I think it’s been four years since Frat AU? I’m writing this anyways? I miss them.
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Adannar has never been a heavy sleeper, and fatherhood has only increased his sensitivity. Serahlin sleeps like the dead, which is good, she does so much work during the day, she needs the rest. Adannar needs it too, but he’s happy to let her sleep while he goes and tends to any night needs his kids have.
It was apparent early on that Ileth took after his mother in terms of sleeping habits. He was sleeping through the night by his third month and he could be counted on to nap reliably.
Tonlen was a different story. Due to his prematurity and breathing difficulties, the first year of Tonlen’s life was a hectic cycle of stress and worry broken up with bouts of joy at his little son’s progress. That first year was very much sleepless as Adannar hovered around his baby’s crib, just watching him breathe. Serahlin wasn’t much better. They spent more nights in Tonlen’s nursery than in their own bedroom that first year and even now, he’ll wake to find Serahlin has slipped into Tonlen’s room to watch him sleep.
Maker, just thinking about that year sparks anxiety and worry. His baby was so small, so weak, needed so much and there was more than one night where Adannar wasn’t...he didn’t... well, it doesn’t do to think about it now. He has a happy, healthy four-year-old who sometimes needs an inhaler and that’s the important piece. Tonlen laughs, he runs, he plays, he’s perfect.
Due to that first year, Adannar has become exceptionally attune to the sounds in the house. When his eyes open to darkness and he feels like he’s needed, he doesn’t question it - just gets up and goes and checks on his kids. He makes a beeline for Tonlen’s room and before he can reach for the handle, the door opens and Tonlen stands at the door - his stuffed lion clutched in one arm, eyes red from crying.
“Oh baby, what happened?” He doesn’t wait, just bends down and scoops up his son. Tonlen slumps against him and sniffles.
“I had bad dream,” he murmurs before resuming crying. His small body shakes and Adannar’s heart breaks. He steps into the bedroom and takes a seat on the bed, still holding Tonlen, rubbing his back, just letting him cry. One of the few memories he still has of his father is of him coming into Adannar’s room when he was little and holding him when he too had a bad dream. He didn’t say much, just held Adannar and let him be upset. He wants to provide that for his own kids.
“I’m here, I’m always here,” he whispers, leaning his cheek against Tonlen’s head. Tonlen clutches at Adannar’s bare chest, and bit by bit, he calms enough to fall back to sleep, still in Adannar’s arms. After he’s sufficiently convinced that Tonlen is down for the count, he shifts and tucks Tonlen back into bed.
He’s finishing closing Tonlen’s door when his ear twitches. He turns to see Ileth standing in the hall, his mismatched eyes bright in glow of a nearby nightlight.
“They talk and talk, I can’t...” Ileth tries and Adannar again doesn’t wait. He moves to Ileth and gently pulls him into a hug, lifting him off the ground and into his arms. At ten years old, he’s much bigger than Tonlen, but still small in Adannar’s arms. Ileth shivers and a prickle of energy makes all of the hairs on Adannar’s arms (and on his chest and neck) stand up.
He wishes there was something he could do for the mage nightmares - but he isn’t a mage. Selene and Dirthamen and Uthvir basically all said the same things - some mages are just more sensitive, more prone to the dreams.
Adannar could take Ileth back to his room, but...no, not tonight. He walks back into the master bedroom and sets Ileth between himself and Serahlin. His wife is curled up on her right side, the blankets half-kicked off of her, a long body pillow curved around her front to support her pregnant belly. She doesn’t stir as Ileth settles in, pressed against both his parents. Soon his breathing evens out and Adannar lets himself relax.
He doesn’t know how much later it is, but Tonlen eventually slips into the room, sniffling. Adannar sighs and brings him into the bed, snuggling him in between Ileth and himself. As he balances on the edge of the bed, clicking the remote to the ceiling fan to increase its speed, he thinks he needs to invest in a bigger bed. And about how he wouldn’t change a thing about his little family.
Summary: You and Jeongguk have had the same arrangement for years, that whenever he's back home in Busan, he gets to recover from stardom in your arms. It allows you to act out your deepest fantasies without any strings attached, but maybe it doesn't have to remain a fantasy forever.
Pairing: Idol!Jungkook x Reader
Genre: Slice of Life AU, Childhood Friends/FWB to Lovers, Fluff, Smut
Word Count: 5.1k
Warnings: unedited writing (!), blurred lines of friendship, complicated feelings, hidden feelings, friendly banter, pet names (baby, sunshine), fatigue. SMUT: kissing, neck kissing, titty play/fondling, oral sex (male receiving), nudity, cum swallowing, dirty talk, okay I think that's it!
Author’s Note: happy FESTA, my loves!! now, I know what you're all thinking; alyssa, aren't you sick? and what is this random story not on your masterlist? well, this is what I decided to write in my acetaminophen-induced stupor. it's completely unedited, so if you see a typo, no you didn't, but I literally couldn't do anything the last three days but sleep and think about bts' concert and that's why this exists. and you might also be wondering why I didn't just work on cradle robbers since I still need to finish it, but that story requires time and effort and this is just my horny, lovesick (and literally sick) brain. so, enjoy!
You recognize the rhythmic knock on your door as easily as your favorite song, despite not hearing it in a while. It’s always the same; three long raps and then two short beats.
Everything Jeongguk does has some sort of musicality to it. Even the way he kisses feels melodic. He’s the only person who can play you like a fiddle, or the only one you allow to.
“It’s open,” you holler from the kitchen.
It isn’t the norm for you to keep your door unlocked, but you already knew he was coming. Not because you two talked about it beforehand or because he texted you on his way over. This is just what you two do, and have done, for two years shy of a decade now.
Light shines in from the street lamps outside when Jeongguk enters your house, drops his bag, and kicks off his shoes. The sounds are understandably familiar given how many times this exact scenario’s played out. And just like clockwork, a couple seconds after the door clicks shut, you feel two warm, strong arms wrapping around your middle.
“This all for little ole me, huh?” Jeongguk whispers where his lips are grazing your neck.
You hear him inhale your scent and contentedly hum between his soft kisses along your throat, leaving you to fight off the urge to totally melt into him.
“Why would it be? Is today a special occasion or something?”
He chuckles into your skin. It’s low and deep, making it obvious how tired he is, but still as bright as ever.
“Oh, not really. Just Bangtan’s golden anniversary.”
“Ah, I see.” While he continues to paint your neck in affection, you add the finishing touches to the seaweed soup you made. “Well, I’ll have you know you guys don’t own the date June thirteenth.”
“No?”
His cheerful giggles tickle your ear and cause your head to tilt, unintentionally giving his mouth more space to work.
“Nuh uh. It also happens to be my, um, my grandma’s cat’s birthday,” you retort.
It’s such a stupid joke, but hearing Jeongguk’s loud laugh is enough to tell it again and again.
“My apologies,” he drawls with a final peck. “To the cat.”
By the time he turns you around in his arms, you’re giggling, too. It’s par for the course whenever you’re together, just like his hands caressing the bare skin of your waist below your top.
He looks so unbelievably handsome, even with evidence of fatigue written all over his face. His black hair’s gotten longer since you last saw him, but it’s parted on one side to show off his forehead and pretty, doe eyes.
On instinct, you reach up to comb through the front pieces and Jeongguk instantly wilts. His eyes close, shoulders drop, and muscles relax, bringing his body an inch closer to you.
“You didn’t have to come, you know.” As if to directly counter your statement, one of his arms loops around your back. “It’s been a long two days, no?”
“Missed you.”
His response is so quick it’s almost like muscle memory and you have to fend off the butterflies in your stomach as a result.
“I’m not going anywhere. You could’ve stopped by tomorrow or something.” When Jeongguk shakes his head with a slight pout, it triggers your memories of him doing the exact same thing as a kid. He hasn’t changed at all since you two grew up together here in Busan, even though it feels like a lifetime ago. “Ggukie.”
“I…” His eyes open again and a smile slowly breaks out across his face as he surveys you. “I didn’t wanna wait. I needed to be with you tonight.” You can’t resist mirroring his expression. “Is that alright?”
After a long inhale, you nod.
“It’s always alright.”
That’s apparently all he needs to hear because he kisses you without missing a beat. It’s mundane and regular to feel his lips against your own. Of course, it is. He was your first kiss as a teenager and you’ve lost count of how many you’ve shared since then.
Jeongguk’s lips are consistently soft, pleasant, and gentle. He kisses you like it’s the first time even in the middle of your raunchiest affairs. Sometimes he’s so delicate you forget the type of relationship this really is.
To be fair, Jeongguk doesn't treat you like just some friend with benefits or a random situationship. The years of familiarity between you garner a much deeper respect than that. But that also allows your heart to occasionally get the wrong idea.
He isn’t yours, and you’re not sure if he ever will be. Which is okay. All you ever want is to have him in your life and whether that’s platonically or romantically, you don’t care. The only thing you could never withstand is losing him altogether.
Although, it’s a lie to say you won’t miss the feeling of his hands on your spine and your chests pressed together if your relationship suddenly becomes friendly. His long fingers occupy the majority of your back whenever he holds you like this, encompassing you in his presence until it’s all you can think about. Not to mention how his mouth guides your own open so he can slip his tongue inside.
This is how he gets you every time without fail. You can be completely focused on something, but as soon as his lips are on you, it’s game over.
For instance, the meticulously planned meal on the counter behind you.
“Jeo — Jeongguk,” you murmur between kisses. “The food’s getting cold.”
He just laughs at your feeble attempt to stop him.
“You have a microwave for a reason, no?”
His head tilts to the opposite side so he can kiss you with more fervor, but you push on his chest to force him back. He looks cartoonishly offended by your actions and you have to lace your fingers together just to wipe the frown off his face.
“You’re really choosing pussy over food? That’s a little out of character.”
“Nah, not when it’s you,” he argues. “You gotta know by now you’re my favorite meal.”
An embarrassingly bright blush creeps in which you try to hide by glancing to your left, but Jeongguk knows you too well. He uses your chin to turn your head before smiling like a devil because of how pink your cheeks are. Leading you to swat his hand away and pivot in the opposite direction.
“Hey! Where do you think you’re going?”
You barely make it two feet before he catches you with a single arm, tugging you into his chest while you squeal and pretend to fight back. Jeongguk triumphantly cackles in return as he carries you to the couch and flops onto his back, bringing you down with him.
The position leaves all your most sensitive areas wide open and he takes full advantage by tickling you wherever he can reach. It’s no different from when you were kids on the playground, although back then the behavior wasn’t inundated with sexual tension. Because despite him making you screech and flail, a tender heat follows his fingers where they dance across your skin. His lips are also right beside your ear and the puffs of air from his laughter spreads goosebumps all down your arms.
“Ggukie,” you whine, but he ignores the protest.
Well, partially. He stops tickling you, but only so his hands can slide beneath your shirt to feel your bare skin. One arm fully wraps around your stomach to keep you close while the other sneaks upwards until he finds your bra. His fingers push the material up so he can grope you unimpeached, eliciting a quiet moan when he begins massaging your breast.
In the meantime, he starts kissing your neck again. And like a true musician, he marries the tempo of his hand and mouth so every peck coincides with a firm squeeze. It turns your brain to putty and all you can do is let him keep touching you like his own personal piano.
“God, you’re so warm.” His lips are dangerously close to your weak spot, the skin right before your shoulder that always makes you squirm. “This is always what I miss the most.”
“Oh, so you don’t miss my company? Just my body?”
Jeongguk giggles and it’s so damn cute you almost forget your tit’s engulfed in his palm.
“Of course, I do,” he assures you. “I miss everything about you. All the time.”
You hate when he says shit that makes your heart race. It isn’t fair because you can’t respond in kind or else you risk scaring him away.
He’s the one who asked for this arrangement; to be able to stroll through your door whenever he’s in town and have you all to himself until he has to leave again. It’s not like you mind. You’ll give yourself to him any day of the week if he asks, but it means there are boundaries he’s allowed to push and you aren’t.
Still, you find ways to skirt around your limitations.
“I missed you, too. It’s been so long.”
“Mm. When was the last time I was here? March?”
“Yeah.” Before you can finish your sentence, he switches to your neglected breast and repeats his ministrations. “Right before the album dropped.”
“I’m sorry, sunshine. I didn’t mean to neglect you.”
His lips move to your earlobe and it sends a familiar chill down your spine.
“S’okay. I’ll forgive you as long as you actually touch me,” you tease.
When he laughs again, you swear it’s like everything in the world just feels right.
Rather than responding, Jeongguk trails his other hand down your torso until he reaches the waistband of your jeans. He doesn’t dip his fingers beneath the fabric, though, instead choosing to fiddle with the buttons while you grow increasingly more impatient.
“Gguk.”
“Hmm?”
Along with a dry chuckle, you twist your upper body so you can see him.
“You think you’re so cute, don’t you?”
You could drown in his responding smile.
“No.” His hands move to your hips as he sits you both upright. “But I do know you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Even though you’re in a less compromising position, you’re still between his legs with your back half against his chest.
“For starters, you made me seaweed soup to celebrate the special occasion,” he answers. “And you know I just got done with back-to-back concerts. So I’ll be two seconds into fingering you when you hit me with, ‘no, Ggukie, you deserve to come before I do.’”
Unfortunately, his impression of you is spot on, but you can’t let him have a complete win.
“Eh, five seconds.”
Perhaps you deserve the reprise of his tickle attack, but you still try evading it by standing to create more distance between you. The only problem is Jeongguk’s arms are long enough to catch you, allowing him to force you onto his lap so his hands can torture you for however long he pleases.
Which is thankfully not long at all, because once you’re straddling his thighs, his fingers creep underneath your shirt to yank it over your head. Your bra’s his next victim, joining your top on the floor before he leans in to suck your nipple into his mouth.
“Oh,” you gasp as one hand sinks into his hair. “Fuck.”
He hums around your nub while pinching the other between his thumb and forefinger.
You would let him play with your tits all night if only you had the time. He’s an expert at bringing you pleasure with his fingers, teeth, and tongue. Alas, he’s right about you wanting him to come first. It’s only fair after how hard he’s been working lately.
As much as you’d love to let him keep going, you use your grip on his scalp to pull his head away from your chest so you can kiss him. His mouth’s warm and swollen from his efforts, making it all too easy to nibble on his bottom lip until you hear a low groan.
Jeongguk’s hands are already on a different quest now, too, moving up and down your bare back and leaving goosebumps in their wake. Eventually, one of them glides up into your hair where he turns your soft strands into a mess of knots.
It’s not like you mind, by the time you two are done your hair’s usually unrecognizable.
“You should be proud, Ggukie.” You leave his mouth alone to pepper his sharp jaw with kisses. “Thirteen years is a long time.”
He breathes out a laugh.
“Are you proud of me?”
The question halts you. Not because of the words themselves, but their sincerity. You lift your head so you can see his eyes and just like you expected, there’s a glimmer of expectation in them.
“I’m always proud of you.” Your fingers in his hair begin to brush some locks away from his face before trailing down his cheek. “And I always have been. Since the day you left for Seoul.”
A nostalgic smile graces his lips.
“You mean when I kissed you goodbye at the train station?”
It was your first kiss, his as well, and although it was nothing more than a millisecond-long peck, it stopped your heart.
“Oh, I’ve never been prouder of you than in that moment.”
His grin grows before he cranes his neck for another kiss, albeit much more chaste than its predecessors.
“I can’t thank you enough for always being here,” he remarks. “And I’m not just talking about the sex. I know you know that, but I wanna make sure you understand how much you mean to me.”
It’s so hard getting sentimental without your shirt on because then he can see your whole chest and neck flushing with affection.
“I know,” you tell him.
Jeongguk sighs and lets his head fall forward into your sternum where he places a couple gentle kisses.
“You smell nice.”
The unexpected compliment causes you to snicker.
“Yeah?” He nods. “Well, surprisingly, you do, too.”
“Because I showered, you brat!”
He’s forced to glance up again when your laughter makes his resting place shake too much, but he doesn’t seem to mind. There’s a wistful smile on his lips as his eyes flit around your face.
“It’s because you’re expecting to get your dick sucked, isn’t it?” As much as he tries to hide it, the lopsided smirk that forms immediately gives him away. “You greedy bastard.”
“Oh, please, like I’ve ever stepped through your doors and not gotten my dick sucked.”
Alright, you suppose that’s fair.
“Whatever. It still shouldn’t be expected.”
His tongue hits the roof of his mouth.
“So it’s not happening?”
“I never said tha —”
“Then why aren’t you on your knees yet?” You gawk at him before smacking his chest, leaving him melodramatically clutching his left pec. “I was kidding!”
“No, you weren’t,” you challenge.
After another moment, he drops the act and lets his hands roam your hips.
“I mean, don’t you think I deserve it? Thirteen years of working day in and day out. The least my best friend can do is let me fuck her pretty little mouth.”
It’s genuinely diabolical how wet you become from his words alone.
“You have a sick interpretation of what best friends are for.”
Jeongguk doesn’t respond, just tilts his head to one side while waiting for you to give in, because he knows you will. You always do because you want him just as badly as he wants you. That’s why this arrangement works so well and has lasted this long.
Like clockwork, you roll your eyes and drop to your knees in front of him. It produces an overconfident grin as Jeongguk sinks into the couch and spreads his legs apart to make room for you.
“And yet, here we are,” he comments.
You gaze up at him with a fiery glare, but it’s contrary to how your hands are already undoing his belt buckle. He pitches his hips up to help you pull his jeans and boxers down, revealing just how hard he is after everything you two have gotten up to so far.
His dick’s so pretty; long and thick with big veins running down his shaft. You haven’t even touched him yet, but he’s twitching and leaking precum all over his cockhead.
“No wonder you’re so demanding tonight, you look like you’re about to bust.”
He groans when you place your hands on his thighs instead of touching him where he clearly needs you.
“Please, sunshine, I’ve been thinking about you all fucking day.”
“Oh?” Your fingers inch higher, but not nearly close enough. “How so?”
“Y/N.”
“If you tell me, I’ll give you what you want,” you sing-song.
Jeongguk’s head falls back onto the cushions as another sound of protest passes through his lips. He must realize you won’t give in, though, because he eventually looks down to hold your eye contact.
“Since the moment I woke up this morning I’ve been picturing all the different positions I wanna put you in. Could barely focus during soundcheck because of how badly I need you.”
Well, that was a bad idea because now you’re freaking drenched. But you still gotta maintain a little dignity.
“Is this one of them?”
Before replying, he slowly nods.
“Of many.”
You sure like the sound of that. It also seems particularly mean to continue torturing him. Not to mention how terribly you want him after months apart. It isn’t the longest you’ve gone without seeing each other, but any amount of time is tough when he’s the only person who knows how to make you feel good.
So, you move your hands up to give yourself enough leverage before leaning in to kiss his tip. His whole body lurches from your touch, but once your tongue darts out to collect his precum, he relaxes against the couch cushions.
At the same time you moan over his familiar taste, he groans and tosses his head back again. His fingers find your scalp and latch onto your hair, simultaneously pulling it away from your face and giving him an anchor.
You don’t waste time, not like how you normally do by dragging your tongue up and down his shaft. Tonight you immediately take his head into your mouth while letting spit drip out to lubricate him.
Jeongguk’s clearly happy with the decision because you feel a harsh tug on your hair as well as his thighs clenching beneath your hands.
“Fuck, baby, just like that,” he mindlessly encourages you.
Except it actually almost stops you in your tracks. He’s never called you baby before, or any pet name, at least not during a sexual encounter. Maybe while trying to tease you or in a general manner, but never like this.
He doesn’t seem to notice, though, so you chalk it up to him being deep in the throes of pleasure.
After pushing the comment from your mind, you inhale through your nose and sink lower, swallowing another inch of length as Jeongguk loudly moans above you.
“God.” While you focus on not gagging, his free hand combs more of your hair back so he can see your lips stretched around his thick cock. “You have no idea how good this feels, sunshine. No one does it like you.”
You hum in acknowledgment, eliciting another deep moan.
Before his praises can distract you any longer, you take in one last gulp of air and force your head all the way down to his pelvis. Both you and Jeongguk choke, but surprisingly, his own lasts longer than yours. You’re used to having his dick deep inside your throat, so although it’s been a while, you only need a moment to adjust.
On the contrary, Jeongguk’s practically losing his mind. Both of his hands land on your head as he endlessly groans and pants your name.
“Oh, fuck. Jesus… fuck.” It’s hard not to laugh at how seemingly mesmerized he is. “Y/N, baby, please move. Need you so bad.”
Another one? How does he expect you to give him the blowjob of his dreams when he keeps calling you that?
Luckily for him, you’ve been doing this long enough to overcome his abnormal behavior.
You already know exactly how he likes it; slow, sloppy, and wet. Jeongguk’s an attention whore and loves knowing all of your focus is solely on pleasuring him. Hence why you begin leisurely bobbing up and down while using the tip of your tongue to trace the underside of his cock.
He sighs in relief and you can feel all his muscles unwinding, giving you quite the confidence boost. Jeongguk’s always responsive in these situations, but he seems particularly drunk on you tonight.
Besides the actions of your tongue and lips, you alternate between moaning and humming whenever his tip sinks deeper into your mouth. You also repeatedly let more spit roll down his shaft, which creates a sinful cacophony of sound when mixed with Jeongguk’s whines and groans.
“Shit. Oh… my god.”
When you glance up, all you see is a sharp jawline and pretty neck. But it isn’t long before a pair of shiny, doe eyes meet your gaze.
Jeongguk’s pupils blow wide when he realizes you're watching him and you even feel his dick twitch inside your esophagus. Soon enough a proud smirk appears and one of his hands traces your profile until he’s caressing your cheek.
“You look so beautiful, sunshine.” He pulls on your hair to bring your mouth back up around his head and you instantly understand the silent memo. Rather than swallowing his length again, you circle and tease the sensitive ridge of his tip with your tongue. “That’s it. Always s’good for me, aren’t you?”
After humming and batting your eyelashes at him, you feel another sharp jolt from his cock. You take it as your cue to keep going and even start massaging his balls that are covered in your drool. In response, Jeongguk shouts a string of curses and his fingers scratch your scalp as he struggles to stay sane.
You’ve done this enough to know he’s close, but you need a break before you can finish him off. Following one last lap of your mouth, you let your hand take over so you can replenish your oxygen.
“Goddamn,” he huffs as his eyes follow your finger’s movements along his shaft.
“Where do you wanna come?”
His focus shifts to your face again, so you send him a mischievous grin.
“C’mon, sunshine, you already know where.”
“You never know,” you counter. “My tits look pretty good tonight.”
Jeongguk snickers.
“They always look good.” The next thing you know, he’s leaning down and using his grip on your face to guide you closer. “But I wanna fill you up right here.”
There’s no need for clarification because he kisses you to explain himself. It’s messy and amorous, not only because of how swollen your lips are, but because Jeongguk shoves his tongue inside your mouth.
You both moan and more precum leaks from his tip as your wet muscles tangle together. If you aren’t careful, he might come before you even wrap your lips around him again.
When you finally pull back, a string of saliva stretches between your mouths that Jeongguk swipes away. He leaves his thumb there for a moment, pressing down on your bottom lip before slipping his finger between your teeth.
Even though you know what he wants, you playfully bite down on his knuckle instead. Following his shocked yelp, you both burst into laughter.
“You’re such a fucking brat,” he scolds you.
“Well, this brat’s still got her hand around your cock.”
You squeeze his head to make a point, causing Jeongguk to hiss and yank on your hair in retaliation.
“Can we change that?” As if you two weren’t just teasing each other a second ago, he gently cradles your face again. “Will you let me paint your pretty throat white?”
If only you could muster a witty response, but all you can manage is an aimless nod that leaves him smirking as he sits back against the couch once more.
There isn’t any reason to wait, so you let your hand drop back down to his balls before encasing his head between your lips. You immediately bring his entire length inside your mouth again, picking up where you left off without any hesitation.
