The Way This Made My Heart Ache Sm😭

the way this made my heart ache sm😭

I Hate You, Be My Girlfriend: The Finale (Damian Wayne x Reader)

Word Count: Way too long (jk it's about 7267)

Warnings: Minor cussing

Summary: After a fight with Damian, you realize you have to come to terms with the fact that he doesn't love you, until something comes along and makes you realize he might.

France was even more gorgeous than you had expected it to be. Google images regrettably did not do the country justice and neither did your phone, but that didn’t stop you from snapping as many pictures and videos as you could in order to preserve the memory.

Yet, despite all of the wonderful scenery and the fantastic food and the exceptional people, the best part - hands down - had to be waking up in the arms of Damian fucking Wayne for the past few days. The first night - and subsequently the following morning - you were neatly tucked into his side at an arm’s reach away. It was a warm but hesitant touch, a subtle ask for something more. Days passed and suddenly instead of the tentative touch you woke up to, you found yourself sprawled out on Damian’s bare chest with his arms tightly wrapped around you.

As if he was as desperately in love with you, the small cavernous side of your mind echoed. The thought was quickly shaken away. Despite Damian becoming more affectionate, his attitude remained like a stubborn piece of gum glued to a shoe. No matter how many times he held the warmth of your hand or gave you a gentle smile, it never seemed anything more than to save face and - at most - simple kindness. That did not ease the drumming ache of your heart, and you could only beg to the most benevolent Gods that he couldn’t hear it while he held you.

The morning beams leaked out of the windows of the hotel room, spraying you both with warmth. A husked groan escaped Damian’s lips, his head tilting to escape the blinding light. Most of his raven morning hair fell flat without the immense gel he used with some strands sticking up. His glazed-over gaze caught yours, the hazy emerald color melting into your own, making you feel naked in a snowstorm.

“How do you always end up sprawled out all over me by the morning?” He mumbled, tugging at the silk sheets to cover more of his body.

“You’re the one cuddling me, Dami.” You quickly pointed out, loving the way he casually rolled his eyes but didn’t let go.

“How dare you, I refuse to call this cuddling.”

“Then what would you like to call this?” You pouted.

Damian began to draw soft circles and other miscellaneous shapes into your skin, his hands slightly calloused for inexplicable reasons. Being this close to him, you could make out the constellations of scars scattered along his body, the feathered birthmark near his collarbone that almost resembled a bird, the slight tint of crimson darkening his cheeks. It was weird being this close to your crush and part of you was close to pinching yourself to wake up from this fantasy.

“Why does this need a name? I feel like that would ruin the rapport of it, don’t you think?” He questioned gently. His hardened eyes studied you, analyzing your reaction. Damian could probably see the way your eyes widened - could feel the quickening of your heart as it pumps blood to your face as it nodded in agreement. But if he did hear or notice any of those things, he didn’t mention it. He simply stared down at you.

“I um…” You gulped. “Are you excited for the bachelor party? You’ll get a break from me for once.” You let out a yawn, rolling off Damian’s chest and taking the blankets with you. Despite it being Summer time in France, the early mornings were not kind.

“Meh, not really.” Damian groaned and got up along with you to presumably get his clothes for the day. “I think I’m beginning to enjoy your company and I really don’t feel like being at a bar for five hours listening to my brothers act like Neanderthals.”

You failed to hold back your laughter listening to Damian continue to complain about his family. Even when it came to minor things like this, Damian always argued with immense zeal. It had to be a double edged sword, both one of his greatest strengths and one of his greatest faults.

Your heart fluttered at this idea - well, not of the idea itself - but because of the meaning behind it. You were getting closer to Damian, he wanted your company. Compared to a few weeks ago, he would have scoffed at the idea of even being close to your vicinity but now everything has changed.

But as soon as that glimpse of hope burst in, it popped instantly. This was all just a game to Damian, a façade he has put on to not show any weaknesses to his family. What was going on between you - the cuddling, hand holding, and soft kisses - was not anything special like how you dreamed. It was merely an act, the same one he would use at galas or any other public events. None of this meant anything to him because he didn’t love you.

The thoughts continued to get worse and worse, the idea of Damian being affectionate because it meant nothing killed your mood. Suddenly, a bachelorette party didn’t seem as fun anymore even if it was in Bordeaux. Looking back at the bed, it seemed way more comfortable than it did prior, but then you remembered the way Damian held you and another rush of regret seeped its way into your pores.

You scolded yourself for letting this get to you. Afterall, you knew from the very beginning that there was a high probability of you getting hurt. You were so swept up by the projected romance that you forgot that this was real life; Damian wouldn’t fall in love with you and after the wedding is over, he will most likely go back to avidly hating you.

“Are you okay?” You turned behind you, catching the sight of Damian who had pulled on a tight forest green sweater and dark gray slacks all complimented with a black coat. He had worn these kinds of clothes before, so you wonder why your heart is beating faster than ever.

You clutched your clothes tighter in your grasp. “I-I’m fine…”

Damian squinted his eyes. It was obvious he didn’t believe what you told him. “Are you sure? You seem so…finicky this morning.”

You swiftly tried to escape the conversation, trying to hurry your way to the bathroom to change. “I guess I’m just a little nervous for the wedding. There’s going to be a lot of people so…”

Damian’s hand cut you off from entering the bathroom. “Tell me what’s actually going on.”

Fine. If he was being stubborn you may as well be too. “Why do you care all of a sudden? I thought you didn’t like me much.”

You tried to play off the comment as a half joke, thinking that he would laugh along with you. You weren’t expecting the borderline horrified look he gave you instead. His eyebrows knit in confusion and his jaw tightened, giving you enough time to slightly move his hand and enter the bathroom and change.

“Why do you keep thinking I hate you?” Damian’s voice was outside the doorway. His voice sounded like he accidentally stepped on his dog’s foot or his cat’s tail. Again, you weren’t expecting this reaction. Was he not the one who said he hated you? Did he not relentlessly tease you whenever you talked?

“What, are you saying that you don’t?”

“Yes. That is exactly what I am saying. Don’t be a fucking idiot.” This time, his voice seemed more agitated as if it was a ridiculous thought to have. A cloud of confusion permeated through your mind, refusing to leave and causing you to go silent. What were you supposed to say to that? Was this not a contradiction to how he acted 98 percent of the time you knew him?

Damian was standing a few feet away when you walked out. “Of course, you’re just going to act like an immature baby about things.” He stepped closer to you with an all too familiar glare. “What is the problem? We were fine a few minutes ago.”

“I don’t understand you, Damian! One minute you are charming and nice, and then the next you sling insults at me!” You snapped. “And then you act surprised when I assume you hate me?”

The intense glare you received made your skin crawl. His mouth opened once, twice, only to quickly shut. For the first time since you knew him, he was speechless.

“It’s not like you actually love me.” You continued, voice quieter and abnormally cold.

You attempted another laugh but it came off sounding like a sad sob. It was a last resort to cover up the pain you felt, a nervous tick, a bad habit. Laughing was easier than admitting how much rejection hurt. It felt like being shoved into an operating chair and having a knife rip you apart until there was nothing left. Not even hope for a miracle.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Damian could not believe his ears; he wasn’t sure if he wanted to break down into tears or scream in a furious rage. The latter seemed more tempting. You looked like a wounded puppy, like he had kicked you and left you out on the street during a cold winter to starve.

“I…what?” He stuttered.

It’s not like you actually love me…

The words sounded so disdainful…so frigid, the exact opposite of your optimistic personality. It startled him, left him scrambling for a reason - a reason for why it hurt, a reason for why you were hurt, a reason why this was happening in the first place.

It was ridiculous, really. Damian had fought against hundreds of villains with only his sword and his brain. If it weren’t for his wits and natural skill, he would have been long dead and buried six feet under. So why, why was it that he failed to properly articulate what he wanted to say to you?

Never in his life did Damian regret his actions more than he did now. The way your eyes sparkled with tears, how your hands crossed your chest and your legs shaked - he wanted nothing more than to be the one who comforted you, to make up for the way he treated you. Alas, he failed to actually say what was on his mind.

“You don’t actually love me.” You repeated, once again trying to laugh, but he can tell it wasn’t sincere. “That is the whole joke of this situation.”

“Shut up, Y/n. You don’t even know what you are talking about.” He said, although he wasn’t really sure why. For most of the time he knew you, he assuredly did not love you at all. He would swear by it. Other than his love for animals and the cursed blood that pumped through him, you were one of the few constants he had in his life. Every single time he saw you he got lightheaded and felt like he was under some watered down version of Joker’s laughing gas, but now that he was forced to be near you, he had grown to enjoy the feeling you gave him. It became something he would willingly flight for.

Whilst he wasn’t sure why, Damian wanted you more than anything; more than his father’s cowl, more than a pet turtle named Michelangelo, more than a cookie from Alfred.

“I mean, it’s true. You would never love someone like me, not in a hundred years.”

And there it was. The same stomach churning feeling he got whenever he did something overtly terrible to you. It made him want to take a dagger and plunge it into his heart, maybe that would stop the terrible ache it gave.

“But what if I did?” Damian blurted. “What if I really, truly did and I was just a dumbass and didn’t realize it before. Is it really impossible for you to believe that I might?”

“Well…” You took a step back, and then another, eyes twitching and breath heavy. “T-that…that wouldn’t…it wouldn’t…”

Damian noticed how you were on the verge of crying, with your lip trembling and fingers fraying the sides of your sweater. It irritated him; all of this was because of his behavior, because he was not enough, because he couldn't unravel the strange feelings that lingered in his gut.

“Why are you crying?” He immediately bit his lip, realizing how harsh that sounded. What he meant to say was Why aren’t you smiling at me? What can I do to make you smile?

You grabbed the key card for the shared room off the table, wiping away the few tears that slid across your cheeks. “Doesn’t matter…” You replied. “Let’s just ignore that this conversation happened and get breakfast.”

Despite wanting to say so much more - to argue about how it was unfeasible for him to hate you - all Damian could do was exhale and follow you to the breakfast area.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Breakfast was an absolute disaster. Considering that this was the first argument you and Damian had, it managed to ruin the mood for a majority of the afternoon. The rest of his family could tell that there was some sort of miscommunication between the two of you as well. The frequent jokes and remarks you two made were replaced with depressing silence and forlorn glances.

Damian still could not grasp the idea of you thinking he hated you. He was determined to make it up to you since he now considered your opinion of him of the utmost importance, but no matter how many times he attempted to apologize you would shoot him down. He couldn’t even tell if you were angry with him since you just stared at him with those sad abused puppy dog eyes that always seemed to be a blink away from shedding tears.

It boggled him, absolutely infuriated him to the point where he accidentally snapped at his older siblings and Alfred (who he later apologized to). The idea of him loving you raced through his mind numerous times; the proposal of it felt like greeting an old friend. It was surprising how he was not opposed to the idea in the slightest.

All Damian could think of were the times you were kind to him and saw through him like he was a transparent ghost and how he retaliated with rudeness. He allowed himself to wonder if the whole situation would have been different if he had been kinder to you, only to realize that the likelihood of you being present with him now would be near improbable if he had been.

He cursed under his breath in his mother’s tongue as he often did when he was this upset. It was one of the only few comforts he had at the moment. There were no animals he could hold and pet, no canvases to illustrate his emotions, no criminals to punch into a reddened smoothie. He only had you but he was not sure how he could approach you again. Preferably it would have been tonight but you were both dragged respectively to a bachelor/bachelorette party.

The loud music and excited chatter of his family at the circus themed bar only proved to worsen Damian’s mood. The beating lights that bounced to the music and the steady flow of acrobatic men and women who somersaulted sent Damian’s mind into a dizzying blur. The whoops and cheers next to him did not make his situation any better. He couldn't care less. As important as this night was for Dick, he would have preferred to not be there at all.

“What’s got you scowling like that, lil D?” Dick yelled across the huge bar table, his face flushed and eyes dilated to the point where the ocean in them expanded into a black sea.

“He’s having girl issues, Dick!” Tim remarked. “He probably said something really shitty to Y/n and has no idea how to say sorry.”

“Hey, I-”

“No fighting at my bachelor party!” Dick slurred. He turned back to him. “What happened, buckaroo?”

Damian cringed at the pet name. It seemed like alcohol reverted Dick back into the ancient youth he was while being Robin. “Don’t you dare call me that again, Grayson.”

“Come on, lil D! Let us help you, I am amazing with women!”

