan to stop. you lean in to press kisses to his cheeks and work your way to his jaw and neck. when you stop to look at him again, he looks hopelessly up at you, and you think he’s waiting again, waiting for permission to do something. “i think you’re so nice that you’re not telling me everything you’ve wanted to do to me these last few years.”

the way andrew looks up at you after you said that—god. you wish you could engrain it into your memory. you’re not someone who does this often, but you might just be good at figuring out how to get andrew to crack. he looks up with some of the hunger you’d imagined there’d be, and it makes something stir inside of you.

it feels strange to be wanted the way andrew wants you right now. you’re just not used to it, not entirely sure that you’d ever feel this way. that someone would ever make you feel this way.

your thoughts are wiped again when he pulls you into another kiss, and you deepen it, moaning into his mouth. you’re being so loud that your older neighbor might be able to hear you, but you can hardly bring yourself to care right now. andrew is quiet, like you thought he would be, but each soft grunt and heavy sigh is enough to make your entire body tingle.

you think you’re being better at staying quiet yourself when andrew scoops you up into his arms, carrying you like it’s nothing for him. you yelp loudly, forgetting everything for a second, realizing how lovely it feels to be carried by him. he leads you two to your bedroom, setting you down gently on the bed.

you stare at him, hovering above you, wondering how you’ll get to do this. how you’ll get his clothes off and watch out for his hurt hand and that you’ll finally get to feel him inside of you—when he just stops moving.

andrew looks up and around your bedroom, craning his neck to take in all of it. you’re not sure why, stuck in a position under him that forces you to just watch.

“is everything okay, andrew?” when you say his name, he turns back to stare down at you.

“yes. yes, it is. it’s just-” he pauses, looking back up and then down. the room is decorated with lots of pretty frames. there’s yellow curtains on the windows and your sheets are yellow under you too, just like he’d suspected. seeing it in real life almost sends him back to years ago—the first time he’d wondered what your bedroom looks like. the place from where you write your letters, the place you read them. “it looks just like i thought it would.”

and just like every other part of tonight, your reaction continues to surprise him. you smile and then laugh, holding onto his shoulder even tighter.

“spend a lot of time thinking about my bedroom, huh?” you tease, and he remains just as confused as ever.

you are such a conundrum. andrew thinks that he wants you so badly he can’t form a proper thought—and then the thoughts merge and blend and anger at the very idea that you’re so trusting of him. you should be more careful. you shouldn’t trust anyone how much you’re trusting him right now—inviting him inside your home, letting him into your bedroom.

and then you pull him down for another kiss and it all washes away like letters in the sand.

eventually he does pull away—though it takes an enormous amount of self control. the words you said on the couch haven’t completely left him yet and he still needs to answer you. you claw and pull at his shirt so he lets you take it off of him, you trace a hand down his chest, stopping at his heart and pressing your palm flat against him.

you’re staring, he thinks, but you’re really just admiring. taking in every detail, every scar and bruise so you can ask him about it later, moving your fingers down his abs and biting your lip while you stare daggers at his chest.

he moves away from your touch though, as sad as it makes you.

“you wanted to know everything i’ve thought about you?” andrew says, and the words make you tense up—thighs clenching, walls fluttering just from words alone. your fingers tighten around his bicep where you’ve been holding on, and you nod up at him dumbly. “can i show you?”

your head falls back onto your pillow with a thud. you nod again.

you let andrew set the pace—he peels off your clothes and you lift your hips and raise your arms in compliance. he starts with a kiss to your stomach that makes you whine, fingers leaving his skin and grabbing onto your sheets instead just to have something to hold on to.

you’re embarrassingly wet—you already know you are. it’s almost painful how badly you want him, even against better judgement that tells you that you could have, at the very least, taken things slowly.

you guess andrew just brings it out of you.

his kisses move south and you brace yourself, every muscle tensing up in anticipation. andrew is silent except for his deep breaths and somehow, with each one deeper than the last, they make your entire body shudder in anticipation. when he finally gets to your leaking cunt, you hear it. a strangled moan, sounding painful and from the depth of his chest and filled with want and need. just from looking at you. you can’t imagine what he’ll sound like when—

“this is what i thought about. this is always what i thought about.”

and then andrew licks down the length of your cunt with the flat of his tongue, and you can’t think about anything else anymore. he’s relentless, exploring you with his mouth like he’s a man starved. you can hear the noises, obscene and sloppy and wet as they are.

and then you feel it—his mouth around your clit while one finger prods at your tight opening. your back rises off the bed but he holds you down with one huge hand over your stomach. his finger slips inside you more easily than he thought it would. though you’re wetter than he imagined, he doesn’t stop teasing your clit.

your wetness coats everything—his tongue, his lips, his chin. your thighs are wet too, and he’s sure he can get your yellow sheets soaked too if he could tease you long enough. but he’s been incredibly patient all these years, unsure if he can wait any longer to get what he’s wanted.

his hand keeps you pinned down while his mouth stays on your clit and then andrew adds another finger and you thrash up against him. it’s useless against the weight of his hand holding you down, but your body moves anyways, hands wrangling into his brown curls, likely making a complete mess of them. you keep pulling and he moans between your legs and the vibration makes you thrash harder, a completely exhilarating cycle.

when he finally releases you from his grip, you think the other hand will explore up and down your body, but true to form, you’re wrong. andrew finds your hand and holds onto it, lacing your fingers with his while he keeps going.

when adds a third finger, you realize that he’s saying something against you. you can’t quite make it out with your heart thudding in your ears and how loud you’re being, but then it becomes a little clearer—

“you taste even better than i thought you would-” and you can’t stop it, the tension in your stomach winding tighter and tighter before it snaps altogether. a white hot heat washes through your body and makes you shake even harder, but andrew’s hold on you keeps you completely grounded. he works you through it, not stopping even once, not until you’re trying your hardest to pull away from him. you try to catch your breath but it’s useless. your head feels completely empty.

incoherent, you grab at andrew, murmuring something about inside, please, and he really tries to stay level headed. but one glance at your naked, writhing body and your expression while you beg for him is enough to tip him over the edge.

resisting you requires a level of self control that he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to have.

andrew doesn’t think he’s ever had any self control when it comes to you. it’s why he did this, isn’t it? showed up at your hospital with your sweet letter folded up and somehow convinced you, without saying much of anything at all, to trust him and let him back into your life. he doesn’t even know how he did it—he can’t recall most of what he said to you. it plays in his head like a movie, like how your letters used to.

he doesn’t know what he did to deserve your trust, just knows that he’ll do whatever he has to in order to keep it forever.

andrew’s thoughts about keeping you cloud him while he lifts up your legs, manhandling your body while you squeal under him. he pushes your knees to your chest and lets your legs hang in the air while he hovers over you. all he can think about is getting inside of you—-giving you exactly what you’ve been begging for, fulfilling every fantasy he’s had about you in the last three years. the noises you’ll make. how tight and wet and warm you’ll feel around him. how you’ll look with his cum dripping out of-