Similarly, it doesn’t take long for Jeongguk to teeter on the brink of ecstasy. After only a few strokes, you feel his balls tighten and then his hot cum floods your mouth. His release makes him groan so loud you actually worry your neighbors will hear, but you also don’t care when you’re busy swallowing his seed.
Jeongguk always tastes good and you can’t resist moaning while moving up and down his shaft to collect all his cum.
“Holy shit, baby,” he gasps as you continue lick and suck throughout his climax. “Fuck, don’t stop.”
Not like you need to be told twice. You love breaking him off just as much as he does.
Once he’s practically devoid of semen and you’re out of oxygen, you release his cock and sit back on your heels. Jeongguk melts into the couch afterwards, including his eyes rolling back as his whole body relaxes.
“Good?”
He humorlessly laughs.
“The best fucking head of my life.”
In the middle of you pridefully giggling, Jeongguk hooks his arms under your shoulders to hoist you back up. But you have other plans, and before he can manhandle you into his lap, you grab the bottom hem of his shirt to pull it off.
He’s so fucking sexy it makes your head spin, especially after how much he’s been working out on tour. You could spend hours just running your tongue along his abs if he’d only let you.
“Oh, is this what you want?”
Instead of waiting for a response, Jeongguk tugs your jeans and panties to the floor in one smooth motion before guiding you to straddle him again.
As if he wasn’t wet enough from your blowjob, your cunt lands right on his dick and all the essence you’ve been leaking since the moment he stepped inside your house lubricates him even more.
“Oh, my god,” you whine, causing him to smile over his effect on you.
“You get this wet just from sucking me off, sunshine?” Despite how embarrassing it is, you nod. “Good. Want you to be nice and soaked when I fuck you.”
“Ggukie, please.”
“Yeah, is that what you want? For me to fuck you just right? Like I always do?”
“Mmhm.”
Based on past patterns, you expect him to drive his cock into you without another word, but his hands just trace your curves while his eyes map your features.
You’re about to question his hesitation when he delicately cups your jaw, causing your eyebrows to pinch together.
“What if I want more?” He asks sincerely, in complete contrast to a moment ago.
“What?”
Jeongguk inhales and licks his lips.
“What if I don’t want to just see you whenever I’m in Busan? What if I want to see you in my bedroom and my kitchen and lying on my couch?”
“In… in Seoul?”
He smiles.
“Itaewon.”
If your heart wasn’t about to beat out of your body, your eyes would roll back so far they’d get stuck.
“Jeongguk, my whole life’s here. My job, my family —”
“I know, sunshine. I do.” His fingertips brush against your cheek and it takes all your willpower not to rest your head in his palm. “I’m not saying it’ll be easy or can happen right away, but eventually…” He looks uncharacteristically nervous and it makes you hold your breath in anticipation. “Eventually, I want your face to be the first thing I see when I come home at the end of the day.”
The air you were keeping captive disappears in an instant as you digest his words. You desperately want them to mean exactly what they sound like, but you’re terrified of misinterpreting the situation.
Except when you focus on how Jeongguk’s looking at you, with starry eyes full of wonder and hope, you don’t believe you are. Which elicits quite possibly the biggest smile you’ve ever worn before you lean in to kiss him.
Jeongguk catches on quickly, his fingers on your face sliding into your hair so he can keep you close. Your own hands move from his shoulders to his neck while his opposite arm circles your waist. It doesn’t even matter that you’re naked, all your attention’s on the fluid movement of your mouths and how undeniably happy you are.
“I’m crazy about you, Y/N,” he whispers to your lips.
Although you delightfully giggle at first, you soon pull away to smack his chest.
“What took you so damn long, huh?”
He momentarily gawks before parroting your laughter.
“I’m sorry, baby. I just didn’t think I’d be able to handle it all.”
“I wouldn’t have cared,” you protest.
“But I would’ve. I needed to make sure I could be an idol and the boyfriend you deserve before asking you to be anything more than this.”
As much as you want to fight him on it, there’s no going back now, and all you truly care about is having a future with him.
“And you feel like you can do that?”
You trust him to be everything you deserve and more, but you want to ensure he won’t be spreading himself too thin for your sake.
“I do. More importantly, I want to,” he clarifies. “I want you so fucking bad, and I don’t mean sexually. I wanna cook you dinner, take you out for ice cream, and go on walks near the Han river.”
“Oh, I’ve never been there.”
“I know! I’ve been dying to take you for years.”
It’s been a long time since you’ve seen Jeongguk this excited about something, and your possible life together being the reason is more than you could ever wish for.
When he smiles in response to your confession, it feels like the entire world around you falls away. In fact, you barely register him closing in for another kiss. And you certainly don’t realize he’s flipping you over until you feel the cushions on your back.
Nothing else really matters after that, anyway. You two have had sex so many times over the years it’s the last thing on your mind in comparison to the future.
Not to say you don’t thoroughly enjoy yourself when he puts you in all those positions he mentioned earlier, but all you can think about is what sex will be like in a shared bed. One you’ll get to wake up and fall asleep in together, for many years to come.
summary: you were raised to always get what you wanted. then you married baelor targaryen, who says no to you with the patience of a saint and the immovability of a wall. it was funny, once. it isn't funny now. (5k)
pairing: baelor targaryen x fem!reader
content: canon divergent, reader is from house rowan, grief, fear of loss, stubborn baelor and reader (yikes), protective!baelor, angst with a resolved ending, hurt/comfort, arguing, fluff, and unedited work cause i wasn’t bothered with editing.
Your father had never said no to you. Not in any way that actually stuck.
There had been nos, technically, over the years–the soft kind, the ones that came with a but and a maybe and a let me think on it, the one that always, without fail, ended with you getting exactly what you had asked for. The horse you’d spotted at the marked when you were nine and pointed at until your mother told you to stop pointing. The third puppy from the hunting dog’s litter when your mother had already said two was plenty. The yellow dress with the embroidered hem that your father jad bought you the day before your wedding, because you’d said quite reasonably that you couldn’t possibly get married without something new to wear.
Lord Aldric Rowan of Goldengrove had three sons before you came along, and he loved them well enough. But you were his daughter, and that had always been a different thing entirely, and everyone in the household had understood it without it ever needing to be said out loud. You weren't spoiled in a mean way. You'd never been cruel about it. You simply had a very poor relationship with the word no and a father who had never seen much reason to improve it.
You hadn't known any of this was unusual until you married Baelor.
Baelor Targaryen says no to you like it's the simplest thing in the world. Not coldly, he's never cold about it. He just says it the same way he says most things, quietly and without any indication that he expects it to go differently, and then he waits for you to finish responding to it with the patience of a man who has genuinely nowhere else to be.
In the beginning you didn't believe he meant it. You'd assumed, reasonably enough, that his nos were like anyone else's nos, a starting position rather than a final answer. You'd tried waiting him out. You'd tried rephrasing. You'd tried the look, the one that had worked on your father without fail since you were old enough to know you had it, where you look up through your lashes and say nothing and let the silence do the work.
Baelor had looked back at you with those mismatched eyes of his and said, "No, my love," and that had been that.
It took you most of the first year to truly believe he meant it every time. A few months after that to stop trying anyway, mostly because the habit was so deeply set you did it without thinking. You still try sometimes. It's less about winning now and more about the shape of the thing, the back and forth of it, and somewhere along the way you'd stopped minding as much as you thought you would–because Baelor's nos always come with something else. He listens. He takes you seriously. And then he finds another way, always, and he delivers on it, and there is something in that you hadn't been expecting and have never quite gotten over.
This particular morning you’d found him in his solar after breakfast, sitting at his writing table with the focused stillness of a man who had a great deal to do and intended to do all of it. He looked up when you came in, giving you a small smile.
“I want a thing,” you say, because the preamble with Baelor is pointless. He sees through it before you’ve finished building it.
“Of course you do,” he says, and sets his quill down.
You come and sit on the edge of his writing table, which he allows from you and nobody else, and he looks up at you with a patient expression, knowing something is coming.
“There’s a market in the lower city today,”
“Is there?”
“A travelling one. From the Reach.” You fold your hands in your lap. “One of the kitchen girls said they’ve brought silks.”
"Mm," he says, which is not a yes but is not yet a no either, and you take it as encouragement.
"I want to go."
He sets his quill down. "Alone."
"With a guard."
"One guard is not a proper escort."
"Two guards, then."
"No."
"Baelor, it's a silk market—"
"Two guards is still no." He says it the same way he always does, no particular weight on it, just the word sitting there. "You're not going into the lower city today."
"Other women go into the lower city all the time."
"Other women aren't you."
"That isn't a reason."
"It's my reason," he says, with the perfect untroubled calm that you find both deeply reassuring and deeply maddening depending entirely on the day. "When the market comes through the city again I'll take you myself."
You kiss your teeth, rolling your eyes. "You say that every time."
"I took you to a market three months ago."
"That was three months ago." You look at him. He looks back at you. This is the part where your father would start to soften — you could always see it happening, the way his shoulders would drop a little, the way he'd look away first and when he looked back his face would have changed. Baelor doesn't soften. He just sits there. "The silks will be gone by the time you find a free afternoon," you say.
"Then I'll send someone down to buy them for you."
"It isn't the same."
"No," he agrees, pleasantly. "It isn't."
You make a sound that's somewhere between a sigh and a groan and slide off the table. He watches you with what you're fairly certain is amusement, though he keeps it mostly off his face. "Fine," you say.
"Thank you," he says, and picks his quill back up.
You stop at the door. "You'll actually send someone today. Not next week."
"Today," he says. "Tell me what you're looking for."
So you tell him. In considerable detail. The colour, a specific dark green, not just any dark green, the weight of the fabric, roughly how much you'll need. He listens to all of it without looking like he finds it tedious, writes something down, and nods. You go back to your morning.
The silk arrives before supper. It's exactly right. You don't tell him it's exactly right–he'd only be unbearably calm about it, but it is.
The puppet show had been the talk of the keep for nearly a week.
It had started with the kitchen girls, then spread to the stable boys, then somehow made its way up through the household until even some of the younger knights had mentioned it in passing, the way people mentioned things they assumed you already knew about and could simply go and see if you wanted. A travelling group from Lys, apparently, setting up in the square just beyond the main gate every evening after dark. Elaborate puppets, someone said. A full retelling of the Tragedy of Florian and Jonquil, with music.
You had mentioned it to Baelor on the second day, at supper.
"There's a puppet company in the square," you'd said.
"Mm," he'd said, reading something.
"From Lys. They're doing Florian and Jonquil every evening after dark." You'd reached for your wine. "I'd like to go."
He'd looked up then. "Outside the gate."
"Just to the square."
"At night."
"It's just beyond the gate, Baelor, it isn't—"
"No," he'd said, and looked back down at whatever he was reading, and that had been the end of it. You'd sat across the table from him and finished your supper in silence and felt the frustration of it sit in your chest like a stone.
That had been four days ago.
That had been four days ago. The group was leaving at the end of the week.
You'd thought about it every day since.
The thing was, you weren't asking for anything unreasonable. It was a puppet show. It was just beyond the gate. Half the keep had already been, freely, without anyone telling them they couldn't, and you had sat inside the walls every single evening watching the candles burn down and listening to people talk about it the next morning and thought about how unbearably unfair it was to be the only person in all of King's Landing who wasn't allowed to simply go and see a thing.
Baelor was in council meetings all day. He was always in council meetings all day. You'd had breakfast alone, which you did most mornings, and then sat with your embroidery for two hours, which you did most mornings, and then walked the same stretch of garden you always walked, and then sat in your chambers and stared at the ceiling for a while, and then it was supper and Baelor came back tired and preoccupied and you had an hour together before he fell asleep.
That was most days. That was nearly every day. Yes he always did make time for you, but you always thought it was merely never enough time.
You'd put on a plain dark cloak, the one with the deep hood that you used in winter, and told yourself you'd be back before the last bell.
The square was everything everyone had said it was.
The puppets were extraordinary, large and intricate, moved by six puppeteers in dark clothing who seemed to disappear into the shadows behind them so that the figures appeared to move on their own. The music was live, a lutist and a woman with a small drum, and the crowd was thick and warm and pressed in close around the low stage, and you'd stood at the edge of it with your hood up and felt, for the first time in what felt like a very long time, like a person who was simply somewhere, watching something, with nobody expecting anything from her.
Florian was wonderful. Jonquil made you cry a little, which you would deny if anyone asked.
You were back at the keep gate before the last bell, which felt like a technicality worth holding onto. Your cheeks were cold and your slippers were damp from the cobblestones and you were in a better mood than you'd been in all week, and you were very nearly back to your chambers with your plan of a hot bath and immediate sleep fully intact when one of the younger serving girls appeared in the corridor looking deeply uncomfortable.
"My lady," she said, not quite meeting your eyes. "His Grace has asked for you in his study."
You stopped walking.
"Has he," you said.
"Yes, my lady." She was very pointedly not looking at the cloak or the damp slippers or your windswept hair. "He said–he said as soon as you returned."
As soon as you returned.
You stood in the corridor for a moment and thought about the very small possibility that this was about something else entirely and knew, with the deep certainty of someone who had been married long enough to know things, that it was not about something else entirely.
"Thank you," you said, and turned around.
His study was lit when you got there, many candles flickering in the room, and Baelor was standing with his back to the door looking out the window when you came in. He didn't turn around immediately. You came to a stop just inside the doorway and waited, which was not something you were naturally good at, and the silence sat there between you and stretched.
"Close the door," he said.
You closed it.
He turned then. His expression was not the one you were used to, the patient one, the one that waited you out with perfect equanimity. This was something else. His jaw was set. His eyes were very steady and very still in a way that made something small and cold settle in the pit of your stomach, because in all the time you'd been married you had never quite seen this particular version of his face before.
"Where have you been," he said.
"I went for a walk," you said, which was technically true in the way that most things you said were technically true.
Baelor looked at you.
"Outside the keep," you amended.
"To the square," he said.
You said nothing.
"Three separate people have told me they saw a woman in a dark cloak in the crowd tonight who looked very much like my wife," he said. "Would you like to tell me they were mistaken."
You looked at him. He looked back at you with that still face and those serious eyes and you thought very briefly about saying yes, they were mistaken, and decided against it because Baelor always knew and lying would only make it worse.
"No," you said. "They weren't mistaken."
He was quiet for a moment. "You walked out of the keep alone," he said, slowly, like he was making sure you understood each word. "At night. Into a crowd of strangers. Without telling anyone where you were going."
"I had my cloak."
"You had your cloak," he repeated, as if it were the stupidest thing he has ever heard.
"Nobody knew it was me."
"Three people knew it was you."
"Three people thought it might be me," you said, "which is different—"
"It is not different." His voice was still low but there was something in it now that you had not heard before, something tight underneath the surface of it. "Do you understand what could have happened? Do you understand—" He stopped. Pressed his lips together. Looked away for a moment and then back at you. "You are the Princess of Dragonstone. You walked into a crowd of strangers at night, alone, and you didn't tell a single soul where you were going."
"I was back before the last bell," you said, which came out smaller than you intended.
"That is not the point."
"I know," you said, even smaller.
He looked at you for a long moment. You looked back at him and felt your eyes go wet, which you hadn't been expecting, the sting of it catching you off guard, and you blinked hard because you weren't going to cry about this, it was a puppet show, you were not going to stand here and cry about a puppet show.
"It was Florian and Jonquil," you said. Your voice came out very quiet. "Everyone in the keep has seen it except me and I just — I only wanted to see it. That's all. It was just a puppet show."
Baelor was still looking at you. The tight thing in his jaw hadn't entirely gone.
"I know that I'm not supposed to go outside without an escort," you say. "I know that. I've always known that. But Baelor—" You stop, and the words that come out next are not the ones you'd planned on saying, are not really about the puppet show at all. "You're in council from morning until supper every single day. I have breakfast alone and I sit with my embroidery alone and I walk the garden alone and then supper comes and I have an hour with you before you're asleep, and that's–that's every day. That is every day." Your voice is doing the thing again, tightening somewhere in the middle. "I'm not asking you to change everything. I know you have duties. I know the kingdom doesn't stop because your wife is bored. But I've asked you for things, small things, just to have somewhere to go or something to see, and the answer is always no, and I understand why, I do, but sometimes I just–" You stop. Press the back of your hand against your mouth for a second. "I just needed to go somewhere."
The study is very quiet.
Baelor looks at you for a long moment. Something has shifted in his expression, the tight thing in his jaw less rigid than it was a moment ago, and he crosses the room and stops in front of you and looks at your face in that way of his, reading all of it.
He's quiet for a moment, the anger in his face settling into something heavier. Then he reaches out and takes your face in his hands, tilts it up toward him. Your eyes are very wet and you're fairly certain at least one tear has escaped, which is embarrassing for reasons you can't entirely articulate. His thumb moves across your cheek.
"I didn't know," he says. "That it was like that for you."
"I didn't say," you admit.
"No," he says. "You didn't." He's quiet for a moment, his eyes on yours. "I'm not going to pretend I'm not angry about tonight. I am. What you did was dangerous and foolish and you know that."
"I know," you say.
"But I hear you," he says. "The rest of it. I hear it."
You look at him and feel the thing in your chest that had been tight since the corridor loosen, just slightly, not all the way, but enough. "Are you very angry," you say.
"Yes," he says, plainly.
"How angry."
He looks at you for a moment. His thumb is still against your cheek but his eyes are serious, no warmth in them yet, not the usual kind. "You had no reason to do what you did tonight," he says. "I understand that you're lonely. I hear that. But when I say no it is not a suggestion and it is not a starting point and you do not get to decide that it doesn't apply to you because you want something badly enough." His voice is low and even. "That is not how this works."
You look at him and say nothing.
"Go and have your bath," he says. He drops his hands from your face and steps back and the warmth of them goes with him. "We'll speak in the morning."
You nod and go.
In the morning he is up before you, which he always is, but he doesn't talk to you the way he usually does. He answers when you speak to him. He isn't cruel about it. But the easy back and forth of it, the morning stories, the complaints about Daeron, the small warm ordinary thing that is your favourite part of the day–none of that comes, and you sit across from him at breakfast and feel the absence of it like a bruise.
You don't push. For once in your life you don't push.
You take your embroidery to the garden instead and sit with it and say nothing and wait for it to pass.
You're in the garden some days later with some embroidery you're not making much progress on when one of the serving girls finds you, a letter in hand.
You see your father's seal before you take it. The rose of Rowan, pressed with the same signet ring he's worn your entire life. You break it and read it.
It's short. Much shorter than his letters usually are. His handwriting is shakier than you remember, the lines uneven in a way they never usually are, and you read it once and then read it again because the first time doesn't seem possible.
He's ill. He's been ill for some time, he says– in that careful way that means longer than some time but he's chosen not to say so. The maester is doing what he can. He wants to see you, if it can be arranged.
If it can be arranged.
Your father, who had rearranged the entire world on a regular basis to make sure you had whatever you wanted, is asking if it can be arranged.
You sit in the garden for a long time without moving. The sun moves. The letter stays in your hands. The embroidery sits forgotten beside you.
When you finally go inside you go straight to Baelor's solar. He's at the window with a cup of wine, a small frown creasing his brow, and he turns when the door opens. Whatever he sees in your face makes him set the cup down immediately.
"What's happened?"
You hold the letter out. He crosses the room and takes it from your hand and reads it, and you watch his face the whole time. The way his eyes move down the page slowly. The way his jaw tightens. The way a stillness settles over him, the particular controlled kind that means he's keeping something off his face on purpose.
He looks up and meets your eyes and you already know what he's going to say.
"I need to go to Goldengrove," you say.
"I know."
"Then I can go."
"No."
It lands differently than it ever has before. Every other no had been the silk, the market, the puppet show–small things, things you'd pushed back on out of habit more than anything. This is not that. This is your father's shaky handwriting on a short letter asking if it can be arranged, and Baelor is standing there saying no and looking at you like he's braced for what comes next.
"Baelor." Your voice is low and tight.
"No, my love."
"He is ill." You take a step toward him. "He is asking for me. Do you understand that? He has never in his life asked me to come home, not once, and he is asking now, and you are standing there–"
"I understand."
"Then act like it." Your voice cracks on the last word and you push past it. "He could be dying. He could be dying and you're telling me no like it's the same as everything else, like this is the silk market, like this is–"
"It isn't the same."
"Then why is the answer still no?" You're in front of him now, close, your eyes burning. "Give me a reason. A real one. Not the roads, not the timing, not whatever careful thing you're about to say–give me something real or get out of my way."
Something flickers across his face. His jaw is tight and his eyes are steady and he says, quietly, "The roads are not—"
"I don't care." The words come out before you've decided on them and you mean every one. "I don't care about the roads. Send fifty men with me, send a hundred, come yourself if you have to, I don't give a damn how it's arranged–but you do not get to tell me no on this." Your voice is rising and your hands have curled into fists at your sides and you're aware distantly that this is not how a woman of court is meant to speak to her husband and you cannot bring yourself to care about that either. "This isn't a silk market. This isn't a puppet show outside the gate. This is my father."
Baelor looks at you for a long moment. He doesn't flinch at the volume of it, doesn't step back, just stands there and takes it with that infuriating stillness of his, and the muscle in his jaw works once.
"I know," he says. His voice is very quiet. "I know what it is."
"Then tell me why." Your eyes are filling now and you hate it, hate standing here crying when you're trying to be furious, but you can't stop it and you're not going to look away. "Because I have trusted you every time. Every single time you've said no I have found a way to accept it because I trust you and I love you and I know you don't do things without reason. But you have to give me something, Baelor. You have to give me something to hold onto right now or I swear to you I will walk out of this keep tonight and you will not stop me."
A beat of silence.
Baelor's eyes move over your face. He's reading you the way he always reads you, carefully and completely, and whatever he finds there makes something shift in his expression. The tight set of it loosens, just slightly. He exhales through his nose.
"Sit down," he says.
"I don't want to sit down."
"Please." The word comes out differently than his usual pleases, less patient, more like it costs him something. "Sit down and let me tell you."
You look at him. Your chest is heaving and your eyes are wet and you're still furious but there's something in his face now that wasn't there before, something heavy and careful, and it makes you go still.
You sit.
He pulls a chair across and sits facing you, close, his elbows on his knees, and is quiet for a moment like he's deciding where to begin.
"Your father has debts," he says. "Significant ones. He has been carrying them for years, managing them carefully, and then about eighteen months ago he stopped being able to manage them."
You look at him. "What does that mean?"
"It means he borrowed from men who are not patient about repayment." He holds your gaze. "When the payments slowed, they started taking an interest in Goldengrove itself."
Something cold moves through you. "What kind of interest?"
"The kind that comes with threats." His voice is even, giving you the facts without wrapping them in anything softer. "Specific ones. Against the estate, against your brothers." A pause. "I became aware of it some months ago. I have had men watching the roads to Goldengrove since. That is why I cannot send you there alone–not because of the roads themselves, but because of who is on them."
The room is very quiet.
"Months ago," you say slowly.
"Yes."
"You've known for months."
"Yes."
You stare at him. "And you didn't tell me."
"Your father asked me not to." He says it plainly, without apology, but his eyes don't leave yours. "He came to me himself. He asked me to handle it quietly and to keep it from you. He didn't want you to know he was in difficulty." A beat. "He was very clear about that."
You open your mouth and close it again.
"I should have told you regardless," Baelor says. "That is on me. But I want you to understand that he asked me not to, and I thought I was honouring that." His jaw tightens slightly. "I was wrong to keep it from you this long."
You sit there and let it all settle into shape. The cheerful letters. The shaky handwriting on this one. Your father at the door when you left, holding on a beat too long.
"He's been carrying all of this," you say quietly. "This whole time."
"Yes."
"Alone."
"He had me," Baelor says. "For what that's worth."
You look at him and feel something complicated move through your chest that isn't quite anger anymore and isn't quite grief and sits somewhere between the two.