“That’s probably not the best thing to say, Dick.” Jason rolled his eyes. “Regardless, I do think the embarrassed look on Damian is amusing, so please continue.”

Everyone looked to Damian expectantly, all of them raising the iconic eyebrow learned from Alfred. It was a similar stare to the one you gave him, and the sudden thought of you sent another wave of goosebumps along his body, making him feel possessed.

Damian chose his words carefully. He could not just blatantly confess to forcing you into a fake relationship, nor could he ask for help when he didn’t know what to ask help with.

“I don’t think that I am showing enough…affection to Y/n and I…I think she is really hurt about it.” He managed to mumble. “I don’t know how to appease her.”

The stupefied look on his brothers face made his cheeks burn, his eyes furrowing in further annoyance. “Have you tried to flirt with her? Like, walking up to her and giving her a wink. Maybe saying a good pick up line or two with a devilishly sexy smirk?”

“I-” before Damian could argue, he realized that this was Dick he was talking to, and if anyone knew what they were talking about, it would be him. “Out of pure curiosity, what lines do you suggest? Flirting wise.”

The table groaned in unison. “God no, I’m not drunk enough for this.” Jason rolled his eyes. He gestured to one of the laced up women for another drink.

“Well, when Babs and I were still young I used a multitude of different ones.” Dick hiccupped, leaning against the wooden table with a wide grin. “Once I told her that I loved the new adjustments she made on the batgirl costume, but I said that it would look better on my floor. Oh! And there was this other time that I said she was so hot that my zipper was falling for her.”

Dick paused, looking up fondly to the tented color ceiling as if it were replaying those memories like a TV show rerun. It was at this time that Damian realized he should probably be taking notes; although he was confident in his memory, when it came to you, you always found a way to snatch away his words.

“The dirtier the pick up lines, the better!” Dick finished after snapping back into reality. “Oh, and you have to deliver it confidently. Confidence is super sexy! Eventually she’ll see how much you love her and want her if you do it enough.”

He hummed in affirmation, taking a few notes on his phone. Damian realized that the few pick up lines Dick used were so…dirty. Of course, Damian was not a prudish snob when it came to being dirty but the thought of being remotely dirty with you sent his mind once again spiraling like a rollercoaster. Imagining you…with your clothes on the floor…all for him…Holding you underneath the bed and finally kissing your honeyed lips…

The sound of Jason’s low, deep chuckle brought him back to focus. “What’s so funny, Todd?”

“Nothing, nothing. I just think Dick’s advice is absolutely terrible and he will probably realize that once he’s sober.” He turned to his younger brother with a look only the Devil could muster. “Plus, you are terrible at disguising your thoughts.”

“I don’t see you coming up with better advice.” He retaliated.

Jason shrugged and reclined back in his chair as he took another sip of his beer. “I think I’m having more fun laughing at how embarrassed you are. Oh, and don’t take that in a bad way - although I’m sure you will.”

“You are absolutely useless, Todd. I’m sure even Tim could offer better advice than that.”

The said brother tilted his head back with a tired indifference. “I’m lucky that Conner even loves me so I’m not sure I should be one to help. Have you tried to, I don’t know, show your appreciation by paying attention to every single detail of her life and memorizing it so that when asked, you know everything about her?”

There was a deathly pause, everyone at the table looking toward Tim. “That sounds utterly ridiculous…” Still, Damian hastily wrote it down in his notes anyway, just in case it proved to be useful. He doubted it though, since he knew almost everything about you like the back of his hand.

“It worked for me.” Tim said with yet another shrug. “Just make sure she doesn’t notice you doing it or else she will get really really weirded out.”

Damian wrote Watch her every move in his notes the same time a dark shadow stalked towards him. Looking up, Damian saw the tired yet content face of his father next to him, glancing at his phone.

“Sorry I’m late. I had to deal with another Killer Croc rampage.” His father’s voice was coarse and gruff with age, his chin clear of any stubble and his eyes an icy blue.

Dick stood up, his feet wobbly, to embrace Bruce. Although this was not a common occurrence, the two men embraced each other similar to how one would grasp a lifesaver. “I almost thought you wouldn’t come. I’m so glad you could make it, Dad.”

The two broke away almost as soon as it happened. “Good timing too. We’re all trying to help Damian with the girl he’s with.”

Damian’s face burned a bright crimson, matching the colors of the circus uniforms as they swayed by, giving him the appearance of drunkenness. He forced his cheeks to remain neutral despite the need to break out into a goofy smile at the mere mention of your existence.

Sitting down next to him, his father gave a thoughtful hum. “I’m not the best with women but-“

“Father, you have nothing to add to this conversation.” Bruce almost looked offended, frowning as he closed his mouth.

“That’s…fair.” He said eventually.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was really late at night when all the girls returned to Des Quinconces after the bachelorette party. Busy chatter filled the empty air with melodic excitement as the party filed into Barbara’s room. Everyone had decided to have a huge sleep over the night before the wedding, spurred on by Stephanie and a few of the newer arrivals. It was a sigh of relief to you, since you weren’t sure you could handle a meeting with Damian at the moment.

You were still visibly upset with the argument you had with Damian, and since you had spent this whole trip with him exclusively (and with very few meetings with his family since he was still paranoid they will catch on to the act), it was even worse being without him for this long. You already began to miss his witty comments and the friendly debates, but most of all, you missed the brief smile he gave you. Witnessing it was like finding a double rainbow after heavy rain or pinpointing a shooting star in the night sky. Without him, there were no double rainbows or shooting stars - just a gloomy night sky saturated in monochrome.

As the cluster of girls made their way up the stairs, you dragged behind like a fish poop, wondering how to salvage things with Damian before the trip was over. When expressing the problem to the rest of the group (albeit carefully so it doesn’t seem suspicious) they suggested a plethora of things ranging from making him jealous, giving him the silent treatment, and or seducing him. Despite being told by one of the girls, Kor’i, that she could probably find another guy for the scheme, it felt impossible to make Damian jealous when there was a multitude of prettier girls at the wedding.

Now that you’re thinking about it, it would be the perfect escape for him. If the two of you broke up during the trip he wouldn’t be questioned about you afterward. You were just a ragdoll after all, a puppet he could use for the sake of not being embarrassed by his family.

The image of Damian’s disappointed and heart-broken face reappeared in your mind. He looked so upset that you assumed he hated you, as if this whole trip was not a huge, perfectly photo-shopped picture. Was it because you were assuming the absolute worst of him?

Another idea crossed your mind: What if he loved you? What if you magically made him succumb to the same feelings he gave you?

Perhaps the reason why he was so hurt was because the tenderness he showed you was out of something close to love and your rejection of it angered him. Or perhaps this was you once again wishing for a miracle, hoping for something that would prevent you from the massive heartbreak you would undoubtedly endure.

Despite the earlier conversation pointing to the former, you just could not push aside the year or so of bickering that led to this moment. As you laid your head down for the night, you concluded that the best course of action was to stick with the original plan: Pretend to be Damian’s girlfriend until the trip is over. Once it is over, you may as well get over him as well. There was no use wishing for a miracle.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The day of the wedding arrived with the breaking of an egg yolk, the sun peering over the horizon as if it too was not ready. Gathering whatever was left of your excited energy, you did your best to help Barbara and everyone else get ready. The whole room was a technicolor war zone with different colored dresses and materials scattered carelessly.

Stephanie and Cassandra took care of Barbara for the most part, assuring her that Dick wouldn’t walk out, giving you time to look for the dress you stored away for the event. Originally, Damian wanted to be there with you to pick out the dress so that it matched his, but you thankfully were able to keep it a surprise until now. Looking at it, a wave of bittersweetness washed over you, like the taste of dark chocolate melting on your tongue. You wondered if the dress was too bold, or if it would even fit you correctly without it making you look like an unfinished sketch.

Whatever it did, it was too late to turn back now.

You caught a glimpse of yourself in the bathroom mirror, trying to picture how Damian would react. You wanted a reason to look pretty, to try and attract and beguile him. Now it seemed like any other piece of clothing you owned, just with a bit more frills and lace. The magic was gone.

“Wow, you look beautiful!” Stephanie walked in with a grin, her perfect blonde hair curling like a lion’s mane. “I told Damian to wait for you downstairs, he looks pretty decent. We’ll meet you there.”

She winked, dragging you out of the bathroom and pulling you out of the door. “Stepha-”

Your fate was already sealed when the door slammed closed. You sighed, turning back around. Worry and hesitance consumed your body, eating away like moths to old fabric. Alfred was at the bottom of the stairs, seemingly talking to the youngest Wayne. At least he hadn’t noticed you yet; it made the 1,000 mile journey down more doable.

Taking one last gasp of air, you painted a happy expression on your countenance and trudged onward. It didn’t take long for Damian to notice you, he always did, the glimmer in his eyes drawing you in further.

He was smiling

No, wait…He was smirking at you.

“Ah, it is good to see you Miss L/n, right on time.” Alfred nodded at you then turned to Damian once more. “I trust you will keep our conversation in mind?”

“Of course.” When you were within reach, he extended his hand and palmed yours. Warmth flooded your senses. It only worsened when he brought your hand to his lips and planted a kiss that was as gentle as a bird’s wings.

His forest eyes connected with yours, and it was then that you noticed how amazing he was dressed. It was a normal black suit with a dark green undershirt, the cuffs of the suit embellished with a golden W. His hair was slicked back as usual, no bedhead in sight. There was no trace of sadness or anger in his face from the argument yesterday.

“Beloved, you look…absolutely stunning, ravishing even.”

“I-I…” You stuttered. “Thank you, Dami.”

You walked to the sleek black rental car, his hand in yours the whole way through. The noisy, busy street dissipated as you were enveloped in the quietness of the vehicle.

Damian shifted in his seat, buckling in and smiling back at you. “Are you ready to go, my love?”

Not trusting your ability to speak, you simply nodded. The already tight dress now seemed constricting. Silence filled the car with only the grinding of tires against the ground serving as music. You squirmed around, doing your best to make yourself comfortable.

Damian cleared his throat. “Beloved…I…I wanted to apologize for how I have treated you, not just for yesterday, but for every other time too.”

“Oh, I…” Your mind grasps for a response. “Don’t um, don’t worry about it.”

His mouth twists in a thin line, pushing on the break at the red light. He reaches for your hands again, eyes heavy with an unfamiliar emotion. “I mean it, Y/n…I should have been kinder to you.”

When he was not met with an answer, he continued hastily. “I noticed yesterday that your eyes did not have the same fiery glint in them as they usually did when we were together. You also only smiled twice that day compared to the minimum of 32 every other day. I-It made me realize how much your happiness means to me.”

The kaleidoscope of butterflies returned with gusto, a genuine smile fighting its way on your face. “That’s...oddly specific.”

Nevertheless, you couldn’t help but giggle; whether the numbers he used were accurate or not, it showed how he actually cared. This reaction seemed to vex Damian.

“If you aren’t going to take me seriously, I’ll have to pin you against a wall until you start to listen.” He grumbled.

“Wh-what?!”

His smirk reappeared, this time evidently victorious as if he took a gamble and won. “You heard me.”

"I'm not sure if I did...the Damian I know wouldn't blatantly flirt with me like that." "But how could I not flirt with you when you look so pretty all flustered for me?" He teased.

The wedding venue broadened along the horizon, revealing a gorgeous sectioned off garden or…was it a park? You weren’t able to tell. Cars were parked all along the perimeter, an ocean of people filling into the area.

“That’s a lot of people…” You exclaimed. “I thought you said this was going to be a small event?”

“Trust me, my family knows way more people than those who are at the wedding.” Damian pulled into the allotted parking area, flashing his ID to one of the valet members.

“`That doesn’t really help, Dami.” You looked into the mirror and played with your appearance. “I’m not sure how well my acting will be around so many people.”

He turned off the engine of the car, clicking his seatbelt and grabbing the keys. “The solution is simple then. Just don’t pretend anymore.”

It was almost as if Cupid himself pierced your heart with one of his infamous arrows, making you fall deeper into the pit you created for yourself. You were 100 percent certain that Damian knew the effect he had on you if his smug grin were anything to go by, serving to only worsen your sheepishness. He was flirting with you as if it were second nature, as if he wanted to draw out this side of you.

All worries of him loving you or not vanished as smooth as a sunset. When he opened the door for you, there was no hesitance; you swiftly took your place beside him. Two perfect puzzles placed next to each other, both their own picture but when put together, make an even more beautiful picture. Damian threw the keys to the valet attendant.