“andrew, please, please,” you plead, and he’s not sure that you understand exactly what you’re asking for. it’s good that it’s him you picked for those letters, good that he’s the one who tracked you down.

someone else, well, he thinks, lining himself up with your soaking wet entrance, someone else might have had bad intentions with you. not andrew, though.

his intentions for you are only good. intentions to keep you happy and safe and move you away from this tiny apartment and make sure you get the job that you want, no matter who he has to threaten in order to do so. intentions to keep everything taken care of so the only thing you ever have to worry about again is him, just like you’d done for all those years when you wrote to him.

and as he slips inside, he knows those letters are in this bedroom somewhere, that this bed is where you read them, that these were the pretty hands that held his letters and these were the pretty eyes that read them.

you stare at him while he hovers over you, not pushing in just yet. andrew’s dick is just like the rest of him—thick and broad and so wide that you don’t know how you’ll be able to walk tomorrow. there’s veins too, just like his arms, and it’s all you can think about with him enclosed over you.

when he pushes his thick head past your fluttering walls, you make a noise like nothing he’s ever heard before. pure want and heat wrapped up with pleasure and pain. you keep begging for more but he’s not sure you can even handle it—but who is andrew to deny you?

he pushes further inside of you, now half way, and you cry out. andrew leans in to kiss you again, swallowing the noise and letting you moan against his lips.

another thrust and he’s almost all the way in. he pulls out and pushes back in, and then he starts his rhythm. your tits bounce with every thrust and he watches entranced, until his eyes go back to where you and him meet. in this position, on his knees with you folded underneath him, he can see it perfectly.

it’s enough to make him finish instantly. you look completely fucked out under him, crying out with each push of his hips.

your open your wet eyes and glance up at him. through wet lashes and blinking eyes, you get out a few words, stopped by each thrust.

“is it-” you gasp, words getting caught in your throat because andrew is so deep inside of you that you can feel him in your stomach and your chest. “is it what you imagined, andrew?”

“god, yes,” he says, and the sound is so perfect to you. it comes out broken, in the form of a gasp and a moan combined, and you want to hear it again and again. he says your name like it’s a prayer grounding him to you and you keep your arms wrapped around his neck, holding him close to you and bringing him in for another kiss. you can feel andrew’s pace start to stutter, his moans getting louder and his grip on you getting tighter. you hold his face in your hands, locking eyes again.

“inside, andrew, please, i want it inside, please, please,” and again, andrew thinks to himself, like some besotted fool, who is he to deny you? he releases whatever inhibitions he had left and fills you up with his cum—rivulets almost never ending. it leaks out around his dick, messing up your sheets and staining your thighs and making a mess of everything. he hears your heavy breaths and looks to see you smiling sweetly up at him.

and then he collapses next to you.

“hi andrew,” you say quietly next to him. your hands go to his, playing with his fingers and running the pad of your thumb over the veins on his hand. “was it how you thought it’d be?”

“it was better,” he says, breathless. you giggle and lean in to press a kiss to his cheek—and for a moment, he forgets everything. the circumstances of your introduction and the way he’d discovered you long forgotten for a few heartbeats. just you and the sound of your laugh and the promise of the future he wants with you before him.

“there’s still some things i thought about that we didn’t get to yet,” you tease, and he wonders, briefly, what he’s going to do with you.

and then you two hear it—scratching at your closed bedroom door.

“oh god,” you say, sitting up in bed.

you groan a little since your thighs are sore and it’s a wet, sticky mess between them. andrew keeps his hand on your arm and helps you sit up, and joins you in the position, like he’s preparing to help if you need something.

“warden, stop,” you say, but he doesn’t listen. you turn to andrew. “i’m gonna get him.” you try to move your legs and put weight on them, but you feel your knees buckle immediately, with andrew rushing to your side to help you back into bed.

“oh my god. you broke me.”

“i’ll get him. just-just sit down.”

andrew opens the door and picks up your cat like it’s second nature, bringing him to you on the bed before getting in right beside you. your cat is sweet but there’s not many people over at your apartment, and you worry for a moment that he won’t be nice to andrew when he wants your attention. but wardy doesn’t move from his position, staying curled up again andrew’s chest and arm, completely at ease.

“he likes you. that makes sense,” you say, smiling up at him, leaning in to pet wardy’s head.

but andrew doesn’t understand.

“warden. i thought you said his name was wardy?”

“that’s just a nickname.”

“why warden?”

“oh well. it’s silly, um-”

“tell me.”

“well, uh. well, warden is just the letters in andrew. uh, rearranged.”

“oh.”

“i’m sorry. i’m so sorry, is that creepy? i was really projecting, i guess, when i got him. i just loved your letters so much and i’ve never had a boyfriend or anything like that-”

“do you think we should get married?”

thanks for reading! ♡

[honey-moon-13]

baby boy, honeybee ⋆˚࿔

pairing: Boyfriend!Pope Cody x fem!Reader summary: Pope spends the day at the mall with his girlfriend, buying everything they need to turn the little beach house he bought in secret into a home of their own.  a/n: No one can convince me that Pope wouldn’t be the best husband and father in the world. warnings: (secret) established relationship, clingy!Reader, mentions of a blowjob and swallowing cum, reader touches Pope over his jeans in public once, references to murder and Smurf’s abuse, Baz hate (fuck him), past controlling relationship, anxiety and self-loathing, Pope scares a Sephora employee, these two are so sweet they’ll give you cavities!!! wc: 7962 k

I’d love to know what you thought, so please don’t be shy and leave me a little comment. Hearing from you truly means so much to me .⋆❀°

By the time you left Zara Home, Pope had six bags hanging from his hands and the receipt folded into the pocket of his jeans. You had offered to carry something twice. Both times he had moved the bags before you could reach them, so now you walked with your arm linked through his, pressed comfortably against his side while he checked the list you had written together that morning.

“Sheets, towels, bath mat,” he read, dragging his thumb down the paper while the shopping bags rustled around his wrists. “We got everything.”

You leaned closer to look at the list, although you already knew exactly what was written on it. “We got more than everything. We have four sets of sheets because somebody decided two wasn’t enough.”

“One’ll be in the wash.” Pope tapped the folded edge of the paper against his palm, as though that settled the matter.

“We only have one bed, baby.”

“Yeah, and we’re gonna use it every night.”

He folded the list before he could see what that answer did to your face and tucked it into the pocket of his jeans. You tightened your arm around his and kissed his shoulder.

“You liked choosing them,” you said, staying tucked against his side when he began walking again.

Pope shifted the bags higher on his hands. “They’re good sheets.”

“But you checked the stitching on every set.” You ran one finger along the seam of his sleeve, imitating the way he had examined the fabric inside the store.

“Because one of them was coming apart.”

“And then you spent ten minutes touching towels.”

“I wanted the soft ones.”

You slowed, making him stop with you. “For me?”

“For us.”