"The debts," you say. "Are they–can they be–"
"They're already being settled." He says it without any weight on it, like it's already done, which it nearly is. "Within the fortnight Goldengrove will be safe. The men watching the roads will be gone." His eyes are steady on yours. "And then I will take you there myself."
You look at your hands in your lap.
The room is very quiet when he finishes.
You look at your hands in your lap. You think about your father's letters, the cheerful ones, the ones about the estate and your brothers and whatever small ordinary thing had happened at Goldengrove that week. You think about the shaky handwriting on the letter in your hands. You think about how long he must have been carrying all of it alone, smiling in ink across the distance, not wanting you to worry.
"He didn't want me to know," you say. Your voice comes out very small.
"No." Baelor's mouth presses together briefly. "He didn't want you to worry."
You look up at him. "Is he dying?"
"I don't know." He holds your gaze and doesn't look away from it. "I think he's more ill than the letter says. I think he wanted to see you and didn't know how to ask for it plainly." A pause. "The debts are already being settled. Within the fortnight Goldengrove will be safe. When it is, I will take you there myself and we will stay as long as you need to stay."
"The fortnight," you say.
"The fortnight." He holds your gaze. "I give you my word."
You look at him for a long time. This man with the grey in his beard and the careful eyes and the particular way he says I give you my word, like it is the most serious thing a person can say.
"I'm angry at you," you say quietly. "For not telling me sooner."
"I know."
"And at him."
"That's fair."
"I'm angrier at you."
"Also fair," he says, without moving.
You look away, at the wall, at your hands. Your eyes are still wet and the anger has gone somewhere quieter now, turned into something heavier that sits low in your chest and doesn't have a clean name.
"I said I would walk out tonight," you say. "I meant it."
"I know you did."
"I still might."
"I know that too." He reaches out and covers your hands with one of his, warm and unhurried. "But you won't."
You look down at his hand over yours. "You're very sure of yourself."
"I'm sure of you," he says simply.
You sit there with his hand over yours in the quiet of the solar and feel the last of the fight go out of you, not cleanly, not all at once, but slowly, like something that had been held at full stretch finally being allowed to rest.
"The fortnight," you say again, more quietly.
"The fortnight," he says. "I promise."
You lean forward and press your face into his shoulder and his arms come around you and he holds you there, and you cry properly, the slow exhausted kind, and he says nothing and lets you.
You believe him. You always believe him eventually, even when you'd rather not, even when it would feel better not to. He has never once said something he didn't mean.
Your father had given you everything you ever asked for and you had loved him for every bit of it. But sitting there with Baelor's arms around you, you think there's something to be said for a man who knew when not to.
Premise : Picture a parallel universe where all your blorbos are the ones expressing their profound yearning for you (yes, YOU) through the sacred arts of fanfics, fanarts and exchanging kudos. Perhaps you're a celebrity, perhaps you're just an ordinary person charming enough to have an entire fandom behind you or, you're the fictional character in this universe instead. Let's dive into this website, shall we?
Note : So uh, I typed this down with almost zero critical thinking and 100% whimsy within one hour. Character selection is random, too. Please excuse any unintentional errors <3
— THE WRITERS AND ARTISTS
Phainon has an erratic writing pattern, no one can guess what this guy will whip up in his next post. One moment he's weaving gourmet in text-form about an emotion-packed forbidden love story between knight and monarch and the next he's posted some unedited word vomit with a witty ‘no beta we die like ___’ tag. That, or it's his stick figure comics against the world. Everyone thinks he's mad funny though, so the readers forgive him.
Scaramouche who started as a HATER. What do you mean people are so obsessed with one person that they've made a digital shrine of fanfics and fanarts for them? He's going to do a thorough research on you... for the sake of ethically sourced hate of course. One thing leads to another, his ‘research’ spirals and all you need to know is that he's a diehard [Name] simp now — not that he'd admit it.
Mydei who, in great contrast to his usual self, writes some very cutesy stuff. “What if you two turned into chimeras for a day” stuff like that. He's mostly known for his chibi drawings though. Very escapism-from-a-burdened-life themed, if you want to psychoanalyze, that is.
Sunday who just can't cross the boundary of writing gentlemanly hand-kisses and heartfelt hugs in terms of physical affection, even though he's probably read hardcore smut by someone else. And even when he's writing about kissing your hand, he's squirming in his seat, wings restless enough for him to start taking flight or something. His characterization tends to be very thoughtful though so the readers don't care.
One of the very first dwellers of the website, Gepard's... unique drawings fed many people back in the days and are still remembered fondly to this date. Nowadays, he isn't as active as he used to be though.
Venti's blog is dedicated to poetry about you, everyone is low-key jealous of his rhyming skills. He's also one of the more active people, sharing others' works regularly without fail.
Dr. Ratio who becomes SICK of the amount of mischaracterization floating around about you in the fanfics and the burn from the majority of the fics not meeting his standards, so, he starts writing fanfics catering to his specific needs himself.
Alhaitham who posted like two or three 10k something word-count fics and then dipped because he lost motivation. The readers are still in mourning, because he left them on a devasting cliff-hanger. Kaveh, Cyno and Sethos have made a ‘Day X until @/vulturevolans posts’ chain in the comments. They just don't know it's Alhaitham who's the writer.
Albedo is that artist whose works you'd think would be hung on museum walls, yet, he's here posting jaw-dropping art with you as the muse. His ‘character study’ series of sketches about you is noted to be... very brainrot-worthy, let's say.
— MISC. INHABITANTS
Aventurine is the famous ‘commissioner’ guy who drops by people's inboxes with hilarious memes seeking fic or art, or just to appreciate the existing works. You can bet he's commissioned something out of every writer and artist on this site.
Childe is another commissioner. He'd most likely commission Phainon though because he knows Phainon can whip up a good flirting-through-sparring oneshot with accuracy ensured about how a sword works and all. They say Varka of Mondstadt has this fic printed and binded like a book.
Don't tell the Trailblazer and March 7th, but Dan Heng is one of the admins who manage the site. He knows every work posted here like the back of his hand. He may or may not know about the true identities of everyone who has an account on this website.
— NOTABLE READERS
Anaxa who gets exposed as a fanfic reader in class after he accidentally comments, ‘‘This looks like something that you'd find in fanfiction.[you].net.’’ while grading a few students' (read: Phainon and Castorice) essays. He got back at them with the threat of ‘If the next fic doesn't meet my standards, I'm failing you.’ though. So, no worries.
Argenti who's known as the ‘long comment guy’. He leaves whole paragraphs of praises with sparkly rosy emojis under every work on the site, without exception. It's kind of an honor to receive his comments.
Ayato, Jing Yuan, Flins, Neuvillette and Zhongli aren't really part of the dramatic crew. They tend to savour the works from a distance. They don't even have to commission the writers here, the sincere compliments and ideas they share are enough to keep the facilitation of brainrot smooth.
summary: It's a truth universally acknowledged (by everyone but himself), that Clark Kent's been in love with his best friend ever since the two of them were knobbly-kneed kids, wading through the sun-bleached grass of his childhood farm. For whatever reason, it's never seemed like the right time to do something about it. Some wound of his, a boyfriend-shape ache of hers; excuses kept them lingering in a purgatory of one day, one day, a prayerful pang that Clark kept telling himself over and over. Until it's not enough anymore—not for you, anyways, who was fed up of waiting for him to do something other than halfheartedly tell his parents that, It's us, Ma and Pa, it's always gonna be us. She knows that. It's also a truth universally acknowledged that if you take a girl for granted, you'll lose her. Clark, wonderful, boyish, tender Clark, just never thought it would happen to the two of you.
word count: 15k (she's a mammoth, of course). Unedited, sorry. I couldn't read over my own filth. Hopefully the inevitable mistakes aren't too glaringly obvious.
content warning: Angst, a lot of it. But, also plenty of soft fluff, because it's Clark, and it's a friends-to-lovers fic. Strong language, smut, yearning, emotional cheating, Clark self-sabotages a lot, miscommunication, a lot of sexual tension, oral (fem receiving), Clark's a munch and eats it like he'll die if he doesn't, fingering, situationship? Reader's nickname is 'Daisy.' Let me know if I forgot anything.
note: First time writing smut, kinda nervous lol. But it felt needed for this fic, because of how long it is, and how attached I got to them, I just kind of needed Clark to eat out the reader, who he loves so so so much. Also she deserved some good head after the shit he puts her through.
sequel: You get lost when you're led by blind faith.
Inspired by 'Parachute' by Hayley Williams.
I thought you were gonna catch me... / I never stopped falling for you...
4th of July, 2023.
It was the 4th of July, a smattering of fireworks smearing the inky-purple sky a few miles down the road at the town’s celebrations in a barren field. Just over the canopies of the surrounding trees, you could make out a lit-out ferris wheel, the very same that you and Clark shared your first kiss at the top of exactly ten years ago. An innocent enough exchange, his hands folded nervously in his lap the entire time, a bit of teeth-knocking, and you were pretty sure that he briefly bit your lip in his boyish enthusiasm to finally be kissing you. Back then, it seemed like the biggest thing in the world, the most important thing that ever happened to you. Ten years later, on the very same holiday, it just made you grimace distastefully as you watched a few of the carriages on the jittering ride crest to the top.
If there was a girl, sixteen, fragile-hearted, all swooning in that trembling seat, hands fluttering against the iron-bar as she waited for her best friend to swoop down and kiss her, you wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her, screaming, Don’t do it, idiot! It’s not worth it! He’ll act like it didn’t happen the next day, and you’ll wish that you just jumped off the damn thing—
You took an indignant swig of the pale beer in your clenched fist and tried to stop thinking about pitching yourself from very tall heights. It probably wasn’t the most festive pastime, and the last thing you wanted to do was dampen the mood. That was probably why you were here, sitting outside on the wraparound porch of the Kent’s farmhouse on that quaint little bench that used to feel so big, but now your legs were curled awkwardly underneath you. Your cramped limbs were covered halfheartedly by the scratchy, crocheted blanket that Martha insisted you’d take with you after you muttered something about, ‘wanting to watch the fireworks,’ (everyone, thankfully, took that as you-language for needing a breather).
“Hey, you.” Everyone, it seemed, but Clark.
It’s not like you didn’t expect it. Friends and family alike were all bustling around in the kitsch bungalow, drinking beers, belly-laughing amicably, throwing companionable arms around shoulders, and genuinely enjoying the holiday. You weren’t in such good spirits. Clark must’ve thought you looked as sour-faced as you felt when he watched, unflinchingly, as you took the blanket from his mother with a soft thanks, Ma, and stalked outside to his porch. Realistically, it was only a matter of time before he ducked outside to find you.
And, surely, here he was. Lingering on the second step, smiling at you all bright and beautiful, impossibly soft in a plaid t-shirt that looked fathoms more comfortable than the expensive top you shimmied in for the occasion, shamefully regretting as soon as you stepped into the Kents’ home to see the rest of their guests in some variation of Betsy Ross’s flag.
“Hi,” you said breathily, snatching your gaze back to the far-off fireworks and that damned ferris wheel.
Clark hummed to himself, quickly realising the kind of mood you were in. You hated that he could always read you so effortlessly. You heard soft footfall against the patio, felt his warm hands on your ankles, lifting your legs up, and saw him, briefly, just out the corner of your eye, as he sunk down onto the bench next to you and let your calves smush against his thighs. Attentively, he fixed the askew blanket so they covered your socked feet, and swept his hand underneath it to toy absently with the daisy-charm anklet he got you when you were kids at the seaside.
“Not feeling the patriotism?” he mused wryly, thumb stroking over your anklebone like it was the most natural thing in the world.
A resentment worked in your throat and made it very hard to swallow. So, thickly, you responded, “Not much to feel patriotic about. This country’s shit.”
“I mean,” Clark laughed amiably, “you’re not wrong.”
You knew he was only half-lying. Clark saw the good in everything. That’s why he kept saving the world, and the people in it. He’d told you plenty of times before that the government’s sins weren’t his business, but the hearts and lives of the average citizen was.
“Sometimes I just want to leave,” you continued, feeling belligerent, almost wanting him to fight with you. “Pack all of my bags, get on a plane, and never come back.”
Clark smiled at you warmly. “Yeah? And where are you going, daisy?”
Daisy, Clark called you. Hence the anklet. Hence the little finger-painting his parents’ still have up on their fridge of the wildflower (one of Clark’s finest, Jonathan would tease).
“I don’t know. Anywhere but here,” you replied irritably, picking a frayed thread off the blanket.
Clark didn’t seem too rattled by your hostility, and kept smoothing little caresses against the skin of your shin. “Okay. Say the word, and we’re gone. Heck, you don’t even need a plane.”
He knew you hated when he took you flying with him. It was stomach-churning, and terrifying, and—well, in truth, it was fucking exhilarating, and beautiful, and honestly one of the most intimate things you would ever experience. But, those weren’t things you could just tell Clark. He made sure of that, time and time again.
Still, he called you Daisy, and none of his girlfriends could ever stomach your existence in his life for too long, and he kissed you on that ferris wheel, and his hands were on your ankle, and he was telling you, even if lightheartedly, that he’d whisk you away in his superhuman arms and fly you off to some land where you could breathe lighter. Clark didn’t realise that the reason why you struggled to breathe was him, but saying that would crush him, and make that horrible, wounded, tender look screw up his pretty features, and no matter how bitter you felt, you couldn’t do that to him.
“That’s nice, Clark,” was all you said, and swigged another mouthful of beer.
For the first time all evening, Clark frowned, and he did it in that awful, boyish way he did whenever his feelings were hurt but he was trying not to show it. That tiny crease between his eyebrows and soft poutiness of his mouth that wouldn’t really be noticed by anyone other than you—but, the whole effortless reading thing was a two-way-street. You knew Clark just as well as he knew you.
“Did I, erm…” His hands hesitated against your ankles, “are you…” Idiot. Beautiful, lovely, idiot. “Daisy, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“Something is wrong,” he insisted, fingers tightening around you, warm, steady; you hated it. “Is it being back home? Do you miss the city? We can go home earlier than planned—I know we said that we’ll stay the week, but if you’re not—”
“God, Clark,” you interjected exasperatedly.
Clark flinched. His hands left you entirely. They fell into his lap like limp, dead birds, and he suddenly looked so forlorn, and unusually small.
It all delivered a pang of remorse to your stomach that might’ve been unbearable if it wasn’t for that stupid ferris wheel taunting you over the heads of all those trees.
“I’m fine,” you said tightly, “everything’s fine. I don’t need to go back to Metropolis. I don’t need you fussing over me, either. I really did just want to get a breather, s’all.”
Clark looked as though he was barely listening, staring listlessly and with the slightest tinge of rejection at where your legs were still draped awkwardly over his lap, but again, you knew him better. He was listening to every last scathing, contemptuous word. He was swallowing them whole and letting them sit at the pit of his stomach, to fester, and ache, and tally all of his deficiencies by vicious names.
“Right,” he said hoarsely, swallowing, “m’sorry, Daisy.”
You blinked at him. This was what you wanted, right? To make him as solemn as you? To get him to shut up, for once? So, why did it feel so deplorable? You blamed the sickening talent he had for manipulating your heart—those pretty, blue eyes of his, and that crestfallen expression; they were evil, really, and unkind. (Two words that didn’t describe Clark at all, you knew that, but you hated being back here—in the small-town that you honestly thought, at this point, you’d be returning to at holidays with a ring on your finger, Clark’s mouth on your cheekbone, but each time, you were met with pitying, confused looks from distant relatives and old schoolfriends, asking innocently if you and Clark were together).
“Don’t be sorry.” You flashed him the biggest, most shit-eating grin you could manage, and gently sunk the heel of your foot into his ribs. “Lighten up. I’m just tired, that’s all. Sorry if I upset you?”
“You didn’t,” Clark lied softly, touching you again, quieter now.
Eyes narrowing, you tilted your head at him as he kept his own down and shy, gouging his features. “So,” you murmured, testing the waters, “that guy asked me on a second date.”
Clark hummed thoughtfully. “I thought you said he was boring.”
“He was,” you admitted hollowly. “But, he was cute, I guess. And, well, I’m not getting any younger,” you half-joked.
“So, you’re going to settle for a guy who finds taxes exciting?” Clark retorted.
He was trying to be lighthearted and funny, but it kind of fell short because of the slight bite to his voice and the squinty frustration behind the eyes that didn’t quite meet yours.
“Hey, the market’s tough right now,” you teased.
“And the stock market, too, I’m guessing? Did he tell you about that, too? Tesla shares and his sharing account—”
“Clark,” you said sternly, slanting him a droll look.
Clark glanced down again, frowning. “Sorry, Daisy. Sue me for thinking you deserve a little better than some Wall Street guy.”
The sinews of your heart throbbed at the intensity of his vulnerable honesty. This was why you loved him. This was why you had to go on that second date with some ‘Wall Street goon.’ He was so tender, and lovable, and you adored him completely. He knew this. But, he wouldn’t let anything happen. That ferris wheel was a distant, aching memory, one that he swept under a rug of bashful charm, telling you the next day, Darn, I was such a bad kisser, right? Sorry, Daisy! Let’s go and get burgers…
Obviously, there was nothing more you’d like to do than kiss him again. Than to unravel your legs from his lap and straddle it instead, bury your fingers in his unruly curls, steal the air from his lungs, tell him, I love you, you idiot, I fucking love you. But, he wouldn’t let you. For whatever reason, he’d put his hands on your thighs so kindly and softly, and tell you that it can’t happen. And he’d be so sweet about it, so sweet with you—because, he adored you right back, and he always would, you knew that, too. But, he wouldn’t really explain why it couldn’t happen, and your ego would be in ribbons and tatters in your shared lap as he cradled your face as if you were his dearest thing, murmur lovely words to you that would do nothing for the wounded pride butchered in your ribs. Then, he’d slip you so tentatively from his lap, and offer you a hand, saying something to you about returning to the party, complimenting the top you spent a silly amount of money on just for him, and spend the rest of the night at your side, acting as if nothing had happened. As if you didn’t love the very bones of him.
You couldn’t stomach it. You had tried before—in the dim light of your apartment back in Metopolis after a night out, slurring on too many rum and cokes, trying to make yourself as endearing and sexy as possible as you practically offered yourself on a shameful platter to him. He was so affectionate and patient with you that night, it made you love him even more, even as he delicately removed your hands from his face, and told you that you were too drunk. He still called you pretty as he lovingly removed your make-up. He still tucked you into the softness of your sheets and pecked the crown of your head. Hell, he even spent the night on your sofa, legs almost folded up to his chest, so he could take care of your miserable hangover in the morning.
You tried ten years ago, on that ferris wheel.
You couldn’t keep trying. You couldn’t keep letting him mutilate your heart as if it mattered nothing to him.
“Maybe I fancy him,” you sighed then, swinging your legs off of his lap, settling your feet stubbornly in the grass beneath the bench. “Maybe I just want to get laid, so it doesn’t really matter if he’s boring or not.”
Clark stared at you, unhappy. “That’s not what you want.”
“Like you care about what I want,” you found yourself seething, so inadvertently furious and reckless.
That was the wrong thing to say. Clark’s face languaged itself into the most wretched thing you had ever seen, and you thought, for a terrible moment, that he might cry.
“Daisy, that’s…” Clark shook his head softly, “that’s not fair.”
“Not fair? Not—fuck you, Clark,” you snarled, getting up and snatching the blanket, leaving him cold and without you.
He seemed to shiver against it—the wind, and your absence. Even with you standing, and Clark still sullen on the bench, he was almost as tall as you. He frowned at you, so distraught at whatever this was unraveling in the middle of you both, so confused and desperate to understand why it felt like he was losing you these days when, to him, nothing had really changed to make you so mean and cold.
“What did I do?” he asked dolefully, blinking up at you with wide, startled eyes that were still fawnlike despite their blueness. “I don’t—is this about Ben?”
It was beyond you how Clark remembered the name of a guy you went on a date with when you had been wracking your mind over it for the last twenty minutes. It only stirred the wrath in your stomach even more.
“Don’t talk about things you don’t understand,” you snapped.
Clark gestured helplessly with his empty hands. “Well, help me understand! That’s what I’m here for, isn’t it? That’s who we are. Why are you being like this? All I said was that you deserve—”
“Maybe I will go back to the city early,” you muttered, turning your back to him, looking back at the colourful, exploding fireworks swelling in beautiful contusions of scintillating red and white and blue.
“Okay,” he mumbled, lost, standing too, “we can go in the morning. Ma and Pa will understand. We’ll tell them Perry needs us for—”
“I’ll go,” you interjected, “you can stay. There’s no need for you to cut your trip short.”
Clark looked like everything he held dear was falling apart at the seams and he couldn’t do anything but pathetically hold one end of the fraying thread. “If that’s what you want, then…” He shook his head solemnly, disconcerted. “Daisy, can you please just talk to me? I’ll drive you to the airport in the morning, and you can be alone for the week back in the city, but please, can we just—”
“Are you ever going to let me be your girlfriend, Clark?”
It was such a ridiculous, petulant sentence to say—so raw, and childlike, and humiliating. But, you didn’t really know how else to phrase it. Because, Clark let you love him. He let you love him unconditionally, in fact. That wasn’t the issue. So, you couldn’t really stand there and plead that he let you into his heart, because you were scored all over it in cicatrices and tenderness, in a way that you knew nobody else would ever really be. You didn’t take that for granted. You appreciated that, maybe, that was all he could offer you. This purgatory state of greyish almost, not quite understanding where you stood on the delicate line between best friends and more. You might be able to stomach it better if he was more final and definite about it. If he told you, earnest and brutal, that no, you would never be Clark Kent’s girlfriend, maybe it might be easier for you to move on, and to digest the love you had for him a little better. Maybe, you could stop these bouts of meanness and cruelty that you never thought you’d ever inflict in him.
“Daisy, I…” Clark looked tormented. You might as well have sucker-punched him, with how agonised he seemed. “You know how I feel about you,” it’s the same script as last time, and the time before that, and it regurgitated like blood in his mouth, blood in your hands; incessant and ugly. “It’s always going to be you and me. Isn’t it?”
Isn’t it?
“I don't know, Clark,” you replied honestly. A flinch later, and Clark was staring miserably at the floor, at the fluffy socks cladding your feet—the pair he offered you after you slipped off your pretty heels at the welcome mat earlier. “I thought it was going to be,” you continued, lifting your shoulders lamely, hands coming to cradle the goosebump-covered flesh of your arms, “but…I don’t understand what we’re doing here anymore.”
Clark was on his feet instantly, swaying a little at the suddenness of it, as if he wasn’t Superman, as if he wasn’t practically ichor and steel bones. “You’re my best friend. I thought that was enough.”
Guilt panged through your ribs. “Clark, it is. You are. It would be enough, if there weren't all of these…appendages, I don’t know? Like, it would be more than anything, it would be everything, if I knew there wasn’t anything else,” you beseeched. “But there is. I know there is. And so do you. So,” you added, bottom lip wobbling, “it should be me asking you if I’m enough, ‘cause I really don’t know what else is stopping us from—”
“We can’t keep doing this,” he whispered ruefully. “Every time, it’s like you’re breaking my heart, Daisy. I’ve told you, we can’t—”
“But, why?” Your voice raised now, lashing out with the crack of a ruthless whip, bringing the entire length of your friendship down on the rosary of his spine. It made Clark fold in on himself, impossibly small for someone of his stature. “Why, Clark? I think…I don’t know, I think it would be—” a tear rolled down your cheek, without permission, or dignity, but you made no move to wipe it away (you knew it killed Clark to see you cry, so you let it slip and carve a jagged line down your face). “I think we’d be okay.”
Clark was ravaged. His chest was throbbing, hands trembling, and an ugliness lay dormant on his tongue.
You let your chin dip hollowly toward your sternum, holding yourself tightly. “Right,” you said faintly, “okay, Clark.”