The summer sun felt delicious on your exposed skin. Living in Gotham, days like these were as rare as gold and twice as valuable. Fresh grass and the exuberant amount of irises and lilacs intoxicated your senses. Most of the people seemed to be seated in the white pews.

“May I ask why you are acting all flirty and endearing all of a sudden? Not that I’m complaining or anything, I just want to know what kind of trouble you are planning on getting me into.” Damian’s grip tightened.

“Who’s to say I want to get you in trouble? What if I was just being honest with you for once?” He questioned.

He leaned in closer, breath fanning against your ear, his hair tickling your skin. “Maybe after tonight I want to call you mine.”

You blinked. “Uh…”

“Is…did that not work?” Damian glanced at his phone then back at you, tilting his head and squinting. “Dick told me that would work. Why is- Are you not falling madly in love with me right now?”

“Damian, what are you talking about?” You said, just as bewildered as him.

Damian’s face contorted, green eyes tearing away from yours. “I wanted to make up for hurting you all those times. I thought that if I did that then…”

A pale visage, eyes darting everywhere but to yours - his facade was breaking right in front of you. A sigh emanated from his lips, broken and cracked. “My family…they made me realize-”

“Damian?!” A booming voice followed with a sudden gust of wind cut him off. “I haven’t seen you in so long!”

A similarly aged boy rushed in to give the Wayne a tight hug; he had swirly black hair and pale skin, his eyes a baby blue. He was a few inches taller than Damian as well.

“You have terrible timing, Jon.” Damian complained.

The man, Jon, pulled away from him but kept his arm slung around his shoulders.

“Ah, sorry. Sometimes I get carried away.” He beamed. “My name’s Jon! And you are?”

You attempted to speak but Damian cut you off before you could. “She’s my girlfriend, Y/n.”

Jon’s eyes widened, turning to the other with a gasp. “You got a girlfriend and didn’t tell me?!”

“We’re pretty new, Jon. I didn’t want to make her feel overwhelmed.”

You raised an eyebrow to Damian, who did not seem to have a problem changing the agreed upon story.

“I-I..er…it’s nice to meet you, Jon!” You finally said. The smile you gave felt like a cheap knock-off in the presence of Jon, who resembled more of a golden retriever.

“We should go, beloved. I’m afraid my brothers are probably waiting for us.” Damian tried to tug on the sleeve of your dress while you were in mid conversation with Jon. He gave you a needy whine.

“Oh, alright then.” Jon said. “See you later?”

“Yeah, maybe.” Damian replied, hand now in yours.

The two of you weaved your way towards the saved seats near the front of a flower woven arch. Familiar people greeted you and Damian, ranging from Rachel and Kara (who you met yesterday) to newer people named Conner and Wally. They all seemed nice enough, but your mind couldn’t maintain the same level of focus it usually did. How could it be when Damian was acting like a clingy, jealous boyfriend?

Not only that, but the conversation beforehand seemed to be leading to a teary eyed confession. Whether it be a confession of love or of just remorse, you weren’t sure. You desperately wanted to believe that it was the former of course. It felt natural being beside him. Acting as a couple didn’t feel as fake as it did prior, causing a flurry of bubbling adulation.

You imagined taking your place in the pews during the wedding for weeks now, imagined what it would be like to watch two people vow their love for eternity and beyond. Music began and the remaining people who were ambling about quickly found their seats.

Dick was in the front with a charming navy suit, his face twisted in a nervous smile. The pastor was a woman with flowing black hair that towered over the bridegroom.

The traditional marriage song began and suddenly Cassandra emerged, twirling and leaping with a basket of purple petals, tossing them in the air like glitter. Her dress was a little longer than a ballerina’s and her hair was accented with white flowers. The laws of physics seemed defied as Cass made her way across the aisle as if wings sprouted from her back.

Barbara made her way across the aisle with her father, her mermaid dress trailing behind her. She was absolutely stunning and she knew it. Dick’s face broke out into a goofy smile, fidgeting with the collar of his suit. Babs took her place next to Dick and the ceremony began.

You couldn’t help imagining yourself in Bab’s place, exchanging words of affection with the love of your life. Your eyes dragged to the person next to you. You were met with his eyes staring into yours, a blush dusting his face as if he could read your mind.

“Richard Grayson, do you take Barbara Gordon to be your wedded wife, to live together in marriage? Do you promise to love her, comfort her, honor and keep her for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health, and forsaking all others, be faithful only to her, for as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.” Dick said, his voice straining.

“Barbara Gordon, do you take Richard Grayson to be your wedded husband to live together in marriage? Do you promise to love him, comfort him, honor and keep him for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health and forsaking all others, be faithful only to him so long as you both shall live?” The woman asked.

“I do.” She answered quickly.

“Well then, I happily pronounce you husband and wife! You may now kiss the bride!” Applause erupted from the crowd as Dick pulled Barbara into his arms for a sentimental kiss.

Your applause was cut short by Damian, who attempted to drag you to the far side of the venue. You laughed as you tried to run in the heels you wore.

“Damian, I swear you are trying to kill me. What was that for?” You asked out of breath, fighting a giggle fit.

“I’ve been trying to talk to you for the past hour and a half and I am not in the mood for anyone else to interrupt it.” He softly grabbed your wrist, creating a mere few inches of distance.

“My family made me realize that I…” He took a deep breath. “They made me realize how much I care for you. The time we have spent together it’s been…it’s been one of the most enjoyable weeks of my life.”

“That’s really sweet, Damian. I’m glad we have grown to be friends.” You nuzzled into his chest.

“I, no. That’s not…” Damian huffed out of exasperation. “I don’t want to just be friends with you, Y/n. I want to be more than that. I want what we have in the late nights and early mornings when it’s just us. Not because I am afraid of what my family will say, but because you make me a better person and I long to be the one who makes you smile.”

The bomb that had been slowly ticking down to its demise finally went off, a glorious bombardment of color and sparks that hazed your mind like a Fourth of July Night.

“You…want me?”

“More than anything, Y/n. That’s why I got so upset yesterday…I was upset at myself for making you think I hated you when I didn’t.” The confession felt as soft as an everlasting Spring breeze, a promise to love during the blazing heat and decaying cold. His finger tilted your head up so you could look up at him. There was no mask hiding away his feelings, it was plain to see that he meant every word.

“I’ve had a crush on you for a long while, Dami. I- God, I’ve fantasized about you saying that to me for months. I’m sorry for assuming you hated me..it was more of a defense mechanism than anything.”

“Oh really?” He leaned in closer with his iconic smug smile. “What else did you fantasize, beloved?”

You gulped. “Kissing…maybe?”

You gave him your best version of a puppy eyed stare.

“Do you want me to let you in on a secret, Y/n?” When you nodded, he said “I don’t think I could ever deny you when you look at me like that.”

In a blink of an eye, Damian’s lips pressed to yours and it only took you a moment of processing for you to kiss back. There were no fireworks, sparkles or any other bombardments as usually described in the romance books you read. Just the simple warmth you shared.

Breaking away, you became aware of where you were and part of you felt bad for missing the immediate celebration. Barbara had her back to an array of women and some men, about to throw her bouquet of lilies. In front of it all was Tim’s boyfriend, Conner, who looked like he would shoot down anyone if he did not get the flowers. As she threw the bouquet, she managed to throw it towards the pews where Jason was sitting idly on his phone, effectively hitting him in the face and landing in his lap.

Jason stared at his lap for a few seconds, confused. He looked to the crowd and spotted Conner, throwing them in his direction.

“Mine!” He yelled, catching the bouquet with almost inhumane speed. “Hey, Timmy! Wanna head to Vegas and get married?”

Tim stared at his boyfriend, shaking his head with a flustered smile.

“I’m sad that we’ll have to leave in a day…It would have been nice to go to Champs Elysée and Place de l’etoile.”

Damian briefly spun you around so you were facing him again. “Who’s to say we can’t do that still?”

“You’re Dad and Alfred? They said we’d be going back to Gotham the day after the wedding?”

He hummed. “Too bad I’ll have to tell them we’ll be staying for another week so I can take you everywhere else you want to go to in France.”

“You what?”

“Is that a yes?” He asked. “I was hoping to take you to Paris for a date.”

“I- Yes! Of course it’s a yes, Damian!”

“Oh that’s good, because I already booked everything and I’d hate for it to go to waste.” He smiled at you like a complete dork.

“Hell yeah! Time for crab stuffed mushrooms and a huge ciambellone!” Dick hollered, Barbara in his arms.

The huge crowd seemed to be making their way to their cars, petals still drifting in the air.

Your stomach growled.

“I am starving, come on! Let’s go so we don’t have to deal with a ridiculous line for food!” You exclaimed, this time dragging Damian to his car. Your giddy laughter filled the air like a melody.

Damian couldn’t help but smile broadly. “Alright, beloved."

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD I AM DONE WITH THIS. Don't get me wrong, I had a blast with this series, but I had no idea that this final part would take this long to write. I had thought that I would have enough time to finish it on Wednesday, not realizing I would write another 5k words.

The writing towards the end is probably not as good as the beginning because I had a little bit of a hard time. Still, I hope you guys liked the ending. There was so much more I wanted to add to it too, but my writing juices were thoroughly squeezed and I didn't want to push it back further.

TAGLIST: @greenkiki, @lorosette, @noah-uhhh-what, @vanessa-boo, @herascave, @celestair, @trashmouthsahra, @littlemiss-nightshade and @itzstaticrainbow

love affair. [tsukishima kei x f!reader] chapter three.

>>The unsavory reputation that Tsukishima Kei has built for himself as the Sendai Frogs' rudest rookie puts his upcoming contract renewal at risk

Tsukki really needs a girlfriend, and you really need everyone to stop calling you his pathetic, pining best friend<<

series status: [complete]

previous. || masterlist.

a/n: dont talk to me about that scene after he wakes up and gets angry in her bed okay dont fucking talk to me about it,,,,, that was the filthiest non-smut scene ive ever written

[feel free to buy me a cup of coffee!]

---------------------------------------

Kei stays at your apartment until the end of the semester.

He goes home a couple times a week, of course – he has to do laundry, and he and Yamaguchi have a pre-set Tuesday night plan of sitting on the couch and playing video games until it’s late enough that Tadashi almost always sleeps through his first class on Wednesdays.

But… he somehow finds himself in your bed every other night of the week.

The first two weeks or so, he comes up with excuses.

‘ It’s getting cold, and your heating hasn’t kicked in yet. ’

‘ If I go home this late, it’ll wake Yamaguchi. ’

‘ We’re going out in the morning, anyway. It only makes sense. ’

He does it until, one morning, you roll over and lean your chin on his chest, looking up at him with those doe eyes he likes so much.

‘ You do realize I’ve already agreed to let you keep staying here, right? We talked about it that first morning.’

He’d remembered. He just hadn’t been sure if you’d meant it. But since you’d brought it up again, he’d stopped asking. He’d just allowed himself to get used to falling asleep and waking up next to you.

It makes sleeping on his own for two nights a week utter hell. He can’t get to sleep no matter what he tries. The only thing that works is falling asleep on a video call with you, like a stupid, lovesick teenager. He’s terrified you’ll tell Kiyoko, who would immediately tell Yamaguchi, who would never let him live it down. But it seems you’re just as shy about it, about the fact that you’ve become dependent on each other to do something as simple as sleep.

And sleep is all you do. He’s never dared to cross a line with you in bed. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t try anything, not there, and he’s stuck to it. He lets himself kiss you stupid on the couch before bed, and in your kitchen when you make him coffee before class, and against the wall of your bathroom when your outfit and makeup look a little too good on you.

But never in bed. It’s too tempting – you’re too tempting. And you have no fucking clue.

You just prance around your apartment in those stupid little shorts, with your stupid little smile and that stupid little way you say his name–

‘ Tsukki!’, your giggle excited and your eyes bright.

‘Hey, Tsukki-’, your tone distracted while you sort through mail.

‘Tsukki…’, your eyes wide and your voice whiny while you ask him for something.

It drives him crazy. It makes him want to grab your face and kiss the pout right off your mouth. It makes him want to buy and do anything you want, even when you want nothing at all. It makes him want to whisper your name and admit things that he shouldn’t.

But nothing makes him want to do any of those things more than when you say his name properly, with a little edge in your voice.

‘ Tsukishima.’ , your hands on your hips and your eyebrows arched in annoyance.

