(moaning, panting, begging)

𝙨𝙝𝙚’𝙨 𝙖 𝙠𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙧, 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙡𝙤𝙤𝙠 𝙞𝙨 𝙖𝙡𝙡 𝙞𝙩 𝙩𝙖𝙠𝙚𝙨… ؛༊ 18+ 𝙤𝙣𝙡𝙮 | 𝙘𝙝𝙚𝙘𝙠 𝙣𝙖𝙫𝙞𝙜𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 👄

[slvttyfied]

“𝐝𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐬𝐥𝐲 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐮𝐧𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐠𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠… 𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐲 𝐚 𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐧…”

°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･

GINA’s SPELLBOOK ₊ ⊹

“you’ve reached the coven, please proceed at your own risk”

𝐠.𝐛𝐚𝐛𝐲. 𝟐𝟓. 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐭. 𝐛𝐥𝐤 𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐜. 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡. 𝐝𝐢𝐥𝐟 𝐥𝐯𝐫, 𝐯𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐟𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐫 ⋆˚𝜗𝜚˚⋆

no minors/ageless, blank blogs. no like spamming. dark content. <𝟑 .ᐟ

m.list ★ ko-fi ★ most recent upload

| © slvttyfied

[yourleogf]

closet confessions ❥ michael jackson

PAIRING: late 70s!michael jackson x black!fem!reader

SUMMARY: inspired by this edit + this edit as well + in which you and Michael like each other, but are too shy to tell each other how you feel, so Michael’s brothers lock you and him in a closet and won’t let you leave until you properly clear the air. 🩷

AUTHOR’S NOTE: reading fics about Michael gave me motivation to write again & i’m so joyful to be back doing what i love 🤭

TAGLIST (click here to be added!): @pinkkycherrish @hismainchic @laniiimariee3 @junkie05 @buckybarnessweetheart @h3avenlyglory @soimightlikeoldmen69 @fifi-asco @chaotuics @arithescorpio @myhobari @niyahctrl @somenichegirl @mxnijuana @freshbonggwater @spencerreidismyhusband123 @mrsj4cks0n @liyahhsnuckhere @vampsbayou 🩷

“Marlon!— no!— stop it!—” you squealed as you and Michael pushed against the closet door with all the strength both of you hand, trying to stop Marlon, Jermaine, and Tito from successfully closing the door on the two of you.

“uh-uh, y’all got business to handle! gon’ and get all that mushy out of y’all’s systems so everything can go back to normal!” Marlon remarked through boyish laughter as the three brothers suddenly shoved their body weight against the door in unison and the force sent you and Michael back from the door and tumbling to the ground, a yelp coming from you and a grunt coming from him while the two of you fell wrapped in each other’s limbs.

Michael’s brothers were known to toy with you and him, especially since it was obvious — to them, at least — that you and Michael had not-so secret feelings for each other, but three of them going as far as to shove you and him in a closet together was extremely embarrassing for both of you.

to be more specific, it was Marlon who dragged you to the closet and Jermaine who followed him with Michael in his arms, but it was Tito who held the closet door open for them to put both of you in there.

you and Michael had been friends since you were teenagers and spent much of your adolescence together, even going as far as sneaking out to see each other and hang out at odd times of the night. as time progressed, your bond grew stronger and the two of you were practically two peas in a pod, but somewhere along the way, things started to shift between the two of you.

it wasn’t very obvious, but it could be subtly felt. touches started lingering a bit more and eye contact felt different, almost as if layered with something deeper than platonic affection. the thin line between close friends and lovers was becoming blurred and neither of you realized it.

Jackie noticed it first, then Jermaine, and that’s when the rest of the Jackson brothers started piecing things together as well.

everyone knew Michael was shy at times, but you were no better than him. both of you were equally shy in your own ways, but especially when it came down to romantic feelings, relationships, or connections — truthfully, anything under the ‘romance’ umbrella made both of you very timid and quieter than usual.

so obviously, the Jackson brothers knew that you and Michael would never confess how you really felt about each other, so they decided to do what they do best: meddle.

“you okay?” the sound of Michael’s soft voice pulled you from your thoughts and you blinked as you looked up at him, realizing the fall had planted him right on top of you.

“yeah… y-yeah, i’m fine,” you answered softly as you searched his face for a moment and swallowed thickly, the confined space suddenly feeling smaller than before, “you?”

“i’m okay.” Michael reassured, a small shy smile creeping onto his face, as you instinctively smiled back and the two of you stood from the ground with each other’s help, both of you adjusting your clothing before you moved towards the door.

wrapping your fingers around the doorknob, you twisted it once, then twice, and your face dropped once you realized it was locked.

“hey!” you shouted with a huff as you let go of the doorknob and slapped the door with the palm of your hand instead, “y’all better open this doggone door!”

“not until y’all admit that y’all like each other!” Jermaine shouted back.

“and don’t lie ‘cause we all see how you look at him!” Marlon immediately added in, one of his infamous giggles slipping out mid-sentence.

“and Mike ain’t innocent either! boy be lookin’ like a lost puppy when you around!” Tito chimed in, causing the three brothers to erupt in laughter together.

huffing quietly, you took a step back from the door and leaned against the nearest wall as your gaze shifted to Michael, who was sheepishly covering his face with his hands — presumably due to the embarrassing statements from his brothers.

“…Mikey?” you called softly, your voice barely audible, as Michael peeked through his fingers and looked over at you before slowly — almost reluctantly — lowering his hands from his face, knowing that neither of you could avoid the conversation that was about to happen — at least, not anymore because of his meddling brothers.

“…yeah?” Michael answered back, his voice quieter than normal, as he slightly pursed his lips together before tucking his bottom lip between his teeth, a gesture he always managed to do when he was nervous.

you slightly parted your lips to speak, but nothing came out but quiet stammers that only fueled your embarrassment, causing a small comforting smile to form on Michael’s face.

“hey, hey, it’s okay… d-do you want me to go first instead?” Michael offered, finding your bashful stutters adorable, as your mouth closed and you slightly nodded, a shy smile spreading across your features.

“yeah, if, um… if that’s okay with you.” you finally managed to put a sentence together and crossed your arms across your chest to ease your nerves as Michael slowly nodded his head and swallowed hard, trying his hardest to maintain eye contact with you while he nervously toyed with the hem of his shirt.

“okay… okay, um… you know, we’ve been friends for a really long time now and, um, i really like spending time with you,” Michael spoke softer and more carefully, trying his best to stay calm in what he viewed as an embarrassing situation, “you… you make me feel so good inside. better than any other girl really has, honestly. so, um… i gotta’ tell you somethin’.”

you slightly stiffened and let out a quiet exhale as you slowly nodded your head, gesturing for him to continue while your arms slightly tightened around your chest, “…go ahead, Michael.”

“i…” Michael hesitated a bit, going quiet for a moment before exhaling shakily, “i like you… i really like you. and, um… my brothers been tellin’ me that you like me too, but i… i wanna hear it from you personally… please.”

Michael’s plea nearly made your knees buckle and you let out a soft breathless laugh filled with relief and lingering anxiety, a smile spreading across your face at his confession.

“oh, Mikey… i really like you, too. i wanted to tell you sooner, but i didn’t really know how to bring it up because the thought of it made me… nervous,” you admitted timidly as Michael smiled back at you and your arms slowly uncrossed, feeling the weight of your confession leave as quickly as it came, “i do hate that we had to confess like this, though… think i might have to fight your brothers after this.”

Michael giggled at your comment and you giggled with him, your combined laughter in the small room easing the lingering embarrassment in the air and causing both of your shoulders to slowly drop in unison.

“so… could i ask you somethin’?” Michael asked, his smile softening, as he took a small hesitant step towards you and you grinned a little before nodding your head.

“yeah. anything.”

“would, um… would you like to be my… girlfriend?” Michael asked bashfully, gently toying with the hem of his shirt again, as your eyes lit up and a wide smile quickly spread across your face, excitement overtaking you and completely diminishing any trace of shyness.

“yes! oh, yes, Michael!” you squealed as you suddenly threw your arms around Michael’s neck and pulled him into a tight embrace, catching him off guard and making him stiffen before he slowly melted in your embrace and reverently wrapped his arms around your waist.

Michael lowered his head into the crook of your neck and inhaled the scent of your perfume as his large hands splayed across your back, holding you against him while the two of you stood there silently holding each other and basking in the new beginning of your relationship — the shift from platonic to romantic sending gentle chills down your spine.

the two of you stood like that for a moment, your surroundings seemingly fading away the longer you were in each other’s arms, before Michael raised his head from the crook of your neck to properly look down at you, prompting you to raise your head from his shoulder.

meeting his gaze this time felt different, but in the best way — his gaze was softer yet more intensely, seeming overcome by joy and love that he couldn’t help but to look at you as if you were the best thing that ever happened to him.

“could i ask you somethin’ else?” Michael asked softly, searching your eyes, as you smiled a little and slightly nodded your head while you maintained eye contact with him, “can i— may i… kiss you?”

you blinked once, then twice, and that was when realization dawned on you and you realized that none of this was a dream. your best-friend-turned-boyfriend Michael Jackson just asked you for a kiss… and by this point, who were you to deny what both of you had been secretly wanting?

“yeah… yeah, of course.” you answered quietly, slightly nodding your head again, as Michael smiled a little at you and the two of you looked at each other for a moment before you began leaning towards each other in unison, your nose slightly brushing against his before his lips locked with yours.

the kiss was soft and tentative, both of you testing the waters and not trying to scare each other off, but once the two of you got used to the feeling of your colliding mouths, the kiss deepened. his mouth moved slowly against yours and you maintained that rhythm, neither of you wanting to rush this sweet moment of intimacy you had been denying yourselves.

however, the universe seemingly had other plans because the closet door suddenly flung open and every single one of Michael’s brothers now stood there watching the two of you, you and Michael breaking the kiss at the sound of the door opening as your heads snapped towards the doorway.

“ahh-ha, i knew it! i knew it, i told y’all! i told y’all they was in here kissin’!” Marlon squealed, giggling through his banter, as the other brothers erupted into laughter with him and Jackie shook his head instead, though a content smile rested on his face at the sight of you and his younger brother wrapped in each other’s embrace.

identically sheepish grins spread across you and Michael’s faces and Michael immediately turned away from his brothers to shield his face as you buried your face into his chest with a muffled groan of embarrassment, which somehow only fueled Marlon’s amusement because he started laughing even harder than before.

“Mikey, i swear i’m gonna kill Marlon.”

[slvttyfied]

sista, imma get Marlon too! 😭 awwwwwww this was so cutieeee 🥹 I love how shy Michael gets, it’s just always been in his nature, you wrote that so beautifully 💐

[yourleogf]

sista can you pleasee give us some jaafar jackson content there’s hardly anything out here😫

jam ❥ jaafar jackson

PAIRING: jaafar jackson x black!fem!reader

SUMMARY: inspired by this post + “Jam” by Kevin Gates + in which the plan of making dinner with Jaafar while music plays goes awry when cooking a meal turns into a makeout session. 🩷

AUTHOR’S NOTE: all of the credit for this idea goes to the original writer of the post linked above!! i saw the post & wanted to expand on at least one of her thoughts 🩷

TAGLIST (click here to be added!): @pinkkycherrish @hismainchic @laniiimariee3 @junkie05 @buckybarnessweetheart @h3avenlyglory @soimightlikeoldmen69 @fifi-asco @chaotuics @arithescorpio @myhobari @niyahctrl @somenichegirl @mxnijuana @freshbonggwater @spencerreidismyhusband123 @mrsj4cks0n @liyahhsnuckhere @vampsbayou 🩷

it wasn’t a secret that Jaafar had a playlist of songs reminded him of you — well, it actually was at first. he was initially hesitant on playing it around you because he’d get a bit timid at being put on the spot, but once he got used to it, it practically became a staple in your relationship.

he didn’t play it as often as he wanted because he didn’t want to risk overplaying the songs he had dedicated to you, but he never missed out on the opportunity to play it whenever the two of you were doing something together — even if it was something as simple as a car ride to the grocery store.

tonight he played it because he wanted the two of you to make dinner together as a couple, but things took a heated turn once a specific slow jam played — a song both of you tend to really enjoy — and Jaafar sang it to you, despite being shy about showing off his vocal abilities to you.

one thing led to another and your mouth was on his, the two of you making out in the kitchen and not necessarily paying attention to the food that was cooking in the oven.

slow jams that reminded him of you continued to play in the room, adding to the cozy and romantic atmosphere, and Jaafar continued holding onto your waist as he kissed you deeply, the kiss slow, deep, and passionate while the two of you got lost in each other.

you leaned against the counter for stability and your hands cradled the sides of Jaafar’s neck as you melted against his body, faint hums and soft lip smacking harmonizing with the music playing. his thumbs subconsciously traced small circles against you and he slightly angled his head to kiss you deeper, coaxing a quiet moan from you while your arms wrapped around his neck to pull him closer.

before you could fully forget where you were, the smell of something burning eventually flooded your nostrils and a small furrow formed between your eyebrows as you rested your hands on Jaafar’s shoulders and reluctantly pulled back from the kiss, earning a whimper in protest from him.

“J, i think something’s burning.” you advised, your mind still fuzzy from the kiss and prohibiting you from realizing the depth of this situation, as Jaafar blinked and looked down at you for a moment before his eyes suddenly widened and he quickly pulled away from you to dash over to the oven.

“wait!— ohhh, no, no, no— the food, baby!”

and that was the moment you realized that slow jams and kissing in the kitchen are a no-go when cooking with Jaafar.

[slvttyfied]

oh yes ma’am 🥹😍😋 a part of me feels like this is safe, tame waters for Jaafar x reader that I’m starting off with until we get into it into it and honey, I am ready for it allllll, this was mad cute. he’s so fine 😩😩😩

[yourleogf]

Hey Gurl! Could you write a story with Cameron Cade inspired by Freakum Dress by Beyoncé? Like have Y/N wear the freakum dress to seduce cam?

thanks boo!

if i can’t have you ❥ tyriq withers

PAIRING: tyriq withers as “cameron ‘cam’ cade” from “him (2025)” x black!fem!reader

SUMMARY: inspired by “Freakum Dress” by Beyoncé + in which you and Cameron are flings that see each other from time to time, but when he suddenly gets a girlfriend, he cuts you off and moves on without you like you don’t exist. little does he know, you won’t be leaving him alone that easily — or ever. 🩷

AUTHOR’S NOTE #1: also inspired by “tell me what you want” by Sasha Keable (“fuck is a break when i’m on all fours for you? told me you ate, well, here, i got some more for you.”) + “I’ll Kill You” by Summer Walker & Jhené Aiko (“don’t want no problems, i wish a bitch would. try to come between us, it won’t end up good. you know i love you like no one else could.”) ✨

AUTHOR’S NOTE #2: also inspired by my lovely moot @slvttyfied’s “A Thin Line Between Love And Hate” series that i’m still so deeply engrossed in 🤭

TAGLIST: @darkseidex @plan3tch1ld @cozygirljay @mooki3-bear @houseofathenaa @h3avenlyglory @isthattyra @pinkhoodi @k0niiii-blog @vanillaiceyhot @hismainchic @bamb1ss @numberoneszafan @freshbonggwater @saltygoldengirl @mxnijuana @camesgf @snowseasonmademe @chaotuics @fifi-asco @the1miscief @theesexyyaquariuss @evimmarvel @sativadivastuff @myhobari @n0r4sarchive @mamasturn @neighbourscat @thatonecarebear @hiitsmebbygrl16 @thatssokarii @hotgirlgenniesblog @kyomionline @arithescorpio @irunfadesoverkenny @watamotee33 @tenacioustestamentambush @koyadagreat @ynniksslirg @goldenelixer-24 @moneymeeeeeeeee @youdntknowmeirl @kaivsh @riahhmiyaa @prettygalleria @paris-chanel-blog1 @jaden1738 @kaystacks17 @superheroprincess22 @yourm0mish0t 🩷

“said, it’s been a minute since i had some. he’s been actin’ up, but he won’t be the only one…”

you and Cameron started off as classmates. nothing more than just two people who sat beside each other in the same classroom for an hour and a half throughout the semester. you never paid him any mind and he didn’t bother you like most athletes would when they saw an attractive girl — the two of you just minded your own business and continued on casually.

you didn’t really know how things shifted from strangers to flings, but when the two of you ended up having a one night stand after being drunk at a Homecoming party, you were sure that was when things changed.

even though both of you were intoxicated that night, the sex that transpired wasn’t forgotten when you awoke beside each other in the morning. you remembered everything and so did Cameron, which is why neither of you could leave each other alone after that.

the atmosphere in the class you two shared was never the same. it went from both of you paying more attention to yourselves than each other to you and him passing notes back and forth and his hand caressing your thigh under the desk. the sexual chemistry the two of you had was something different, in a more hypnotizing way.

it was like you couldn’t get enough of each other, and it grew harder and harder to try and keep your hands away from each other when you were in public, which led to rumors circulating around campus that you and Cameron were secretly dating.

neither of you addressed the rumors, though. you two weren’t officially together, but you also weren’t seeing or talking to other people — at least, you weren’t.

you and Cameron continued fucking around for almost the entire semester, until he randomly cut you off three weeks before it ended, leaving you stunned and completely throwing you off. you tried reaching out to him to get an explanation and see if you did anything wrong for him to just up and leave you like that, but he never called or texted you back. it was like he vanished into thin air when it came to you, but remained available for everyone else.

however, the moment you finally found time to confront him in person, you nearly flashed out at the sight of him kissing and hugging another girl in the middle of the courtyard — but the icing on the cake? the girl was Jasmine, the same girl you had two of your classes with.

you were never the same after that. you weren’t sad, no. you were far from sad. you were furious, bitter, jealous, and even revengeful — you were a woman scorned, and hell hath no fury like the wrath you were about to unleash on Cameron Cade.

you became quieter around campus, almost reserved. the people closest to you were concerned about your wellbeing, but you were eerily calm. you couldn’t let your emotions take over your life, but you couldn’t just let Cameron slip away from you and into another woman’s embrace. you needed a plan, a real good plan that would surely make him realize the mistake he was making — and that, you did.

throughout the last three weeks of the semester, you did more than just finish up homework and study for exams — you plotted, tremendously. you had to think of something that would scare Cameron straight and have him running back to you, but you also didn’t want to hurt him. you wanted to warn him, but you certainly weren’t going to repeat yourself.

this would be his first and final warning, and if he fucked up again, you’d punish him with actions instead of threats.

after the semester concluded and your grades and GPA were in great shape, you were able to fully focus on your plan, and luckily for you, the NPHC was having an end-of-the-year party at a frat house off campus tonight — an event that you knew Jasmine would be at because you stalked her Instagram on your burner account, a page that nobody knew about but you.

you waited until she posted a video at the party to confirm Cameron wasn’t with her, but to further solidify your assumption of him not being at the party, you stalked his Instagram. you didn’t find anything, so you stalked his friends’ accounts too, but you didn’t find anything there either — that’s when you truly knew he wasn’t in attendance.

upon finding realizing that, that’s when you set your plan in motion. you got dressed in a sexy black lace dress, the piece enunciating the fullness of your breasts and the curve of your ass. the dress was practically a type of negligée and it was so lacy that it didn’t leave much to the imagination, but that was exactly why you bought it — and it’s also why you chose to wear nothing underneath it.

your feet were enclosed in black pumps that added to your height, and once you finished admiring your appearance, you put on a black ankle-length trench coat and tied it at your waist, properly concealing your risqué form. after securing the knot, you slipped something really special inside the inner pocket of the coat before grabbing your keys and heading over to Cameron’s apartment, not bothering to inform him of your impending arrival.

it’s not like he’d answer your texts anyway, and you were through being ignored by him.