As you went toward his house—a place ripe with childhood memories, shared, and precious, and intangible now—Clark felt himself unravel, exclaiming your name, your real name, not just Daisy. Not that borrowed fondness that felt so absent of belonging now. It scraped his throat raw at the unfamiliarity of it, leaving an aftertaste of bile and grief.
“Please,” he said desperately, “can we just—c’mon, Daisy, it’s us.”
You didn’t turn to face him. Honestly, you were too afraid of all self-preservation leaving you as soon as you saw that wrecked look on his pretty face. You must harden yourself to him. You’ve spent too long waiting and aching and cutting yourself up into darling little pieces for him.
“Goodnight, Clark.”
You swore to yourself, then—ten years after your first kiss—that you would cut off your own hand before you reached for Clark Kent again.
Now I know better, never let me... / Leave the house without a parachute...
A year earlier.
“—Ma, that was delicious,” you enthused, so bloated that you were sitting at the quaint dining table with the button of your jeans popped open. “Honestly, your best work.”
“Nawh, you’re a flatterer, Daisy,” Martha Kent said, flustered and ruddy-cheeked as she gently dabbed a tissue at her mouth. “It was just pie!”
Clark, so broad and long-limbed at your side that his shoulder was brushing yours and you couldn’t quite tell where your legs began and his ended, was hasty to gently repudiate his mother’s modesty, “Ma, Daisy’s right. It was beautiful. Tell her Pa.”
“Huh?” Jonathan startled, having been focused on the crackling static of the box-television, playing some football game or other. He blinked, looking at his son, his crimson wife, and finally you, before nodding a little too enthusiastically. “Oh. Oh, yeah. Wonderful, darling. I mean, just—”
“Okay, that’s enough from all of you,” she reprimanded gently, moving to gather everyone’s cleaned plates. “Go off, the lot of ya, so I can wash up.”
“Oh,” you chimed in, smiling brightly, “we’ll wash up.” You touched Clark’s shoulder, “Won’t we?”
Clark blinked at you, softening at the hand on his shoulder, at the warmth in your eyes, and didn’t tear his eyes from you once as he quickly acquiesced, “Of course. Yeah. Ma, we’ll wash up.”
It didn’t take much convincing. Martha and Jonathan were soon shuffling into the parlour to nurse glasses of homemade lemonade, icicles tinkering against glasses, bellies hearty and full with the wonderful pie. You could distinctly hear them singing your praises at being so generous as Clark filled up the sink with soapy, hot water.
Not really thinking much about it, you plant your palms flush against the granite countertop of the kitchen island and lift yourself up onto it, not far away from where Clark was submerging the dishes into the sudsy water. It was as if your offer of a joined attempt at washing-up had completely evaded you, but you couldn’t help it. Clark looked so irresistibly domestic with his towering figure looming over the wash-basin, the window overhead peering out to the garden letting oozes of sunlight filter through the water-speckled glass. It was most likely the Kryptonian in him, but there really was something special about Clark doused in sunlight. Sometimes, you wondered if he would bleed it—ribbons of beautiful gold and trickling warmth. He was wearing a simple white tee, the material of it strained against the muscles of his back as he scrubbed away at the ceramic plate in his hands, not even grimacing against the scorching temperature of the water.
“I’m starting to think you had ulterior motives offering to do the dishes,” he mused wryly, eyes flitting teasingly to you as he rinsed off some bubbles from the chinaware and settled it considerately onto the drying-rack.
You feigned an offended gasp. “I would never? I take my duties as chief dishwasher ‘round here really seriously!”
“Yeah?” Clark taunted, a lopsided grin curling up the corner of his mouth. “Is that why you’re sat there, all pretty and not moving a finger?”
I wish you’d move a finger, you thought lamely, maybe three…?
“I’m watching the next generation of dishwashers bloom, all right? Have to make sure that I’m passing the torch onto someone worthy of—“
“I think you’re in the wrong profession,” muttered Clark drolly, “you’re a great journalist, but you’d kill it in theatre, Daisy.”
You swung out a leg to kick him in the kidney. “Bite me, Kent.”
“Sure, let me wash the dishes you said you’d do, then pick a place, and—“
“Oh, you’re letting me choose?”
“I’m a people pleaser, at heart.”
“Who bites people. Cannibal.”
“Cannibal implies we’re the same species,” corrected Clark. “And, technically, we’re not.”
You rolled your eyes at his facetiousness. “Can I just bite you?”
“If you ask to bite my arm again—“
“I think it would feel nice!”
Finally, he placed the last of the plates on the rack and started to drain the sink of the dirty water. Ever the gentleman, he made sure to dry his soapy hands in a nearby dishcloth before he turned around and settled his hands on your thighs. It’s moments like this—with touches like these, and similar airs of domesticity, and warmth—where you find yourself inadvertently cursing your best friend. Those thoughts only worsened when one of his thumbs stroked over where your jeans still hung loosely unbuttoned at the waist.
“I’m glad you came,” he mumbled affectionately. You were pretty sure he was looking at the slither of lace from your underwear peeking through the gap in your unbuttoned jeans, but found yourself without many words or protests as he hooked his fingers through the belt-loops, tugging you the slightest bit closer to the edge of the countertop as your knees touched the sides of him. “Ma and Pa have really missed you.”
You hummed sweetly, glancing unashamedly at his mouth. “Yeah, well, I missed them.”
The callused pad of his thumb stroked over one of your jutting hipbones, just where your tee had ridden up during dinner. “I missed you.”
“We literally see each other every day.”
“Yeah, but,” Clark smiled pensively, “it’s different here, when we’re back home. Don’t you think?”
Your throat went very dry. “You’ll have to explain that logic to me, Kent.”
“I don’t know…it’s just—it’s like we’re really us here. Not that we’re not us in Metropolis, but…” A troubled sigh escaped him, “It makes sense in my head, all right?”
“That’s okay,” you promised him, flattening a hand against his hummingbird chest. “You don’t—I think we’re pretty far past explaining ourselves, don’t you? We’re, you know, us. Here, and there. And I guess I know what you mean—about it being a little different, back here.”
His smile softened impossibly more, the most tender and loving thing you had ever seen, dimpled and precious, and God, you love this boy.
“You understand?”
“Yes, Clark. I understand.”
Later that night, just after you slipped out of the shower, almost imperceptibly quiet from your exhaustion as you dried yourself off, you overheard Clark in the middle of the closest thing to a heated debate he could ever have with his beloved parents. Martha was ranting like you hadn’t heard her since the Bush administration, almost splenetic as she referred to Clark by his full name, reprimanding him for something or other. Jonathan, occasionally, would chime in, weary and loving in a way only a father as softhearted as him could be.
“—Ma, Pa, you don’t understand—“ you briefly caught Clark saying, sounding a little stretched thin and pained, “it’s us. Daisy, she doesn’t mind about none of that stuff. It’s always gonna be us—“
Stomach in knots, you tried not to listen anymore. You didn’t want to make a habit out of eavesdropping on conversations that clearly had no space for you, especially ones so intimate and distressing. But, the little bits you caught onto pressed against your skin and marrow like thousands of tiny, little knives. You tried to ignore the sting as you tiptoed the length of the hall from the bathroom to Clark’s bedroom, where you had spent the night countless of times before, but now it felt so challenging and foreign that slipping under his boyhood covers felt like trespassing. The voices stayed the same volume, oozing through the walls as if they had forgotten you were there altogether. Until, finally, one side of the discussion acquiesced, and the farmhouse went uneasily still.
As soon as the floorboards outside of Clark’s room started to creak underfoot, you rolled onto your side on his twin-size mattress and feigned sleep. It took one glance at you, him lingering briefly in the doorway, for Clark to know that you weren’t asleep.
“Did you hear any of that?” he asked calmly, making his way into the room.
Keeping your head tucked into his pillow, you heard him rummaging through old comforters and blankets to fashion himself a makeshift bed on the floor. It felt reminiscent of childhood sleepovers, rather than a pair of twenty-somethings who had spent the last afternoon in the ankle-deep grass of the farm, sunbathing and laughing and tangling your legs together as if being symbiotic was the only way to breathe. He should be trying to make room for himself next to you on his tiny mattress, an intertwined network of desperate limbs as he cradled your head to the warmth of his chest. His mouth should be peppering a litany of kisses to your face, but instead, he was flopping into his sorry excuse of a temporary bed, body lying parallel to yours.
“Bits,” you replied finally.
Clark just made a contemplative sound, before saying, “Today was nice.”
When you pressed your eyes closed, you felt a tickling of tears welling in the waterline.
“Yeah,” you whispered, “it was.”
“You’re my favourite girl, Daisy. Always will be.”
You knew that. It didn’t make any of this easier to swallow.
It didn’t make you any less hungry.
A single tear soaked through the terracotta of his pillow-case. “Night, Clark.”
Silence swelled in the room like a purpling bruise, then, shuffling, a soft murmur of your name, and you felt a hand on you. His hand, stroking the back of your head. You squeezed your eyes shut even tighter, evicting another tear. His other hand moved, next, thumb collecting the tear and smearing it into your hairline.
“Please don’t cry,” Clark asked of you softly, a wrenching plea.
“M’not,” you denied childishly.
He scoffed, not unkindly, and brought his thumb closer to the corner of your eye. “Look at me. Please?”
“Asleep.”
“Please?”
How could you deny such a tender request? Your eyes fluttered, the lampshade on his nightstand eclipsed by his face, mere inches from yours. Clark smiled at you, all dimples and pearly teeth and years of love. His hands held you still, so gingerly and doting.
“There she is,” he said quietly.
“Clark,” you protested.
“Do you wanna sleep down here? With me?” Knelt and penitent, he looked almost holy like this in front of you. Clark then smiled at you all boyish and lame, saying, “I’d say we could share the bed, but…”
But it was barely big enough for him alone, never mind the two of you.
You should’ve said no. Should’ve protected the splitting in your chest. But, you had never really made a practice of saying, no, to Clark Kent, and you weren’t about to start now—not with his hands on you so dotingly, his eyes crinkled at the edges in sentimental affection, in the middle of his boyhood room.
“Okay.”
Together, you removed the duvet and pillows from his bed, fashioning something charming and a little laughable on the floor out of this fragile peace he was desperately trying to maintain. Only when you were folded like a letter within the envelope of comforters did Clark flick off his lamp and cuddle up behind you, lolling his chin against your shoulder as if it was second nature to him.
“Do you forgive me?” he asked innocently.
“Nothing to forgive you for,” you sighed, eyes open against the darkness of night, “you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Say you forgive me anyway. Indulge me.”
You love him. You really, really love him.
“I forgive you, Clark.”
“Thanks, Daisy.”
I thought you were gonna catch me, / I never stopped falling for you.
20th November, 2023.
The movie was fine. Ben picked it—he always did. A palatable, predictable rom-com with pretty actors and pretty homes, the kind of thing that suspended just the right amount of belief to have you shuffling out of the cinema with a self-pitying ache in the basement of your belly. He dropped you off outside of Clark’s place afterward, pressing a chaste to your lips as he absently reminded you about brunch with his sister and her husband next weekend.
“You’re late,” Clark teased from the living room as you let yourself in. He had that soft lilt to his voice that sounded terrifyingly more like welcome home, than, hi, my totally platonic best friend, how was your date with your boyfriend? He was sprawled on the couch in a threadbare pair of grey sweatpants, long legs kicked up onto the coffee table, a half-finished bag of popcorn next to his crossed ankles.
“Sorry, Dad,” you taunted, shrugging off your coat and toeing off your shoes, “did I miss curfew?”
“I told that young man to have you home by eleven,” Clark played along wryly.
An impossibly large grin carving into your sore cheeks, you padded over to him, curled into the usual spot on the plush sofa, knees crazing his thigh. To the common eye, it was the same as it had always been. Except it wasn’t—not to you, and not to Clark. His arm wasn’t slung easily along the back of the couch anymore, fingers tracing aimless patterns on the skin of your shoulder. His pinkie didn’t reach tangibly for yours on the cushions. And you, inwardly, hated how obvious the absence of touch felt.
“How was the movie?” he asked, eyes on the television, playing some aviation documentary or other.
“It was fine.” You played with a loose thread on the sleeve of your cardigan. “Ben enjoyed it.”
Clark hummed noncommittally and briefly spared you a polite smile, as if to say, oh, I’m glad.
It made your chest throb dully. “You would’ve hated it, though.”
“Good thing I wasn’t there, then,” he said absentmindedly.
It was a lot of this recently—feigned indifference, halfhearted comments, muted smiles that didn’t quite reach eyes; your well-mannered, deferential best friend. He was so respectful, it hurt. Admittedly, you were taking his chivalry rather to heart. For the last few months of dating Ben, you had been silently willing Clark to do something—he wasn’t the primal, territorial kind of guy, you knew that, but…didn’t it matter? Didn’t you matter? Weren’t the two of you more than this—diplomatic dinners where Clark pretended that he gave a damn about capital and assets and the property market for the sake of you? God, all you wanted was for him to tell you to leave him. It would take the slightest bit of jealousy from him, and you’d dump Ben in a heartbeat. Sure, that probably made you a wretched woman, but this was Clark.
You stared at him, desperate for him to fracture, to stop playing Switzerland about the guy you were spending your weekends with. But Clark only reached for the popcorn, offering you the bag with a gentlemanly smile.
“Do you like him?” you asked sharply, the words leaving you before you could stop them.
Clark’s hand went still halfway to his mouth, throat working as he chewed a single kernel. “Does it matter if I do?”
A pulse of agony ribboned through you. “Of course it matters.”
Now, he granted you the privilege of his gaze—blue eyes too bright, too earnest, like they’d strip you bare if you let your resolve crack the slightest bit. “Then, no. I don’t like Ben.” A pregnant pause, Clark wetting his lips, gentling his voice, and he continued, “But you do, right?”
“He’s…” Not you, “nice.”
“Nice,” Clark echoed, grinning, and returned his attention to the screen. His knuckles whitened around the bag of popcorn, so, small victories.
Selfishly, you wondered what kind of extremes you would have to go to in order to get the caveman, possessive reaction you truly wanted from him. Like, did you have to go into gruesome detail about your incredibly boring sex life with this guy?
“He asked me to come home with him for Thanksgiving.”
Jackpot.
Clark’s lungs emptied in a sharp, hitching exhale. His gaze snapped to you, too fast, too raw—he may as well have wrenched open his ribcage and exposed all the knots of himself to you. Thank fuck.
“You always come home with me for the holidays?” he said quietly.
This whole time, you never really considered that coaxing some kind of reaction from him would hurt you too, but that wounded, confused look on his face, like a rejected, kicked puppy, was a sucker-punch. Because, he was right—he often was. Every year, since the two of you moved away for college, you’d gone back with him to Smallvile—the Kent farm, Martha’s pumpkin pie and Jonathan’s well-meaning teasing, the two of you curled under that scratchy blanket by the fire, crackling with logs Clark had spent the better half of the afternoon swinging at with an axe as you swooned. You belonged there, with him, back home. Not in some stranger’s dining room in upstate Metropolis, making small talk with Ben’s fair-weather parents and boring-as-him sister.
“I know.”
A muscle twitched in Clark’s taut jaw as he set the popcorn down, hands dangling pathetically between his knees as he took his legs off of the coffee table. “So, you said no. Right?”
Nothing left your mouth. Nothing even formed on your tongue.
“Daisy.” The endearment left him roughly. “Tell me you’re not going.”
You shivered, wanting nothing more than to tell him no, I’m not. God, you wanted to so badly, with every yearning morsel of your being. You wanted him to demand it of you, to give you permission to shatter this fragile, unspoken arrangement. But, he only stared at you, silent and aching, handing you some kind of invisible knife carved of kryptonite.
“I don’t know,” you confessed.
“It won’t feel like Thanksgiving if you’re not there with me.”
Your self-preservation unravelled, and you moved without thinking. You touched his sternum, almost flinching at the pounding of his heart. “Then, say it, Clark,” you seethed, “tell me not to go. Tell me you want me there, with you.”
For an agonising moment, your best friend just stared at you, as if the entire, tangled history of the two of you was haemorrhaging in this harrowing space. Then, with the kind of excruciating gentleness and self-sacrificing bullshit that only Clark Kent could muster, he shook his head.
“You know I can’t.”
The finality of it butchered the girl in you that you thought was buried years ago. Evidently, some part of it stuck around, nursing some kind of mad hope that maybe he’d be ready for you, one day. You stood, trembling, and staggered wordlessly towards the entrance hallway of his apartment.
“Daisy,” Clark called, panicked, standing too, “Daisy, wait—”
You turned, undoing, strangled, and so very tired of this cycle of punishment. “You expect me to wait around with no real sign that you’re ever going to be ready. Do you realise how cruel that is?”
He said your name again, your real name, and you were starting to resent the sound of it—this pattern you had fallen into, of him only breathing it when he looked like this; torn and apologetic, but never willing to do something about it.
“Lana Lang got married last month,” you told him steadily, trying not to cry. “Pete Ross and his wife just had their second baby. And I’m—I don’t know. Hoping you’ll ask me nicely to break up with my boyfriend? My life’s going on without me because I’m waiting for something that’s probably never going to happen.” You stared at him witheringly, at the devastation in his eyes but evident rigidity in his bones, his lack of movement or protest. The absence of any kind of reassurance. “Am I wrong?”
Clark didn’t say anything. He wouldn’t. Couldn’t.
“Right,” you muttered sourly, snatching your jacket from its designated hook on his crooked coat-rack. “I’ll see you at work, Clark.”
It’s time you sever that hand completely.
You told me you waited for me, you said that you won... / Asked me on a plane from Rio, do I ever think of us?
12th of September, 2024.
Clark’s apartment was hollowed and harrowed all at once, silent except from the faint hum of his bare refrigerator and his own shallow breathing. He sat on the edge of his couch, the Superman suit draped over the arm of it like shredded snakeskin, wearing nothing but a pair of black boxers as he nursed an ice-pack to the ugly swelling over his left eye. His ribs ached with each ragged breath, the bruises already flowering with petals of violet and blue across his chest and sides. He could still taste blood, metallic and sour and familiar, at the corner of his split lip.
It wasn’t the worst of nights—he’d been pulling his punches, recently, letting blows hit closer to comfort than he would’ve a year ago. Still, the empty space next to him, around him, was enough to make the wounds ache that bit more profoundly as he pressed the ice harder to the contusion, just to relish in the sting.
He hadn’t seen you in days. Weeks, really. Not properly, not like before. You were still best friends—exchanging texts and funny videos, calling in the middle of adult responsibilities, and catching up at the coffee machine at the Daily Planet, as your lives weren’t grotesquely and obscenely woven together. Boundaries existed now that didn’t before, cruel ones that weren’t ever really negotiated, but they were necessary—they both knew it. It was nights like these where Clark found himself missing you the most, a hunger settling bitterly between his third and fractured rib. When he was bandaging his own pains, when laughter didn’t reach the parts of him you could, when he caught himself glancing at the door like he was willing you to walk in—you’d tell him you saw the fight on the news, that it terrified you, that you needed to know that he was okay.
Just that morning, Clark woke up from the cruellest of dreams. It was of you, of your mouth, of your skin. He was touching you, everywhere, and kissing you, and his sheets were drenched in sweat when the sunshine split through the curtains to give him a mean dose of reality. He tried jerking off in the shower when the ache got too painful, but last month, Clark ran out of the emergency supply of your shower gel that you kept here, and the lingering smell of you left his bathroom weeks ago. He washed off the shame and the desire, and went to work, and avoided your eyes even more stubbornly than usual.
Then, his phone vibrated aggressively on the coffee table, flaring his ribs with a dangerous glimmer of hope.
Daisy.
His pulse rabbited against his scratched throat. He thumbed in the numbers of your birthday, unlocking his phone, and winced at the vicious pull in his abdomen as he leaned forward.
DAISY: Hey are you up
Clark blinked. Did she not see the news, or the tram torn from the tracks by the grubby hands of some extraterrestrial, or Clark being launched into a skyscraper as if he weighed little more than a paperweight?
CLARK: Of course I’m up
CLARK: Sorry that sounded rude I didn’t mean it to be
CLARK: Yes I’m awake are you okay?
He hated himself. He fantasised briefly about self-flaggelation and almost felt glad for the agony in his body.
DAISY: Lol don’t worry Clark Knt could never be rude
DAISY: Erm so……he proposed!!!
Screw self-flaggelation. Give him a gun.
Clark suddenly thought maybe the super-bots got it wrong, and he really did have a concussion, that maybe his brain was short-circuiting under the weight of exhaustion, internal bleeding, and the enormity of his yearning.
So, he reread it—just to be sure. And he reread it again. Thrice. The words, horrifyingly, didn’t change. He proposed. You were engaged. His thumbs wavered, typing, deleting, typing again. What was there to say?
CLARK: Wow
Kill him.
The three dots appeared, disappeared, appeared again—and it was at least some comfort to know that the two of you still had some things in common, after all of this. Clark denied himself the privilege of breathing as he waited for your next message, his ribs screaming against the strain.
DAISY: I haven’t said yes yet
The ice-pack slid uselessly to the rug, where it stayed, resembling some flayed animal. Clark’s hands quivered now around the phone that looked so pathetically small between his fingers. Whatever this pain was, it was brutish. He wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Not even Lex Luthor, doglike and sniffing at the hem of the Superman cape like something rabid and wronged. Not even Ben.
CLARK: Okay
A breath.
CLARK: What did you say?
He couldn’t help but think he deserved it, though. Hadn’t she warned him this would happen?
DAISY: I told him I needed to think
DAISY: You’re the first person I told
Because, that’s Clark. Your best friend, the first person, a medley of shared memories and experiences and a childhood that belongs to the both of you, and not even this could separate it. A surgeon could take all the silver instruments in the world, and it still wouldn’t sever the two of you—there wasn’t a pair of scissors sharp enough to cut that invisible string, and Clark clung to that. He was the first person you told. It gutted him, it felt like an executioner coming for him, it felt like the gallows—but he was the first person.
Not your parents, not his, not Lois. Clark.
Clark wanted—golly, what did he want? He wanted everything. Clark was nothing but want and bruises and heroism. He would cut open a vein in his arm and bleed out you, if he could. The pulmonary artery of his yearning pulsed viciously against his worst fears and agonies, and he wanted, darn it.
His thumb trembled again against the edge of everything he had ever known.
Don’t marry him. Don’t say yes. I’m the first person. Don’t marry him, I’m begging you.
CLARK: I’m glad
CLARK: Glad you told me I mean
CLARK: And glad he proposed
He’ll die alone and wanting.
DAISY: Glad?
CLARK: It’s what you wanted wasn’t it?
CLARK: To get married
To get married to him. He knew that. Of course, he knew that. How many dreams had slipped through his fingers of you in white, a wedding back at the farm, wildflowers in your hair, and fireflies scintillating the night-sky as pressed his mouth onto yours when it was all said and done, and you were his wife?
Wife. Wife. You were going to be Ben’s wife.
DAISY: You think I should say yes?
CLARK: I think you should have everything you’ve ever wanted
Well, not everything.
DAISY: Will you be there?
CLARK: Are you asking me to be your maid of honour?
DAISY: Clark
CLARK: I’ll always be there Daisy
You seemed to be typing for a long time, then. He could picture you, in the warmth of the fairylights in your bedroom, or the flickering of vanilla candles, typing out belligerence, needling snarls, cursing out his name, until you finally reached on something far more scathing and perfunctory.
DAISY: That’s not what I mean and you know it
DAISY: But okay
DAISY: I’ll talk to him in the morning
Clark hated himself.
CLARK: I’m so happy for you Daisy.
You didn’t reply for the rest of the night.
And you were at my wedding, I was broken, you were drunk... / You could've told me not to do it, I would've run, I would've run.
