𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐎𝐗𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍: act of using substances prior to or during sexual acts
𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑: Orochimaru (Naruto/Boruto)
𝐒𝐘𝐍𝐎𝐏𝐒𝐈𝐒: Mitsuki is a really sweet kid that you teach as a part of your homeroom class (even if he's a bit strange or aloof sometimes), and this year, you've been tasked with visiting your students' homes to discuss their academic progress and know more about them. Though, one particular parent wants to know more about you...
𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐒: continuting a really late kintober! alcohol (therefore dubcon), snake-biting, slightly incorrect use of Orochimaru's snakes, fingering, edging, cock-drunk, no protection, drugged, I feel like Orochimaru could have both genitals at will, technically, but he'll have a dick here...
Parent teacher home visits are usually predictable things. Polite smiles stretched thin over concern about grades and friend groups. You are new to the academy, but you've done it a few times today to not get too nervous.
This one is different.
You stand at the edge of a secluded compound that does not resemble any of the other homes on your list. The path leading up to it is quiet in a way that feels curated, as though even the insects have been instructed not to intrude. The architecture is elegant yet severe, all clean lines and shadowed corners, traditional elements softened by modern precision. There is nothing overtly sinister about it, and yet your pulse refuses to settle.
You remind yourself that he has retired. That he has been pardoned. That he has contributed research, stability, cooperation. That this is no longer the era of whispered war stories and forbidden experiments.
Still, the name sits heavy in your throat.
Orochimaru.
You lift your hand and knock. The sound echoes more than it should.
For a moment, there is only silence. Not the awkward kind, but the deliberate kind, as if the house itself is considering you. You become acutely aware of the folder in your hands labeled with Mitsuki’s name, of the neat bullet points you prepared regarding his academic excellence and his curious social detachment. You are early by perhaps ten minutes. You debate fleeing and returning precisely on time.
The door opens before you can entertain the thought further.
He stands framed in the doorway with a composure so complete it almost feels rehearsed, though nothing about him seems strained. His presence is quiet and immovable, like still water with unknown depth. He is dressed simply, robes falling in pale, fluid lines that soften his tall, slender frame. His skin is luminous in the low light, almost porcelain in its smoothness, and his features are refined in a way that makes it difficult to assign him to anything so narrow as handsome or beautiful. He is both, and neither, and something else besides.
His eyes settle on you.
Golden. Slitted. Unblinking for a fraction too long that its slightly unsettling.
And yet his expression is gentle.
“You must be Mitsuki’s homeroom teacher,” he says, tilting his head slightly. His voice is velvety you feel as though you could listen to it for hours. It carries warmth, even kindness, but there is an undercurrent beneath it that you cannot quite place. Something analytical. Something that feels as though you are being studied even as you are being welcomed. With no ill intent, of course.
You realise you have not answered.
“Yes. I am. Thank you for agreeing to meet with me,” you reply, mentally scolding yourself for how tight your voice sounds.
“Of course,” he says smoothly. “Please, do come in. You are a little early, but I do not mind. Punctuality is… refreshing.”
He steps aside with a fluid grace that feels almost theatrical in its restraint. As you cross the threshold, you notice the scent first. A subtle blend of dried herbs and something clean, neutral, almost medicinal but softened into comfort. It is pleasant, grounding in a way that unsettles you further because it contradicts every warning story you have ever heard.
The interior is immaculate. Minimalist without feeling empty. Shelves lined with books and carefully labeled containers. Plants with their leaves glossy and healthy. There is no clutter.
He closes the door gently behind you.
“Please,” he gestures toward a seating area, elegant yet understated. “Make yourself comfortable.”
You sit, careful, conscious of your posture. He takes the seat opposite you, folding himself with effortless poise. He rests his hands loosely in his lap and regards you with polite attentiveness.
“I trust Mitsuki has not caused you any… difficulties,” he says, the faintest curve touching his lips.
You blink, gathering your professionalism. “Not at all. He is exceptionally intelligent. One of the strongest students academically. I did want to discuss his social integration, however. He participates, but he seems… observant. Reserved.”
“Ah,” Orochimaru hums softly, as though you have confirmed a hypothesis. “He has always been inclined toward observation. Curiosity is a trait I encouraged.”
There is pride in his tone, but not boastful.
As he speaks, you cannot help noticing the symmetry of his face, the sharpness of his jaw softened by the way he tilts his head when listening. He maintains eye contact without wavering, and it should feel respectful, but instead it feels like standing beneath a microscope. You are acutely aware of your breathing, the way your fingers press against the folder in your lap.
“You seem nervous,” he observes lightly, not accusatory, simply factual.
Your heart stutters. “I… I meet many parents. This setting is just unfamiliar.”
His smile deepens by a fraction. It does not reach his eyes, though it is not cold. Merely knowing.
“That is understandable,” he replies. “My past reputation tends to precede me. I assure you, I have no interest in revisiting it. My priorities are considerably more domestic these days.”
The way he says domestic is almost amusing, as though he is testing the word for flavor.
You swallow. “I appreciate that.”
“And I appreciate your dedication,” he continues, voice softening further, a small smile on his face. “To visit each student personally speaks to your commitment. Mitsuki benefits from attentive guidance.”
The compliment is delivered with such polished sincerity that it almost disarms you completely. Almost.
There is a sense that he is enjoying this exchange in a way you cannot fully decipher.
He leans back slightly, elegant and at ease.
“Now,” he says smoothly, “please. Tell me everything you have observed about my son.” And as you begin to speak, you cannot shake the distinct sensation that you are the one being evaluated.
You take a deep breath, forcing yourself to relax into the chair, the folder balanced neatly on your lap.
The discussion about Mitsuki flows smoothly at first. You describe his studies, how diligent he is, the way he approaches problems logically, always precise, always polite. You mention how socially he’s a little aloof, how he often observes rather than participates, and Orochimaru listens with an expression that is polite, warm, yet unnervingly intent. Every so often, his smile flickers as though he’s storing away every little detail you mention, filing it with perfect memory.
You bring up the cafeteria incident almost casually. “He, um… once tried to swallow a boiled egg whole,” you say, unsure whether to laugh or frown, picturing the bewildered cafeteria staff. “He said… he just wanted to see if he could.”
Orochimaru tilts his head slightly, still smiling. “Ah,” he murmurs, voice smooth, each word deliberate. “Yes, a fascinating experiment in—table manners and the practicalities of human consumption. One must ensure proper mastication; the esophagus is not so forgiving.” His tone is light, almost teasing, but the precision in his observation is clinical, almost like a scientist discussing a rare specimen.
You pause, the words hanging between you. It is an awkward silence, punctuated only by the subtle creak of the chair as he leans back slightly. You clear your throat, unsure where to look, feeling the gentle weight of his scrutiny without it being oppressive.
Gradually, your gaze drifts around the room. The space is intimate, functional yet elegant. Dark oak furniture gives it a grounded warmth, the kind of polished wood that feels almost reassuring. Shelves line the walls, neat and deliberate, and then you notice them—rows upon rows of bottles. Some are familiar, labeled for drinking, their contents amber and clear, glinting in the soft light. Others are medicinal, their labels precise and clinical. And a few are unlabeled, small, curious vials that seem to hum with unknown potential. Your eyes linger, drawn in despite yourself.
Orochimaru follows your gaze and smiles, noticing your interest. “Ah,” he says softly, as if reading your thoughts, “you’ve seen my collection. Each bottle serves a purpose. Some are for study, some for taste, some for experimental application. The ethanol content varies precisely, the pH controlled. Medicinal extractions require exact ratios — some are for ingestion, some for topical observation, and a few remain untested, pending evaluation of physiological effects.” His voice is calm, almost scholarly, the way one might discuss chemical reactions rather than beverages.
You feel your cheeks heating, realizing you’ve been staring longer than polite, and the blush spreads fast across your face. Your words come out in a stuttered, embarrassed jumble. “I… I, um… I enjoy… trying different drinks… for research purposes,” you manage, the rationalisation barely convincing even to yourself.
Orochimaru’s smile deepens, subtle amusement in his eyes. He rises from his chair, movements fluid, precise. “Please, then,” he says softly, gesturing toward the seat across from him, “let me offer you some tea.”
You hesitate, unsure if he means just tea. There is a softness to his tone, a gentle insistence, but still something in his eyes that makes your stomach twist.
He tilts his head, expression innocent, the faintest playful lift to his smile. “Or perhaps… a drink?”
Your breath catches. Your cheeks flare even hotter, and you can feel yourself fumbling the words. Finally, you let out a soft, embarrassed sigh, nodding. “Yes… of course. Thank you.”
The tension in the room shifts slightly, warm and charged, leaving you acutely aware of the space, of the dark wood, of the neatly lined bottles, and of the impossibly calm, impossibly composed man standing before you, smiling. Because just a drink or two wouldn't hurt.
The tea — or perhaps what you now think of as “a drink”— slides down a little too easily. You are careful at first, pretending to sip slowly. But the warmth spreads faster than you expect, and soon your words are more… free.
You find yourself talking about Mitsuki in ways you hadn’t intended. Little anecdotes tumble out, loose and giggling, the sentences bending over each other, messy but affectionate. “I mean, he really does try, you know? Like, he tried to eat a whole boiled egg at lunch one time. Whole! Like a—like a snake!” You laugh at your own description, the sound too loud in the otherwise quiet room. “Can you imagine? Just stuffing it and—oh gosh, the staff looked mortified!”
Orochimaru doesn’t correct you. He doesn’t comment on the absurdity or the potential danger of swallowing a hard-boiled egg whole. Instead, he watches. He tilts his head slightly, one hand pressed lightly against his temple, the other resting on the arm of his chair. His smile is soft, almost amused, but utterly still, impossible to read. He doesn’t sip from his own cup—or perhaps he does, but if he does it leaves no trace, no warmth, no reaction. He wouldn’t get drunk even if he tried. You know, somewhere in your tipsy ramble, that it’s impossible for him to be affected. He has altered himself, genetically, perfected himself to a degree you cannot even comprehend. And yet… watching you, he leans in the faintest fraction, eyes glimmering with something closer to delight than amusement.
“Quite the observation,” he murmurs quietly, and you almost spill your drink laughing. “Mitsuki’s table manners leave room for… experimentation.”
You tilt your head back, letting out a hiccupy chuckle. “Experimentation! Ha! That’s exactly it!” You wave your hands like conducting some invisible orchestra, your cup wobbling dangerously. “He—oh, he’s brilliant. Totally brilliant, but socially… ahhh, not quite there, y’know?” You laugh again, louder this time, and accidentally slam the cup down harder than intended, the liquid sloshing up the sides.
Orochimaru leans forward, voice smooth, measured, yet a touch amused. “You are rather animated when you are intoxicated,” he says softly, letting the words hang in the air like velvet. “The alcohol has affected you rather… pleasantly.”
You nearly tip the bottle trying to giggle at that. You clutch it with both hands, wobbling slightly in your chair, face burning a deep pink. “P-pleasantly? Me?!” You laugh, then hiccup again, swaying a little, cheeks still hot. “Oh my gosh, you’re… you’re too kind!”
He tilts his head again, those impossibly calm eyes watching you. “Perhaps… you should not drink any more.” The suggestion is gentle, almost casual.
You blink, tipsy enough that your grin falters for a second, the warmth spreading into a mix of embarrassment and relief. “Yeah… yeah, probably a good idea,” you murmur, setting the cup down more carefully this time, cheeks still flushed, stomach fluttering from the drink.
"Perhaps you should also go home, Miss, or you may come to some... regretable actions." You hiccup, almost offended and embarrassed.
"Regretable? I've done many regrettable things already." You mumble and stare down at the empty porceiln cup, "This being some of the less dire things..."
"Oh?" Orochimaru set the bottle where you couldn't reach it and leaned over, much more interested. "Those being?"
You laugh at yourself, tracing a finger carefully around the rim of your empty cup, "I regret ... wasting my time on blind dates. And clumsy, obnoxious men!"
You dissolve into giggles as his eyes widen ever so slightly, "And I also regret wearing a jacket this evening."
You fumble with the buttons of your jacket, unable to take it off without tugging at your blouse underneath, "Because... It is far too warm for a jacket, all of a sudden —"
The very edge of your bra peeks out as your top few buttons come undone. Orochimaru barely shifts, "Allow me, if it is difficult."
"It's — its quite alright..." You begin to say, only to hear a very slight hissing beside you, sliding up your legs, tummy then settling between your cleavage. You open your mouth to shriek in surprise but quickly enough:
"Please do not be alarmed."
You immediately shut up, resorting to small trembling motions instead, eyes flickering between Orochimaru and the snake upon your skin, stroking up and down the cotton of your blouse.
Orochimaru leans on the table with one hand, tall, impossibly still, the other lifting a tiny, colorless vial with deliberate care. His movements are calm, measured, yet every detail—every glint of the dim light against his pale skin, every slow tilt of his head—feels like it’s designed to make you ache and shiver in anticipation. He smiles, the eerie calm of him sending chills down your spine, lips curling just slightly as he places the vial carefully on the table between you.
“I apologise,” he murmurs, each word soft but deliberate, his chair scraping barely at all as he approaches. “I couldn’t resist. You are far too interesting… too tempting… to study.” His eyes glint faintly in the dim light, unnerving, almost hungry, though his expression remains polite, even gentle.
The snake slithers again, brushing along the curve of your waist. Your body reacts without permission—heat spreading, fingers gripping the cotton of your blouse, dragging along the fabric in automatic, trembling motions. You open your mouth to protest, to demand he stop, but the words catch in your throat, leaving nothing but soft, shaky breaths.
Your fingers graze a snake's body — and then the hiss of others fills the room. Shadows in the dim light twist, and more snakes appear from places you didn’t even notice.
You freeze entirely, chest heaving, staring at him with wide eyes, cheeks burning as the heat between your thighs twists and folds in on itself. You are trapped—bound lightly but completely, with his snakes everywhere, eyes flickering with his calm, unnervingly precise observation.
“Staying calm is better, Miss,” he murmurs, voice hypnotic and smooth. He hooks a finger into the thin fabric of your bra, tugging it down off your breasts to expose them. A snake comes up and gently bites the nipple, enticing a moan from you. A sound you didn't even know you could make.
He smiles, slowly rubbing his thumb over the curve of your breast. “Every reaction is… fascinating.”
You can only bite your lip, trembling, hands hovering over the constraining coils around your wrists, the room spinning just slightly as you feel the effects of whatever he slipped into your cup intensify.
"Would you like some more?" He muses, holding and squeezing your jaw open. You fumble with sounds of useless struggle for a moment as he tips the rest of the vial down your throat and your vision blurs. Your mouth can't hold it all and it spills down your lips, down your neck in a thin stream.
He hums before trailing it down with a finger, down your neck, chest before his slender, white fingers landed on your waistband.
"Please forgive me, for ruining your clothes." He digs into the elastic of your waistband, ripping it down your hip until your dress pants fall either side of your thighs in two parts. A snake slithers around your leg, tugging off your underwear, leaving your throbbing slit exposed to the cool air.
"I didn't realise what a... mess... you could make," He slowly dips the tips of his fingers between your folds, gently rubbing up and down, missing your clit until it began to ache. Your back arches off the chair, only tightening the restraints. "Tell me, Miss, how does it feel."
You buckle forwards, head into his body, inhaling in his scent. He smells dizzingly good. The body of the snake throbs against your folds, his slender, nimble fingers flicking at your clit.
"A-AH —!" You can't help it anymore, body numb, unable to struggle from the drugs. He's amused, the sound in the rooom shifting from the soft rustle of the fabric to the wet, lewd squelch of his long fingers burred deep in your dripping cunt. Almost gouging into you, casually, his knuckles nudging your puffy clit as you stretch around them.
Every time he pulls his fingers all the way out, there's a lewd, wet pop that makes you blush, "You can hear, it too, no? Isn't it fascinating —" He stops mid-sentences, shoving the two dingers back in, right up against that gummy spot inside you, making your vision go white and tears prick at your eyes. " — how beautiful you look? While sounding so crude and disgusting?"
"O—Orochimaru-sa-"
"If it is not a moan, I'm not interested in what you have to say, Miss," He smiles, leaning over, face close to yours that you get chills, darkness casting over his face.
He twists his fingers inside you, letting a snake come up and bite your nipples, almost drawing blood. The snakes don't stay still; scales rasping against your sensitive folds, sliding between your slit and mixing with the friction of his fingers.
Its not enough. You're in tears, it's not enough...
He watched the frantic twitching of your thighs with clinical fascination. You're going to finish, going to cum if he keeps up but —
He withdraws his fingers with an agonising, fluid slowness, leaving you with a lewd, wet pop. They pull with long, glistening strings of your own slick.
You groan, actually mewling and begging in restless breaths for this captor to give you some sort of release.
Between your legs, you are a disaster, a fucking embarrassing disaster; your slit is swollen a dark, angry red, pouting open and leaking a steady, drip of cream that spatters onto the already-soaked upholstery. The air hitting your exposed cunt, fresh torture, making your clit throb with a dull, heavy heat.
"Look at the state of you," he murmurs, his voice a soothing, terrifyingly kind caress. He lifts his hand, the one slicked to the wrist in your juices, and moves it with elegant precision. He doesn't touch you again; instead, he simply holds his fingers near your face, tracing your slick lips with them. "Sopping wet, shaking like a common animal, and utterly ruined. It’s quite a beautiful transformation, wouldn't you agree?"
He leans in, strength deceptive as he hooks his arms under your knees, around your waist and slides you onto the table you'd just sat at. The sudden shift in gravity sneds the world spinning into shimmering shadows; the aphrodisiac in your blood turns the vertigo into a sickeningly sweet rush, making your head loll helplessly against his shoulder.