Cameron didn’t know what to expect when he heard a knock at his door, but you were definitely the last person he expected to see tonight. he answered the door in a tank top and some sweatpants, a look of confusion crossing his pretty face the minute his greenish-blue eyes landed on you.

“what you doin’ here?” Cameron asked as he leaned against the door frame and rested one of his hands against the side of the door, looking down at you as if he were assessing you.

“you gon’ let me in?” you simply asked, not wanting to beat around the bush with small talk, as you slightly tilted your head, “it’s cold out here, Cameron.”

you weren’t actually cold, but he didn’t know that. he wasn’t supposed to, actually. you didn’t want to stand outside on his door step and talk to him like a woman desperate for answers. that wasn’t your style.

you were far from desperate. you were as calculated as a person could be.

Cameron eyed your attire for a moment and took notice to your heels, but chose not to say anything. instead, he leaned up from his door frame and took a step back before stepping aside, allowing you inside.

you entered his residence, but you didn’t rush to sit. you didn’t want to. that wasn’t what you came over for. you came over to make a point: you will not be left high and dry while he experiences romance with someone who isn’t you.

you watched him shut and lock the door behind you, and the minute he turned around, you stepped closer to him, keeping him from walking past you and almost causing a collision between your bodies.

“why you been ignoring me, Cameron?” you asked, a small furrow forming between your eyebrows, as Cameron stepped back to create distance between the two of you and you immediately followed, your eyes slightly narrowing at the action, “i been calling you. texting you, too. and you just… disappeared on me.”

“i been busy,” the way Cameron could lie so smoothly to your face without considering the consequences almost made you want to punch him in his mouth, but you clenched your jaw instead to keep yourself from listening to the voices in your head, “my bad. just ain’t had time to check my texts lately.”

“mhm,” you hummed lowly as you stared up at him with a blank expression, seemingly calm on the surface but fuming in the inside, “that’s pretty funny, you know? especially since you’ve been real active on social media lately.”

“not to mention, you been flashing your lil’ girlfriend around campus, too. in fact… isn’t there a picture of you and her pinned on your Instagram that you posted three days ago, Cam?” you asked casually as you flashed a grin, though there was no joy in your expression whatsoever, “what was her name again? hm, let me think… oh! Jasmine, right?”

Cameron looked at you silently, though his face spoke more than his vocals ever could. he can’t say he didn’t expect this, but what was throwing him off was the scarily calm look on your face and the intensity in your gaze. there was something different about your presence and he couldn’t put his finger on it, but whatever it was had the hairs on the back of his neck standing at full attention.

“you didn’t stop speaking to me because you were ‘busy’. you stopped speaking to me because you got a girlfriend,” you chuckled bitterly as you glared at him, “uh-huh, that’s it. you cut me off and left me high and dry to go play boyfriend, that’s what this is.”

Cameron parted his lips to speak, but you immediately raised your index finger and sat it against his mouth, watching his lips immediately close again and his adam’s apple bob from a swallow.

“shut the fuck up. i’m talking,” you growled as you narrowed your eyes at him and removed your finger from his lips, your hand moving to grab ahold of his jaw to force him to maintain eye contact with you, “you think you can just fuck me and leave? huh? you think you can ghost me and move on like i don’t exist? like i didn’t become your stress reliever when you’d get out of football practice? like you didn’t have my legs pinned beside my head while you fucked me like i owed you something?”

“well, guess what? i’m not goin’ nowhere and i’m not sharing you, Cameron. you’re mine, so fuck her and fuck that lil’ ass ‘relationship’ you got with her,” you warned as you slightly raised your eyebrows to emphasize your point, “i’m only gon’ say this shit once, so you better heed my fuckin’ warning. because next time, i won’t talk and i’ll let you see for yourself how serious i really am.”

your hand left his jaw and went inside your coat to slip inside the inner pocket as your fingertips wrapped around your special toy and slyly pulled it out, pressing the cool steel of it underneath his chin.

Cameron’s eyes never left yours and his body tensed up as he swallowed hard at the feeling of your handgun against his warm skin, his jaw clenching slightly to contain the fear coursing through him.

“you feel that, baby?” you cooed condescendingly, smiling sadistically, as you slid the gun up to his cheek and gently tapped the barrel of it against his face twice, your smile widening when you saw him flinch, “you feel what’s gon’ happen to you if i catch you with her again? hm?”

you applied slight pressure and pressed the barrel of the gun further onto his cheek, watching his breathing hitch as his hands balled up at his sides. your eyes lingered on his face before slowly dragging down his body, finding satisfaction in seeing the way his body reacted to being held at gunpoint.

however, when your eyes dropped below his hips, one of your eyebrows rose at the sight before you, and you smirked patronizingly as your head raised and you looked up at Cameron, noticing the shift in his gaze.

“damn, if i knew you’d get hard from me pullin’ a gun out on you, i wouldn’t have waited this long to do it,” you chuckled mockingly as you pressed your body flush against his and watched him inhale sharply through his nostrils, his hard dick now pressed against you and pulsing through his sweatpants, “untie my trench coat, Cam. i got another surprise for you underneath it.”

truthfully, Cameron didn’t know how to feel because he had so many emotions coursing through him at once that it was hard to determine which one was the strongest.

he was afraid of what you’d do to him, but was also intrigued by how far you were willing to go just to have him to yourself. he felt embarrassed about getting an erection from your malicious threats, but his body seemingly had a mind of its own and viewed the gun as an aphrodisiac instead of what it actually was — something that’d be used against him without a doubt if he didn’t comply.

his hands trembled slightly as he raised them from his sides and grabbed ahold of the knot in your trench coat, his eyes nervously flickering between yours and the article of clothing on your body. slowly, Cameron untied the knot and gently pushed the coat open, inhaling sharply through his nostrils at the sight of the black lace against your bare melanated skin.

“f… fuck…” Cameron managed to croak out, his voice barely audible, as his eyes dragged along your figure and you smirked satisfactorily, pulling your arms back and shrugging the coat off of your shoulders until it eventually hit the floor behind you.

“you like it?” you grinned innocently, batting your eyelashes at him, as you pressed the barrel of the gun into the center of his chest and dragged it down his torso before stopping at his lower abdomen, causing his breathing to catch while his eyes dropped down to watch your movements, “i bought it just for you, baby… i remember you said you loved seeing me in lace.”

Cameron’s eyes found yours and he blinked through his hypnotic state as he gazed down at you and swallowed thickly, his throat suddenly dry the moment he tried to find his voice again. when he failed to speak, he nodded instead, the motion meek and almost submissive, earning a soft chuckle from you.

“mm-mm. use that mouth, Cam,” you cooed, a small smirk crossing your face, as you moved the gun to press into the center of his chest for a second time and your other hand reached down to his erection, wrapping your fingers around it through the layers of clothing and gently squeezing it, “tell me you like my dress.”

“…i-i like your dress…” Cameron admitted softly, his words a bit breathy from your grip on his dick, as his hands cautiously found your waist and you smiled in delight, your body instinctively leaning into the warmth of his palms while your eyes remained locked in on his face.

Cameron didn’t stutter often, nor did he ever speak timidly, but there was something about you that had him feeling more submissive than he ever had in his life — or maybe, it was just the effects of his life being on the line for fucking over the wrong woman that had him too fearful to say or do the wrong thing.

“how much?” you purred, gently biting down on your bottom lip, as you let go of his dick and slipped your hand inside his sweatpants, brushing past the waistband of his boxers with ease and wrapping your fingers around his bare phallus while you began to stroke him slowly.

a soft groan fell from Cameron’s lips and his grip slightly tightened on your waist as his head tilted back a bit towards the door and his hips gently jutted forward, pressing himself further against you and the palm of your hand.

“s-shit… so much, mama,” Cameron groaned as his hooded eyes left your face and averted to your body again, allowing them to slowly wander across your scandalously-clad figure and properly drink you in, “you look so fuckin’ good in that dress.”

your eyes lit up and you grinned widely, watching Cameron’s eyes choose parts of your body to momentarily fixate on before moving to another part of you. the term of endearment sent pleasant shudders through you and a moan of contentment fell from your lips as you slightly tightened your grip on his dick and sped up your hand a little, flicking your wrist to also stroke him in a circle instead of the only doing the standard up-and-down motion.

“good enough for you to bend me over that couch and fuck me in it?”

your hands clung to the couch cushions as you stood bent over the couch arm, a deep arch in your back while Cameron fisted your dress and bunched it up against the middle of your back. your moans and cries filled the room and echoed off the walls as sounds of skin slapping, groans, and wet squelching harmonized with your sounds of pleasure, Cameron’s other hand firmly gripping your hip while he deeply stroked you at a quick pace.

your ass bounced and rippled against Cameron’s pelvis and your breasts pressed into the couch as a furrow sat between your eyebrows and your mouth hung open, your jaw slack while your body slightly jerked forward with each of Cameron’s thrusts. Cameron’s grip on your dress tightened and his fingers dug into the material before it sharply ripped under his tight grip, earning a broken gasp from you as you felt him completely tear it off of your frame.

this — this is why you couldn’t let him go. he knew your body better anyone else did. he knew how to fuck you so good that you’d still feel him the next day. Cameron was notoriously skilled in bed, and you knew other girls on campus knew that because word gets around fast, but you were through sharing — you were completely over it, actually. you were tired of thinking about the next bitch who got to cum on his dick that wasn’t you.

this time things would be different — because you’d be the only one cumming on his dick from now on.

suddenly, the position switched and both of you ended up on the couch as you sat on his lap, your thighs on either side of his while you bounced at a quick pace. his large hands firmly gripped your hips to help guide you and he leaned up to you as he kissed you hungrily, desperately deepening the kiss while your hands clung to his shoulders.

you moaned into his mouth and he groaned into yours in response, but the moment was abruptly interrupted by the sound of a phone ringing, making you huff in annoyance before pulling away from the kiss.

your hips gradually slowed and you parted lips to question whose phone could possibly be ringing, but then you paused before a word to leave your mouth, and a smirk slowly spread across your face as you met Cameron’s gaze and slightly tilted your head.

that wasn’t your phone, and you knew it wasn’t because you left yours at home.

“answer it, Cam.” you grinned innocently, your hips coming to a stop, as you sat fully seated on his dick and caressed his shoulders with your fingertips, feeling them tense up from your words.

Cameron’s mouth opened to decline but you immediately glared at him before any word could actually leave his vocals, one of your hands leaving his shoulders to grab ahold of your gun.

“i wasn’t asking,” you remarked, your voice suddenly shifting to a snarky tone, as you pressed the gun into the center of his chest and your other hand tightened on his shoulder, your eyes slightly narrowing at him, “pick it up and put it on speaker. now.”

the moment your gun touched Cameron’s chest, his dick twitched inside you and his fingers flexed against your hips, his breathing hitching and becoming a bit heavier than before. hesitantly, Cameron took a hand off of you and leaned forward as he grabbed his phone from the coffee table and leaned back against the couch, looking up at you for a moment before reluctantly answering the phone call.

“hello?”

“hey, baby! i was callin’ to see if you were still awake or not ‘cause i’m gettin’ ready to come see you,” the sound of Jasmine’s sweet and unsuspecting voice echoed throughout the living room and you could feel Cameron tense up further underneath you, “i didn’t wake you, did i?”

your eyebrows immediately furrowed at her words, your eyes darting between Cameron’s face and his phone. she was “getting ready” to come see him? while you were here with him? you weren’t going for that. in fact, you were going to make sure she didn’t show up at all.

before Cameron could even open his mouth to speak, you started moving again, deep determination and pure fury surging through you while your grip tightened on his shoulder and you pressed the tip of the gun further into his chest. Cameron’s eyes slightly widened and he inhaled sharply through his nose as he watched you intently, unable to control the way his body responded to the feeling of your pussy wrapped around him.

“n— nah. nah, you d-didn’t.” Cameron tried to mask his pleasure, but his words came out completely strained and his voice slightly cracked as his hand left your hip and his entire arm banded around your waist, holding you against him while you continued bouncing on him.

you smirked sadistically and pressed your forehead against his as you slid the gun up to rest underneath his chin and pressed your chest flush against his, eliciting a quiet whimper from him while his colored eyes searched yours.

“why you sound like that? you okay?” the genuine concern in Jasmine’s questions only made your smirk widen and you bit down on your bottom lip as you pressed your knees deeper into the couch cushions and bounced harder, taking his dick as deep as possible while a furrow formed between Cameron’s eyebrows.

Cameron’s jaw fell open and his bottom lip trembled as he tried to form a sentence of reassurance to give his girlfriend, but a deep moan fell from his lips instead once he felt your tongue drag across his mandible. you smiled victoriously and dragged your tongue all the way to his earlobe, kissing it before flicking the top of it with the tip of your tongue.

“you know what i want you to do, Cameron,” you whispered patronizingly in his ear as your hand slid up from his shoulder to the back of his neck, cradling it in your palm while his arm flexed around you, “tell her you done with her. tell you don’t want her no more. tell her not to call you no more. tell her you leaving her. do it or i’ll kill her.”

“Cameron… are you good? what the hell was that?”

a desperate whimper fell from Cameron’s mouth, though he didn’t know if it was from fear or pleasurable, and the sound of your threatening whispers mixing with Jasmine’s innocent voice nearly sent him into psychosis, conflict and pleasure internally battling to control his facial expressions.

“J-Jas…” Cameron exhaled shakily as he swallowed hard and tried to steady his voice, but considering the position he was in — literally and figuratively — he knew it would be a waste of time, “i can’t… c-can’t do this wit’ you no m-more.”

“you can’t do what no more with me? Cam, what the hell you got goin’ on? like, seriously. ‘cause i know you not about to do what i think you are.”

you pulled back from Cameron’s earlobe and looked down at him, meeting his gaze that was somewhat unsteady. a stray tear formed in one of Cameron’s eyes and you smiled sadistically as you watched it roll down his cheek before wiping it away with the tip of the gun, making him flinch.

“do. it. Cameron.” you whispered demandingly, slightly raising both of your eyebrows, as you gently tapped the gun against his cheek and suddenly bucked your hips, earning another whimper from him.

“i-i’m… i’m leaving you, Jasmine. i c-can’t do this relationship shit wit’ you no m-more…” the words left a bitter taste in Cameron’s mouth, as if his stomach acid had refluxed and scorched the back of his throat. his body tensed after the words hit his eardrums, as if it had physically pained him to leave the woman he cared about.

but you? you were elated to see the words pour from his mouth, no matter how much they may have hurt him you say or how much they may have hurt Jasmine to hear. there was no going back after this, and you and Cameron both knew it, but sooner or later, you’d grow on him and he’d learn to love you like you loved him — frankly, he had no choice.

and just like that, Cameron was stuck between a rock and a hard place — the “hard place” being a woman he mistakenly fucked over who wouldn’t hesitate to kill to get him all to herself, even if it meant he had to die, too.

