content: inspired by taylor swift’s dress (all credits to her! this is made just for fun <3)
warnings: angst, reader is a global icon, reader is also inspired by taylor swift during reputation era. mentions of anxiety, pain, and panic. let’s js pretend social media was already a thing during the 90s LMAO
author’s note: this is my first time writing after SOOOOO MANY YEAAAARS so pUHLEAAASEE BE KIND … 🥹 lmk if this should have a part 2 or what …
── ⟢ ・⸝⸝
King of Pop, Michael Jackson. That was his title. Michael had fans all over the world, yet he stayed very humble. That made him even more famous. His kindness, understanding, and love for people and his work made him a living legend, which was his reputation.
After forging his path, he was dedicated to spreading his mission— to spread love through his music because he believes that music brings people together. Love was his message.
He was the man who sold out stadiums, broke records, and inspired generations. Wherever he went, crowds followed. Millions knew his name, his songs, and his signature moonwalk.
But behind the fame was simply Michael.
A man who loved creating music in the middle of the night. A man who found joy in making people smile. A man who believed that kindness cost nothing yet meant everything.
Despite being admired by millions, Michael was no stranger to loneliness. Fame came with a price. Every move he made became a headline. Every word he spoke was analyzed. The world knew Michael Jackson, but very few knew Michael the person.
And there’s Y/N.
Y/N has already established her name in the industry. From being a countryside singer to a global icon. Her songs always top the Billboard 100, winning multiple grammy’s, sold out shows, every singer's dream, she has it. Their fantasy is Y/N’s reality. She is young and passionate. But her life is not always glitz and glam. She has to pay for the fame she has right now.
In this industry, being unliked is not new. Well, not everyone would love your music, right? But for Y/N, it’s different. Some people love her music, some people don’t— or they just don’t really like her. Headlines, controversies, and scandals were linked to her.
“Y/N, the Global Icon was seen in public with a new guy after her break up!”
People talked about her as if she were not real anymore. As if the girl beneath the headlines is deceased and is someone they could just criticize. She was linked to a lot of guys; some were true, the majority were rumors. Rumors her so-called friends made to bring her down. It was unfair. So unfair.
She was criticized for writing many songs for her ex-boyfriends. Every song she releases is like a game for the public, guessing whose ex-boyfriend this new song is dedicated to. She became a joke, a laughing stock, and was labeled as a snake.
“Have you heard Y/N’s new song? I bet it’s about her new boyfriend again!”
“Every song she writes is about her ex-boyfriend. No wonder no guy stays with her!”
“She deserve every hate she gets, to be honest”
Every word thrown was like a knife, sharp, deadly. Y/N would be lying if she says it’s not affecting her; because it does. She might say she doesn’t care but deep down, it hurts her. Y/N couldn’t understand why people hate her, is it because of her music? her face? or they just really loathe her as a person?
The room was silent except for the faint hum of the television in the background.
Y/N sat on the floor of her bedroom, her phone clutched tightly in her hand. She knew she should stop reading the comments. She knew she should put the phone down and walk away.
Yet she couldn’t. One comment became ten. Ten became a hundred.
Snake.
Attention seeker.
Slut.
Manipulator.
Each word blurred together until she could no longer tell where one ended and another began. Her eyes drifted toward the mirror across the room. For a moment, she stared at her reflection.
The same face that appeared on magazine covers. The same face that thousands of fans screamed for every night. The same face people seemed to hate so much.
Slowly, she stood and walked toward the mirror.
“Am I really the problem?” she whispered.
The question lingered in the empty room.
No answer came.
Only silence.
Y/N let out a shaky laugh and wiped the tears from her cheeks.
── ⟢ ・⸝⸝
Y/N was currently on her couch, rotting while eating a tub of ice cream. She was watching her comfort show, when her phone suddenly rang, it was Pam, her manager.
“Hey, what’s up?” she lazily answered.
“Uh, don’t what’s up me girl, i’m your manager” Y/N laughed with the sassiness of her tone. “You’re invited to a charity gala”
“Yeah right, they haven’t seen those nasty tweets and scandals about me, yeah?”
“They have, and they don’t believe a single thing about it” Y/N wanted to believe. Believe that people still see her as a good person, but with all the lies she sees on the internet? It was hard.
“Whatever. I’m not going.”
“You are, Y/N. I already contacted brands for your attire”
“Why should I? the media would just eat me alive and ask some stupid questions”
“Y/N, the media may hate you, but your fans don’t. Do this for the people who love and support you. Plus, who cares? Fuck the media. We both know the truth.” Her manager spoke, “Plus, this is the best time to clean your slate. Show the motherfucking world who the hell Y/N Y/L/N is”
She can’t help but to smile. Her manager is right, a lot of people still support her despite the scandals and controversies. It’s killing her, having to show up in front of dozens and dozens of journalists and photographers. The flashing, the uncomfortable questions, and the worst part, the judging stares.
But she will still do it, she’s gonna show everyone that she is not who the people and the media dictate who she is.
Charity Gala Day arrived. She was inside the limousine for the last 10 minutes, anxiety creeping her whole body. She was wearing the famous Chanel Black Chain Dress. It fit her like a glove, matching with her gold accessories and black high heels.
She was inside the limo, panicking, overthinking what the reporters would ask her and how the people would look at her. She was breathing heavily, cold sweats dropping from her forehead.
“Pam, I really can’t… I’m so afraid of what the media would say to me…” She said, hyperventilating.
“Y/N, look at me.” She forced her eyes on Pam.
“You’ve already performed in front of people. Thousands of people, to be exact.”
“T-That’s different…”
“How?”
“W-Well… They loved me…”
Pam, her manager’s gaze softened. She can feel Y/N’s pain and anxiety. She has been Y/N’s manager for years but this is the first time she saw her really break down.
“Then think about the people who love you. Think about the people who believe in you. The ones who streamed your songs, bought tickets to your shows, and the ones who defended your name when you couldn’t.”
Y/N swallowed hard. Pam held her chin and made her look at her in the eyes,
“You are not your rumors. You are not the headlines. And most definitely, you are not those idiots spreading fake news about you. They are just jealous because you’re talented, amazing, and beautiful.”
Y/N smiled. A genuine smile.
“Now, go in there, and remind us, who the fuck is Y/N Y/L/N.”
Pam’s words really did encourage her. She took one last deep breath and nodded. She’s going to face the cameras, and prove that no one can bring her down. The chauffeur opened the limo, and immediately, the cameras exploded in front of her.
“Y/N, over here!”
“Y/N smile for me, darling!”
“Are the headlines true?! Who’s your new man?!”
“Any comments about your scandals?”
Her chest tightened. The noise was overwhelming her. Questions being thrown at her from every direction. Some are harmless, some are harsh.
She kept her head up and smiled brightly, not stopping from walking.
“Just smile and wave, Y/N” she told herself.
She smiled so brightly, the cameras didn’t notice she was pretending. Then suddenly, the crowd became louder.
Not because of her, but because someone just arrived. The reporters rushed towards the entrance, the photographers turned their cameras away from her, and for the first time, Y/N wasn’t the center of all attention.
She let out a big sigh, glad that the attention is not on her anymore, yet curious, so she turned her head to see who’s coming.
It was none other than Michael Jackson.
The crowd surrounded him, yet he carried himself with effortless calmness. He smiled and waved at every reporter and photographer, greeting them with the warmness he was known for.
Y/N was expecting him to walk past her. I mean, who is she besides Michael Jackson? But, she was wrong. As Michael made his way towards the entrance, he noticed her immediately. His glance landed on her softly, as their eyes met. Y/N sensed comfort in his eyes. He was looking at her with kindness.
No assumptions, No judgement. Nothing.
And somehow, that startled her more than the cameras ever could.
summary: after years of distance, resentment, grief, and misunderstanding, matthew is finally forced to confront everything that went wrong between him and his brother. as old wounds resurface and painful truths come to light, the two of them are left standing in the aftermath of everything they lost — and everything they still might be able to save.
author’s note: hi <3 this fic is very much for the plot and the angst, and i just wanted to clarify that i’m not trying to disrespect any players at all. i’m also not trying to insinuate that the way i wrote any of these characters is realistic or representative of who they are irl. this is purely fictional and dramatized for the story! basically: it is angst and all for the sake of the fic ALSO: i 100% used AI to help me edit this and clean it up, but i did write it all myself. so please keep in mind that while i did write it all on my own, chatgpt did save me when it came to the grammatical errors and the format of the fic and the scene spacing (so there are things like “just” used too often)
warnings: slightly toxic family environment, trauma, sexual assault mention, cancer/loss of parent(s), mentions of unhealthy eating habits, depression, mentions of homophobia, overall just sad shit bro
word count: 7.5k (i know. its a lot. bare with me)
Matthew sat in front of his stall with one elbow on his knee and his phone in his hand, half dressed for warmups, while your voice poured tinny and soft through one AirPod.
The Islanders’ room was loud in the usual ways. Tape ripping. Sticks knocking against the floor. Someone on the far side laughing too hard at something not that funny. The music overhead. The low hum of pregame routine.
But Matthew barely heard any of it.
He just stared at your album cover on his screen and listened.
You’re On Your Own, Kid.
Then Anthems for a Seventeen Year-Old Boy.
Then Summer Child.
By the time I Can Do It With a Broken Heart came on, his face had gone still in that way it always did when he was feeling too much and refusing to show any of it. His heart squeezing when you sang She said She’d love me all her life/But that life was too short, breaking down, I hit the floor. The direct nod at your mom’s death shooting a fiery blow straight to his heart.
Mat Barzal looked over while he was retying one of his skates and snorted.
“Why do you look like someone just kicked your puppy?”
A couple heads turned.
Matthew didn’t answer.
Barzal nudged his shin with the blade guard on his skate. “Seriously. You look miserable. What is that? Breakup music?”
Matthew pulled the AirPod out slowly, thumb still resting on the screen. He looked down at the tracklist again. mirrorball was next.
“No,” he said.
Mat waited.
Matthew inhaled through his nose. “It’s my brother’s album.”
Barzal blinked. “Your brother?”
“Yeah.”
There was an awkward quiet pause, when Gatcomb was standing nearby, already taping his stick, frowned. “Wait. Your brother as in….”
Matthew’s mouth tightened. “There’s only one, so.”
Barzal stared at him for a second. “Why have you never said that before?”
Matthew shrugged, but it wasn’t casual. It was defensive. “Never came up.”
Horvat sat across from him, lacing up one of his skates and said, “That’s wild.”
Mayfield leaned back against his stall. “So you guys close?”
Matthew looked back down at the phone.
Your name sat there on the screen, bright and impossible to ignore.
“No,” he said.
Something in his voice made the room go a little quieter around them.
“We don’t talk.”
Barzal’s expression shifted. Less teasing now. “Why not?”
Matthew let out a breath that almost sounded like a laugh, except there was nothing amused in it.
“Because he’s my brother,” he said, “and somehow that made things worse.”
Barzal tilted his head. “That doesn’t answer anything.”
Matthew rubbed his thumb across the edge of his phone. He could already feel the old ache building under his ribs, the familiar one. The one with your name on it.
He looked up at the ceiling once, then back at Barzal.
“It started when we were kids.”
And all at once he was gone.
⸻
You were thirteen and nearing the end of eighth grade the first time the house made you feel like there was no room in it for you.
Johnny was in a mood. He was being mean in that casual big brother way that felt like intentional cruelty disguised as innocent, brotherly love.
The fight had started over nothing, which is how the worst ones always start.
You had said something sharp back to him after he’d knocked over one of your notebooks and laughed at the pages full of lyrics and crossed-out lines and badly drawn melodies written in margins.
He’d shoved your shoulder. You’d shoved him back.
And then he said it, red-faced and sneering.
A mean, ugly comment about you being gay.
The room had gone dead quiet after. Not because anyone else was there, but because you stopped moving, fear and hurt freezing you in place.
Johnny had looked almost surprised by the stillness on your face, like maybe he’d expected you to hit him or yelling or something louder than what he got. Understanding the reason behind your stillness, he began apologizing.
“Shit. Y/n. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize… Wait. You’re actually gay? I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
Instead you’d just bent down, picked up your notebook, and walked away.
Matthew had been seven at the time. Too young to understand the impact of what had just happened, only old enough to understand that it had happened.
He remembered standing in the hallway, watching you pass him.
Your expression had been blank, but you were crying. Neither of your brothers knew the process and confidence it took to come to terms with your sexuality at that age. Your face was blank in the way people get when something hurts too much to show.
He remembered that now, in flashes, with the kind of shame that you feel later in life and feel even more guilty over.
A month later, you were at the dining room table with your computer open in front of you, headphones on, building something out of sounds Matthew didn’t understand. There were loops laid on tracks, fragments of layered vocals, keyboard chords played and replayed until they turned into a shape only you could see. He never realized how much of a science music is, the language of it.
Matthew had wanted you outside with him, simple as that. He wanted you to play hockey in the driveway with him. He wanted your undivided attention. He wanted, without knowing how to name it, for you to act like a brother the way brothers were supposed to.
So he’d run to your mom in the kitchen and complained in the merciless nagging way kids do.
“Y/n won’t come outside.”
Your mom hadn’t looked up from where she was drying a dish. “Then go ask Johnny.”
“I want Y/n.”
“He’s busy.”
“He’s not busy,” Matthew had argued. “He’s just on his computer making music that’s never going to be good anyway.”
Your hands had stopped moving over the keyboard, raising to your sides, eyebrows furrowed in and mouth agape.
Your mother had given Matthew a look. “You know hockey isn’t his thing.”