He doesn't need to bind you this time; the drug has turned your bones to lead and your mind to mush. He casually gestures, and a thick, mottled serpent glides up the leg of the table, coiling firmly around your left wrist and pinning it flat against the dark oak, beside your head with a thud. Another snake, smaller and more agile, settles over your right breast, its weight a heavy, pulsing pressure that makes your nipple ache and swell as the reptile’s scales rasp over it. You are laid out, your legs falling open in a wide, shameful V, exposing the dripping wreck of your pussy to his clinical, mused gaze.
The sensation of being stretched, even that tiny bit, is enough to make your hips buck off the table, with a pathetic, broken moan. He keeps only the tip buried inside you. He watches you writhe, your head thrashing against the table as the drug makes your head spin and throb.
"There is no need to rush," he murmurs, his voice a low, vibrating hum that seems to echo inside your own chest. He begins to move, his pace agonizingly steady. "Please don't move so much. You will tire yourself out."
Yopu slow, gulping back saliva pooling in your mouth. Each thrust is deep and deliberate, bottoming out against your cervix with a dull, wet thud that makes your vision blur. Your mind's drowning in the chemical heat of the drug.
He watches your drooling face, his golden eyes tracking the way your features twist in a mask of drugged-out ecstasy. With a calm, eerie precision, he withdraws two fingers from where he had been bracing himself against your hip. They are dripping, slicked to the knuckle with the translucent cream your pussy is dripping around his cock. He simply presses them against your lips, prying your mouth open. He hooks them over your tongue, pulling down slightly to stretch your jaw.
You can’t help it. Between the drug and the overwhelming sensation of him fucking you, you lose control of your own body. You begin to drool, a thick, silver string of saliva mixing with the juices on his fingers and trailing down your chin in a lewd, messy line. He watches the liquid spill over his pale skin with a look of quiet, scientific satisfaction.
The snakes hiss around you. The one coiled around your breast tightens, its scales rasping more harshly against your swollen nipple, while the one on your wrist keeps you pinned. You are a complete wreck— limbs heavy, pussy raw around his slow, punishing cock, your mouth full of his fingers as you choke on your own desperate whimpers.
Each thrust a deep, blunt pressure that made your insides spasm in a desperately. Until it hit hard enough, a wet thud against your guts that made you cum. Your vision shattered into white noise as your pussy clamped down on his cock. All you could remember, really. In that moment of total ruin, you felt the hot, pulsing stickiness seep into your womb, until you felt painfully, perfectly stuffed.
Orochimaru stands over you, composed as if he hadn't just spent the last hour methodically ravaging your body. He watches the way your chest heaves, his gaze lingering on the translucent trail of his fluid as it escapes your twitching thighs. With a slow, elegant motion, he reaches down to brush a sweat-dampened lock of hair from your forehead, his own hair perfectly intact.
"I would rather you remember this, Miss," he murmurs, his voice a soothing rasp, nothing more than a musing, "The fact you're still concious is interesting. It would be a shame to lose it. But I doubt you'll forget it."
He leans over, his throbbing cock resting against your thigh as he studies your face with a small, genuine smile, "Right, Miss?"
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THIS IS AN ABSOLUTELY GOATED request from 🌾🍞 anon!! I'M SORRY, ITS LATE!! Hope you enjoy though and feel free to give feedback!! Mwaaaaa asks always open guys, I love them!
cw: period-typical attitudes to being gay (not homophobia though), male/amab reader, older/college reader (21), kinda-rough making out, Rodrick in last year of highschool, so he's 18.
★ You are forced to come back home, stay at least a week during college break with your family. And you knew your sister had all the guys after her, but maybe leading on a guy who definitely was a joke to her was a bit much. You're just trying to help him out. You think so, anyway...
click here for part 2
click here for part 3
If you’d told Rodrick Heffley that he was gonna end up in the kitchen of a house that probably cost more than he’d make in his entire life — with another guy’s tongue in his mouth, no less — he’d have laughed in your face.
Not that he had a problem with gay people or anything. He was cool. Chill. Open-minded, in a way only someone who’d spent most of his life in a suburban basement with an eyeliner pencil and a drum kit could be. But him? Making out with some rich guy? Yeah, no way. Wasn’t gonna happen.
Except it was happening. Kinda. He just didn’t know it yet.
It all started when he got Heather’s number when he’d flirted with her outside the bowling alley, giggling behind their hands as they gave him the digits and told him to "swing by sometime." And he had. Of course he had. He was Rodrick Fucking Heffley. Girls loved him. Right?
So now here he was — standing on the porch of a massive house tucked into a dead-end road he didn’t even know existed until tonight. There was no answer when he rang the bell. No party. No Heather. Just silence, a pretty porch light, and a feeling that maybe, maybe, he was getting punk’d.
He was just about to leave — muttering under his breath about rich girls and their mean-girl cliques — when he heard that sleek convertible purr down the street.
You pulled up like you owned the whole goddamn block, engine shutting off with a smug little hum. You stepped out slow — lazy, bored — dressed in a leather jacket and black jeans that fit too well, rings on your fingers, hair still pushed back from your day, face unreadable.
Rodrick blinked.
You didn’t say anything right away. Just stood there on the sidewalk, one brow raised, keys jingling in your palm as you looked him over with the kind of stare that made his flannel and band tee feel suddenly...lame.
There was a second where you just stared at each other. He looked a bit like a washed up rat, sad, pouty and definitely trying to hide it. Then the guy let out a small scoff.
“You lost or something?”
Rodrick swallowed. He opened his mouth. Closed it. Then shrugged, trying to sound like he totally had his shit together.
“I’m here to see Heather.”
The guy’s brows lifted slightly more. It was you, and you're honestly not going to let... what seemed to be a creep, stand outside and look for your sister. “Heather’s not home.”
“Right, yeah.” Rodrick scratched the back of his neck, voice dipping into that awkward fake-confident tone he always used when he felt like he was two seconds from being told to scram. “She invited me.”
A pause.
You gave him a look — something unreadable, amused maybe, maybe not — before stepping forward and sliding your keys into your back pocket.
“You’re Rodrick, huh.”
It wasn’t a question.
Rodrick stiffened. “…Yeah?”
You sighed like this was the most exhausting development in his week, then jerked his head toward the door. “C’mon. I’m not lettin’ you stand there like a creep all night.”
“What?”
You tipped your head, deadpan. “You’re just standing there. Staring at the door. Like a creep.”
“I’m not a creep, okay?” Rodrick shot back, bristling. “I’m here to see Heather.”
You gave a sharp little laugh under your breath — cold and amused.
“Right. Heather.”
Rodrick squinted, arms up in almost defence. “Wait. Who the fuck are you?”
You looked him dead in the eyes. "Her brother."
Rodrick's mouth opened. Closed. “…No the hell you're not.”
“Yeah. I fuckin’ am, hate this damn house so I barely come back from college,” you said, stepping past him like you lived there — because, well, you did. “And yeah, Heather’s a bitch. But you? You look like a fuckin’ Craigslist serial killer standing on my porch.”
Rodrick bristled again, like he wasn’t sure whether to be offended or impressed. “Dude. I’m just—”
“I know who you are, Rodrick,” you cut in, unlocking the front door. “She told me. Didn't expect you to be real, honestly.”
You pushed the door open and stared at him for a second too long. There was something sharp in your eyes. Not hostile. Just…assessing.
He wasn’t her type. Not even close. But something about the slouch, the messy eyeliner, the smug little grin trying to mask the awkward twitch at the corner of his mouth — it kinda was your type. Not that you were gonna admit that out loud.
You stepped aside, voice dry. “Well? You comin’ in or what?”
Rodrick swallowed and stepped past you, suddenly hyperaware of how much taller (even if not literally) you felt. How nice you smelled. How warm it was inside.
“…This is the weirdest fuckin’ day of my life.”
You just shut the door behind him with a little shrug. “Get used to it.”
You didn’t say anything else — just brushed past him, your shoulder knocking lightly against his as you headed down the hallway like you owned the place. Which, yeah, you did. Rodrick barely had time to adjust to how nice the fuckin’ hallway smelled before you were already halfway to the kitchen.
He followed, awkward and out of place, eyes darting to the high ceilings, the family photos, the spotless hardwood floors. The house looked like it came out of a magazine. He felt like he tracked in dirt just by existing.
You pointed at the dining table as you walked into the kitchen. “Wait in here.”
Rodrick paused in the doorway. “What am I, a dog?”
You didn’t even turn around. “I mean, you showed up uninvited and you look like you bite 'nd have rabies.”
He opened his mouth, ready with a half-assed comeback, but you were already at the fridge, grabbing a can of something cold and cracking it open without looking his way.
Rodrick lingered for a beat before making a decision. Slowly — maybe a little stubbornly — he pushed off the doorframe and leaned against the kitchen counter instead, folding his arms across his chest, doing that thing where he stared at the floor like he wasn’t affected by anything at all.
You turned slightly, side-eyeing him with an amused little smirk.
“Didn’t I tell you to wait at the table?”
Rodrick didn’t budge. “Yeah. And I didn’t.”
Your lips twitched.
Huh.
He really was that kind of kid. All bark, too much eyeliner, and barely enough spine to hold up the act — but he was trying. You could tell from the way his jaw flexed, how he refused to look at you, as if meeting your eyes would confirm something neither of you were ready to admit.
You took a slow sip of your drink, leaning against the opposite counter, just watching him.
“This how you usually get into people’s houses?” you asked, voice lazy, teasing. “Show up lookin’ like you rolled out of a Hot Topic clearance bin and challenge the older brother to a pissing match?”
Rodrick’s ears flushed red. “Didn’t know you’d be home.”
“Yeah,” you said, nodding once. “You look disappointed.”
“I’m not.”
That smirk turned into a grin. “Sure.”
You let the silence stretch for a second, your gaze dropping to the edge of his jaw, the way he clenched his fists a little tighter when he felt you looking.
He was cocky. Slouchy. Barely legal and probably running on Monster and the fumes of delusion.
But shit — cute.
And way more fun to mess with than Heather's last boyfriend. Not that you believed he was Heather's boyfriend at all because NO WAY.
You tilted the can back and let the last of the drink slurp loudly, obnoxiously, like you were doing it on purpose. Rodrick flinched at the sound.
Then you turned, casually tossing the empty into the recycling bin like you’d done it a hundred times (you had), and cracked open the cooler on the floor beside the counter. The soft hiss of ice shifting echoed as you rummaged through it, then pulled out something in a blue-and-silver can — cold and probably cheap. Smirnoff Ice. A college classic. Trashy, sugary, everywhere.
You straightened up and glanced at Rodrick.
“You eighteen?”
Rodrick blinked. “Uh—yeah.”
“You drink?”
He froze for half a second — just half — but it was enough.
You snorted, laughing as you popped the tab on your can. “Yeah, okay. That’s a no.”
He huffed, defensive. “Didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.” You crouched again, this time deeper in the cooler, your hand pushing past bottles of water and chilled energy drinks until you found a can of orange soda and stood, tossing it across the kitchen.
“Catch.”
Rodrick’s eyes widened — he caught it, barely, fumbling for a second like it might’ve hit the floor and shattered his already-fragile pride. He cleared his throat and turned the can in his hands like it offended him.
You watched him with lazy amusement, sipping your drink, leaning one hip against the counter again. “You’re lucky. If you dropped it, I would’ve kicked you out.”
Rodrick scoffed. “No, you wouldn’t’ve.”
“Try me.”
The kitchen was quiet again, save for the fizz in your drink and the hum of the fridge.
Rodrick cracked the soda open, took a slow sip, and stared at you over the rim. He didn’t say anything, but his eyes did — a flicker, a shift. He was trying to place it. The way you talked, the way you stood. How old were you?
You let the moment linger before you said it.
“Twenty-one.”
Rodrick blinked, straightening a little.
“Just turned. Last month,” you added, tapping the top of your can. “Heather threw a fit ‘cause I wouldn’t let her come to the bar, y'know? Gotta tell her to stop whoring it.”
Rodrick flinched, taking another tentative sip.
You looked at him again, head tilted slightly. “That what you were thinkin’? How old I was?”
Rodrick choked on his soda a little. “What? No.”
You grinned into your drink. “Sure.”
Rodrick lingered near the kitchen counter, pretending like he wasn’t eyeballing everything in the room. The granite countertops, the fancy-ass stove that probably cost more than his van, the wine rack built into the wall. Who the hell lived like this?
You noticed him looking.
“Don’t steal anything,” you said, lazily sipping your drink.
“I wasn’t gonna.”
“Sure. You got that feral look. That ‘I eat cigarettes for breakfast’ vibe.”
Rodrick rolled his eyes. “At least I don’t drink Smirnoff Ice. What are you, a freshman girl at her first frat party?”
You barked a laugh, full and sharp. “That’s cute coming from the guy holding a Fanta like it’s a beer. You want a paper straw too, princess?”
“Do you ever shut up?”
“Only when my mouth’s full.”
Rodrick froze for a second. Your grin widened. He looked like a raccoon caught chewing drywall.
You leaned back against the counter again, arms crossed, casually sipping your drink like that hadn’t just slipped out on purpose. The tension in the room shifted — still playful, but tight, electric.
“Yeah, well—” He paused. “Thought she gave me her number.”
You smiled, slow and dangerous, and started walking toward him — not threatening, but steady. You placed your drink down on the counter and kept moving, until Rodrick backed up just slightly, hips bumping into the edge.
“You really believe she gave you her number?” you asked, both hands coming up to rest on either side of him, boxing him in. Not touching — yet. But close. Close enough to watch him squirm.
Rodrick faltered. His voice dropped a little. “...Well. I mean. Not anymore.”
You laughed again, warm and low. “Poor thing. Got punked by a couple of high school girls.”
He rolled his eyes and looked off to the side, trying not to look at you. “Whatever.”
You tilted your head, eyes flicking over him. “So what? You into her? That your type? Bitchy blondes who call you names and pretend you don’t exist in public?”
Rodrick scowled, brows furrowed and squinting. “Says the guy who is related to her.”
“Touché.”
There was a pause. Then—
“If it doesn’t work out with her,” you paused, “you could always get with me instead.”
Rodrick choked on nothing.
“I—What?! Dude, I’m not— I’m not gay.”
Your eyes glittered. “Didn’t say you were.”
He floundered. “I mean—not that there’s anything wrong with—whatever—but I’m not—”
“Relax, man.” You chuckled, real low and easy, tilting your head a little closer. “No one’s asking you to get on your knees.”
He swallowed. You could see the flush creeping up his neck, fighting the smirk he was trying not to let show.
You leaned in just a little more.
“...Unless you want to.”
Rodrick made a quiet noise in his throat — something between a scoff and a nervous cough — and set the Fanta can down behind him on the counter. Not because he was finished, but because he needed an excuse to look anywhere but at you. The fizz hissed faintly as it settled.
He scratched the back of his neck. “You’re messing with me.”
You smiled, real slow. “Am I?”
“You gotta be,” he muttered, eyes on the countertop now like it held all the secrets of the universe. “I mean. That’s what this is, right? You’re just fuckin’ with me.”
“Rodrick.”
You said his name like a joke and a promise in one breath. The way it dropped from your mouth made his stomach flip in a way he didn’t like. Or maybe he did. He wasn’t sure.
He looked up at you finally, jaw tense. “I’m not… like that.”
You shrugged. “Sure.”
“No, I mean— I’ve never—” He faltered. His hand made a vague gesture between the two of you. “This isn’t my thing.”
“But you’re still here.”
Rodrick’s mouth opened. Then closed. Like a fish. An angry fish. A flustered, horribly aware he might be into something fish.
You tilted your head, stepping in just a bit closer — still not touching, but you didn’t need to. The tension was thick enough to sink in.
“I’m just saying,” you murmured, voice low and amused, “if it doesn’t work out with Heather… you’ve got options.”
Rodrick cleared his throat. “Yeah, uh—well. I—I’m not…”
He trailed off. You waited. His tongue darted out to wet his lips, eyes flicking briefly to your mouth before he immediately looked back down at the floor like it burned him.
Then, quietly — barely audible:
“…Have you ever kissed a guy?”
You blinked. “Me?”
He nodded, sheepish. Still not looking at you. “Yeah.”
You raised a brow. “A couple times. Why?”
Rodrick didn’t answer. But he was chewing the inside of his cheek now, face pink, breath shallow. Hands shoved in his pockets like they might anchor him.
You stepped in just a fraction closer.
“…Wanna know what it’s like?”
If you’d told Rodrick Heffley that he’d lose his footing on his sexuality in the middle of a rich guy’s kitchen, with the house dead quiet and a guy’s mouth hot on his, he would’ve thrown a drink in your face.
Not because he was homophobic or anything — Jesus, no. He was punk, not a dick. It was just… him? Doing this? Never crossed his mind. Not until now. Not until you.
You were Heather’s brother. College-aged. Intimidatingly hot. Driving some sleek-ass convertible like you owned the damn moon. And now here you were, pushing him back against a cold marble counter, lips crashing into his like he was a fucking challenge.
And he liked it.
Rodrick grunted as his lower back smacked the edge of the counter, the sudden jolt making him gasp into your mouth. One of your hands slid down, rubbing over the spot gently in a rare flicker of comfort before it curled around his hip, pulling him back in.
It was messy.
Your mouth tasted like cheap spiked lemonade and something bitter. Beer, maybe. He’d never had alcohol before — not like this. Definitely not off the mouth of some guy he just met. It was a little weird. A little electric.
His hands fumbled awkwardly at first, catching the hem of your shirt, one sliding around your shoulder as if trying to find something solid to hold onto. Because he was TOO aware he looked like an idiot right now.
Your fingers found the edge of his studded belt, tugged him closer with a harsh yank that made him groan. His hips twitched. His whole body felt like it was catching fire.
He was… hard.
Embarrassingly so.
Rodrick stiffened, trying not to grind into you, but failing when your hand slipped lower to press at his back — guiding him in.
He gasped again. “Shit—fuck, uh, I didn't—”
“Relax,” you groaned actually annoyed with yourself when you should be feeling triumphant, as you kissed down to his neck, your own breath starting to hitch. “You’re not the only one.”