20th of May, 2025
“—Here, son…C’mon…”
Agony lanced right through him as Clark felt his father lift his legs onto the bed, Lois’s hand gingerly coaxing him to lie flat as Martha grasped frantically at his fingers. It felt like a thousand little, white-hot knives were pricking at his flesh, trying to reach bone. He was distinctly aware of his childhood room around him—the photograph of you crowned by a wreath of daisy-chains in the field angled just right on his nightstand, so close to his mother’s fussing elbow that it worried him, even through the stabbing pain, coursing through his poisoned, black-dyed veins.
“Hi, Ma,” he groaned, bellyaching in a childlike hurt as Martha cradled the nape of his neck lovingly. “Ma,” Clark croaked wretchedly, “they sent me here to rule over everyone…They sent me here to kill people…”
A single tear slipped out the corner of his ear, stinging and corrosive against his infected skin.
“Clark,” his mom protested, “that’s not…that ain’t…”
He shivered feverishly, feeling as though every drop of blood had been drained from him, as though his entire body was hollowed and raw. Black dots started to blur his vision, the morose faces of his beloved parents eventually melting into amorphous masses.
“Daisy,” panted Clark restlessly, craning his neck from side to side blindly, as if he might find her in this sea of black. “Daisy, Ma. I need—”
“Oh, Clark,” Martha wept.
It was a wretched and unthinkable thing for a mother to see her son like this.
Lois, stood in the doorway, fumbled uselessly with something to say or do to make any of this better. It was then when her eyes caught that brass photo-frame, that familiar face of you—her co-worker, but years younger, and fathoms brighter than the last time she saw you, ranting splenetically about wedding expenses and the uselessness of the guy you were seeing. You looked softer, there, lighter. A halo of daisies on your forehead as sunlight enveloped you in some kind of ethereal, golden warmth—or, that could’ve been the boy behind the camera. Lois always did think you looked happier when you were with Clark.
“I’m gonna…” Lois blinked, gesturing lousily, “I need to just—I’m going to make a call.”
And she scarpered out of the room, prying her phone out of her jeans’ pocket. It was you she called. Because, who else?
You picked up on the third dial, voice rasped and exhausted. “Hey, Lois. Is this about Clark handing himself over, because I saw. And, honestly, I can’t even speak about it without spitting—”
“He’s asking for you,” she interjected quickly, talking over your rant. You went quiet, stunned. Lois blundered on, “Clark, he’s—he’s seriously hurt, and…and he asked for you. Well, he asked for Daisy, but I’ve worked with you both long enough to know what that means. He’s asking for you.”
Still, you said nothing. Lois’s teeth worried at the torn flesh of her bottom lip. She could hear, through the crackling, bad signal of the Kent farm, a disgruntled murmuring on the other end of the line. Lois could only presume that this was your fiancé, and that Ben, who she knew little about at all, wasn’t very happy about being rudely awoken by your ringtone.
“Hello?” Lois uttered your name, desperate. “I’m really sorry to wake you up,” she said, unapologetically, “I know it’s late, and I know things aren’t the best between you and Clark right now—”
“Is he home?” you asked.
Lois’s breath hitched. “He’s in Smallville. We’re in Smallville.”
You made a musing hum, as if that’s what you had already meant by ‘home,’ and it startled Lois all over again to think about the tangible, terrible landscape of memory that you and Clark shared.
“I get that you’re going to have to book a flight, and that’s so much hassle,” she stressed, “but, I thought you’d want to know, so you could—”
“No, no,” you rushed out, and Lois could hear rustling, and the sound of a stubborn zip, and more disparagement from Ben, “I’m glad you called, Lois. Really. Thank you. You’re a good friend. I’ll, erm—I’ll be on the first flight out. Yeah?”
“O-Oh!” Lois stammered, surprised. “Oh, you’re—okay! Yeah! Erm, well, I don’t know if I’ll still be here. There’s actually some stuff that I need to—you know what? Never mind that. He’ll be here. Big guy’s not going anywhere right now,” she added, grimacing. “He’s pretty beat. But…he’ll be real glad to see you when he wakes up, Daisy.”
A soft exhale of breath travelled through the line, followed by the gentle closing of your apartment door. “Yeah,” you didn’t sound very convinced at all, but still inexplicably soft, “thanks again, Lois. Seriously. I’m so grateful to have you—that…that Clark has you.”
Lois blinked, alarmed. You didn’t think that she and Clark were together, did you? “Oh. Clark and I, we’re not—”
“See you!”
And the line went dead.
____________________
You were so sure that you’d never recover from this kind of devotion.
The love you had for Clark—it wasn’t the kind of thing you could pray away with a wounded pride, or have Ben kiss away until it was rendered. It immolated you, blotted you out, made you a shell of yourself. Receiving that call from Lois had your heart lodged in your throat, a splattering of viscera smearing the ivory of your ribs with innards and terror.
Now, you were back here. Back home. The air smelt of ozone, livestock silage, and something distinctly Clark—that cedar, sandalwood warmth, tinged with a faint lingering of his blood. You were half-slumped on a humble, wooden chair at his bedside, not quite near enough to reach out to touch him. And Clark, well, he may as well have been dead with how still he was lying, chest barely rising and falling against the weight of Kara’s loyal, tail-wagging dog perched under his chin. Sunlight imbued his tartan curtains; it wouldn’t be long until he woke up, and saw you. Anxiety clawed at the dry length of your throat, and you were very swiftly regretting the decision to decline Martha’s offer of a hot cocoa upon entering the farmhouse an hour or so ago.
There hadn’t been any debate or hesitation after Lois told you that Clark was hurt and asking for you. It didn’t matter that the two of you weren’t the same nowadays, that there was a cavernous ache in between you that not even overfamiliarity could nurture. It definitely didn’t matter that Ben wanted to go wine-tasting this afternoon—you couldn’t think of anything worse than swilling decanted wine around your mouth as your proxy sommelier of a fiancé oohed and aahed pretentiously over the different types of grape. This was Clark. And even the ring glittering on your finger, obscene and way too gaudy for your taste, didn’t beat that. You were starting to think nothing ever really would.
“Daisy…”
It was whisper-soft, a parable on his tongue, and you genuinely were starting to worry that the reason why Clark was always so reluctant to let anything happen with you was because he had fashioned some kind of infallibility out of you, some religion.
The brittle legs of your chair scraped softly against his floorboards, a half-instinctive movement toward him that you would later blame on muscle memory, until you stopped yourself. Fell short. The space was better.
“I’m here,” you said carefully.
Clark stirred, the sheets rustling leaf-like underneath him. Even so weak, he was gorgeous. Shamefully, you’d even argue he was more so. It killed your heart to seem so fragile, but his dishevelled curls, almost onyx, were haloing his pretty, devastated face in a way that reminded you of how closer to God he was than man. His eyes, periwinkle and frantic to find sunlight—or you (if there was much difference)—were swollen and glassy, fluttering as they found you. The worried crinkles softened out, all of him seemed to soften, in fact; melting into the mattress, easing as if his bones were turned to liquid. His lips trembled around the sweetest of smiles.
“You…” he groaned, struggling to move, to talk, to even breathe, “you came.”
A frog in your throat, all you mustered for him was a nod, staring at the wall, trying to ignore the photograph of you preserved on his nightstand. In your periphery, his hand was twitching feebly against the comforter, fingers curling like he was trying to reach for you, half-expecting your hand to be there already, waiting. But you didn’t move. You couldn’t. Your hands stayed protectively in your lap.
Clark’s voice cracked, raw and bending under the weight of twenty years of this: “I thought you wouldn’t.”
That hurt.
“Don’t,” you said firmly, still tender, but not leaving room for him any longer. Your engagement ring pressed painfully into your skin, biting like tiny, diamond teeth. His hand tried to move again, to reach the impossible. “Clark, stop. Save your strength.”
He laughed—or attempted one, at least, thought it left him like a sob being pried from the depths of him. “Strength.” He closed his pretty eyes against the shame of it. “I’ve got none left, Daisy. Not without you. I mean—have you caught the news recently?”
“And that’s my fault, is it?” you asked, almost scoffing. “I didn’t believe a word of it, Clark, if that’s what you’re talking about. Well. It could be true, about your birth parents. But not about you.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about. I lost. I failed.”
You tried to harden your resolve against the brokenness of his voice and the single tear on his cheekbone. You sunk your canines into your tongue against the weaker parts of you that begged to hold his hand or kiss his temple. To be kind when you must be resilient. It wasn’t your softness he needed now, anyway. Not in this state. He needed some brutish, old-fashioned honesty.
“You didn’t fail anybody, Clark,” you said steadily.
Clark’s bottom lip trembled. “I failed you.”
“How—” Your heart ached, “Clark, what do you—”
“I let you go.” It was if someone stole the words from him; snatched, so unforgivingly, so brutally. They fell between the two of you like viscera or entrails—some other gore. “I stood there, and I let you slip away, and I told myself it was right, it was fair, that I was protecting you—but, golly, Daisy—” Clark’s body shook with the enormity of his honesty, “every day, I think I’m dying without you.”
The room held a breath, a twin pair of grape-lungs, purpling against the strain. Just the hum of grasshoppers outside of his window, and the faint pant of the slumbering dog on his sternum. It would’ve been peaceful, under any other circumstances. Now, it taunted you.
“Clark, don’t—”
“Don’t what?” His eyes finally opened again. They were hazy with fever and want, but fixed on you so intensely with a devotion that he would surely never recover from, either. “This is what you wanted, wasn’t it? For me to be honest with you.”
Your eye twitched furiously. “It’s ten years too late, Clark!”
“I know,” he admitted, guilt-wracked. “I know, and m’sorry, Daisy, but I can’t—you don’t understand—”
“I don’t understand?” you sneered in disbelief.
“Please,” Clark whimpered. “Don’t be angry with me.”
He had taken plenty of blows so far this week—he even stomached Kryptonite poisoning. Somehow, the malice in your eyes hurt the worst.
“Fuck you, Clark,” you said then. Clark flinched pitifully. He hated swearing—it was a childlike, Midwestern thing of his. Charming, usually. It only angered you more. “You don’t get to say this now. You’ve got no right. I’m engaged. You told me to marry him. Remember? I gave you so many chances to…to do something, Clark! To say anything!”
“Please. Stop. Daisy, just—”
“I’m getting married,” you said again scathingly. “It’s not fair to tell me this. You’re supposed to be my best friend. To want what’s best for me. And now you want me to marry him, knowing that you—” A sob strangled you, treacherously, and a filthy tear rolled hot down your cheek. You scrubbed it away as if it wronged you with the knots of your knuckles, the gold of your ring scratching the blotchy skin. “You’re selfish.”
Clark crumpled. “I know. I know I am. But, I do want what’s best for you, Daisy—”
“Stop.”
“And you are my best friend. In the whole world. That’s why—”
“Stop it.”
“You deserve better than him. You deserve better than me, too. Golly, I know it. But, you can’t—”
“God, Clark—”
“Don’t marry him.”
There it was.
You stared at him, ravaged. He stared back, undone.
“That’s…” your fists clenched in your lap, “...Clark, you’ve hurt me a lot over the years. Without ever meaning to. But, this—”
“Don’t marry him,” he said again, begging. “Don’t marry him, Daisy.”
Hastily, you got to your feet before the weakness in your knees could betray you, too. His eyes followed you helplessly, aching, and he tried to move, but Krypton’s paws pressed tighter into his chest, his body failing him.
“Daisy,” Clark pleaded hoarsely, “where are you…” His gaze tracked your heated movements towards his door, the frantic grasping of your bag, panicking, “don’t go. Please, don’t go.”
“I hope you get everything you want, Clark. And I hope I never hear a word of it.”
I thought you were gonna catch me... / I never stopped falling for you.
4th of July, 2025.
If handing out wedding invitations for a wedding you never imagined was excruciating, the apologetic letters explaining to relatives and high school friends that the ceremony wouldn’t be happening was a torture method.
Honestly, it was preordained—a self-fulfilling prophecy that you and Clark had got yourselves marked by that day on the ferris wheel when you were sixteen, to tangle you up in this cycle of punishment and humiliation. You would always be hung up on him, he would always be alone, and that’s the price you had to pay for the people you had wronged on the destructive, toxic path you had tread in your inability to let go and his martyr complex. Maybe, you thought bitterly, you deserved this.
He may have been boring, and pretentious, and he probably didn’t even love you as he should’ve, but you genuinely hoped that Ben would find a woman who could enjoy the cantankerous things he also enjoyed.
You were in the middle of penning the sixteenth letter that evening—ink blotching some pathetic excuse about we just didn’t want the same things for an old friend of your mother’s, who would probably laugh dementedly over the whole ordeal—when you heard the faint tapping of knuckles against your living room window. And, of course, it couldn’t be anyone but Clark. His feet didn’t touch the floor, hovering just above the iron-grate of the fire escape, as if he was half-expecting to be turned away. In this fragile assumption, he had tucked his chin shallowly towards his chin, as if it pained him to face the inevitability of your rejection.
He was still wearing his work uniform, you realised, as your eyes raked over the godlike boy outside the glass. The night sky was smeared lilac behind him, and for the first time in a long time, not a single scratch marred him. Your body yearned for him in a way that your mind screamed for you to ignore.
You stayed knelt as you opened the latch, staying at some altar of longing and shame as he lingered just outside of the familiarity of your home that he hadn’t felt in so long—the flickering of candles, the needle-scratch of your record player over a Marvin Gaye vinyl, the leather sofa he helped you shoulder up the stairs the day you moved in. Clark waited, breathing it all in, but kept his eyes on you the whole time—you, on your knees; you, blinking up at him fawnlike and expectant; you, his. Still. Even now.
His feet settled on the windowsill as soft as snowdrift. “Hi, Daisy.”
“What do you want?” you asked gravelly.
“That’s…” Clark exhaled breathily, a boyish laugh warming through his chest, “that’s a loaded question.”
You narrowed your eyes at him, then glanced sparingly at the apology letters on your coffee table, and back to your best friend. “Well,” you said dryly, “I’ve got the time.”
Grimacing, Clark looked at you in love and agony, and crouched to ease himself inside your life again. You thought he might remain standing, that he might appreciate the imbalance you inadvertently granted him through the feebleness of your knees, but you should’ve known better. Should’ve known Clark better, that if you were knelt in front of him like this—so unravelled and distraught and more his than you had been in years—then, he was going to match you. He sank to one knee first, and the sight made the sinews of your heart tug, and then the second. He still towered you, but it was never intimidating. His hands even stayed patiently in his lap, because this was Clark, and he loved you, and he respected you, and you’d always known.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “I’m so sorry, Daisy. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, and, gosh, I’m an idiot for letting it. I’m a coward. I was too weak to tell you, too weak to let you go, and I don’t feel very super or manly at all.”
You blinked at him, processing the words you had been waiting for since you were a girl. You thought, after all this time, they might underwhelm you. It didn’t. It pressed against you like everything. Your spine ached like a rosary and, maybe, you made a religion out of each other, after all.
“And?” you pressed, wetting your lips.
Clark’s hands twitched, waiting on his knees. He looked pretty, like this, you decided unabashedly.
“And,” he said, almost smiling, “and, I love you, Daisy. You’re my favourite girl. Always my—” he went quiet then, staring at you, all blown pupils and this dazed, adoring expression that made your lungs throb, “can I kiss you? Please,” he added sweetly.
“Can you…?” You felt yourself short-circuit. Did he really just ask that?
Clark smiled nervously. “Can I kiss you, Daisy? We can talk after. I just, well, I’m so glad to see that ring gone. And you’re so pretty. And I love you. I love you, I love you, I—”
You threw yourself at him.
A part of you thought, blasphemously, that you always would.
You threw yourself at Clark, and he caught you, and you genuinely reckoned that you would never stop falling for this boy—but, at least he would always catch you.
Your sternums touched, your hands grasped at the curls on the nape of his neck, and Clark kissed you as if he wanted it to bruise. It didn’t particularly hit you until now how much it must’ve killed him to see that ugly monstrosity of a ring on your finger—especially when he’d known exactly the kind of ring you wanted ever since you were fifteen and browsing the pawn shops in downtown Smallville. Not until now, at least, with Clark’s mouth hot and heavy against yours like he was trying so desperately to kiss any memory of any other man out of you.
You were sure his teeth grazed your bottom lip in the middle of it all, and it was a surprisingly nice sting that you hadn’t expected from him. Granted, the last time you kissed, it was both of your firsts—too much saliva, and teeth, and tongue—but now, there was just the right amount of everything, and you wanted to sew yourself to him like this. You wanted to kiss him forever, even against the merciless ache in your lungs. His hands, finally, had the bravery to move, and you prayed he’d never be a coward again, and always touch you like this—like you belonged to each other, like your limbs were one. His palms grasped at the meat of your hips, slipping under the flimsy cotton of your oversized sleep-shirt to touch bare skin, and he moaned shamelessly into your mouth—as if this was what he needed, this was what he was looking for: your skin.
“Clark,” you breathed, trembling. His mouth took the opportunity of yours being busy murmuring his name to trace an unmapped path along your jawbone, hands smoothing against the small of your back now. “Clark…”
“Yeah, sweetheart?” His teeth grazed a sensitive spot just under your ear that you didn’t even know existed. You shivered against him, gently pulling at the curls on his neck. You felt his lips smile against your bared throat, and you didn’t expect this from Clark—not one bit. “What is it, Daisy? Hmm…?” he pressed an open-mouthed, heated kiss to the crook of your shoulder, suckling an imperceptible lovebite to the strained tendons there, “Talk to me.”
“I…I can’t focus when you’re…Clark…” One of his hands was at the fish-eye hooks of your bra, teasing, “Shit, you’re—”
“Language,” Clark reprimanded sweetly, letting go of the bra-strap as if he was punishing you for swearing. You pressed your knees closer together as something throbbed between your folded legs.
You sighed shakily as his mouth returned to the corner of yours, pecking you so intimately that you almost cursed again. “Clark, I thought you said we would talk.”
“You can talk,” he retorted, kissing your lips again, short and sweet, “I’m listening, Daisy. I always listen to you. Don’t I?” He asked it so innocently, it was disarming—and so crude against the contrast of his fingers toying with the waistband of your gauzy sleep-shorts. Clark laughed then, not unkindly, looking at you all dimpled and wonderful through mirror-bright eyes. When his thumb stroked over your hipbone, something whimper-like rolled off your tongue, and his grin punctured an even deeper dimple into his ruddy cheek. “You know, sweetheart, I think it’s you who isn’t listening to me.”
“Now you’re just being mean,” you protested weakly, pulling his hair in halfhearted protest.
“I could never be mean to you,” denied Clark, both palms flush against your back again.
And, before you could process it, he was lowering you onto the rug beneath you as his knees gently nudged yours apart to make room for yourself between your thighs. And, of course, you accommodated—lost in yourself, and your thoughts, hands tumbling from his neck to his strong arms, to his elbows, to his wrists that your fingers couldn’t even wrap half of themselves around. Clark leaned down over you, eyes so adoring as he admired you like this—committing the sight to memory, you on your back, knees kissing at his waist, throat bared to him, chest heaving salaciously. Then, juxtaposing the downright wanton thoughts intermingling in both of your minds, he chiselled away the narrow space between you to kiss you so tenderly that you almost felt bad for the wetness between your legs.
“I love you, Daisy.”
Your heart ached with it, hands clumsily fumbling until they were on his biceps again. You felt the muscles flex under your touch. His pupils were blown so wide, it made you feel feverish. It was as if twin black moons were staring back at you, fraying at the edges with the blue sutures of his irises.
“I love you too, Clark,” you murmured, nudging your nose lovingly against his. “Always loved you,” you said, saccharine. “Always gonna, if you let me.”
His fingers splayed out on your bare thighs, shorts hiked up impossibly. The sensation of his skin on yours was incomparable.
“Let you? Let you, baby?” Clark, baffled, had to kiss you again. So, he did. Over, and over, and—shit, was his hand on the waistband of your shorts again? “I’m never letting you go again. Never,” he swore against your mouth.
“Promise me?” you begged, feeling pathetic, and girlish, but you couldn’t help it. You couldn’t have this and never have him again. It would be a cruelty that you couldn’t stomach.
Clark was wrecked. He kept one hand just on the hem of your useless shorts and brought the other to your flustered face, cradling your jaw, smoothing his thumb over your cheekbone, before placing it reverently to your bottom lip. It took every little bit of your self-control not to let it slip into your mouth.
“I promise you, Daisy. I promise. Love you, baby,” he said, voice husky, rasped, meaningful to the marrow as his thumb ghosted over your lip. “I love you so much.”
The invisible string in your chest tightened ruthlessly, in the prettiest of ways. You nuzzled into his palm, mourning the weight of his thumb, but compensating it with a featherlight kiss to the inside of his hand.
“I love you.”
Clark only responded with a sound that could be described as half-sob, half-prayer. Whatever it was, you loved it, and you grabbed his face with both of your greedy hands, bringing him down into another kiss—just as hard, and desperate, and filthy as before. The hand he kept on your shorts finally tugged, tentative but determined, and the cotton slipped just enough for the cool air trickling through the still ajar window to lick at your bare skin.
You shuddered, pressing your forehead devoutly to his, clinging to his shoulders. It suddenly dawned on you how much clothes he was wearing, and how little you were. The blazer of his Daily Planet attire felt wrinkled and distressed under your frantic hands, whilst you were in a cheap pair of pyjamas.
“Clark…”
“Sweetheart,” he soothed lovingly, an ache to his voice that crept through the softness, “I’ll stop if you tell me to. I swear. But, golly—Daisy, please don’t tell me to.” Clark’s curls brushed your cheek, unruly and dark and smelling strongly of green apples, as he buried his face into the crook of your neck. He breathed you in—you felt nothing short of sacred. “You don’t know how many times I’ve dreamed about this. Of you. And now I’ve got you, and you’re mine—you are mine, right—?”
You felt dizzy. “I’m yours, Clark.”
“—and I need to show you, baby,” he carried on, as if he never doubted it, as if this was always supposed to happen.
And how could you deny a boy so earnest and yours?
“Show me then, Clark.”
Clark stiffened, as if he hadn’t expected it, in spite of all his kisses and touches, and his maddest of hopes, and filthiest of dreams. He pulled back to look at you, blown eyes and kiss-swollen lips.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. You beautiful, idiot boy.” You smiled at him, and hoped it was more dazzling than desperate, but you’d take anything. “Please, Clark. I want you to.”
He groaned brokenly, and then he was moving—kissing you as he went; your jaw, the flushed bit of your skin exposed by the askew nature of your tee, lifting the hem of it to kiss at your stomach, and you had never felt holier. His hands parted your thighs reverently, and when he glanced up at you from between them—eyes dark, cheeks rosy, mouth spit-slick and parted in some kind of stunned adoration—you thought that he might actually slaughter you.
“Daisy,” Clark whispered, mouthing just above the waistband of your shots, his big hands bear-like and needy at your thighs. “You’re so pretty. The prettiest girl. My favourite girl, hm?”
You didn’t know if he was expecting a response to that, but you couldn’t manage one. He didn’t wait for one, either, not as he hooked his fingers into your shorts and slipped them off you as if they, or you, or both, were precious. You shivered at the contrast of sensations—the breezy draught from the window, the hot breath from Clark’s wanting mouth—against the gossamer lace of your panties. Suddenly self-conscious, you tried to close your legs, almost wrecking Clark.
“Hey…hey,” he said softly, hoarsely, his fingertips pressing into your thighs as he kept them open. “What’s that for, hm? C’mon, Daisy,” he murmured, leaning down to kiss at the ratty bow at the top of your underwear, almost making you spasm at the tenderness, “don’t hide from me.”
His hot mouth lingered over the lace covering your heat for a heartbeat, and then moved lower, pressing a worshipful kiss to your inner thigh as if it were scripture. He kept your legs steady and open, memorising everything your skin had to offer—the faint lines of your stretch-marks, the dimpling of cellulite, the living warmth. You loved him. He was mouthing at your thigh, wet and wanting, and you needed him more than anything.