“But I want him to play with me.”
“Matthew.”
“Please? Just make him come outside for a little while.”
And because your mom was tired and trying to keep peace in a house that often made peace impossible, she’d called you in that voice that meant she was done arguing before the argument even started.
You’d gone anyway.
Out into the driveway, squinting in the afternoon sun, holding the stick wrong. Matthew remembered being excited for about five whole minutes before excitement turned into impatience which quickly became the innocent cruelty of a child who wants to be good at something in front of someone who isn’t.
You missed the pass he sent. Miffed completely on your own shot, losing your balance trying to stop it.
And Matthew, all his never ending energy, sharp and fast limbs, and feelings that were too big for his small body, had laughed and said, “God, you suck.”
You’d looked at him then.
Not mad. Just tired. Too tired for a boy at only thirteen.
Then another month passed.
You came home with a B minus in one class.
It should have been nothing. In another family maybe it would have been. In yours, it became something bigger than necessary.
Your mom stood in the kitchen holding the paper while you stood across from her in your damp swim jacket, chlorine still clinging to you from practice, your backpack sliding off one shoulder.
“A B-minus?” she said.
“It’s one class.”
“It’s slipping.”
“I can fix it.”
“You need to do more than fix it. You need to focus.”
“I am focused.”
“No you’re not! No swimming until you bring it up.”
“What?!”
“You heard me.”
“That’s not fair.”
“I’m not arguing.”
“But swimming is the only—”
“No.”
Her voice rose just enough to cut through yours, calm in volume and somehow harsher for it.
“No. Why does everything have to be an argument with you? Why can’t you just be more like your brothers?”
Matthew remembered being in the next room and hearing the silence after. He hadn’t understood the sentence then. Not really. He understood the words, but not the impact it would have on you.
You had gone still.
Looked at her with something quick and raw in your face: hurt, disbelief, maybe both, before schooling it so fast it almost looked like it had never been there.
“All right,” you’d said.
A week later, all of you were at the dinner table.
Johnny talking. Matthew practically bouncing in his seat while he told some story about hockey practice, about a drill he’d done right, about a coach praising his shot. Your mom was smiling at him, and his dad was listening, and the whole table was full of a warmth that somehow curved around you instead of reaching you.
You were moving peas around your plate with the side of your fork. Not eating. Just rearranging.
Your mom noticed eventually.
“How was your day?” she asked.
You looked down at your plate. Then up.
And in a voice so calm, you said, “I think I should go live with Dad.”
For a moment, time stopped.
Matthew remembered his own spoon halfway to his mouth. Remembered your mother going pale. Remembered Johnny saying your name.
Remembered not understanding that there are sentences that split a family open even before anyone answers them.
⸻
Back in the locker room, Matthew stared at the floor between his skates.
No one said anything for a moment.
Barzal was the one who finally broke it. “So… what? You guys don’t talk just because he went to live with his dad?”
Matthew shook his head once.
“No.” He stood and reached for his helmet. “It’s deeper than that.”
He jammed his phone into the pocket of his suit pants and got to his feet. “We should head toward the ice.”
The room stirred back into motion around him.
No one pushed for more right away, but Barzal knew him well enough to know that silence like that never meant done. It just meant later.
⸻
The tunnel to the ice was cold and bright.
The crowd was a low roar beyond the walls. Matthew adjusted his gloves, rolled his shoulders once, then stepped out into the wash of arena light for warmups.
His legs knew what to do. That was the comfort of hockey. The mercy of it. On the ice, you didn’t have to understand anything. You only had to move. Barzal skated up beside him while they circled the zone.
“So what happened after he left?”
Matthew took a pass, snapped it back. “He got famous.”
“That usually helps sibling relationships.”
Matthew gave him a look that said “not ours.”
He looked away and the second memory opened up.
⸻
You were sixteen when you came back to visit in November, all long limbs and expensive clothes and the kind of exhaustion that made you look older than you were.
You had been in the industry for a year by then, technically, but not really. Not the way the world would soon understand it. You were still on the edge of becoming a story too big for the family that made you.
That night, everyone crowded around the television for the Grammy nominations. The house was loud in that anticipatory way family houses get around good news, like everyone had decided joy in advance and was just waiting for word to celebrate outwardly.
The broadcaster’s voice came through clear and polished.
“For Album, Song, Record, and Best New Artist…”
“Single Soon, Y/n L/n!”
The living room erupted. Your mom gasped and covered her mouth. Johnny shouted. Your stepdad let out a stunned laugh. Your assistant grabbed you around the shoulders, jumping up and down screaming. Everybody was talking at once.
Everybody except Matthew.
He was at the kitchen table, arms folded, staring down at a homework packet he wasn’t reading.
You looked around through the excitement, realized he wasn’t there, and stepped into the doorway between the living room and kitchen.
“Hey,” you said, still half laughing from the shock of it. “Why aren’t you celebrating with us in here?”
He didn’t look at you at first.
Then he did and there was something dark and young and kind of hurt in his face.
“Because it’s not worth celebrating.”
You blinked. “Matt…”
“It’s just another excuse for you to leave.” His voice shook with the effort of keeping it hard. “Congratulations on being some big, amazing popstar so you never have to see us again.” He shoved back from the table so fast the chair scraped, bolted out the front door, and disappeared into the cold.
A minute later the family could hear the hard, repeated thunk of pucks hitting the practice net outside.
You stood in the kitchen doorway for a long time, staring at the empty space he’d left behind.
That February you won every category you were nominated for.
Twelve Grammys in one night at only sixteen years old. You were the youngest artist ever to take that many home and the first and openly gay male artist to be nominated for that many categories and sweep them all. It was cultural reset, according to the press. A once in a lifetime star born in the 21st century.
You stood at the microphone with your suit glittering under the lights and your hands visibly shaking.
When you accepted the award for Best New Artist, you thanked your dad. You thanked your family.
And then, smiling out at a room that adored you without knowing you at all, you said, “And to my little brother Matthew, who told me a few years ago that my music was never going to be good anyway…”
The room laughed.
Even some people in the house laughed watching from home.
Matthew didn’t. He just felt his face go hot with humiliation and grief and something else he would only later recognize as guilt.
⸻
Warmups blurred around Matthew.
The San Jose Sharks came out onto the other end of the ice, a wash of teal and black sliding into a tight and intimidating formation.
Matthew’s eyes tracked the logo on one player’s chest without really meaning to.
“Sharks would be his home team,” he said.
Barzal glanced over. “Because of California?”
“Yeah. He moved to Northern California when he went to live with his dad. His dad went to college out there.”
Barzal nodded. “Well, surely your relationship got a little better after the Grammys, right?”
Matthew laughed once, humorless and dry.
“No. It got worse.”
He took another puck, fired it into the net harder than necessary.
“After the Grammys, his career blew up overnight. Like insane overnight. Stadiums. Press everywhere. Every award show. In a new country every other weekend. Every time I turned on a TV or opened my phone, there he was.”
He circled back, stopping hard enough to spray ice.
“There’d be birthdays where he was on the other side of the world. I’d get a happy birthday text. He’d try to call. I’d decline it.”
Barzal’s brows lifted. “You declined his calls?”
Matthew’s jaw flexed. “Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because he changed.” He looked away. “And not totally for the better.”
That wasn’t the whole truth, and he knew it.
The whole truth was that fame had made you shinier and less reachable, yes. But it had also made him feel abandoned in a way he’d never quite gotten over. Every missed call was a chance to make you feel some fraction of what he had felt.
Childish. Petty. Real.
And then came the years that broke everything open.
⸻
He was fifteen the first time you showed up unannounced at one of his high school games.
You were twenty one by then. World famous in an impossible way that made you come off as untouchable. Security when you needed it. Dark sunglasses indoors to hide your face. The kind of famous that made people stare before they even realized why.
He saw you after the game with the family, standing there with one hand in your jeans pocket, trying to smile at him like this might be normal, like you hadn’t become someone who lived in headlines and hotel suites and cities with names too glamorous for the rest of them.
And he walked right past you.
Not because he didn’t see you. He did. He walked past you, jaw locked, shoulders tense, and ignored the quiet way your face changed.
That same night, the whole family went back to the house.
There were snacks and blankets out because your mom had wanted everyone together, wanting comfort and some semblance of normalcy.
Then she sat all of you down and said the sentence that split your world in half.
She had cancer.
Everybody fell apart differently. Johnny cried openly, immediately. Matthew too, because he was still young enough that grief was simple in its shape. Your stepdad held her hand so tightly his knuckles whitened. You went to her and hugged her and for one suspended second, Matthew thought maybe all the old anger had been stupid, because family was still family when it mattered.
Later, during the movie night that none of you were really watching, your phone buzzed.
You stood.
“I have to take this.”
And went upstairs.
Matthew watched you go with a new and furious certainty hardening in his chest.
Mom tells us she has cancer and he only cares about himself.
That sight rooted itself in him right there. It lived in him for months. Years, maybe.
He didn’t know then that the call was with an oncologist. One of the best in North America. That your assistant had spent hours arranging it. That you stood at the top of the stairs speaking in a voice that silently broke while you asked about treatment plans and clinical options and who they could call and how fast they could move.
He only knew you left the room.
And Matthew had always made a religion out of your habit of leaving.
February of 2024 smelled like antiseptic and stale coffee.
The hospital room was too bright and then not bright enough and somehow unbearably ordinary for a place where the worst thing in the world was happening.
When the doctors told them she was gone, Johnny folded in half with the force of it. Matthew sobbed with his whole body. You were crying too, but in that strange, silent way that looked almost strained until you turned and walked down the hall because you couldn’t break down in front of anyone, not wanting to upset them even more.
Matthew had watched you go even then.
Leaving… again.
Only later… months later, through some conversation with your assistant and then your dad’s old texts and then one awful moment when Johnny put pieces together aloud, did Matthew learn the truth about that phone call the night she’d told you all she had cancer.
You had been trying to save her. You had cared enough to leave the room because caring in other’s views was making you frantic.
It knocked something loose in him.
Not enough to fix anything, but enough to ruin the version of you he’d been leaning on.
⸻
During a line rush, Barzal coasted near him and said quietly, “It sounds like he cared to me. He probably just didn’t want you seeing him like that.”
Matthew’s mouth pulled tight.
“Maybe,” he said.
“I wasn’t all that nice to him after that either.”
Barzal didn’t say anything.
He didn’t need to.
Matthew already knew where the next memory would go.
⸻
You were twenty three at the time of the 2025 NHL Draft.
Matthew had known you were coming because his dad told him. Had told him with that careful voice adults use when they suspect one of their kids is already angry and don’t want to set off the rest of it. He was seated with Johnny, his dad, and the ache of his mother’s absence like another person at the table.
Then you came in, suit dark and elegant, face thinner than he remembered, your eyes searching until they found them.
You walked over and stopped just short of the table.
“Mind if I sit with you guys?”
Johnny lit up instantly. “Yeah, of course.”
His dad gestured to the empty chair beside him with quiet affection. “Saved your spot for you.”
Matthew looked at you and felt something hot and ugly rise up in his throat.
Because there you were. Clearly late, but looking beautiful, famous. All together, impossible to ignore.
Because you still got to belong. Because part of him had always believed that leaving should have cost you the family, and every time it didn’t, he resented you more.
When his name was called first overall, the whole room exploded around him.
He hugged Johnny andd his dad. The moment was everything he’d dreamed of and nothing like it, because your mother was not there to see it.
He turned to you, giving you a curt nod because he could not bring himself to do more, then walked to the stage and pulled on the Islanders jersey with hands that only barely fit.
In his draft speech, he talked about his mom and how he was playing for her.
He didn’t look at you.
After the after party, all of you went out for dinner. The restaurant was loud, crowded, glossy. Everyone celebrating him, the first overall pick, the future. Cameras had finally vanished. For a moment, it was just family.
Matthew noticed you weren’t eating much, not really touching anything but rather playing with your food.
He was already angry and exhausted by the mere nearness of you, the wrongness of you in the same room as all his grief.
So he said the cruelest thing he could think of in the moment.
“What? Sad there was no way for you to make everything about yourself for once?”
You looked up sharply, hurt flashing across your face before you could hide it.
“You know…” you said slowly, quietly, “you’ve been a dick to me for the last few years and I don’t understand why. Was it because I went to live with my dad? When I started making music that people actually liked? Why?”
Matthew looked away.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Then he stood. “I’m not hungry anymore. Let’s just go.”
Outside the restaurant, the night was crowded with people from the draft. Prospects. NHL stars. Names anyone who follows the hockey world would have noticed immediately. Bedard. Crosby. MacKinnon. Tkachuk.
You didn’t seem to notice a single one of them.
You followed him out onto the busy street and said, “No. Seriously, Matthew. Why do you hate me so much?”
He spun around so fast it made even Johnny jump at the sudden movement.
“Because all you do is leave!”
People nearby went quiet, watching the chaos unfold in shock.
“You left us to live with your dad! You left us to be a popstar! You left us when we found out Mom had cancer. You left when she died and now you want to show up like this and pretend we’re okay? We’re not!”
You stared at him, eyes widening, tears instantly filling to your brim.
And then he said something unforgivable:
“Mom would never forgive you for this,” he snapped. “She would hate you.”
Your whole face changed. Not dramatically. It was almost worse, because it went very still.
You swallowed and looked to the left. Nodding a couple times like you were trying to understand an unearthed truth you had not expected to hear from him. One tear slipped down the left side of your face.
“All right,” you said, voice breaking. “I wasn’t aware that’s how you think of me. I… um…” You breathed in shallowly. “I’m just gonna go then.”