Rodrick's eyes widened slightly as he felt your crotch against his hip.
Oh.
Oh.
Well… shit.
You two stared at eachother a bit more until you slid your hands under his stupid band tee, both hands on his hips. You're surprised—you thought he would be a bit scrawnier. Not that he was built by any means,
Your mouth was back on his again — teeth catching his bottom lip this time, dragging until he hissed. Rodrick’s fingers clenched in your shirt, dragging you impossibly closer, hips twitching without meaning to.
“F-fuck,” he muttered against your mouth, shaky and stunned. “What the hell is this—what are we—”
You didn’t answer. Just kissed him again. Rougher. Meaner. Like you were trying to make up for every second wasted being normal around him.
“Look, do you want to do this or not?” Your hands were braced on his hips, and his belt buckle was digging into your palm. It was all metal and heat and confusion and want.
Rodrick's mouth opened, in nothing but a shakey breath.
Then—
BANG BANG BANG.
A shrill, angry voice cut through the house:
“HELLOOO? OPEN THE DOOR?? I FORGOT MY KEYS, WHERE'S MOM—”
You pulled back with a sigh, forehead dropping to Rodrick’s shoulder. His chest was rising and falling way too fast for how little space was between you.
He was flushed. Breathing hard. Lip red from biting. His hair was sticking up like he’d just been electrocuted and he looked fucking wrecked.
You grinned.
“Sounds like your little crush is home.”
Rodrick blinked at you, still half-dazed, lips parted. “Jesus Christ…”
You pushed off the counter slowly, casually fixing the hem of your shirt as if your dick wasn’t half-hard in your jeans and you hadn’t just kissed the guy your sister was supposed to be prank-dating.
“You comin’?” you asked, already walking down the hall.
Rodrick huffed, slamming back the last of the soda he’d left on the counter before following, muttering under his breath, “I fuckin’ hate rich people.”
And that was ironic because he was pretty well-off himself.
The door swung open and Heather practically exploded into the entryway, voice already halfway to a screech.
“Ugh, finally! I thought I was gonna get murdered out there, do you know how sketchy the suburbs are at—” She cut off mid-sentence, blinking hard. “Wait. Was that—was that fucking Heffley??”
You leaned against the doorframe, still slightly flushed, your knuckles brushing the curve of your bottom lip like you were trying to wipe away a smirk. Your eyes followed Rodrick’s retreating figure down the driveway, watching him fumble to get into his van like his legs forgot how to work.
You didn’t answer your sister. Just called out toward the driveway, voice syrup-smooth,
“Come back some time!”
Rodrick paused, mouthing what seemed suspiciously like 'fuck you' and then yanked the door shut behind him harder than necessary.
He was mumbling prayers and he barely even listened in church. I mean, he wasn't praying because he thought he had sinned or something — he was pretty sure Jesus would be fine with gay people.
No, he was praying because he was sure he just met the devil reincarnated.
Heather turned toward you slowly, eyebrows climbing toward her hairline. “Seriously. Seriously? What the hell was that?!”
You shrugged like it was nothing. Like you didn’t still taste him on your tongue.
“Dunno. Might stay back for the rest of the holiday.”
Heather blinked. “You’re deranged.”
You just grinned wider.
click here for part 2
♡ Please do not modify, steal, plagarise or post on other platforms without asking. Thank you!
"Birthday girl — party 4 u" Rodrick x reader angst!
“I only threw this party for you
Only threw this party for you, for you, for you
I was hopin' you would come through...”
“One thousand pink balloons
Dj with your favorite tunes...”
“All I'm thinking, all I know is
That I hope you knock on my door,
Nervous energy
My heart rate rises higher, higher up
I wish you'd get here, kiss my face
Instead you're somewhere far away...”
Anon request from here (it would be cool if you have some feedback, anon! ilysm mwa)! Reader is Heather's best friend; Rodrick and Heather are dating beause he's stupid and follows her around like a lost puppy. Even at your own birthday party, even as you sit lounging in your own pool, absolutely fuming.
It’s your birthday. But not just any birthday — it’s your birthday. The kind that usually gets booked months in advance at a rooftop lounge or beachside club, with glittery invites and ice sculptures and those awful, too-small cakes from boutique bakeries that look better on camera than they taste.
But this year? You kept it at home. Backyard pool, soft blue lights draped in canopies, your mom's old stereo blasting throwbacks. Your friends don’t get it, not really — not when you could’ve gone big like Heather did. But you didn’t want big. You wanted... him.
Rodrick.
Your mistake was telling Heather that. The two of you have always been a bit toxic — partners in crime, teeth bared under pink gloss smiles. But where you bit, Heather devoured. And she decided she wanted a taste of him too.
You learned quick it was never about liking Rodrick. Not for Heather. She just liked how easy he was to bait — a clumsy, wide-eyed stray who followed the bone she dangled in front of him, even when she was snapping it in half right after. And the worst part? He chased her like she was worth something.
You hated him for it. You hated yourself for watching it.
Now you're at your party, waist-deep in the water, drink sweating in your hand as you lean back against the cool tiles of your pool. The music’s pulsing, flashing in between choruses, your friends’ laughter echoing off the walls like it’s anyone’s night but yours. And then you hear it. That sharp, shrill cackle that cuts through everything.
Heather.
You tilt your head and there he is. Rodrick. Dripping wet. Sprawled half-dazed in a kiddie floatie he clearly didn’t try to get into willingly, with soda splashed down his shirt and some gross glitter lipgloss smeared on his cheek like a joke.
Heather and the other girls are laughing like it’s the goddamn Oscars.
Your grip tightens around your cup.
Because you saw it. You saw her fake trip into him, saw her whisper something to her friends before pushing the stupid float into his arms. Saw him just take it. Again.
And you hate the way he’s blinking through it all like maybe, maybe this time she’ll kiss him for real.
You lower your cup and shut your eyes for a second.
You threw this party for him. Your birthday. Your pool. Your playlist. Your drink recipes, damn near themed for his shitty band’s favorite albums. All because he liked pool nights. All because you were stupid enough to think maybe, if Heather wasn’t looking, he’d look at you.
But he’s never not looking at her.
You bite your tongue so hard it hurts.
And then, like clockwork, he’s wiping his face, dragging himself out of the shallow end like a sad, wet cat, and heading — right toward you.
“Yo,” Rodrick says, a little sheepish, hair plastered to his forehead, soda fizz still clinging to his sleeves. “These drinks? Kinda sick. What’s in the pink one—?”
You don’t let him finish. You just stare at him, that bitter knot in your throat tightening. He doesn’t get it. Of course he doesn’t. He never does.
“Is it vodka or, like, that pink lemonade crap from Trader Joe’s?” Rodrick keeps going, oblivious. He’s wringing out his shirt with one hand, licking soda off the corner of his mouth like that’s the most urgent thing in the world. “’Cause I swear I tasted both. Kinda fire. Wait—did you put something spicy in it? Like jalapeño or some shit? I saw that on some magazine—”
You don’t even look at him.
“Cool,” you say flatly, eyes still locked on the other end of the pool where Heather is doubled over in her bikini, laughing like she just won prom queen.
Rodrick laughs a little too. “Yeah, they thought it was funny, I guess. The floatie thing. I mean, whatever. Wasn’t that bad.”
“Mhm.”
“I got soda in my ear though. Like, in my ear. That ever happen to you? It’s like fizzy in my brain now—”
“Rodrick.”
He stops, eyes flicking to yours. You’re still not really looking at him — not properly. Just staring dead ahead, voice flat, body still half-draped in water, your fingers white-knuckling the rim of your glass.
“What?”
“Shut up.”
There’s a beat of silence. Just the bass line of the music thudding through the pool speakers and the distant shriek of someone doing a cannonball.
He laughs again, awkward this time. “Damn, okay. Someone’s moody tonight.”
You turn your head, slow.
He’s grinning like he didn’t just embarrass himself in front of half your graduating class. Like he didn’t make you want to scream every time he showed up looking hopeful, bruised and sticky and fucking blind.
And you don’t mean to snap.
But it bubbles up, spills over, drowns you.
“You’re so fucking annoying!”
It’s not loud at first. It’s sharp. Piercing. And for a second, it cuts straight through the static of the party. Rodrick reels back like you slapped him, blinking hard.
“What the hell?” he mutters, looking around, suddenly self-conscious.
People are watching now. A few heads turning from the drink table, some giggles quieting by the pool. A full-body flush crawls up your throat, but you don’t care. Not enough. Someone’s nudging Heather. The birthday party has screeched to a standstill, everyone watching the meltdown with wide eyes and shallow breaths, pool lights casting ripples over your soaked legs, your flushed cheeks.
You’re already moving, pushing off the edge of the pool, sloshing water as you storm toward the steps. You push out of the water, the drink in your hand forgotten as it splashes somewhere near the edge. Your hair’s clinging to your shoulders, the bottom of your sheer cover-up dripping down your thighs, but you don't care. You’re fuming and it hurts even more to know you don't even have to right to be.
You wipe at your face with a wet hand, mascara already trailing down your cheekbones, and huff a broken breath.
You storm through the crowd soaked, barefoot, and trembling — half from the cold water clinging to your thighs, half from rage that burns so deep it tastes metallic in your throat.
Everywhere is people.
Shoulders brush you, bodies press close in the narrow hallway as some junior you don’t even know screams-laughs about how she “totally got with that one lacrosse guy”. Someone knocks into your arm and doesn’t apologize. Another spills half their beer down the front of your cover-up.
No one notices it’s you. The birthday girl.
The house is packed — kids climbing over furniture, slumped in clumps on the stairs, smoke trailing from the open den, laughter spilling from bathrooms where they’re doing lines off your mom’s makeup counter. The party doesn't stop for you. It never does. You could vanish and they’d still go on, drunk off your dad’s liquor, high off your name.
Because it was never about you, was it?
You shoulder past a couple making out in your doorway and slam the door behind you, the bass muffled immediately.
You don’t even bother with a towel.
Your wet feet slap against the tile, against the hardwood, your body soaked and shaking, your hair a dripping mess down your back as you push through the crowd. Someone’s shoulder clips yours. Someone else drunkenly cheers your name like it’s part of a game.
No one really notices. Or if they do, they don’t care.
The birthday girl vanishing through her own house like a ghost? Not a headline when Heather’s holding court at the poolside with tequila shots and that skin-tight bikini. Not when the music’s thudding hard enough to rattle the walls and someone’s just plugged in a disco light in your living room.
Because this party was never really about you.
It was about the invite list. The photos. The way Heather could say she hosted your birthday without having to clean up after it.
You shove past a group crowding the hallway, wet arm smearing your own makeup on the doorframe as you make a sharp turn toward the stairs.
They part for you barely — a few slow looks, one guy mumbling something about you being “kinda dramatic,” but you don’t stop. You can’t. You take the stairs two at a time, chest tight and throat hot, mascara bleeding in rivers down your cheeks.
Your bedroom’s dark when you slam the door behind you.
Muted laughter still filters through the floorboards. You ignore it. Stumble into your ensuite bathroom, flick the light on, brace both hands against the counter.
Your reflection stares back at you — smeared lipstick, tangled hair, eyes blown out with too much everything. You drag a hand down your face, furious at the tears that won’t stop falling. The sink runs. The water’s ice cold.
Inside, it’s quiet and you like it. Your room and bathroom are untouched by the chaos outside — makeup still lined up along your dresser, along the sink, pink birthday balloons bobbing gently from your headboard. You dim the lights of your en-suite, fingers already tugging at the straps of your swimsuit. You're halfway to unraveling the stupid decorative braids Heather made you sit still for when you finally look up — eyes ringed in black from the run of your mascara, mouth trembling because you're far away from Rodrick and that's what matters right now.
But Rodrick’s still in the pool when people go back to laughing. Initially, anyway.
Someone tosses a float. Someone cranks the music louder. Someone else asks if there’s more beer, and just like that — it’s like nothing ever happened. Like the birthday girl didn’t just scream at him in the middle of her own party.
He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, still tasting soda and chlorine. His brow furrows.
“Wait,” he mutters under his breath, “what just happened?”
There’s a ripple of laughter a few feet away — not cruel, just amused — and it makes something prickle hot under his skin. He looks at the trail of wet footprints she left behind and suddenly he’s moving, scrambling out of the pool with a loud slap of bare feet on concrete.
He grabs his shirt, doesn’t bother wringing it out this time, just yanks it on half-soaked and starts wading through the mob of people like a lost puppy. Every hallway’s a blur of bodies and red solo cups and cigarette smoke, and for a second he’s not even sure where he’s going — until he remembers the layout from the one time he came over to pick up Heather for a party.
Upstairs. Left. Second door.
He takes the steps two at a time, breath caught somewhere in his throat. Her room’s closed. He hesitates, knocks once — soft, unsure — then pushes it open.
Empty.
His brows knit as he steps in, blinking. Then the soft click of a faucet behind the bathroom door draws him forward, and he inches closer, leaning just enough to peer through the open frame—
You scrub at your face again, smudging mascara in frustrated, angry swipes. Black streaks stain the towel you yank off the rack, and your breath hitches in short, shaky pulls as you press it to your eyes.
You hear the door creak open behind you.
Then his voice. Hesitant. Wet footprints on tile.
“...Yo?”
Your eyes flick up to the mirror and there he is. Rodrick. Damp hair a mess over his forehead, his soaked shirt clinging to his ribs, looking around like he’s half-expecting Heather to pop out and laugh in his face again.
You blink once. Breathe in deep.
Then flatly say, “Get out.”
He scoffs, genuinely offended, “Why?”
You don’t turn. Just grip the edge of the counter tighter, knuckles pale against porcelain. Your voice is low, almost calm — but there’s an unmistakable edge to it. Like the simmer before a boil.
“What are you doing here?”
Rodrick shrugs, throwing his hands out, water still dripping from his sleeves. “You just screeched like a freaking banshee at me in front of everyone, what do you mean what am I doing here?”
You lift your eyes to the mirror again. Your reflection looks so messed up it almost makes you laugh — runny mascara, eyes puffy, hair undone from the pretty braids you sat still for. You look like a drowned, humiliated brat.
So you snap.
“Well, Heather treats you like shit in front of everyone. Which would you rather?”
Rodrick blinks. Like that stunned blink of a dumb boy who’s never considered something until it’s hurled in his face. He doesn’t answer. Just stands there, jaw working like maybe he’s trying to come up with a quip, a joke, anything to deflect.
You keep going. Voice rising.
“I’m so tired of it. Of watching her yank you around like a little fucking joke, like she’s bored and you’re just the new shiny thing she can throw in front of people and laugh at. I’m tired of seeing you go along with it. You fall on your face and she laughs and you still chase her like a dog—” your breath cracks, “and it’s pathetic, Rodrick. And it’s sad. Because you’re not that stupid. You see it.”
You finally turn then, hand flinging toward him like you’re gesturing at a ghost only you can see. Your voice splinters somewhere between fury and ache. “And you still fucking let her!”
Tears well up now, uninvited, hot and blurring your vision. “You let her make fun of you. Humiliate you. Hurt you. And you just... take it. And I have to watch it. Every goddamn time—”
You cut yourself off with a ragged breath, wiping at your eyes even though it’s useless.
Rodrick is still frozen in the doorway. His mouth’s parted, brow furrowed like it physically hurts him to hear any of this. His shoulders sag just slightly, expression finally cracking from dumbfounded to... remorseful.
But he doesn’t say anything and neither do you, for a moment.
It hurts more because you were the one who would sneak off everytime Heather fucked him over, to check up on him, toddling over in shoes too sparkly and big for you— coming over with an icepack when Heather made him bash his lip against the edge of the rollerskating rink.
It hurts more because you were the one that would nudge him and ask him about whatever shitty music tape he was holding when no one at the table was paying attention to him.
It hurts more because you know you have no right to like him in the way you do.
You’re trembling by the time you spit out the last sentence, chest rising and falling like you just ran the length of the street. You’re too exhausted to shout anymore, too choked up to keep the edge in your voice. The silence afterward stretches thick between you both — breathless, muggy, fluorescent. The soft buzz of the bathroom lights is suddenly the loudest thing in the world.
And Rodrick’s just staring.
All wide-eyed and stupid. Like your tears, your voice cracking, your fists clenched so tight your nail beds ache — none of it even registered until just now. You like-liked him?.
He blinks once. Then again.
“Oh... shit.”
And you laugh. One sharp, dry breath out of your nose. Bitter.
That’s all he has to say?
It’s so him you want to hit something. Want to scream in his face again. Instead, you just shove past him, shoulder catching his collarbone, movement so fluid it could almost look staged — like you’ve had practice pushing through the people who disappoint you.
“Forget it,” you mutter, voice low, throat still thick. “Forget I said anything.”
He doesn’t stop you.
Of course he doesn’t.
You stomp barefoot down the hallway, a mess of half-dried limbs and smeared lip gloss, towel clutched tight to your chest, your hair twisted into some uneven, makeshift updo like muscle memory — like you’re too used to holding yourself together after falling apart. You disappear down the stairs again. Back into the party. Back into the noise.
Rodrick watches the door frame long after you're gone. Still dripping. Still dumb. Still trying to figure out how the hell he got here.
And the worst part? Somewhere deep down, even he knows it’s not all on you.
You could’ve said something sooner — sure. But he could’ve seen it sooner too. Seen the way Heather weaponised him for fun, the way you looked at him when no one else did. All those times you snuck over, pretending it was just coincidence — the bandaids, the icepacks, the split-lip awkward jokes. The way your hand would shake a little when it brushed his. The way he pretended not to notice because it was easier to chase someone who never wanted him than to sit in the possibility of being wanted back.
You were both cowards.
And now you're both wrecked.
The music downstairs surges again — someone’s turned up the bass. Someone’s splashing in the pool. Laughter climbs and falls and no one notices the birthday girl’s vanished for good.
Rodrick stands alone in your bathroom, mascara smudges on the sink, towel fallen on the floor.