The answer came easily. There was none of the hesitation that usually appeared when Pope had to talk about something belonging to both of you, no brief tightening of his mouth while he decided whether he was allowed to claim it too. He simply looked at you as though us had been the obvious answer.

Your smile softened. You stepped in front of him and slid your arms around his waist, catching him by surprise. Pope hurriedly gathered the handles into one hand and lifted the bags away from your body before they could knock against you.

“What’re you doing?” he asked, looking down at your face.

“Hugging my boyfriend because he spent ten minutes choosing the softest towels in the store.”

“They had to be soft, sweetheart.” His newly freed hand hovered beside you for a moment before settling against your back.

You leaned away just enough to see him properly, leaving your arms around his waist. “That so?”

His brow furrowed slightly, as if he did not understand why you needed an explanation.

“You use all those oils and creams every night to keep your skin soft,” he said. “Wasn’t gonna buy towels that’d scratch you up.”

Your arms tightened around him. “You thought about that?”

“Yeah.” His hand moved once along your back. “Course I did.”

“You’re soooo sweet.”

“They’re just towels, baby.” Pope glanced past you, discomfort creeping into his face now that you were looking at him as though he had done something extraordinary.

“No.” You rose onto your toes, your arms slipping higher around him. “They’re our towels.”

Pope bent to meet you. His hand pressed more securely against your lower back as his mouth softened beneath yours, holding you close while the bags swayed forgotten beside his leg.

“Yeah,” he said when you pulled away. His eyes remained on yours, his thumb moving slowly over your back. “They are.”

The mall had grown busier while you were inside, pop music spilled from the open stores and people kept cutting across your path without looking. Pope’s shoulders tensed, his hand settling more firmly against you to keep you close. When you slowed in front of another window, however, he stopped beside you and followed your gaze, content to wait while you looked.

“We need to stop at Sephora,” you said, slipping your hand into his and steering him toward the entrance. “I’m out of my lip mask, I need a new blush, and there’s a lip balm I saw on TikTok that I want to try.”

Pope followed without resistance. “The little pink jar?”

“The berry one, yes.” You glanced up at him. “I’ve been scraping the sides for three nights.”

“Get two, then.” He said it immediately.

Your pace slowed. Pope took another step before the pull of your joined hands made him stop and look back at you.

“You like it.”

His eyes moved briefly to your mouth. “Tastes good.”

“Is that why you always kiss me right after I put it on?” You stepped closer, running your thumb across the back of his hand.

“I kiss you every night, baby.” Pope turned toward the store again, but you caught the slight tightening at the corner of his mouth before he could hide it.

You let him guide you forward for another few steps before leaning into his arm. “But you always kiss me twice when I’m wearing that.”

Pope did not answer, but you squeezed his hand as though you already had one. 

He had never told you what happened after those goodnight kisses, on the nights when sleep refused to come no matter how tired he was. He would lie beside you for hours with his body held rigid beneath the sheets, listening to the house settle around him while his mind returned to places he had spent the day trying to avoid. 

Every car slowing outside made him look toward the window. Every change in your breathing had him checking that you were still asleep, still safe, still there.

Some of the lip mask always transferred to his mouth when he kissed you, and hours later, when the rest of the sweetness should have disappeared, Pope could sometimes find a trace of it by running his tongue over his lower lip. 

He did not understand how something made for chapped lips could feel like a balm pressed over whatever bruised part of him people meant when they spoke about the soul. It gave him something gentle to concentrate on when his memories would not leave him alone. 

Like as long as he could still taste you, some small part of you seemed to remain awake with him, and the darkness became a little easier to endure.

“I’ll be quick,” you promised.

“You don’t have to be.” Pope adjusted the bags before brushing his thumb across your hand. “Take your time. Look at whatever you want. I’m not going anywhere.”

Your previous boyfriend had never allowed you that freedom. He claimed you only wore makeup to attract other men, forcing you to order everything online and hide the packages because even entering a store like this could start an argument. The excuse had never made sense to Pope. He could not understand seeing you happy and wanting to take it away. He loved watching you get ready and slowly became more comfortable in your own skin. Makeup did not make you more beautiful to him. He simply liked the way you smiled when you felt beautiful.

Your smile softened. You lifted his hand to kiss his knuckles before leading him inside. “Then you can help me find everything.”

Pope followed you inside. “That’s why I’m here, baby.”

Inside, you headed for the Laneige display while Pope stopped beside a Benefit stand. Several testers had been abandoned along the shelf, some without their caps and others returned to the wrong slots. By the time you came back, he had already matched two lip tints to their labels and was turning each tube so the name faced forward.

“Found them.” You held up the two jars of Laneige Berry Lip Sleeping Mask before placing them in the basket. “One for the bathroom and one for my nightstand.”

Pope glanced down to make sure they were both there. “Good.”

His attention had already returned to the Benefit stand beside him. Several testers were lying on their sides, some missing their caps and others pushed into the wrong slots. Pope had matched three of them to their labels while you were gone and was turning each tube until its name faced forward.

You kissed his cheek, smiling when he barely paused in what he was doing. “How much of this have you reorganized?”

“A couple of them… They have numbers, see?” Pope showed you the small label on the tester in his hand, then pointed to the empty space bearing the same one. His brow drew together as though the system should have been impossible to misunderstand. “People just don’t put them back right.”

You picked up a lip tint that had been abandoned on its side and held it over the first empty slot you saw. “Does this one go here?”

“No.” Pope’s eyes moved along the row. “Two over.”

You shifted it one space. “Here?”

He reached across you and moved the tube one place farther to the right. “There.”

You watched him turn it until the label matched the others. Pope did things like this almost without realizing: straightening bottles while he waited in line, returning something to the exact place he had found it, wiping down a counter even when the mess was not his. You knew the impulse did not always feel gentle to him. You had seen how something left crooked could hold his attention until he corrected it, how disorder seemed to settle beneath his skin and make it impossible for him to relax.

That was not the part you loved, you loved what Pope did with it. 

Even here, in a store full of strangers who would never know he had helped, he replaced caps and returned testers to their proper slots because somebody had arranged the display and somebody would have to fix it after closing. Pope noticed that labor. He respected clean spaces, organized shelves and the people responsible for maintaining them. He would never make another person’s job harder simply because he could walk away before they saw him do it.

People often mistook his silence for indifference but you had learned that Pope cared about far more than he knew how to say.

You rested your head briefly against his shoulder while he fastened the cap on another tester. “What would this store do without you?”

“Throw everything wherever they want, apparently.” He returned the tube to its numbered space and reached for the next one lying out of place.

He fastened one last cap before taking the basket from you. When you moved toward the next aisle, Pope gathered the shopping bags and followed with his free hand resting against your back.

You stopped in front of the Summer Fridays display.

“These are the balms everyone keeps talking about on TikTok.” You picked up one of the tubes and turned it around to show Pope the label.

He studied the display before looking at the tester in your hand. “What’s different about them?”

“Mostly the scents, apparently.” You returned the tube to its slot and reached for another. “They’re not supposed to be quite as good as my olehenriksen ones.”