[slvttyfied]

oh my love, i am sooooo honored!!! because this was hot as FUCK 😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨 miss thing is very Kaymore Lake coded, I promise I can’t tell the difference 😋 baby got the freakum dress on but it’s to get revenge and I LIIIIVEEEEE!

“tell her you done with her. tell you don’t want her no more. tell her not to call you no more. tell her you leaving her. do it or i’ll kill her.”

that was my favorite part 🤭 and what I love the most is I don’t even think Cam listened because he thought he was gonna die, he was gonna do this anyway. whether miss thing had the g*n or not, she was getting her way w/ him regardless!!!! 💋

Thank you for the tag and I love that you live for crazy sht like this right along with me because I promise you, this my sht right here! 🤭 job well done, ke baby!!! 💐💕

[slvttyfied]

making a new navigation post brb

[slvttyfied]

new nav + masterlist <3

[slvttyfied]

⋆. 𐙚˚࿔ 𝐬𝐥𝐯𝐭𝐭𝐲𝐟𝐢𝐞𝐝’𝐬 𝐦. 𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭𝜗𝜚˚⋆ 💋

rules °❀.ೃ࿔*:

No minors allowed whatsoever. ageless accounts and blank blogs will be blocked — zero exceptions.

Spam liking is prohibited — please don’t run through liking every fic from this list, it’s a sensory issue for me, you will be blocked.

BLACK! FEMALE! SHE/HER CHARACTER INSERTS! I ONLY WRITE FOR BLACK WOMEN! BEWARE IN THESE FICS RESPECTIVE BLACK CHARACTERS WILL OCCASIONALLY USE THE N WORD!

index °❀.ೃ࿔*:

c.evans

╰┈➤ s.rogers . a.barber . hr.drysdale . a.levinson . l.hansen

s.stan

╰┈➤ jb.barnes

fear street

╰┈➤ n.goode . t.slater

outer banks / obx

╰┈➤ r.cameron . j.maybank . k.carerra (coming soon). s.cameron (coming soon)

tyriq withers

╰┈➤ t.withers . c.cade . l.ward . aaron from atl . sa.jackson brooks . t.spencer

all work/lists will be respectfully and respectively updated as they come out. 🩰

⊹₊⟡⋆

all rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form without the prior permission of the author. by complying with the authors moral rights, no persons shall face penalties for illegal copyright infringement and will not face zero charges.

created 2018 | © slvttyfied

divider: @uzmacchiato 💋

[slvttyfied]

𝐑𝐀𝐅𝐄 𝐂𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐑𝐎𝐍 : 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐊𝐎𝐎𝐊 𝐏𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐂𝐄 ✰

— a masterpost for a 6’2 blue eyed brunette with anger issues.

* : indicates dark material and/ or smut

- I do not give anyone permission to steal my work, whether you credit me or not. I only post work to my tumblr and AO3, any other platform is not me whatsoever! I do not own or take ownership of the people and the characters I write for, everything is purely fictional and for enjoyment purposes.

I write with fem/female pronouns and fluidity! My work is open for all to read but I primarily write for black women, afro hispanic women, and plus sized afro hispanic women!

Heed every warning of every piece as a lot of my writing has dark elements and undertones, I am not responsible for your content consumption. Minors— never interact or I will block indefinitely.

ONE SHOTS / STAND ALONE(S) ✯

FIVE A.M

⤷ When Rafe needs a shoulder to cry on, you’re the last person he expected

DON’T MAKE ME WAIT FOREVER *

⤷ Your short fused, stalker ex has had enough of waiting for you to come back to him

WELCOME HOME, SIDNEY *

⤷ Ghostface is back on the prowl despite your survival of an attack two years ago. When the mask comes off, it’s who you least expected it to be

NEED TO KNOW *

⤷ You decide it’s time to lose your virginity

THE JEALOUS TYPE *

⤷ In which you stake your claim on two of the most popular boys on campus

SERVED COLD / GHOSTFACE DUO *

⤷ “Don’t you know history repeats itself?”

SERIES ✯

SALACIOUS *

⤷ Something isn’t right with your adoptive brother and you’d find out against your will — COMPLETED

PYRAMIDS *

⤷ Your regular at your job just can’t comprehend what it’s like between business and pleasure — ONGOING

A SOFT SOLITUDE

⤷ Faceless/ Hidden! Rafe Cameron and a social media AU. Will he let you in like he’s let in others? — ONGOING

METANOIA *

⤷ “Who is this? Who am i? What is this?” / sequel story to Salacious.

BLURBS AND HC’S ✯

RAFE KIDNAPS THE READER *

⤷ While on a trip to Barbados to start over their lives completely, the family takes Sarah. Realizing this means leaving behind the OBX, Rafe takes the one person he can’t live without

RAFE SAYING I LOVE YOU *

⤷ Those three words but not in your usual setting

IF RAFE WAS LIKE TOPPER *

⤷ If a love sick Topper obsessed with Sarah was Rafe loved up and heartbroken over you

RAFE TAKES YOU GOLFING *

⤷ A golfing date with your boyfriend sounds beautiful and exciting, right?

* will be updated with every upload of something new!

[slvttyfied]

𝘽𝙊𝙊𝙆 𝙊𝙁 𝙃𝙀𝙓𝙀𝙎 ☆

Wᵣₐₚₚₑd ᵢₙ bₐᵣbₑd wᵢᵣₑ, ᵤₙₑₐᵣₜₕₑd, ₐₙd ₕᵢddₑₙ fₒᵣ ₐ ᵣₑₐₛₒₙ. ₜₐₖₑ ₐ ₗₒₒₖ ᵢₙₛᵢdₑ ₐₛ ᵢₜ ᵢₛ ₜₕₐₜ ₜᵢₘₑ ₒf ₜₕₑ ₛₑₐₛₒₙ.. 🦇

⋆

however if you stumble upon this and decide to follow me but you are a minor, your blog is blank, and your age isn’t in your bio— you’re blocked!

Spam liking is also prohibited, please don’t run through liking every fic from this list, it’s a sensory issue for me, especially if you don’t plan on leaving comments! If you see this and proceed, I will block you.

𝐌𝐄𝐄𝐓 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐀𝐒𝐓:

ＣＨＲIＳ ＥＶＡＮＳ ＊

ＳＴＥＶＥ ＲＯＧＥＲＳ ＊

ＡＮＤＹ ＢＡＲＢＥＲ ＊

ＨＵＧＨ ＲＡＮＳＯＭ ＤＲＹＳＤＡＬＥ ＊

ＡＲＩ ＬＥＶＩＮＳＯＮ ＊

ＬＬＯＹＤ ＨＡＮＳＥＮ ＊

ＪＡＭＥＳ ＢＵＣＨＡＮＡＮ ＢＡＲＮＥＳ ＊

ＦＥＡＲ ＳＴＲＥＥＴ ＊

ＯＵＴＥＲ ＢＡＮＫＳ ＊

[slvttyfied]

also re-doing!!!

[slvttyfied]

making a new navigation post brb

[mamasturn]

EARLY MORNINGS | JAAFAR JACKSON

Pairing: Jaafar Jackson x Black!OC Amara Jackson Summary: Amara has early morning opinions about what her man should be doing. Songs: WC: Warnings: 18+ suggestive content Note: headcannon from the miniseries I have for them <3

SHE LOVED HIM LIKE EARLY MORNINGS IN BED…LUSH. QUIET. PEACEFUL…

“You still got opinions about what I should be doin’ on my knees?” Jaafar asked quietly.

Amara didn’t answer immediately. She traced his fingers where they rested against her. “…Yes.”

A pause.

The wind whispered the linen curtains in front of the window. The birds sang a sweet song on the balcony’s ledge. The sun peeked through the blinds.

“Even now?”

Another beat.

“Especially now.”

He hummed. Fingers sliding along blue satin that covered her hips. Amara lifted her chin, the corner of her mouth raised.

“Baby…” She laid her hand on his chest and used it as leverage to hover above him. She held his gaze. “Don’t act like you didn’t hear me last night.”

Jaafar lifted his eyes.

Amara exhaled, “Beautiful.” Her thumb smoothed over his eyebrow and trailed down his warm skin.

He bit his lip. “You mean it, or you tryin’ to get what you want?” He asked it low, like he already knew the answer.

Amara didn’t blink. “Both.”

A pause. Slow. Measured.

He huffed once through his nose. Not amused enough to give her satisfaction, but not unaffected either. Not when Aphrodite had emerged from seafoam and clothed herself in satin and gold.

“Hm.” Then, quieter: “Say please.”

Amara leaned forward, her lips warm against his jaw. Then his cheek. Then his ear. Her teeth found the shell of it and bit softly. He shuddered beneath her. “Please, baby…”

His breath hitched. She smiled.

“Lie back.”

-

Tags: @darkseidex @plan3tch1ld @saintwrld @prettyangeliczz

[slvttyfied]

I’d like to formally say thank you for being the first Jaafar fic I’m reading as I’m steadily opening up to reading for him and his fine ass uncle! 😋😩 this was the perfect soft introduction to my man being an eater, i love it! 💕 Will continue to read everything you got! 🥰

[slvttyfied]

To my writing moots— imma read and spam the fck outta y’all’s writing today so be prepared! 💕😌💐

tags include but not limited to: @yourleogf @mamasturn @bamb1ss @darkseidex @xoshowgrl @sonder-slut 🎀

to my loves that I missed, if you see this post, PLEASE tag me in some writing and I’d be more than happy to show love. Y’all be loving me tf down and I HAVE to give that sh*t back 🦋💫💕

reblogs are welcome to any work from non moots that folks want me to check out, I’m mad open and more than happy to give some lovin’ 💐

talk to me!

- gina b

[slvttyfied]

today is all abt them 💕

[mamasturn]

Sigh…time to get my pen out

[darkseidex]

╰┈➤CHAPTER ONE- BEE!

Tyriq Withers thinks accepting the role of Lorenzo Anders is just another career move—until the name Karnation Noel James is placed in front of him again.

Sitting in his agent’s office in Jacksonville, Tyriq learns that he has officially been cast as the leading man in the film adaptation of Karnation’s bestselling novel, Ruin Me Gently. To the public, Lorenzo Anders is fiction: a beautiful, destructive, unforgettable man readers cannot stop loving. But to Tyriq, the details are too familiar to ignore. His middle name. Their childhood street. Pieces of his past, his flaws, and the love he lost years ago are written all over the character.

The problem is, Karnation is not just his ex.

JEZEBEL 

Tyriq sighed as he leaned back in the leather chair opposite his agent’s desk, manspreading with the lazy entitlement of a man who had long ago stopped being aware of how much space the world allowed him to take up, one arm draped across the side of the chair, the other resting against his thigh while his thumb worried absently at the edge of his phone, a light frown pulling at his face as Jacksonville daylight came spilling through the tall office windows and painted gold across the hard line of his jaw, the bridge of his nose, the slight crease between his brows, and the mouth that had made photographers rich and women unreasonable.

Outside, the humidity pressed its wet hands against the glass like Florida itself was trying to get in, all heavy air and palm shadows and traffic moving slow beneath a bruised-blue sky, and even inside the chilled polish of his agent’s office, with its framed magazine covers, expensive candles, acrylic awards, and one ridiculous fiddle-leaf fig that had no business surviving in a room full of egos, Tyriq could still feel that old heat sitting on his skin.

Jacksonville heat was different.

It remembered him.

It clung to him the same way the past did, slipping under collars, behind ears, beneath rings that were not wedding rings but still came with expectations, beneath the name of a woman he had been with for years and still somehow had never fully learned how to belong to.

Across from him, his agent, Darlene Baptiste, stood behind her desk with both hands braced on the glass top, looking at him over the rim of her glasses like she was two seconds away from either cursing him out or calling his mother, which was a dangerous look on a Southern woman because it meant she had already done both spiritually.

“And you’re sure I was cast in this role?” Tyriq asked, his voice low and slow, threaded with disbelief he was trying to disguise as boredom.

Darlene blinked at him once.

Then twice.

Then she leaned back, pressed her tongue to the inside of her cheek, and exhaled through her nose in that tired, church-lady way that made a man feel like he had disappointed every woman who had ever packed him a lunch.

“Tyriq,” she said, dragging his name out until it sounded like both a warning and a prayer, “you’re fixin’ to get off my nerves.”

He lifted a brow.

“I’m asking a question.”

“No, you’re asking the same question with different seasoning.”

“I’m trying to understand.”

“You understand just fine,” Darlene said, circling the desk in heels sharp enough to puncture foolishness, a cream blazer sitting crisp over her shoulders, her locs swept back from a face too composed for how irritated she clearly was. “You just don’t like that the answer stayed the same after the fifth time you asked.”

Tyriq’s jaw moved, but no words came out immediately, because the truth was that he had understood her the first time, had understood perfectly well when she told him the studio had moved forward, the contracts were being finalised, the announcement was being timed, and his name was attached to Lorenzo Anders like it had always belonged there, but understanding a thing and letting it enter his body were not the same, and this particular truth had been standing at the door of him for twenty minutes, knocking politely while he pretended not to be home.

Lorenzo Anders.

Even the name bothered him.

Not because it was ugly, because it was not, but because it touched too many old things at once, dragging knuckles along the underside of memory with the confidence of someone who knew where all the bruises lived.

Lorenzo was his middle name.

Anders was the street he had grown up on.

And Karnation Noel James, because God apparently had a flair for cruelty and dramatic structure, was the woman who had written him.

Not literally, Darlene kept saying.

Not provably, his lawyer would probably say.

Not according to any interview Karnation had ever given, where she smiled that clean, elegant, media-trained smile and said Lorenzo was an amalgamation of men, myth, and imagination, which was the kind of answer that sounded beautiful on camera and dishonest to anybody who had once stood with her beneath Florida rain while she traced his palm and told him she could always tell when he was lying.

Tyriq stared at the glossy packet on the desk between them.

The title sat bold across the first page.

RUIN ME GENTLY

Beneath it, in smaller letters, the adaptation details, production timeline, studio attachments, casting confirmation, and Karnation’s name sitting there in black print like it had not once been written in the margins of his notebooks, on birthday cards, on the inside of his wrist in blue ink because she had gotten bored during church and decided his skin needed decorating.

Karnation Noel James.

The name had weight.

It had always had weight.

Even when they were kids and she was just Karnation from two houses down, all knees and braids and bossy little mouth, yelling at him because he ran too fast and never waited for her even though he always slowed down eventually; even when they were teenagers and she started becoming beautiful in a way that made him angry at everybody who noticed; even when they got older and crossed that invisible line between friendship and something too hungry to be innocent, her name had always done something to him.

Now it sat on a film packet.

On a publishing empire.

On bestsellers and award lists and interviews where she wore silk and spoke like every sentence had been edited by God.

And she had not spoken to him in years.

Tyriq shifted in the chair, widening his knees a little more as if his body could physically push the discomfort out of the room, but the leather only creaked beneath him, and Darlene, who had known him too long to be impressed by posture, watched him with her arms folded.

“You’re acting like you didn’t campaign for this role,” she said.

“I didn’t campaign.”

“You called me at eleven at night after reading the script.”

“I had notes.”

“You had feelings.”

“I had professional interest.”

“You read the bathroom scene three times and went quiet for ten minutes.”

Tyriq’s eyes cut to her.

Darlene lifted one manicured hand.

“Don’t look at me like that. I was on the phone.”

“That scene was good.”

“That scene was personal.”

He looked away first, and that irritated him more than anything she had said, because Tyriq had built an entire public life out of not looking away first.

He had learned early, long before cameras and stylists and women screaming his name from barricades, that confidence was a kind of currency, that men who looked sure of themselves could get away with not knowing what they were doing, and over the years he had sharpened that lesson into armour, wearing arrogance so well people mistook it for personality.

But Darlene had known him before the luxury watches, before the security detail, before the red carpets and the interviews where hosts leaned in too far and asked him about his type like there was not a woman at home who checked his phone whenever his shower ran too long.

Darlene had known him when Velma still showed up to events in dresses too tight and smiles too sweet, holding his hand like she was not afraid of losing him because she had already lost him once and decided never again.

Velma.

His phone lit up against his thigh, and, as if summoned by the mere thought of her, her name appeared across the screen with three red heart emojis and one location pin she had started using in his contact because she said it was “cute” but Tyriq knew better.

VELMA ❤️❤️❤️📍: Where are you?

A second later.

VELMA ❤️❤️❤️📍: You been in that meeting long.

Then.

VELMA ❤️❤️❤️📍: Is Darlene in there by herself with you?

Tyriq stared at the messages without opening them, his mouth tightening slightly before he turned the phone face down on his thigh.

Darlene saw it anyway.

Of course she did.

Darlene saw everything except mercy, which she considered optional.

“She still tracking your breathing?” she asked.

Tyriq gave her a look.

“Don’t start.”

“I didn’t start. Velma started years ago and never stopped.”

“That’s my girl.”

“I know who she is,” Darlene said, her voice flattening just enough to make the sentence mean more than it said.