Somewhere, the music downstairs is picking up again. People laughing. Like nothing happened.
Like the party wasn’t ever about you. Like you didn’t just bleed the truth into a bathroom mirror and leave it there with the boy too stupid to see you, but you were too bitchy to ever let him in.
And all he can do is whisper a useless, too-late, “...shit.”
♡ Please do not modify, steal, plagarise or post on other platforms without asking. Thank you!
FINALLY, I am BACK with part 3, guys (I also am planning a part 4, so make sure to drop suggestions)!! There were so many requests, one from 📷 anon, one from 🌾🍞anon, and this anon here, and from 🌌 anon and this one and from 💛🍀anon ... and all the replies on parts 1 and 2!! Ilysm, all of youuu!!😭💗
cw: period-typical attitudes to being gay, male/amab reader, older/college reader (21), Rodrick in last year of highschool so he's 18, making out in the car, awkward and totally accidental fast food/drive-thru date!!
★ Yeah, so Rodrick sucked off the sleazy older brother of the school's most popular girl in his impressive (not that he'd admit it) convertible in the backseat, no big deal. Yeah Rodrick's not actually gay, right? Like it's not like they're dating... Who would've known the first date he'd go on would be in a drive-thru, with another dude? Well, not him, clearly.
click here for part 1
click here for part 2
(should i turn this into a full fic with an actual plot?)
Rodrick shifted uncomfortably in the backseat. It was getting dark but it wasn't like his parents expected him home early or something.
His stomach grumbled loud enough to make him wince. You smirked at the sound, fingers drumming the steering wheel as the glowing yellow arches and red roof tiles came into view.
“Romantic, huh?” you said. “Fine dining.”
“Yeah, real classy,” he muttered, glancing at the drive-thru menu board, now faded black because some punks bashed the screen in, “Hope they still got fries that taste like actual ass.”
"Sorry, wasn't aware you've eaten ass before," You grin, glancing at his almost immediate expression of surprise.
"What the f —" He furrowed his brows, suddenly sitting up and leaning over through the gap in the front seats, "And you have —?!"
You grin, pulling your key out of the car and dangling it in his face as the engine shuts off, "Alright loser, get out... Drive-thru ain't in order."
Rodrick lifted himself out of the gap painfully slow.
You teased. “Or you gotta rest your throat before dinner?”
“Shut up,” he snapped and suddenly sat up and crawled the hell out of the backseat, voice cracking halfway through. It only made you snort louder.
“Guess not.”
The parking lot lights buzzed overhead, painting everything that sickly white-orange that made the two of you look like background characters in a gas-station ad. Inside, the place was practically empty — just one kid mopping the floor and a guy in a paper hat pretending not to fall asleep behind the counter as some woman places an order. Probably a supermarket employee because who the fuck else even comes to McDonald's this late at night that isn't a college fuckboy with his emo-teenage pet.
The air smelled like salt and fryer grease and middle-aged despair otherwise.
Rodrick jammed his thumbs in his jeans pockets, walking beside you but not too close. He couldn’t tell if it was the smell or the memory of literally choking on dick like half an hour ago making his face hot.
“Bet you order the weirdest thing on the menu,” he said, breaking the silence. “You look like the kinda guy who gets, like… a Filet-O-Fish just to piss people off.”
You shot him a look over your shoulder. “I’m sorry, Mr. Chicken Nugget Connoisseur?”
“Hey, nuggets are classic,” he said, mock-offended. “You can’t screw up nuggets. You can screw up fish, though. That’s like food-poison-speed run territory.”
The two of you reached the counter, the woman from earlier standing off to the side as her order flashed on the screen — it was the only one on there, pathetically lonely.
The kid behind the register blinked at you both like he’d been waiting for a fight to break out. Rodrick rocked on his heels, pretending to study the menu board in the smell of grease and teenage regret.
The cashier then sighed a little in the silence as if wasn’t paid enough for whatever teenage soap opera he was witnessing.
Rodrick tilted his head at you, finally speaking with a sly grin. “Thought you were getting something light… got appetite left?”
You gave him a look so dry he had to cough into his fist to hide his laugh.
You lazily pointed your thumb slightly behind you at Rodrick.
“Make his with extra pickles—" You sucked in a breath, shoving your hand into your jeans, "...he likes choking on things.”
The cashier froze mid-typing, while Rodrick’s face turned a brilliant shade of red.
“Dude!” he hissed, punching your arm.
“What? You said you were hungry.” You stare at him, with his smudged eyeliner, dazed face and flushed expression. He looked like he was going to punch you, but that was hot. Because you know he couldn't really.
Rodrick gave up and stuffed his hands in his pockets, rocking back on his heels while you leaned against the counter like you hadn’t just detonated a bomb in his brain. The hum of the soda machine filled the silence, all syrup and fizz and neon light bleeding off the tiles.
You looked calm. Too calm.
He, on the other hand, could feel his pulse under his skin—like it was trying to claw its way out.
You were just standing there, totally chill. That was the part that messed with him most. Like, how the hell could you act so normal after what happened? After he’d— after that— like it was just some dumb inside joke? His jeans still felt weird, even after drying.
Rodrick kept glancing at you from the corner of his eye, jaw tight, heart in his throat.
You caught him once and grinned. “You staring at me, Heffley?”
He blinked hard. “No.”
“You sure? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I do want you dead, actually,” He scoffed, straightening up, "Been thinking about it."
“Dangerous hobby,” you said absently, turning and taking the tray before the cahsier called out the number — not like there were any other orders anyway. “Try fries instead.”
He huffed out a laugh that died halfway.
Thinking. Yeah. He was thinking. About the fact that he’d done something so far left-field that he didn’t even know what box to put it in. About the fact that you’d been so casual, so steady— like it hadn’t even been weird. Like you’d done this before.
And him? He’d been so desperate to prove he wasn’t a joke, that he’d just— gone along with it. And now here he was, in a McDonald’s line, trying to remember how to breathe like a normal person.
The smell of fries hit him and made his stomach twist, half hunger, half dread.
He wanted to say something, ask if this was, like, a thing— or if you were just messing around. He's not sure what he'd do in either situation.
You motioned. “Come on, freak. Fries await.”
Rodrick blinked, realizing he’d been staring at the tiled floor.
You grabbed the tray, brushing past him, and he caught a whiff of your cologne—warm, expensive, grounding—and his stomach did another weird twist. He hated it. He hated that you smelled good. He hated that he noticed.
He followed you to a booth near the window, the tray rattling between your hands as you slid into the seat opposite him.
“Want some?” You said, tearing open a ketchup packet, "Would help you wash that taste out."
Rodrick made a face, grabbed a fry, and flicked it straight at you. It hit your sleeve and fell onto the table with a sad little splat.
“Watch it,” you said, deadpan, brushing at your arm. “I paid for those.”
“Oh, sorry,” he muttered with a smirk, leaning back in the booth. “Didn’t realise you were feeding a family of four.”
You pointed a fry at him like a warning, one eyebrow raised. “Keep talking, Heffley. I’ll start charging you rent.”
He snorted. “Yeah, I know what payment you'd take.”
It was almost normal again. The kind of teasing that had teeth but no bite, easy and familiar. You talked about the fries being too salty, about the McFlurry machine never working, about how this place always smelled like wet mop and regret.
But Rodrick’s laugh stalled and caught in his throat as he stared past behind you at the door.
A group of jocks from school stumbled in, loud and sloppy with beer-stained laughter. They looked like they’d just come from someone’s basement party, varsity jackets hanging off their shoulders like trophies.
Rodrick watched them over your shoulder. Mild curiousity, really — difficult to ignore obnoxiously drunk teenagers that are built like actual army tanks.
One of them—tall, stupid grin—shoved another in the chest. “Dude, quit it. You’re acting like my girlfriend.”
“Yeah?” the other one barked, “What, you gonna kiss me next?”
“Bro, what are you, gay?” the first one snorted, and the whole group burst into laughter that echoed off the tiled walls.
It was the kind of sound that crawled under your skin, sharp and familiar.
You didn’t even flinch. Just sat there, leaned back with your legs spread over the seat, fingers twitching for a cigarette all of a sudden.
But Rodrick froze. The laugh he’d been half-forming died in his throat.
He stared down at the tray, jaw flexing, feeling the burn crawl up the back of his neck. He hated the way his pulse jumped at a word he’d heard a million times before — how it suddenly pissed him off.
You coughed, patting your hands on your jeans to dust salt off them, "I need a smoke. Will be back."
Rodrick watched you leave and shrugged beacuse he told himself it didn't matter that you were leaving — totally wasn't like he was dreading being in this exact situation alone.
You flicked the tip of your cigarette with your index and thumb, getting it to burn better. Once it had, you placed it between your lips, jaw ticking with slight irritation though you didn't know what about.
You stepped back into the fluorescent hum of the diner, shooting a tight-lipped smile at the employee glaring at you for smoking indoors — guess you get let off since there's practically no one here.
"Enjoying the ambience or whatever?" You scoffed at Rodrick, still hunched over slightly, half way through a burger. He looked at you, bored like you'd just asked the stupidest question.
You grinned, but it faltered as your eyes flicked past Rodrick, taking in the cluster of jocks at the back, slouched over trays and soda cups. One of them nudged another, and the drunken cackle was loud enough to echo off tiled walls.
"You move onto dudes now, Heffley?"
Rodrick froze, halfway reaching to a fry, awkwardly turning around in his seat to face where the voice came from. You looked amused — they were obviously talking about you, whether or not they knew you were related to their little highschool queen.
"Heather finally dump you?"
You could faintly recall whatever disaster went down at Heather's sweet sixteen — she made it her whole personality sob-story for a year, so no way anyone would forget.
You caught his eye as he looked like he was about to lose it — which was strange, since he looked nothing like the shy, flushed guy who spent almost five minutes trying to undo your belt.
Just to see what he'd do, you said nothing. Cigarette dangling from your lips, exhaling like it was the most normal thing in the world. Your eyes scanned the scene with mild amusement.
“Nah, man,” he said finally, forcing a grin. “Just dinner.”
It didn’t land.
“You sure?” another one called, smirking over his shoulder. “Looks like you’ve been replaced.”
The words hung there, sharp and echoing.
You leaned back in your seat, eyes flicking between them and Rodrick, cigarette burning slow between your fingers. You didn’t move, didn’t even flinch — just watched, smoke curling against the glass.
Rodrick’s knuckles went white around the edge of the tray. Something in his jaw ticked.
He could’ve brushed it off. Could’ve laughed. But the air felt hot, heavy, like his body had been rewired for fight or flight and forgot how to pick one.
So he stood. Too fast. The chair screeched back.
One of the guys laughed — that ugly, half-drunk kind of laugh that sticks under your skin.
“Hey, relax, dude—”
But Rodrick was already moving. Shoving past the booth, shoulder clipping the guy’s arm harder than he meant to, tray skidding off the table and clattering to the floor. A soda cup burst open in a hiss of fizz and ice.
You exhaled, slow. Smoke curled past your lip. “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”
The jocks were still yelling something behind him, but it blurred into the hum of the lights and the faint ring of the door chime as you followed him out.
The air outside was damp, smelled like oil and rain.
Rodrick was halfway across the parking lot already, moving like he couldn’t get far enough fast enough. He yanked open the back door of your car and climbed in, slamming it shut with more force than necessary.
You stood there for a second, staring. Then sighed — long, tired — and flicked the cigarette away before it could burn your fingers.
“Jesus fucking Christ, be careful with the door,” you muttered, sliding into the driver’s seat.
The slam of your door sealed the world out.
Silence.
Rodrick was hunched in the back, head tilted down, breathing hard. You could see his reflection in the rearview — eyes red-rimmed, jaw locked, hair sticking to his forehead.
You stared out the windshield for a beat, knuckles resting against the steering wheel. The lights from the lot flickered against the dash, stuttering shadows across both your faces.
“You gonna tell me what the hell that was?” you said finally, not looking back.
Rodrick let out a breath that wasn’t quite a laugh.
You pinch the bridge of your nose, “Cool. Great talk.”
He shifted in the back seat, the vinyl squeaking under him. “...Damn,” he muttered, half-under his breath. “Think I left my fries.”
You hummed, mouth twitching. “Nah.” One hand reached to the passenger seat, rustling the paper bag. “Got ‘em.”
He blinked up, caught off guard. “Oh.”
He reached out halfway, palm open, but you yanked your wrist forward before he could take them.
“Come get ‘em,” you said, nodding at the empty front seat.
Rodrick hesitated, eyes flicking from you to the bag. Then he sighed, pushed the door open, and slid into the front, the seat belt buckle clinking between his knees.
You handed over the fries wordlessly this time.
He dug in, chewing slow, eyes on the dashboard. The smell of salt filled the car again, mingling with the faint smoke as you cracked the window and lit up.
Neither of you spoke. The glow from your cigarette pulsed in the reflection of the glass, brief orange flashes between inhales.
Rodrick leaned back, still eating, slower now. The paper rustled softly every time he reached in for another.
You crack the window open, cigarette wedged between your fingers. Rodrick’s done now, legs sprawled out, wiping his hands off on his jeans like he’s trying to erase what just happened back there.
Neither of you talk for a while. Just the sound of the wind through the gap, the hum of the radio that isn’t even on.
He clears his throat first. “Guess that’s one way to ruin a date.”
You snort, lips twitching around the filter. “Yeah? That what this was?”
He watches you flicking ash out the window. Then, almost absently, your hand reaches across the console, fingers slipping into his hair. It’s damp — clumped in a few places.
You tilt your head, finally glancing over. “You got soda in your hair or something?”
He stiffens a little, swatting your hand away. “What?”
“Your hair’s sticky,” You say, deadpan, running your hand through again like You’re checking for yourself. “Gross.”
"Dude, I swear its rain —"
"Sure hope so," You raise an eyebrow, letting your arm rest on the centre console.
You don’t even think. One second he’s laughing under his breath, the next you’ve got your fingers curled into the front of his hoodie, dragging him across the console.
Rodrick makes a sound — surprised, low — but he doesn’t pull back. Your mouths meet halfway, rough enough that his teeth catch your lip. He tastes like salt and leftover soda, and he’s breathing hard, like he can’t figure out if this is still a joke.
You tilt your head, deepening it; your hand slides up, catching the back of his neck to keep him close. The angle’s awkward, the car more cramped than you'd like.
There’s a thud and a wince as his knee hits the console, and you pull back just enough to breathe. His eyes are wide — a little dazed, like he’s still catching up.
“Are we seriously do this again—” Rodrick started, one hand on your arm like he’s trying to hold you back.
Your cigarette is still between your fingers, but you jam it into the cupholder and cut him off, leaning close enough that he can feel the warmth off your body.
“Listen, Heffley,” you murmur, tone sharp but lazy, “you don’t gotta… think about it, alright? None of that stuff.”
He blinks, flush spreading across his cheeks. “I—wait, what—”
“Get your mind out the gutter,” you interrupt again, thumb brushing lightly over his jaw. “Shut up, and just… enjoy it.”
You don’t even pause this time. Your hand drags along the back of his neck, fingers threading through damp strands, pulling him closer until his chest bumps against yours. The car is too small, but it doesn’t matter — nothing outside the windows matters.
Rodrick stumbles against the edge of the console, curses low and sharp, but doesn’t pull back. His hands find your arms, gripping for balance, for something solid, and you press into him anyway, nudging his shoulder with yours, half-laughing against his lips.
Your cigarette rests forgotten in the cupholder, smoke curling around your heads as you tilt, nudge, and tease him. His jaw brushes against yours; his hair smells faintly of rain, sweat, and whatever leftover fries clung to it.
He tries to speak between kisses, a muffled “uh—hey—” that’s drowned out by your smirk, your thumb dragging along his jaw like it’s nothing.
“God I said enjoy it,” you murmur against his mouth, lips brushing his ear, “...you seriously look like you need it.”
You tug him closer, hand slipping under his flannel collar, fingers pressing against his back, tracing the line of his spine. Rodrick groans low, leaning back into the passenger door, the doorpanel digging into him sharp enough to make him wince — but he doesn’t care. Not really.
Instead, he arches against you a little, pressed up against the window, warm glass cold against his nape, chest tight, heartbeat hammering. Your other hand snakes under his shirt too, thumb brushing over skin, over ribs, over the muscle you can feel tensing beneath him.
His hands grip your shoulders, hoodie bunched in his fists, balancing against the awkward crush of space. He mutters something muffled— “shit—fuck—” — but it’s swallowed quickly by your lips as you drag him closer again, tongue slipping between his surprised lips.
Every shift, every nudge, every brush of knee or elbow against the console or seat makes the contact sharper, more urgent.
He presses back harder against the door, and you lean into that little arch, hand gripping the small of his back, tilting him just enough that he’s forced against you in the tight space. God, that little arch was hot.
You briefly thought of fucking him right here Under better circumstances of course. Though, he'd probably short-circuit if you said that.
The car rattles slightly as he shifts, knee hitting the console again. You wince, but don’t let go — if anything, you hold his hips down tighter. You said he was the one in the gutter, but now you're imagining worse that he is right now.
He's not curvy or anything but he's got enough to grab and it's driving you insane. Thank God it's dark because he wouldn't let you live it down if he knew what a boner you had right now.
Rodrick groans low, his hands finally settling on your shoulders like anchors. You pull back and breathlessly laugh, which comes out more like a frustrated scoff.
“You’re fucking ridiculous,” he mutters, voice rough, gasping for air with a look that says 'what are we?!'
“Yeah,” you reply between pants, hovering above him, “but you like it.”
Rodrick runs a hand through his hair, still half-flat on the front seats, before giving you a mean middle finger "fuck you".
You laugh, "I couldn't fuck you here if I wanted to."
But god, you wanted to.
He curses you out for a few moments more but you're not listening —you slide off him, back into the drivers seat and stub out your cigarette on the console.
Cigarette now out, hand resting on the wheel as you glance at him. “Alright, let’s get you home before someone thinks your sorry loser ass ran away.”