You turned and started walking toward the hotel.
Matthew, still furious, shouted after you, “Go ahead. Do what you do best and leave.”
You didn’t turn around, but he saw your shoulders shake once before you disappeared.
He thought about that almost every night afterward.
⸻
The Islanders won.
Matthew scored once and assisted on another, and the crowd chanted and the room was all victory afterward, all adrenaline and noise.
But once the media was done with him and the congratulations had all been handed out, he sat at his stall again, phone in hand to finish your album.
Now that he was listening for them, the references were everywhere.
A line about a hospital hallway.
A lyric about your mother’s perfume on an old sweatshirt.
A line that sounded suspiciously like the driveway back home, the cheap net, the smack of a puck against plywood.
A song that turned the dinner table into a haunted house.
A bridge that all but said his name without saying it.
He sat with his elbows on his knees and let track after track rip something open in him.
He opened older headlines, reading them in the harsh white light of his phone:
Your dad dying from cancer, only a year after you lost mom.
Your stadium show attacked by a homophobe.
You injured in the aftermath, then almost killed in the car accident the morning after while driving to the hospital to visit victims from the attack. Your fiancée dead. You alive.
Photographs of you leaving a club disheveled and glassy-eyed. The world chewing on your pain before it knew it was pain. No one, but you, knowing you had been assaulted in the club bathroom.
Then being diagnosed with the same type cancer that had killed your dad. Three months later: remission. Recovery. Another false positive headline about you “beating cancer” with the kind of language people use when they want to turn suffering into something uplifting for their own convenience.
He scrolled and scrolled until the room blurred due to tears he didn’t realize had welled in his eyes. It felt, reading it all together, less like your life and more like an indictment.
As if the universe itself had taken aim and the world had looked at you, deciding that not enough bad things had happened yet.
He put the phone in his pocket and walked out of the room hollowed out. Near one of the concession stands in the quieter part of the arena, you were waiting for him.
No security visible. Just you in a dark coat, sleeves tugged over part of your hands, expression tired enough that for one insane second all he could see was thirteen year old you at the dinner table moving food around a plate.
He slowed.
You looked up. For a second neither of you moved, then he walked over.
“Hey,” you said.
Your voice was gentler than he expected.
“Hey.”
The silence after was unbearable.
The crowd was gone now, seldom for a few arena staff in the distance. The smell of popcorn gone stale.
“I didn’t know if you’d stop,” you said.
“I almost didn’t.”
“Fair.”
He looked at you properly then.
You were thinner. Paler. There was a drag to the way you stood, as if your body was still relearning itself after all it had survived. Up close, the famous parts of you disappeared. What was left was just his brother. Twenty four years old and exhausted beyond language.
He hated that this made his chest hurt.
You glanced at him, then away. “I heard you got the game puck.”
“Yeah.”
“Congrats.”
“Thanks.”
Awkward silence vibrated between the two of you.
You exhaled slowly. “I listened to some of the postgame interview.”
“Why?”
You shrugged. “I keep tabs.”
That hit him strangely. He looked down at the floor. “I listened to the album.”
This time it was your turn to go still.
“Oh.”
“Mostly sad songs.”
A faint, humorless smile touched your mouth. “Yeah. That seems to be my brand lately.”
“You wrote about Mom.”
You looked off toward the emptying stands. “I wrote about a lot of things.”
“You wrote about me.”
Your jaw shifted. “Some of it.”
Matthew swallowed.
He could feel the old anger in him, but now it sat next to understanding.
“I read the headlines,” he said.
You laughed once. It sounded brittle. “That must’ve been fun.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I tried.”
He frowned. “No, I mean all of it. The cancer. The…” He stopped before the club, the assault. He didn’t know if he had the right to say it out loud. “Everything.”
You stared at him a moment, eyes unreadable.
Then you said, very quietly, “Because every time I tried to be around you, you looked at me like I was ruining the room.”
He flinched.
You looked down at your hands. “And because after a certain point, you start feeling stupid for bleeding in front of people who resent you for making a mess.”
He opened his mouth.
You kept going, softer now, like the truth only came out when you didn’t look directly at it.
“I know I left. I know that. I know it hurt you. But I was thirteen, Matt. I was drowning in that house.” Your voice shook once. “And later, yeah, I got famous and I got busy and I got worse at being there in normal ways. I know that too. But I never stopped…” You stopped and swallowed. “I never stopped caring.”
Matthew’s throat tightened.
He remembered the phone call upstairs. The oncologist. The months of hating you for something that had actually been love in the only form you knew how to give it.
He said, “At the draft… when I said what I said…”
You laughed under your breath, a sound with no joy in it at all. “Yeah. I remember.”
“I shouldn’t have said Mom would hate you.”
Your face changed at that, but only a little. Like the wound was old enough now that touching it no longer bled, it only ached.
“No,” you said. “You shouldn’t have.”
He nodded, half expecting you to say more. To hit back. To tell him where to go. To finally give him the version of your anger he had always thought he deserved.
Instead you just looked tired.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
The words sounded small in a building this big. Small against the years. Small against the dead.
You looked at him for a long time.
“I’m sorry too.”
“For what?”
“For making leaving look easy,” you said. “For every birthday text from another country. For every call you declined that I should’ve made in person sooner. For not knowing how to be your brother anymore once the world got loud.”
Matthew looked away. His eyes burned.
“Do you know what the worst part is?” you asked. You smiled without humor. “I kept thinking if one more terrible thing happened to me, maybe it would finally make sense to everybody. Maybe then I’d stop looking like the villain in all my own old stories.” Your voice went quiet. “But it just kept happening and it still didn’t fix anything.”
He stared at you.
In the fluorescent light, you looked less like a popstar than a person apologizing for taking up space.
Maybe that was what that whole year had done to you. Maybe that was what he had helped do.
His voice came out rough. “You should’ve called me.”
You smiled weakly. “Would you have answered?”
He didn’t.
That was answer enough.
You nodded faintly. “Yeah.”
Without hesitation or though, he said the thing he hadn’t known he was coming here to say until it was already halfway out of him.
“You weren’t the only one who got hurt, Y/n.”
The sentence landed between you.
Not as accusation, at least mot entirely.
Just fact. A bruised, imperfect fact.
Your face softened in a way that made you look younger.
“I know,” you said. “I know.”
He couldn’t stay after that. Couldn’t do whatever came next while standing in the bright public in-between of an arena concourse.
So he nodded once, turned, and walked away. He could feel your eyes on his back all the way to the tunnel.
⸻
A month later, you won Album of the Year again.
The Islanders were in Chicago after playing the Blackhawks, and Matthew was at Connor Bedard’s apartment with half the league’s under-twenty-five royalty jammed into one space.
Connor. The Hughes brothers. Macklin Celebrini. Will Smith. Matt Rempe. Gabe Perrault. Cole Caufield. Juraj Slafkovský. Lukas Reichel. Adam Fantilli.
The TV was on. Everybody half watching, half talking over it the way athletes do with award shows they claim not to care about and somehow always have on.
Then your category came up and suddenly the roomwent mute.
You walked to the stage looking immaculate and somehow wrecked at the same time. Beautiful in the polished, unreal way celebrities are on television, except Matthew could see now what most people in the room couldn’t: the fragility under it. The overcareful posture. The face of someone holding themselves together one breath at a time.
You took the trophy.
The applause swelled.
Then you started speaking.
“This has been the best year of my career,” you said. “And the worst year of my life.”
Nobody in Connor’s apartment moved.
Your speech went on, and the longer it did, the less it sounded like an acceptance and more like an apology. Not for the album, but for being alive. For surviving what other people hadn’t. For still standing there. For existing where everyone could see you.
Matthew felt something cold slide through him.
Celebrini muttered, “Fuck, man. Life has just had it out for that guy.”
Matthew stiffened so hard Connor noticed.
“You good?”
Matthew was already standing. “Can I use your bedroom?”
Connor nodded immediately. “Yeah, go.”
He shut the door behind him, suddenly desperate for quiet.
Then he called you.
Once.
No answer.
Twice.
Nothing.
Three times.
Four.
Still nothing.
He sat on the edge of Connor’s bed with his elbows on his knees and his phone in his hand, heart beating too fast for someone sitting perfectly still.
Then it buzzed.
Y/n is calling.
He answered so fast he almost fumbled it.
“Hello?”
The noise on your end was overwhelming—music, voices, the huge bright chaos of after-award crowds. For a second he thought the connection was bad.
Then your voice came through.
“Matty?”
Just hearing you say his name like that did something painful to his chest.
“Yeah. It’s me.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t hear the calls. Everything’s insane here.”
“I figured.”
Then, awkwardly, “Congrats.”
You laughed softly. Tired. Disbelieving. “Thanks.”
He could hear you moving, a door shutting, the noise dampening as you stepped somewhere quieter.
“All right,” you said after a second. “What’s up?”
Matthew swallowed. He hadn’t thought this far.
“I saw your speech.”
“Unfortunate for both of us.”
He almost smiled.
“It sounded…” He stopped, searching. “It sounded like you think you have to apologize for surviving.”
The line was quiet for a beat.
Then you said, lighter than the words deserved, “Occupational hazard.”
“Y/n.”
There was a pause on the other end, and when you spoke again your voice was lower.
“I don’t know how to do this year,” you admitted. “Everyone keeps telling me how strong I am and I feel like I’m made of tissue paper and bad timing.”
Matthew closed his eyes.
“You don’t have to do it alone.”
Silence.
He heard you breathe in, then out.
“That’s new,” you said softly.
“Yeah,” he said. “I know.”
Then, carefully, like he was crossing thin ice, “I was wrong about a lot of things.”
You didn’t answer right away.
He kept going before he could lose his nerve.
“About you leaving. About Mom. About the phone call. About all of it, probably.” He rubbed his hand over his face. “I think I was so angry that it got easier to keep making you the bad guy than to admit I missed you.”
The words sat there between you.
He could hear your breath catch.
On the other end, when you finally spoke, you sounded like you were already struggling to hold the tears back.
“I missed you too.”
Matthew looked down at the floor. In the living room outside, somebody laughed at something on television. A hockey game highlight maybe. Life going on stupidly, normally, while his whole chest felt cut open.
“I don’t know how to fix it,” he admitted.
“You probably can’t,” you said.
He flinched.
Then you added, “Not all at once.”
He breathed.
“Okay.”
Then you said, with the faintest trace of the old dry humor that used to belong to you before grief made everything brittle, “For the record, I always thought your skating was obnoxiously good.”
Matthew let out a startled laugh.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Annoying, actually.”
He smiled despite himself. “Your music got all right, I guess.”
You snorted. “Thanks. How generous of you to say.”
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees again.
“Where are you now?”
“In a hallway at the Grammys hiding from people who want pictures of me crying.”
“That sounds awful.”
“It is.”
Then he said, “Text me when you get back to your house.”
There was a pause.
“Why?”
“So I know you got there safely.”
You went quiet for just long enough that he wondered if he’d pushed too far.
Then, very softly: “Okay.”
He nodded to no one. “Okay.”
Neither of you hung up.
Not immediately.
It was strangely hard to end it.
Finally you said, “Goodnight, Matty.”
“Night.”
After the line went dead, Matthew sat there for a long time with the phone still in his hand.
Outside the bedroom door, the apartment noise went on. Connor and the others talking. Somebody raiding the fridge. A burst of laughter.
Normal life.
But in Matthew’s chest something had shifted, small and stubborn and painful.
Not forgiveness. Not yet. Not healing either.
Just this:
for the first time in years, when you had called back, he had answered.
And for the first time in years, neither of you had tried to make the other one leave.
Summary: your his famous popstar partner and he protects you from paparazzi
A/N: This will be the last one for the day because unfortunately I have a full time job and work tomorrow morning. But feel free to send in some requests and I’ll try get them done. I tend to only post every couple of days when I’m at work tho.
The first time it happens, it’s chaos.
Proper chaos.
You’re halfway out of the car and it’s instant. Flashes going off like mad, people shouting your name, cameras shoved way too close like you’re not even a person, just something to capture.
“Oi, are you lot serious?”
Morgan’s out first and he’s already annoyed.
You barely get your foot down before his arm comes across you, stopping you stepping fully into it. Quick. Protective. No hesitation.
“Back up. Actually back up, what are you doing?”
They don’t.
One of them leans in even closer, camera practically in your face, and you flinch hard.
That’s it.
“Nah, get that out her face”
He steps forward properly now, right in front of you, pushing the camera down with his hand.
“Have a day off, man”
Someone keeps filming, still pushing forward, trying to get around him.
Morgan steps straight into him.
“I said move”
Low. Sharp. Serious.
The guy hesitates but doesn’t fully back off.
Morgan doesn’t budge.
“You’re doing too much. She’s just trying to walk, it’s not that deep. Move out the way”
His jaw’s tight, eyes locked, not even blinking. He’s not shouting but it’s way more intense than that.
You’re stood just behind him, heart racing, watching the way he doesn’t give an inch.
He reaches back without looking, grabs your hand, pulls you in behind him.
“Stay behind me”
You do.
Completely.
He walks you through it like that, blocking people, moving them out the way, not politely anymore.
“Move”
“Give her space”
“Sort your life out mate”
Every word clipped, irritated, done with it.
By the time you’re inside, your chest is tight and your head is spinning.
The door shuts.
Silence.
Morgan drags a hand through his hair. “Actual joke, that. Bunch of weirdos”
You’re staring at him.
He clocks it instantly.
“You good?”
You nod.
“Yeah”
But your voice is softer than usual.