You’d give up air, you thought ferally.
“Clark,” you pleaded, fingers tangling in his curls again.
“Mine,” Clark muttered, sucking a mark against your thigh, “all mine. Us, Daisy. Yeah? You’re mine.” It kind of left him like slurring nonsense. You would’ve thought he was drunk if you didn’t know that it was an impossibility for him.
The desire in your stomach was grotesque, and you couldn’t control the abrupt, needy bucking of your hips, desperate for more. Clark didn’t seem to mind this, though. If anything, it spurred him on more. He briefly pecked the mark already blooming on your thigh and then let his eyes drag up to yours, pious and worked-up.
“Can I taste you?”
And fuck. Who were you to deny that?
“Yes,” you begged, “please, Clark.”
He’d do anything for you, always had, always would—so he granted your plea. First, with the most ridiculously tender kiss to the lace just above your pulsing clit. You practically mewled, almost kicking your legs out, wrenching at the roots of his hair. All he did was kiss it, and it was almost imperceptible in its faintness, but God, he felt everywhere. Next, he licked his tongue flat and salacious against the damp patch on your underwear, and you were sobbing his name.
The material dampened further, from you, from him—the most sinful of benedictions, and you were falling in love with him all over again.
“Clark, please,” you gasped wretchedly. “Don’t stop, please, don’t—”
His tongue traced the heat of you through soaked lace, pressing, licking, tasting, coaxing each arch of your spine and shaky slip of his name with a masterfulness that was making your head spin. The idea of him doing this to any other girl before you made your stomach knot, even through all the desire and ache. It made you feel greedy and ridiculous, but then he was hooking his fingers into the waistband of the panties, and you forgot about everything else but Clark.
“M’pretty girl,” he told you as he gently, ceremoniously, started to peel off your ruined underwear. He treated every next bit of exposed skin as a new blessing. Your hips thrashed again, but Clark caught you firmly, kissing right below your navel before sitting back onto his haunches. “M’Daisy.”
All lovelorn and careful ministrations, he tugged the fabric down over your knees and let it dangle from one of your ankles. Incidentally, the very same limb your anklet was glittering on. Clark must’ve noticed this, too, because he was slowly lifting your leg and draping it over your shoulder, craning his neck to the side to kiss adoringly at the jewellery. He seemed to peck every last one of the daisy charms as if they were scintillating, silver extensions of you.
“I love you,” he said again.
God, you’d never get sick of hearing that.
“Love you, too,” you punched out breathlessly, arms useless at your sides, “even if you’re totally blue-balling me right now.”
A laugh startled through him, fingers toying with that precious anklet. It haunted you that he was still in a two-piece suit and you were in nothing but a t-shirt.
“Blue-balling you?” Clark echoed, almost smug. “Well, I can’t do that to my girl, can I? What kind of cruel, horrible man would that make me…?”
“A really…” you swayed, trying to hit up, resting your weight back on your elbows, and watching through heavy-lidded, lascivious eyes as Clark hooked your other leg over his spare shoulder, and narrowed in ever closer to where you needed him, “...really evil one…”
“Evil, huh?” His breath tickled your heat, making your legs shift jerkily over his shoulders. “I saved this city not too long ago, ma’am, didn’t you hear?” Two of his fingers were now tracing the wetness just around your clit, and you bit hard on your lip to keep in a string of obscenities, afraid of him edging you for bad language, or something equally Clark. “I’m somewhat of a hotshot ‘round here, actually.”
You were panting now, losing your mind. “God, even like this, you never shut up.” It was still said fondly.
“Never,” he admitted breathlessly, kissing your hip. “Not with you, Daisy.”
He removed his fingers then, and maintained the most intimate moment of eye-contact you think you would ever experience as he slipped them in his mouth. Your jaw swung open almost comically, blinking so fast it was as if you were trying to convince that this was actually happening, that Clark Kent was actually tasting you on his fingers. You even tried squeezing your eyes shut for as long as five seconds, and then cursed yourself for wasting even a breath of this—because, sure as day, he was still there, humming around the digits, throaty and appreciative, as if yellow sunlight was on his tongue.
Unbelievably turned on, you bucked up into him again, whimpering his name. You thought you might genuinely start bursting into hysterics if he didn’t do something, fast.
“You taste so good, sweetheart,” Clark praised sweetly, mouth dewy. “Look so pretty. I’m the luckiest guy in the world.”
And then, his mouth was on you. Properly. And you let out the most pornographic, indecent moan that anyone—even yourself—had ever wrangled from you. Your elbows slumped, slipping against the rug, and you splayed back out on the floor, head thrown back.
Clark’s hands stayed on your thighs as his mouth devoured you like he was a starving man. It was feral, and primal, and obscenely dirty. Each stroke of his tongue, each teasing flick of your clit, made you sob, arching into him wantonly. His eyes looked torn on what to settle on—his handiwork between your thighs, the aching, fluttering of your entrance, or your eyes. You were pretty sure he was moaning into your heat, but you could barely hear anything over your own.
“Oh, God, Clark—please, please…” You didn’t even know what you were begging for, fingers in his hair again. How did you ever think you would marry anyone but him? “Don’t stop, don’t stop, please—baby…”
Clark groaned in agony at that, sucking harder at your clit. The vibration of it made you swear, and you swore his teeth grazed at your pearl the slightest bit in reproach. No other punishment, though. He was too lost in you.
“So pretty,” he murmured against you, still kissing, sucking, lapping, “taste so good. My favourite girl…”
“Clark, Clark, Clark.” It was a chant, now. You grinded closer to his face, feeling the slight crookedness of his nose bump against your clit as he moved down to lap his tongue even lower. “Baby, you’re—” The words got trapped in you when he, without any warning at all, sunk his index and middle finger into you, curling with some kind of extraordinary second-nature right at your sweet-spot. And, seriously, how were you ever with anyone before him? How foolish were you to not wait, when it was Clark all along?
You careened upwards, panting, sobbing his name.
“You’re—oh…”
“That’s it, Daisy,” coaxed Clark lovingly, his mouth still on you, his fingers stimulating so effortlessly at a part of you that felt so deep, and so intense, and so good, it now belonged to him. It most likely made biologically no sense whatsoever, but the sensation felt so sublimely him that you would forever associate this kind of pleasure with Clark. He kept praising you and complimenting you and telling you how much he loved you—overwhelming you so much with sweet words and blinding ecstasy that you hadn’t even realised that he was rutting his clothed bulge against the rug underneath the two of you. “I got you, sweetheart. I got you.”
Clark’s fingers massaged at that swelling pleasure inside of you, nursing it reverently, but his mouth kept tasting you, kissing your clit, sucking it to get a sob out of you, rewarding the needy sounds with ensuing, tender licks. It was too much. It was too good. It was too Clark. He was everywhere. The hand that wasn’t working to fit a third finger into you was now pressing his forearm into your middle, and you could only assume, through all your mindlessness, that he was getting slightly upset with all your thrashing and riled-up jerks.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” Clark even sounded otherworldly. All ragged and passionate, your best friend, nestled between your thighs like he belonged there. He met your eyes again, so dark with lust, you almost forget they were ever blue at all. His mouth left your heat for the briefest of moments, slick with your arousal and his own saliva. “You’re almost there, aren’t you, sweetheart? Hm?”
“Clark,” you wept unintelligently.
“Awh, yeah. You are. It’s okay, Daisy,” he praised, putting his mouth on you again, curling his fingers—that third one easing in with little difficulty at all. “Give it to me, sweetheart. Let go. I’ve got you. Always got you, angel.”
And just like that, you’re falling for Clark Kent all over again, and he was catching you. Working you through the orgasm with the gentlest of kisses and the sweetest of nothings. A blinding, unrelenting worship of his fingers and lips, and you swear you hear him groan against you again, panting as if he just finished himself. But, he didn’t let you go. Not once. How could he?
Your body trembled with the aftershocks of it all, and Clark’s lips lingered, kissing every quivering inch of goosebumped skin he could rich. His fingers left you so carefully as he nuzzled into the hollow of your hip.
“My Daisy,” he said again, guttural.
Wrecked, you clung to him, hands grasping for anything you could get purchase on. You didn’t have the strength for it, but Clark seemed to tell what you wanted—because, after all these years, he could still read you so effortlessly. He crawled up the length of your spent body, palms roaming as he went, pressing against your ribs, sliding up your sides under the sweat-drenched cotton of your sleep-shirt, holding you like you were the most fragile, sacred thing in the world.
It was like, to him, cradling sunlight, as he pressed his head to your chest, and your hand kept him there, threading in his lovely curls. You might not have been able to pull him up to you, but you definitely managed the adoring kiss you swept against his forehead. And, thank God, you did—because that expression he gave you afterwards, that lovesick, impossibly delicate look of his, made everything worth it. The strewn letters on the coffee table, and the ring you returned to Ben last month, and all the heartache.
Clark, lolling his chin against the swell of your chest, kiss-swollen mouth glistening with you, the blue returning to his eyes, but not a morsel of adoration leaving. He was worth it.
“Please stay,” you asked of him fragilely.
“M’not going anywhere, Daisy,” he promised you. Delicately, Clark rolled the two of you so were on your sides, tangled up in each other. He was muttering something about the both of you needing a shower, but the feeling of his index finger tracing your spine was too distracting to care about responsible things like washing yourselves or getting him out of his ruined work clothes. “I love you,” he said again, assuming correctly that you were too out of it to listen to anything else.
You hummed contently, letting your body melt into his. “I love you, too. Always loved you."
You didn’t think you’d ever truly stop falling for Clark Kent. Now, you weren’t sure you wanted to.
summary: Four Times You’re Found Out (And One Time You’re Home) OR: A collection of scenes where people you love find out about your relationship (maybe they already knew)
pairing: steve harrington x fem!(byers)reader
word count: 8.3k
warning(s): some swears, plot inaccuracies, definitely canon divergent (please don't come for me), pretend steve and robin still work at family video....also I have no idea when steve's birthday is supposed to be, but just bear with me for the plot, highly unedited, I still apologize for the poor writing (English is unfortunately my first language)
a/n: I am back with a part two!! I just wanted to say a huge thank you for the love you've given project parenthood; it's surreal and very much humbling. I adore getting to hear from y'all and would more than love for that to continue with this one. As always, feedback and comments are highly appreciated, and my inbox is open for anything you may need <3
If you haven’t already, read part one: project parenthood?
I. The Party
This moment feels intensely like deja vu, sitting in Mike Wheeler’s basement—waiting for the start of what you’re sure will be an eventful evening —except, in the last few weeks, so much has changed. Namely, your relationship with Steve. You still catch yourself staring at him, half in disbelief, half in contentment at the thought that he’s actually your boyfriend.
Boyfriend. What a loaded word, you think, as your mind drifts deeper into the sense of familiarity with your current setting.
The Wheeler house, however, remains unchanged by the shift in your evolving dynamic. It’s warm in that familiar, musty, lived-in way it always is — like old carpet, dusty board games, and the faint, perpetual scent of pizza grease that’s soaked into the fabric of the basement couches. The mismatched Christmas lights Will hung in November still twinkle overhead, softening the space into something cozy and oddly safe. Mike declared just days ago that he never wanted to take them down, and so, they remain…another constant despite the obvious changes.
If you’re being honest, you really shouldn’t be here. Or—okay, fine—you should be here, because it’s movie night and you promised Will you’d show up. But, you probably shouldn’t be pressed against Steve Harrington on the old couch like two magnets with no intention of separating.
The movie hasn’t even started yet, but everyone’s getting settled, which actually means Dustin and Mike are arguing about seating arrangements and snack distributions (Dustin won’t stop gatekeeping the Doritos) and Max is threatening to throw Lucas off the couch if he touches her foot one more time. El simply watches the two of you with curiosity in her gaze, as if she’s stumbled upon something precious—something only she has noticed.
Steve sits beside you, thigh touching yours, shoulder brushing yours, and even though you’re trying to look casual, your pulse clearly didn’t get the memo. You thought once you’d kissed him for the first time, this feeling might go away, that you might not be as nervous around him. Clearly, that had been wrong…because now, you feel everything tenfold.
You suppose nervous might not be the right word to describe it. Steve makes you feel alive, like every nerve in your body has been set alight. And you can’t help the spark that shoots up your spine as his breath drifts along the side of your neck.
He leans in, voice dropping just for you. “I think Mike’s about to challenge Dustin to a Doritos duel.”
You stifle a laugh. “It’s always those two.”
“Yeah well,” he murmurs, nudging your knee with his, dipping his hand into the popcorn bowl, “we have the better seats and the better snacks.”
“Because you got here early and claimed your spot,” you point out. And it’s true, he did. He made sure of it.
“Because,” he corrects softly, “I wanted to sit with you. And I knew if I got here any later, you’d have six teens fighting for your attention. Who am I to compete with that?”
You hate how fast that hits you. You hate even more how warm you feel and how you can’t stop smiling.
It’s been a few weeks now — a few weeks of Steve’s hand on your back in passing, a few weeks of stolen kisses in quiet corners, a few weeks of him picking you up from school or work with that soft look he gets only for you. A few weeks of dating.
And somehow, miraculously, none of the kids have figured it out. At least not officially.
Steve shifts, like he can’t help gravitating toward you. His hand drifts onto your knee, thumb brushing a slow arc just above your jeans, the popcorn bowl now discarded onto the coffee table. Your chest warms at the proximity and you inch closer. It’s subtle, small, but your entire body reacts like he whispered something dirty in your ear.
He looks at your lips and you look at his. You shouldn’t. You really, really shouldn’t—
“—Oh my god.”
The statement detonates in the basement, multiple pairs of eyes shooting toward the source of the noise.
You jolt so hard you nearly fall off the couch, Steve’s hand flying off you like you’re radioactive.
Dustin stands frozen near the bottom of the stairs, clutching his bag of chips to his chest. His eyes are huge. His jaw drops open so wide it might hit the floor. The gears in his mind aren’t just turning…they’re spinning.
Mike appears right behind him, finally done arguing. He sees you and Steve sitting suspiciously close, and immediately recoils like he’s walked in on something he never wanted to see.
“No,” Mike mutters, hands waving in mock disgust. He’s put the pieces together. “Oh no, no, no—this is worse than the mom and dad thing.”
Lucas joins them, squinting at the two of you with the precision of a detective. “Did we interrupt something?”
Max pushes past them. “What the hell is going—”
She stops. She sees Steve sitting close enough to share breath with you. She looks at your face, then at his. Then at the space between you, or rather, the lack of it.
Max throws her hands in the air triumphantly. “Called it!” She announces to the ceiling.
You choke. “Called what—?”
“Nope, no, don’t even try,” Max cuts you off, pointing accusingly, wagging her index finger with gross enthusiasm. “Something’s changed,” she narrows her eyes at you in a smug way, “You two are together.”
The way the word together falls from her lips leaves no room for interpretation. You’ve been caught…all thanks to Steve’s wandering gaze. And hey, maybe you’re a little to blame. Just maybe.
Steve turns pink so fast it’s almost impressive. “We’re— it’s not— I mean we—”
Will slides into your eyeline, blinking in confusion. “Wait. The two of you…?”
He looks between you. Very slowly. Very carefully. He can read you better than anyone on the planet—and it’s clear as day.
His eyes widen with soft, dawning realization.
“Oh,” he breathes. “You are.”
Your stomach twists with something warm and embarrassing and too precious.
Mike shakes his head, looking directly at Steve “Oh man, this is worse than when you dated my sister. (Y/n)’s like, like—” he struggles to find a description he thinks fits.
“–like a better sister?” Lucas supposes.
“Yeah.” Mike affirms, hoping no one will let that little jibe get back to Nancy.
Sure, he loves his sister, she’s great…you’re just much cooler. On any given day, you’re also much nicer to him. You put up with his shit without making him feel like a nuisance, like you actually care about him. His next words hang in the air, “And somehow I can say they’ve both dated Steve Harrington.”
At the accusation, Dustin drops the Doritos, finally picking up on everyone’s deductions. He actually drops them.
“YOU’RE DATING?” Dustin yells so loudly you think you see the Christmas lights flicker. “How long has this been happening?” The onslaught of questions begins. “Why didn’t I know about this the second it happened? Were you ever going to tell us? Or—or were you just going to continue canoodling like you thought we’d be stupid enough not to notice?”
You send Dustin an unimpressed look that says ‘a little late on the uptake kid,’ but you smile nonetheless.
“Canoodling?” Steve sputters, because of course that’s the only thing he’d take away from Dustin’s word vomit. “Who even says canoodling?”
“I DO,” Dustin snaps. “WHEN I CATCH TWO PEOPLE CANOODLING IN THE DARK.”
“We weren’t canoodling,” you protest weakly, barely caring enough to try and stave him off.
“You so were,” Mike argues with a smirk. “Your knees were touching.” You roll your eyes, how scandalous…your knees were touching.
“We’re allowed to sit next to people!” You say, defensive, flustered, and lying horribly.
Max gestures violently. “Your faces were doing that thing.”
“What thing?” Steve asks.
“The thing,” she says, pointing between your eyes. “The gross lovey-dovey face thing.”
“Lovey-dovey face thing?” You repeat it like a question you’ll never know the answer to.
“You’re doing it right now!” She exclaims. This is getting ridiculous.
Lucas confirms, nodding. “I first noticed it last week. I just didn’t say anything because I didn’t want Mike to scream.”
Mike glares at him. “Thanks?” He accepts with contempt. As if Dustin hadn’t been the one to just have a meltdown.
Steve runs a hand through his hair — nervous and sheepish. “Okay. Okay, yes. We’re dating.”
Smiles light up on each of the kids’ faces. El’s grin is the biggest as she steps forward suddenly — quiet, certain — and wraps her arms around you.
“I’m happy for you,” she says simply.
And somehow that hits harder than any of the chaos.
Will beams. “Me too.”
Lucas grins. “Steve’s good. For you.”
Max shrugs, but her smile gives her away. “Yeah, I guess he’s not the worst.”
Mike crosses his arms. “Fine. But if you start making out in here, I’m leaving. And this is my fucking house.”
And as if summoned by the universe—Dustin points at you two dramatically. “Hey! They were about to, if I hadn’t said something.”
“DUSTIN,” you blurt.
He screeches. “Don’t deny it. I have a girlfriend—I know what almost kissing looks like!”
Steve hides his face in his hands. “You’re such an ass Henderson.” He takes a second to glance from teen to teen, mentally sizing each of them up. “And just so you know, I hate all of you.” His voice comes out muffled.
“No he doesn’t,” Will says gently to the group. “He’s really happy.”
Steve peeks at you through his fingers. Softly, shyly. How can this guy be yours? Your heart flips and you take his hand — openly now, boldly now — fingers lacing with his.
“We weren’t really hiding it,” you say.
“Good,” Lucas deadpans. “Because if you were, you're both horrible liars.”
Max nods. “Terrible job, concerning honestly.”
And as the chaos swells again, as Dustin interrogates Steve about how many times you’ve kissed and Mike threatens to cover his ears, Will catches your eye.
He smiles. It’s full of warmth and pride. It’s comfortable. It’s the kind of smile that reaches his eyes, makes the corners crinkle, and somehow feels like a hug without a touch.
In that brief moment, all the noise around you fades. You can see it: the genuine happiness in him, the quiet comfort that comes from knowing you’re with someone who treats you right. He’s not just proud that you’ve found someone; he’s proud of you—for letting yourself be happy, for trusting Steve, for navigating all the messiness of the past years and finding solace, something truly good.
There’s a softness to him now, a subtle shift in posture, like he’s carrying a small, secret joy that he doesn’t need to announce. And even though the teasing continues around you, you know he’s silently cheering both of you on, hoping that this—whatever this is—sticks, hoping it brings you the same kind of peace he feels in that smile.
“I’m glad you’re happy,” he says softly, and dear god, how you love him.
And in that moment, surrounded by noise and teasing and absolute chaos, you realize you don’t mind them knowing at all.
Not if it means Steve’s hand in yours. Not if it means this.
• ж • ж •
II. Nancy & Jonathan
The Byers kitchen feels unusually peaceful tonight.
The overhead light hums softly, spilling warm gold across the counter where half a loaf of bread, an abandoned jar of peanut butter, and one crooked salt shaker sit like relics of someone’s late-night snacking, Will’s definitely. That kid loves peanut butter more than Steve, and that’s saying something.
The house itself is quiet — Joyce is out, Will’s in his room sketching, and the Party won’t descend for at least another hour. As for Jonathan, well, he’s Jonathan. You stopped asking questions about his whereabouts a long time ago. He’s always been too independent for his own good.
Everything just feels…safe.
You lean back against the counter, smiling despite yourself as Steve stands at the sink, sleeves rolled up, washing dishes he absolutely created zero of. He insisted. You let him.
There’s music playing on the little radio — soft, gentle, something like Fleetwood Mac if the signal wasn’t so staticky.
He turns slightly toward you, a dish towel in one hand. “So, remind me again how I got tricked into doing your chores?”
“Tricked?” you scoff. “You literally volunteered.”
“I volunteered,” he says, throwing the towel over his shoulder, “because you smiled at me in that please help me, my life is chaos way you like to do.”
“I did not.”
“You did,” he insists, stepping closer. “It works every time.” You know he’s a sucker for you, just as you are for him. One glance from those soft brown eyes…and it’s over.
He’s standing between your knees now, hands braced lightly on the counter beside your hips. The small light over the sink paints him in soft yellows— hair glowing, eyes warm enough to melt something inside you.
You try not to grin like an idiot. You fail.
He leans in a little. “I like being here, you know.”
Your breath catches, a low hum rumbling in your tone, “I’m glad.”
He tilts his head, lips inches from yours—
The front door clicks. You hear two sets of footsteps, and then a voice.
“Mom? You home?” Jonathan’s voice calls.
Steve leaps, bumping the counter.
It’s still strange to see Steve Harrington like this, flustered and wary, like a man who’s stared down monsters without blinking is suddenly at the mercy of your younger brother. And part of you understands why. You’ve always thought of Jonathan as gentle, maybe a little (or a lot) introspective, the kind of person who folds inward rather than takes up space. But that’s only half the truth.
Jonathan is meek with you. He’s always been soft-spoken, careful, the kind of brother who listens more than he talks, who steps in front of you without making it obvious that he’s doing it. With you, his protectiveness is quiet. He shows it through a hand on your shoulder, or a look that asks are you okay? without demanding an answer.
But wiith Steve, it’s different.
With Steve, you know Jonathan remembers everything.
There’s a history of pain there. And maybe some of it has been left in the past, but some of it will never leave him.
You’re well aware how Jonathan feels. He’s told you.
He remembers the hallways at Hawkins High and the way Steve used to move through them like he owned the place. He remembers the laughter that followed him and the distance between the Harrington house and the Byers house, measured not just in streets but in silence, in absence, in the way some people were allowed to be careless because someone else was always there to catch them. Because Steve always had something to fall back on if he failed.
Kids like you and Jonathan, coming from nothing but the blood, sweat, and tears of a struggling single mom — you didn’t have that luxury. And a part of Jonathan has always resented Steve for that.
On top of it all, Jonathan never forgot the things Steve said back then. The way his friends laughed. The way Nancy cried. For a long time, you used to hate Steve too.
And even though Steve isn’t that kid anymore — even though Jonathan knows that, has watched him change, watched him show up again and again — history doesn’t disappear just because time passes. You know that.
So when Jonathan and Nancy appear in the doorway — Jonathan holding a stack of film canisters, Nancy with her coat half-off her shoulders and hair windswept from the cold, you don’t know what to think.
Jonathan opens his mouth to greet you, then notices the scene.
You’re perched on the counter. Steve’s too close, much too close for his liking. There’s a warm glow, a gentle energy rumbling in the air. Two mugs of hot chocolate rest on the counter. The towel on Steve’s shoulder looks so domestic. And Steve’s entire soul is radiating guilty boyfriend energy, sheepish lopsided grin and all.