Pope’s brow furrowed. He glanced from the rows of Summer Fridays balms to your face, already imagining you opening one at home only to discover that it did not live up to all the videos you had watched.

“If they’re not as good, you sure you wanna risk getting one?”

The concern in his voice made you smile. 

Pope hated watching you look forward to something only to be disappointed by it. It did not matter whether it was a plan being cancelled or a bakery running out of the cake you wanted. He would remember the change in your expression long after you had forgotten about it, quietly resenting whatever had caused it as if it had let him down too.

“I think I’ll survive the risk,” you assured him, smoothing one hand over his chest when his frown remained. “Everyone says these smell much better. And considering how often you kiss me, I thought you might appreciate that.”

Pope’s attention followed your fingers before settling on your mouth. “The other ones make your lips shiny.”

“Juicy,” you corrected.

His eyes remained on your lower lip. “Same thing.”

“It is absolutely not the same thing.” You stepped closer, smiling when his gaze followed the movement of your mouth. “But you agree they make my lips look juicy?”

“Yeah.” Pope shifted the basket to his other hand, his voice lower than it had been a moment ago.

“How juicy?”

His eyes moved slowly across your lips before lifting to yours. “You know.”

“I’d still like to hear you say it, baby.” Your finger caught briefly on one of the buttons of his shirt, waiting.

Pope held your gaze for another second, then reached past you for one of the testers. He turned it over in his hand with more concentration than the label required, ending the conversation before the heat rising into his face became any more obvious.

“Which one are you getting?”

“I thought we could choose one each.” You leaned your hip against the display and watched his fingers work the cap loose. “I’ll choose the one I like, and you can choose one you want me to wear only when I’m with you.”

His fingers went still around the tester. When he looked at you again, the caution had disappeared from his face.

“Only with me?”

“Yes.” You stepped closer and lowered your voice, although nobody nearby was paying attention. “One balm for whenever I feel like wearing it and another that belongs to you. Something I put on because I know you’ll be the one tasting it.”

Pope’s eyes returned immediately to the balms. This time he studied them with real interest, taking in every shade and label as though the display had changed while he was looking away.

“So I get to pick whichever one I want?”

“Whichever one you want.”

He looked back at you, making sure. “And you’ll only wear it with me?”

“That’s the idea.”

Pope set the basket down beside the shopping bags, freeing both hands for the decision. 

“What if I choose one you wouldn’t pick for yourself?”

“I’ll like knowing you chose it.” Nudging him toward the beginning of the display. “Besides, you know me. You’ll pick the right one.”

Pope glanced along the entire row again. The corner of his mouth lifted before he could suppress it.

You had already chosen Pink Guava before entering the store. It was the shade that had appeared in the TikTok saved on your phone, and the sheer pink stain it left across the back of your hand only confirmed that it would be coming home with you.

“This one’s mine.” You dropped an unopened tube into the basket and held out your hand for Pope to inspect. “What do you think?”

“Looks good.” He looked at the color, then at your mouth as though trying to imagine it there. “You already knew which one you wanted.”

“I did.” You stepped aside and gestured toward the rest of the display. “Now you get to choose yours.”

He read every shade name before opening its tester, taking the responsibility far more seriously than you had expected. Vanilla barely held his attention. Pink Sugar made his nose wrinkle, and he returned Iced Coffee after one careful breath.

Then he opened Cherry.

The scent was sweeter and stronger than the others. When you held out your hand, Pope drew the tester across your skin, leaving a sheer red stain beside the Pink Guava swatch. His thumb remained beneath your wrist after he finished.

He stared at the color, his mind went to your mouth first.

Pope pictured the Cherry balm leaving a faint red print on his cheek, another beneath his ear and several more down his chest as you worked your way lower. You would take your time because you knew what tenderness did to him—how quiet he became when you touched him as though there were nowhere else you would rather be.

Then you would kneel between his spread thighs.

Your glossy lips would press to the head of his cock, leaving a soft red mark against the flushed skin. You would look up before kissing him again, lower this time, your tongue following the slow drag of your mouth while one hand wrapped around the base.

Pope could already feel the restraint it would take not to push into you. He would let you set the pace, watching the neat prints blur as you worked your way back to the tip and took him between your lips.

His fingers would slip into your hair. He never knew how to let you touch him without reaching for you in return. He would cradle the back of your head, thumb moving beside your ear as your cheeks hollowed around him. When he reached deeper, a small sound would catch in your throat and your eyes would begin to water, but they would remain fixed on his.

Even in the filthiest version of the fantasy, having his cock in your mouth would be another way of loving him. There would be no disgust in your expression and no hesitation when saliva gathered at the corners of your lips. Only your warm hand stroking what you could not take, your tongue beneath the head and those soft eyes watching every piece of control leave him.

He would come with your name caught somewhere behind his teeth, his hand tightening in your hair as his cum spilled across your tongue. You would keep him in your mouth until the final pulse passed, then draw back and look up at him.

Pope would forget how to breathe when you opened your mouth.

You would show him the mess he had left there, white against your tongue and the fading Cherry tint around your swollen lips. Then, without looking away, you would close your mouth and swallow. His eyes would follow the movement of your throat, transfixed by the knowledge that something of him had disappeared inside you because you had wanted it there.

By the time you smiled, the color would have faded from your mouth.

Pope would pull you up before you could wipe your chin. He would hold your face between both hands and kiss you deeply, tasting Cherry and himself on your tongue. You would make that quiet, pleased sound he loved and settle into his lap with your arms around his shoulders, understanding that he needed the closeness as much as the release.

The thought made him hard inside his jeans.

He had spent most of his life believing there was dirt beneath his skin. He could wash the blood from his hands, burn the clothes he wore during jobs and stand beneath the shower until the water ran cold, but the feeling remained. Smurf had used his body to frighten and hurt people for so long that Pope sometimes struggled to remember it could be good for anything else.

Then you touched him and somehow, Pope had never felt cleaner.

You kissed every scar without asking where it came from. You held his face while he moved inside you and looked at him as though the pleasure he gave you mattered.Your hands made his body feel like it belonged to him again. It could give you pleasure. It could hold you without hurting you. It could make you reach for him instead of recoil.

Pope sometimes wondered whether this was the relief people felt after confession. 

They entered carrying everything ugly they had done, spoke it aloud and left feeling lighter because someone had heard the truth without turning them away. Sex with you felt like that. You saw how desperate he could become, how badly he needed you and how little control he sometimes had left by the end. Then you pulled him against your chest and kissed him as if he had confessed nothing shameful at all.

“You really like that one, baby.”

Your voice dragged Pope back into the middle of Sephora. He realized he was still holding the Cherry tester, his fingers clenched around the tube.

“It’s good,” he said, but his voice came out rougher than he intended.

You studied him. The color had spread beyond his ears now, warming his cheeks and continuing down the side of his neck. When you stepped closer, Pope avoided your eyes and pretended to examine the red mark on your hand.