‘I swear, Tsukishima- ’, your breath sharp and shallow because you’re stopping yourself from picking a fight.

‘ Tsukishima… ’, your lips close and your eyes twinkling with amusement, because you remember the things he’d been drunk enough to admit at that party.

When the syllables of his name stack in your mouth like that, he’s overcome with thoughts that one should never have about a friend. Thoughts of pinning you up against the wall and daring you to say his name like that again. Thoughts of bending you over the side of the couch and showing you just how in charge you really are. Thoughts of kissing you in that tiny bed, and then making you cry in it, your face buried in the sheets and his name – ‘ Tsukki, please- ’ – whined so prettily.

But he doesn’t do any of that. He just watches you use his name in that scolding, reprimanding way, and he smiles. He sits there and smiles and pretends that every fiber of his very being isn’t aching to show you how to use that smart ass mouth of yours.

And yet, despite the torture, he stays. He stays, waking up next to you every morning and enduring the pain of your presence, and he has no idea why. Maybe it’s the way you hum to yourself while you make breakfast and wince when your coffee’s too hot, because it somehow always is. Maybe it’s the way you think aloud when you do chores, your grocery list rattled off while you stand in the corner folding laundry. Maybe it’s the way you gravitate toward him as if on some biological clock, every half hour marked by your fingers combing through his hair while he works or your arms wrapping around him from behind while he’s putting his shoes on to leave for practice.

Maybe it’s the way you treat him exactly the same but completely different.

You’re the girl he’s always known, rolling those pretty little eyes and telling him without hesitation when he’s being an idiot. You still judge him when he says stupid shit, and you’re still strong about your boundaries and your ability to hold a grudge. But… something’s different.

You sit closer lately, your legs draped over his knee and your side pressed against his. You let him kiss you even when you’re mad, and sometimes – sometimes — that’s all it takes to get you to forgive him. You call him on your way home from class – not because you have anything specific to say, but because you simply feel like talking his ear off while you walk.

He’s not sure which of these things is the reason he stays, but he thinks about every single one. He thinks about them, and he seeks them out. He calls you on the days that you forget to call him yourself. He takes his headphones off if he sees you go into the kitchen, because the chance of hearing you hum off-key is high. He gravitates to you when you’re too immersed in work to pay attention to him, his body draping over yours. He pulls you into the spot between his legs when you watch TV, because sometimes, having your legs hooked over his knee isn’t enough. Sometimes, he wants your back against his chest and your thighs in his hands, your head against his shoulder and your breathing synchronized with his own.

God, he thinks he’s obsessed with you.

Maybe that’s why – on Friday nights, when Yamaguchi and Kiyoko come over – his roommate always looks at him a little too long, the freckled boy staring in suspicion. Tadashi plays along with Kiyoko’s jokes about the two of you, but his eyes are always narrowed when no one’s looking, a knowing smirk tugging at his lips before he looks away. And, when Kei inevitably mumbles that he’ll be staying the night instead of going home with Yamaguchi, maybe that’s why his roommate always meets his eyes evenly, like he’d been expecting it.

Maybe that’s why, on a Saturday morning in mid-December, he finally gets tired of watching your body insecurity get in the way of everything. In the way of that stupid little smile he’s starting to fall for, in the way of the sweet way you say his name. In the way of you seeing how painfully obvious it is that he’s obsessed with you.

It’s that Saturday morning in mid-December that he finally loses his mind, in that tiny bed with you.

–

He wakes on that cold morning to you shifting beside him, wrapped up in his arms. Your back is pressed to his chest, one of his arms wrapped snugly around your middle and the other tucked under your head. You wriggle against him, and, in his half-groggy state, he genuinely wonders if you’re trying to start something with him (later, he chalks that one up to wishful thinking).

You shift again, your hips moving under his arm, and he hums.

“‘s up?” He says, sighing into your hair and pulling you tighter against him. You curve your back protectively when he does, one of your hands coming down on his wrist.

“Uhm,” You mumble. “Can you… Uhm-”

It’s the discomfort in your voice that clues him into the fact that something’s going on with you.

He peels one eye open and examines you, and, when he still doesn’t understand what’s happening, he opens his other eye and lifts his head. You’re holding your phone with one hand, the screen displaying a comment posted under a photo of the two of you.

[8:54 AM] keisgirl : is it me, or is she gaining weight?????

It’s one of the most-liked comments, with the replies underneath it varying from neutral agreement to outright hateful bullshit.

You haven’t realized that he’s seen your phone. “Could you let me go, please?” You ask, in a voice so small and vulnerable that he’s tempted to listen to you. But he doesn’t, because he knows what this is. This is you falling back in on yourself, closing your body off to him because you don’t want him to touch or look at you.

He sits up quickly, ignoring the noise of surprise you make when his arm slides out from under your head. He snatches your phone away and turns his back to you, scrolling through the comments.

“Tsukki-” You say, recovering and sitting up. You press your chest to his shoulder, reaching for your phone, but he just brushes your hand away, shamelessly pulling up the rest of your open tabs. He knows he shouldn’t, but he needs to check.

Unfortunately, he knows you a little too well.

The Trajectory of Frogs’ Tsukishima Kei’s Relationship with Plus-Sized Girlfriend: Will They Last?

Y/l/n Y/n: In Love or Gold-Digging?

How to Lose Weight in Time for the Holidays

30 Pounds in 30 Days: New Diet Takes World by Storm

Kei’s not sure he’s ever been this angry before. He stares emptily down at your phone, finally letting you pluck it out of his open palm. His hands shake just slightly, and he knows you can see them by how still you are.

“ Tsukki, ” You whisper after a moment. “I-”

“Are you out of your mind?” He says, his voice devoid of emotion.

“I just-”

He whirls on you, eyes alight. “Are you out of your mind , Y/n?” He jabs a finger at your phone. “What are you gonna do, starve yourself because of something that someone on the internet said?”

“It’s not just one person,” You argue weakly. “I’ve been gaining wei-”

“So?” He barks. “So what? I can’t tell.”

You roll your eyes, and he actually feels his eye twitch. “I think you’re a little biased, Tsukki-”

“No,” He says. Laughs, because you’re really going to make him lose it this time. “No, I’m not biased. I’m important.” He rips your phone from your hand again, dropping it on the nightstand as he turns in place and climbs over you. “After everything, you still listen to a bunch of shitheads who know nothing about you. And then you call me biased, because I have an accurate fucking opinion about how you look.”

You gasp when he puts a hand on your shoulder, shoving you down on the mattress. He grabs your thighs and pries them open, settling himself between them. “Why did you want me to let you go, Y/n?”

You swallow hard. “I… I don’t know-”

“You didn’t want me to touch you. Why?” He anchors his hands to your waist, dragging you toward him. “Did you think I was suddenly going to change my mind if I could feel your body? That I was going to feel you under my hands and realize that I was repulsed by you? That I only like you with your clothes on, that I hadn’t considered what might be under them? Is that what you were scared of?”

You don’t answer him for a moment, so he grips your hips tight, his thumbs sure to leave prints on your skin later. “Yes,” You whisper finally, shutting your eyes. “I just… don’t feel pretty-”

“Look at me,” He says, a heated sigh leaving him. You don’t, so he tugs on your thighs hard. “ Look at me, Y/n.”

You pry your eyes open, staring into his own with trepidation.

“Now listen to what I’m about to say to you,” He snaps. “Can you do that, for once ? Or are you going to keep acting stupid? Because I’m not in the habit of having stupid friends.”

Your brow furrows in irritation, and he’s glad to see it. He’s glad to see anything that isn’t that haunting insecurity. He sits back on his heels, keeping his eyes locked on yours.

“What you seem to be fundamentally misunderstanding, Y/n-” He growls. “-is the idea that the way you look and the way you’re shaped is something that is, without a doubt, unattractive. You think your body is something that no one would ever want to touch — you don’t seem to fucking comprehend that some people might like the way you feel.”

He squeezes your hips once. “ Some people might like that they can hold you like this – that the more of you that there is, the more that they can hold while they fuck you.” Your face is starting to turn red, and he feels immense pride for it. He anchors himself to you, shifting his weight and dragging you down against his hips, over and over again. “ Some people want to see what your body looks like when it bounces like this, Y/n-” You’re starting to gasp, and Kei’s unable to stop the way his eyes trail down the length of your body while he moves you.

“Some people are obsessed with the idea of making you look like this,” He says, his own breath coming short for a moment. “Because some people want to rail you, and no one could ever look as good getting railed as you would.”

“Tsukki,” You whisper, your chest rising and falling sharply with each gasp. He stops moving you – lets you breathe for just a moment – and slides his hands up your sides, his palms absorbing the heat in your skin while his fingers fan out greedily over your ribs. Your shirt rises with his movement, and he stops when the fabric is bunched up under your breasts. His fingertips skim the skin there, notably missing that lacy underwire that’s always kept him at bay.

He’d noticed that you don’t wear a bra to bed – of course you don’t, that would be unreasonable to expect, even with him here – but fuck, if he isn’t just now realizing what that means. He chews on the inside of his bottom lip, eyeing you hungrily.

The moment to breathe seems to have been enough for you, because your fingers close around his wrists. His first thought is that you’re stopping him from going further, that maybe he should back off. But you don’t push him away.

If anything, your eyes seem glazed over with desire, your breath still coming a little short.

“ Tsukki ,” You breathe, shifting your hips against his carefully — there’s no way you can’t feel how hard he is right now. Your voice is quiet, like before, but now there’s more. More, like you want him to keep talking to you.

He can do that.

“Do you believe me yet?” He says. His voice shakes with his breath, and he swallows hard to hide how you’re affecting him. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

When you don’t answer him this time, he can’t tell if it’s because you really don’t have an answer, or if it’s because you’re fucking with him. Because the way your eyes drag down his body – the way you open your thighs an inch more and press your hips against his gently, an invitation – makes him think you might be fucking with him.

“I’m just,” You mumble, your legs starting to wrap around his waist. “I dunno, Tsukki.”

You must be fucking with him.

“No?” He says, his hands sliding down to hook under your thighs and peel them off of him. Your eyes widen, his own narrowing. He extracts himself from between your legs, as much as he doesn’t want to, and tosses your legs sideways onto the bed. You gasp, alarmed, and he grips your waist, hoisting you up by force and turning you over. You scramble to catch yourself, your hands and knees hitting the mattress.

“What-”

Kei sits up behind you, finding his place on your hips again and yanking you back. Your ass presses against him, and he holds you there, no matter how hard you wriggle. Your heavy breathing is audible, and he’s thankful for it, because the way you’re moving against him is not making his own breath very quiet at all.

“Still not sure, sweetheart?” He says, flattening a hand against your back and pushing down on it. You collapse on your elbows with a yelp, and he slides his fingers up and takes a fistful of your hair. “How about this-” He snaps his hips forward, feeling his thighs slap against yours and your ass ripple from the force. You choke out a moan, and he does it again, against his better judgment.

“You think the right guy wouldn’t die to feel you like this, Y/n? You think he wouldn’t do anything for a chance to make you sound like this?”

You moan again in response, and his stomach flips with excitement – because the syllables that had just stacked in your mouth were undeniably those of his own name.

He rocks his hips into yours again as he uses his hold on your hair to yank you up. Your breath catches in your throat, and you lift up blindly, so trusting and sweet while he pulls you back against his chest.

“What was that, princess?” He says, breathless and embarrassingly eager. “What’d you say?”

Your lips purse, and he knows he was right, because you’re looking up at him with embarrassment. He releases your hair, his hand coming down to wrap around the column of your throat. He stares down into your eyes, feeling your pulse skip under his palm.

“ Again, Y/n ,” He whispers, watching goosebumps break out over your skin. Two syllables fill your mouth, the same he’d heard the first time.

“ Tsukki.”

He’s so fucked.

Releasing you, he plants a hand on your back and shoves you onto your stomach, handling you roughly as he turns you back around. He clambers between your legs, relishing the way your thighs open and wrap around his waist, so welcoming. He cages you in, hovering over you as he stares. You stare back, eyes wide and breath short.

And then he stops, because he knows he should.

He has to.

“Is this okay?” He whispers, eyes searching your face. You seem taken aback by his question, your brow furrowing.

And then you blink, and your eyes clear.

And, for all that he’s silently begging you to say yes – begging for this to be such a simple choice for you – he’s glad he asked. Because he can see the realization starting to hit you. That this will go somewhere, somewhere fast and irreversible, if you say yes.