Jonathan stops dead. Nancy stops beside him.
The moment hangs in the air like a soap bubble.
Jonathan’s left eye twitches. Something in his chest tightens. Not with anger exactly. With instinct.
He can’t help the feeling that climbs up his throat. You’re his sister. You’ve always been the one thing Jonathan never questioned protecting. Even when he was exhausted, or scared. Even when the world kept asking more of him than he had to give. And now — somehow — Steve Harrington has crossed into that sacred territory.
Jonathan doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t puff out his chest. He just stops. Takes it in. He measures the space between you and Steve with the same careful attention he’s always used when something matters. It’s honestly beginning to unnerve you more than anything else. The silence.
You can almost see the conflict play out behind his eyes — the past colliding with the present. The person Steve was, with the man he’s becoming. The quiet fear that comes with letting someone else take on a role Jonathan’s always filled himself, despite being a year younger than you.
Steve shifts under his gaze, suddenly hyper-aware of his hands, of his posture, of how close he’s standing to you. For once, he doesn’t look like the confident king of Hawkins. He looks like someone who knows this moment matters.
Nancy’s eyebrows rise very, very gently, equally taking in this scene before her. She knows just what Steve looks like when he cares, when he’s in love.
Jonathan notices it too, despite wanting so badly to ignore the glaring signs. And maybe that’s what softens him — not immediately, not fully — but enough.
Because Steve isn’t smirking. He isn’t posturing. He isn’t pretending. He’s nervous.
If anything, Jonathan knows what it looks like when someone cares more than they’re comfortable admitting. He’s spent his whole life being that person.
“Harrington.” The Byers boy nods in apprehension, standing closer to Nancy than he was before.
Steve attempts a casual wave that looks more like a man being held hostage. “Hey guys! Just—uh—helping. With dishes. Love… dishes.”
Jonathan stares. “Do you?”
“For sure man,” Steve says instantly.
You drag a hand down your face. Perfect. Fantastic. This is exactly how you wanted this to go. You’ve just spent about a minute or two in utter silence, the two men before you sizing each other up, and now you’re wrapped up talking about dishes…
Nancy steps forward a bit, gaze sweeping between the two of you with that laser-sharp focus she applies to murder mysteries and English essays. She’s not shocked. She’s… confirming.
Jonathan, however—
“Are you two—?” he starts.
Your face warms painfully. “Jon—”
“—together?” he finishes, voice cracking in three different places. No fucking way…you and Steve? His sister AND Steve?
There’s a small part of Jonathan that always worried Steve still had feelings for Nancy. He can’t help the weird feeling that creeps in his chest — he’s not sure this is any better.
Steve stands up straighter, like someone preparing for execution. “Yes. I mean—if that’s okay. With you.” Steve resorts to something stupid, something like a meaningless joke when he finishes with a firm, “Sir.” He’s not serious. You know he’s not. It feels a little defensive, like a flicker of that history, that tension you know has never fully left flares in the room.
Nancy gives him a bizarrely sympathetic pat on the arm, before sending him a warning gaze. “Steve, you don’t have to call him sir.”
You cringe. “Please don’t call him sir.” You can tell how nervous he is, just how much he cares. How much he wants this to work.
Jonathan just blinks. “Wait… so this isn’t some kind of joke? You’re actually dating?”
Steve glances at you once — quick, soft, like he’s checking if he’s allowed to say it.
You nod.
“Yeah,” he says quietly. “We are.”
That feels good to admit.
Jonathan processes this in real time — each second visible on his face like a flipbook: first there’s shock, then confusion, then realization, then a slight look of mild horror, then acceptance, and then finally something warm and reluctant and brotherly.
He sets the film canisters on the counter. “Okay.”
Steve sags in relief.
“Okay?” you repeat, uncertain.
Jonathan exhales slowly, bracing his palms on the back of a chair. “Yeah. I mean—look. I want you to be happy. Obviously. Always. And if Steve is… if he’s good to you, then… then I’m good with it.”
You can hear the underlying words he wants to say, reading between the complicated lines. Through everything that’s happened Steve’s a good guy.
You smile, taken aback by how gentle his voice is. This is the Jonathan you’re used to, the one you love more than words can express.
Nancy beams at him like he just passed a test. Because in her mind, this felt very much like that exactly. “That’s very mature of you.” She says.
Jonathan shrugs, cheeks pink. “I’m trying.”
He pauses. Then adds, with brotherly menace “But if he ever hurts you, I own multiple blunt objects and no sense of self-preservation.”
Steve nods rapidly. “Yep. Totally fair. Very understandable. Blunt objects. Got it.”
“I mean it Harrington.” Jonathan smiles, the cadence of his voice rising at the end. “I beat your ass once—I can do it again.”
Steve grimaces lightly, then relaxes his shoulders. “Dude! I thought we agreed never to bring that up again.”
“You agreed.” Your brother clarifies with a smirk. “I reserve the right to bring that up whenever I may need it.”
Nancy snorts. Steve’s gaze turns to her in an instant, suddenly nervous to see how she’s taking this.
She raises a brow at him with a knowing glint in her eyes. “Relax, Steve. I found out about you two weeks ago.”
You and Steve look at her in unison. “You did?”
She lifts one shoulder, amused. “You two act different around each other. Softer.” Her eyes flick to you. “Happier.”
You warm instantly.
Then she gestures at Steve. “Plus you wear her scarf sometimes.”
Steve’s jaw drops. “It’s warm!”
“Mmhm,” Nancy says. “And definitely not because you miss her.”
You elbow him lightly. “You wear my scarf? I thought I’d lost it.”
Steve mutters, “It smells like you,” and immediately regrets saying it within Byers earshot.
Jonathan groans into his hands.
You hide your smile behind your sleeve. “That’s… sweet.”
Before Steve can combust, Nancy steps forward, her expression softening. “I’m really glad,” she says to you quietly. “He’s good. And you deserve good.”
Your throat tightens unexpectedly. “Thank you.”
She nods once, sincere.
Jonathan watches Steve for a long moment — not threatening now, just evaluating him the way only a protective younger brother can.
Finally he says, “I trust you.”
Steve goes still. His breath catches. “Really?”
Jonathan nods. “Yeah. I do.” He means it.
It’s such a simple sentence — but it hits Steve like a punch. And you can see it. The way his shoulders soften. The way he stands a little taller. The way he looks at you like you hung the moon and then put it back in the sky by hand.
Nancy glances between all of you with a small teasing smile. “Okay…well…We’ll leave you to your… dishes.”
She sends you one last wink before she takes Jonathan’s arm, steering him toward his room.
Jonathan stops halfway, pointing two fingers at Steve’s eyes, then at his own. “You know what that means.”
“Yes sir,” Steve blurts again before wincing.
Jonathan disappears down the hall, muttering, “Stop calling me sir.”
The moment the door shuts, Steve blows out a shaky breath. “That wasn’t so bad.”
You laugh, sliding off the counter as you step closer to him. “You almost passed out.”
“I did not almost pass out,” he insists, cheeks pink. “I was just—uh—nervous.”
You wrap your arms around his waist, leaning into him. “You didn’t need to be.”
He melts immediately — hands finding your back like they were made for it. “Still kinda was.”
You tilt your chin up. “You handled it.”
He looks down at you, eyes full and warm and overflowing with something tender. “Yeah. But only because you were here.”
And before you can tease him for being sappy, he kisses you — slow, sweet, lingering — right there in the Byers kitchen, where both your families are starting to figure out the truth: You and Steve aren’t just dating.
You’re building something.
Something real.
• ж • ж •
III. Joyce & Hopper
Your living room smells like lemon cleaner and fresh laundry — Joyce’s doing, obviously — mixed with the faint scent of sawdust drifting in from the open front door. Hopper had insisted, loudly and with great paternal authority, that the loose window frame in the living room “wasn’t safe, damn it,” and he was going to fix it before the “whole house collapses and kills someone.”
Which is why your home currently sounds like someone is fighting a grizzly bear with a hammer.
You’re curled up on the couch, legs tucked beneath you, flipping lazily through a magazine you don’t actually care about. Your head dips sideways, eyes drifting to the kitchen doorway where Steve stands, rummaging through the cabinet like a man who can’t believe other people don’t organize things alphabetically.
He mutters to himself, “Who puts cumin next to paprika? That’s psychotic.”
You bite back a laugh. “Steve, what are you even doing?”
“Making coffee,” he says with the indignant confidence of a husband defending his territory. “Your mom bought the fancy grounds. I’m trying to find the—Aha.”
He pulls down the coffee tin like it’s a trophy. You’re about to tease him when Joyce breezes into the kitchen, humming softly as she folds a dish towel. She doesn’t even look up at first.
“Oh, thank you, Steve,” she says warmly. “Make yourself at home.”
He freezes, absolutely freezes. Like she just pointed a spotlight at him. He straightens, nodding stiffly. “Just… being helpful.”
Joyce smiles knowingly. “I know.”
And somehow that feels suspicious. You sit up straighter.
A loud THUD rattles the house.
“JOYCE, WHERE’S THE DAMN LEVEL?” Hopper booms from the living room.
Joyce cups her hands around her mouth. “Check the toolbox!”
“I DID CHECK THE TOOLBOX!”
“Check again!” She shouts back.
“I SWEAR IT GREW LEGS AND WALKED AWAY—”
Steve leans into the doorway, raising his eyebrows. “Is he okay?”
“No,” you and Joyce say at the same time.
Joyce chuckles and turns back to the counter. “He gets very dramatic about tools.”
Steve snorts softly. And Joyce notices it.
In fact… she’s been noticing a lot.
Her gaze drifts between you and Steve — your soft smile, his pink cheeks, the casual way he stands closer to you than he needs to. Her eyes narrow. Not judgmental. Just… motherly.
Dangerously motherly.
Steve sets two mugs on the counter. “(Y/n), you want cream and sugar?”
Joyce’s eyebrows lift. Steve’s eyes meet hers…he’s made a mistake. He’s let on that maybe he knows a little too much.
He attempts a recovery — poorly. “I mean—not because I know what you like or anything.” He shrugs. “Everyone wants cream and sugar.”
Joyce grins slowly. “Do you?”
Your soul leaves your body.
You scramble up from the couch. “Mom—”
But it’s too late.
Joyce Byers is in full Investigation Mode now. “Cream and one sugar, right? That’s how she likes it.”
Steve’s eyes go wide, oh God, how does she know? And your mother LIVES for this kind of emotional carnage.
You nearly choke on air. “Mom!”
Joyce clasps her hands against her chest. “Oh my God.” She turns to you. “You finally told him?” I mean sure, you’d told your mom about your feelings for Steve, especially when you thought it wasn’t going to go anywhere. But now she’s smiling like she’s won the lottery as she confirms, “You two are dating.”
Steve splutters. “No—we—well—yes—but—actually yes—” He deflates in defeat. It’s not worth it to explain it any further.
“OH MY GOD!” Joyce squeals, hands flying up in excitement.
You cover your face. “Mom, please don’t—”
Joyce ignores you completely, bursting with pure maternal joy. “I knew it! I knew it! I knew there was something happening! The way you look at each other—oh! I should’ve trusted my instincts sooner!”
“JOYCE?” Hopper bellows from the other room. “WHY ARE YOU SCREAMING?”
Joyce cups her hands around her mouth. “THEY’RE DATING!”
A beat of silence. Then—
“WHO?” Hopper stomps into the kitchen, covered in sawdust, eyebrows knitted together beneath his cap. “Who’s dating?” You’d heard that same sense of disgust in his tone when he'd found out about El and Mike…it’s the exact tone he’s using now.
Joyce gestures proudly between you and Steve. “(Y/n) and Steve!”
Hopper stares. It’s long and painfully silent.
Then he lifts one thick eyebrow. “Since when?”
“A few weeks,” Steve answers automatically. He immediately regrets being honest.
Hopper crosses his arms. “And you were gonna tell me… when?”
Steve swallows. “Right now?”
A deep, low rumble vibrates Hopper’s chest, halfway between a growl and a sigh. He pinches the bridge of his nose. “You’re lucky I actually like you, Harrington.”
You snort. “That’s debatable.”
Hopper shoots you a look, then fixes Steve with a suspicious glare. “You being good to her?”
“Yes sir.”
You whip your head around. “Why do you keep calling everyone ‘sir’?”
“It’s a respect thing,” Steve protests weakly.
“It’s a fear thing,” you correct.
Hopper raises a hand. “Let the boy speak.” He enjoys being called sir, it makes him feel like he matters in your life. Like even though he’s not blood, he’s more of a father than you’ve ever had. And he wants to hear what the Harrington kid has to say.
Steve takes a breath — steady, serious. “I care about her. A lot. I’m not going anywhere.”
Your mom melts at that, her eyes full of love for you, and a newfound love for Steve.
Hopper studies him, jaw tight.
Joyce grins. “Jim, stop scaring him. They’re so cute!”
Hopper grumbles into his beard. “Yeah, yeah.”
She can still see the nerves radiating from Steve. The way his index fingers are tapping on the edges of the mug he’d been meaning to give to you, and the way his weight shifts from foot to foot in apprehension.
“Honey,” she says gently to him, “you don’t need to be nervous.”
Steve nods, but it’s obvious he still is. He’s been good at being a guest his whole life — polite, helpful, careful not to take up too much space. It’s a skill you don’t learn unless you’ve spent a lot of time in houses that never really felt like yours.
Joyce moves forward and cups your face in both hands, beaming. “Sweetheart, I’m so happy for you.” She looks between the two of you, eyes flicking from you to him. “You deserve someone kind—both of you.”
You soften, leaning into her palms. “Thanks, Mom.”
“And Steve?” Joyce walks over and pulls him into a hug so sudden and full-force he nearly drops the mug of coffee he’d been holding. “Welcome to the family, honey.”
Steve’s eyes go huge. “Oh. Uh. Wow. Okay. Yep. Hugging. This is happening.”
The mug rattles slightly against his chest as he scrambles to keep it upright, frozen in place like he’s afraid that if he moves, the moment will shatter.
Joyce hugs him like she means it. Like she’s done this a thousand times before. Like she’s not worried about boundaries or awkwardness or whether he deserves it.
Just — arms around him. Solid, and absolutely certain.
And something inside Steve breaks open. He’s not used to this. Not used to being claimed so easily. Not used to adults who don’t keep one eye on the door, who don’t treat affection like something transactional or conditional. At home, birthdays pass quietly. Dinner tables are long and empty. Love arrives in the form of credit cards and apologetic notes, if it arrives at all.
No one has ever welcomed him anywhere. Definitely not like this.
His hands hover awkwardly for a second, unsure — before they settle against Joyce’s back, tentative at first, then firmer. Like he’s testing whether this is real. Whether it’s allowed.
His throat tightens.
You see it — the way his shoulders sag, just a little. The way he exhales like he’s been holding his breath for years without realizing it. Joyce pulls back, still smiling, hands firm on his arms. “We’re really glad you’re here.” She says.
Steve nods, because he doesn’t trust his voice. His eyes shine, but he blinks quickly, embarrassed by the intensity of it all.
“Thank you,” he manages. “I—yeah. Thank you.” Being loved like this feels strange to him, foreign. It’s heavy on his shoulders, heavy in his hands, like something he’s terrified to drop. And maybe for the first time, this isn’t something Steve has to earn. It’s the kind of love he gets to keep.
Hopper pats him on the back once — hard enough to nearly knock him forward. He snaps the moment in a way only a paternal figure like Jim could, “You break her heart,” he threatens, “and I'll break your legs.”
“Hopper!” Joyce swats him, hissing.
Steve salutes, breaking out of his daze. “Legs remain unbroken, sir.”
“Oh my god,” you mutter, laughing despite yourself. This is so unserious, and yet, so so nice.
Joyce pulls you beside Steve, squeezing your hands. “I’m proud of you. Both of you.”
And the warmth that fills your chest is heavy, immediate, and overwhelming. Steve’s hand finds yours instinctively, fingers linking — not hidden, not hesitant.
Just there. Solid.
Hopper grunts. “Alright. Enough mushy crap. Who wants pancakes? I’m making pancakes.”
Joyce groans. “Jim, you cannot cook pancakes.”
“I can TOO cook pancakes.”
“I swear you burned water once.” You tease him jokingly.
He plays along, “Hey, that pot was broken!”
Steve grins at you as your mom and Hopper make their way back into the living room. He squeezes your hand.
“You okay?” he asks softly.
You nod, leaning into him. “Better than okay.”
His expression warms. “Me too.”
And as the two of you stand together in the soft kitchen light — hands linked, hearts racing, Joyce humming happily in the background — Steve realizes he’s never felt more like part of a family.
• ж • ж •
IV. Robin
Family Video on a Sunday evening is pretty much dead. There’s no customers, no returns, and thankfully, no Keith. All there is to do is stare at the walls, as dust motes drift lazily through the air like they’re bored too.
The fluorescent lights buzz overhead with all the charm of a dying bee, and Steve is leaning on the counter flipping through a magazine that he definitely isn’t reading. He keeps glancing at the door like he’s waiting for you to appear at any second.
Robin watches him. She watches him flip the pages without looking at them. She watches him fix his hair every eight minutes on the dot. She also watches him check the door again.
After the third hair adjustment, she groans loudly.
“Oh my god, just go outside and wait for her like a normal lovesick golden retriever.”
Steve nearly drops the magazine. “I— I’m not lovesick.”
Robin scoffs so dramatically it echoes. “Steve. You’ve checked your reflection in that horror-movie mirror so many times the ghosts are going to file a restraining order.”
He scowls. “I just don’t want to look like a mess.”
“You always look like a mess,” she says sweetly. “It’s your brand.”
He hurls a crumpled popcorn receipt at her. She dodges easily.
Then the bell over the door jingles.
You step inside, cheeks flushed from the wind, hair tucked into Steve’s old Hawkins sweatshirt that you “borrowed” and never returned.
Steve lights up like he’s been plugged into a wall outlet. Robin doesn’t miss it.
“Hey,” you say, smiling at him first, always at him first — before waving at Robin. “Slow day?”
“Painfully,” Robin says. “I’ve reorganized the horror section three times. It still sucks.”
You hop up to sit on the counter, legs swinging lightly. Steve gravitates toward you immediately, leaning his hip against the counter next to your knee, thumb brushing it before he can stop himself.
Robin raises one eyebrow. You call it the eyebrow of doom.
You pretend not to notice. Steve pretends he didn’t do it.
“Oh,” Robin says lightly, “so we’re doing this now.”
Steve freezes. “Doing what?”
“This,” she repeats, gesturing vaguely at the space between you — the space with no actual space. “The whole... heart-eyes, I-want-to-hold-your-hand-but-I’m-too-chicken situation.”
Your face heats. “We’re just hanging out.”
“Uh-huh,” Robin says, stepping closer, eyes narrowing in the affectionate-interrogation way only she can pull off. “Tell me again how you’ve accidentally shown up wearing Steve’s clothes.”
You gasp in mock realization, hand dramatically flying to cover your mouth. Maybe you’re just tired of trying to hide this from her “How did you know—”
Robin points at your chest. “Because last time I checked, you didn’t play on the boys basketball team.”
You look down, smirking. “It looks good, doesn’t it?”
Steve scrubs a hand over his face, mumbling into his palms. “I hate you both.”
“No you don’t,” Robin chirps. “You love me. And you love her.”
Your breath catches. Steve stops breathing.
Robin pauses. Then squints. “Okay, maybe you’re not ready to say it out loud yet, but like... come on.” She drones on. “I’ve known since the day we spent hours together in that Russian elevator. Or when we were hopped up on truth serum, and you said a lot of things you may pretend not to remember but that sounded a hell of a lot like a love confession."
She smiles again, manically, “You spend three minutes just staring into each other’s eyes after that.”
You blink. “Three minutes?”
“Three minutes.” She taps the counter. “I timed it mentally.”
Steve groans. “That’s not a thing people do.”
“It is when they work with their emotional support dumbass every day for two years,” Robin says, pointing directly at Steve’s chest. “I know your patterns. I know your eyebrows. I know your hair. I know when you showered, I know when you didn’t—”
Steve sputters. “ROBIN.”
Robin throws her hands in the air. “Point is: the second she walked into scoops the first time and you got that my sun, my moon, and all my stars look on your face, I knew.”
You choke on air. “I— he— what look—?”
“That look,” Robin says, nodding firmly. “The one he’s doing right now.”
Steve snaps upright. “I’m NOT doing a look.”
Robin folds her arms. “Then stop staring at her like she invented breathing.”
You bury your face in your hands. “Oh my god.” This is embarrassing, but also kind of amusing. You’re not sure you should feel so conflicted.
Robin plops down on the counter beside you. “You guys are cute. Annoying. But cute.”
Steve recovers enough to glare. “Have you told anyone—”
“Steve.” She pats his cheek. “Everybody already knows.”
You and Steve exchange a horrified glance. Except, it’s true. Over the past week or so, you kind of have let it slip to almost everyone in your life: the kids, your brothers, your friends, your mom…and Hopper.
Robin continues breezily. “Anyway! While we’re all in this circle of truth, I’m very happy for you both. But if either of you make out in the back room while I’m on shift, I will unplug the VHS rewinder and hide the cable.”
You laugh. “That’s cruel.”
“Yes. And effective.”
Then, gentler, Robin bumps your shoulder. “Seriously… I’m happy for you. He’s stupid, but he’s good-stupid. And you’re… very very good for him. Maybe too good for him.” She eyes her best friend warningly.
Your chest tightens, and you’re unexpectedly emotional.
Steve smiles at her, soft and grateful. “Thanks, Rob.”
She squints at him. “But if you ever make her cry, I will egg your house.”
Steve pales, although he’s not entirely convinced. “You don’t even know how to aim an egg.”
“I’ll learn,” she vows.
You slip off the counter, stepping between them before Steve has a heart attack. “Okay, okay — I think he gets it.”
Robin smirks and throws an arm around your shoulders. “Welcome to the club.”
“What club?” you ask, laughing.
“The Steve-Harrington-Emotional-Support committee.”
Steve squints at her. “That is not a real club.”
“Oh, it’s very real,” Robin says. “It meets weekly. There’s always snacks, and we get to watch you spiral. Dustin’s club president.”
You laugh. “That explains a lot, actually.”
Robin nods solemnly. “It really does.”
Steve points accusingly, with a waggle from his index finger, and it all feels so maternal. “You are both being incredibly rude.”
Robin grins wider. “Correct.” At the same time you say, “Sure thing mom.”
Steve looks between the two of you, betrayed. “Is nothing sacred?”
“No,” Robin and you answer in perfect unison.
And Robin grins, victorious.
• ж • ж •
+1. Candles, Cake, and the Picture That Lasts
Steve Harrington does not like birthdays.
He never says it outright — never announces it, never makes a big deal of it — but you know. You’ve always known, in the way he shrugs when someone asks what he wants, in the way he insists it’s “not a big deal,” in the way he looks faintly uncomfortable when the date comes up at all.
Birthdays, for Steve, have always been quiet things.
Too quiet.
They’re empty houses and echoing rooms. Parents who call late, if they call at all. Cards left on the counter by a housekeeper, signatures neat and impersonal. A cake ordered from a bakery he doesn’t like, eaten alone at the kitchen island while the radio hums in the background for company, or maybe it’s the tv.
He learned a long time ago not to expect much.
So when Dustin, Max, and Lucas insist on dragging him out of the house that afternoon, claiming it’s “very important,” “top secret,” and “Steve you’re not allowed to ask questions” — he goes along with it, suspicious but indulgent in the way he always is with them.
You stay behind.
Steve doesn’t see you slip out of the car with an excuse about forgetting something. He doesn’t see you unlock the door to his house with the spare key he gave you weeks ago, casual, like it didn’t mean anything — even though it did.
The house is quiet when you step inside.