Rodrick fumbles to sit up straighter, cheeks still pink, muttering something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like, “Why do I let you do this—”
You just hum, pulling the car out of the lot, tires crunching on the gravel.
“And just so you know,” you say, glancing at him with that lazy, dangerous grin, “you should be grateful you don't have any to explain when you get home.”
He freezes mid-word, eyes wide and for a little while just as you get him home, his constant bickering doesn't sound so tiring to listen to.
click here for part 1
click here for part 2
(should i turn this into a full fic with an actual plot?)
♡ Please do not modify, steal, plagarise or post on other platforms without asking. Thank you!
THIS IS AN ABSOLUTELY GOATED request for part 2 from 🌾🍞 anon, who asked for a part 2 and I'm flattered!! I'M SORRY, ITS BEEN A WHILE SINCE YOU REQUESTED A PART 2, I HAVE EXAMS AAAAA- Hope you enjoy this part too (they get freaky)...!! Mwaaaaa asks always open guys, I love them!
cw: period-typical attitudes to being gay (not homophobia though), male/amab reader, older/college reader (21), Rodrick in last year of highschool, so he's 18, awkward first-time blowjobs, rude/crude teenage boy humour
★ It's been a while since Rodrick tripped over his sexuality, thinking of you so badly he actually couldn't escape a speeding ticket when driving his van. So now he actually has to walk home and he hates it. Even worse when a certain convertible pulls up and he REALLY doesn't want to decline a free ride...
click here for part 1
click here for part 3
Rodrick needed to back-track this all. Okay, he'll admit, he WAS thinking about it. Thinking about it all day, all week.
It all started when he got Heather's number when he flirted with her outside the bowling alley, and told him to "swing by sometime." And he had. Of course he had. He was Rodrick Fucking Heffley, who got punked by a group of highschool girls.
So how the hell did he end up slammed against a granite countertop, gripping a stranger's expensive shirt while their tongue was halfway down his throat?
Well, turns out Heather's older brother wasn't just some preppy dude with a nice car. He was hot. Older, confident, smug as hell — the kind of guy who looked at Rodrick like he was a stray dog he was about to either adopt or put in his lap just to see what would happen.
And Rodrick let it happen.
No one knew. He hadn't talked about it. Who would he even tell? Rodrick hadn't even looked him in the eye the next time he came around to pick Heather up — just stayed silent, face hot, like he was afraid his dick was gonna remember what happened if he said more than a sentence.
Now it's been a couple weeks.
And today, Rodrick was trying so hard to look cool.
He was waiting out front of the school with his bandmates, sprawled across the sidewalk like they owned the place, cracking jokes and pretending they weren't all probably failing. Rodrick had his jacket off his shoulders like it was a cape. Fingerless gloves, shirt unbuttoned just enough to say yeah, 'I know I'm hot,' eyeliner smudged on purpose.
It was a whole look. And you were eating it up.
Heather was taking forever. Probably reapplying lip gloss or bullying freshmen or whatever she did.
His friends were trickling off, getting picked up or peeling away on their sad little skateboards one by one. Rodrick stayed put, tapping his boot against the pavement, adjusting his chain wallet, glancing at his phone for no reason. Just vibing.
And then?
Then he heard it.
A car horn — short, sharp, and obnoxious — ripped through the air like a slap across the face.
Rodrick's head snapped up.
He finally noticed you.
Window down. Arm draped out the side, knuckles loose on the wheel. Designer sunglasses. Lip between your teeth, chewing gum slow and deliberately like you were in a goddamn commercial. The engine purred like a threat. You looked like sin on legs and a fat inheritance.
And you were looking right at him.
Rodrick froze like he'd just been caught with his pants down.
Because in a way, he had. And after what happened last time? He doesn't want to imagine having his pants down, because... well, that's obvious.
The car didn't roll past. It lingered. Engine purring low AGAIN like it was laughing at him.
Rodrick squinted against the sun, already feeling the heat crawl up his neck. He didn't move. He could've walked away, sure. Pretended he didn't see you. Kept his pride and maybe a shred of sanity.
But he didn't.
Instead, he stood there, hands shoved in his pockets, jaw clenched like he was trying to win a fight he didn't even know he was in yet.
The convertible idled in front of him, all sleek lines and ego. Then came the voice.
"Hey, loser."
You were leaned out the window, sunglasses low on your nose, gum clicking against your teeth. That grin on your face? It was unholy. Like you knew exactly what you were doing to him.
Rodrick rolled his eyes so hard he almost saw the moment you kissed him play out in the back of his skull. "Real original," he muttered, biting the inside of his cheek.
"Aw, don't pout." You stretched your arm a little farther out the window, flexing your fingers mockingly. "I figured you'd be flattered I remembered you."
"Yeah? Well, I'm not." He puffed up a little, angling his shoulder like he wanted to block your view but couldn't stop himself from inching closer to the car. "What're you even doing here?"
You popped your gum. Loud. "Picking up my bitchy little sister. What else?"
Rodrick blinked. "Heather?"
"Duh."
His brows knit together, mouth twitching like he couldn't decide between confusion or sarcasm. "She left like... fifteen minutes ago."
You tilted your head, mock confusion on your face.
"Did she now?"
You slammed your palm hard against the outside of the door with a thunk, arm still draped lazily out the window, wrist dangling like you owned the whole damn parking lot. The car jumped slightly under your force, and Rodrick actually flinched.
You didn't smile, cursing obnoxiously loud, "That bitch."
For a second, his face was all wide eyes and instinct, like a feral cat cornered behind a dumpster.
Then he burst out laughing.
Not just a chuckle—a full, mocking cackle that cracked out of his chest like he was watching a soap opera and you were the main character having a meltdown. "Holy shit," he snorted, "You look like a pissy brat. Relax, man."
You narrowed your eyes. "Shut the hell up."
Rodrick took a step forward, one arm just above the driver's window, leaning in casually and milking this new authority—like he'd won something. "Touchy, huh? Thought you were all grown up—"
"Touchy?" you cut him off sharply, voice low now, almost a growl. "You wanna talk about touchy? Last time I recall you're the kid—a kid with a raging boner."
The laugh caught in his throat.
Rodrick's mouth opened, then closed. Like maybe if he stared at you long enough, you'd take it back. His ears turned a distinct, traitorous red.
You popped your gum again, the sound sharp as a slap, and let your arm hang loose again like you weren't even phased. You stared into his face, his more rigid posture and his fist against your car. You weren't phased, god no, you saw pathetic, barely legal teens running their mouths all the time. But this time, you wanted that mouth on something else—eyeliner, cracked lips and smudged makeup all.
Rodrick, however, looked like someone had just unplugged his amp mid-set.
"Well?" You grin, eyes flicking from his face down to his studded belt then back up again, "You better run home, buddy. Before your mommy tells y' off or something?"
Rodrick didn't move.
His hand curled into a loose fist against the top of your car door, knuckles pale like he was using it to stay grounded. His eyes flicked down to the tires, then your rims, then back to your face. He was quiet for a second too long, and that silence said everything.
You raised an eyebrow. "What, cat got your tongue?"
"No," he muttered, voice tighter now, jaw clenched like he'd just bit down on glass. "Just thinkin'."
You leaned your cheek into your shoulder, blinking at him real slow. "Let me guess. Van trouble?"
Rodrick's eyes narrowed.
You huffed a little laugh, shifting in your seat. "Right. You've been walking, haven't you? What happened, Daddy find out you drive like a bat outta hell?"
He didn't respond, just gave you a glare that tried to be threatening but only made you smirk harder.
You dragged your tongue across your teeth and clicked your gum again. "I'll give you a ride."
Rodrick perked up ever so slightly, but you held up a hand like a cop issuing a citation.
"Backseat."
His face dropped.
"What?"
You popped the car door lock with a little click, lazily jabbing your thumb over your shoulder. "You heard me. You wanna get driven, you sit in the back. Can't have you near the stereo, you might get ideas."
"Are you serious?" His voice cracked with disbelief and something dangerously close to a whine.
You smiled now, mean and slow. "Dead serious."
Rodrick looked at the door, then at you, jaw working like he was chewing rocks. "You treat me like a fuckin' dog, man."
You shrugged. "Nah. I like dogs."
He muttered something under his breath—definitely a curse, probably directed at you—but he opened the back door anyway, dragging his feet like he was being escorted to a prison van.
You watched him slump into the seat through the rearview mirror. "Good boy."
Rodrick flipped you off immediately, middle finger directed at you through the mirror, leanign against the window like a little shit.
You didn't start the car.
Instead, you leaned forward, grabbing a fresh piece of gum from the center console, slow and deliberate like you were on a break instead of chauffeuring some crusty eyeliner gremlin with control issues. You unwrapped it with a flick of your wrist, popped it in your mouth, and started chewing again, slow like molasses.
Rodrick squinted at you through the rearview mirror. "Dude. What are you—?"
You turned, not your whole body, just your head, resting your elbow on the wheel like you had all the time in the world. "You want some?"
He looked at the pack, then at you, suspicious. "Is that the weed kind?"
You rolled your eyes. "No, princess. I wouldn't waste the good shit on you. Pink lemonade. Super innocent. Calm down."
Rodrick gave a little scoff but didn't move.
"Suit yourself," you said with a hum, stretching just enough to spit the old gum into a tissue and stuff it into the door pocket. "More for me."
A pause.
"Just drive," Rodrick gritted, leaning his forehead against the glass like he was trying to escape by osmosis or something.
You made a soft noise of protest, exaggerated and bratty. "Can't. Finishing my gum. Can't you see? My mouth's busy."
Rodrick groaned, leaning back again, both hands in his hair now.
You caught his eye in the mirror, that same mirror where he'd glared at you, flipped you off, bit back a dozen smartass retorts. And now?
Now his gaze was stuck. Jaw clenched. Thighs spread just a little too wide.
Your smirk curved wider, and you tilted your head.
"Unless," you said, voice dropping slow and sticky, "you want your mouth busy too?"
Rodrick stopped breathing.
Like actually. You saw it. His chest locked up, and his eyes darted from your mouth to the back of your headrest and then down to his lap like maybe that would save him. He HAD been thinking about it all week. He was basically semi-hard for days, honestly (though he'd never admit it), too embarrassed to jack it off.
You didn't turn around. Just stayed staring into the rearview, chewing your gum, letting the quiet buzz of the car hold the moment taut.
And now Rodrick Heffley looked less like a punk and more like a problem about to beg for one himself.
"Well?"
Rodrick cleared his throat. Loud. Like maybe that'd distract from the very obvious urge
"I'm not— gay— or into...that—," he muttered.
You raised your brows at the mirror. "Cool. Neither is gum, but you've been chewing on me with your eyes since the kitchen."
"Jesus," he groaned, pushing his palms to his face. "You don't get it."
"No, I do." You smirked and let your tongue flick against the gum once. "You're not gay. You just—what? Accidentally had your tongue down my throat? Accidentally got hard? Accidentally stood in the shower for twenty minutes thinking about it, but didn't jack off because that would make it gay?"
Rodrick flinched. You grinned. You knew.
His hands dropped to his lap again. "I didn't—fuck off, dude—"
"Aw, c'mon," you crooned, turning your head just slightly now, still leaned casually against the wheel like you had all the cards. "I'm just saying. If you're gonna moan about being straight, you might wanna stop looking like you're one lip-bite away from crawling up here and asking me to fuck you."
He scowled, flustered, but didn't deny it.
You let the silence crawl back in, slow and viscous, like syrup in the heat. Then, softly but it wasn't meant to soothe him or anything—the exact opposite actually,
"Unless that's not what you want. Maybe you don't wanna fuck. Maybe you just wanna suck."
Rodrick blinked, almost spluttering over nothing. "What the hell—"
"Not a bad option." You popped your gum again. "Start slow. Feel it out. Literally. Could be an experiment. You're in high school, right? Great time for science."
Rodrick looked like he might short-circuit. He opened his mouth. Closed it.
He's a highschooler, a dude at that too—sex and porn is meant to be funny, obnoxious and excite him. Not nervous, god why is he nervous?
Then, very softly, his gaze dropped and he muttered something that sounded like:
"...I mean—not...I dunno..."
It wasn't a yes. But it wasn't a no either. You could work with that.
You reached up and killed the engine. The quiet thud echoed loud in the space between you. You unbuckled your seatbelt, smooth and slow, then rolled your neck like you had time to kill.
Then, one hand shoved casually in your pocket, you stepped out of the car.
Rodrick straightened in the backseat, heart pounding like the drums he thought made him cool.
And you rounded the side, steps easy. Measured. Like you weren't about to absolutely ruin him, "Let's take care of that week-long boner, loser."
The second the door clicked shut behind you, Rodrick had to stop himself from backing away, cursing at first but shut up immediately. No time wasted — your fingers curled around his collar, tugging him forward until your mouths collided in a kiss so messy it knocked your teeth together. He tasted like Coke and teenage desperation, and you still tasted like that gum you'd been chewing, artificial mint and sugar, sweet and sharp on his tongue. It made his knees weak.
He leaned back against the seat, trying to match your rhythm, but he was all nerves and fidgeting hands, kissing like someone who'd had a few hot dreams and maybe tried it once behind a garage in seventh grade. Your lips moved slow, dragging over his in a way that had him chasing after the contact, heat rising up his neck. Every time your teeth scraped his lower lip, he gasped into your mouth like you'd stolen all the air from the car.
You kissed like you were used to this. Like you knew how to melt someone down to mush without even breaking a sweat. And Rodrick, poor Rodrick, who always tried so hard to look cool with his flannels and black nail polish and that stupidly smug walk, was crumbling already.
You gripped the sides of his unbuttoned flannel, easing it off his shoulders, one arm at a time, and he let you, blinking up at you like you were something holy and dangerous. Underneath, his vintage Iron Maiden tee clung to his chest, collar stretched and sleeves rolled, like he'd tried way too hard to look effortless that morning. He wasn't pulling it off now—he looked flustered, cheeks pink and lips slick, like he'd been caught in something too big for him.
He shifted, sitting up slightly, and fumbled at the button of your jeans. His fingers were trembling. He missed the catch the first time, then the second. His nails scraped your waistband. You didn't help—just watched, still half-straddling him in the cramped backseat, licking your lips like you were enjoying the show.
"Take your time," you said, slow and syrupy, practically crooning it against his jaw.
Rodrick froze. Looked up at you, eyes wild, like you'd just pulled a gun on him. His face twisted, flustered and furious, and he scoffed, "Fuck you. You're takin' the piss right now."
You laughed, quiet and rich, leaning in until your forehead bumped his. "Nah," you whispered, your lips brushing his again, so soft it made him twitch. "I just like watching you try."
His breath hitched. You kissed him again—this time slower, letting him taste the gum still on your tongue, sticky-sweet and minty. It pissed him off on how good it tasted—he made a mental note to actually take the gum next time you offered.
Next time? God, why is he even thinking about a "next time"?
It took Rodrick a solid thirty seconds to finally undo your belt. He kept tugging at the wrong loop, too forceful, too clumsy, and you leaned your weight back on your palms, watching him like this was entertainment. Maybe it was. His brows were drawn together, lips parted in concentration. When he finally got the tongue of the belt through the buckle, he let out a breath like he'd just cracked a safe.
The zipper was easier—he tugged it down in one slow motion, the sound loud in the heated silence of the car. He paused when your cock was free, stiff and flushed, the tip already glistening. His eyes widened just a little. You didn't miss it. You never did. You've done this a few times before, but he clearly hasn't even seen porn of two dudes before.
"You're a guy too, Rodrick," you said, voice warm with amusement. "You know what feels good, right?"
He nodded, hesitant. One hand cupped you awkwardly, his fingers twitching like he wasn't sure where to start, then finally curled around your cock. His touch was cautious at first—slow pumps, like he was still testing the waters. But it only took a few strokes before he found a rhythm, the kind that made your hips jerk slightly forward into his hand.
"Mmph," you exhaled, half-laughing, half-moaning. "Damn. You're pretty good at this."
That did it—Rodrick's cheeks lit up instantly, a flush rising from his collar to the tips of his ears.
You tilted your head, grin sharp. "So how often do you jerk off to get this good at handling dick, huh?"
He choked on air—literally coughed, pulling his hand back like your cock had burned him or something. "What the fuck—?!"
You laughed outright this time, low and throaty, grabbing his wrist and guiding it back to your crotch. "Relax. I said you were good. Don't go getting all shy on me now."
Rodrick muttered something again—something that might've been fuck off or I hate you or Jesus Christ—but he was still holding you, still moving his hand, and you were still panting through your teeth, barely holding in a groan.
"Don't just use your hands," you said slowly, your voice going silkier, heavier. "Use your mouth. C'mon."
His eyes snapped to yours like you'd just pulled the emergency brake mid-highway. "What?!"
You just tilted your hips forward, cock tapping lightly against his lower lip, a bead of precum catching on the edge of his mouth. "C'mon. I've seen how you stare. Open up. I'll tell you what to do."
He was frozen. And then, so slowly it was almost comical, his lips parted, breath trembling.
"Keep your head down. Windows are glass, y'know?" you murmured, your fingers threading into his hair, guiding his head down to hollow out his mouth. "Now choke on something for real, babe."
Rodrick pulled off for a moment, panting and wet lips against your tip, brows furrowed in a weak glare, "Call me babe again, I'll bite your fucking dick off."
You huffed a laugh, "Sure, sweetheart."
And before he could snap back, you nudged his mouth open again with a firm, guiding hand on his scalp.
He went back down slower this time. Less out of hesitation—more like...curiosity. His lips wrapped around your tip, warm and tentative, and you felt the way he breathed through his nose, nostrils flaring as the weight of your cock settled onto his tongue. The taste hit him in waves—salty, bitter, heady—and his whole face twitched like he didn't know if he hated it or if he wanted more.
He tried to hide it. Tried to pretend he was indifferent. But you saw the way his lashes fluttered, the way his eyes briefly closed when you twitched in his mouth. That tiny throb of your cock against his tongue? He felt it. And it made him shift in his seat.