“You’re blushing.”

“It’s warm in here.”

You moved behind him and slipped your arms around his waist, resting your cheek against his shoulder. “Were you thinking about where Cherry might leave marks?”

Pope swallowed. “Maybe.”

“On your cheek?” You pressed a kiss there. “Your neck?”

Your lips brushed the skin beneath his ear. Pope’s grip tightened around the tester.

“Or somewhere lower?”

One of your hands moved down his stomach. When your palm reached the front of his jeans, you found him already hard. Pope caught your wrist, but he did not pull you away. His fingers closed around you while your hand remained pressed over him.

“Baby,” he breathed.

You rubbed your palm over the shape of his cock once, feeling it harden further beneath the denim. “Were you imagining my red lips around you?”

Pope’s face turned completely red. His eyes moved toward the nearest aisle, checking whether anyone had noticed, before returning to your reflection in the display mirror.

“You know I was.”

The admission removed the last of the teasing from your expression. You kissed the back of his shoulder and left your hand beneath his.

“Then maybe Cherry should be yours.”

Pope looked down at the tube, seriously considering it, before glancing at the remaining testers.

“I still have three left.”

Your smile returned. You moved your hand back to his stomach and gave him enough room to continue. “All right. Keep going.”

Pope carefully returned Cherry to its proper slot before reaching for the next one.

Toasted Marshmallow had almost no color, only a few fine gold flecks suspended in the balm. Pope expected another scent sweet enough to make him return it immediately. Instead, he went still as soon as he opened it.

The warmth of it brought him back to the beach house after dark. He imagined opening the front door and finding the oven cooling, the scent of whatever you had baked still clinging to the kitchen. There would be something covered on the counter for him and a note beside the plate telling him which container to put in the refrigerator.

Sometimes you would be waiting on the couch with your legs tucked beneath you, looking up from your book as soon as you heard his key in the lock. On later nights, Pope would find you asleep beneath a blanket and the television playing quietly in an empty room. You always left a lamp on for him. 

Pope smelled the tester again.

Cherry had left him hard, still too aware of the front of his jeans and the hand you had pressed there. Toasted Marshmallow made him want the rest of the night. He wanted the bath you had planned, the new towels waiting in their bags and your body leaning against his chest while the water cooled around you. He wanted to put the balm on your mouth himself and taste something that reminded him of coming home.

Pope closed the tester carefully. He picked up an unopened Toasted Marshmallow and placed it beside Pink Guava in the basket, although his fingers remained curled around the tube.

“This one.”

You moved around him to see what he had chosen. “Toasted Marshmallow?”

“Yeah.”

“What happened to Cherry?” The question was gentle, accompanied by a knowing smile.

Pope’s face warmed again. He kept his attention on the tube and rubbed his thumb over the printed name. “I like this one more.”

You opened the tester and smelled it yourself. The scent was warm and familiar, closer to something that belonged in your kitchen than a makeup display.

“Because it smells like cake?”

“Sometimes.” Pope shifted his weight. “Or pie.”

You looked from the balm to him, understanding beginning to soften your expression. “It smells like the house when I’ve been baking.”

Pope nodded.

“You mean that smells like home, baby?”

His eyes lifted to yours. “Yeah.”

You moved closer and laid your hand over his. “Then Toasted Marshmallow is yours.”

Pope looked down at your joined hands. “You meant what you said?”

“About what?”

“Only wearing it with me.”

There was something almost uncomfortable in the way he asked, as if he needed the reassurance but disliked how plainly his voice revealed it.

“Yes, baby. I meant it.”

Pope nodded, his gaze dropped to your mouth before moving back to the balm.

“You’ll wear it when we’re at the house?”

“Whenever you want me to.”

His brow furrowed. “No, I mean—” He stopped and shifted his weight again, the shopping bags rustling beside his leg. “Tonight.”

You waited, giving him time to finish.

“When we take a bath.” Pope rubbed his palm over the back of his neck. The color had spread from his ears into his cheeks again, although nothing he was asking for should have embarrassed him this much. “Could you wear it then?”

“For you?”

“Yeah.” His eyes returned to your lips. “For me.”

The quiet need in his voice made your chest tighten. Pope could walk into a room full of armed men and make them listen but asking you for something tender was different. He looked as though wanting it this badly had left him exposed.

You slipped your arms around his waist. “Yes. I’ll wear it for you in the bath.”

Pope’s hand settled against your back, but the uncertainty remained in his face.

“And…” He glanced toward the other shoppers before lowering his voice. “Can I put it on you?”

Your smile softened. “You want to?”

He nodded.

“Then you can.”

“With my finger?”

The question came out so earnest that you had to press your lips together to keep from smiling too widely. Pope noticed anyway, and his brow tightened.

“What?”

“Nothing.” You stroked your hand over his chest. “You can put it on with your finger. Then you can kiss as much of it off as you want.”

Pope swallowed. His eyes dropped to your mouth again, lingering there.

“You promise?”

“I promise, my love.”

“Okay,” he murmured, some of the tension finally left his shoulders.

You rose onto your toes and kissed the corner of his mouth. “Are you happy with your choice?”

Pope drew you closer. 

“Yeah.” He glanced once more at the balm in the basket. “I’m happy, sweetheart.”

The Rhode display stood near the front of the store. You crouched to check behind the remaining Pocket Blushes before pulling out your phone.

“The website still says they have Sleepy Girl.”

Pope looked over your shoulder. “Ask somebody, baby.”

An employee was unpacking boxes from a cart nearby. Her name badge read ALLISON. She rubbed her temple before reaching for another package.

“Excuse me,” you said. “Could you check whether you have any more of the Rhode Pocket Blush in Sleepy Girl? The website says there are a few left.”

Allison glanced at the empty slot and shifted the box she was carrying against her hip. “If it isn’t out, we don’t have it.”

“It still shows as in stock. Could there be some in the back?”

“Our inventory is wrong all the time.”

“I understand. It’s just that sometimes new products haven’t been put out yet—”

“We don’t have it,” she cut in, looking toward the clock above the register. “Choose another shade.”

Your fingers tightened around the basket. “But the others turn orange on my skin.”

“They’re all blush. It won’t make that much difference once they’re blended.”

The bags touched the floor behind you.

Pope came to stand at your side. “She asked you to check.”

Allison turned toward him. “I heard her.”

“Then check.”

Allison shifted the box higher against her hip and released a tired breath through her nose. “I’ve already explained that if it isn’t on the shelf, we don’t have it.”

“You didn’t even look.”

“I work here. I know what we have.” She reached for another product on the cart, attempting to return to her task.

Pope placed his hand over the box before she could pick it up. Allison’s gaze dropped to his fingers and then travelled slowly back to his face.

“The website says you have it,” he said.

“Our inventory is probably wrong. I still have all of this to put away.”

“Then it shouldn’t take long.” Pope removed his hand from the box, but instead of stepping back, he moved closer. “We’ll wait.”