Because all you can think about is how he looked out there. The way he stepped up without even thinking. The way he got in that guy’s face like it was nothing.
It sticks.
-
Fans are different.
Still a lot. Still overwhelming sometimes.
But he handles them completely differently.
You’re outside a venue, and it starts nice. People smiling, asking for photos, telling you they love you.
You’re happy to stay.
Morgan hangs back at first, just watching, letting you do your thing.
Then it builds.
More people. Less space.
Phones everywhere again, people edging closer, a bit too excited, a bit too pushy.
“Morgan…”
“Yeah, I’m here”
He’s beside you instantly, hand settling at the small of your back.
Grounding.
“Alright, chill a bit, yeah? One at a time, no need to rush”
His tone’s firm, but calm.
Not aggressive. Just clear.
Someone bumps into you trying to get closer.
His hand presses slightly more into your back.
“Careful please mate”
Still calm.
But there’s a warning in it.
They listen.
He glances down at you quickly. “You alright?”
“Yeah”
“Yeah? Sound”
He looks back at them.
“We’ll do a couple more, yeah, just don’t push”
And they actually listen.
Because of him.
When it starts getting too much again, he doesn’t wait.
“That’s us for now, yeah. She needs a break”
No arguing. No pushing.
Just done.
His hand slides down to yours, fingers linking like it’s nothing.
“C’mon”
You let him pull you away, your heart doing that same stupid thing again.
-
The airport is the worst.
You’re tired. Already overwhelmed.
And when it hits, it hits hard.
Cameras everywhere, louder than they need to be, someone literally walking backwards filming you.
“Move, man, what are you doing?”
Morgan’s patience is gone instantly.
He steps right in front of you, arm out, stopping someone getting any closer.
“Watch where you’re going”
They keep coming.
Keep filming.
And that’s when he fully snaps.
He steps forward, straight into one of them.
“Bro, move”
The guy tries to laugh it off.
Morgan doesn’t even crack a smile.
“I’m not joking. Move out the way”
There’s tension now.
Proper tension.
Everything around you dips quieter, like people are clocking this isn’t just him chatting.
He holds eye contact for a second longer, then shakes his head.
“Get a real job, man. It’s embarrassing.”
Then he turns straight back to you like nothing happened.
“You alright?”
Soft again. Just for you.
You nod, stepping closer without thinking.
He takes your hand, guiding you through.
“I’ve got you. Stay with me”
And you do.
Every step.
-
After that, it’s all you notice. How quick he is to step in. How different he is depending on who it is. How he doesn’t hesitate, ever.
It gets to you.
In the best way.
-
The next time it happens it’s quiet
No chaos. No crowd.
Just the two of you walking back after dinner, talking rubbish, laughing, his shoulder knocking into yours.
But your head’s not in it.
You’re thinking about earlier. About the airport. About the way he got in that guy’s face without even blinking. About the way he held your hand after like it was nothing.
You stop walking.
“Morgan”
He turns straight away. “What?”
You don’t think.
You just grab his hoodie and pull him down into a kiss.
He pauses for half a second, caught off guard.
Then he’s kissing you back properly.
Hands on your waist, pulling you in tight, like he needs you closer.
You kiss him harder and he matches it instantly, one hand sliding up to the back of your neck, holding you there.
“Where’s this come from then?” he mutters against your lips.
You smile, breath a little uneven.
“You”
He huffs. “That’s not an answer”
“It is”
You kiss him again, slower this time.
“You’re just really hot when you do that”
“Do what?”
“All the protective stuff”
He pauses for a second, then lets out a quiet laugh.
“…You’re serious?”
“Yeah”
That’s all it takes.
His grip tightens slightly, pulling you back into him, kissing you deeper now, slower but heavier, like he’s properly feeling it.
“Mad” he mutters.
But he doesn’t stop.
Your hands grip his hoodie, his hand firm at your waist, keeping you close, grounding, the same way he always does.
Except now it’s different.
Warmer.
More intense.
You barely notice anything else.
Until -
Click.
It’s faint. But he hears it.
Morgan pulls back just slightly, eyes flicking past you.
And his whole expression changes.
“Are you fucking serious?”
You turn your head slightly and there’s a paparazzi across the street, camera still raised.
Morgan’s already moving.
“Oi!”
His hand drops from your neck but stays on your waist for a second, like he’s making sure you’re steady before he steps away.
“Are you actually taking pictures right now?”
He turns slightly toward them, jaw tight again, that same energy from before coming straight back.
“Put the camera down, man. What are you doing?”
And just like that, he’s back in front of you again.
You should’ve known something was wrong that night.
Jake hadn’t kissed you when you showed up. He always kissed you. It used to be the first thing he did—before hello, before even looking at you properly. But when you slid into the Hard Deck, dressed down in jeans and one of his old Navy hoodies that you’d cropped yourself, he only looked over his shoulder and smiled like a man who didn’t quite recognize you.
That smile didn’t reach his eyes.
Still, you didn’t push it.
You were used to busy. You were used to pressure. You were used to distance. That’s what happened when a pop star dated a fighter pilot. Schedules clashed. Time zones blurred. The only thing that made it work was trust.
And God, had you trusted him.
After all, this was Jake.
Jake, who flew you to Catalina Island just for your birthday dinner.
Jake, who stayed up until 4am FaceTiming you between stadium shows.
Jake, who’d kissed your knuckles and called you “darlin’” in front of the entire press line at the AMAs.
Jake, who inspired songs like “Call It What You Want” and “Lover.”
He had been everything. He was everything.
Until the moment he wasn’t.
You were halfway across the bar when it happened. You’d stopped to say hi to Phoenix and Bob—sweet Bob, who always offered you his seat and never once asked for a selfie. You hadn’t even made it to Jake’s side yet when you caught a glimpse of blonde. Slender hand. Red nails. Her laugh, high and flirty, practically floated through the air like it was layered with glitter.
Your eyes found them before your brain did.
Her hand on his chest.
His arm around her waist.
Too close.
Too familiar.
You froze.
Maybe…maybe it wasn’t what it looked like. Maybe she was just drunk. Maybe he hadn’t noticed. Maybe he was about to push her away and tell her he had someone—someone who just released her second platinum album, someone who thought he was the one.
But he didn’t move.
He didn’t stop her.
He just leaned in and whispered something against her ear, and you watched her smile like she’d just won a game you didn’t know you were playing.
That was when he saw you.
It was like someone had hit pause on the entire bar.
Jake’s eyes widened.
“Babe,” he called, too late. “Wait, it’s—”
You were already backing away.
Already blinking hard.
Already feeling the air rip out of your lungs in one brutal gust.
Everyone was watching.
Bob stood like he might go after you.
Phoenix cursed under her breath.
Reuben and Mickey looked like they didn’t know whether to tackle Jake or follow you.
“She Left in Tears. He Stayed With the Other Girl.”
Your phone didn’t stop buzzing for days.
Your fans wanted blood.
Your label wanted a statement.
Your heart wanted…nothing. It was done.
You didn’t say a word.
Instead, you disappeared.
You hid out in LA for a week, crying into your own merch hoodie and whispering “I should’ve known” between voice memos you couldn’t bear to play back.
But then—
Then you flew to San Diego.
⸻
You showed up on base like a ghost draped in vintage sunglasses and heartbreak. No press. No entourage. Just you, your notebook, and a guitar.
The squad didn’t know what to say.
Phoenix hugged you like a sister.
Bob nodded, gently, like he didn’t want to scare you off.
Jake was…well. He was there. But you didn’t even spare him a glance.
Instead, you made yourself at home in Hangar 3.
Your studio, for now.
A quiet corner of hell where you could write and rage and feel without interruption.
And write you did.
Every single day.
Songs about lies. About betrayal. About still loving someone you wished you didn’t.
Jake watched from a distance.
Bob brought you coffee.
Neither one of them knew that somewhere between “Mr. Perfectly Fine” and “All Too Well,” you started writing new songs.
Not about Jake.
Not anymore.
These were softer. Secret.
Songs about the way someone’s voice could ground you.
About kindness in the quietest corners.
About a pair of ocean eyes that never looked away when you were hurting.
———
It was raining the first time he showed up with tea.
You didn’t hear him at first—too lost in your own head, curled up in the corner of the hangar with your knees pulled to your chest and your hoodie drawn tight around your face. A half-filled notebook lay open beside you, the pages too damp to write on now, thanks to the open door and a moody coastal wind that didn’t seem to care you were mourning.
You weren’t even crying anymore. You were past that.
You were just… tired.
Then there was a rustle.
You looked up, half-expecting Jake.
But it was Bob.
So quiet. So soft. He stood at the edge of the hangar like he didn’t want to intrude, rain dotting his jacket, glasses fogged at the edges. He didn’t say anything at first—just walked slowly over and crouched beside you, setting down a paper bag and a tall cup with your name scribbled on the side.
“Didn’t know what kind of tea you liked,” he said gently. “So I brought three.”
You blinked at him. Your throat ached. Your voice was barely above a whisper.
“I didn’t ask you to come.”
“I know,” he said. “Didn’t come to talk.”
He didn’t ask if you were okay. He didn’t bring up the headlines. He didn’t mention Jake, or the girl, or the way the entire squad had watched you break like glass in real time.
He just sat.
Pulled out a sleeve of Oreos and placed them between you. Took off his jacket and laid it across your knees. Opened one of the teas—green, lightly sweet—and set it down beside your notebook without another word.
You didn’t speak.
He didn’t push.
But he stayed.
Minutes passed like hours. You listened to the rain. To the rustle of wrappers. To the steady sound of Bob Floyd existing beside you, like some kind of lighthouse in a sea you hadn’t asked to drown in.
And slowly, you reached for the tea.
He didn’t look at you. But when you sipped, he smiled.
⸻
It became a routine after that.
He never asked. Never made it a thing. But somehow, every time you showed up at base with your bag and your notebook and your aching chest, he found you. Sometimes with snacks. Sometimes with blankets. Sometimes with nothing but his calm, anchoring presence.
He’d sit beside you while you scrawled lyrics in red ink, your hand trembling with rage or heartbreak or both.
He never asked to see.
Never tried to pry.
But once—just once—you caught him humming one of your songs under his breath. One of the old ones. A love song, from before.
You didn’t say anything.
But your heart stuttered.
And that night, for the first time in weeks, you wrote a different kind of song.
It wasn’t about Jake.
It was about kindness in borrowed jackets.
It was about the way someone could sit beside you in silence and somehow make it feel like the loudest comfort in the world.
You titled it “Lavender Haze.”
And you didn’t tell a soul.
———
Jake had seen a lot of wild things in his career—enemy missiles, dogfights over desert skies, even a bird strike at Mach speed—but nothing, nothing, prepared him for the gut-punch of walking into the hangar and seeing her laugh.
Not just smile.
Laugh.
And it wasn’t with him.
Bob was sitting beside her on a folded blanket, one arm resting over a box of donuts, the other holding her phone as she showed him something that made her snort. She nudged him with her shoulder and said something Jake couldn’t hear. Bob said something back, awkward and sweet, and she actually leaned her head on his shoulder for a second like it was normal.
Like she did that now.
Jake stood frozen in the doorway.
He hadn’t seen her really laugh since… well, him. Since them.
Now, it was Bob.
It wasn’t fair.
He waited until Bob left—quiet, like he always was. No big goodbye, just a soft little smile and a promise to bring her coffee tomorrow.
Then Jake stepped into the hangar.
You looked up and stiffened immediately. Gone was the easy smile. The laugh. The soft body language. Everything shuttered like a slammed door.
“What do you want?” you asked flatly.
Jake sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “Just to talk.”
“About what?” You turned back to your notebook. “You cheat on all your girlfriends or was I just lucky?”
He winced. “That’s not fair.”
You scribbled something in red ink and didn’t even look at him. “You know what’s not fair? Getting humiliated in front of your friends and fans by someone who said he loved you.”
Jake stepped closer. “I did love you.”
“No, Jake,” you said, eyes finally locking with his. Cold. Hard. “You loved that I loved you. You loved the spotlight. The attention. You didn’t love me.”
He opened his mouth. Closed it again. His jaw flexed. “Are you… with him?”
You tilted your head. “With who?”
“Bob.”
You laughed. It wasn’t warm. “God, Jake. If I was, what makes you think you get to care?”
Silence.
Then:
“Because I miss you.”
Your heart clenched, but not in the way it used to. It was like hearing a song that used to break you and realizing it just didn’t hit the same anymore.
You stood, walked up to him slow.
“You don’t miss me, Jake,” you whispered. “You miss the control. You miss being the one the songs were about.”
And before he could speak again, you stepped around him.
Back to your corner.
Back to your notebook.
Back to the love songs you were finally writing for someone who never once asked to be the center of them.
———
Jake had seen a lot of wild things in his career—enemy missiles, dogfights over desert skies, even a bird strike at Mach speed—but nothing, nothing, prepared him for the gut-punch of walking into the hangar and seeing her laugh.
Not just smile.
Laugh.
And it wasn’t with him.
Bob was sitting beside her on a folded blanket, one arm resting over a box of donuts, the other holding her phone as she showed him something that made her snort. She nudged him with her shoulder and said something Jake couldn’t hear. Bob said something back, awkward and sweet, and she actually leaned her head on his shoulder for a second like it was normal.
Like she did that now.
Jake stood frozen in the doorway.
He hadn’t seen her really laugh since… well, him. Since them.
Now, it was Bob.
It wasn’t fair.
He waited until Bob left—quiet, like he always was. No big goodbye, just a soft little smile and a promise to bring her coffee tomorrow.
Then Jake stepped into the hangar.