You swallow, and then your eyes look away from his, and he takes that as his answer.

“Okay,” He sighs, hanging his head. “Okay.” He starts to lift away from you, but your hands are on his biceps.

“Wait.” You search him anxiously. “Tsukki, I- I just…”

“I know,” He says, nodding. He’s a little disappointed — mostly just a little hard and more than a little horny — but there’s no world in which he’d rather you do something you’re not sure about. “It’s okay. I know. That’s why I asked.”

You look like you want to cry. “Are you mad at me?”

He glares down at you. “Seriously?”

“I feel like I led you on-”

“Y/n, of course I’m not fucking mad at you.” He sighs, slowly extracting himself from between your thighs and sitting beside you. “I’m not that guy-”

“I know!” You sit up on your knees, hands on his shoulders. “I know, Tsukki. I just… Are we good?”

He laughs tiredly, dropping his head back against the wall. “ Yes , Y/n. We’re good. I’m not gonna make you do something you’re not ready for.”

You shake him. “But are we good, Tsukki? Us?”

He looks at you, taking you in. You look so scared. And as much as he wants to yell at you, to snap at you for being this worried that he would be upset with you over this, he knows he can’t. Not when you’re this scared.

“Will you please stop listening to other people? I really can’t keep doing this. I mean it this time,” He says. You pause, and then you nod. He lifts his brows. “You believe me? You trust me?”

You give him a shy laugh, your face radiating heat. “I think you kind of… made it clear what you think. I believe you, Tsukki.”

He tries to fight the blush that’s rising. He’d really lost his mind there. “Then, yes,” is all he says, pushing your hair behind your ear and taking your face in one hand. “We’re good. I promise.”

You sniffle, but you nod, and the doe eyes you give him make his heart skip. “Okay. Thank you. I… I’ll be ready soon, I swear-”

“You don’t have to promise me something like that, Y/n. You don’t have to be ready soon, and it doesn’t even have to be me.” He bumps his forehead against yours, the closest he can come right now to shaking you in frustration.

“It’ll be you,” You admit, glancing away nervously. Kei thinks his heart actually stops in his chest when he hears that.

“You’re… Are you sure?” He says, barely a whisper. “It doesn’t have to be.”

You just laugh, watery and sweet and perfectly capable of killing him where he sits. “Of course it’ll be you. Don’t be stupid.”

“ Me? ” He can’t help but laugh, sharp and full of disbelief. “You’re telling me not to be stupid? Are you joking?”

When he ropes you into his arms and starts berating you for being stupid, you only giggle and let him, and he thinks — not to be dramatic or anything — that he might just do anything to hear that sound for the rest of his life.

He’s so fucked.

–

He goes home later that day, to get some more clothes and because Tadashi’s going home for Christmas.

When he enters the townhouse – brushing off the paparazzi at the gate asking if he plans to move in with you since he’s spending so much time at your place – he finds his roommate rushing around the house in a flurry of open suitcases and screaming.

“Uh-” Kei ducks as a pair of boxers goes flying over his head. “Are you okay ?”

“ I overslept! ” Yamaguchi screeches from upstairs. “ I stayed on the phone with Lev too late last night, and now I’m going to miss the train! ”

Kei lifts his brows, finding a safe place in the armchair and watching the destruction unfold in their living room. “So… things are good with him, then?” Yamaguchi had been on a few dates with the aspiring model since Halloween, and Kei had heard him talking recently about officially seeing him. “Gonna introduce him to your family soon?”

“ You shut your ass! ” Tadashi yells. “ I’d say the same about you and Y/n, but your family already knows her! Didn’t she have a massive crush on Aki when we were kids?! ”

Kei flushes, scrubbing at his brow. “We’re not dating, Dashi,” He murmurs. “And, yes, she did. It was annoying.” Tadashi reenters the room at a high speed, flying down the stairs with clothes piled high in his arms.

“You sure about that?”

“About the two years she was convinced she would marry my brother? Yes, I’m sure.”

“About you dating, dumbass.”

Kei sighs. “I know. I’m sure about that, too.”

“Doesn’t look that way to me or Kiyoko.” His roommate shrugs, reconsidering one of his shirts and tossing it on the couch.

“Yeah?” Kei laughs nervously. “How’s it look?”

“Looks like you’re madly in love with her, to be really honest-” Tadashi cuts off, seeing Kei pick up the throw pillow behind him. “ Don’t give me brain damage right now, please. I’m too busy.”

“I’m not in love with her,” Kei mumbles, setting the pillow in his lap.

“Dude, you’re obsessed with her.” Tadashi sits on his pile of clothes, shoving it into his suitcase with his ass. “You’d bottle her farts and smell them throughout the day if you could.”

“You’re really romantic, you know that? Lev into that kinda thing?” Kei says, growing frustrated. He knows he’s obsessed with you. He knows . He’d all but admitted it to you in bed this morning.

“Look,” Tadashi says, running into the bathroom and throwing literal bottles out the door and across the length of the living room. Kei watches, impressed, as he racks up a high success rate of getting them in his suitcase. “You’re staying at her place all the time, you only come home to get clothes-”

“And for our Tuesday nights!”

“-you fall asleep on the phone with her if you do sleep here-”

“Who told you that!”

“-and your face turns a really weird shade of red whenever I bring this up.” Tadashi points at him now. “Kinda like that.”

It is rather warm in here.

“Just think about it,” Tadashi continues, slamming his suitcase shut and zipping it up with shockingly minimal struggle. “You have all of Christmas Break. Kiyoko’s busy with Kyoutani, and I won’t be here, so you don’t need to come home at all.” He stands the suitcase up with a huff and then stares down at it with hands on his hips, proud of his work. “Kiyoko tells me Y/n’s also having a hard time.”

Kei perks up, following him to the foyer and watching him put his coat on. The words ‘ it’ll be you ’ float through his head, and it’s suddenly a lot warmer in here. “What’d she say?”

Yamaguchi eyes him. “Exactly what I just told you. That you two are acting like idiots who don’t know how to speak to each other.” He rolls his suitcase to the door. “Stop dancing around each other and make this official. Not labeling things is going to end up with one or both of you heartbroken.”

So you had talked to Kiyoko about this.

Yamaguchi leans in, squeezing Kei in a tight hug and then slapping him on the back. “Go get ‘em, Tiger-er. Frog.”

And then he’s gone, leaving Kei staring at the front door with a mumbled ‘ have a safe trip ’ echoing in the empty foyer.

–

Tsukki stays with you through Christmas.

After that morning in your bed, you have an irrational worry that – when he goes home to say bye to Yamaguchi – he might never come back. You pace your apartment for an hour after he’s gone, eventually calling Kiyoko to freak out. You severely regret that decision, because she spends the better half of another hour laughing in your ear about how you’d almost fucked your best friend. She does calm down, eventually, and it’s to remind you that Tsukki’s never lied to you.

He’s never lied to you, and he’d told you he wasn’t mad at you, so you have to believe him. You have to believe him about everything , because that’s all he’s asking of you.

So you hang up the phone, wishing Kiyoko ‘ good luck and good fucking ’ before she leaves for a date with Kyoutani, and you sit on the couch with the TV on. You stare at the screen and pretend to know what’s happening, only checking your phone sixteen times over the course of another few hours. And when there’s a knock at your door, you only pounce off the couch before catching yourself, managing not to run all the way to the door.

And, God, are you glad that you did everything you could to remain calm. Because, when you open the door, Tsukki’s standing there holding dinner and looking through his duffel bag like he’s checking that he didn’t forget anything. He’s standing there, completely normal, like you hadn’t all but asked him to fuck you and then promptly rejected him only hours earlier.

He just looks at you, hair dusted with snow and nose tipped red from the cold, and asks if you’re okay. Because you’re just standing there staring at him like it’s Christmas morning, not letting him in. You do let him in, and you eat dinner together, and then you go to bed together. And you’re scared that being in that bed with him again might be awkward, but he just climbs sleepily between your legs and falls asleep with his head on your chest.

It doesn’t come up again until Christmas Day.

—

On Christmas morning, you wake to the conflicting smell of coffee and something burning. Sitting up, you look directly into the kitchen, seeing smoke and a towel waving through the air.

“What are you doing?” You gasp, rolling out of bed and rushing over to where Tsukki is coughing and waving his arms.

“My fucking best!” He sputters, fanning a hand in front of his face. “What does it look like?”

You round the bar, yanking the smoking pan off the stove and dumping its contents in the trash. You roll your eyes when he whines ‘ my beautiful breakfast’ somewhere behind you. “What were you trying to make?”

“Eggs,” He grumbles, and you can’t help but shoot him an amused grin.

“Finally, something the Great Tsukishima Kei absolutely sucks at.”

“I suck at most things that aren’t volleyball and school.”

“Well, thank God for that,” You snicker, throwing the pan back on the stove and turning to plant a kiss on his mouth. “If you’re gonna be good at something, I would hope it’d be your job .”

He grumbles briefly but just wraps his arms around your waist and follows you around the kitchen, severely interfering with your ability to cook an actual breakfast.

“Speaking of my job…” He starts, his voice muffled in your shoulder. “I think they’re supposed to let me know soon about the contract.”

You turn in his arms, setting the carton of eggs down. “Really? When?”

“Dunno. But it’s the end of the year, so…” He looks indifferent about it, but you can see that he’s worried that they haven’t said anything so close to New Year’s Eve.

“Okay. I’m sure they’re just finalizing things, that’s all.” You card your fingers through his hair and pull him in, kissing him gently. “Do you wanna go out tonight? For dinner?”

He smiles against your mouth. “You askin’ me on a Christmas date? So cliche, princess.”

There’s no amount of money in the world that could make you admit to him how fluttery those words make you. You just kiss him again, letting him back you into the counter.

“Maybe,” You mumble. “Pick a place. My treat.”

“You’re funny,” His mouth drops to your neck. “Thinking I’d ever let you pay for anything while I’m around.”

“You let me pay for coffee that one day,” You argue pointlessly, your breath short from the way he’s nibbling on your skin.

“That’s because you’re a two-faced liar who hides the important things in a relationship.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” You coo jokingly. “Can I make it up to you?”

He groans, laughing after. “You know exactly how that sounded.”

“Yep,” You say, finally pushing him off of you and returning to the eggs on the counter. “Pick somewhere nice for dinner. It’s Christmas!”

He grumbles through the morning, your giggles filling the rest of the air, and you exchange gifts after breakfast. You’d made him a photo album of all the most ridiculous pictures you’ve taken together over the last few months. He’d gotten you a necklace that he’d watched you ogle in the window every single time you’d passed by, always claiming that it was too expensive and that you didn’t need it, anyway. He helps you put it on – kissing down the curve of your neck and over your shoulders and whispering that you’re even prettier now – and you sit in his lap with the photo album open, trying your very hardest not to kiss him silly every time he laughs that bright, genuine laugh that always makes your heart beat harder.

Around dinnertime, you get ready, asking what kind of restaurant he’d picked and rolling your eyes when all he says is ‘ a nice one ’. You pull out your best dress – a floor-length, wine red little number – and then you watch as Tsukki loses all concentration, his tie dangling pathetically in his hands.

“Ready?” You say, stepping out of bathroom as you finish pinning your hair up. His eyes drag down the length of you, and then he shakes his head dumbly.

“Not even a little bit.”

You make fun of him all the way to his car, brushing your mouth over his in the elevator and watching with a smirk as he fights the urge to chase after you when you pull away.

The dinner goes perfectly – it’s an upscale spot that serves way too little food on plates that are way too big, but Tsukki holds your hand the whole time and looks at you like he’s never looked at you before. It makes you nervous, but he just smiles when you blush, mumbling that he likes that look on your face. You wonder what’s gotten into him, but you decide to let it go in favor of sharing a glass of wine with him and giggling when his face starts to flush from the alcohol.

He’s decently nice to the reporters outside the restaurant, either feeling relaxed from the drink or too busy pulling you away from Nariko, who you’re chatting up with a wine-tinted bubbliness that makes the other reporters scowl. She just squeezes your arm and tell you to have a merry Christmas, and Tsukki busies himself with leading you by the hand down to his car. You don’t see it, but you find out a few hours later on Twitter that he’d pulled a wad of cash out of his pocket and stuffed it in Nariko’s hand, telling her to go home to her family for the holidays. The pictures online had all shown Nariko’s awe-stricken face and the jealousy of much meaner reporters who’d never gotten the time of day from Tsukishima Kei.