Tyriq’s shoulders stiffened.

Velma had been his girl before Karnation, which was the part of the story everybody conveniently remembered when they wanted to make his life sound cleaner than it was, but the truth was never clean where the three of them were concerned.

Velma had been first in the technical sense, first girl he claimed loudly enough for people to repeat it, first girl who wore his letterman jacket like a warning label, first girl who learned how to hold his hand in public and tighten her nails into his palm whenever Karnation walked by, but Karnation had been first in the way that mattered, first in the marrow, first in the place men like him spent years pretending did not exist because admitting a woman had reached it meant she could ruin you without touching you.

When he and Velma broke up the first time, people said he moved on with Karnation.

They said it like Karnation had been an interruption.

A mistake.

A rebound with pretty eyes and too much pride.

They did not know that Karnation had been there long before Velma ever learned how to say his name like possession, long before kissing became a public matter, long before Tyriq understood that sometimes your best friend could become the love of your life so slowly that by the time you noticed, she had already rearranged the furniture inside your chest.

And then he lost her.

Or she left him.

Depending on who told it.

Depending on whose mother was crying.

Depending on which side of the street you stood on.

The part that made him look worst, the part Darlene knew because Darlene knew too damn much, was that Velma had come back the day after Karnation was gone.

One day.

Twenty-four hours, if that.

Tyriq had been so deep in heartbreak he could barely eat, though he never admitted that to anyone, not even himself, just moved through the world mean and quiet and reckless, acting like anger was easier than grief because for men like him it usually was, and Velma had shown up with soft hands, wet eyes, and a voice that told him he did not have to be alone if he did not want to be.

He had let her in because he was hurt.

Because he was proud.

Because Karnation had vanished and he needed somebody, anybody, to look at him like he had not been abandoned.

Because Velma loved like a locked door and he was too broken at the time to notice the difference between being held and being trapped.

Now years had passed, and Velma was still there, threaded through his life like a ribbon pulled too tight around a gift nobody had asked for, smiling beside him at premieres, correcting women who called him single, telling interviewers they were private, calling his mother more often than he did, and slipping into every empty space Karnation had left behind like filling a vacancy could make her the rightful owner of the house.

His phone buzzed again.

Darlene looked down at it, then back at him.

“You answering that?”

“No.”

“Growth,” she said dryly.

“It’s a meeting.”

“Since when has that stopped her?”

Tyriq’s eyes narrowed. “Darlene.”

She held up both hands. “Fine. We’ll talk about the job before your girlfriend sends a search party through the lobby.”

“She’s not that bad.”

Darlene’s mouth did something complicated.

Not quite a smile.

Not quite agreement.

“She once called my office pretending to be your dermatologist so she could confirm whether you were in a meeting with me.”

Tyriq rubbed a hand over his mouth.

“That was one time.”

“That was Wednesday.”

He said nothing.

“She also tried to get your assistant fired because the girl wrote ‘safe flight’ with a heart emoji.”

“It was unprofessional.”

“It was a yellow heart, Tyriq. That’s barely a heart. That’s a customer service heart.”

Despite himself, his mouth twitched, but the almost-smile died quickly because the packet still sat there, Karnation’s name still staring up at him, Velma’s texts still warming his phone like a small electrical fire.

Darlene sat on the edge of her desk, her irritation softening into something more careful.

“You need to understand what you’re stepping into,” she said.

Tyriq leaned back again, eyes lifting to hers.

“I understand the job.”

“No, you understand acting. You understand the camera, the schedule, the physical work, the press junkets, the interviews where people ask the same six questions and pretend they’re original. That’s not what I’m talking about.”

He said nothing.

Darlene picked up the packet and tapped it once against her palm.

“This book is not just a book to people. Women have built whole personalities around this man. They got quotes tattooed on ribs. They argue about him online like he owes them rent. Lorenzo Anders is a monster, a fantasy, a wound, and a warning sign wearing good cologne, and now you’re the face of him.”

Tyriq’s eyes stayed on the packet.

“And?”

“And the woman who created him is Karnation Noel James.”

The room seemed to settle around her name.

Tyriq looked toward the window, jaw flexing as the Florida sun shifted slightly, catching the side of his face in a way that made him look carved and cornered at the same time.

Darlene lowered her voice.

“I know you two got history.”

He gave a humourless laugh.

“Everybody thinks they know that.”

“I know enough.”

“No, you know what folks said.”

“Then tell me what they got wrong.”

Tyriq looked at her then, and for one second there was something almost dangerous in his eyes, not violence, not anger exactly, but the defensive flash of a man standing too close to a place he had spent years fencing off.

Darlene, being Darlene, did not flinch.

The silence stretched.

Outside the office, someone laughed near reception, bright and distant, and the sound felt obscene in a room where the past had pulled up a chair.

Tyriq’s fingers tapped once against the armrest.

Then stopped.

“We were kids,” he said finally.

Darlene’s expression did not change.

“You were in college.”

“We grew up together.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one I got.”

But it was not.

That was the lie.

He had thousands of answers, too many answers, answers that had lived under his tongue for years and turned bitter from being swallowed.

He could have told Darlene about Karnation at seven, marching into his yard because he had broken the head off her doll and swearing she would never speak to him again before coming back an hour later with two popsicles and a demand that he apologise properly.

He could have told her about Karnation at thirteen, elbowing him in the ribs at the movies because he was breathing too loud, then falling asleep against his shoulder ten minutes later with her hand curled in his hoodie.

He could have told her about Karnation at eighteen, standing in his dorm room with tears in her eyes and rage in her voice, asking him why loving him felt like trying to hold water in both hands.

He could have told her about the breakup.

The real one.

Not the version people passed around with missing pieces and convenient blame, but the ugly, unfinished thing with too much pride, too many people in their ears, too many half-truths, and one final argument that had left him certain she would come back because Karnation always came back, until she didn’t.

Until her phone stopped ringing.

Until her mother stopped answering the door the same way.

Until the James family stopped sitting near his at church.

Until Anders Street, which had once belonged to both of them, split itself down the middle like a cracked plate nobody knew how to glue back together.

And then Velma had been there.

Sweet at first.

Too sweet, maybe.

The kind of sweetness that stuck.

The kind that made it hard to breathe if you let it sit too long.

Darlene watched him carefully, and her voice softened further.

“Have you spoken to Karnation since?”

His gaze cut away.

“No.”

“Not once?”

“No.”

“In all these years?”

“Darlene.”

“I’m asking because if this becomes an issue, I need to know before it becomes my issue.”

“It won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“It won’t,” he repeated, though the words sounded more like a command to the universe than an assessment of reality.

Darlene stared at him for a long moment, then stood and walked back around her desk, opening a drawer with the kind of deliberate calm that told him she was about to produce something unpleasant.

When she pulled out the paperback, his chest tightened before his face could stop it.

He had seen the cover before, of course.

Everybody had.

It had been in airports, bookstores, grocery aisles, TikTok edits, Instagram stories, women’s hands on beaches, nightstands, coffee tables, and once, painfully, in Velma’s tote bag, though she had claimed she bought it “just to see what all the hype was about” before spending three days in a mood and asking him if he had ever loved somebody enough to let them ruin him.

The cover was elegant, dark, expensive-looking, all deep shadows and soft gold lettering, the kind of book that knew exactly what it was doing.

Darlene placed it on the desk in front of him.

Tyriq did not touch it.

“You read it?” she asked.

“Parts.”

“That’s a lie.”

His jaw tightened.

“I read enough.”

“You read enough to call me at eleven at night.”

“I read the script.”

“You read the book too.”

He stayed quiet.

Darlene tapped the author name with one nail.

“Karnation is an executive producer.”

“I know.”

“She will be involved.”

“I know.”

“She may be in rooms.”

“I know.”

“You may have to sit across from her and discuss Lorenzo Anders like he is not wearing pieces of your face.”

Tyriq’s eyes lifted sharply.

Darlene did not blink.

“There it is,” she said quietly.

“What?”

“That look.”

“I don’t have a look.”

“Baby, I have represented you for six years. You have exactly five looks and three of them are bad decisions in different fonts.”

He huffed once, despite himself, but his attention dropped back to the book like gravity had changed.

Lorenzo Anders.

Karnation had taken his middle name and their street and made a man out of them.

A man women loved.

A man critics called beautifully destructive.

A man readers forgave for things they would have told their friends to leave.

A man who, according to the lines Tyriq had read at two in the morning with the house dark and Velma asleep beside him, knew how to love a woman with both hands and still somehow leave her bleeding.

It had pissed him off how familiar it felt.

It had pissed him off more that it was good.

“Why me?” he asked, quieter this time.

Darlene’s face shifted, and the answer was in her expression before she spoke.

“Because you’re right for it.”

“That’s the agent answer.”

“That’s the truth.”

“No,” he said, leaning forward now, elbows coming to his knees, all that careless sprawl folding into something sharper, more focused, more unsettled. “The truth is there are a hundred men who could play this role. Younger men. Men without history attached. Men who don’t come with—”

“With what?” Darlene asked.

He stopped.

Her eyes narrowed, not unkindly.

“With Karnation?”

Tyriq looked away.

His phone buzzed again.

Then again.

Velma.

He ignored it.

Darlene noticed that too, and for once she did not comment.

He stared down at his hands, at the faint scar near his knuckle from where he had punched a locker after Karnation left and told everybody it was from training, at the watch Velma had bought him for his last birthday because she liked expensive proof, at the empty space where no ring sat because even Velma, for all her determination, had not managed to force that particular surrender out of him yet.

“She know?” he asked.

“Who?”

“Karnation.”

“That you were being considered?”

“That I’m cast.”

Darlene hesitated.

It was tiny.

Barely anything.

But Tyriq had made a career out of reading pauses, and this one told him enough.

His eyes lifted slowly.

“She doesn’t know.”

“The official announcement hasn’t gone out yet.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

Darlene sighed.

“She may have been informed by production. She may not have. These things move fast.”

“Darlene.”

“I don’t know,” she admitted, and for the first time all meeting, she sounded genuinely tired. “I don’t know what Karnation knows.”

The answer sat badly in his chest.

Not because he owed Karnation comfort, though maybe he did, maybe he owed her a thousand things and had spent years pretending the debt disappeared because she never came to collect, but because some part of him, old and stupid and still loyal to the girl from Anders Street, hated the idea of her finding out from the internet.

He could see it too clearly.

Karnation somewhere elegant, somewhere controlled, her face composed while her eyes went unreadable, that little inhale she took when something hurt her but she refused to let it show, the way her chin lifted when she decided she would rather die standing than ask anybody to hold her.

He wondered if she still did that.

He wondered too much.

Darlene placed both hands flat on the desk.

“Tyriq, I need you to be honest with me.”

He gave her a look that said honesty was expensive.

She ignored it.

“Can you do this role without making it personal?”

The office went still.

Even the air conditioning seemed to quiet down, leaving nothing but the damp shine of Jacksonville beyond the windows and Velma’s unanswered messages gathering on his phone like tiny accusations.

Tyriq looked down at the book again.

At Karnation’s name.

At the title.

At the character he already knew too well for comfort.

Then he leaned back in the chair, slow and deliberate, spreading his knees again, letting the old confidence settle over him because it was easier than admitting that a woman he had not touched in years could still reach across a room through paper and make him feel seventeen, foolish, and unfinished.

“It’s acting,” he said.

Darlene stared at him.

She did not believe him.

He did not fully believe himself.

But the lie looked good on him, and that had always been half the problem.

His phone buzzed again.

This time, Velma called.

Her name lit up the screen, bright and possessive, vibrating against his thigh while Karnation’s name sat printed on the desk in front of him, and Tyriq, caught between the woman who had claimed the years and the woman who had haunted them, let the call ring.

Darlene’s eyes flicked to the phone.

Then to him.

“Well,” she said quietly, pushing the contract packet toward him, “then prove it.”

Tyriq stared at the pages, daylight cutting across his hands as he reached for the pen.

For a second, just one, his fingers hovered above the signature line.

And in that second, he was not famous, not grown, not anybody’s boyfriend, not Lorenzo Anders, not the man the studio wanted, not the man Velma guarded like property, but a boy from Florida who had loved his best friend too badly, lost her too completely, and somehow, years later, found her name waiting for him in ink.

Then he signed.

Later that evening, the condo was too quiet when Tyriq walked in, and that was how he knew he was in trouble.

Not because Velma was a quiet woman, because she was not, not in temperament, not in spirit, not in the way she loved, argued, cooked, laughed, prayed, cried, or breathed through any room she believed had even briefly belonged to her; Velma did not do silence naturally, she wielded it, sharpened it, set it in the middle of a room like a mousetrap and waited for a man to step wrong.

The place smelled like her perfume and something sweet burning low in a candle near the kitchen island, vanilla, amber, and a little smoke, the kind of scent that clung to the back of his throat and made the air feel decorated, and from the moment Tyriq shut the door behind him, keys still in one hand, contract packet tucked beneath his arm, phone heavy in his pocket from all the calls and texts he had not answered, he felt her presence before he saw her.

She was sitting in the living room with one leg crossed over the other, back straight against the couch cushion, robe slipping slightly off one shoulder, hair pinned up in a loose knot that did not look nearly as careless as she wanted it to, her nails tapping against the wineglass in her hand while the television played on mute, throwing blue-white light over her face and making her eyes look colder than they actually were.

Or maybe they were that cold.

Tyriq paused just inside the doorway, took her in, then exhaled through his nose.

“Tyriq,” Velma said, without looking at him, “what I say about you not texting me back?”

Her voice was too calm.

He almost preferred when she started loud, when she came at him already blazing, because at least then he knew where to put his hands, what tone to use, how close to stand, how much softness to pour over the fire before it reached the curtains, but this quiet, this smooth, waiting thing, always made something in him brace.

“You know I was working, V,” he said, dropping his keys into the dish by the door, his own voice lower than hers, careful without sounding afraid, because fear was something Velma could smell and he had learned a long time ago not to feed the parts of her that got hungry for it. “What was I supposed to do? Interrupt Darlene?”

Velma finally turned her head.

Slowly.

Like she wanted him to feel every inch of her attention arrive.

“So you was with Darlene all day?” she asked, one brow lifting while her mouth curved in a smile that had no sweetness in it. “That’s what you’re telling me, nigga?”

Tyriq sighed as he raked a hand over his face, the day pressing into him all at once, Darlene’s office, Karnation’s name on that packet, the pen in his hand, Velma’s unanswered calls, the Jacksonville sun, the way his middle name had looked disguised as another man’s destiny, all of it gathering behind his eyes until a frown pulled at his lips before he concealed it, smoothing his expression as he moved toward her with the lazy, deliberate confidence of a man who knew that sometimes walking slowly toward a problem made the problem remember it liked being wanted.

“C’mere,” he murmured, reaching for her as he stopped in front of the couch. “What you tripping over, ma?”

Velma’s eyes narrowed, but she let him take the glass from her hand and set it on the coffee table, and that was the first answer, the first little inch of surrender hidden beneath all that attitude, because Velma could rage all she wanted, could text him six times in twelve minutes, could call Darlene’s assistant with a fake customer service voice and pretend she had boundaries, but when Tyriq stood close enough for his cologne to settle between them and called her ma in that low, worn-out voice, her body almost always betrayed her before her pride could object.

Almost.

Not tonight.

Tonight, she leaned back before he could pull her up, her eyes dragging over him with surgical precision, taking inventory of his hoodie, his watch, the crease in his trousers, the tiredness around his mouth, the packet tucked beneath his arm, the phone still in his pocket, probably imagining women in every empty space he had occupied without her supervision.

“I’m tripping over you acting brand new,” she said. “That’s what I’m tripping over.”

“I’m not acting brand new.”

“You ain’t answer me all afternoon.”

“I was in meetings.”

“Meetings plural now?”

“Velma.”

“No, don’t Velma me,” she said, standing then, quick enough that the robe shifted again and the fabric whispered down the smooth line of her arm before she yanked it back up like modesty had suddenly become a weapon. “I asked you a question.”

Tyriq looked down at her, and even though he had height, even though he had weight, even though most rooms bent around him without being asked, Velma had never been intimidated by the size of him, had never looked at him like he was too much to challenge, because Velma loved him like she was always fighting another woman for the right to breathe near him, even when there was no woman in the room.

The problem was, tonight, there was.

Not physically.

Worse.

Karnation was in the room because her name was in the packet tucked beneath his arm, because her voice lived inside the script he had read until two in the morning, because her past with him was old enough to have roots, because even after all these years Velma could feel when Tyriq’s silence belonged to somebody else.

He set the packet on the coffee table, face down.

A mistake.

Velma’s eyes dropped to it immediately.

“What’s that?”

“Work.”

“What work?”

“The role.”

“The role Darlene had you locked in that office about all day?”

He rubbed his tongue along the inside of his cheek, then nodded once.

“Yeah.”

Velma looked from him to the packet again, and there it was, that flicker, sharp and fast, the tiny piece of suspicion catching flame before either of them had said the name.

“What’s the movie?”

Tyriq held her gaze.

“It’s the adaptation I told you about.”

“You told me about three adaptations.”

“This the big one.”

Her face changed, and because Tyriq knew her too well, because he had spent years learning the storms of Velma in order to survive them, he saw the exact second the memory landed.