You looked up and stiffened immediately. Gone was the easy smile. The laugh. The soft body language. Everything shuttered like a slammed door.
“What do you want?” you asked flatly.
Jake sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “Just to talk.”
“About what?” You turned back to your notebook. “You cheat on all your girlfriends or was I just lucky?”
He winced. “That’s not fair.”
You scribbled something in red ink and didn’t even look at him. “You know what’s not fair? Getting humiliated in front of your friends and fans by someone who said he loved you.”
Jake stepped closer. “I did love you.”
“No, Jake,” you said, eyes finally locking with his. Cold. Hard. “You loved that I loved you. You loved the spotlight. The attention. You didn’t love me.”
He opened his mouth. Closed it again. His jaw flexed. “Are you… with him?”
You tilted your head. “With who?”
“Bob.”
You laughed. It wasn’t warm. “God, Jake. If I was, what makes you think you get to care?”
Silence.
Then:
“Because I miss you.”
Your heart clenched, but not in the way it used to. It was like hearing a song that used to break you and realizing it just didn’t hit the same anymore.
You stood, walked up to him slow.
“You don’t miss me, Jake,” you whispered. “You miss the control. You miss being the one the songs were about.”
And before he could speak again, you stepped around him.
Back to your corner.
Back to your notebook.
Back to the love songs you were finally writing for someone who never once asked to be the center of them.
———
The Hard Deck didn’t hit the same anymore.
It used to feel warm. Familiar. Like summer in a bottle. Like love and laughter and Jake’s arm around her waist while the squad clapped and joked and told her to sing something on the piano, come on, just one song.
Now, it was cold. Loud. Every corner felt haunted by a ghost with green eyes and a reckless grin.
And he was still here.
Laughing, like nothing happened. Sitting with her. The girl he cheated with.
It had been a week. One week since she caught him with her—in public. One week since she stormed out in tears and said nothing to anyone. One week since the internet exploded with breakup headlines and fan accounts posting side-by-sides of old love songs with the caption:
“Was this about him? 😭😭”
She hadn’t said a word. Not to Jake. Not to the press.
But she didn’t have to. She had a pen.
And if he thought she’d be quiet? He didn’t know her at all.
So she walked in that night dressed to kill. Not for him—but for herself. Big sunglasses even though the sun was down. Blood red lip gloss. Glittery boots and a notebook under her arm. She ordered a Shirley Temple, took a seat at her usual corner table, and started writing like he wasn’t twenty feet away with his hand on that girl’s thigh.
She was going to ruin him.
Until she looked up—and saw Bob Floyd.
Quiet, soft-spoken Bob. In a navy tee with his sleeves rolled up, helping Fanboy and Coyote carry drinks from the bar. Laughing at something Phoenix said, his curls a little wild from the breeze, glasses slipping down his nose. Sweet and unbothered and good in a way that infuriated her.
Her breath caught. She blinked. Blinked again.
No.
No no no. This was not happening.
Because suddenly she was writing a new line in the margin of her heartbreak anthem, and it wasn’t about Jake at all.
You’re so gorgeous I can’t say anything to your face…
She looked away, then looked back.
God. His face.
Look at your face. LOOK. AT. YOUR. FACE.
“You’re so cool it makes me hate you so much,” she mumbled to herself, cheeks burning. She scratched the words onto a napkin, shoved it under her notebook like a dirty secret, and immediately took a sip of her drink to calm down.
She could not be doing this. She wasn’t ready. She was supposed to be angry. She was supposed to be ruining Jake. Not suddenly sitting here imagining Bob Floyd holding her hand and telling her to get some sleep. Not daydreaming about his shy little smile. Not wondering what his voice would sound like whispering into her neck at night.
And yet, she was.
When she peeked up again, Bob caught her looking. He smiled.
Waved.
And her heart betrayed her all over again.
———
The album was done. Twelve tracks, thirty-seven minutes, one hell of a story.
The private listening party wasn’t massive — just a handpicked list of industry reps, a few press faces, and the entire Top Gun squadron. Yes, even him. Jake and the girl he cheated with were posted near the back wall, looking out of place in their half-assed “supportive” poses.
She sat near the front, legs crossed, drink in hand, in a black jumpsuit and boots. Confidence radiating. The heartbreak? Buried under eyeliner and heels. The love songs? Still a secret.
Bob slid into the seat beside her with a soft smile and a gentle, “Hey.” He had a little bag of her favorite candy in his lap.
“Thanks for coming,” she murmured.
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
He didn’t know. Not yet. About the tracks he’d inspired. About how he helped stitch her heart back together just by being there.
The lights dimmed. A producer leaned over the mic.
“Alright, everyone — here’s the first listen of ‘Lover, Loser, Legend’.”
The first track dropped.
“I was a name in your mouth, a notch in your pride / Now I’m on stages you only dream about at night…”
Phoenix audibly said, “Oop.”
Rooster leaned forward, whispering something low under his breath about how brutal the lyrics were. Jake flinched at the second chorus.
“You said I was dramatic / Turns out I was prophetic…”
By track three, ‘Mr. Perfectly Fine,’ the room was shifting. Jake was white-knuckling his beer. His date was staring at the ceiling like it could save her.
By track five, ‘How Did It End?’, the tears were already welling in her own eyes, but she kept her face calm, unreadable. And then—
“He never looked back, not once / But I kept watching the door…”
Bob’s hand gently brushed her knee. Subtle. Reassuring. He thought she was reliving what Jake did to her — which was half true. But the tears weren’t just about Jake.
Because then track seven began: ‘Gorgeous.’
“You’re so gorgeous / I can’t say anything to your face…”
Her eyes flickered to Bob — who was watching the speakers, brows furrowed.
“And I got a boyfriend, he’s older than us / He’s in the club doing I don’t know what…”
“You make me so happy it turns back to sad…”
His head tilted slightly, like he was trying to connect a thread.
Then came ‘Lavender Haze’. And finally ‘Dress’.
Bob sat frozen, lips parted slightly. He didn’t say anything. Didn’t have to. She could feel the question forming in his head.
When the last track faded and the studio lights came back up, applause broke out. Industry people buzzing. Phones lighting up.
But all she could hear was her own heartbeat.
Phoenix leaned across the back of the couch. “Girl… who are the love songs about?”
All eyes were on her.
She glanced sideways, met Bob’s eyes just briefly — and smiled.
“I guess you’ll find out when the tour starts.”
———
Snapbacks, glitter, black sequins. The stadium was packed. A sea of lights. Signs. Chants. They were screaming her name before the first note even hit.
Bob stood among the VIP section, pressed between Phoenix and Rooster. The squad had gotten seats up front—close enough to feel the bass in their bones, to see the sweat on her brow when the spotlight caught her just right.
Jake was further back.
He wasn’t the one she was singing to tonight.
The stage was fire and vengeance for the first half.
She strutted across it like she was born to, voice raw, fearless, devastating.
“I bet you think I’m sleeping soundly / But I’ve been burning every bridge you ever touched…”
Jake looked like he wanted the floor to eat him. Every other line seemed to call him out by name. The fans knew. They screamed and shouted, middle fingers raised when she sang ‘The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived.’
Then the lights went out. Total blackout.
A hush swept the crowd.
One single spotlight clicked on. A piano. Just her.
“There’s a dazzling haze, a mysterious way about you dear…”
Bob blinked.
“I’ve been in a lavender haze…”
Phoenix sucked in a sharp breath. Rooster nudged her.
Bob didn’t move. His eyes were locked on her.
She was sitting now, legs crossed delicately, mic pressed to her lips. And she wasn’t looking at the crowd.
She was looking dead at him.
“You’re so gorgeous / I can’t say anything to your face / ‘Cause look at your face…”
He froze. That line. That smile.
She gave the tiniest tilt of her head. The barest smirk.
“I’ve got a boyfriend, he’s older than us / He’s in the club doing I don’t know what…”
Jake’s eyes widened behind him. “That’s not—”
“Shh,” Phoenix hissed.
“I knew from the first old-fashioned, we were cursed / We never had a shotgun shot in the dark…”
And then—then—came the moment.
The moment the stage went violet, the lights came up, and the synth for ‘Dress’ hit. The whole crowd screamed.
“Only bought this dress so you could take it off…”
She stood again.
Walked slowly, intentionally, to the edge of the stage, eyes never leaving Bob.
“Say my name and everything just stops…”
And he stopped. Every muscle in his body locked.
“I don’t want you like a best friend…”
The implication hit him like a freight train.
His mouth opened just slightly. His breath caught.
Phoenix clutched his arm.
“Oh my god,” Bob whispered.
“Carve your name into my bedpost…”
She smiled.
It wasn’t a seductive smile. It was a knowing one.
She had kept this secret for months. And now it was out, bleeding across speakers, echoing through stadiums, seeping into every pair of headphones around the world.
She ended the song with her eyes still on him.
And when the applause crashed like a wave, when her name echoed from the rafters—
Bob was still standing there, heart racing, mind spinning, stunned into absolute silence.
Because all this time…
Every love song…
Was about him.
———
The roar of the crowd hadn’t faded yet. It pulsed through the concrete of the backstage halls like a heartbeat. Sweat still clung to her brow, her voice was hoarse, her hand clutched a cold water bottle that had long since stopped sweating.
But none of that mattered.
“Ray,” she said, snapping her fingers gently as her ever-faithful bodyguard appeared at her side. “Can you bring Bob back here? The one in the glasses. Blue shirt. Sitting next to Phoenix.”
Ray didn’t even blink. “On it.”
She barely waited a beat before pulling her oversized hoodie on over her stage outfit, pacing the floor of her dressing room like a storm in soft slippers. Her heart was beating too loud. The adrenaline was already starting to crash—but the nerves? Those were just now kicking in.
What if I just made everything weird?
What if he didn’t get it?
What if he did?
A knock on the door.
She nearly tripped trying to get there first.
Ray stepped aside, revealing Bob—still a little wide-eyed, still looking like he hadn’t quite caught his breath. His shirt was rumpled. His cheeks pink. There were about six emotions warring in his expression.
“Hey,” she said softly.
“Hi,” he answered, eyes flicking to the ground for just a second before finding hers again. “You wanted to see me?”
She nodded, stepping aside so he could enter. It was just the two of them now. The room was quiet, too quiet compared to what they’d just come from. The echo of her lyrics still lingered in the air.
She closed the door behind him gently.
“I figured it was time I stopped hiding.”
Bob swallowed. “They were about me. Weren’t they?”
She didn’t answer with words. She just looked at him. And when he didn’t flinch, didn’t retreat, didn’t deny—that was her answer, too.
“You were the only thing that kept me standing after… you know.”
Bob’s voice was soft. “I didn’t know.”
“I know.” Her lips twisted. “I didn’t want you to. I didn’t think I could handle it if you didn’t feel the same way and then I’d ruin the one good thing I had left.”
He blinked slowly. And then—
“I don’t know how you expect someone to feel the same when they didn’t even know they were in the running.”
She laughed, almost disbelieving. “Okay, fair.”
“You wrote ‘King of My Heart,’” he said, like it had just hit him all over again. “And ‘Enchanted’?”
“I wrote ‘Gorgeous’ the day I saw you helping Phoenix carry out takeout from that taco place,” she admitted.
Bob’s face turned completely red.
“But I also wrote ‘Lavender Haze’ the week you sat in the corner with me and brought me tea and snacks like I wasn’t being completely unhinged writing revenge anthems two feet from my ex-boyfriend.”
He looked down, a little smile ghosting his lips. “I just… wanted to be there for you.”
“You were,” she whispered. “You still are.”
Another beat. Another breath. Then he looked up, really looked at her.
“Do you wanna get dinner sometime? Just us? No instruments. No lyrics.”
She nodded, heart pounding. “Yeah. I’d like that.”
Before either of them could say more, the door burst open with a rush of voices—Phoenix, Rooster, Fanboy, Payback, the whole crew barreling in laughing, shouting, hugging.
“You were incredible!” “Best concert of my life!” “Those songs—damn!”
She barely had time to glance at Bob, but when their eyes met across the room—when he gave her the softest, sweetest smile like he was still carrying her lyrics with him—it was enough.
Jake wasn’t there. Neither was she.
But Bob was. And he wasn’t going anywhere.
———
The roar of the crowd hadn’t faded yet. It pulsed through the concrete of the backstage halls like a heartbeat. Sweat still clung to her brow, her voice was hoarse, her hand clutched a cold water bottle that had long since stopped sweating.
But none of that mattered.
“Ray,” she said, snapping her fingers gently as her ever-faithful bodyguard appeared at her side. “Can you bring Bob back here? The one in the glasses. Blue shirt. Sitting next to Phoenix.”
Ray didn’t even blink. “On it.”
She barely waited a beat before pulling her oversized hoodie on over her stage outfit, pacing the floor of her dressing room like a storm in soft slippers. Her heart was beating too loud. The adrenaline was already starting to crash—but the nerves? Those were just now kicking in.
What if I just made everything weird?
What if he didn’t get it?
What if he did?
A knock on the door.
She nearly tripped trying to get there first.
Ray stepped aside, revealing Bob—still a little wide-eyed, still looking like he hadn’t quite caught his breath. His shirt was rumpled. His cheeks pink. There were about six emotions warring in his expression.
“Hey,” she said softly.
“Hi,” he answered, eyes flicking to the ground for just a second before finding hers again. “You wanted to see me?”
She nodded, stepping aside so he could enter. It was just the two of them now. The room was quiet, too quiet compared to what they’d just come from. The echo of her lyrics still lingered in the air.
She closed the door behind him gently.