He was getting hard.
You caught the way his thighs pressed together. How his hips squirmed, almost guilty, like maybe if he clenched up tight enough his dick wouldn't be leaking against the inside of his jeans right now.
You groaned, low and pleased, hips barely tilting forward. "That's it. Good, fuck..."
Rodrick didn't answer. Couldn't—not with his mouth full, and your fingers tugging lightly at his hair to keep him there. But his eyes flashed up at you, defiant and pink-cheeked, watery with effort. You were thick, and he still wasn't used to it. His jaw ached, his throat was trying to suppress a gag, and yet he didn't pull off again.
You gave a shallow thrust—just enough for him to feel your cock stiffen inside his mouth.
He shuddered.
Rodrick groaned, and the sound vibrated down your length. He didn't want to answer. But his mouth stayed open. He sucked back down, slower, deeper this time, spit dragging from his chin to your base.
He liked it.
He hated that he liked it.
And you could feel the tremble in his thighs when your cock bumped the back of his throat again—could see the way he rocked ever so subtly into his seat, chasing a little friction, desperate not to make a sound.
You noted it through hazy vision, furrowing your brows to make use of it. A little surprise never hurt anyone, right?
Your hips twitched once—just once, experimentally—up into the wet heat of his mouth. And that was all it took.
Rodrick flinched with a surprised grunt, the motion nudging him deeper, forcing him to adjust and—fuck—he didn't back off. He actually followed through, the shift in pressure making your thighs tense.
"Oh—fuck..." you groaned under your breath, fingers tightening in his hair, guiding him just enough, but letting him choose to keep going.
And he did. Mouth working messily and drooling now, rhythm shaky but there, flushed red from his ears down his throat, like sucking you off was getting him off too—and it was. His own hips kept shifting like he didn't know what to do with the ache in his jeans. Because he really didn't—the closest thing he's ever been to cumming untouched was a wet dream.
You caught it just between the messy fold of his clothes —the way his hand hovered near his waistband, unsure, then gave in.
Your hand clenched against the car seat. The air felt thinner, charged, like it was vibrating around you both.
And when it hit, it hit hard. Your breath shuddered out, spine arching just a little, and Rodrick jerked at the taste, the sudden strange texture filling his mouth, but didn't pull back. Didn't flinch. He stayed right there, like he didn't know what else to do except ride it out with your cock in his mouth.
A second later, he slumped forward with a stifled gasp, forehead thudding lightly against your thigh. His mouth still damp. His belt half undone. He was breathing like he'd just sprinted a mile, and the way he clung to your leg like it was anchoring him made your lips twitch into a slow, smug smile.
His face was pink. Embarrassed and glowing all at once.
You ran a hand through his sweaty bangs, barely brushing your knuckles over the back of his neck.
"Damn," you muttered, catching your breath. "You're wayyy too good at that for a guy who's not into dudes."
Rodrick groaned into your thigh, trying to burrow and hide his face. "Shut up."
You couldn't. Not when he looked so cute— his face was a warm, flushed colour and eyeliner that began to run after sucking your cock pricked a few tears at his eyes.
You noticed the stickiness against the loosened waist of his jeans, his hips twitching in tiny, involuntary aftershocks. A huff of laughter slipped out of you before you could stop it—mean, but kind of stunned, too.
He's still catching his breath like he's fighting off the shame. You take the bait, whistling slightly as you motion to the crotch of his jeans where he'd cum, "Didn't even have to touch you, damn. Liked it that much?"
Rodrick groaned loudly, dragging the sleeves of his discarded flannel over his face like he could disappear inside them. His whole face went about as red as the knobs on your car radio, and when he didn't snap back right away—not with a joke, not with a shove, not even a middle finger—you blinked.
He was mortified. It would be too easy to push him further, but you decide to let up this time.
Your teasing tapered instantly. "Hey," you said, voice gentler now. Your fingers skimmed along his shoulder, grounding. "Hey, I'm not—"
He didn't lift his head, "Oh, fuck off."
You shifted, letting your palm settle between his shoulder blades. "Look, I'm not gonna keep going if you're freaking out."
"I'm not freaking out," His voice was still muffled into your jeans, but more steady, holding more vigour now, "Just. Shut the fuck up."
You did, scoffing and half-relieved his bite came back. "...You think your parents'll care if you stay out a few more hours? Or are you some curfew princess."
His head tilted, just slightly. "What?"
"Just asking," you shrugged, voice casual, but your thumb brushed behind his ear, playing with the fake cuff on them.
Rodrick's still reeling from the mess he just made, but he lifts his head, blinking at you. His face is a mess of emotions—still a little red but some sort of gratitude that you aren't totally making fun of him at least.
"Yeah..." he mutters, still avoiding your gaze. "They're not home for a while."
You give him a wink, rubbing your thumb on his bottom lip now—feeling the stickiness of it from whatever of your cum he couldn't swallow. Or rather, coughed back up when trying to. "I'm staying my whole break here this time. If you're up for it."
Rodrick's eyes narrow in warning and disbelief. "You really are an asshole."
You shrug, still chewing your gum and leaning back in your seat. "I'm not heartless though."
He props himself up on his elbows, cogs turning in his head. Did you mean what he thought you meant?
"What?" You look at him, mumbling for the first time since you've met him. "I got hobbies besides being college fuckboy-trash."
Rodrick stares at you, eyes narrowed like he's trying to figure out if you're screwing with him again—but there's a twitch at the corner of his mouth, betraying the smile he's fighting. He exhales a shaky laugh, rubbing a hand over his face. "Yeah, well...your other hobbies better include food. I'm starving."
You reach for the keys from your back pocket, gum snapping between your teeth in a smile you pray he didn't catch. "Guess it's your lucky night, Heffley. Hope you like drive-thru food and post-nut clarity."
♡ Please do not modify, steal, plagarise or post on other platforms without asking. Thank you!
Hi sillies!! Below is all the characters I have made d!ck profiles + NSFW headcannons for! All characters are implied to be of age, or are CANNONICALLY of age. They are all written as gn!reader; as in no genitals are mentioned.
𐙚┆INDEX 🥛 !
♡ Boothill - HSR link
♡ Aventurine - HSR link
♡ Dr. Ratio - HSR link
♡ Blade - HSR link
♡ LuoCha - HSR link
♡ JingYuan - HSR working...
♡ Sampo Koski- HSR link
"You could sl!t my wrists, I'd write your name in a heart with the hemorrhage..." romantic.
♡ IT'S BEEN like 6 MONTHS I'M SORRY EXAMS TOOK ME OUT + I got employed </3 I ALSO FAILED MATHS BUT YK.. But I'm back to regular updates! We're almost at the end, guys, stay locked in. This is actually something that happened recently during a party-! Names are similar, actually, because some of the people involved are my friends (and ofc myself), so it was really an experience to write, tbh. anyways, have fun reading!! It's pretty long!
CW: self harm (sh), drug use, drug and alcohol use, implied sexual assault, drink spiking, molly-use, opioids, hospital settings... uh, just a party gone wrong, both characters realising they do actually mind dying.
word count: 9200
masterlist of all parts
song4this: "DiE4U" by Bring me the Horizon
-------story starts here-------
The tide had finally started turning.
It wasn’t like everything was sunshine and glitter, rumors were stubborn and teenage girls could be worse than gossip columns—but you were clawing your way back, one returned smile at a locker and “oh my god, I love your outfit” in the hallway at a time. Slowly, the noise was quieting. The whispers behind hands now turned to invitations. Pity was morphing into envy again. You were becoming you again.
And part of that meant saying yes when the girls invited you out.
It was nothing major, really. Just a “come out, you never do anymore” kind of night. A few drinks, some awful dance-floor selfies, and maybe a late-night diner run before someone puked in the Uber.
Rodrick didn’t say anything at first. He just watched you from where he was lying upside down on your bed, head hanging over the edge, legs still in his scuffed Converse, picking at a string in your bedsheets while you rifled through your closet.
“You’re sure you wanna go?” he asked eventually, like it was casual. It wasn’t.
You paused with your hand on a hanger. “Rodrick.”
He looked up—well, as much as he could from that angle—then let his head drop again with a groan. “I know, I know. I’m not gonna do the whole clingy boyfriend thing, okay? I’m just…”
“Whiny?” you teased, pulling out a dress and holding it against your chest. You looked at him over your shoulder. “You think this one’s cute?”
His face did that thing it always did when he liked something on you but didn’t know how to say it. His eyes widened slightly before darting away, ears pinking. “I mean. Sure. If you’re tryna kill me, then yeah. Wear that one.”
You rolled your eyes but smiled anyway, turning back to the mirror.
Behind you, he sat up properly, crossing his legs and watching you do your makeup with the kind of lazy reverence that made your chest ache a little.
“You gonna drink?” he asked, after a long pause.
You nodded while fixing your eyeliner. “A little. Not too much.”
“Need me to pick you up?”
You met his eyes in the reflection, a soft smirk tugging at your lips. “What, you want to be my Uber driver now?”
He scoffed. “Please. I’m way cooler than an Uber driver. my van has way more personality.”
You laughed. “Fine. You can pick me up when I’m done.”
“I’ll leave the backseat clean for you.” He stood, walking up behind you and resting his chin on your shoulder, arms sneaking around your waist. “Just… call me, alright? I don’t care if it’s 2 a.m. or if you forgot your shoes. Not like your shoes are made for walking anyway...”
“I will,” you whispered, leaning back into him just for a second.
You could feel him watching you the whole time you touched up your lip gloss. And he didn’t say it but you knew what he was thinking about.
He trusted you. But he still hated the thought of you in the same room as Nathan.
You turned and kissed his cheek gently. “I’ll be okay.”
Rodrick grumbled something under his breath, squeezing your hips once before letting go. “You better be. Or I’m pulling up to that party and dragging your glittery ass outta there myself.”
You laughed, already slipping your phone into your tiny purse. “Can’t wait.”
And with that, you were gone —leaving the scent of perfume behind and a boy in a band tee muttering about how unfair it was that you looked that good and knew it.
You could hear the music before you even stepped out of the Uber.
Bass thumping like a heartbeat through the pavement, the sound warping as it pushed through walls too thin and windows thrown open to the sticky summer air.
Kayla had said it would be “just a small thing,” a little wind-down with people from her cousin’s college who were visiting for the weekend. Nothing crazy. Casual. Maybe fifteen people.
But when you stepped onto the lawn, it was obvious she’d lied through her teeth.
It wasn’t massive, but it definitely wasn’t small either. People were spilling out onto the porch with red cups in hand, laughing too loud and stumbling in too-high shoes. The house glowed from within with colored LEDs casting everyone in that party-pink and purple haze. Inside, it was all low ceilings and bodies pressed too close together. Sweat and perfume. Beer and burnt weed. The air was thick and warm, like a mouth breathing right onto your skin.
You found Kayla in the kitchen, holding a drink in one hand and a glow stick in the other. She turned, spotted you—and for a moment, her face did that awkward flinch like she wasn’t sure if she was allowed to be happy to see you.
Then she smiled anyway.
“You actually came!” she shouted over the music, pulling you into a loose hug that reeked of tequila and strawberry vape. “Oh my god, you look so good.”
You laughed and accepted the compliment, even if part of you still felt brittle around her. The whole Nathan situation was a wound that was just barely scabbed over — and Kaylya and her boyfriend had been right there. In the car behind Nathan’s.
But she was trying. You could see that.
So you tried too.
The first hour was easy. Familiar faces, easy laughs, music that made your bones itch in the best way. Someone poured you a drink that tasted like candy and sin. You danced with your girls in the middle of the living room, hair sticking to the back of your neck, arms thrown around shoulders you used to resent. And for a little while, it actually felt good.
Rodrick stayed in your pocket the whole time — figuratively, not literally. You could feel him in the texts you didn’t check. The picture you almost took. The way you didn’t let your drink go empty too many times. You knew he’d be waiting when the lights went out. That kept you steady.
But then later—once the dancing wore off and the night slumped into its slurred, half-spoken twilight—you drifted. You were moving through the hallway when you caught the tail end of a sentence from someone’s half-drunk mouth:
“—I mean, like, Rodrick? Seriously?”
It wasn’t said to you. Not directly. But it didn’t have to be.
You froze near the wall, half-hidden behind someone in a letterman jacket.
The girl who said it—you recognized her vaguely. She was one of those girls whose name you never bothered to learn but had always sat two seats behind you in English. Glossy mouth. Low-rise jeans. Smudged eyeliner but it wasn't intentional because that's probably "too goth" for them or something.
“I just think it’s wild,” she continued, sipping something blue from her cup. “She went from Nathan to that guy—what’s his name? Heather’s sloppy seconds?”
There were a few laughs. You cringed; seems like no one's forgetting the stunt at Heather's sweet sixteen.
“She could’ve had anyone,” another girl chimed in. “Like, literally. She’s hot, she’s popular again. And she’s dating the guy with the crusty van and a nose ring?”
You could've punched her — Rodrick doesn't even have a nose ring!
It wasn’t like you hadn’t heard worse, though.
And somewhere, in the back of your mind, you were already thinking about calling him.
You were about to leave. Just needed a refill of something fizzy to tingle that weird ache in your head.
The hallway opened back into the kitchen, dimmer now, the air hot and glossy from too many bodies and open bottles. You pushed through the crowd, not even sure what you were reaching for—vodka? soda? your phone?
And then—
“Wait—hey. Hey, can I talk to you?”
You blinked as your chests collided a little, holding your arms out to steady yourself against a body much taller than yours with its equipped heels.
She was standing just off to the side, near the fridge, clutching her half-empty drink like a peace offering. Her bleached-blonde hair was twisted up into two sparkly clip-on tails, glitter lining the inner corners of her eyes. Crop top, fuzzy purse, three butterfly rings stacked on one finger like they were trying to fly away.
It was such a Kayla-look; all loud and bubblegum and unapologetically her.
You stopped, the cup in your hand hovering somewhere between letting go and holding on.
She chewed the inside of her cheek before speaking. “I know this is random. And, like, you totally don’t have to talk to me right now if you don’t want to. I just… I really need to say something.”
You nodded, warily. “Okay.”
“I’m sorry,” she blurted out. “For not telling you. About Nathan. About what I knew. I should’ve said something sooner.”
You blinked.
“I—I knew something was going on,” she continued, her words speeding up, tumbling over each other. “My boyfriend, Danny, he was there that night. The one behind Nathan’s car. And I heard stuff. And I knew he was sketchy. But I didn’t say anything because—” She laughed, breathlessly, bitterly. “Because I didn’t want Danny to think I was stuck-up or whatever.”
You stared.
“Which is so dumb, because honestly? I liked being your friend. You made me feel like I didn’t have to play dumb all the time, like why was Daniel so pissed anyway? I've slept with him before. I don’t know.”
The music shifted behind her, someone switching songs. Laughter spilled in from the living room. But all of it felt weirdly far away.
Because this—this moment was real.
Kayla, usually so bubbly and superficial, standing there with her sparkly drink and tears clinging to the tips of her mascaraed lashes. Not crying. Just honest.
You didn’t realize you’d been holding your breath until you let it out.
“It's —fine—.” The words left your mouth before you fully decided on them. But you meant it.
Because you weren’t perfect either. Because people made mistakes and picked the wrong people and lied to themselves just to feel safe, you guess.
Kayla let out a little relieved squeak and hugged you, arms wrapped tight around your waist, her head bumping your shoulder.
“You still smell SO good,” she murmured. “God, I missed that.”
You laughed as she pulled back, looping a glittery arm through yours with a grin that could’ve powered the entire house’s string lights.
"You want a refill, right?" she chirped, dragging you toward the kitchen. "Brantley and his team... they brought the good punch. Besides..."
She leaned in a little, lowering her voice like it was a secret.
“I broke up with Daniel.”
You blinked. “Wait, seriously?”
She gave a dramatic eye-roll. “Yeah. He said I was ‘too much,’ and I was like — you dated me while I had zebra print nails and rhinestones in my hair, what did you think this was? If he didn't like it, he shouldn't have dated me!"
You snorted. Of course she said that.
“I need a new boyfriend,” she declared, straightening her top with purpose. “And that group has cute guys. I’m talking jawlines and forearms. So you can help me pick, since you're taken and all. You have, like, boyfriend experience.”
You paused, eyeing her up and down. “…Boyfriend experience?”
“Yeah, duh,” Kayla said breezily. “Rodrick. Obviously.”
You stared at her for a beat, eyebrows knitting slightly. She caught the expression and laughed, slapping your arm playfully.
“I mean, like — he dresses weird,” she added quickly, twirling one of her sparkly rings. “But then again, so do I.” She struck a quick pose, winking. “I respect it. And he looks like he treats you good.”
Your mouth twitched. Rodrick, with his ripped shirts and cargo shorts, probably smelling like basement and Red Bull. Treating you good.
The thought warmed you in places that had gone cold this past month.
By the time you reached the kitchen, Kayla had already grabbed two cups and was dragging you toward the couch. She was radiant again, loud and shiny and alive, like she'd just respawned after being off your radar for too long.
She plopped down on a sagging couch cushion, legs crossed dramatically, and called out over the music:
“Okay, make way, I’ve got the fallen queen! Everybody shut up and bow or whatever!”
A few cheers went up—some joking, some genuine. You felt yourself flush a little, but you smiled.
The couch was low and lumpy, where you had to move every so often so it didn't eat you whole. Kayla had parked you both there like royalty, legs draped, laughter loud. She kept introducing you to people you half-remembered— names came and went like confetti, smiles too bright, perfume too sweet.
You tried to hold onto the warmth, to the casual sparkle of Kayla’s joy. You wanted to. She was finally herself again, no longer shrinking to fit into some guy’s pocket.
Then he sat down.