The book.

The one she had bought and pretended not to finish.

The one she had left on the kitchen counter with a bookmark halfway through the spine, though he knew damn well she had read it to the end because Velma did not abandon anything that threatened her.

The one she had brought up at midnight months ago, sitting on their bed with narrowed eyes, asking him real casual whether his middle name had ever meant anything to anybody besides his mama.

Tyriq’s chest tightened.

Velma stepped closer to the coffee table but did not touch the packet.

“Ruin Me Gently?” she asked.

He said nothing.

Her laugh came out once, dry and humourless.

“Ain’t that cute.”

“V—”

“No, that’s real cute, Tyriq.”

“It’s work.”

“You keep saying that like I’m stupid.”

“I ain’t say you stupid.”

“But you talk to me like I am.”

He blew out a breath and glanced toward the ceiling for half a second, because this was the part where the floor always shifted beneath them, where any sentence could become evidence, where trying to calm her could sound like confession if he used the wrong word, the wrong tone, the wrong pause.

“I’m not doing this with you tonight.”

Velma’s head snapped back.

“Oh, you’re not doing this with me?”

“That’s not what I mean.”

“No, say what you mean then,” she said, closing the distance between them until she had to tip her chin back to look up at him, her eyes glossy now but hard, always both with her, always hurt dressed up as accusation. “You ain’t doing this with me because you already did enough today, right? Sat up in that office with Darlene talking about Karnation’s book, Karnation’s movie, Karnation’s little fake man that everybody with eyes knows is about you.”

His jaw tightened at the sound of her name.

Velma saw it.

Of course she did.

Her smile widened, but it shook at the edges.

“There it go.”

“Velma.”

“There it go,” she repeated, pointing at his face like she had found blood on his collar. “I say that girl name and you get that look.”

“What look?”

“That same stupid look you got when somebody played that interview of hers and she said she don’t believe first love ever leaves the body.”

He remembered that interview.

He hated that he remembered that interview.

Darlene had sent it to him months ago when the casting conversations first started to get serious, and he had watched Karnation sit across from some glossy host in a cream suit, legs crossed, hair falling over one shoulder, face calm, voice softer than he expected when she said, I don’t think first love leaves the body. I think it learns how to be quiet.

He had played it once.

Then again.

Then he had closed the laptop so hard Velma had looked up from her phone.

“I don’t have a look,” he said.

Velma scoffed, stepping away from him now because distance helped her rage better. “You got a whole face for that girl.”

“That girl?” he repeated, and the correction came quicker than it should have, rougher than he intended.

Velma froze.

Tyriq did too.

There was the mistake.

The room inhaled around them.

Velma’s eyes filled, but not with sadness first.

With fury.

“Oh,” she said softly. “So she not that girl now?”

“Don’t twist my words.”

“I don’t gotta twist nothing. You straighten them out just fine by yourself.”

Tyriq dragged a hand over his mouth, trying to catch his patience before it ran from him completely, because the last thing he needed was to fight with Velma over Karnation when he had not even spoken to Karnation in years, had not heard her laugh outside an interview clip, had not seen her face outside photographs, had not touched anything belonging to her except the pages she had written and somehow that still felt more intimate than it had any right to.

Velma stared at him, chest rising and falling faster now.

“You took the role?”

“It’s a good role.”

“That’s not what I asked you.”

“Yes,” he said, because lying would have been foolish and Tyriq had made enough foolish choices in his life to recognise one before stepping in it. “I signed.”

Velma went still.

There were different kinds of quiet with her, and this one was the kind that made the hair on the back of his neck rise.

“You signed,” she repeated.

“I signed.”

“Without talking to me.”

Tyriq’s brows pulled together. “Talking to you about what?”

Her mouth fell open slightly, not from surprise but from insult.

“Are you serious?”

“It’s my job.”

“It’s her.”

His eyes flashed.

“It’s a movie.”

“It’s Karnation.”

There it was again, the name splitting the room clean open.

Karnation.

Not baby, not ex, not old friend, not childhood sweetheart, not the woman whose family used to eat barbecue in his parents’ backyard on Sundays, not the girl whose mother had stopped hugging him after the breakup, not the ghost everyone learned to step around because saying her name in the Withers house had once been enough to change the weather.

Just Karnation.

And somehow that was worse.

Velma folded her arms over her chest, robe belted tight now, as if she could hold herself together through force alone.

“You remember what happened last time with her?”

Tyriq’s face hardened.

“Don’t.”

“No, you remember?”

“I said don’t.”

“Because I remember,” Velma snapped, voice cracking through the calm at last. “I remember you not eating, not sleeping, walking around here looking like somebody died, punching walls, ignoring everybody, acting like the whole world had done you dirty because Miss Perfect packed up and left your ass.”

Tyriq’s eyes went cold.

“She didn’t just leave.”

Velma laughed, sharp and ugly.

“No? Then what she do, Tyriq? Since you know so much and tell so little.”

He looked away.

The problem was that he did not know.

Not enough.

Not the parts that mattered.

For years he had built anger around the missing pieces because anger was stronger than confusion, because it was easier to say Karnation left than admit there had been a gap in the story so wide he could still fall through it if he looked down too long.

Velma watched him not answer and nodded like she had won something.

“Exactly.”

Tyriq turned back to her slowly.

“Careful.”

The word came out low.

Velma’s nostrils flared, and for one second he saw fear flicker behind her eyes, not fear of him hurting her, never that, but fear of losing the version of him she had spent years trying to secure, fear that one name, one book, one movie, one woman from Anders Street could undo what she had been sewing around him since the day after Karnation disappeared.

Then she stepped into him again, smaller than him but bold as sin, pressing one finger against his chest.

“No, you be careful,” she whispered. “Because I was there after she left. Me. I was the one who picked up them pieces while she went off and turned you into some paperback demon for white women with tote bags.”

Despite everything, Tyriq nearly laughed at that.

Velma saw it and smacked his chest once, not hard enough to hurt, but hard enough to accuse.

“Don’t laugh.”

“I wasn’t laughing.”

“You was about to.”

“Paperback demon was wild.”

“This ain’t funny.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t,” she said, and now the tears were winning, making her lashes shine beneath the television glow. “You don’t know what it felt like watching you grieve another woman while I was laying right next to you.”

That landed.

Harder than he wanted it to.

His expression shifted before he could stop it, and Velma’s face softened for half a second because that was the ugly bind of them, the reason they never fully left each other alone, because beneath all her surveillance and suspicion and theatrics, beneath his avoidance and half-truths and talent for making women feel chosen without ever handing them the whole of him, there was real hurt between them too.

Velma had loved him badly.

Possessively, maybe.

Selfishly, often.

But badly loved was still loved, and Tyriq, who had once been too heartbroken to notice the difference between comfort and control, had let that love become a house around him.

Now he was standing in it with another woman’s name on the coffee table.

He reached for Velma again, slower this time, one hand settling at her waist while the other lifted to her jaw, his thumb brushing beneath the corner of her eye before the tear could fall properly.

“C’mere,” he said again, softer now. “Look at me.”

She tried not to.

He tipped her chin up anyway, gently, with the kind of practiced tenderness that made her angry because it worked.

“I’m here,” he said.

Velma’s lips trembled, but her eyes stayed sharp.

“For now.”

“Velma.”

“For now,” she repeated. “Until you get on that set and she look at you with them sad author eyes and start acting like y’all got unfinished business.”

Tyriq’s thumb stilled against her cheek.

Velma gave a small, wounded laugh.

“See?”

“There ain’t no unfinished business.”

The lie came out clean.

Too clean.

Velma searched his face like she was trying to find the seam in it.

“You sure?”

He should have said yes immediately.

He knew that.

A smarter man would have.

A kinder man might have told the truth.

Tyriq, unfortunately, was neither smart nor kind when cornered by feelings he did not know where to put.

So he leaned down and kissed her instead.

Not rough.

Not at first.

Just enough pressure to interrupt the question, enough warmth to move the conversation from language into something he could manage, because Tyriq had always been better with his mouth when he was not using it to explain himself. Velma made a small sound against him, angry even as she softened, her hands going to his hoodie, fingers curling into the fabric like she was deciding whether to pull him closer or push him away.

He let her choose.

She pulled.

Of course she did.

His hand slid from her jaw to the back of her neck, holding her there while he kissed her deeper, not because desire had vanished but because distraction was an old, reliable sin, and Velma kissed like she fought, like if she could get enough of him in her hands, enough of him under her nails, enough of him breathing hard against her mouth, she could prove he belonged to her in a way no book, no memory, no woman from Florida ever could.

When he pulled back, her eyes were wet and furious.

“That’s not an answer,” she whispered.

Tyriq rested his forehead against hers.

“I know.”

“Then answer me.”

He closed his eyes for one second.

Behind his lids, against his will, he saw Karnation’s name.

Not Velma’s face.

Not the condo.

Not the life he had been living.

Karnation Noel James in black ink.

Karnation at seventeen with lip gloss shining in summer heat.

Karnation at twenty, walking away in a memory he still could not finish properly.

Karnation’s voice in an interview saying first love learned how to be quiet.

His phone buzzed again in his pocket, probably some email from production or Darlene or a calendar alert he did not care about, and Velma stiffened immediately because every vibration in his life was apparently a potential enemy.

Tyriq opened his eyes.

“I’m not leaving you,” he said.

Velma stared at him.

“That wasn’t what I asked.”

No.

It wasn’t.

But it was the answer he could give.

Her face changed as she realised that too, and the hurt that moved across it was almost enough to make him cruel again just so he would not have to feel guilty.

She pulled away from him, wiping beneath her eye with the side of her finger before any mascara could betray her.

“You hungry?” she asked suddenly, voice flat.

The pivot was so sharp he almost missed it.

“What?”

“I said, you hungry?”

He watched her walk toward the kitchen, spine straight, robe swaying around her thighs, pride carrying her like a second skeleton.

“Nah.”

“You ain’t eat.”

“I’m good.”

“You always say that when you’re not.”

The sentence hit too close to Karnation, too close to everything old, because Karnation used to say the same thing, standing in front of him with her arms crossed and that little crease between her brows, telling him he always lied about hunger like food was a weakness.

He hated how many women in his life knew pieces of him.

He hated more that none of them had ever had all of him.

Velma opened the fridge, stared inside without seeing anything, then shut it again.

“You going back out?”

Tyriq looked at her.

“What makes you say that?”

“You got that restless look.”

“I got five looks, apparently.”

She did not smile.

Damn.

Wrong audience.

He sighed and picked up the packet from the coffee table, tucking it under his arm again because leaving Karnation’s name face down in the middle of Velma’s living room felt crueler than carrying it.

“I might go for a drive.”

Velma turned slowly.

“A drive.”

“Clear my head.”

“Clear it from what?”

He did not answer.

Her mouth tightened.

“From me?”

“No.”

“From her?”

“Velma, stop.”

“Then stay.”

The word landed between them stripped of attitude, bare and desperate enough to make him look at her fully.

Stay.

Not because she wanted dinner.

Not because she wanted company.

Because some part of her knew that if he left with Karnation’s name under his arm and old memories in his chest, the night might take him somewhere she could not follow.

Tyriq stood there, tall and tired in the middle of a beautiful condo that suddenly felt too small for all the ghosts inside it.

“I just need air,” he said.

Velma laughed under her breath, but this time it sounded broken.

“Florida got the thickest air in the country and you still need some?”

He almost smiled.

Almost.

She walked toward him again, slower now, anger drained enough to leave the fear visible.

“You took the role,” she said quietly.

He nodded.

“You gon’ see her.”

He said nothing.

“You gon’ talk to her.”

Still nothing.

Velma looked up at him, eyes shining.

“And you gon’ remember.”

Tyriq swallowed.

The cruelest thing would have been to deny it.

The truest thing would have been to admit he had never stopped.

So he did what he had always done best.

He chose the middle and called it mercy.

“I remember a lot of things, V.”

Her face crumpled for half a second before she repaired it.

Then she stepped back.

“Go take your drive then.”

“Velma—”

“No, go,” she said, lifting her chin, voice cold again because softness embarrassed her when it failed to get what it asked for. “You grown, right? Big movie star. Big Lorenzo Anders. Go clear your head.”

Tyriq stared at her for a long moment.

He wanted to say something that would fix it.

He did not know if such a thing existed.

Instead, he moved toward her, kissed her forehead because he could feel her shaking even when she tried to hide it, and she let him, which somehow made it worse.

“I’ll be back,” he murmured.

Velma’s eyes closed.

“For now,” she whispered again.

He did not answer that time.

He grabbed his keys, his phone, and the packet with Karnation’s name on it, then walked out before the guilt could hook into him deep enough to make him stay.

The hallway was cool and empty, the elevator mirrored and too bright, and when he stepped outside, Jacksonville hit him full in the chest, humid and warm and familiar, wrapping around him like a city that knew all his secrets and had been waiting years for him to come home careless enough to drop one.

His phone lit up as he got into the SUV.

A message from Darlene.

DARLENE: Announcement goes live tonight. Try not to do anything stupid.

Tyriq stared at the text.

Then at the packet in the passenger seat.

Then out through the windshield, where the evening had deepened into a purple-black kind of heat and the road ahead looked slick beneath the streetlights.

He huffed once, humourless.

“Too late,” he muttered.

And pulled out of the lot.

The world blurred as he moved through the motions, one hand loose on the steering wheel, the other resting near the gear shift, Jacksonville sliding past him in streaks of streetlight and shadow while the packet on the passenger seat sat there like a living thing, Karnation’s name hidden beneath the flap and still somehow louder than anything playing low through the speakers.

He drove with no real destination, only that old, restless instinct carrying him through familiar roads his body remembered before his mind could approve them, past corner stores with faded signs, churches with lit-up crosses, gas stations where boys leaned against cars pretending they were men, palm trees bending slightly in the heavy evening air, and neighbourhood streets that looked too much like the ones he used to haunt barefoot and laughing, back when his life had been simple enough to fit between two houses on Anders Street.

Memories came through him without permission.

Them.

Who they were.

Who they had been before pride, before silence, before Velma, before fame, before contracts, before the whole world learned Karnation Noel James’s name and he had to sit in an office pretending it did not make his chest ache to see it printed in black ink.

Karnation at eight, bossing him around in his own backyard because she had decided he was playing tag incorrectly and needed supervision.

Karnation at twelve, sitting on the curb outside his mama’s house with a scraped knee and a dramatic pout, refusing to cry because he had laughed when she fell off his bike, and him feeling so guilty he gave her the last red freeze pop and let her call him stupid for twenty straight minutes.

Karnation at fifteen, walking into church late with her mother, white dress brushing her knees, braids swinging down her back, smelling faintly like cocoa butter and vanilla, and him sitting two rows behind her trying not to stare because Velma was beside him at the time and had pinched the inside of his wrist hard enough to leave a crescent-shaped warning in his skin.

Karnation at seventeen, storming across Anders Street barefoot because he had ignored her text for two hours after football practice, standing beneath the porch light with her arms crossed and her mouth sharp, telling him if he ever made her look stupid again she was going to throw a brick through his window, and him laughing because even angry, especially angry, she had looked like home had learned how to fuss.

Karnation at nineteen.

Karnation in his dorm room.

Karnation with tears on her face.

Karnation saying his name like she was trying to make him understand something he had been too young, too proud, too surrounded by noise to hear.

His grip tightened around the wheel.

He hated that part of the memory because it never came cleanly, never arrived with beginning, middle, and end, never let him hold the full shape of what happened without something missing from the centre; it came instead in fragments, all heat and raised voices and her eyes gone glossy with a hurt so deep it had frightened him into anger, because Tyriq had not known what to do with a woman’s pain when he was the one who had caused it, had not known how to kneel before it, had not known how to say, Tell me where I hurt you so I can stop touching the wound.

Back then, he only knew how to defend himself.

Back then, he only knew how to make himself look untouchable.

Back then, he thought if Karnation loved him enough, she would come back after the argument the way she always had, because she had been coming back to him since they were children, across grass, across streets, across classrooms, across parties, across every ridiculous fight that ended with one of them laughing before the other could finish being mad.

But that time, she did not come back.

That time, she disappeared so completely it felt like somebody had reached into his life and erased her with a wet thumb.

His phone rang just as he turned onto a quieter road, the sound cutting clean through the car, and when he glanced at the screen mounted near the dash, his mother’s contact came up with the old picture she had never let him change: her smiling at one of his early premieres, hand on his chest, eyes bright with the kind of pride that made him feel smaller and bigger at the same time.

MAMA

Tyriq stared at it for half a second too long.

Something in him already knew.

His thumb hovered near the button before he answered, and her voice filled the car before he had even finished saying hello.

“Boy.”

He closed his eyes for one beat.

“Hey, Ma.”

“Don’t you hey Ma me like you don’t know why I’m calling.”

Tyriq exhaled slowly through his nose, the corner of his mouth twitching despite the exhaustion sitting heavy behind his eyes, because his mother’s voice could still pull him back into himself faster than any publicist, agent, girlfriend, or therapist-adjacent motivational quote Darlene tried to send him when she got bored.

“I don’t know why you calling,” he lied.