“I figured it was time I stopped hiding.”
Bob swallowed. “They were about me. Weren’t they?”
She didn’t answer with words. She just looked at him. And when he didn’t flinch, didn’t retreat, didn’t deny—that was her answer, too.
“You were the only thing that kept me standing after… you know.”
Bob’s voice was soft. “I didn’t know.”
“I know.” Her lips twisted. “I didn’t want you to. I didn’t think I could handle it if you didn’t feel the same way and then I’d ruin the one good thing I had left.”
He blinked slowly. And then—
“I don’t know how you expect someone to feel the same when they didn’t even know they were in the running.”
She laughed, almost disbelieving. “Okay, fair.”
“You wrote ‘King of My Heart,’” he said, like it had just hit him all over again. “And ‘Enchanted’?”
“I wrote ‘Gorgeous’ the day I saw you helping Phoenix carry out takeout from that taco place,” she admitted.
Bob’s face turned completely red.
“But I also wrote ‘Lavender Haze’ the week you sat in the corner with me and brought me tea and snacks like I wasn’t being completely unhinged writing revenge anthems two feet from my ex-boyfriend.”
He looked down, a little smile ghosting his lips. “I just… wanted to be there for you.”
“You were,” she whispered. “You still are.”
Another beat. Another breath. Then he looked up, really looked at her.
“Do you wanna get dinner sometime? Just us? No instruments. No lyrics.”
She nodded, heart pounding. “Yeah. I’d like that.”
Before either of them could say more, the door burst open with a rush of voices—Phoenix, Rooster, Fanboy, Payback, the whole crew barreling in laughing, shouting, hugging.
“You were incredible!” “Best concert of my life!” “Those songs—damn!”
She barely had time to glance at Bob, but when their eyes met across the room—when he gave her the softest, sweetest smile like he was still carrying her lyrics with him—it was enough.
Jake wasn’t there. Neither was she.
But Bob was. And he wasn’t going anywhere.
———
The restaurant was one of the best in San Diego—rooftop view, mood lighting, and a private area already cleared out by the time the group rolled in. The Navy crew weren’t used to this kind of luxury. Cloth napkins. Candlelight. Plates that cost more than their monthly car payments.
But they were riding the high of the concert, and their girl—America’s sweetheart with a platinum voice and a heart like steel—had just done the unthinkable.
“Y/N paid for everything,” Phoenix whispered to Fanboy as they were seated. “Even pre-paid the tip.”
“Wait—like for all of us?” he whispered back.
“All. Of. Us.”
“What kind of money is this?”
“Taylor Swift money,” Rooster muttered as he eased into his seat.
She just smiled as they all settled into the massive circular table. Bob ended up across from her—not by accident. He’d chosen the furthest open seat from hers, trying not to make anything look different. Trying to be respectful. Careful. Not because they had anything to hide.
But because he was now, finally, something she wanted to keep.
She caught his eye once, twice, as the waiters poured wine and passed appetizers. He smiled at her over his glass. She tucked her tongue into her cheek and looked away.
They were fine.
The others? Less so.
“So,” Hangman started, swirling his bourbon. “We all know the breakup songs were about me. I mean…” He gestured dramatically to his own face. “It’s not exactly hard to figure out.”
Payback muttered, “Can’t believe she let you live after ‘Mr. Perfectly Fine.’”
“Oh no, ‘The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived’ was personal,” Rooster chimed in, snorting.
“Oh my god,” Phoenix groaned. “She dragged him to hell. And then resurrected him just to do it again.”
Hangman rolled his eyes, clearly annoyed but trying to look cool. “Whatever. I’ve moved on. I’m happy.” He said it a little too loud, a little too sharp.
No one cared.
“What I wanna know,” Fanboy leaned forward, lowering his voice like he was telling a ghost story, “is who the love songs were about. Because ‘King of My Heart’? ‘Dress’? ‘Gorgeous’? Babe. Those were not written by a woman heartbroken. She was writing like she was in love.”
Everyone turned to her.
She blinked, feigning innocence. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh come on,” Phoenix groaned. “You’re glowing. You’ve got that ‘I wrote a song about a boy and he doesn’t know it’ face.”
“I’m literally not glowing,” she said, sipping her wine. “It’s just the lighting.”
“You said ‘I got a boyfriend, he’s older than us, he’s in the room’!” Payback quoted. “Is he in the room?”
“Is he older?” Fanboy added.
She shrugged.
Bob, across the table, was silent—his eyes trained very steadily on his water glass. His cheeks were pink. His jaw was tight.
He knew. Or at least, he was starting to.
“I’m not telling,” she said simply, leaning back in her chair and letting the silence hang in the air like a smirk. “You’ll have to keep guessing.”
Hangman scoffed. “What, is it someone famous? Some actor?”
Rooster leaned over to Bob, voice low. “She’s definitely messing with us.”
Bob gave a polite laugh, nodded—but didn’t speak. Because he had no idea what would come out if he did.
And across the table, she met his eyes just once more.
Held it.
You’re so gorgeous, I can’t say anything to your face…
The fans weren’t the only ones trying to figure it out anymore.
———
After four months and thirteen days of quiet dating, late-night studio runs, and secret smiles, it was time.
⸻
The Music Video
It dropped without warning:
—Rocketing chords join low piano keys—
Her voice begins soft, trembling with emotion:
“I, I just woke up from a dream
Where you and I had to say goodbye
And I don’t know what it all means
But since I survived, I realized
Wherever you go, that’s where I’ll follow
Nobody’s promised tomorrow
So I’ma love you every night like it’s the last night
Like it’s the last night”
One shot: her and Bob in bed. Bare feet. Early morning light. Soft laughter as she wakes him with a kiss.
—The chorus rises—
He’s there with her, hand in hers as they run through empty streets:
“If the world was ending
I’d wanna be next to you
If the party was over
And our time on Earth was through
I’d wanna hold you just for a while
And die with a smile
If the world was ending
I’d wanna be next to you”
No CGI. No drama. Just two lovers lost to each other. The world could crumble—they didn’t care.
She takes over, voice shaking with feeling:
“Ooh, lost, lost in the words that we scream
I don’t even wanna do this anymore
’Cause you already know what you mean to me
And our love’s the only one worth fighting for”
They dance barefoot in the living room. His hand around her waist. Her head against his chest. It’s them, finally unmasked.
—Back to the chorus—
Overlapping vocals, echoing through candlelit tender moments:
“Wherever you go, that’s where I’ll follow
Nobody’s promised tomorrow
So I’ma love you every night like it’s the last night”
—Bridge and final moments—
They kiss in front of a fire. Fade to black. Then:
“If the world was ending
I’d wanna be next to you…
I’d wanna hold you just for a while
And die with a smile”
Last lines linger:
“If the world was ending
I’d wanna be next to you
If the world was ending
I’d wanna be next to you”
When dawn broke, the internet died.
“THEY. WERE. DATING???”
“THAT’S BOB???”
“GORGEOUS WAS HIM ALL ALONG?”
Her phone buzzed nonstop as the Navy squad flooded her mentions with pride and disbelief. Jake didn’t comment. He didn’t show up.
Backstage, Bob pressed play on her phone. His eyes filled. He looked at her. Humbled. Nervous.
“You wrote that verse for me?” he whispered.
She nodded, stepping closer.
“Lost in the words that we scream…” she recited, voice soft.
“Our love’s the only one worth fighting for.” – Her eyes on his.
“If the world was ending, I’d wanna be next to you…” she finished, reaching for his hand.
He grinned, brushing his thumb over her knuckles.
“I want the whole world to see how much I love you.”
She leaned in and kissed him.
No cameras. No scripts.
Just two people who risked everything—writing a love story that nobody saw coming.
———
The premiere was for a gritty indie-meets-blockbuster war drama. She had a supporting role—a fierce, grounded medic with three pivotal scenes and one unforgettable monologue. Critics were already calling it her “breakout screen moment,” but all anyone could talk about wasn’t the film.
It was who she brought.
Because when she stepped onto the carpet, Bob Floyd was right there beside her.
Not trailing. Not lingering like security.
Right there. Holding her hand.
He looked devastating in a custom navy suit that matched his eyes, glasses polished, curls soft and brushed back just enough to show off that boyish charm.
She wore black silk. A plunging neckline. Diamonds glinting on her ears. A classic Old Hollywood silhouette—but modernized, fierce. The press gasped. Cameras fired. And then—he looked at her.
He looked at her like she was the only thing that had ever mattered.
Like he still couldn’t believe she chose him.
—
A reporter tried to ask who her date was.
She just smiled and said,
“This is Bob. He’s… the reason behind most of the album.”
And that was it. Chaos.
—
Photo after photo:
• Her whispering something into his ear and him blushing like he’s never been on a carpet before.
• Bob wrapping his arm protectively around her waist as flashbulbs go off.
• Her laughing while he looks at her like she personally hung the moon.
• One shot where she looks dead at the camera, unbothered, but he is staring at her like she’s the only one in focus.
Twitter melted.
“Bob Floyd is the new standard.”
“He looks at her like she’s art.”
“Jake WHO? THIS is love.”
Even gossip blogs had to admit it.
“He watches her the way everyone deserves to be seen.”
“It’s clear: she wrote the breakup songs about Hangman, but the love songs—they were always Bob.”
—
When they got inside, she leaned into him in the plush theater seat and murmured,
“How you doing, Red Carpet King?”
Bob just shook his head, pink in the cheeks, and kissed her temple.
“I’m not used to all this,” he said quietly, “but I’d follow you into any storm.”
She smiled.
“Good,” she whispered back, “because this love story’s just getting started.”
For ur next fic it would be so cool if you wrote him dating someone who’s like a famous musician and dealing with that
Real Gone Kid
→ Pairing: Jannik Sinner x Reader
→ Summary: You're a famous pop star, and your 10-month-long worldwide tour is finally coming to an end. But you miss Jannik Sinner, your boyfriend, who you've barely had time to see since both your tours took you to different cities, different continents, different time zones. Maybe it's time to make a decision about what's more important to you.
→ Word Count: 2.5k
→ One Shot
→ A/N: Thank you so much for my first request! I hope you like it, and I'm always welcome to more requests from anyone! (Also, the title is a song by Deacon Blue, a Scottish band I totally recommend to everyone.)
The lights went down for the last time that night, and the Accor Arena erupted with noise. Fans cheered until their throats turned to barbed wire, people still crying, still begging you to come back and sing ONE MORE SONG!
You couldn’t stop yourself smiling as you trailed after your manager, Abby, gulping down water, heart thrumming in your chest with the lingering adrenaline of performing. It was slowly starting to mix with the weirdly overwhelming feeling of the end. Like a stone pulling down your stomach. A weird emptiness of no more concerts. Your tour was over, and now you were supposed to go home and try to get used to sleeping in your own bed. Your manager made you promise to relax when you got back to Monte Carlo. No working, just lazing around, eating junk food, sleeping too much. You didn’t tell her, you’d already made a plan. A couple of songs rattling off in your head.
Abby was right. You’d spent ten months on tour with only a week between continents to yourself. You were tired. You’d grown sick of the same dances, the same songs night after night. You never even got a chance to watch a tennis match live, instead stuck watching the highlights hours later tucked in your bed. Your everlasting album tour was amazing – at first. All your fans in those huge arenas cheering for you. Everyone singing along to your songs. Getting to know your dancers, the band, the opening acts better.
But slowly, surely, you’d started to feel the aching strain it had taken on your relationship with Jannik Sinner.
You’d met years ago. His first big Gucci ambassador party, your third or fourth. They all started to blend together after a while. The same people that you had become friends with, the same drinks, the same hands to shake and jokes to fake a laugh at. He caught your eye almost immediately, the random chance of your heads moving at the same time. You, in a large group of people, mingling like you’d grown used to. And him, in the corner, nursing a beer, blushing wildly whenever anyone new spoke to him. You liked his unruly ginger curls, his awkward lanky stance, the way his green eyes caught you and kept you there – one conversation in, and you knew life would never be the same for you.
You texted occasionally at first. A photo of him in the gym. A voice note from you in the studio. Little tidbits from your everyday life that struggled to keep the other at bay when your crushes were so noticeable. Texts turned to calls to video calls to dates whenever you were in the same city. He came to your concert in London, after being knocked out of Wimbledon early on, and you sang the song you wrote for him for the first time, in front of all those people, able to find him right there in the special guest box. A photograph of you kissing after the concert went viral, and he called you his girlfriend in his winning speech at the US Open shortly after that. Life was nice, easy. You fell into a routine that worked when you were both so constantly busy, and you eventually moved to Monte Carlo to maximise time together between tournaments and concerts.
But the tour … god-fucking-damn.
Everything had been okay at first – ten months ago. You started your tour in Australia so you could watch him play in Melbourne, and he could come to your concert after yet another Australia Open win. Then, your tours took you in separate directions that never seemed to meet in the middle. It was the longest tour you’d ever been on, and, unfortunately, your schedules rarely – if ever – aligned. He came to your concert in New York, just before the US Open, but you weren’t able to go and watch him play because you’d already moved on to another state too far away. Texts, and phone calls, and video calls were not enough to make up for the lack of kisses, hugs, a shoulder massage after a week of concerts.
You missed him, he missed you, and you were both too afraid to appear selfish in asking the other to give up their tour. So, you argued. Harsh, biting arguments. The kind that would have had most couples breaking up. The kind that put him off his game. The kind that almost made you forget your words. You fell out about not seeing each other, because it was easier than saying I Miss You. You didn’t speak for a week because every time you did, your words came dripping out like sharpened knives. It was easier to cry yourself to sleep than to watch Jannik play so far away. It was easier to ignore the aching Jannik-sized hole in your chest than admit you needed to be at his side.