Not beside you, but too close. A face you didn’t know—some friend of Brantley’s, apparently. He had that lean, hungry look that didn’t match the glitter of the party. His eyes landed on you like he already knew what you tasted like. Like you were a drink he’d ordered ages ago and was tired of waiting for.
“You’re quiet,” he said. He was smiling, but it wasn’t the kind that made you feel seen. It was the kind that measured you.
"Been a while," You shrugged, gave a polite smile, the kind you’d rehearsed in a mirror once, maybe. “Just soaking it in.”
He chuckled like he’d found that charming, even though you hadn’t meant it to be. His gaze flicked to Kayla, who was distracted by someone on her phone. Then back to you.
“Someone like you… I’m surprised you’re not with anyone.”
You didn’t say anything. Just sipped what was left in your cup. Sugar and cheap vodka, maybe.
He leaned forward a little, elbow on his knee. “You seeing anyone?”
There was a pause.
You could’ve said it. Could’ve said Rodrick’s name like a blade and be done with it.
Why didn't you? You regretted pausing but it felt too late to still say it. You're not ashamed of him, you love him more than anything and you also want to leave more than anything—
But you didn’t want to derail Kayla’s night. Or make a scene. Or seem dramatic. So instead, you just smiled again. Too soft, too slow. “Not looking to date.”
It wasn’t no. Not really.
He smiled at that—sharp, small. “That’s a shame.”
And then he stood. You thought that was it, thought maybe he got the hint, until he returned.
With another drink.
You stared at it for a second when he held it out, condensation dripping down the red Solo cup like sweat. The music thudded through the floor like a second heartbeat.
“Try this one,” he said. “Tastes better than the punch. Promise.”
You hesitated—but Kayla had grabbed hers already, too busy chatting with someone across the table. People were laughing. Maddison was taking selfies. Everything felt normal. Bright. Harmless.
So you took the cup.
It smelled fine. Fruity. Innocent.
You raised it to your lips. Drank.
Just a sip.
The sweetness clung to your tongue, thicker than before. It burned slightly, but you figured that was the vodka. You swallowed and laughed at something Kayla said.
The drink settled warm in your stomach, sweet and sticky like syrup, and you kept Kayla close, her laughter loud in your ear as she twisted toward Maddison and the others. You were anchored for a moment—like maybe it would all stay light and stupid and sugar-rushed.
But then came the joke.
“Kayla, deadass, that spray tan? Girl, you look like an éclair.”
Laughter burst around the couch, the kind that’s more of a performance than a reaction.
“Not the chocolate part, obviously,” someone added. “Just the pastry. Like—if I bit into you, would you be white and creamy inside?”
The whole group wheezed. Kayla cackled like she didn’t care, tossing her fake fur boa over one shoulder, but you caught that half-second of delay—where her smile dropped, even just an inch.
“I want an éclair now, actually,” she chirped, hopping up. “Watch my drink, babe!”
She gave your arm a squeeze and disappeared into the thrum of bodies.
You were left holding two cups and a laugh that didn’t quite land for a moment, far too alert and noticing things you shouldn't.
You tried not to notice the guy from before still floating nearby, talking to someone else now, his body angled like he might pivot back toward you at any second. You shifted, heart skipping like a scratched CD, and suddenly the couch felt too hot, too soft, too much.
“Need air,” you mumbled. Maybe to no one.
No one heard you leave.
You weaved through the haze of vape smoke and cheap perfume, bass pounding low enough to rearrange your ribs. The lights were low but neon-sharp, warping everything into a smear of pinks and purples. Someone bumped into your hip and murmured an apology you didn’t catch.
You placed it on the side table, fingers slow but mind screaming at you to put it down like it was red hot. Any actual screams and squeals felt like they were happening through a fishbowl.
Someone next to you leaned in—tight ringlets, sloppily drawn eyeliner, too-close perfume. She grinned, gum snapping.
“You look wrecked,” she said, not unkindly. “You rolling?”
You blinked at her. “What?”
“Molly. You on it? Everyone is. Brantley brought like, a whole stash. Want some?”
Your heart stuttered, just once, before you shook your head. “No, I—no thanks.”
But her voice lingered behind your ear as she moved on, neon-bright and echoing. The couch dipped, bounced, and you realized your body wasn’t quite following commands the way it should. You stood up too fast, or maybe the floor rose too quickly to meet you.
Colors bled at the corners of your vision. Someone’s LED lights pulsed from blue to red, red to blue, and for a second it felt like sirens.
You needed air.
You moved through the crowd like water, your body slow, heavy-limbed, dragging itself on instinct. A warm hand touched your back—maybe just someone passing by — but you flinched.
The hallway was no better. Laughter chased you down it, and your hands dragged along the wallpaper like it might keep you upright.
You pushed open a door. Wrong room and you cringed mentally as you saw two people half-naked on the floor.
Another. This one was empty. Or maybe it wasn’t. You couldn’t tell anymore.
Your head swam.
Music from downstairs vibrated through your ribs, dull and distant.
Your fingers trembled at your sides. Your mouth was dry.
You tried to sit on the edge of the bed. You missed. The carpet met your knees hard, then your shoulder, then the side of your face. You didn’t feel it, not really.
The world bent sideways. Tilted.
You thought of Kayla laughing, powdered sugar (sugar probably wasn't the only powder she had so far) on her lip, and you wondered—
Did she save you one?
It started with a sound. A soft, almost apologetic click.
You stirred with it, a dull ache blooming behind your eyes as your body begged you to sink back down into sleep. But the sound dragged you back up.
Your shoulder was cold. Your leg numb, half-hanging off the bed or maybe a couch. You weren’t sure. The surface was unfamiliar. You half expected Kayla's arm to still be clinging around your middle since that was the last coherent thing you could remember.
You blinked. The room was dim, sticky with late-night air. A single LED light pulsed a soft lavender glow in the corner, casting long shadows over clothes slung over the desk chair.
And your mouth— God. Your mouth tasted like metal and bile. Not the dry cotton of a hangover nap; you hadn't even drank enough to get drunk. But it wasn't the sugary crash after too many shots either.
You shifted, swallowing hard, only to freeze when your own movement tugged something at your back. A strap. Your bra.
One clasp was undone.
No, actually — two.
You reached around with leaden fingers. The third had just slipped free between your fumbling fingers. That was the sound that woke you.
Your stomach turned.
Something itched behind your knees. Your skirt had twisted halfway up your thigh, one strap of your top hanging off your shoulder.
You pulled your legs together. And froze.
There was a wrongness. Not pain. Not anything you could name. Just...sticky and cold. Actually, your whole leg felt like that.
You inhaled too hard, and the sourness in your mouth rose again. You coughed, a sickly sound in the silence of the room.
And suddenly it was like your body wasn’t yours anymore. Like it had been borrowed.
You sat up too fast, and the world tilted again—but you didn’t care. You yanked your bra back into place with fumbling hands and tried to flatten your skirt, blinking hard against the sting in your eyes.
You didn't cry. Not yet.
You just sat there, frozen in the purple glow, the room too still, the silence too loud.
Your phone buzzed weakly from somewhere under the bed.
But you didn’t reach for it. You thought you had but you didn't because your arm never actually reached out. Actually, you never even sat up or fixed your bra or skirt as you thought you had.
The door flung open with a clatter.
“Okay—this room better not be taken too—hellooo?” Kayla’s voice was singsong, flirty, one hand behind her dragging some black-jeaned guy who looked like he only answered to his band’s SoundCloud stats.
She was laughing as she pushed the door wide, balancing on her chunky heels and tossing her blonde hair back over one shoulder. Her hand slid down to the guy’s belt as she peered in, her bronzed skin practically glowing under the hallway’s gold light.
Then she spotted you.
Slumped. Half-curled on the mattress.
Alone.
Kayla blinked, grin lingering. “Wait—you too, girl? What the hell! You’re literally taken, you skank—”
She cut herself off.
Her brows pinched. You weren’t looking at her. You weren’t looking anywhere.
Then—
“Wait,” Kayla said, louder. “Wait—hey. Are you—”
The guy beside her stepped back awkwardly, muttering something about going to find another room, but Kayla didn’t notice. Her fake nails clicked hard against her phone screen as she rushed to kneel beside the bed.
Your mouth was moving — kind of. Your lips trembling, parted, jaw slack. A thick, white foam bubbled up at the corners.
“Oh my god.”
Kayla’s voice cracked.
You weren’t responding. You weren’t blinking. The whites of your eyes were cloudy, and your breath rattled like something stuck in your throat.
“HEY!” Kayla screamed now, her voice slicing down the hallway as she dropped her phone and grabbed your shoulders.
She pulled you up, cradling your limp weight against her, shaking, nails digging into the fabric of your top.
Her nails dug into your shoulders hard enough to leave crescent moons.
“Hey, hey, hey—no, no, no, don’t do this,” she was saying, and it came out breathless and high, the words tripping over each other as if speed alone could drag you back into yourself. Your head lolled forward against her collarbone, spit and foam slick against her glittered skin, and she made a small, horrified sound when your jaw twitched but your eyes didn’t focus.
Downstairs, the bass kept pounding. Someone shrieked with laughter. A chant started up over a drinking game. The house was alive and roaring and oblivious.
Kayla screamed again, louder this time. “I need help! Like—actually help!”
Feet thudded in the hallway. Two girls you vaguely recognized crowded the doorway, their expressions morphing from irritation to confusion to something sharper. One of them swore under her breath.
“Is she drunk?” the eyeliner girl asked.
“She’s not drunk!” Kayla snapped. “She’s—she’s not — I dunno, YOU look at her!”
You made a wet, choking noise, and Kayla’s stomach dropped straight through the floor. She shifted you onto your side instinctively, hands shaking so badly she could barely manage it. Foam gathered at the corner of your mouth again, thick and wrong, and she wiped it away with the sleeve of her top, smearing mascara and panic together.
“Call an ambulance, or something” someone whispered.
That word detonated in the room.
“No, are you crazy?” came a sharp voice from behind them.
The guy Kayla had dragged upstairs earlier stepped back into view, jaw tight now, no flirt left in him at all. “You call an ambulance, cops show up. You know that, right? Brantley’s stash is still downstairs. Half these people are rolling either a blunt or they're rolling on the floor. We’re all screwed, you hear me, Kayla?!
Kayla stared at him like he’d just slapped her, but he was just grabbing her by the shoulders, trying to shake the panic out of her.
"She'd be screwed too."
“She could also die,” one of the girls hissed.
“She’s not gonna die,” he shot back, but there was a tremor under it. “She’s probably just mixing stuff. Give it a minute.”
Another minute passed.
You didn’t come back.
Your breathing hitched again, uneven and ugly, and Kayla felt something cold and ancient bloom in her chest. Everyone hears that these things are going to happen but its different when it actually does.
“She didn’t even take anything,” Kayla said, voice shaking. “She had, like, two drinks. I was there.”
The guy’s eyes flickered, blame hanging between them as he grabbed your face, lighting trying to shake you awake. “You sure?”
Kayla’s gaze snapped to him. “What does that mean?”
He hesitated just long enough.
And in that hesitation, Kayla understood that maybe she hadn't kept the best eye on you. She knew you didn't want to come and she felt horrible like she was responsible somehow. If she hadn't gotten carried away maybe.
Her head whipped toward the door, scanning the hallway through teary eyes, your head still in her lap like she might spot the answer scrawled on the wallpaper. “Where is he? The guy who gave her that drink?”
Nobody answered.
Because nobody wanted to be that person.
Your body jerked faintly in her arms, not a seizure, not dramatic, just wrong enough to make Kayla’s throat close. She grabbed her phone off the carpet with clumsy fingers and almost dialed 999 on instinct.
Her thumb hovered.
Sirens. Blue lights. Police asking questions. Parents called. Brantley’s cousin in handcuffs. Headlines in the local Facebook group. Suspensions. Charges. Her own mom crying at the kitchen table.
And you, limp in her arms.
Kayla swore viciously and scrolled instead.
She didn’t think about it, not really. But it wasn't like thinking is going to get her anywhere now — it was too late for all of that.
Rodrick.
It rang once.
Twice.
Downstairs, someone switched songs and the bass shifted key, but up here the world narrowed to the tinny buzz against her ear and your shallow, uneven breaths.
He picked up on the third ring, voice rough and half-awake but instantly alert. “Yeah? Baby, you coming home already? It's like 9pm —”
Kayla’s voice cracked the second she heard him. “It’s Kayla.”
A beat. Confusion. “The who? Why do you have her phone?”
“I don’t,” she choked. “She—she’s here. At Brantley’s. Something’s wrong.”
There was a sharp rustle on his end, like sheets being thrown back, something clattering to the floor. "Cheesit-tanned Brantley? What do you mean something’s wrong?”
“She’s not responding,” Kayla rushed out, words tumbling over each other. “She’s breathing but it’s weird and she’s—she’s foaming, Rodrick. I don’t know what she took. I swear she didn’t take anything on purpose. I was with her. I was—”
God, Kayla thought, Why am I still talking? I should've been more careful.
“Send me the address,” Rodrick had no idea what this meant. Not that he should. No one tells you what to do when this happens, only like, how to avoid it.
“I—okay—okay.” Her hands shook so badly she nearly dropped the phone again. She fumbled through messages, copied the pin someone had sent earlier, forwarded it to him.
“I’m coming,” he said.
And he hung up.
Kayla stared at your face, at the way your lashes trembled but didn’t open, at the glitter still clinging stubbornly to your cheekbone like the night hadn’t gotten the memo. She smoothed your hair back with shaking fingers.
“Okay,” she whispered to you, even though you couldn’t hear her. She took one hand and tugged down your skirt . “Girl, it's okay. He’s coming.”
Downstairs, the party kept pulsing, unaware that the axis had tilted.
Outside, tires squealed against asphalt as a dented van tore around a corner too fast for a residential street. The engine rattled like it was protesting the abuse, but Rodrick didn’t ease up. His knuckles were white around the steering wheel, jaw locked so tight it hurt, eyes fixed on the glowing blue dot on his phone’s screen.
He didn’t remember grabbing his jacket. He didn’t remember locking his door. He just remembered the word foaming — what did that even MEAN?! It didn't feel good, though.
The house came into view at the end of the block, lights blazing, shadows moving in the windows like a living organism. Cars lined the street haphazardly, bass leaking out through the walls in dull, vibrating waves.
Rodrick slowed just enough to not plow into someone’s bumper and then pulled up across from the lawn. Not that he would've done anything if he did, anyway.
For a second, he didn’t move.
He just sat there behind the wheel, engine still running, staring at the house like it had personally declared war.
His reflection in the windshield looked wild-eyed, pale under the streetlight, a boy in a band tee gripping a steering wheel like it was the only thing keeping him from coming apart.
he second he steps out of the van, the music hits him like a physical shove. Bass crawls up his spine and settles in his teeth, vibrating through bone, through thought. The house looks the same as any other party house on any other Friday night, lights bleeding neon through the curtains, silhouettes moving like shadows in a lava lamp, laughter spilling out onto the lawn in drunken waves. For a split second, his brain tries to make it ordinary. It’s just a party. She probably drank too much. Kayla’s dramatic. Foaming could mean anything. People exaggerate.
Because how could it look this normal?
Rodrick shoved his van door shut harder than he meant to and cut through the yard without waiting for an invitation. A guy near the steps gave him a once-over, clearly filing him under not invited, and Rodrick didn’t even slow down.
His brain kept trying to translate it into something manageable. Dramatic. Exaggerated. Maybe she just threw up. Maybe Kayla panicked. Maybe you were just drunk and dramatic and everyone was overreacting because girls at parties liked theatrics, or something, right?
Foaming.
He couldn’t picture it.
He’d seen rabid dogs in YouTube clips. He’d seen bad horror movies with people convulsing and spitting white like cheap special effects. But you? In a glittery dress? With lip gloss you’d applied in his mirror?
No.
That didn’t make much sense.
He pushed through the front door and heat swallowed him whole. The air was thick with sweat and alcohol and artificial fruit. Someone collided into his shoulder and mumbled an apology that dissolved into a laugh halfway through. A girl shrieked when she saw him, not because she recognized him but because he’d disrupted her spin in the middle of the living room. Like Jesus, woman, you look like a tropical bird...
He grabs the arm of the first person who looks semi-conscious. “Where is she?”
The girl stares at him blankly. “Who?”
He doesn’t answer. He just keeps moving.
Upstairs, the hallway is narrower, hotter. The music dulls slightly but the air feels worse, thick with heat and something metallic beneath it. He tells himself this is nothing. She probably just mixed drinks. Maybe she tried something new to prove something. Maybe she wanted to show she could handle it. The thought twists in his chest. Maybe she did it on purpose.
That thought hits harder than the music.
He hates himself for even letting it form, but it’s there now, ugly and persistent... He's not the cleanest, he knows that. God, the way you two met, you'd seen him so pathetic and almost dead. Did she get so sick of all of it that she decided to make it worse?
No.
What if you took something on purpose? What if this wasn’t an accident?
He shoves the idea away almost violently. She promised she’d call. She kissed his cheek. She said she’d be okay.
He starts opening doors.
The first one reveals a couple tangled together on the floor, half-dressed and startled, and he recoils instinctively, muttering a tight apology before slamming it shut again. The second room is empty except for coats piled on a bed. The third has someone hunched over a toilet, retching loudly, another friend rubbing their back and glaring at him for intruding. He doesn’t explain. He doesn’t slow down.
Each wrong room makes his pulse climb higher.
He’s aware, distantly, that he’s been downplaying this since the phone call. Telling himself that if she was really dying, Kayla would have called an ambulance. Telling himself that foaming could just mean drooling, or throwing up weirdly, or some dramatic exaggeration born out of panic. He’s been clinging to that narrative the entire drive, gripping it like a lifeline because the alternative is too big, too catastrophic to let into his head.
Third door.
Locked again.
He knocked once, hard. “Hey!”
No response. Just muffled movement feeding his frustration.