He takes you to a pizza place down the street after leaving the restaurant, where you split a large supreme pizza and complain about how little food there was at the expensive place. You ask if they charge for air, and he jokes that they probably charge for smelling the food. You crack shitty jokes and fight over the last slice, and then you watch with thinly veiled affection as Tsukki signs the t-shirts of some young boys who’ve run over from the next booth over. He even gives them a small smile when they say he’s their favorite Frogs player, and then he gives you a large one when they turn to you and ask what it’s like to date someone famous.

‘ It’s a pretty sweet gig, ’ You tell them, leaning in conspiratorially. They lean in, too, eyes twinkling. ‘ I get to see a side of him that no one else does. Kind of like having a secret identity.’

They run off, claiming to their mother that Tsukki’s a superhero. Or a spy. They can’t decide.

Tsukki takes you home soon after, intertwining his fingers with yours and running his lips back and forth over your knuckles absentmindedly while he drives. When you get home, you change into sweats and take all your makeup off, realizing only then that Tsukki looks at you the same way even while you stand there in old, ratty clothes and mascara smeared under your eyes.

He just watches you, his eyes flicking away but always coming back, a small smile tugging at his lips.

“What’s with you, tonight, huh?” You finally say, curled up against his side. There’s some trashy movie on, but you can’t bring yourself to focus – not with him sliding his fingertips across the strip of skin that peeks out from under your shirt, over and over again until you start to shiver with each pass.

“Nothing,” He says, glancing down at you and then back at the TV. “Just… I dunno, it’s Christmas.”

You smile up at him, your eyes twinkling. “You’ve never been one for Christmas spirit , Kei.”

“Well, maybe I am now.” He rolls his eyes. “It’s nice to just spend it with you and do nothing else.”

“We spend every Christmas together,” You argue, smiling wider when he just squeezes you.

“‘s different,” He mumbles. You give up on bullying him, your heart warming and your skin prickling with happiness. It is different. Things are different. Every moment with him feels realer than the last, like you could do anything with him because you know it’ll be okay.

You look up at him, examining the way his lips start to tug up when he senses you watching him. Finally, his eyes drop to yours, honey-golden and warm, and you lean up to kiss him.

You barely manage to brush your lips to his when his phone rings in his pocket.

He leans back but keeps his eyes on your mouth while he extracts his phone, not looking at the Caller ID before lifting it to his ear.

“Hello?” He watches your mouth still, distracted.

And then he blinks, eyebrows furrowing as he looks away.

“Okay..?” He says, retracting his arm from your waist and standing slowly. Your heart starts to drop as you watch him pace the space between the couch and your bed. Who is he talking to? Is something wrong?

“Okay,” Tsukki says, blinking rapidly. “Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.” He sighs. “Yeah. That’s-Thank you.”

And then he hangs up, and you watch him stare down at his phone, eyes wide with disbelief.

“Tsukki…?” You whisper after a moment, officially worried. When he looks at you, though, you see it.

The relief in his eyes.

“They’re signing me.” He stares. You stare back. And then his mouth breaks in a smile, and he looks you over. “They’re signing me, Y/n. They’re throwing an event on New Year’s Eve.”

“What?!” You jump over the back of the couch, launching yourself at him. He hoists you up and laughs, that beautiful, bright laugh that you can’t live without now. “Tsukki!” You wrap your legs around his waist, burying your face in his neck and squealing.

“Holy shit,” He breathes, laughing in disbelief. “Holy shit, we did it.” And then, when you lift your head to smile down at him, he uses one hand to grab the back of your head and drag you in for a kiss. “ Fuck, we did it. You did that ,” He mumbles against you. “ Thank you. ”

You shake your head, dropping your legs and kissing him while he sets you down. “ You did that, Tsukki,” You say, turning and heading into the kitchen. “You’re amazing, you know that?” You search through cabinets, extracting two bottles of wine. You brandish them at him with a grin. “We have to celebrate!”

He looks between the two bottles, chewing on his bottom lip, but you see the smile peek through after a second. “Yeah… Yeah, I’d say both bottles are necessary.”

“To celebrate. Properly,” You justify.

His grin is wide now. “Properly.”

–

Celebrating properly ends up – somehow, some way – involving Tsukki’s lips on your throat and his fingers tangled in your hair. He smells like wine, and your head is swimming from him and the alcohol.

You’re laid back on the couch, hair fanning out around you and legs wrapped around him. He’s got his other hand on your waist, inching higher and higher every few seconds and taking your shirt with it.

“ Tsukki ,” You whisper, your fingers locked in his hair and your back arched until your chest presses to his. “ Please. ”

He groans against your throat. “ We can’t ,” He slurs, shaking his head. “‘r not ready-”

You whine, using your grip on his hair to pull his head back up. You kiss him heatedly, moaning when your shirt bunches up around your breasts, his fingers stalling there but sliding hesitantly under the hem.

“Doesn’t have to be-” Your breath stutters, because his hips are moving unconsciously against yours, and you can feel how hard he is. “Doesn’t have to be everything-”

He seems to like that answer, his kiss growing rushed. “Really? You sure?”

“Yeah-yes-” You nod furiously. “Please. Please. ”

He sighs roughly, pulling away from you and sitting up. You barely have time to breathe before you’re being lifted through the air and dragged into his lap. You gasp, your head spinning, as he turns you quickly in place. Your back slams against his chest, and his mouth drops to the junction of your throat.

You reach up, carding your fingers through his hair. “Tsukki,” You sigh, feeling his heart beating against your back. He slides his arms around your waist.

“You’re sure?” He asks again, his voice low and humming through your skin. You nod, eyes half-closed and staring blankly at the movie that’d you’d lost track of a long time ago. You sigh in relief and close your eyes when he pushes his lips against your throat, the scene in front of you lost as you breathe him in.

With your eyes shut, you feel him more intensely. The warmth of his lips on your skin, the way his hands start to slide across your sides, your t-shirt falling over his wrists. He stops just below your breasts, nipping his teeth on your throat to get your attention.

“ Last chance ,” He whispers.

You arch your back, grinding your ass subtly back into him. You feel his cock twitch against it, and he bites down harder on your shoulder.

“Was that your answer?” He breathes, his hands growing more certain on your skin.

“ God , Kei,” You laugh. “Do something before I do.”

You feel him smile before anything else.

He slides one hand back down around your waist, using his arm to anchor you to him. His other hand slides up, and you gasp, feeling his palm cup your breast.

“ Oh -” You arch your back again, your head falling back against his shoulder. You’d noticed how big his hands are over the months together, but you’d never really realized .

He keeps you flush to him while his fingers roam eagerly over your chest, the pads of his fingertips rough and calloused from volleyball. He kneads one breast, his palm as searing hot as the kisses he trails along your throat, and then he switches to the other. His fingers tweak and pluck at your nipples, teeth blunt on your shoulder and his other arm holding you tight as you start to wriggle and moan.

You dig your hands into his thighs, the fabric of his sweats balled up in your fists. Your head swims, face warm and skin sweaty, and you loll your head back and forth on his shoulder. “Tsukki, please,” You moan, unconsciously spreading your thighs and pushing them against his. He notices, the hand on your waist squeezing once.

“Want more, princess?”

“Please, fuck-” You want to growl when he takes his hands off of you, but the brief disappointment is replaced with a distinct thumping of your heart when he hooks both hands under your knees and pries your thighs open, hanging your legs over the sides of his knees. You feel briefly vulnerable sitting like this, but he just slides his hand back under your shirt and continues to play with you.

“Comfortable?” He asks, his other hand toying with the waistband of your pants. You nod, your breathing growing heavy when his thumb slips under the band. “You sure?”

“Tsukishima, I swear-” You gasp, feeling him tug hard on your nipple. He snickers against your shoulder, whispering ‘ so easy ’ into your skin as he pushes his other hand past the band of your sweats. He doesn’t bother stopping there, fingertips slipping past your panties and finally pausing right over where you need him.

“ Mm- ” You purse your lips hard to keep from moaning too loud. But your head fills with static and your stomach flips over itself again and again while he swipes teasing circles over your clit.

“C’mon, princess,” He breathes smugly into your ear, but you hear him swallow hard as his fingers dip lower and slide through your folds. “You’re not gonna let me hear you? After everything?”

His fingertips are hot against you, and you become suddenly aware of how much larger his fingers are than yours. You feel — horrified, truly — as you become wetter against his hand. Tsukki’s smile is wide against the shell of your ear.

“What happened, baby?” He whispers, nudging the tip of his middle finger against your entrance. “If there’s something you want, you gotta ask for it.”

You just lift your hands to your face, hiding. Tsukki lifts his own hand away from you before coming down quickly, the slap sharp against your core. You yelp, hands flying to hold onto his arms and face burning as he soothes the pain by running his fingers through your folds. There’s a soft squelch that echoes in the room and makes him chuckle low against your head.

“ I think your pretty little pussy likes me, princess ,” He whispers, the hand on your chest sliding up through the collar of your shirt and resting on the base of your throat. “ Better ask fast, before I lose interest. ”

You whine, your heart pounding against his hand. “Please, Tsukki…”

“Yeah?”

You tighten your hold on his arms, nervous. “Please finger me?”

“Aw,” He coos, laughing gently as he swipes more circles over your clit, still gentle. “That’s so sweet, baby. But you can do better.”

“What?” You whine, turning your head and burying your face in his neck. Your throat pushes further into his hand, and you feel yourself get impossibly wetter when he tightens his grip.

“You can ask better than that,” He mumbles, and you feel his cock twitch against your back when you clench, his fingers sliding patiently back and forth.

“Uhm-” You shudder, because he’s switched to flicking his fingertips against your clit. “I-”

“ Come on, Y/n, ” He whispers against your head. He starts to tap his fingers, one and then the other. “ I’ll stop if you don’t ask soon.”

Your heart wrenches in your chest, and you shake your head. “Please don’t-”

“Then ask me-”

“I did- ”

“ Ask me, Y/n- ”

“ Please , Tsukki!” You yell, squeezing your eyes shut and trying not to think about how your voice bounces on the walls. “I need you to stuff your fingers in my cunt and fuck me before I lose my fucking mind -”

He groans loudly, drowning you out, but your voice cuts short anyway, because he’s sliding his middle two fingers down and pushing them roughly into you.

“Oh, my- Tsukki- ” You gasp, his name ripped from your throat.

“ Fuck- ” He groans, sliding his fingers out and slamming them back into you. “ Y/n- ”

You purse your lips to muffle yourself, wriggling and arching your back, your throat pressing into his hand. “Tsukki, fuck.”

“God, you’re so pretty, baby,” He whispers, his breathing rough and shallow. “You feel so good-” His chest heaves against your back, and your head fills with white noise, a ringing in your ears as you feel nothing except the way his fingers stretch you out, his palm slapping against your clit over and over again until you feel like your skin is on fire. “You’re doing so- so good with my fingers-“ He cuts off, moaning and pressing his face into your hair when you clench hard around his fingers. “ Fuck , Y/n-“

“Please,” You whimper, knowing how desperate you sound. “More, Tsukki, please-”

“Baby-“ He laughs, his voice strained. “I don’t know-”

“ Please , Tsukki. Please, I need you-“

He slams his hand into you, stopping long enough to take a deep breath. “Y/n, I don’t want you to do something you’re not ready f-”

“I’m ready!” You scream pathetically. “Please, I promise I’m ready, I need you so bad, Tsukki-”

“Y/n-”

You know it’s only been a week since that morning on your bed. You know that he’s worried that you’re not thinking straight. But you also know that it’s him, that it’s always been him. That, above all else, he’s the one you need. That there will never be anyone else.

You think you might be in love with him.

And if that’s the case, then you’re really not seeing any reason to keep waiting.

“Tsukishima Kei, I swear to fucking God – if you don’t fuck me, I will actually start sobbing.” Your voice is already starting to crack, and your chest is heaving in large gulps of air. He moans quietly in your ear, and you think he says something to the effect of ‘ Okay, baby. I got you’, but you can’t be sure. The ringing in your ears is too strong, worsened when he quickly slips his fingers out of you. You whine at the emptiness, the sound lost in the shuffle of Tsukki lifting you into his arms and standing from the couch.