Allison’s shoulders pulled tight. “Sir, there won’t be any.”

Pope held her gaze. “Go look. Then come back and tell her that.”

Allison opened her mouth again. Pope moved half a step closer, leaving little room between her and the cart. He kept his hands at his sides, but his voice dropped enough to make her grip tighten around the box.

“Go check.”

Allison’s eyes flicked over his face before she set the box down. “Fine.”

She disappeared through the stockroom door.

Only after it closed did you put the basket aside and take Pope’s hand. His fingers remained stiff around yours.

“Andrew, come here.”

You drew him away from the cart and back toward the Rhode display. Pope followed, glancing once over his shoulder at the stockroom.

“I love when you stand up for me,” you said, running your thumb over his knuckles. “You know I do.”

“She was talking to you like you were stupid, baby.”

“I know. She was rude.” You moved closer and rested your other hand against his chest. “But I think she was already having a terrible day before we walked over.”

“That doesn’t make it okay.”

“It doesn’t.” You explained. “I just don’t think it was about me. Her coffee’s gone cold, she keeps looking at the clock and she has half the store left to unpack. I think I asked the wrong person at the wrong moment.”

Pope’s jaw remained tight. “She still shouldn’t have talked to you like that.”

“No, she shouldn’t have.” You kissed the underside of his chin. “And you didn’t have to let her.”

His hand settled against your back, though his attention stayed on the stockroom door.

“You’re not mad at me?”

“Of course not, baby.” You stroked your palm slowly over his chest. “I’m glad you came over. I only think you scared her more than you meant to.”

“I wasn’t going to do anything.”

“I know that.” You kissed him softly. “But she doesn’t know you.”

Pope looked down at your face, some of the tension finally leaving his fingers.

“When she comes back, maybe apologize for the way you spoke to her,” you murmured. “That’s all.”

He rubbed his thumb against your waist. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“I’ll apologize.”

You smiled and kissed his cheek. “Thank you.”

Allison returned carrying three Sleepy Girl blushes. She avoided Pope’s eyes as she placed them in the empty slot.

“They were still in one of the shipment boxes,” she said. “They hadn’t been stocked yet.”

“Thank you for checking.” You picked up one of the small boxes.

Pope looked at Allison. His jaw shifted once before he spoke.

“I’m sorry about before.”

She glanced at him, visibly surprised. “It’s fine.”

“No.” Pope looked briefly toward you, then back at her. “It wasn’t.”

Allison rubbed her palm against her trousers. “I’m sorry too. It’s been a long day, and I took it out on you.”

You gave her a small smile. “It’s okay.”

Pope nodded toward the blushes. “Thanks for looking.”

Allison returned the nod, some of the tension leaving her shoulders.

You held up the box for Pope. “This is the one.”

He placed it beside Pink Guava and Toasted Marshmallow in the basket. “You want another?”

“One is enough.”

Pope checked your face before gathering the bags again.

“Anything else?” Allison asked.

“No, thank you.”

At the register, Pope arranged the two Laneige masks, Pink Guava, Toasted Marshmallow and the Sleepy Girl blush on the counter. When you opened your purse, he caught your wrist and guided your hand away from it.

“I can pay for my makeup, baby.”

“I’ve got it.” He kept hold of you while passing his card to the cashier.

“You already bought everything for the house.”

“These are for the house too.”

You picked up Pink Guava. “This is going in my purse.”

Pope took the tube from you, returned it to the counter and tucked you against his side. “Your purse comes home.”

The cashier lowered her head to hide a smile. You stared at Pope while he entered his PIN.

“That isn’t how house purchases work.”

“You need all of it, sweetheart.”

“And apparently that means you need to pay for it.”

Pope returned his wallet to his pocket and pressed a kiss to your temple. “Yeah.”

There was no point arguing once he had decided. You slipped your arm through his and rested your head against his shoulder while the cashier packed everything.

“You sure you don’t need anything else?” Pope asked, looking down at the products before the cashier placed them inside the bag.

You laughed softly. “Yes, baby.”

You slipped beneath Pope’s arm as you left Sephora, talking about unpacking the last kitchen boxes and washing the new sheets before putting them on the bed.

“Kitchen first,” you said. “Otherwise we’ll leave everything in bags for a week.”

“Bed first.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to sleep in it tonight.”

You looked up at him, smiling. “We could do both.”

Pope drew you closer and kept walking. He had spent the entire afternoon waiting for something to go wrong. Every vibration of his phone made him expect Smurf’s name on the screen, followed by questions about where he was and why he had been gone so long. Only Deran knew about the two of you and the house by the beach, and Pope had told him because someone needed to know where to find you if he failed to come home after a job. Deran had promised to keep his mouth shut, but the secret still made Pope feel exposed because nothing in his life had ever remained his once Smurf discovered it.

His arm tightened around you without warning.

Your sentence trailed off. You turned within his hold and laid your palm flat against his stomach, feeling the tension beneath his shirt.

“Baby, are you okay?” You searched his face when he did not answer immediately. “Is it getting too loud? We can leave if you need to.”

Pope noticed the worry gathering between your brows and loosened his arm.

“No. Sorry.” He covered your hand with his, keeping it against him. “Keep talking, sweetheart.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah.” His thumb moved over your knuckles. “I don’t want to leave. Tell me what you were saying.”

You studied him for another moment before kissing his chest through his shirt. Pope pressed his mouth to the top of your head, and only then did you settle against his side again.

“I bought bath salts,” you continued, slipping your arm around his waist. “So we can unpack the kitchen, make the bed and then have a bath like you wanted.”

Pope’s hand began moving slowly over your back as he listened.

“But you’re not allowed to pour in the entire bottle of bubble bath this time.”

“It wasn’t the entire bottle.”

You tilted your face up to him. “Baby, it was nearly full when I gave it to you.”

“There was some left.”

“Enough for one very small bath, honey.” You held your thumb and forefinger barely an inch apart.

Pope watched the gesture, the corner of his mouth beginning to lift. “Still wasn’t the whole bottle.”

Then a small shop beside the exit caught his attention. A rotating stand of Jellycat bag charms stood near the door, little animals, fruit and flowers hanging from metal clips while their thin cord legs swung beneath them.

Pope stopped.

You felt his hand tighten around yours. “What is it?”

He nodded toward the display. “We need keychains for the new keys.”

Your face lit up. “We absolutely do.”

Pope let you lead him inside and set the shopping bags beside his feet while you crouched in front of the stand. You had barely turned it once before a green shamrock caught your attention.

“Wait.” You lifted it from its hook and touched one of its dangling feet. “They all have legs.”

Pope glanced at the other charms. “Yeah.”

“How have I never noticed that?”

You turned the stand again, laughing when a sun, a ladybug in tiny black shoes and several pieces of fruit swung into view. Then you found a lemon and picked it up, making its little legs walk across your palm.

“Look at him. He has somewhere important to be.” You held it beside your cheek and smiled at Pope. “Should this one be mine?”