“Okay,” Abby interrupted your thoughts. “Your flight home is in four hours. Your bags are all here, we’ve got your travel outfit steamed–”
“Can you cancel my flight?”
“Huh?” Abby froze, and you crashed right into her back, not expecting the sudden stop. “Cancel the flight? But you’re – you’re supposed to be going home. You know, having a break?”
You shook your head, still sweaty from the concert, heart still pounding. But you knew what you needed most. “I’ve already spoken to Darren. I’m going to see Jannik tomorrow. Surprise him.”
Abby blinked at you. You’d decided it last night in bed, watching his progression to the finals of the Paris Masters through Twitter fans instead of being there to cheer him on. You saw them all thirsting over his new maroon-coloured kid, and though you whole-heartedly agreed he looked sexy, the sight of it made your heart sink, empty and shrivelling. Every time Jannik got a new kit for a new tournament, he’d send you a mirror selfie modelling it. There had been no mirror selfie of the maroon kit.
You hated not being there. Touring, you loved – hearing the fans sing along, getting to see different cultures, knowing your music was reaching the hearts of millions. But, ten months was too long. You’d grown sick of it.
You needed a break.
A real one. Not just a month off that you and Jannik spent in the mountains, or a villa overlooking the beach. A break where you didn’t have to worry when you’d see each other next. A break that didn’t include TV interviews, award show performances, or guest starring at a friend’s concert. A break that meant getting to be with Jannik. Really be with him.
Every step of the way.
🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶
It was the day of the Paris Master’s Final. Jannik versus Felix Auger-Aliassime, after a surprisingly early exit of Carlos in the round of 32. All going well, this would be Jannik’s first Paris victory, and another indoor hard court tucked under his belt. You snuck through the door Darren held open for you, luckily unnoticed by the paparazzi milling around the stadium.
“It’s good to see you, kid.” Darren tugged you in for a hug, squeezing you too tightly, like a dad who hadn’t seen his child in too long. “How was the tour?”
“Good. Exciting.” Too long, you kept to yourself. “Glad to be done, though.”
“I can imagine. Ten months is a long time to be away from home. Jannik’s been missing you.”
Guilt flashed across your face before you could catch it. You hadn’t been there to comfort him after his loss at Roland-Garros, instead having to listen to him cry over the phone while you tugged sparkly blue tights up your legs. You hadn’t been there to celebrate his historic Wimbledon win, too busy watching thousands of phones act as flashlights during your slowest love song. His song – the first one, anyway. You’d missed the bitter disappointments of Cincinnati and the US Open, combined, and you hated yourself for it.
You wanted to be there.
Jannik never – and he’d never dare to – asked you to put music aside for him. He loved how much you loved your job, because it reminded him so much of himself. The joy at getting to live your dream, the ambition to always do better, the love you both held for your fans. He’d never ask you to pause your career, because he’d hate you for asking the same of him.
Instead, you had to take it upon yourself.
You’d explained everything to Abby last night as she sat panicking in your hotel room. You were going to tour with Jannik. You’d follow him around the world, tournament to tournament, and you’d use your sudden spare time to write your next album from the comfort of his arms. You had plenty of experiences now to draw on – feelings you could finally find the words for. It was going to be bitter, and angry, and longing. The press would claim it as your very own ‘Rumours’ and you’d stay at the top of the charts for almost an entire year. It’ll win Best Album at the Grammy’s, and Jannik will miss a tournament just to be able to sit beside you. It’ll be about love, and sacrifice, and fear, and a breakup teetering in your peripheral vision. It’ll be about the engagement ring burning a hole in the bottom of his bag, and your teary yes after his career grand slam win. It’ll be about watching each other grow, and change, and building your lives around the other.
But, before all that, you had to face Jannik.
Darren led you through the stadium, expertly dodging cameras and interviewers and anybody who didn’t need to know you were here. Jannik only had his team in his box this time around. His parents had been in Vienna, and his brother would probably be in Turin. But there was no one here to cheer him on.
Nobody but you.
“He’s just in here.” Darren held the door open so you could slip under his arm, and into the room. For the final, the players got their own suites to share with their teams on the run up to the match. To exercise, to eat, to nap as Jannik was always prone to do. The door slammed shut behind Darren, and all heads twisted towards you. Umberto was fixing the tape on Jannik’s rackets, while on the couch, Alejandro was massaging a twinge in his calf.
The pain was instantly forgotten. Jannik jumped to his feet, but didn’t move any closer, didn’t race over to swing you into his arms. He didn’t run to kiss you, or hug you, or even just to be close to you. Your stomach dropped, that kind of weird anxiety you always got just before you stepped onto stage. It made your throat tighten.
What if Jannik didn’t want you on his tour?
“Dolcezza, you’re here.”
He still said that sweet pet name like it was sugar on his tongue. Like it was a beating heart for him to gently hold. There were no tears in his eyes, but he looked at you like he’d just lost another Grand Slam – all grief, and hurt, and the tiniest, barely-there flicker of hope. You held onto that brief spark until it burnt your palm.
“I couldn’t go home without you.” Your voice cracked. You hadn’t realised that warm fresh tears clung to your eyes. “I don’t want to go home without you anymore. It isn’t–” Hot tears fell over your cheeks. You’d always been an easy crier, but the sudden distance between you made life feel all the more emptier. Concerts weren’t enough to hide your aching loneliness. “It isn’t home without you, Janni.”
Jannik crossed the room, and caught you in his arms just as your tears turned to sobs. He cradled you against his chest, one hand curled around the back of your head, and whispered Italian sweet nothings against your hair, which you barely understood.
“We’ll give you some time,” you heard Darren say, solemn and fatherly, before he, Umberto, and Alejandro slipped from the room.
“I’m sorry, dolcezza.” Jannik continued to whisper against your temple, soothing his words with gentle kisses. “I miss you. Your voice, and your hands, and your beautiful words. I miss listening to you sing while you shower, or cook, or do literally anything. I miss having you by my side. I’m sorry. I’ve been so sad, and I’ve taken it out on you.”
You managed to get your tears under control. At least enough to pull your head away and meet his watery gaze.
“Me too. I never want to spend that long apart again.”
You played with the soft fabric of his maroon shirt, right against his spine. A nervous tick he instantly picked up on. His thumbs rubbed soothing circles into your hip bones, the sort of gesture he always used when you got worked up.
“What are you thinking?” he asked, voice low, gentle, like he was trying to ease the words out of you.
“I want to–” You sucked in a breath, and looked up to meet those lovely green eyes. You’d missed seeing them in person. It was never the same over the phone. Never as bright, as lively. Never showing the depths of his emotions, those little hints of feelings he usually hid from his face but you could always pick up on. “I want to go with you next year.”
“No.” Jannik stepped away from you, out of the circle of your arms, shaking his head like that would convince you all. “No. I promised I would never make you give up your career. Okay? Music is too important. We can make our schedules work–”
“No, Janni.” Your giggle cut him off, and you reached for him again, hand wrapping around his, tugging him closer until your arms could loop around his neck. You liked the way his hands instantly found the base of your spine without having to think.
The way he instantly jumped to defending your career made you all the more convinced this was the right thing to do. He loved you, he loved your music, and he’d never be selfish enough to ask you to put that aside for him. So, you took matters into your own hands. You would need to sit down with Abby and write a proper statement during the break, but in January, you’d announce it to all of your fans. You were taking a break. No tours, no concerts, no interviews, no features, no magazine covers, no new album. Just for a year. Just until you started feeling human again, less like a music churning machine. It’d go viral, and you’d ignore all the online gossip while you packed for Korea and Australia.
“I want to do this. I can still write, I just won’t be performing. I want to support you.”
“You want to be in my box at every tournament?”
“If you’ll have me.” His laughter crowded the air as he finally swung you up and around, giggling into your neck. When he finally wins Roland-Garros and asks you to marry him, he’ll have the exact same reaction to your teary yes.
🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶 🎶
Hi everyone! My first ask, thank you so much, anon. I hope you enjoyed it and it's what you were hoping for! Always happy to get requests, though it might take me a little time to write them.
hello! i love your work SO MUCH and i was wondering if you wee willing to write maybe a vox x reader where vox is completely obsessed with reader? like maybe reader is a normal person, or maybe theyre a pop star, but vox is a huuuge fanboy of them! 😊 thank you so much!
AHHH OF COURSE!! I hope you like ittt 😋
🩵Hell's Biggest Fan🩵
Vox x Famous! Reader
CW: Stalker Behavior
Preforming is the one thing you're truely passionate about. Starting when you were a little kid with dancing, owning the stage with every step you took, until the day you died. It was ironic actually. It was the first preformance at your new Dance University. On stage, you spun around over and over, plié after plié. Just as you were about to do your big jump, you slipped. Landing on the slick part of your ballet slippers, resulting in you slipping and falling fifteen feet off stage and onto your head.
So, best belive in Hell you didn't stop preforming. You took to the stage as soon as you could, your vocal talent peaking the interest of many. The song lyrics you scribbled down on notepads in greenrooms before shows, now put together into chart topping hits that every sinner in hell had on repeat.
And tonight is the biggest show you've had yet. After blowing up overnight a few months ago, you've been playing at small venues, which have been selling out within secconds, packing every seat. It's been amazing seeing your fanbase grow from five people, to five thousand. But your longest, and most adoring fan, has to be Vox himself.
Vox has been one of your most adoring, (bordering obsessive), and supporitive fans. Funding shows and billboards, always making generous donations, he just couldn't get enough.
You look in the mirror, your hair down in gentle curls, puffing up around your shoulders. You're in a tight blue leotard, covered in twal sequence with red trim. It hugged your body nicely. Your dark red fishnets ran down your thin legs and to your black pumps. You take a deep breath as your assistant attaches your mic to your ear, giving you a three seccond count down before you're meant to be on stage.
As you preform – singing and dancing your heart out – you recognize a familiar TV shaped head in the front row. With all the times he's boughten VIP tickets to meet you. You've recognized that he's... certainly a big fan.
As the shows go on, you can't help but notice him often, occasionally taking note of his (brightly glowing) expression. His eyes bordering on smitten.
Little did you know just HOW obsessed he was with you. He has a habit of stalking checking in on you constantly. Out in public? He's watching through security cameras. Practicing in your studio? He's listening through your phone in your pocket. He has every poster, shirt, and other merchandise with your face on it.
(keeping it hidden from Val and Velvette of course, he'd never live down having a shirt that says "ride me like a cowboy" with a half naked woman with cowears on. He personally thinks it's your best album though.)
Once your show is over, you run backstage, panting. You grab your waterbottle and CHUG it before your manager comes and guilds you to the designated meet and greet section. Where your met with only one face, Vox.
"Where is everyone?"
You chuckle, looking around at the empty room.
"I bought out all the tickets, I'd like as much time to talk to you as I can."
He smiles and relaxes in his chair, looking at you as you sit in the chair across from him.
"So, did you enjoy the show?"
You smile, placing your hands on the black silk tablecloth, gently tapping your nails against the table. He grins widely.
"I did, I do every time. Are you signed to a label?"
He leans in as he questions you. You shake your head no.
"Nope, I hire my small team off of my paycheck, no label."
You smile, he loves that smile.
"Would you like to be?"
You pause, trying to process the question. He continues.
"You see, VoxTech is expanding our entertainment district and I think you would be an AMAZING candidate. I could hire you the most skilled team, have you sell out the biggest venues in hell, and have nobody but the best trainers. My associate, Velvette, could have you fitted in nothing but the highest quality of costumes and makeup."
He leans closer.
"Right now, you shine like a star, but under VoxTech? You can be as bright as the sun."
He whispers. You... debate for a moment, thinking. You really think, your manager is always late to your practices, your vocal couch can't sing, and you know more about dance than your choreographers.
"I'll do it."
You decide on a whim. He grins like a wolf.
"We'll have you sign the paperwork at the tower. Go inform your little... team, get your stuff, and meet me back here, Doll."
You nod, scrambling to get up and get back stage. When you get back stage and essentially tell everyone they're fired, explaining the deal, it's.. awkward. But you manage to grab your things and get out before someone can yell.
You meet him back at the VIP area, a small bag on arm. He walks over and nods.
"Alright. Let's go, Sweetheart."
He places his hand on your lowerback and guilds you out a secluded door on the side and into a car that awaited there.
As the driver pulls onto the busy road, Vox turns to you again.
"We're... I'M very happy to be working with you."
He grins and extends his hand, which you shake. He ends up sliding an arm over your shoulder.
"You thirsty? We have drinks in here."
He uses his free hand to pop open a cooler with wine bottles on ice. You nod and he grabs a class.
"Red or White?"
"White."
He nods and pours you a cold glass of wine, handing you the glass. You sip as he starts to talk again.
"I already have choreographers and voocal couches lined up for you. And I'll manage you, I can make you a star."
He whispers, rubbing your shoulder.
——————
It's now your first show under VoxTech. You feel a lot more confident. For once, you were pushed beyond your comfort zone with your choreo and gotten insightful feedback during vocal practices. And what feels the most impactful, Vox managing you. You'd think with him quite literally being one of the head of the biggest tech company in hell, that he'd be far too busy to manage you. But, that's far from reality. If you ever need him for anything, he's there within secconds.
The other thing you've noticed about him is how touchy he is, which isn't a problem with you one bit. You've always found Vox very attractive, assuming you had zero chance with him given he was a CEO and at the time you were a small artist preforming in bars.