He carries you to bed in two strides, lying you down much more gently than you’d expected. Climbing over you, he slides his shirt off and drops it to the floor in one smooth motion. Your heart jumps, and you eagerly sit up to do the same, barely catching the way his eyes widen as he takes you in. And then you lie back, clutching the sheets in both hands to fight the urge you have to cover your chest. But it seems like he might be enjoying what he’s seeing, because he just hooks his fingers distractedly into your sweats and panties, his eyes roaming your body. He pulls them both off and sends them somewhere off the edge of the bed without looking.

“Shit,” He whispers, more to himself than anything. You shiver under his gaze, gathering the courage to let your thighs fall open. Cold air hits your skin, but you barely have time to whimper before his eyes are dropping. They go wide, and you watch all the air leave his lungs as he stares down at you. “ Shit ,” He says again, even quieter.

“Coming?” You breathe, reaching one hand along the sheet for him. His gaze flies to yours, golden eyes still stunned but recovering the moment he sees you looking up at him. Wordlessly, he drops down over you, his lips finding yours in a rush of heat and everything he’s not saying right now. You sigh against his mouth, holding his face and spreading your thighs further when you feel him reach down between you for his own pants. He pushes them down blindly and kicks them off into the distance, his mouth hot and his wine-laced tongue dancing along yours.

“Y/n,” He mumbles, and you tighten your hold on his face.

“If you ask me if I’m sure, I will finger myself in front of you and then kick you out.”

His laugh is the prettiest thing you’ve ever heard.

“Okay.” He nibbles on your lip and shifts his weight. You feel his cock brush along your thigh, precum smearing on your skin. “I hear you.”

You will admit that you’re nervous. As he pulls his lips from yours and glances down between you with purpose, the head of his cock bumping up against your entrance, you’re struck with anticipation and a little bit of fear that this might hurt a lot, especially considering his size. But then, as he’s using his thumb to push the tip in as slowly as possibly, his eyes flick up to meet yours.

And you remember just how sure you are.

So, even though it does hurt — the sting causing you to grip the sheet hard enough to rip it — Tsukki’s eyes are flicking back and forth between your face and your core, his brow furrowed in concentration, and you feel impossibly safe. Because he would never do anything that might hurt you.

You trust him.

“‘s this okay?” He grunts, sliding painstakingly slowly into you. You just nod, bottom lip caught between your teeth and eyes scrunched shut. He leans forward, pressing his lips to yours and forcing you to free your lip from its torture. “Y/n, if it hurts, we can stop. We don’t have to do this,” He whispers against you, but you only shake your head, whining.

“‘m okay, I promise. ‘s just new.” Your breath is shallow in your chest. “Maybe if I jus’…” You angle your hips up and spread your thighs just an inch wider, and you feel his sigh against your lips. The relief is instant for you, too, and your lungs fill with air. “Okay,” You breathe, prying your aching fingers from the sheets and stretching them. “Okay.”

“Okay,” He whispers back, his hand finding your thigh and his fingers splaying across the underside. He sighs, the sound a half-groan as he bottoms out inside of you. “Fuck.”

Your brow’s broken out in a sweat and your skin is flushed with heat, but when you open your eyes, Tsukki’s staring right back at you, gaze searching your face. You wonder what you look like, because you’re seeing awe in the way his eyes trace you.

“You okay?” His eyes track the embarrassed purse of your lips and the way you glance nervously down your body at the place where his hips meet yours.

“Are you?” You ask breathlessly, watching his arms shake as he holds himself over you.

“No,” He laughs. “This is torture.”

You beam up at him, your voice weak when you say, “You can move, Tsukki.” Your fingers find his shoulders, and he collapses onto his elbows, pressing his forehead to your chest.

“Really? I don’t want to hurt you-”

“Are you this careful with every girl? I’m starting to get a little offended-”

“ You’re not every girl ,” He says simply, muffled against your skin. Your stomach flips, and you accidentally clench around him. The sound he makes is inhuman. “ Was that necessary? ” He complains pitifully into your chest. You giggle wholeheartedly, and he shakes his head against you. “ Don’t do that either- ”

“Oh, my God, Tsukki – please just move ,” You laugh, snaking your arms around his neck and lifting his head toward you. He shifts, kissing you firmly and breathing a soft ‘ yes, ma’am ’ against your lips.

He starts slow, slow as before. His hips pull back carefully, and then he rocks forward on his knees, bumping gently up against you when he bottoms out again. The sting is still there, but he distracts you by kissing you, his lips eager on yours and his quiet moans breathless and lost in your throat. He circles your clit gently with his thumb while he does, and you start to shiver against him. Eventually, the sting subsides, and the only notice you give him is the stretch of your thighs and the shallow cant of your hips upward to meet his. His kiss falters for a moment, and the hand on your thigh tightens in surprise, but he doesn’t ask any more questions.

When he snaps his hips a little roughly, you know he’s gotten the message. You focus on breathing while he rocks his hips, pursing your lips to keep from moaning too loud. He’s breathless over you, and you’re secretly amazed to see him like this — brow furrowed and lips parted, eyes flicking between yours and then shutting briefly before finding you again. You’ve never seen his expression so unguarded before.

There’s a quiet sound that vibrates in his throat every time his hips meet yours, and you find yourself wanting to hear it properly. So you card your fingers through his hair and kiss him, whispering his name against his lips and rocking your hips up in time with his. You hear it then, clear and perfect.

“Oh- fuck- ” Tsukki groans loudly, his hand sliding urgently along the sheet in search of you. His fingers interlace with yours and latch on tight. “You feel so good-” He drops his head to your shoulder, lips hot on your throat. “God-” He laughs pathetically. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this much of a mess.”

“Tsukki,” You whisper, feeling something below your navel twist and tug. “Tsukki-I’m- mm-” You wriggle, arching your back and wrapping your legs around his waist. “Please-”

“Are you close, princess?” His voice is teasing, but you can see in the way he lifts his head, eyes searching your face frantically, that he’s eager. When you nod, his face melts into a kind of affection you’ve never seen from him before. He smiles, eyes flicking down to your mouth, and nods. “Okay, baby. Close your eyes.”

You whimper, doing as he says and immediately feeling him shift over you. His hand falls between you, fingers swiping ever so gently over your clit as his hips start to bump against yours with a little more force. You cry out, hearing the headboard slam against the wall over and over again.

“ Tsukki! ” You cant bring yourself to care anymore how loud you are, your breath coming too fast now and your reservations slipping the moment you hear him moan your name.

“You look so pretty, Y/n-so pretty like this.” He pants, his hips starting to stutter and his cock twitching inside you. The tugging in your navel worsens and peaks, and you moan his name again. He groans at the sound. “You take me so well- fuck . Feels like you were made for me.”

You gasp, feeling yourself being pulled to the edge. “Tsukki, I’m-” You shudder, fluttering around him, and he starts to breathe hard against your skin.

“Come on, baby. Let me feel you come around me.”

Your hands tighten on his hair, and you’re distantly aware of Tsukki pushing his lips to yours heatedly as you’re starting to scream. He swallows the sound, moaning as he spills into you, his hips faltering and then stopping against yours.

You stay that way for an unknown amount of time, your heart beating in your throat, ears, core, and everything else while you come down. Tsukki kisses you with languor, his teeth nipping softly on your bottom lip as he sighs against you. You swallow thickly, whispering his name after a moment.

“Hi,” He whispers back, slowly lifting his head. You scratch your nails on his scalp, and he blinks down at you sleepily. “You okay?”

You giggle. “Guess we’ll see in the morning.” His lips pull into a small smile, eyes tracing your features. You kiss him once, mumbling ‘ should we clean up? ’ against his lips.

He barks out a laugh, nodding. “Stay here.” He lifts off you slowly. “I’ll take care of you.”

You can’t find it in you to be shy about him seeing your body now, feeling all too safe and drifting quickly off to sleep, before he’s even back from the bathroom.

—

It’s still dark outside when you roll over, wincing as you stretch. You reach over for Tsukki, but your arm hits the bed instead. A noise of confusion leaves you, and you lift your head, blinking in the dark.

He’s sitting up in bed, the sheets pooled around his waist and his arms wrapped around his bent knees.

“Tsukki?” You mumble. He doesn’t seem to hear you, so you sit up, realizing with a quick glance that you’re wearing the t-shirt he’d had on before and your panties. He must have cleaned you up and dressed you. “Tsukki,” You try again, touching his arm.

He starts, turning to look back at you. “Oh. Hi.”

That’s all he says.

You pull your hand off of him, something unknown coming between you. “What’s wrong?”

He just swallows hard and shakes his head, scooting toward you. “Nothing.” He puts his hand on your shoulder and tries to guide you back down, but you brush him off.

“Tsukki.”

He stares. You stare back. He looks away and runs his fingers through his hair roughly.

“I don’t know if we should have done that,” is what he says. The words are whispered, but they echo in the silence.

You think you might throw up.

“What?”

“I just-“ He sighs, running a hand down his face. “Don’t get me wrong, okay-”

“Then don’t say something wrong, Tsukki.”

“Y/n, we were drunk-”

Oh.

You blink, scooting away from him slowly. You pull the blankets up to your chest, staring at nothing. He watches you, shaking his head.

“Y/n, just let me talk please. Don’t overdo this-”

“Don’t overdo this?” You ask, eyes wide as they land on him. “I just lost my virginity to you, and you can’t even wait two hours before trying to make your escape.”

“ No- “ He shakes his head, trying to move toward you, but you stick your foot out, stopping him. “Y/n, no. I’m just-I mean, we’re not even together-”

You flinch back at that. He sees it, and regret crosses his face. His mouth opens, but you cut him off.

“Were you dating every girl you’ve ever fucked?”

“No, but-“ He laughs. “You’re not every girl. You know that.”

“No, I thought that,” You say, finally standing from the bed and backing away toward the couch. “But you’re treating me like I’m trash that you haven’t figured out how to throw out yet!”

“No, I’m not!” He stands too, staying at the end of the bed. He seems to have realized you don’t want him near you. “I just wish we had done things right -”

“I thought they were right!” You snap. “That felt right to me, Tsukishima.”

“You know what i mean -”

“What do you want?” You throw your hands out. “What are you trying to gain from doing this? Tell me.”

“God, I’m just telling you what’s going through my head!” He tangles his fingers in his hair, tugging in frustration. “We aren’t together, and we were drunk, and I didn’t want this to be-” He shakes his head, and you get the feeling the rest of that sentence was important. But he’d stopped talking, which means he’s not willing to share it with you. So you just watch, refusing to push him for it, because you need to see what he does on his own.

“I’m just confused,” He finally mumbles. “I don’t know where to go from here. This wasn’t right.”

You stare, feeling tears prick at the back of your eyes. But you just start to laugh, even though your vision is getting blurry.

“You’re confused? ” Your laughter is shallow, pained. “You always told me to stop getting in my head about this — about us — and now you’re the one who’s confused ?!”

“We should have-”

“You told me to do whatever I feel is right-“ You snap. “-and now that I have, you’re confused ?”

“We didn’t talk about any of this!” He yells, shaking his head. “We said we wouldn’t have sex, so we never talked about what this would mean-”

“Yeah! I figured maybe that part could wait until after!” You scoff. “You know, we could have just talked about what comes next in the morning , but you decided to be confused and overthink and ruin this.”

He looks like he wants to argue, his face pinched with stress, but you just rub at your brow, breathing hard. You feel sick.

“This is why I wanted rules,” You mumble. “I knew this would happen.”

He’s quiet for a moment, and then-

“You knew what would happen? That I would fuck this up?”

You meet his eyes, angry. “That you wouldn’t be able to find a way to let me down easy. That you would let me fall for you, knowing you were just going to cut me off at the end.”

He shakes his head. “That’s not what I was doing.”

“No?” You point at the bed. “But you were so quick to think of how cut me loose.”

His brow furrows in irritation. “ Why do you always think the worst of me?”

“Because you couldn’t even wait one night!” You scream. “You couldn’t just be happy with me !”

He steps toward you, and you see in the moonlight that his walls have gone up. “I was not trying to cut you loose. And I have never lied to you . But you’ve always been so fucking resistant to the idea that I could ever be telling the truth.” He rolls his eyes and shakes his head, already turning away from you. “God forbid I tell you what’s on my mind and you actually take me seriously.” He meets your eyes evenly. “Maybe it’s you who’s looking for a way out.”

The silence in the room is suffocating.

“Get out,” You finally say.

The door slams before you have time to process that he’s gone.

The tears finally spill, and your knees hit the floor just as the wailing starts.