Pope watched you, completely mesmerized.

For years, he had believed that was the life he deserved.

Smurf might have been the one who decided who had to die, but Pope had been the one to kill them. Being useful to her did not make him innocent.

Eventually, he had begun to think there was nothing inside him worth saving: no soul, no heart... 

Because a man with either would have stopped long before Pope ever did and he had put too much ugliness into the world to complain when none of the good parts reached him.

Baz had made that clear years ago.

They had been in Smurf’s garage after a job, Baz drinking and still carrying the confidence that made everyone else gather around him. Pope no longer remembered what started the argument. He remembered Baz laughing over the mouth of his beer bottle and asking what Pope thought was going to happen to him.

You think some woman’s gonna marry you? Have a kid with you? You?

Baz laughed again when Pope said nothing.

Nobody wants to wake up next to you, Pope.

Pope had hit him. Baz had hit back, and Smurf had blamed Pope for the broken cabinet without asking about the blood running into his mouth. None of it stayed with him as clearly as the certainty in Baz’s voice. Perhaps Pope had hit him because he already believed him.

Nobody would choose him.

Nobody would build a life with him.

His future had seemed like one long, cold day beneath a sky that never cleared, every morning leading back to another night inside Smurf’s house. Pope had stopped expecting anything else because hope only gave people something else to take from him.

Now you were kneeling in front of a display of ridiculous plush keychains, laughing because a lemon had legs. Pope looked at you and, for one brief moment, the store disappeared.

He imagined somewhere far from Oceanside. Another mall in a town where nobody knew the Cody name. You stood beside him, older but still laughing at everything. A little girl reached for a plush toy while Pope held her beneath the arms so she could see the top row.

She had his dark hair, gathered into two uneven pigtails he had tried to make himself. His freckles covered her nose. Everything else belonged to you: your eyes, your soft cheeks, your lips already turning into the same smile you wore whenever you knew Pope would give you whatever you asked for.

He could see himself buying the toy even after you reminded him she already had too many, he could see the little girl hugging it to her chest while Pope carried her back to the car and perhaps one day the small bedroom in the beach house would hold a crib until they found somewhere farther away.

The thought should have frightened someone like him, right?

Instead, Pope wanted it so badly that his chest hurt.

“Baby?”

You were standing now, the lemon still in your hand. Pope blinked and found you watching him.

“You went somewhere.”

“I’m here.”

You put the lemon back and came closer, rubbing your hand over his chest. “You were looking at me like you wanted to say something.”

Pope reached behind the sun and removed the sunflower hanging partly beneath it. He held one charm in each hand.

“I thought we could get these.”

Your eyes dropped to them. “The sun and the sunflower?”

“Yeah.”

“They’re perfect.” You took them from him and smoothed the sunflower’s soft yellow petals, smiling down at the two charms, making their little cord legs move against your palm before looking back at him. “Why these two, honey?”

His thumb caught beneath one of the sunflower’s petals. He had known what they meant when he took them from the display. Explaining it with you standing in front of him was different. He rubbed the soft fabric between his fingers, keeping his eyes lowered.

“Sunflowers turn toward the sun… They keep looking for it.” He shifted his weight and glanced toward the entrance, then back at the charm. “Doesn’t matter where it moves. They turn so they can still see it. They don't like the dark.”

You watched his fingers worrying at the petal. “And you want to be the sunflower?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

Pope swallowed. He had already told you enough to make the answer obvious, but you waited for him to say it. Your free hand slipped into his and squeezed, giving him something to hold on to while he tried.

“Because I always know where you are,” he said. “Even when I’m not looking at you, I know.”

“And where am I, baby?”

“Here.”

His fingers tightened around yours before guiding your hand to his chest. His heart beat hard beneath your palm, each uneven thud pressing through the thin fabric of his shirt.

You had felt it countless times before. Beneath your cheek while you slept, racing against your ear when a nightmare tore him awake, gradually slowing whenever you climbed into his lap and held him until he remembered where he was. But this felt different. Pope was keeping your hand there deliberately, offering you the frantic rhythm as though it could explain whatever his mouth could not.

For one suspended moment, he felt more yours than he ever had.

He had chosen you. He had taken the parts of himself he kept hidden from everyone else, the frightened ones, the damaged ones, the ones he believed made him impossible to love, and placed them beneath your palm without knowing whether you would hold them gently.

“And if I can’t find you,” he continued, his thumb pressing into the back of your hand, “I look.”

You traced one slow stroke over his shirt. “So you’re the sunflower.”

Pope nodded. His attention dropped to the two charms, and he worried the edge of one soft yellow petal between his fingers.

“And I’m the sun?”

“Yeah.”

You waited.

His jaw shifted. He looked toward the entrance, then at the floor, visibly regretting how far he had allowed the conversation to go. Still, he did not let go of you.

“Because it was dark before you,” he said at last.

Your breathing faltered.

“In my head, I mean.” Pope frowned, frustrated with himself already. “It’s always been loud in there. Telling me this things.”

“What things?”

He rubbed his thumb against your knuckles. “That I’m bad. That I ruin everything. That none of this is gonna last because I don’t get to have good things like this.”

Your chest tightened, but you stayed quiet.

“They’re still there,” he added quickly, as though he needed to make sure you understood that you had not repaired him. “You didn’t make them go away— but they’re not always as mean anymore.”

His words were so quiet that the noise of the store nearly swallowed them.

Pope’s brow pulled tighter as he struggled to explain. “Sometimes there’s something else too. Something that says maybe I can come home. Maybe you’ll still be there when I do. That I’m…” He paused, swallowing again. “That I’m not only what they say I am.”

Your thumb stilled above his heart.

“It sounds like you sometimes,” he admitted. “Not really your voice— I know you’re not in my head.” His cheeks warmed as he rushed to clarify it, but his fingers held firmly to yours. “It just says the kind of things you say to me.”

The pressure behind your ribs became almost painful.

Pope had lived for years with Smurf’s voice buried inside him, joined by Baz’s laughter and every terrible thing he had ever come to believe about himself. You had never imagined that somewhere among them, your love had begun answering back. Not loudly enough to silence them but enough to make the darkness a little less certain of itself.

“You made everything lighter,” Pope murmured. “My life. All the stuff in here.”

He lifted your joined hands slightly against his chest.

“So I keep turning toward you.” His eyes dropped to the sunflower again. “Because you’re my sun.”

The words settled somewhere so deep inside you that you could not respond.

His pulse continued beneath your palm, hard and alive and entirely unguarded. You thought of all the years he had spent convinced that nobody would choose him, only for this man to stand before you now and confess that your love had become the kindest voice inside his head.

Your vision blurred.

Pope noticed immediately. The sunflower slipped from his fingers, swinging by its tag as both hands rose to your face.

“Hey. What happened?”

He searched your expression, alarm sharpening every feature when the first tear escaped.

“Was it what I said?” His breathing quickened when you could not answer fast enough. “It was too much— I shouldn’t have said it.”

“No, baby.”