You're about to go on stage, taking a deep breath, nervous. As much as you're confident, you're always nervous right before going on stage. Vox is behind you, rubbing your back.
"You're going to do amazing, you always do."
He says quietly, sensing your nerves.
"I'm just jittery, I'm fine."
You exhale, your hands shaking. He takes it in his and rubs his fingers over the top of it.
"Relax. You've done this countless of times, it's okay."
He says softly, the softest you've ever heard from him. You nod and crack a joke right before you go on.
"Kiss for good luck?"
You chuckle. He doesnt HESITATE. Pressing your lips to his quickly, smudging your lipstick. You don't have time to react before you have to be on stage.
—————
After your preformance, it blows up on the internet about you havint smudged lipstick and a fuzzy head when you came on stage, rumors about you having a secret lover spread like wildfire. And who sent you the article about it? Vox of course. He was SMUG about it.
You're in bed that night, tired but can't sleep. The scene of Vox kissing you replaying over and over again. You're so in your own world, only snapped out of it by your phone buzzing. You lean over and grab it, clicking open your screen.
"I'm outside your apartment, come let me in"
It's Vox. You groan and roll out of bed, walking through your apartment and opening the door. You're met with your manager, Vox.
"Come in."
You mumble and walk over to the couch, plopping down on the cushions.
"What's up?"
You yawn. He clears his throat awkwardly.
"I got into a spat with Val and he locked me out of the tower."
It's a lie, you don't know that but he just missed you HORRIBLY. You chuckle.
"I'll get you a blanket and pillow."
You mumble, standing up and walking over to a closet by the front door and tossing him a blanket and pillow. He catches them and sprawls out on the couch.
"Comfy?"
You ask as you lean over the edge of the couch, he chuckles.
"Don't play smart with me."
You smile and go to pull your hand back, him grabbing it.
"Wait-!"
He pauses.
"Stay. Just... set up a bed in the livingroom..."
You melt, not outwardly but certainly on the inside.
"Of course."
You grab another pillow and blanket from your closet and pushing the coffee table away so you can set up beside the couch.
You lay down and relax, going to close your eyes. But, you feel bold. You feel this is your one chance to be the confident one for once. You move your hand up onto the couch where he lays and put yours on top his.
He turns his head over, his face dimly illuminsting the room, you can see the blush under his eyes, the stupid smile across his face and it makes your heart warm.
You know this is just the start of something bigger.
There were two dates for your concert in Gotham City—the very final two for your album on the current tour. It was somewhat bittersweet, because you were exhausted and couldn’t wait to relax from the constant movement, but you also didn’t want it to end because you were so in love with performing in front of millions of people.
But being back in Gotham for those final two nights was utter bliss. Even though you were staying in an elite hotel, it meant that you favourite Wayne boys could come and visit and see you perform on stage. Not that they weren’t willing to travel to the neighbouring city’s to see you perform, but they had vigilante duties to attend to, and you didn’t want to be the reason that Gotham ended up in chaos.
The first show night in Gotham was perfect. You weren’t as emotional to be performing in front of so many fans. But the second night, the final show night, had you pushing all your remaining energy into every song.
Even with each set being the same as you had performed for the last few months, the atmosphere felt way more charged than usual. And even without you searching for them in the crowd, you knew your boys were watching like you were the greatest gift on Earth. It was like they were lending you their own strength from the audience.
Finally, there was only one last song to perform.
You stood centre stage, chest rising and falling as you caught your breath. You stared out at the ocean of people, grinning to yourself at how beautiful the lights all looked. It was like a sea of stars winking just for you.
“How are we all feeling about this being the final song?” You asked, now moving closer to the edge of the stage. The audience from all angles screamed loudly.
There was a noise inside your earpiece, followed by your manager counting down until the song was due to play. You weren’t ready to perform the final set—you actually wanted this moment to last forever.
Then, you flicked your hair over your shoulder just as a beat started playing. The crowd went wild with anticipation as one of your most popular tracks began. You strutted up to the centre stage, where dancers joined from the wings, all wearing outfits that complimented your own.
With practiced ease, you settled into the song.
It was popular because it was one of those fun, exciting “we love women” songs that anyone could dance around to. The vocals were on the trickier side, but you had rehearsed it enough to be able to hit every note without any misses. The choreography was exciting too; a dance that went viral on TikTok and is still viral now.
You hit the first bridge of the song, and you lowered yourself onto your knees, smiling sweetly towards the audience. You tilted your head back and arched your back, drawing out a high note while your hands traced down the front of your body in a sultry way. Then, moving forwards onto your hands and knees, you fell into rhythm with the dancers and crawled forwards on the stage. You paused at the edge of the stage and reached your hands down, fingers gliding against the outstretched palms of your fans.
You smiled into the song, a slight giggle causing a lilt to your usually steady vocals.
In the VIP section of the audience, Dick, Jason, Tim and Damian all stood and watched with unblinking eyes. It was a silent understanding that a single blink could mean missing something extremely detrimental, and they didn’t want to miss a single second of your final concert.
They watched as you moved in perfect sync with your backup dancers. How you moved in harmony with them, how they enhanced your talent. There was one female dancer who caressed your hips as she sunk to her knees in front of you, posing like she was worshipping you, and Dick felt himself gulp shakily as he imagined himself there instead.
Jason was envious of the dancers who scooped you up into the air and carried you around like a prized possession. In all honesty, that’s exactly what you were in his eyes. All that was missing was a pillow for you to perch on.
Tim had memorised the choreograph the moment the dance video emerged on YouTube. He knew every step without having to even think of it, and so he knew what was coming next. And when you body-rolled against another dancer, your head leaning back and resting on another’s shoulder, Tim felt himself shudder violently. If he closed his eyes, he could picture himself holding you close to him, just like those dancers were, but he would be far more gentle and caring with his touches, and he’d be mindful of the pressure his fingers would leave on your hips, on your waist, on your—
“We are to marry,” Damian declared from the very centre of the vigilante brothers. He held his head high, and his eyes bore a fiery inferno of determination.
Dick didn’t break his eye contact from your performance as he lifted his hand to wave Damian off. “Get in line, Dami. You’re too young.”
The song ended four minutes later.
You maintained your finishing pose for a few more beats, allowing yourself to soak up the screams and applause that was dedicated entirely for you. It was hard to believe that only a year ago, you weren’t recognised so widely in public. And now you were touring the country with sold out stadiums.
Your dancers broke away the moment you released yourself from your pose. Then, you wandered to the very edge of the stage and beamed outwards like a beacon of hope and light. Your smile was simply radiant.
“Thank you, Gotham!” You cheered, lifting your arms to wave excitedly at the screaming fans. “You’ve been amazing tonight! Thank you for the energy you all brought with you! I felt every ounce of it in my soul. I’m so grateful to be standing here for you all!”
While your fans applauded you for your show, you made a point to applaud them back for showing up. “None of this would be possible without my dedicated fans. I owe you all my love! This isn’t goodbye, Gotham! This is only a goodnight!”
And as you took a step back onto the marker, the platform shifted beneath you and began lowering you down. The further you sank down, the more muffled the screaming and cheering became.
The concert was over.
︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶
You were more than relieved to be standing beneath a steaming hot shower.
Your stage outfit had been removed the moment you reached the wings, and you were quick to wipe away the makeup that felt too thick on your skin. It was a relief to strip into absolutely nothing, and it was even better to feel the hot water thunder against your skin.
But stepping out the shower and slipping into oversized joggers and a hoodie? Now that was unbeatable. Especially after you had worn a corset top and too-tight shorts all night as your costume. You felt like you could actually breathe now.
The moment you stepped out of your changing room and into the corridor, you half expected to find your manager waiting for you. Instead, you were hoisted into the air and whisked away down the hall by none other than Dick Grayson.
You laughed loudly into his shoulder, your arms hooked loosely around his neck for support. You peered up at him, smiling brightly. “I was just thinking about you!”
Dick looked smug. “Oh, you were? Can you say that again when we get to the car?”
You rolled your eyes and gently pinched Dick’s cheek. “Don’t be an ass. You know your brothers get jealous easily.”
Dick could only grin despite being lightly scolded. He’d do anything to one up his brothers, especially if it meant rubbing your affection in their faces. “D’you mind heading straight back to the manor? I understand if your manager needed to see you first, but…”
You leaned your head against his shoulder as he walked, a tired yawn leaving your lips. “Nah. I’ve just spent the last three months with my manager. I’m sure she can cope not seeing me for the next 48 hours.” You looked up at Dick through your lashes, and smiled to yourself when you saw him glance down at you. “Besides, I’ve missed my favourite boys.”
“Boys?” Dick repeated, raising an eyebrow. “Plural?”
You snorted with laughter. “Yes, Dickie. Boys. Plural. I missed all of you.”
At this, Dick seemed to sulk a little.
But all of that changed the moment Dick stepped out of the backstage doors and into the private parking area. Outside was one of Bruce’s most expensive cars, looking sleek and newly polished in the Gotham night.
Bruce stood by the drivers door with his hands folded neatly behind his back. He was talking to Tim and Damian when you emerged in Dicks arms, and their conversation dropped as Dick took you over.
“Congratulations on your tour, [Name]. Your performance was very enjoyable,” Bruce said with an approving nod of his head.
You wriggled in Dicks arms, forcing him to put you down. He looked disappointed as you fluttered off to embrace Bruce, your arms barely stretching around his bulky midsection.
“Thanks, B! I’m so happy that you made it. I thought you had a press conference to attend in another city?” You asked after stepping away.
Bruce hummed. “Appointments were cancelled.”
Tim let out a small snort of laughter, his brows shooting up in amusement. “Don’t you mean you cancelled them?”
“I will not dignify that with a response.”
Damian stepped up to you, one hand hidden behind his back. You blinked down at him curiously, and then let out a delighted gasp as he revealed a single rose from behind him. He held it up to your face, allowing you to sniff and admire it, before you plucked it from his fingers and held it lovingly in your hands.
“Oh, Dami. Thank you!” You whispered, leaning down and wrapping your arms around the young boy.
Damian didn’t stiffen at the affection. He closed his eyes and nodded his head, like this was the reaction he had expected. “No need to thank me, Dearest. I am merely acting as a husband should.”
You pulled away and raised a curious brow at the boy. “Husband…?”
Just then, Jason appeared from the same doors that you and Dick had earlier emerged from. His cheeks were flushed and his brows were drawn together in a deep frown. And when he saw Dick standing so leisurely with his hands in his pockets, he exploded with irritation.
“You!” Jason seethed, now stomping towards Dick.
Dick looked at Jason and held his hands up in immediate defence. “Woah! Take it easy! What’s your problem?” Dick asked as Jason grabbed the front of his shirt.
Jason’s eye twitched. “My problem?!”
You watched with wide eyes at the commotion.
“You locked me in a supply cupboard!” Jason yelled, his face dangerously close to Dicks. “You did that so you would be the first one to see [Name]!”
You placed your hands on your hips and shot an accusing stare towards the eldest brother. “Dick. Seriously? Did you do that to Jason?”
Still trapped by Jason’s fist, Dick could only turn his head to helplessly look in your direction. There was a moment of hesitation on his face, and then suddenly he gave a very sheepish, very guilty smile. “In my defence, I thought he’d get out quicker.”
Bruce grunted and dragged his hand down his face. “This is ridiculous. In the car all of you. Alfred is waiting for us.”
When Jason made no immediate effort to let go of Dick, his eyes still cloudy with anger and a need to satiate revenge, Bruce barked a very clear, very Batman-esque command:
“Now, Jason.”
You trailed after Bruce.
Tim was at your side in the blink of an eye, his hand coming up to gently hold your own. “Sit next to me!” He urged with that innocent smile of his. “I’ve got some cool things to show you.”
“Really? Okay—“
Damian barged his body into Tim’s, effectively shoving his brother out of the way. Tim let go of your hand as he stumbled, and it was quickly replaced with Damian’s.
“No. [Name] will be sitting by my side. We are to be married. It’s only right,” Damian declared.
Jason finally caught up, and he towered menacingly in front of the door, preventing anyone from opening it. “If anyone gets to sit next to [Name] then it’s me. I’ve just been stuck in a broom closet for the last twenty minutes—that’s twenty minutes less that I got to see [Name]!”
“If you got stuck in a broom closet, that simply means you are not worthy to sit with her…” Damian sneered.
Dick held his hands on his hips, looking smug. “I’m the oldest, so that means [Name] should sit with me.”
You looked over your shoulder helplessly towards Bruce. The boys could be genuinely sweet at times, but they hadn’t seen you in three months—save for the regular phone calls and facetime chats—so it was only natural that they were all so clingy and pining for your attention. But right now, you wanted nothing more than to get back to the manor, have some of Alfred’s cookies, and go to bed.
With his patience wearing thin, Bruce stepped in one last time.
“None of you are sitting with [Name],” Bruce finally interrupted, his dad voice booming across the car park. All the boys froze and turned to stare at Bruce with wide, disbelieving eyes. “She’ll be sitting next to me in the passenger seat. Now, all of you get in the car or so help me I’ll leave you all behind.”
You didn’t wait for any confirmation of understanding. Instead, you slipped from the clingy hands of Wayne’s children, and you hopped into the passenger seat with ease.
You settled into the seat and clicked on your seat belt, then turned to Bruce with a thankful smile.
“It’s good to be back, B.”
“Yes. It’s good to have you back,” Bruce mumbled.
He turned the ignition, and the car rumbled to life.
True to their bickering fashion, the boys began to argue about who would sit behind you in the car.
This was going to be a very long journey back to Wayne Manor.