This is stupid. She’s probably just passed out. People pass out all the time. Kayla overreacts. Kayla lives in glitter and drama, probably, she sounded like it over the phoen. You’re gonna walk in and she’s gonna be snoring with mascara on her pillow and you’re gonna feel like an idiot.
He clung to that version. He needed that version.
He reached the last door at the end of the hall and didn’t hesitate this time. He shoved it open so hard it smacked the wall.
The door at the end of the hall is half-open.
He pushes it wider.
For a fraction of a second, his brain refuses to process what it’s seeing. The room is dim, washed in sickly lavender light. Kayla is by the bed, crouched over you, her glitter smeared, mascara streaked down her cheeks. Your body looks smaller than it should, folded wrong, limbs slack in a way that doesn’t really match.
And then he sees your mouth.
The white at the corners. The unnatural stillness of your face. The way your eyes are half-open but not seeing:
That's what it meant.
Everything he tried to imagine on the drive here collapses instantly. All the rationalizations, all the half-formed explanations, every attempt to make it smaller than it is disintegrates in one brutal second. He has never pictured you like this because he never allowed himself to.
His stomach drops so fast it feels like missing a stair in the dark.
For a moment, he just stands there in the doorway, frozen, staring at something he could never have constructed in his own head without seeing it.
For a moment, nobody moves.
Rodrick is still standing in the doorway like the room has swallowed his ability to function. Kayla is half-crouched over you, her glitter smeared into streaks, one hand hovering uselessly over your shoulder like she’s afraid you’ll shatter if she presses too hard. The guy by the wall shifts his weight from foot to foot, jaw tight, eyes darting between Rodrick and your body as if waiting for someone older, smarter, more qualified to materialize and take control.
Rodrick steps forward finally, slow at first, like approaching something feral.
“What did she take?” His voice doesn’t rise. It drops. Low and dangerous and confused all at once.
“She didn’t,” Kayla shoots back immediately. “She barely drank. I was with her.”
He looks at you again. The foam at the corner of your mouth has thinned but not disappeared. Your lashes flutter faintly, your breathing uneven enough to make his chest ache just watching it.
“You don’t just start—” He gestures helplessly toward your face. “You don’t just start doing that for fun.”
The guy bristles. “Hey, don’t look at me.”
Rodrick’s head snaps toward him. “I’m looking at everyone.”
“I didn’t give her anything,” the guy says, defensive but pale now. “She had punch. Everyone had punch.”
Kayla’s voice cuts sharp through the air. “Oh my god, can we not do this right now? She’s barely responsive!”
Rodrick runs both hands through his hair, pacing once across the small bedroom like the walls are closing in. He stops at the window, then turns back immediately as if distance from you is physically impossible. He crouches beside the bed and, for the first time, touches you.
His fingers press lightly against your cheek.
Your skin is warm.
Too warm.
“Hey,” he mutters, voice breaking at the edges. “Hey, c’mon. Don’t do this.”
You don’t react.
His jaw tightens. He looks up at Kayla. “We’re taking her.”
“To where?” she demands, though she already knows.
“Hospital.”
The guy swears under his breath. “If we call an ambulance, cops show up.”
“We’re not calling one,” Rodrick snaps. “We’re driving.”
Kayla hesitates only half a second before nodding. “Okay. Okay. Fine.”
The guy moves first this time, stepping into the hallway to check it’s clear. “Kitchen’s packed,” he mutters. “But nobody’s paying attention.”
Rodrick isn't even sure he could carry you that far. But he steadies you up, one arm clung over his neck. Your head lolls against his shoulder, mouth slack, breath hot against his face . He swallows hard.
“You better wake up and appreciate this,” he mutters under his breath as he stands laughing, strain creeping into his voice. “I am not built for cardio.”
They move fast.
Down the hallway. Past the bathroom with someone groaning inside. Down the stairs where the music swells again, bass punching through Rodrick’s ribs. A few heads turn.
“Is she okay?” someone shouts over the noise.
Kayla doesn’t miss a beat. “She’s just wasted!” she cringes at the wobble in her voice, "Lightweight!"
The front door opens to cooler air, and for a second it feels like oxygen has returned to the planet. Rodrick moves toward the van like it’s the only solid object in the universe. He yanks open the back door and lays you across the seat, shrugging off his jacket to prop under your head.
Kayla climbs in beside you immediately, kneeling awkwardly on the scratched vinyl. “She’s still breathing,” she says, though she sounds like she’s trying to convince herself.
The guy slams the passenger door and looks at Rodrick. “You good to drive?”
“No,” Rodrick says honestly.
Then he starts the engine anyway.
The van lurches forward harder than it should. Tires squeal slightly as he pulls away from the curb. His hands are white around the steering wheel, eyes flicking to the rearview mirror every few seconds like he expects you to vanish if he looks away too long.
In the back, Kayla strokes your hair away from your face.
“Is she breathing?” he demands.
“I think so,” Kayla says immdiately dropping her ear near your mouth, then immediately, “I can’t tell. Wait. Yes. Yes. I think.”
“Don’t say you think.”
“Well, I’m not a nurse, Rodrick!”
They hit a red light.
Of course they hit a red light.
Rodrick slams his palm against the steering wheel. “You have got to be kidding me.”
The intersection is empty. Silent.
The guy shifts uncomfortably in the passenger seat. “You want me to run it?”
“Unless you can magically make it green, shut up.”
The sudden absence of the engine makes the music roar into focus. The heavy metal track he always keeps low and constant, background noise to everything, now floods the van like it’s been waiting its turn. Guitars shriek. Drums hammer. A scream tears through the speakers.
Kayla slowly lifts her head.
The guy in the passenger seat turns, very carefully. They both look at Rodrick. No one says anything.
But the look is loud.
One raised eyebrow. One long blink. One shared, silent: seriously?
Rodrick stares straight ahead like if he doesn’t acknowledge it, it didn’t happen. The scream from the speakers hits a peak behind him, absurdly dramatic against the sight of you lying motionless in the backseat.
He exhales through his nose.
“Are you kidding me,” he mutters, voice low and dangerous.
Kayla glances down at you, then back at him. “Is this… normal?”
“Define normal,” Rodrick says faintly. "I assure you she likes this stuff."
Rodrick twists the key again. The engine hesitates, coughs, then catches, rumbling back to life like it’s offended to have been doubted.
For a split second, he considers turning it off.
Instead, he reaches for the volume knob and cranks it higher.
The red light flips to green.
Rodrick slams his foot down on the gas.
.
Rodrick barely slows as he pulls into the hospital parking lot, the van groaning like it’s had enough of his heroics. Music still blaring, lights cutting through the night, he kills the engine and opens the back. You’re half-slung over his shoulder, one arm around his neck, your head lolling against him, and he winces at how heavy you feel. Kayla follows right behind, clutching your purse and phone, while the guy awkwardly pushes open the passenger door and drags a bag of jackets along like they’re part of some unspoken plan.
They move fast, but careful, slipping through the automatic doors like criminals trying not to get caught, which is ironic because they’re all basically panicking about the opposite: getting caught not helping you. Rodrick’s steps are long and uneven as he tries to balance you, muttering under his breath, “Seriously, someone teach me how to carry a human without looking like a serial killer.”
Kayla whispers from behind, “You’re not supposed to be a serial killer, Rodrick. Not tonight, anyway.”
“Yeah, yeah, very helpful,” he mutters, ignoring her. The bright hospital lights hit them and suddenly everyone in the lobby is a blur. People glance up from their phones. A few security cameras click and whirr. Rodrick tries to make their movement look casual, which fails spectacularly because you’re basically flopping over him like a sack of glitter and regret.
At the reception desk, the nurse looks up, calm at first, clipboard in hand. Rodrick gently sets you down on the counter edge, and she blinks. Then does a double take. “Oh my god,” she breathes, voice sharp and panicked as she shuffles closer.
Rodrick swears under his breath. “Yeah, I’m sorry. She’s… yeah, you take her.”
The nurse scoops you up without hesitation, muttering instructions to Kayla and the guy to wait and not follow too closely, and suddenly they’re left standing there like idiots in the bright, sterile lobby, the echo of heavy metal still humming faintly from the van outside. Rodrick runs a hand over his face.
“She’s gonna be fine.” Kayla says, uncertain but trying to sound convincing.
Rodrick doesn’t answer immediately. He just stares at the spot where you disappeared behind the nurse’s arms, the absurdity of the night pressing down on him. The guy shifts from foot to foot, muttering under his breath something about not signing up for this.
Silence fills the space, except for the faint shuffle of the nurse and the distant hum of machines somewhere behind closed doors. They glance at each other, all three acutely aware that they have no idea what’s supposed to happen next.
Rodrick finally groans, dropping his hands to his sides. “Next time… next time we do literally anything else. Anything normal. Anything not—” He gestures vaguely toward the doors you disappeared behind. “—whatever that was.”
Kayla snorts quietly, palm on her forehead. The guy just swears again. None of them move. They’re all just waiting. All that matters is that you’re inside, somewhere safe, and the rest of the world has to wait.
.
Rodrick slumps onto one of the cold, metal chairs by the vending machine, elbows resting on his knees, hands clasped together in front of him. The fluorescent hospital lights hum above, casting everything in that merciless, sterile glow. The guy from before sits opposite him, hoodie up, knees splayed, looking like he’s half-asleep and half-watching the world burn at the same time. His dark hair falls over his eyes in a careless sweep, a faint shadow beneath them that makes him look older than he is. He’s got that sharp, rough look, not like he’s mean exactly, but like he’s been kicked around enough to know when it’s coming.
Rodrick’s throat is dry, voice low and careful, almost like he’s scraping the words out, “Well… you gonna tell me where you got it all?”
He shifts, the chair creaking under him. He glances away for a moment, then back at Rodrick, expression tight, a little guilty, a little defiant. “Look… it came from Brantley’s,” he mutters, voice rough, almost apologetic. “They brought it in, stocked it in the kitchen, in the closet by the punch bowls… you know, how it is. It wasn’t… it wasn’t supposed to get out of hand.”
Rodrick lets out a long, slow sigh. He stares at Mateo—lean, raw, like he’s built out of sharp edges and cigarette smoke, hoodie draped over his shoulders, hands stuffed in his pockets, posture that says he’s used to being overlooked. “And you’re… okay with all that?” Rodrick asks dryly, not accusing, just trying to make sense of it.
Mateo shrugs, eyes flicking toward the hallway as Kayla emerges from the bathroom, strutting toward the vending machine. She pauses, purse digging for spare change, one hand on her hip, hair catching the lights just right. She's beautiful, to him, so lively and he wonders how the plainest bastard even got her attention before he did.
Rodrick exhaled slowly, leaning back a little, just enough to take in this guy fully. He had that sharp bone structure, eyes that carried a quiet, simmering frustration, the kind that makes you feel like there’s a storm behind them if you dared to stir it. He studied him for a beat. “What’s your name?”
"Mateo," He says, barely looking away. Mateo’s gaze lingers on her a beat too long, lips twitching in some half-smile, and he mumbles under his breath, almost to himself. “Jesus. How a woman like that could ever be into like me.”
Rodrick tilts his head, eyebrow raising. Mateo sighs, leans back in the chair, hands still buried in the pockets of his hoodie and looks back at Rodrick. “You’re keeping your mouth shut about the powder for your girl. I’m keeping mine shut so I don’t get busted. That’s... I respect it.”
He pushes a shoulder toward Rodrick lightly, almost playfully. “Besides… I’m Mexican, so I’d be the main culprit even if Brantley did most of the illegal shit. Huh, white boy?”
Rodrick snorts, a short, dry laugh, shaking his head, "Sorry, man, I don't have the cash to bust you out."
It’s crude, raw, a little funny in the lobby, all of them hovering on the edge of panic and absurdity.
Mateo smirks faintly, eyes flicking back to Kayla, no longer fumbling with the vending machine buttons and victoriously holding a few drinks in her hands, still perfect in a way that makes his chest ache a little.
Rodrick leans back, and tries to look away from them both.
.
The lobby was quiet, sterile, fluorescent lights humming softly overhead, the kind of silence that felt almost fragile after the chaos of the night. Rodrick sat slouched in one of the cold chairs, fingers tapping lightly against his knees, when the doors swung open.
“Hey,” he said, voice low, casual, but something in it made the word feel heavier than it should. You stepped through, hair mussed, clothes rumpled, face a little pale but mostly intact. Your eyes found his immediately, but neither of you said anything at first. The weight of everything hung in the space between you, unspoken and raw, and he just watched you as you made your way toward him.
"Hey..." You slowly said, standing still as he took your hands in his.
“You… want to go home?” His voice was careful now, softer, the usual teasing lilt gone, replaced with a careful edge, as though he was testing waters he didn’t even want to touch.
“No.” Your answer was quiet but firm, and it made him pause, swallow, and nod slowly.
He sucked in a breath, "Mateo left with Kayla. She fell asleep waiting. Took a while to convince her to go."
All he got was a lack of a verbal response, but he noticed the slight relief in your eyes.
He chewed the inside of his cheek for a moment, looking past you toward the hospital doors, then back again. “Want something to eat? Not sure what’s gonna be open at this hour, but like…” His words trailed off, a little uncertain, a little hesitant.
You nodded, accepting it anyway, like it was a small compromise, a thread of normalcy to latch onto.
Rodrick leaned back slightly, running a hand through his hair, and for a long moment the two of you just sat, letting the silence stretch.
You both knew the conversation could wait. For now, you just existed in the aftermath, a quiet, shared understanding passing between you.
.
Rodrick slammed the tray down a little too hard as he plopped into the booth across from you, the wrappers rattling and a fry tumbling to the table. He ran a hand through his hair, sighing roughly, frustration and helplessness tangled together. For a beat, there was just the quiet hum of the McDonald’s, the faint hiss of the fryer somewhere in the distance, and the two of you staring at the food without moving.
He finally started unwrapping his burger, the paper crinkling under his fingers. “Sorry,” he muttered, voice low, rough. “I'm sorry for what I said, I wasn't thinking about you. I was just thinking about what happened and..I thought… I thought maybe you aren't eating because of me and all. So—”
"No," You looked at him, voice barely above a whisper, cutting him off. “I… haven’t really had McDonald’s before.”
Rodrick blinked, frozen for a second, both eyebrows raised. “What?”
“My parents… they were so stuck up,” you said, dragging the words out like bitter gum, laughing a little. “They thought fast food was for broke people. They said I’d get diseases or fall ill if I touched it. Never let me have it., c'mon, its the suburbs.” You shrugged, a little humorless, but there was a brittle honesty to it that made his chest tighten.
He leaned over the table, quietly unwrapping one of the burgers for you, the heat from his hands brushing against yours as he guided them to hold it together. “Here,” he murmured, voice soft but steady, “just… eat.”
You took it, hands shaking, teeth biting carefully into the warm bun, eyes wide as though every chew was a small rebellion, a tiny anchor back to your body. Your body trembled, a subtle, terrified shake, like the fear of the unknown—the gap in memory, the uncertainty—was finally hitting home.
Rodrick’s eyes flicked to yours, concern tightening his jaw. Without a word, he slid his chair around and pulled it to your side, scraping softly against the floor. He sat next to you, shoulder brushing yours, leaning in so that he could keep an eye on you while you ate, hands tensed at the edge of the table.
He sits down the moment she takes another bite, it hits her like a punch to the chest. The warmth of the burger, the greasy, familiar comfort, doesn’t soothe the storm inside — if anything, it drags it up faster. Her hands tremble on the wrapper, teeth trying to chew and swallow, but the tears start anyway, hot and sudden, spilling over the edge of her lashes. The sobs are ugly, guttural, ripping through her throat, muffled around the food, and she hates how weak she feels but can’t stop. Her stomach twists and her chest tightens as the realization crashes over her — this is something she’ll carry forever, a dark, gnawing uncertainty with no name, no culprit, just fragments she’ll always replay and rewrite in her head.
Rodrick’s eyes widen the second he sees it, that your next bite is a choke between a sob. The way your hands shook on the burger, the way your chest heaved, the tiny, strangled sounds slipping through your mouth between bites. You tried to swallow, trying to keep it together, and the effort made you choke back a sob that ended up coming out anyway, hiccuping, ugly and raw. You knew it was ugly. You hated that it was ugly. “Hey… hey wait a sec,” he mumbles, low and rough, trying to make his voice an anchor in the tiny, fluorescent-lit booth. “It’s okay… it’s okay, I’m right here. You’re— you're okay. You’re not… alone right now.”
His words are clumsy, teenage, rough at the edges, but they’re all he can offer. He moves closer, shoulder pressing lightly against hers, leaning so that even if she can’t see his face clearly through her tears, she feels the weight of him, solid and steady. “I don’t… I don’t know what to say to make it better, but… I’ve got you. You’re not… you’re not by yourself in this. I’ve got you.”
She chokes on a sob, swallowing the food hastily, shaking violently, and he rubs small circles on her back, whispering whatever comfort he can manage. “It’s not your fault. None of this is your fault. You didn’t… you didn’t do anything wrong. I don’t care what happens, okay? I… I’m not going anywhere.”
Her shoulders shudder, hot tears smearing over her cheeks, and he shifts slightly, leaning closer, careful not to crowd but to be enough—enough to hold her here, to let her know that in a world that’s suddenly chaotic and cruel, he’s a safe corner. His voice drops, soft and urgent, tugging at her as though sheer force of tone could hold the storm at bay. “You’re strong… stronger than you even know. I know it hurts, I know it’s terrifying, but I’ll… I’ll be right here. Always.”
The sobs don’t stop immediately. They wrack her frame, messy, trembling, almost violent, but he doesn’t flinch. He lets them spill over him, lets her unload, murmuring small affirmations he's not sure is actually working. Like how's he meant to actually know? But its better than doing nothing.
“You’re safe now, I promise, it's going to get better—”
There wasn't much else to say or do. Except sit and wait. It was well beyon when you were meant to be home and you're going to get an earful about this to your parents who probably didn't know. And definitely won't ever know. But you're glad you have someone else to go to.
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tbc...
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