“We can pick different ones.” He reached for the little sun in your hand. “Forget it.”

You caught his wrists before he could take it from you. “Andrew, look at me.”

“I made you cry.”

“I’m happy.”

Pope froze, his palms still cupping your cheeks. “You don’t look happy.”

“I’m overwhelmed.” You turned your face into one of his hands and pressed a kiss to the center of his palm. “Because nobody has ever given me anything as beautiful as what you just gave me.”

“I only said you were the sun.”

“You told me that loving you has made the inside of your head a little kinder.”

His mouth tightened. “Sounds stupid when you say it like that.”

“It doesn’t.” You leaned into his touch, a wet laugh catching in your throat. “It means more to me than I know how to explain.”

Some of the panic eased from his face, though uncertainty remained in the careful way he held you.

“You meant it, didn’t you?” you asked.

“Yeah.”

“Then don’t take it back.”

“You’re sure?”

“Completely.” You kissed the base of his thumb. “But I need you to say it again.”

His brow furrowed. “Why?”

“Because this time, you’ll know the tears don’t mean you hurt me.”

Pope hesitated. His thumb swept beneath your eye, catching the wetness there before it reached your cheek.

“You’re my sun.”

Your face crumpled all over again.

He was not the collection of terrible things he had survived and the worse things he still blamed himself for.

He was Andrew.

Your Andrew.

His eyes widened. “Sweetheart—”

You laughed and threw your arms around his neck before he could panic a second time.

“Still happy, baby. I promise.”

Pope held you tightly, one hand cupping the back of your head while your laughter softened against his neck. When you finally leaned away, his gaze moved between your eyes and paused on your wet cheeks.

You kissed the worried crease between his eyebrows before looking down at the sunflower dangling from his fingers. One of its petals had folded beneath his grip, so you carefully smoothed it back into place.

“My sweet, grumpy sunflower.”

Pope frowned. “No.”

“No what?”

“You’re not calling me that.”

“But it’s perfect.” You lifted the sunflower beside his face, smiling when his frown deepened. “You’re sweet, you’re grumpy, and you just admitted that you spend your life turning toward me.”

Pope reached for the little sun in your other hand, but you hid it behind your back.

He held out his hand, palm open. “Give it back.”

You closed your fingers around the little sun and tucked it safely behind your back. “You gave it to me.”

He stepped closer and slipped an arm around your waist, trying to reach past you while you twisted away with a laugh. “I’m reconsidering.”

“That isn’t how presents work.” You turned, rose onto your toes and kissed the corner of his mouth. “Besides, I’m going to call you my sweet, grumpy sunflower every day for the rest of our lives.”

Pope stopped reaching for the charm.

“The rest of our lives?” he asked.

Your teasing softened. “Yes, baby. That’s the plan.”

His hand settled at your waist and drew you a little closer. “Okay.”

Your smile widened. “You’re accepting the nickname already?”

“No.”

“Then what was the okay for?”

Pope looked at the sun hidden behind your back and then at the sunflower resting against his chest.

“For the rest of our lives.”

You caught his face between your hands and kissed him before either of you could become emotional again.

Pope went still beneath your palms. Then both arms closed around you. One hand spread across your lower back while the other cradled your neck, drawing you firmly against him.

He kissed you slowly. His mouth was warm and slightly unsteady beneath yours, softening each time your thumbs stroked his cheeks. The faint salt of your tears lingered on your lips, and Pope kissed it away before returning for another kiss, then another, as though the first had not been enough.

Your fingers slipped into the short hair at his temples. An uneven breath left him against your mouth, and his hand tightened at your back while the kiss deepened. His thumb moved slowly beneath your ear. He took his time with every gentle press of his lips, holding you closer whenever your fingers moved through his hair.

When you finally began to draw away, his hand tightened softly at your nape and brought you back for one last lingering kiss.

Pope kept his forehead against yours after your mouths parted. His eyes remained closed, his breathing uneven while your fingers continued moving through his hair.

You brushed your nose against his.

“I love you, my grumpy sunflower.”

“Love you too.” His thumb moved over your cheek as the corner of his mouth finally lifted. “But you’re not calling me that in front of Deran.”

You smiled. “No promises.”

taglist: @mcthsman, @pattwtf, @madisonauroraxx

[popecodysgirl]

Devotion | Andrew “Pope” Cody x f!reader

Series Masterlist

Summary: Three years ago, Andrew Cody saw you while he was serving his sentence at Folsom State Prison. Although his interaction with you was brief, you stayed in his mind the entire time and unbeknownst to you, he pledged his devotion to you. Now that he’s out of prison, he’s going to show you just how far his devotion goes for you. Warnings/tags: 18+, smut, minors do not interact, smut, age gap (reader is in 20s and Andrew is late 30s), freak 4 freak, season 1!Pope, perv!Pope, toxic!Pope, limerence, yearning, parasocial behaviour, stalking, voyeurism, unprotected piv, oral (f receiving), masturbation (m and f), breeding kink, praise kink, degradation kink, erectile dysfunction, controlling behaviour, angst, mental health issues, toxic behaviour, obsessive behaviour, obsessive compulsive behaviour, unhealthy attachment, jealousy, prison, violence (related to Cody family business), toxic families, Smurf, mention of death, unhealthy coping, swearing, drinking, smoking, strip club, stripper, mental anguish, childhood trauma, family trauma, fluff, comfort, no use of y/n Author’s note: Going back to my roots and writing for Pope Cody again! If you’ve read my other Pope Cody series, Cody’s Girl, and notice that I’m kind of reheating my nachos (just for some parts), it’s okay because I made the nachos. I also took some scenes I had written for Cody’s Girl and added it to this series instead. Also, thank you guys so much for 800 followers! I love you all so much! This community means so much to me and you truly make every day so much better for me! I hope you guys enjoy it and thanks for reading! 

Chapter 1: Instant Attachment

Summary: The first time Andrew Cody sees you is within the confined walls of Folsom State Prison. You’re volunteering with a prison library program, helping inmates read and providing educational support. One look at you is all it takes for him to become instantly attached to you and he’ll do whatever it takes to protect you. 

Chapter 2: Obsession (coming soon)

Summary: The first thing Andrew does when he’s out of prison is track you down, the object of his obsession. At first he tries to stay away from you, observing from a careful distance, but when his desire to be close to you gets too strong, he gives in and makes contact with you. 

Chapter 3: Party 4 U

Summary: It’s the day of Andrew’s birthday. His brothers take him out to a strip club where he overcomes a personal issue he’s been dealing with since he got out of prison. That evening, you go to the Cody house for the first time for Andrew’s birthday party. 

Chapter 4: Tempest

Summary: After a tumultuous birthday, all the emotions Andrew has been harbouring finally comes to a head and he learns how well you understand him. 

Chapter 5: Reciprocation

Summary: Andrew finds out how you feel about him when the truth comes out.

Last updated: July 26, 2026

Dividers by @strangergraphics and gif by @wesandresons

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