His mother sucked her teeth so loudly he could hear the whole ancestry of her disappointment through the speakers.

“Mhm. You know good and damn well.”

He turned the wheel with one hand, letting the SUV glide past a stretch of closed shops, neon signs, and one little beauty supply store Karnation’s mother used to drag her into on Saturdays while his mama and Miss James stood in the aisle talking like they had nowhere else in the world to be.

The sight hit him harder than he expected.

“You saw it?” he asked.

“I saw it,” his mother said, and the softness that entered her voice made his stomach tighten. “Everybody saw it, Tyriq.”

He said nothing.

The silence stretched, thick with years.

“Karnation’s book,” she said, like he needed clarification, like the name alone was something that still required care in their family, something fragile enough to cut if handled wrong. “They saying you playing the man in Karnation’s book.”

“It’s a role.”

“Don’t insult me.”

His jaw shifted.

“Mama—”

“No,” she said, not loudly, but firmly enough that he shut up the way he had when he was young and she caught him trying to sneak back into the house after curfew. “I raised you. I know when you making something sound smaller than it is so you don’t have to tell the truth about how heavy it feels.”

Tyriq looked toward the road, headlights dragging pale gold across his face.

“It’s acting.”

His mother gave a short, humourless laugh.

“Baby, you can act for them people, not for me.”

The words landed with a tenderness that irritated him because it slipped past every defence he had put up since leaving the condo, and for a moment he could not answer, could only drive through the humid dark while the city folded around him and his mother breathed on the other end of the line with the patience of a woman who had spent years waiting for her son to admit he was still bleeding from something he refused to name.

“I signed today,” he said finally.

“I figured.”

“Darlene thinks it’s good for me.”

“Darlene think breathing near a camera is good for you if the cheque got enough commas.”

He huffed softly.

“She ain’t wrong.”

“She also ain’t your mama.”

“No, she reminds me every day.”

“As she should,” his mother said, then paused, and when she spoke again her voice had shifted into something quieter, something that made him sit a little straighter without knowing why. “Does Karnation know?”

Tyriq’s eyes flicked to the packet on the passenger seat.

“I don’t know.”

His mother went silent.

That silence was worse than an argument.

It carried too much, all those summers and cookouts and church services and birthday parties, all those years when their families had been so tangled together that people stopped asking who belonged to who, because the answer had always been everybody belonged to everybody until suddenly they did not.

“You don’t know,” she repeated.

“No.”

“Did you ask?”

“Who was I supposed to ask, Ma?”

“Somebody,” she said. “Anybody. Your agent. The studio. Jesus. I don’t care who. That girl should not have to find out from the internet that you about to play a man she wrote.”

Tyriq’s mouth tightened.

“You saying that like she wrote him about me.”

His mother did not answer right away.

That was answer enough.

He laughed once, low and bitter, shaking his head as he changed lanes.

“Damn, you too?”

“Tyriq.”

“What?”

“You know.”

He hated those two words.

They were too simple for something so complicated, too clean for something that had spent years rotting in the dark.

“I don’t know anything,” he said, and there was more heat in his voice now, not at her, not really, but at the whole impossible shape of the night, at Darlene, at Velma, at Karnation, at himself, at the book he had read in pieces because reading it whole had felt too much like letting Karnation put her hands inside his chest and rearrange what she found there. “I know she wrote a character with my middle name and our old street. I know everybody online got theories. I know she been doing interviews smiling like she don’t know me from Adam. I know she left and never looked back. That’s what I know.”

His mother inhaled.

Long.

Careful.

“Oh, son.”

He hated that even more.

Not disappointment.

Not scolding.

Pity.

“Mama, don’t.”

“You still angry with her.”

“I ain’t angry.”

“You are.”

“I’m not.”

“You sound like your daddy when he say he don’t want dessert and then eat half my peach cobbler standing at the fridge.”

Despite himself, Tyriq’s lips twitched.

“I’m not angry.”

“You hurt, then.”

His throat moved.

The road ahead blurred for one strange second, not enough for tears, not that, never that, not while he was driving through the city with his mama listening and Karnation’s name lying beside him like a dare, but enough that he had to blink once and tighten his hand around the wheel.

“I was hurt,” he said.

His mother caught the tense immediately.

“That past tense is doing a lot of work.”

He shook his head.

“You and Darlene should start a club.”

“We already in one. It’s called Women Who Know When Tyriq Is Lying.”

“That club got too many members.”

“And whose fault is that?”

He said nothing, but the old rhythm of talking to her settled some of the sharper things inside him, the easy push and pull, the teasing that always carried truth under it, the way she could make him laugh and confess in the same breath if he was not careful.

His mother softened again.

“I saw an interview with Karnation a while back,” she said.

Tyriq’s eyes shifted toward the road.

He knew the one before she described it.

“Which one?”

“The one where she wore that cream suit.”

Of course.

“She looked beautiful,” his mother said, and there was something wistful in it, something that pinched beneath his ribs because his mama had loved Karnation once too, not like a neighbour’s child, not like his little friend, but like a daughter she had half-raised from the other side of the street. “Grown. Polished. Like her mama, but sharper.”

Tyriq’s face stayed still.

“She always looked like that.”

“No, baby,” his mother said gently. “She did not. That girl used to come into my kitchen with one sock on, hair half done, asking if we had cereal because her mama was cooking oatmeal and she was staging a protest.”

He laughed then, unwillingly, because he could see it too clearly.

Karnation at thirteen, standing in his mother’s kitchen wearing pyjama shorts and attitude, announcing that oatmeal was punishment food and she refused to participate in oppression before eating two bowls of cereal and falling asleep on the couch during cartoons.

His mother heard the laugh and went quiet for a second, like she was grieving the sound.

“She was ours for a long time,” she said.

Tyriq swallowed.

“Yeah.”

“And then she wasn’t.”

The car seemed smaller suddenly.

He turned down another road, not because he needed to, but because going straight felt too much like arriving somewhere.

“You ever talk to Miss James?” he asked before he could stop himself.

His mother did not answer immediately.

His chest tightened.

“No,” she said finally. “Not really.”

“Not really?”

“We say hello if we have to. If somebody pass, if somebody marry, if somebody sick and news travel through church folks before a person can sneeze in peace. But no. Not like before.”

Tyriq stared ahead.

He knew that, of course he knew that, but knowing a thing vaguely and hearing his mother say it plainly were different kinds of punishment.

Their mothers had been close once.

Close enough to call each other before storms, close enough to borrow sugar without asking, close enough to sit in folding chairs at cookouts while their husbands argued over ribs and football and Karnation and Tyriq ran between yards like the houses had no borders, because for them, they never had.

Then the breakup happened.

Then Karnation left.

Then Velma came back.

Then everybody chose silence because silence was easier than asking what had really happened.

“I ain’t mean for that to happen,” Tyriq said quietly.

“I know.”

“I didn’t want our families to stop speaking.”

“I know that too.”

“Did she?” he asked, and the question came out smaller than he meant it to.

His mother heard it.

Mothers always did.

“Did who?”

He hated her for making him say it.

“Karnation.”

His mother let the name settle between them.

“I don’t know, son.”

Tyriq’s jaw clenched.

“I called her.”

“I know.”

“I went by the house.”

“I remember.”

“Her mama wouldn’t—” He stopped, because that memory still made something hot crawl up his neck, the humiliation of standing on Miss James’s porch while she looked at him through a cracked door like he was somebody she once trusted and no longer had the strength to hate out loud. “She wouldn’t let me see her.”

His mother’s voice gentled to almost a whisper.

“Maybe she was protecting her.”

“From me?”

“I don’t know.”

He laughed bitterly.

“Everybody keep saying they don’t know.”

“Because we don’t,” she said, and this time there was steel under the softness. “We do not know all of what happened because you two never told us all of what happened, and by the time anybody realised this was not one of y’all little dramatic breakups, she was gone and you were back with Velma.”

Tyriq flinched, though his mother could not see it.

Still, she felt it.

“Mm.”

“Don’t mm me.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You said plenty.”

“Tyriq,” she said, and the warning in her voice returned, old and maternal and impossible to outrun. “I’m not going to speak ill of Velma.”

“That means you about to.”

“I said I’m not.”

“You want to.”

“I want many things,” she said. “A quieter house, better knees, your daddy to stop buying fishing equipment he don’t use, and for you to stop acting like sitting in a situation for years means it is the same thing as peace.”

His mouth opened.

Closed.

The SUV rolled to a stop at a red light, and Tyriq sat there in the glow, one hand on the wheel, the other pressed against his mouth as if he could physically hold the truth inside.

Velma had been there.

Velma had loved him.

Velma had held him through the wreckage Karnation left behind, or the wreckage he made, or the wreckage they both stumbled out of depending on the angle.

But Velma had also turned love into surveillance, devotion into possession, comfort into a chain she kept polishing so it looked like jewellery, and Tyriq, because he had been hurt and tired and proud, had let her clasp it around his throat until one day he woke up and could not remember whether he had agreed to be held or had simply stopped pulling away.

The light turned green.

He drove.

“You don’t like her,” he said.

His mother sighed.

“I love you.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It is the answer I can give without needing to repent on Sunday.”

He shook his head, but there was no real humour left in him.

“She was there when Karnation wasn’t.”

His mother’s voice softened until it nearly broke him.

“Baby, sometimes a person can be there and still not be the place you supposed to rest.”

The sentence moved through him slowly.

Cruelly.

He did not answer because he could not trust what might come out.

For a few moments, there was only the road, the soft hum of tires over pavement, the distant sound of some late-night radio host laughing through the speakers before he turned the volume all the way down.

Then his mother said, “Have you read the book?”

Tyriq’s eyes flicked again to the passenger seat.

“Parts.”

“Boy.”

“I read it.”

“How much?”

“Enough.”

“How much?”

“All of it,” he snapped, then immediately exhaled, regret pulling at his brow. “I read all of it.”

His mother went very quiet.

Tyriq’s chest felt too tight.

He had not meant to say that.

Not out loud.

Not to anyone.

The book had been something he did in private, at first out of professional curiosity, then suspicion, then anger, then something so close to grief he had nearly thrown it across the room; he had read Lorenzo Anders being cruel and tender and proud and terrified of being loved properly, read him standing in doorways instead of crossing rooms, read him kissing the heroine like apology was something a mouth could perform without ever becoming accountable, read entire passages that felt so much like Karnation speaking from the other side of a locked door that he had to put the book down and walk outside in the dark.

Velma had found him on the balcony that night.

She had not asked the right question.

Maybe because she already knew the answer.

“What did you think?” his mother asked.

Tyriq laughed once, low and empty.

“It was good.”

“That ain’t what I asked.”

He rubbed at his jaw.

“It pissed me off.”

“Because it was wrong?”

He hesitated.

The SUV slowed as he reached a turn near an older part of town, and for a second, the smell of rain on hot concrete slipped through the vents even though the windows were up.

“No,” he said finally.

His mother’s breath caught softly on the other end.

“Because it wasn’t.”

Tyriq stared at the road until the lights smeared.

“I don’t know,” he said, but it came out rougher now, honest in a way he had not meant to be. “Some parts were. Some parts weren’t. Some parts felt like she took the worst thing about me and made it beautiful enough for people to forgive. Some parts felt like she knew me better than I knew myself. Some parts felt like she hated me.”

“And some parts?”

He swallowed.

Some parts felt like she loved him still.

He did not say that.

His mother did not make him.

That was mercy.

The car drifted past a strip of restaurants, and a bright red-and-white sign appeared ahead, familiar enough to hook him before he understood why.

Dairy Queen.

He almost laughed.

Of course.

Of all the places his body could have wandered him toward, of all the roads in Jacksonville, of all the ridiculous symbols his life could have offered on a night like this, it brought him here, to a Dairy Queen glowing under fluorescent light like a memory with a drive-thru.

His mother was still talking, something about not letting Hollywood make a mess of what already hurt, but Tyriq barely heard her because suddenly he was sixteen again, fresh from practice, too broke to buy two Blizzards, stealing bites from Karnation’s cup while she threatened him with bodily harm and still tilted it toward him every time he reached.

He turned into the lot before he fully decided to.

“Where you at?” his mother asked, catching the shift in sound.

“Dairy Queen.”

Silence.

Then, softer than before, “Lord.”

“What?”

“You know what.”

He parked near the edge of the lot, engine still running, and looked at the lit windows, the cars, the little cluster of people near the ordering screen.

“I just wanted something cold.”

“Mm.”

“Mama.”

“I didn’t say nothing.”

“You mm’d.”

“That is not speaking.”

“That is worse than speaking.”

She sighed, and when she spoke again the worry was clear enough that he felt it settle in his lap with the packet.

“Tyriq, listen to me. Whatever this role is, whatever that book is, whatever Karnation is to you now, do not walk into this thing careless.”

His fingers tightened on the wheel.

“I’m not.”

“You are,” she said gently. “You get quiet when you careless. You get smooth when you about to do something stupid. You start acting like nothing can touch you, and that is exactly when everything does.”

He looked down at the packet.

Karnation’s name was not visible, but he felt it anyway.

“I won’t hurt her,” he said.

The words came out before he understood them.

His mother went still.

Then, carefully, “Is that what you’re worried about?”

He did not answer.

Because yes.

Because no.

Because he had already hurt her, maybe worse than he understood, and the possibility that seeing him again might reopen something she had spent years sewing shut sat heavier on him than he wanted to admit.

Because another part of him, the selfish part, the boy part, the part of him still standing on Anders Street waiting for her to come back, wanted to see her face.

Not on a cover.

Not in an interview.

Not in a photograph.

Her.

Real.

In front of him.

Breathing the same air.

Hating him, maybe.

Looking at him, definitely.

His mother’s voice softened.

“Then don’t.”

He closed his eyes.

Simple.

Impossible.

“Yeah,” he said.

A car pulled into the spot two spaces away, headlights briefly washing over his windshield before turning off, and Tyriq opened his eyes, blinking against the light.

He did not look over at first.

He should have.

Maybe if he had, he would have seen the black car, the woman inside, the shape of a life he did not know was already close enough to touch.

Instead, he sat there with his mother on the phone, his past in the passenger seat, his girlfriend’s unanswered fear in his pocket, and a city full of ghosts pressing warm hands against the windows.

“I’m gonna call you back,” he said.

His mother paused.

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

“Tyriq.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t,” she said, and there was a tremble of love and warning in her voice now. “But you will.”

He frowned.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means some things don’t stay buried just because we got tired of digging.”

The words moved through the car like a draft.

Before he could answer, movement near the trash can caught his eye.

A woman in a black dress, heels bright beneath the parking lot light, bending with visible irritation to catch a runaway napkin before it slid beneath an SUV.

For one strange second, Tyriq’s mind did not accept what his body already knew.

His heart moved first.

Then his breath.

Then the entire night sharpened around her.

He knew the line of her neck.

The set of her shoulders.

The way she stood too straight when embarrassed, as if posture could discipline the world into acting right.

The phone nearly slipped from his hand.

His mother’s voice sounded far away.

“Tyriq?”

He stared through the windshield.

The woman rose slowly, smoothing a hand down the front of her dress, and when she turned just enough for the parking lot light to catch her face, the years between them did not disappear.

They attacked.

Karnation.

Not memory.

Not ink.

Not a name.

Not a character.

Her.

Tyriq opened his door without thinking, his mother still calling his name through the speaker, the warm Florida air rushing in all at once as he stepped out onto the pavement.

“Tyriq?” his mother said again, sharper now. “What happened?”

He could not answer.

He was already walking.

The phone hung useless in his hand, his mother’s voice fading beneath the sound of his pulse as he crossed the space between the cars, every step dragging him through years he had pretended not to count.

Karnation had not seen him yet.

Not fully.

She was still holding the napkin, still frowning down at the bin like it had personally offended her, still so painfully herself that something inside him twisted.

His mouth opened before he knew what he was going to say.

And then her name came out of him, low and disbelieving, carrying every year, every unanswered question, every childhood summer, every ruined prayer, every piece of him that had never learned how to stop looking for her.

“Karnation?”

tags : @mamasturn @sheinaskirt @authentic-girl03 @k0niiii-blog @trustmymood @glizzymcguirex @ms-mosley-ifunastyyy @blackfemreaderr @blckblossom @trustmymood @unicoo @yourleogf @uniqueoutlierblog @og-goddesstrill @determinednot2fall @melaninhawtie @xoadaraox @thatssokarii @kirayuki22 @the1miscief @plan3tch1ld @daliscrim @szatears @that-one-anxious-mango @sonder-slut @saintaquarius @shellyyy177 @daliscrim @demovies @myginterlude @herasxq @mqueenmelanin @nussaxstrem-blog (lmk if you wanted to be added or removed )

[slvttyfied]

noony, you are sooooo incredibly detailed, i just love the way you write 🥹😭 i love the realness and emotions you pour into your leads and their supporting characters. esp with this plot line, it has me curious about how deep their relationship goes and what happened.

You play on that aspect so well, the fact that everyone in his intimate life knows what happened and now that this new development has happened, it’s resurfacing feelings from his past that Ty is forcing to acknowledge despite time doing it for him.