Steve’s house is big in that way that always feels a little too empty, even now. Polished wood floors. Wide rooms. Too much space meant for people who aren’t there. But tonight, it won’t stay that way.
You work quickly and quietly. Streamers line the walls, taped just a little crooked, and a handmade banner is strung across the living room that reads HAPPY BIRTHDAY STEVE in uneven lettering. The kids helped with it earlier, arguing over colours and spacing, Dustin insisting his letters were the best ones.
You set the cake on the counter. It’s chocolate, because it’s his favorite even though he pretends he doesn’t care. Candles are tucked into the frosting, just waiting.
In the time it takes you to set everything up, your guests have arrived. All except Steve and a few of the kids who had dragged him out at your ordering.
But the time you hear the front door, sensing his official arrival, your heart is already racing.
Steve’s melodic laugh carries through the house first — surprised, unguarded — and then the door opens fully.
He walks towards the main room as the kids race past him, taking position. He freezes at the scene before him.
The lights are on. Music hums softly from the living room radio. Everyone is there — the Party, Nancy, Jonathan, and Robin leaning against the wall like she’s been waiting for this exact moment her entire life.
Steve stands in the doorway, stunned, keys still in his hand.
“Oh,” he breathes.
You step forward before he can say anything else.
“Happy birthday,” you say softly.
His eyes find yours immediately. They always do. He almost feels them well up.
For a second, he doesn’t move. Doesn’t joke. Doesn’t deflect. He just looks — at the banner, at the cake, at all of them — and something flickers across his face. Surprise, yes. But also something deeper,something fragile.
No one’s ever done this for him before.
“Okay,” Dustin announces loudly. “No crying. Or I will cry and then it’ll be a whole thing.”
Steve huffs out a laugh, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “You guys are such idiots.” But his voice is thick.
He steps inside, and you’re right there, close enough that his arm slides around your back without thinking, palm warm and grounding like he’s anchoring himself to you.
The living room glows under soft light. Streamers flutter faintly when someone moves past them. The house feels… full. Lived in. Warm in a way it never quite does, that it never quite has.
“Okay, everyone shut up!” Dustin yells, climbing onto Steve’s coffee table like it’s a stage. “We need to sing.”
Steve groans immediately. “No we don’t.”
“Yes we do,” Max says, unapologetic. “It’s tradition.”
Mike already looks embarrassed on Steve’s behalf. “This is going to be awful.”
“You’re awful,” Dustin snaps back.
You tilt your head up toward Steve, smiling. “You ready?”
He looks down at you, eyes soft, a little overwhelmed — open in a way he rarely lets himself be. “Not even a little.”
The cake is brought out, candles already lit, flames flickering gently. Lucas holds it like it’s sacred. Hopper stands nearby like he’s supervising a controlled burn.
And then the singing starts. It’s terrible, outrageously loud, and completely off-key.
Steve grimaces through the first line, shoulders tense — and then something breaks. Somewhere between Dustin screaming the lyrics and Will singing quietly but earnestly, Steve laughs.
It’s real laughter. The kind that shakes him, that escapes before he can stop it. The kind that sounds like relief.
You watch it happen like it’s something holy.
When the song ends, the room erupts into cheers. Steve leans down toward you, voice low and fond. “I blame you for this.”
You grin. “You love it.”
“I absolutely do not.”
He makes a wish, quiet and private, and blows out the candles in one breath. The applause that follows feels louder than it should. Fuller.
The night settles into something easy after that.
The cake is eaten. Frosting ends up on Dustin’s nose and Lucas steals the biggest slice. Max threatens him with bodily harm if he doesn’t share (he does). El winds up curling up beside you on the couch, content, leaning against your side like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Will leans into your other side.
Steve drifts — talking to Mike, laughing with Robin, letting Hopper clap him on the shoulder a little too hard, and finds himself in a serious but extremely loving conversation with your mom — but he always comes back.
To you.
Like gravity.
At some point, Jonathan lifts his camera.
“Hey,” he says, already adjusting the lens. “Before everyone leaves — we should get a picture.”
There’s groaning, half-hearted protests, but no one actually says no.
People shuffle into place, bumping shoulders, arguing about where to stand. Dustin insists on being in front. Max refuses to smile. Mike complains he looks stupid, he’s having a bad hair day.
You don’t think about where to go. You just end up there, with him.
Steve’s arm slides around your waist, easy and instinctive, like it’s always belonged there. His hand rests warm and steady at your side. You lean into him without thinking, your shoulder tucked perfectly beneath his arm, your head tipping just slightly toward his.
No one comments. No one pauses. It’s simply understood.
Will notices, though. He always does.
He watches the way Steve glances down at you before looking at the camera, the way your fingers hook lightly into the belt loop at his hip. There’s no surprise on Will’s face — just quiet satisfaction. This is right. This is how it’s meant to be.
Jonathan steps back, framing the shot. He hesitates for a moment, taking in the room, the laughter, the closeness, the way Steve stands like he finally belongs somewhere.
“Okay,” he says softly. “Ready?”
Steve squeezes you just a little tighter.
The camera clicks.
The moment is caught — imperfect, a little blurry, but real.
People scatter almost immediately afterward, someone complaining they blinked, someone else demanding a redo. But Jonathan knows it’s perfect just the way it is. He can’t wait to get it developed.
And days later, on a night when you have nothing to do, a night where you can just relax with Steve…when your house is quiet and calm, you sit beside your boyfriend on the couch, legs tangled, his shoulder warm beneath your cheek.
Will approaches quietly, holding the photo. A late birthday present for Steve.
He hands it to you.
You look down — at the way everyone’s pressed together, at Steve’s arm unmistakably around you, at the way you’re both smiling without trying.
“You look really happy,” Will says softly.
You don’t hesitate. “I am.”
Steve hears it. His breath catches just a little as he looks at you, something bright and disbelieving in his eyes, like he still can’t quite believe this is real.
He smiles. And for the first time, you think birthdays might finally mean something different to him. Not empty. Not lonely.
Summary: Jack Abbot has never heard you laugh like this, and he has some feelings about it. Namely, jealousy.
CW: Fluff, Age gap (reader is implied to be Gen Z), dumb humor, she/her pronouns, no use of Y/N, unedited, reader is in a silly goofy mood, unestablished relationship but their like teetering on it. Jack is obsessed with you, as all good men should be, this was a short little bit bc I needed something a bit lighter after writing angst pt. 2
You’re laughing.
And it’s the most beautiful thing Jack’s ever heard. Coming out of the locker room on his way out of the hospital, he heard it long before he saw you. But he didn’t need to see you to know it was you, even if he’d never heard you make that noise. Bright, happy, unabashedly loud- the kind of sound that instantly lifted the ever present weight in his chest.
And he hates it. That’s how he knows he’s going to hell, because he heard your real laugh for the first time and the first thought he had was, Why has she never laughed like that with me?
It doesn’t get any better when he rounds the corner and he spots you at the hub. You’d already changed into your street clothes, a soft looking sweater pulled over you, your hair let out of its tie. You’re laughing so hard he watched your bag slip off your shoulder. Head thrown back, one held clutching at your stomach, knees threatening to buckle, and that smile…
Jack considered himself a funny guy, more dry wit and dark humor than outright comedy. He’d gotten you to laugh before, little huffs under your breath or a chuckle as you shook your head at him, but his favorite was when you’d snicker a little bit before humming his name, stretching it into two playfully lilting syllables, “Ja-ack”
Well, that had been his favorite. Now, he had a new bench march. He locked in on you like a shark with blood in the water, approaching the hub and sidling up beside you as your bold laughter began to wane and you panted to catch your breath. He needed to know what had caused this, needed to know why it wasn’t him, and moreover needed to know how he could make you laugh like this himself.
“What’s so funny?” The attending asked, trying to keep his voice light. He apparently failed judging by how some of the interns clicked off their phones and reached for whatever chart they were supposed to be reviewing during handoff. You opened your mouth to answer him, trying to gather the words to explain to him what had tickled you so much that you had the cutest little tears in the corner of your eyes, but just the thought of it sent you into giggles again. The other night shifters who were still hanging around just shrugged, unfazed by their attending’s usual dry delivery.
“We’ve been trying to figure out the same thing for five minutes.” Ellis informed him, shaking her head. One of Robby’s dayshift residents continued.
“She tried showing us some picture on her phone-“ Whitaker started, watching you like you might become their first behavioral case of the morning, and Santos finished the thought, “And she wasn’t able to get it together to tell us what’s so funny about the picture.”
“No- guys- trust me- it’s really funny- I just-“ You coughed out as you wiped tears out from your eyes, and then you caught Jack’s discerning eye and lost it again. Something relaxed in him slightly, no one here had made you laugh this hard, he was still the funniest Doctor you knew.
“It think night shift broke her-“ Javadi murmured with wide eyes which made Jack sniff a slight laugh himself as he picked your bag up off the floor. If joyful and exuberant laughter was the product of the Pitt breaking you, he and Robby would be much happier men. Still, he figured the double you’d just finished had just as much to do with this giggle fit as whatever picture you had on your phone did.
“Alright, I’m heading out, if we ever find out what’s actually so funny, can someone text it to me?” Ellis tossed the words over her shoulder as she started to saunter towards the exit.
“B-Bye, Ellis- I’ll text it-“ You choked out before another laugh interrupted you as you imagined typing out the accompanying explanation. The sound so bright that it turned heads, Robby’s included. Apparently, 6 AM was all too early for this much joy because he shot Jack a tired, confused look.
“Alright, she’s distracting my residents from the mess you left me.” Robby scolded as he clapped a hand to Jack’s shoulder, but there wasn’t much real heat behind it. Despite the early hour, he knew this place could use all the laughter it could get. The light chide forced you to get yourself under more control, even if your chest still shook from quiet mirth.
“Sorry, Dr. Robby-“ You tittered, clamping your lips shut as you caught a glimpse of the photo on your phone before you clicked the lock button and the screen went dark.
“Alright, Giggles, let me drive you home. Someone needs to get some sleep.” Jack ordered in that quiet way of his, shouldering your bag. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d offered, and as far as anyone besides Robby knew, your place was along the way to his (even though he actually lived in the opposite direction) so it didn’t make much sense for you to catch the bus if Jack was already heading your way. You hummed another laugh, the sounds coming as easily as breathing, and he couldn’t help but think you looked so pretty. Your mouth pulled into a near permanent smile- and not the perfunctory or sympathetic one you gave to patients, but a real, smile. Your hair just slightly disheveled from the movement and how many times you’d run your hand through it, and you were flapping your hands uselessly to fan yourself. The movement did nothing for the flush over your skin.
The brisk, early morning spring air sobered you a little bit, earning Jack some easy conversation as he led you to his truck. And finally, once you were in the passenger seat with your seatbelt clicked and the engine rumbling did Jack broach the subject.
“So, are you gonna tell me what had you in stitches?” He asked, pulling out of the reserved for Doctors parking spot. A surprised giggle burst out of you once more, but now that it was just him it was easier to subdue this time. You shook your head.
“No, it’s so dumb, no one else laughed-“ You smiled at him, legs folded up in his seat in a way that didn’t look comfortable but it was always how you sat when he drove you to and from work.
“I’ve never seen you laugh like that, sweetheart. Was it one of the tick tick things? I never get those.” He sighed, shaking his head as he remembered the first time you’d texted him what was supposed to be a funny video. He’d spent ten minutes downloading the app and making an account, just to send back ‘??’, and it was usually his response to all the memes you sent him. He didn’t mean to call you sweetheart, but the endearments tended to slip out after longer shifts, especially when you were being so damnably adorable, and you were still too giggle-drunk to notice.
“TikTok. And no, peepaw. It’s just a silly picture.” You hummed, shaking your head. Your eyes were soft in that way that only happened after a good laugh, and it really stroked his ego that it was him receiving those soft looks, “And you know, everything’s funnier when people are staring at you. And I’m exhausted so it just made everything ten times funnier-“
“C’mon, show me.” Abbot ‘encouraged’ as he waited at the mouth of the parking garage. You groaned like it was a massive inconvenience, but you pulled your phone out and let FaceID open it. The first thing on your screen was still that stupid picture, and just the sight of it made you giggle, a sound so girlish that it made him feel like a gross old man to be so obsessed with you. Made him feel like an even grosser old man that half of his brain started strategizing how he could make you make those noises for him again. But, as you turned your screen towards him, and he examined the source of your joviality, he was… puzzled. His brows furrowed up and he took the phone from you, “This is it?”
It was a grainy photo. A raccoon that was somehow scowling at something, photoshopped to make it look like the critter was staring down at a phone in confusion. When you laughed at his reaction to the picture, it only confused him further, so he said, as if to double check, “This is a raccoon. It’s photoshopped. Raccoons don’t do this-”
His logical reply or perhaps his bewilderment only set you off again. Abbot had to wait another five minutes of those beautiful, bright laughs to calm again, watching in confusion and amusement as the merriment made you squirm in his truck seat. He forced the less than appropriate thoughts about said squirming and writhing, and handed your phone back to you before continuing to drive. Truthfully, he’d listen to you laugh like that for as long as you’d let him, so he was slight disappointed when you managed to rein yourself in once more.
“The way it’s looking at the phone-“ You choked out, a hand to your chest to keep yourself from losing it again, “It just reminded me of you-“
Oh, his sweet silly girl. He didn’t even care that you were technically making fun of him. Didn’t care that it really wasn’t even that funny. He just shook his head, filing the information away for later, and instead teased you softly, “Maybe night shift really did break you-“
That earned him one of those full body belly laughs, and Jesus Christ, you actually snorted. A hand flew to cover your mouth, and he only shook his head with a wry, strangely smug smirk. New benchmark achieved.
“You love me.” You accused with that mischievous glint in your eyes. Of course, he really did. You were joking of course, and Jack knew that. Knew you weren’t aware of the depth of his feelings, a borderline obsession his therapist had called it. Fucking Weird, Robby had called it. But he did, he really did love you. And, he could hold on to some weird fucked up hope, that if comparing him to raccoons made you this happy… maybe, just maybe you loved him to.
what happens after you end up at the PTMC and run into Jack Abbot, your ex husband of 3 years after a minor accident?
so i just felt the urge to write something here...don't think i've written anything in years but Jack Abbot WOULD pull this outta me...unfinished & unedited but LMK what you think! maybe i'll finish it lol
As the back doors of the ambulance open and the paramedics start to roll out your gurney, you beg them to just let you go home.
"I promise you, I am fine, I'm just a little scraped up," you plead.
After a minor car accident, you were seriously fine. Just a ding, or a bruised rib maybe, but since your car was totaled and the other driver ended up way worse than you, EMS urged you to at least get checked out. If anything you just felt a little embarrassed being rolled around on a gurney.
As you enter the double doors, and the large letters of PTMC adorn the archway you automatically recognize where you are and your stomach immediately drops.
"Fuck," you swear under your breath. Thinking that if you close your eyes and lay down you'd turn invisible. You cannot be here right now. You didn’t even think about the possibility of being brought here. Quickly, you try to recall what time it is. 5 o'clock, you think, maybe he isn't here yet. You knew that was bullshit. He was always early to work. The only thing he made sure he was never late to.
When the bright lights blind you and the cold air breezes through your hair, a familiar face comes rushing to the gurney for intake.
"Alright, boys, what do we got-...Y/N?" she all but yells.
You grimace.
"Hi Dana, how have you been?" you say with an awkward smile. "I swear I'm fine they made me come in"
Dana’s eyes widen and she starts scanning the room, knowing exactly who we need to be straying away from.
“He’s here, isn’t he?” you sigh. Knowing the one person you have been avoiding for years could show up at any moment.
“We don’t have to worry about that right now,” she rushes out as 2 young…interns, you assume, come rushing beside her. They just get younger and younger don’t they?
“Santos and Whitaker,” she starts, both of them wide eyed and eager. “Take her to West 12 and page Robby.
They nod, confused on her sudden sternness as she emphasizes “And do NOT call Abbot, I do not care if Robby is packing up to leave you leave Jack out of this”
As EMS rolls you to your room, past all the patients waiting and the other nurses and doctors, you attempt to breathe through the pain you were pretending you weren’t having. Anything to get out of there faster.
As you get transferred and hooked up to monitors, an older doctor walks in, introducing himself as Dr. Langdon.
You smirk with nostalgia, remembering his dark brown hair and Ken doll-like build.
“Wait, I know you,” you begin.
He raises his eyebrow, “You do?”
You giggle as you remember Dr. Langdon the intern.
“Yeah you were an intern who loved kissing ass to every attending around you,” you chuckle. Reminiscing about how Jack would complain about him at least 4 times a week.
Santos perks up, seemingly excited to learn about her boss’s past.
“Wow, Langdon, who would have thought you were a brown-noser?” she says sarcastically.
Langdon, ignoring her, continues his work-up as Robby walks in. He pauses at the door as you make eye contact sheepishly. Again embarrassed to be there but more embarrassed he’s here to oversee you.
“Oh here we go,” you sigh as you sit back in the bed.
Robby was always protective of you. Like a little sister. You hated it sometimes because you can handle your own and you always have, but you understood where he was coming from.
“Good to see you too, Y/N,” he says while gloving up, grabbing your chart and walking over. “What’s it been, 3 years? What the fuck happened?”
“Robby, please,” you beg. “I was just telling the paramedics I am just scraped up. I am literally fine,” you start.
You look at him intently, as if telepathically telling him you need to get out of here as soon as possible before Jack shows up, not wanting to bring your business up to the 3 other people in the room you just met.
You can tell he knows what you’re thinking, but he would be damned if he’d let you walk out of here without properly making sure you were 100% fine.
“Y/N…,” he starts.
“Fine,” You dramatically sigh as you finally give up. “Just do whatever you need to do”
“It’s good to see you,” he says. “I hate that it had to happen like this but I have missed you. You could have called”
“I could have,” you look away, feeling guilty. Robby was family. But it hurt too much to continue to talk to anyone that reminded you of him. You needed to completely move on. It wasn’t personal, you just had to be selfish for yourself for once.
The awkward silence is broken by a sharp gasp triggered by Santos prodding your side.
“I’m sorry,” she states in a monotone state, fiercely focused on the work at hand. You respected that.
Santos turns to Whitaker, asking him to notate bruised and/or cracked ribs.
“Damn it,” you grumble.
Robby chuckles under his breath. “Yeah you are not getting out of here soon”
“That’s not funny,” you roll your eyes.
At the Nurse’s Station, Dana is suddenly hawk-eyed. Making sure Abbot stays far away from the clear doors of the room you’re in, knowing she’d be on the hook first for not telling him.
“Perlah, if you see Abbot can you let him know I need to see him stat”, she says as she strategizes excuses.
“You got it,” she responds, turning towards Princess with eyes that say “I don’t know what’s going on, but it’s gonna be really juicy”
Dana makes a round on the floor, making sure everything else is running smoothly as a couple of young parents come busting through the ambulance bay with their toddler who may or may not have shoved a Lego piece up her nose.
As Jack makes his way to the E.R., she asks him to take a look at this young girl, buying her just a smidge of time.
“Dr. Abbot can absolutely help you guys,” she says with a sense of concerning enthusiasm.
He offers his help of course, but not before giving Dana a look that says “This is intern work”.
Speaking of, where are the interns? he thought. With no time to actually track them down, Dana leads him and the family to South 20.
Dana sighs with relief knowing that will keep him occupied for at least a while.
Back in West 12, Robby starts prepping an ultrasound probe to check for internal bleeding. Still feeling slightly embarrassed and now wholly exposed, you lay completely flat with your arms up covering your eyes, hoping this nightmare will end soon.
“So,” Robby starts trying to break the silence. “I heard you moved to New York,”
You peek through your forearms. He is really doing this.
“Yeah…my- uh sister is down there. Needed a change and my job was really flexible about it,” you explain, guilt creeping up your throat. Why do you feel guilty? You were a newly single woman, you could do whatever you want.
Robby doesn’t say anything, continuing to move the probe around in your midsection to make sure you aren’t bleeding out.
“I didn’t mean to just run away, I just-,” you begin to defend.
Robby looks from the monitor to you with understanding eyes.
“Hey, if anyone can relate to having the need to get away, it’s me,” he starts.
You give him a confused look as he remembers you’ve missed the last 3 years.
“I uh, also went away for a while,” he says.
You blink, stonefaced before you crack a smile.
“You, Michael “I’m addicted to my job” Robinavitch, went on leave? Ha ha good one,” you joke. There was just no way he got up and left his job. The only person more committed to the PTMC than Jack was him.
Robby can’t help but chuckle at the joke. It’s true, he was so entangled with his job, he didn't know where Dr. Robinavitch stopped and just Michael started.
“I did, I’d never lie about that. I almost didn’t come back,” he says.
You turn towards him, serious now.
“Damn it must have been serious for you then,” you say.
After taking out the 2 Lego pieces from little Jane’s nose. Jack Abbot strolls up to the Nurse’s Station to prepare for the night shift. As he waits for the rest of the Night Crew to show up, he takes a look at the ER board.
“Wow, not too busy at the start for now,” he thinks to himself. He wouldn’t dare say that out loud.
As he’s scanning, he notices a familiar name.
Y/L/N,Y/F/I
MVC
West 12
He freezes. He thinks to himself there is no way that this is the same Y/L/N he was…used to be married to.
Dana comes back to the station cautiously. She can see his gears turning. “Fuck” she thinks.
“Jack,” she starts. Not wanting to cause a scene here.
Jack closes his eyes and sighs. That’s all the confirmation he needed.
“Dana, please don’t tell me she’s here. Please don’t tell me she’s here and no one told me,” he says calmly while his heart starts picking up pace.
“She asked me not to say anything,” she tried to soften the blow
“Bullshit,” he scoffs as he looks around the floor. “Where’s Robby?”
Dana looks down, absolutely not wanting to be involved in the argument that’s about to follow.
When Jack realizes the extent of what the hell was going on as he makes his way to West 12. With each step he grows less angry and more anxious, like his legs could give out at any moment. He doesn’t know how bad it is. It’s also been 3 years since the divorce. 3 years since they’ve spoken to each other. 3 years of him wanting to call her everyday, but knowing he shouldn’t.
Jack busts through the doors as Robby has continued X-rays and ultrasounds. You can’t see who has walked in, as Robby was blocking the door, but you are just assuming it's another nurse as Whitaker keeps ordering labs and scans.
When Robby finally turns you make eye contact with Jack and freeze. Neither of you move. Neither of you talk. The room somehow grows even colder.
Robby begins to speak. “...Jack-,” he starts.
Jack puts his hand up. He doesn’t want to hear it at all. Not now, that doesn’t matter now.
Santos and Whitaker exchange glances and make up some excuse to exit the room that no one really heard.
Robby slowly follows, putting his hand on Jack’s shoulder as he leaves, tapping it twice as if to say, “I’m sorry” and “Find me if you need me”.
It’s now just you and Jack. Silent and staring at each other from across the room as if you’d entered a staring contest. You didn’t even know what to say.
“Hi,” is all you can choke out.
Jack stares at the floor and quietly scoffs. “That’s really all you have to say?” He grabs your chart at the foot of the bed.
“Hey, you aren’t my doctor you can’t just grab my chart,” you try and joke.
He isn’t in a laughing mood, not in the slightest. “You were in an accident and tried to hide from me,” he starts.
“I am literally fine,” you groan for what feels like the 100th time. “I didn’t even know I was coming here it all happened so fast I would have-,”
“Would have what?” he interrupted. “Asked them to take you somewhere else?”
You grow quiet, knowing that you probably would have. You weren’t ready to face him again. You were never going to be ready.
“Jack-,” you begin.
“I have missed you…so much,” he chokes. “I always want to call you after every shift to update you on literally the smallest things, but I knew that you hated me so I-,”
“Woah,” you cut in. “Hate? Jack, I don't hate you. I have never hated you,” You were kind of surprised he felt this way
Jack blinks at you.
“You served me divorce papers and ran away to New York…” he states. “...And you don’t hate me?”