Sorry but I love the effect she has on him, childhood love will do that to you. I loved the conversations with his mom, miss Darlene, and even Velma (😒). It forces out certain and different emotions from all of them but goes back to the original point: Karnation and Tyriq. Again, something he’s actively chosen to disregard after all of this time.

Just know, you’ve got a fan in me with this story 🥹🎀

[sonder-slut]

candy drip — tyriq withers.

pairing ⁀➷ aaron (atlanta episode) x plus-size!blackreader

synopsis ⁀➷ aaron can’t believe that you— the prettiest girl on campus wants anything to do with him.

song of chapter ⁀➷ ‘moment” by victoria monet.

word count + warnings ⁀➷ 1.9k || 18+, nsfw, no minors & lowercase intended. slightly bimbo! reader, nerd! aaron, flirting, cursing, seduction, persuasion, kissing, gum swapping (teehee🤭), oral (m receiving), pet names (babe, daddy), p in v, public sex, facial.

a/n — this is something sweet for yall! i got part 3 to ‘deserve’ coming soon because yall gon’ take me out if i don’t post it, but trust it’s coming!! love yall, please comment and reblog. thxxx!

‘look what your mind’s imagination can do, makin’ shit true.”

ᥫ᭡

aaron’s canon 5d mark iv camera seemed determined to give him a hard time.

the focus of his camera wouldn’t adjust for nothing in the world. he’d cleaned the lens, searched the settings and even changed the room light in hopes it would solve his issue, but alas nothing. he stood outside the campus building and snapped away at the nature surrounding him. birds, trees, clouds and you. an accident initially, but it caught your attention, pausing the conversation with your girlfriends to scurry over to him.

he turns away, hoping you’d get the hint of him not wanting to talk, but you’re determined, furry boots scraping the ground as you approach. you’re swirling your pink tongue around a circular strawberry flavored lollipop.

“hi, aaron!” you call, waving a full manicured set towards him. “you taking pictures?”

aaron scratches his head, “yeah—yeah, been trying to figure things out with my camera.”

“what’s wrong with it?” you lean in and aaron watches you uneasily.

he’d never had girls pay him any mind, much too busy focusing on guys cooler and tougher than him. ones who didn’t spend every waking moment with a dorky camera to their face. aaron’s nervous around you. you’re well known on campus and almost everyone wanted to be in proximity to you. he’s confused as to why a girl like you is talking to a guy like him.

the wind swirls through your wavy curls, and it wafts over the scent of your sweet perfume. a sugary amber and aaron doesn’t know which is sweeter—the smell on your skin or the one on your mouth.

“i think it a hardware issue, maybe the focus sensors or something,” he chuckles anxiously, trying to put away the damn camera, but you’re reaching out for it.

“wait, you should take a picture of me. i wanna see how i’d look on it.”

he sighs. “it’s not working too good right—”

“please aaron, pleaseee,” you beg, pouting prettily, lined lips poking out at him as you give pleading eyes. “just a few, babe.”

he’s on the verge of fainting. not used to being around gorgeous girls like you and certainly not girls who gave him pet names. he ponders for a second longer before turning on the camera to snap a few pictures of you.

you’re giddy, smiling cutely as you remove the sucker from your mouth, striking multiple poses while the light flashes over you. “lemme see, lemme see.”

aaron’s expecting a blurry disarray, but somehow, someway the pictures are in a clear 4k vision. it stuns him, while you just giggle loudly, bringing him into an unexpected hug before bouncing your way back to your girlfriends.

it’s after school hours and aaron is still on campus. now tucked away in the schools darkroom. the cast of a red safelight glows across him as he washed and dried prints for important school events. he’s focused, head down and vision strictly on one thing. but the sound of the room’s door creaking open, distracts him.

it’s you.

you stand right between the threshold of the yellow lighting outside and the red lighting in here. “the lights—the lights can mess up the pictures.”

he calls out and it makes you rush to shut the door. “sorryyyy.”

he wipes his hands onto a paper towel, walking over to you. “is everything okay? w-why are you here?”

you scoff, chuckling a little. “geeze, aaron, tell me how you really feel.”

“i’m sorry, i didn’t mean it like that. i just don’t expect you to be here. it’s usually just me around here at this time of day.”

you shrug, chewing on a piece of fruity gum. it’s subtle, no noise or smacking coming from your glossed lips. “i wanted to ask for a favor. if you can't, it’s totally okay and i completely understand.”

aaron pulls on the sleeves underneath his shirt. “what’s the favor?”

“well, i was wondering if you could help me promote this project i have coming up.”

it sounds good. “um, yeah, what kind of project is it?”

“it’s a pool party me and my friends are throwing, and i was wondering if you could help us get it into the school’s newsletter.”

aaron laughs. he full out laughs at you, before realizing you aren’t joking. he clears his throat. “y/n, that’s impossible. first of all i’m swamped between classes and photography work around the school and secondly, we cannot promote your party in the school paper, that’s nearly impossible.”

you’re gazing up at him and aaron can clearly detail the unique features across your face, like the little beauty mark near your chin. he wants to kiss it.

“you don’t think you can wiggle something in for me, aaron?”

“i’m sorry, but i can’t.”

you pull on his hand, treading your smaller fingers through his, darling brown eyes staring him down. “what can i do to convince you?”

“i-i,” cameron stutters, cutting himself off as your opposite hand presses directly into the crotch of his jeans. he shudders, looking down in astonishment before looking up at you with the same expression. “we—we shouldn’t.”

“why not?”

he swallows, eyes darting to the door fearing someone entering. “we’re still on school property. we can get in trouble, y/n.”

“you wouldn’t get in trouble for me?”

“fuck,” he’d serve life in prison if it meant you would continue caressing him like this. “fuck, fuck, we-we can’t, we can’t, y/n.”

you’re bringing his hand to your chest, allowing him access to fondle your ample breasts. “we can, aaron, don’t be so scared.”

he choked on his rebuttal as you press your full body against his. ballerina shaped nails tangle through his short hair while soft damp lips pepper the exposed skin of his neck. aaron shakes in your embrace, not used to being handled this way by anyone—let alone a goddess like yourself.

“i think you’re so cute, but you’re so shy, aaron. don’t you want me?”

“yeah, yeah—fuck yes, i want you. i—i think about you all the time.”

“then let me make you feel good, daddy.”

daddy?

if aaron had any doubts about his reality, you quickly reassure him by sucking on his bottom and top lip. he moans out in shock, fingertips tingling when you guide his hands to your heavy ass. he just holds you there, unsure of what to do while your lips collide with his. your sweet tongue rushes over his, moist and fervent, as the smacking from both of you rings loudly in his hot ears.

through the passion of the kiss, your bubble gum switches places and travels into aaron’s mouth. he finds himself chewing on the soft, fruity wad without an explanation.

you’re giggling as you pull away. “you’re not the best kisser, babe, but we’ll work on it.”

aaron snorts at the remark because it’s not entirely untrue. he hadn’t kissed many girls in his years, but his laughter subsides when his stomach twists as you lower before him.

“bet you taste so good,” you’re unbuckling the belt around his pants, tugging them down to his thighs right along with his briefs. his dick hits you smack-dab in the face. “you’re so cute, baby, look at you.”

you gently kiss the outside of his dick as his knees shake, fighting to hold still in your grasp. it’s like you’re oblivious to the effect you have on him, casually continuing on with enticing words and movements.

“can i taste, aaron?”

he nods, speech and phrases taken from his vocabulary when you’re pumping him like this. silky hand and fingers brushing the head of his stiff dick with every pass you make. you kiss the tip, tongue swirling as you suck up the precum dripping from him.

“aw, fuck!” he inhales, pushing away your hair to better see you. “your mouth—your mouth is so good.”

he can feel you hum in satisfaction, widening your mouth as you take him down completely, reaching the soft pubic hairs across his groin when you do so. aaron almost hiccups, feeling the way your throat constricts around him, practically giving his dick a hug. your hand finds his again and you’re guiding his fingers to your scalp. he’s timid, cradling your head while you bob around him.

“don’t wanna be rough, i don’t wanna be too rough with you.”

he speaks out in the dark room and you come up to respond, salvia leaking from your swollen lips. “i want you rougher, daddy, want you to pound me.”

he’s speechless. you’re fucking obscene, removing your jacket as you pull him towards a wooden desk. the two of you bump into the object while distractedly kissing. you turn around and raise the fabric of your jean skirt, making it rest around your waist, before pulling damp panties to the side.

“dick’s gonna feel so good inside of me, gonna fuck me so good, aren’t you?”

you ask and he nods because aaron loses every sense when it comes to you. he leans forward, allowing permission for you to take charge, rubbing the tip of his dick against the wettest surface he’s ever encountered in his life.

“you’re so—you’re so,” he gasps, blinking a mile a minute as he tries to adjust, not used to this kind of treatment. “fuck, you feel amazing, you feel so amazing, my god.”

you purr, grinding into his hips. he’s tucked comfortably between your walls. “gotta fuck me, baby. you gotta start moving, aaron.”

he almost forgets how this thing goes. hips stuttering as he begins to move, hands finding placement on your waist, aaron bucks into you. your head falls forward as you moan, reaching behind yourself to pull him closer, gripping his graphic t-shirt.

“just—just like that, aaron, don’t stop.”

aaron doesn’t stop. he wasn’t a pro when it came to this kind of thing, but watched enough porn and heard enough stories from friends to know a little something. goosebumps prickle aaron’s skin as you squeeze around him, causing dribbles of juice to glide down his dick. it’s difficult to see in the darkroom, but aaron can feel it. can feel the warmth shooting throughout his body when your ass applauds against him.

you’re moaning, mouth open wide as you expel out— “right thereee, aaron, you’re fucking me so deep, baby. i can feel it in my tummy.”

he has to cover your mouth. it’s against his will, preferring to hear the possessing sounds you ring free, but you’re too loud at the moment. your eyes roll, enjoying the dominance he activates. you hold aaron’s head to the left side of yours as he grits in your face, hushed curses whispered into your skin. he’s fucking without any more assistance and you’re moaning wildy behind his hand.

“yes—mmfh, keep fucking me, don’t stopppp.”

and you’re cumming, snapping tightly around him with a broken muffled cry begging to be released from the barrier aaron holds. you’re shaking as he pulls out of you, immediately dropping to your knees to press your tongue onto his dick.

“ughh, shit,” aaron jerks himself off, keeping the head of his dick aligned to your mouth, watching as you smile when he cums. “fuck, fuck, fuck.”

hot ropes of ejaculation shoot onto your face as you flick your tongue around him, lapping at the white substance he releases. aaron’s drained, taking a breath, as you caress his thighs, complimenting a job well done. he’s still a gentleman though, helping you stand and cleaning you up with a damp paper towel.

“now can we talk about this pool party?” you ask and aaron pulls you into his lap.

“yeah, come on,” he blows a bubble with your gum, needing to hear your crazy plan on how this will work.

all rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form without the prior permission of the author. by complying with the authors moral rights, no persons shall face penalties for illegal copyright infringement and will not face zero charges.

—𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑-𝐒𝐋𝐔𝐓

[slvttyfied]

another job well mfn done!!! 😭😋😵‍💫 again, my soft domme, bubblegum btch! 🎀🍬🩰🍭 miss girl was gonna get to what she wanted by any means necessary and i loveeeeeee me a nerdy sub but turns up when the time comes! this was so hot, she made him fold and bend to her needs and reading him just barely holding onto resistance and self control? but he got in that field at the end, baby 😮‍💨

your pen, bae.. lethal!!! 💐

[sonder-slut]

untamed — tyriq withers.

pairing ⁀➷ bully! cameron cade x plus-size! black reader.

synopsis ⁀➷ cameron has teased you for years on end, but suddenly wants your help with schoolwork. you oblige, but soon find out his hatred for you is not as it seems.

song of chapter ⁀➷ ‘wish you well’ by brent faiyaz (unreleased)

word count + warnings ⁀➷ 3.9k || 18+, nsfw content, no minors! bully!cam, nerd reader, jealous! cam, teasing, nitpicking, mentions of masturbation, one-sided crush, soft fem domme reader, body appreciation, slapping (cameron likes it🤭), jerking off.

‘darling, i don’t wish you well. when you ain’t with me, i want you crying.’

ᥫ᭡

bully! cameron, who seemed to despise your entire existence.

you couldn’t quite figure it out, but each shoulder check, mocking laugh and condescending comment, let you know he for sure hated your guts. you only shared one class with the highly esteemed quarterback, but ran into him on a constant basis in the college hallways.

it was like cameron’s unpaid job was to put you down. pointing out any little mistake you might make—from tripping on your on two feet to dropping your books on the school's floor, cameron is there to let you know how pathetic you really were.

can’t see where you’re going? you’d think with glasses that fucking thick, you’d be able to see miles away.

you ignored him each time, continuing on with homework assignments for your next class without a word. this thing between you two had gone on since your days of high school—you couldn’t understand it. you would’ve thought after years of teasing, he’d grow tired and find someone else to pick with, but cameron’s attention remained lasered on you.

it’s your bully cameron who asks for a request from you. you’re face deep in a cell biology book when he approaches you in the reserved study room. you often found yourself in the library long after school hours, catching up on school work and spending spare time here instead of parties or social functions. you only had one best friend and didn’t do well in large gatherings. school, family, and home were your main priorities.

when cameron sits across from you at the table, you immediately note the expression on his face. he looks serious. more serious than you’ve ever seen him before. he usually held this demeanor during practice or before a big game. while part of you is annoyed, the other half is intrigued. what did he want?

cameron is the one to ask if you could tutor him throughout the week. he’d heard from classmates about the essays and homework you contributed to. you were a fucking genius and able to help almost everyone get their grades up to at least a ‘c’ average. he desperately needed to get his grades together, or he would risk being kicked off the schools football team.

you’re unsure. this was the same guy who made fun of your glasses at any chance, picked on your height and joked about your smarts. he now wanted your help?

“absolutely not.” you’re firm on your stance.

that is until—

“i’ll pay you good. whatever price you want.”

a day turned into weeks and your sessions with cameron continued. the two of you worked on a multitude of subjects. anything cameron needed help with, you were willing to provide. he made sure to pay on time before each session, and you made sure to help him receive the best grades possible. you couldn’t quite put your finger on cameron cade. he was interesting, but he remained quiet—a complete difference from the way he behaved when his friends were around. he worked, listened to what you asked of him and went back to home as usual.

at least that’s what you believed.

unbeknownst to you, cameron cade didn’t always go directly home after every study session.

it didn’t start like this initially.

cameron truly found you annoying.

your perfect hair, starched clothing and positive energy pissed him off. why were you so chipper at 9 in the goddamn morning? why did you know the answer to every question the professor asked? why did seeing your face make him so fucking angry?

he couldn’t understand it.

the one thing cameron was able to manage was his actions towards you. berating and calling out everything you did to was easier than sitting with his true feelings.

the feelings that hit cameron late at night when it was only him and his thoughts in the comfort of his bedroom. not a sound or soul around—just the whir of a nearby fan blowing throughout the room and the ache of his dick trapped behind boxer briefs.

those same thoughts made his vision blur as he imagined your frame underneath the stockings and pleated skirts you wore. he’d think of how you’d look on top of him. would you take your time and ride him slow—or be just as desperate as he’d been and ride him as wildly as you could?

it was the same thoughts that made cameron growl into the air as he came hotly—sticky white substance dripping over his chest and hand, before he washed up to imagine it all over again. maybe a different fantasy this time—one of you, and he crammed in the back seat of his car. he wouldn’t mind, cameron would find a way to make space for you.

cameron’s maladaptive daydream is interrupted as there’s a sound right outside his bedroom window. cameron lived at home with his parents as it was easier to attend school and save money at the same time. he remained in his childhood bedroom and often gazed out the window to look down on the neighbors and their current shenanigans, but it’s during this that he notices a familiar face and shape.

it’s you…

it’s you and cameron’s next door neighbor.

his neighbor lived at home with his parents, just like cameron. he also played football for the school’s rival team, so cameron has no clue as to why you’re meeting with him. he’s obviously an enemy, but you’re downstairs being best friends with him.

cameron watches as the young man hugs you goodbye and proceeds to walk to your car. you smile stupidly in his face before starting your car to drive off into the night, leaving cameron as confused as ever.

“what the fuck?”

cameron lets the time pass. he writes the interaction with you and his neighbor off as a tutoring session, believing that you wouldn’t be in any kind of relationship with someone like him. it helped put his mind at ease for just a bit.

that is, until he encounters the two of you once again.

you both were exiting a local restaurant just as cameron was crossing the street. it’s late at night and cameron is supposed to be walking the family dog, but finds himself eavesdropping on the conversation you two hold. back pressed to the brick wall of a nearby building, cameron listens carefully as you bust into genuine laughter at his neighbor’s joke.

“no, but seriously, y/n, you’re fucking amazing and i really appreciate you.”

“oh, it’s nothing,” he hears you giggle and you never giggled while you were with him. the sound of your beautiful laugh makes his chest tighten. he wished he’d been the reason for your joy. “i can’t wait to see you again. have a good night, babe.”

babe?

the pet name enrages cameron. he holds enough irritation to knock down this entire brick wall, race over, snatch you up and knock that loser the fuck out.

but cameron does nothing.

you weren’t his. he had no rights to you, no rights to behave this way towards you.

days later, cameron’s phone vibrates in his pants pocket.

it’s a text message from you.

hey, i’m sorry to cancel on you, but i won’t be able to make it today. maybe we can meetup sometime next week?

cameron’s eyes lowered as he read over the message once again. he took a deep inhale and clicked on the power button to his phone.

you and he met in the city’s library for tutoring lessons every wednesday and friday without fail. for weeks, cameron spritzed cologne over his neck and wrists, applied oil to his short hair and made sure to keep a tube of mint scented chapstick in his bookbag for…educational purposes. he absolutely looked forward to sessions with you. whether they be one-sided with only your voice speaking throughout the library or silent altogether—wednesday’s and friday’s were his favorite days of the week.

yet, you cancelled.

cameron couldn’t understand it.

are you sure? we can probably meet sometime later tonight, i really don’t to fail this upcoming exam.

cameron paces his room as he awaits a response from you, hoping his excuse doesn’t sound too desperate.

you won’t fail. we can meet up next week.

you wouldn’t budge, and cameron can’t come up with another reason.

“fuck,” he huffs, tossing his phone onto the bed. cameron takes only a second to collect his thoughts before racing to change out of his current outfit and into looser attire.

he needed to blow off some steam.

a two-hour workout session helped to clear cameron’s mind just a little, but not nearly enough. a few bench presses, a jog on the treadmill and a boxing session with a punching bag—yet he kept thinking of you and the message you’d sent earlier. part of him wanted to let you know how he felt—to tell you the resentment he held towards you was misplaced and that he didn’t know how to regulate emotions regarding you. the other half wished you could read his mind and know exactly what he wanted.

cameron passes the school’s library as he leaves the gym. had it been any other day, cameron would’ve went home as usual, but the cancellation of today’s session was getting to him. he couldn’t fucking think straight. he stopped inside and decided to take a seat at the table you and he usually sat in. cameron sorted through his bookbag and fetched textbooks for tomorrows exam, eyes darting over the words as he tried to comprehend the reading material.

you would’ve helped him to understand it.

your calm voice reading over the text before asking what did he think about it. you would’ve cracked open a notebook and wrote down important information with your black ball point pen. you would’ve taken your time and used real-world situations to compare with the homework, helping him learn everything he can before a big test.

you’re all cameron can think about.

so much so that he swears he can hear you.

it’s the same laugh he’d heard for the first time the other day, and cameron is positive he’s completely lost his mind until he sees you and his neighbor emerge from a study room. cameron hides behind the large textbook to avoid his cover being blown. he listens closely and peers from behind the spine of the book as you hug and peck the cheek of his neighbor.

cameron can only sit for so long—waiting until his neighbor has left the library to follow behind as you slip into the basement area of the building.

you don’t hear or see him—cameron makes sure to keep quiet as he tiptoes behind you, searching for words to perfectly convey his thoughts.

“what the fuck are you doing, y/n?”

there’s aggravation in his tone, and the sound of his tenor causes you to flinch—not jump, but simply raise your shoulders in surprise. you turn on the toes of your leather loafers, eyes widened in surprise at cameron cade’s presence.

“are you following me?”

cameron ignores your question. “answer me, y/n.”

“i’m minding my business, cameron, that’s what i’m doing. now answer my question, are you following me?”

cameron pushes past you to walk further into the dusty basement, brushing towards a nearby book case before he speaks. “why are you dragging this nigga all over town? smiling in his fucking face, hugging him and shit.”

“because i can, cameron. why does any of this matter to you? why are you watching my every fucking move.”

“you and that stupid motherfucker are flaunting around town, i can’t help but to see it.”

he expects you to make a run for it—for you to angrily march up the stairs and never talk to him again, but you instead hold a conversation with pinched brows on your gorgeous face. he can’t help the way his stomach whirls when he’s able to see you fully. the basement of this dusty library is dimly lit, just a flicking light bulb that sways back and forth in the corner of the room, but it helps cameron to see you.

you looked beautiful as usual, but a bit more laid back tonight. boho braids flowing around your shoulders—free from the tight bun you often wore, a small hue of blush upon your round cheeks and no glasses on your pretty face.

you weren’t wearing your glasses.

he only takes a second. brief and steady as he glances over you. “where are your glasses?”

“huh?” you squint and it’s not because you weren’t wearing said glasses. usual black frames are not on your face because you were looking for a change in appearance, at least for tonight.

“you heard me. where are your glasses, y/n?”

you’re surprised cameron picked up on it, but cameron forgot absolutely nothing when it came to you. he’s like a wolf hunting prey. he can’t miss the curls strewn through your hair, the neat pressing of your outfit or the heady scent of the perfume you’re wearing.

“and you’re wearing fucking perfume…you-you put that on for him, didn’t you?”

“who?”

“who? you tell me, y/n, who is the nigga to you?”

you’d never seen him like this. so hostile and on edge over you, but it’s at this moment that reality sets and you remember who you’re dealing with. you don’t owe him anything. not an explanation or even an excuse. you push forward and wiggle out of cameron’s intimidating stance.

“it doesn’t matter. it doesn’t matter what i do, or who i do it with, cameron. you aren’t my boyfriend, so it’s none of your business, and i think it’s best that you leave.”

you walk towards the entrance and hold the heavy door open, waiting for cameron cade to exit onto the other side of it, but he just stands in place. icy eyes peer back at you and they’re unforgiving. the only thing that diverts cameron’s attention is the sound of a notification of your phone as it pings from your book bag.

shit.

it’s a short race between you and cameron as you both rush over to grab the device. you should’ve knew better. a 6-foot behemoth was easily going to overpower you. the most athletic thing you conquered was a brisk walk up a flight of stairs to enter your favorite coffee shop.

“give me my phone, cameron!” he holds a hand outward to block the catty hits you give in attempt to get your phone back.

cameron forgets his place.

the idea of someone else having access to you made him go crazy. cameron could almost handle the thought of him not being with you, but someone else getting the pleasure of being near you was enough to drive him through a wall.

“i don’t recall this being any of your fucking business, cameron. why does it matter what i’m doing?!”

“because you’re fucking hugging and kissing him after canceling a tutoring lesson with me.”

“i was helping him study cameron—there! does that make you feel any fucking better?”

“fuck no! you’re getting fucking dressed up for him, but bailing out on me, i’m fucking pissed.” you can sense the genuine anger surging through cameron as he speaks. his usually light irises darken as they pierce into you.

“i’m sorry, cameron.”

but it’s not enough.

“nah, i need to talk to that motherfucka, i need to know something.”

“you’re going to talk to him for what, cameron? i’m confused as to how this is any of your concern. you hate me, so why are you so worried?”

you and cameron begin to tussle. he’s attempting to push past you, searching all throughout your book bag for the vibrating cell phone. you’re holding him by the arm to stay in place, but cameron’s strong—tall, big—any of the words you could think of, so you have little to no fight at this moment, being easily brushed to the side as he moves about.

it’s a last-minute effort, but the heavy smack you send to his left cheek stops him in his tracks. the inside of your palm rings, while a stinging red mark forms on the side of cameron’s face. you’re about to say something—an apology of sorts when cameron forces you to pause. he releases the tiniest surprised moan—low and trapped in the back of his throat, as you watch his dick twitch behind the confines of his shorts.

cameron is silent. pleading eyes wandering over you as he tries to understand why do you turn him on like this? your book bag and the contents inside fall to the ground once cameron drops it.

“you like that? y-you like me smacking you around?” you’re taken aback by his reaction.

cameron remains quiet, but his dick answers whatever questions you have. you can practically feel the heat radiating from it, as he grows harder, continuing to flinch around underneath his clothes.

“answer me, cameron.”

it’s like chewing glass, and cameron can’t swallow the broken pieces down fast enough to speak. he’d kept these feelings locked away for years. years of longing, aching and needing to be near you vanished into thin air from a harsh slap you’d given him. cameron can’t believe the magic you hold.

“answer me, cam,” you’re on the tips of your leather shoes, lush lips skimming across his neck as you speak. you await an answer, but only draw out another shaky moan from him. “tell me, cameron and i can help you feel better. i gotta hear you say it.”

he gulps sharply, forcing his eyelids closed as he tries to regulate. “f—fuck, fuck, yes, yes.”

you began to soften up some. smugness to your voice when you question him, finding delight in the sorrowful position you have him in.

“can i see it, cameron?”

“w-what?” he stutters. “you—you want to see me?”

cameron’s been convinced you were disgusted with his entire presence, hearing your words makes his dick stiffen more. cameron can’t think clearly, but he knows he wants this, knows he wants you to want it as well.

“let me see you, baby.”

you’ve switched—and so quickly at that. cameron’s not sure if you’ve always been like this, but starting as a timid nerd and turning into a sweet voiced domme, shakes him to his core. cameron’s willing, though. he’s happy you were into it like he was.

so cameron obeys.

untying the string to his shorts, cameron starts to fumble with the clothing items until they fall to the ends of his ankles. and the expression on your face cannot be contained—a mix of surprise and satisfaction. you expected a handsome boy like him to have a nice dick—well groomed and beautiful in color, but his length? cameron was a fairly decent size. you would rather not give him too much credit, but his umber tinted dick truly took your breath away.

“you’re big, cameron.”

“yeah?” he’s breathless as he responds.

nodding your head as you continue. “yes and you’re so pretty, you look so good, baby.”

cameron could die happily with the way you’re talking to him, his dick bobs in appreciation from the complimentary words you utter.

“show me what you can do.”

and cameron’s on it immediately, willing to do whatever he can to please you. his large hard drags over his hard dick in a fast motion, jerking along the tightened shaft without regard or concern. his eyes flick back and forth—from you and down to his piece in hand, while you watch.

“you’re rough.”

you giggle a bit as you cross over the room, taking a few steps to get closer to him, as cameron continues to jerk his dick raggedly. he’s too excited—too anxious to reach his nut, that he can hardly contain himself.

“what’s the rush? we got all the time in the world.”

cameron’s looking to you for relief, awaiting whatever you can give him to get off completely. you step beside him and attempt to reach his height from the short distance you stand, clothed breasts brushing the outside of his strong arms as you linger.

the pad of your soft thumb traces over the end of his chiseled jaw, slowly finding your way to

his bottom lip as you grin softly. “open your mouth, cam.”

you only have to ask once because cameron trusts you. he doesn’t know why, but a major part of him knows you’d get him there without a hassle. cameron’s tongue wraps around your thumb without hesitation, moaning in satisfaction at the faint smell of perfume along your skin. his eyes fall closed in satisfaction of the contact.

“drool on that dick, baby, i want you to get it wet for me.”

you pull your hand away from his lips and cameron follows the instructions, opening his mouth wide enough that an elongated string of spit hits the base of his dick without pause. it’s fucking sexy when he does it, hand holding onto a nearby bookshelf as you watch intensely. you try not to moan and only enjoy the show, but it’s almost impossible with a star football player falling apart the simple commands you give.

“do you want me to touch it, cam? want me to make you feel good?”

and it’s more than anything he’s ever wanted in his life. cameron’s skull could rattle with how fast his head shakes. you only give him a little, gentle fingertips twisting at the head of his dick while he shivers in response.

“yes—yeah, please, y/n, please.”

then you think. “but, do you deserve it? have you been good, cameron?”

cameron knows the truth—he’d been acting a fucking fool as of late, but he was here now and he was willing to try, willing to try and be good just for you.

“i can—i can be better, y/n. i can be calmer, nicer—fuck, just touch me please.”

“promise me cameron. promise you’ll be good from here on out. promise you’ll listen to me.”

he nods furiously, “yes, yes, i’ll be good, i’ll be good and i’ll do whatever you want.”

with the lubrication of his spit, you’re easily able to tug on cameron’s big dick, opposite hand finding purchase around his wide neck. you choke him softly, just enough that it takes his breath way and makes him moan at the same time.

“lift your shirt up, i wanna see you, baby, i gotta see you.”

with hardly any focus, cameron scrambles to unzip his jacket and raise his plain t-shirt like you commanded him to. your soft hand grazes the rippled skin of his abs in admiration. his skin is damp from a previous workout and the anxiety of being in your hold and you can smell it on him. the scent of his natural sweaty aroma combined with a woodsy cologne makes your pussy clench around nothing.

you wanted him.

you didn’t mind the idea of cameron bending you over this bookcase and fucking you like nobody’s business, but you knew better—knew you couldn’t give it to him that easily. cameron would have to earn it. you jerking him off was an act of kindness after canceling the tutoring session. anything from this point forward would require some serious effort.

[slvttyfied]

this was such a flip in the script and one i WAS NOT expecting but boy…. i loved it 😋😩 at first i was fully expecting for him to use his power, strength, and aggression to have his way with her, esp once he realizes that she blew him off on purpose. BUT! my girl flipped the mf script, shook the mf table— that’s my kind of girl 😩🤭

“i can—i can be better, y/n. i can be calmer, nicer—fuck, just touch me please.”

my girl said she a whole different woman once the glasses come off! and she showed OUT! The dirty talk, the soft degradation, the soft dominance 😵‍💫😍 she easily brought this 6’5 mf to his knees. What did Doja Cat say?

“I’m 5’3” but i make that nigga 4’2”

You always do your mfn thing my love, i love you so bad 😭😭😭😭🎀

[sonder-slut]

wild thang — tyriq withers.

pairing ⁀➷ aaron x plus-size black reader.

synopsis ⁀➷ the way you speak to aaron drives him insane.

song of chapter ⁀➷ ‘let’s make love’ by silk.

word count + warnings ⁀➷ 645 || 18+, nsfw content, no minors! dirty talk, doggystyle, foul language, pet names, cumming inside.

‘toss your body back and forth, so i can watch you ride.’

ᥫ᭡

you were a danger to aaron’s entire existence.

aaron often found himself breathless while in the act with you. his vision shifting as he gazed down to watch, mouth hung open in silent pleasure and surprise, as your heavy ass bounced back against his hips.

you left him speechless.

nowhere near a pillow princess, you worked hard to receive what was yours. reaching back every so often to pull him closer, needing to feel his skin against yours, holding your ass cheeks open to make him dive deeper inside—-and your mouth…? aaron could barely find the words to describe the number you did on him. he was only able to rock forward in shock as you moaned out the filthiest things to him.

“stretch me open, baby, i want you to fuck me good, daddy. can you please, baby, please, please?”

“fuckkk,” he physically shivers, as the sounds you make mixed with the sight of your messy pussy is near fatal. “why you talkin’ to me like that, mama? why you sound so fuckin’ good?”

“cause you fuckin’ me so good, baby, oh my goodness. you feel so good inside of me.”

“this pussy got me losing my mind, girl. you got me fuckin’ stuck.”

there’s a sound of a laugh and moan as you continue to throw your ass back on aaron. your face is muffled behind fluffy pillows, your arms tucked underneath them as you take all that aaron gives you.

“want you to fuck me up, want you rough with me, aaron. please aaron, please fuck me harder, daddy.”

“shit, you a nasty ass bitch. you talking so fuckin’ crazy and this pussy soakin’ me all the way up. you want me to beat that pussy up, want me to tear this lil shit up?”

“yea, aaron. want you to pound me so good. i want it so bad, i need it so bad. want that dick in me deeper, baby.”

you’re going on a nonsensical rant, so horny and ready to cum that you have no clue what you’re talking about. aaron exhales, shaking his head while trying to think clearer. folding his lips inward, his hands grip your hips with enough strength to leave marks, but you mind none because aaron’s doing what you requested.

as he moves with more force, you cry out into the pillow while your eyes roll into the back of your skull. “yessss, baby, yessss, fuck—fuck me just like that, aaron, just like that, daddy. you’re fucking me so good, oh my god!”

and aaron’s silent up to this point—unable to hold in his moans, aaron cries out brokenly. gasping and groaning as he attempts to pull out and nut over your ass, but your hand around his and the words you utter out make him pause.

“cum in me, baby, i want you in me, aaron. i want you dripping out of me, daddy, please, please.”

“ahhh, ohhh, fuckkk,” aaron can hardly breathe, mindlessly doing as you plead by staying inside your already wet pussy and fucking his cum into you until you’re both moaning out in satisfaction.

aaron’s entire weight crushes when he falls onto you, trying to catch his breath as you both are spent from the heated moment.

“goddamn, y/n.”

he chuckles and you do the same, ass still raised in the air, as he slowly pulls out of you. aaron takes his time and watches in admiration as his hot sperm spills out of your pussy and onto the mattress. a fucking mess, but he loves it.

“so fucking good, girl,” he smacks your ass while your pussy clenches, emptying the last of his nut out. you begin to shake your ass in a teasing manner, and aaron’s groaning and growing hard once again.

“do you think you got one more in you, baby?”

[slvttyfied]

this means something to me because my mouth is filthy— I looooooove me a btch with a mouth that’s gonna take her nigga through there, esp because I can tell her man isn’t expecting such salacious, nasty, freaky words to come out, he’s probably think he gotta be the one doing all of that— no sir, I got it bad for you too!!! 😩😵‍💫😮‍💨😋 this was so hot, I swear I love your pen, my girl!!! 💐

[slvttyfied]

Chat, why is he kinda…. 😮‍💨 hold on nie!