—

Kei throws the front door shut so hard that something falls off the wall in his foyer. He’s not sure what it is, but he’s tempted to start breaking more things. Thankfully, it’s late enough that no paparazzi were outside when he’d gotten here, or else it might have been someone’s camera on the ground again. Great way to celebrate his contract signing.

Yamaguchi wouldn’t appreciate coming home to a destroyed house, though, so he settles for stomping up the stairs hard enough that one of them creaks in a funny way when he lands on it. He slams the door to his room, too, and then he throws himself down on his bed and screams into his pillow.

He hadn’t meant to say it like that. He doesn’t know why he said it like that. He hadn’t meant to make it sound like a mistake. How could any of tonight have been a mistake with you? He just wishes he’d told you how he feels about you before things had gotten out of hand. He wishes you would have known how he feels about you while you were trusting him with your body like that.

Because then, maybe, you would have known while you were taking your shirt off that you were safe. You would have known, while you were in pain for those few minutes, that he would never hurt you. That he was trying his best, that you’re the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, that you would never have to pressure yourself to have sex because he would have been okay with stopping at any time.

He wishes he would have told you he loves you.

Maybe then you would have known.

But instead, you’d looked at him with betrayal in your eyes when he’d been stupid enough to stumble over his words. You’d taken him for all the things he’s always been, but never with you. You’d trusted him with everything, and then you’d closed yourself off in an instant, and he’d gotten frustrated because you wouldn’t hear him out.

But how could he expect you to hear him out? How could he get mad that you’d retreated into your shell and locked him out? You’d only let him in for a minute, and he’d ruined it.

He’s ruined this.

Kei doesn’t remember the last time he cried, but he makes up for it now, his pillow soaked with tears by the time he finally drifts off to sleep.

—

You spend the next day in bed, sobbing into Kiyoko’s shirt and ignoring the missed calls from Tsukki. And there are a lot of them. He calls back to back for an hour straight — Kiyoko finally has enough and answers for you, muttering ‘ the next time I see you, I’m going to curb stomp you until your teeth are gone ’ before silencing your phone and tossing it somewhere on the couch.

You fall asleep sometime before the sun sets, Kiyoko’s fingers combing through your hair soothingly. You stir a few hours later and think you hear Kyoutani’s voice, soft and deep as he mumbles ‘ he wasn’t at practice today ’ and paces your floor quietly. You fall asleep again, your traitorous heart twitching as it realizes that Tsukki might not be okay, either.

The morning of the 27th, your eyes crack open, swollen and burning, to a knock at your door. You roll over, staring emptily at it, and then you climb out of bed, thinking it’s Kiyoko, and trudge to the door.

It’s not Kiyoko.

In his defense, his eyes are as red and swollen as yours feel.

“Hi,” He croaks. You flinch at the sound of his voice.

“What do you want?” You whisper. He’s holding a plastic bag from the store, and he holds it out weakly to you now.

“I didn’t get to-” He swallows. “I should have taken care of you. After. I didn’t.”

No. You didn’t.

You take the bag, peering inside. Some snacks, a pack of muscle patches, a couple electrolyte-replenishing drinks.

A box of Plan B, sitting at the bottom.

You stare at it emptily. “Who saw you buy this?” The last thing you need is the internet witnessing your heartbreak in real time.

“Management took care of it.”

You’re not sure you’re okay with them being involved, but it’s better than Tsukishima Kei being caught buying Plan B.

You shut the bag, shoving it back at him. “Well, you can thank them for me, but I’ve actually been on birth control for years.” He blinks, taking it while staring dumbly down at you. You smile, your anger manifesting as cruelty. “So don’t worry about it, Tsukishima.” He doesn’t look so happy to hear his name used that way anymore. “I never intended to get pregnant and trap you in a loveless marriage for your fame and fortune.”

His eyebrows furrow, and his frown cuts deep. “Y/n-”

You slam the door in his face.

—

Kei doesn’t speak to you again until New Year’s Eve — until you literally have to speak to him, because he needs to text you about his contract signing.

His fingers shake while he sends it, letting you know that he’d be arriving to your place in a limo booked by the Frogs at 6pm, and then he sends you a picture of his ties, in case you want to match. You don’t respond, so he just picks the black one.

He’s terrified that you’ll decide not to go. Terrified.

But even when you send him a thumbs up (still not responding about the ties), he doesn’t feel less terrified. He just sits at the edge of his bed and stares down at his phone, his heart ripping in his chest as he scrolls through your previous messages from the last few months. All of that — all of your excited texts and flirty memes, all of his thinly veiled affection. All siphoned down to nothing in a matter of days.

He gets ready with trembling fingers, his eyes pricking with tears and then drying up as he shakes his head and blinks away every regret he’s ever had. He sits in the limo in anxious silence, watching it pull into your apartment, the lights flashing on the cameras outside.

And then he wipes his eyes and draws his shoulders back, because, while the world inside has been falling apart under his fingertips, the world outside has been going crazy over the news of Tsukishima Kei going pro.

He exits the limo and bows to a few reporters, waving politely as he waits for you. He doesn’t answer any questions, mostly because he doesn’t want anyone to get too close and see that he’s not okay. But then you come out of your apartment in a black ball gown that makes his heart wrench, and he has to fight tears again.

You smile wide at him, your eyes crinkling and your face glowing as you walk down the steps to meet him.

“You that stunned to see me?” You ask, loud enough to be heard by the paparazzi. They laugh, and you laugh with them as you step up to him. Then you lift onto your tiptoes and press your lips to his in greeting, and he has to remember to close his eyes and act like everything’s fine, even though the feeling your lips on his makes him want to get on his knees and beg for forgiveness.

You pull away and turn to the cameras, waving quickly before ducking through the door he’s holding open. He waves, too, and follows you, the camera shutters loud behind him.

The inside of the limo is dead silent.

You sit on the other side of the car, staring out the window as the driver pulls out to the street. Any evidence that you’d just smiled at him like he’s your world is gone. Kei just looks at you, every nerve in his body fighting to find something to say.

Finally, after five torturous minutes, he swallows. “Y/n.”

“Don’t.” You don’t bother meeting his eyes when you speak. “Let’s just get through this. In the morning, we can ask Management how to break up without making you look bad.”

His heart drops to the ground. “I don’t want to break up.”

You meet his eyes now. “I do.”

“No, you don’t.” He refuses to believe this.

“How would you know?”

He doesn’t. He doesn’t know. That’s why this terrifies him.

“We’re not breaking up,” He croaks finally.

You turn back to the window. “Let’s just get through this.”

The ride to the Frogs’ gym is filled with a silence that certainly feels like he’s been dumped.

—

“-ations to Tsukishima Kei for this amazing step into professional volleyball, and we welcome him with open arms to what’s certain to be a long and fruitful career.”

Kei stands from his seat in the audience, shaking his coach’s hand firmly and bowing at the waist. The Frogs have opened the doors of their in-house conference venue – which is just a large ballroom – the back half filled with round tables and the front lined with a couple rows of chairs for the reporters. The room is capped on the far end by a podium, where his coach has just finished speaking, and a long table. There’s a chair labeled with his name there, in the center of the table, and there’s a stack of papers for him to sign.

He moves there now, glancing up at the front row and finding you staring back. Your face is masked into a perfect smile, and your expression is filled with love and support as you watch him take a seat at a table filled with his coach, manager, captain, and a brand sponsor.

But then you meet his eyes, and he can see how empty they are.

He looks down at his papers, adjusting his tie nervously. The camera flashes are making him warm, and he can’t really hear what’s being said, so he follows his coach’s lead and turns pages when necessary and signs on dotted lines, again and again and again. He’s already read the terms of his employment — they’d emailed him the hundred-page document three days ago so that he could read it and negotiate benefits before the day of the signing. That’s the only reason he’s not more nervous about this moment. He just has to flip pages and sign whatever his coach points to.

The whole process only takes five minutes, cameras flashing away over his bent head. Before he knows it, he’s standing and shaking his coach’s hand again, and then he’s being hugged by his manager and captain and taking a photo with his brand sponsor.

And then he looks at you, still sitting in the front row as reporters start to stand and approach him.

It’s almost worse that your eyes are filled with genuine warmth this time.

He answers a couple questions, but his eyes keep flicking back to you distractedly, and finally a voice speaks from the back – feminine and familiar and belonging to a reporter donning the Sendai Sports lanyard.

“I think maybe Tsukishima would enjoy a moment alone with his girlfriend — We could move to the reception tables and continue our conversations there, perhaps?”

Kei grabs his manager by the sleeve as the crowd is clearing and asks if it’s possible for the Frogs to hire Nariko as his PR rep. His manager looks up at him with surprise and says he’ll speak with her.

When Kei turns again, you’re there. His heart jumps, and he slips his arm around your waist by habit, trying not to react visibly when you tense against him.

“You asked to hire Nariko?” You say, setting a careful hand on his bicep. “That would set her up for life.”

“I know,” is all he says. Your eyes flicker with appreciation, and you step close to wrap your arms around his neck. He hugs you as tight as he can without making it obvious that he hasn’t seen you in days.

“Congratulations,” You whisper in his ear. “I’m proud of you.”

A lump grows in his throat. “Thanks.” You dont respond, and he squeezes you, because he can feel you slipping away. “I’m sorry,” He breathes.

“I can’t,” You say, stepping away. “It’s too late-”

“It’s not .” He’s starting to get desperate, the thought of you closing off to him forever pure torture. “It’s not too late-”

“Stop brushing off what I said.” Your brow furrows with annoyance, and his frustration bubbles for a moment too long.

“Why? You do it all the time.” He dips his head quickly so that the cameras don’t see the tension in his face, and he’s thankful your back is to them, because you’re outright frowning now.

“Let’s just get through this.”

“Would you please stop saying that?”

You sigh quietly, stepping close and running your hands over his shoulders in a way that appears affectionate to anyone watching. “Fix your face, Kei. I don’t want to talk about this now. Let’s just enjoy the evening, because you deserve to be appreciated for everything you’ve put into this.”

He’s amazed at your ability to think of him, even now.

“You put so much into this, too,” He whispers. You just smile bitterly.

“Yeah. And look where that got me.”

He watches you paint a loving smile on your face as you take his hand and lead him toward the reception table occupied by his teammates and Management. He does his best to pretend, even though he feels like he’s losing a piece of his soul.

—

You lean forward on the counter, staring at yourself in the bathroom mirror.

It’s amazing that you’ve been able to keep it together all night. You’ve clung to his arm and followed him around the room, talking to his teammates, to Management, to any reporters who had questions for you. You’ve spoken with a smile and a laugh and a twinkle in your eye, and you’ve done your best to hide how much it hurts to be close to him.

To the smell of him, clean and warm and filled with home . To the feel of him, secure and safe as he holds your waist and kisses your cheek appropriately. To the sight of him, perfect and golden and made of everything you’d fallen in love with.

It makes you sick, looking yourself in the eye and knowing you’d been lying the whole night. Especially with Kyoutani watching you like a hawk, eyes full of blatant concern. And with various members of Management quietly asking if you’re feeling okay, if there’s ‘ anything else ’ you need.

You shake it off, drying your hands and fixing your hair with a quiet sigh. Only a little more, and you can retreat to your dark cave of wallowing.

Straightening your back, you smile at yourself in the mirror and turn, leaving the bathroom and making your way down the hallway back to the reception room.

You hear him before you see him.

“ -the fuck did you say to me? ”

No. No way. He wouldnt.

There’s nervous laughter that follows, and you speed up to get to him before he says something else.

“ I’m just saying- ” You don’t know the voice well, but you think it belongs to one of the only super young reporters at the event today. “ -now that you’re officially pro, you might consider transitioning into a relationship that’s a bit more…. suited to your new lifestyle. ”

You stop short, just shy of the corner.

“Someone a bit more pleasing to the public, if you will,” The man finishes, and you stare down at nothing. You struggle to recover, too many wounds opened too soon, one after another. But you know Tsukki can’t pick a fight, not here. So you lift your head and resume your trudge to the end of the hall, only to find Nariko staring back at you.

She looks angry, and her eyes flick away from yours to stomp just out of view. Just as Tsukki’s starting to respond.

“Would the public find it pleasing if I were to beat your ass for talking about my girlfri-”

“Tsukishima,” Nariko cuts in. “It’s great to get some one-on-one time with you.” You hear the other reporter gasp and stumble, and you’re guessing Nariko’s pushed him out of the way.

Tsukki sighs at her. “Thanks for th-”

He suddenly appears in your eyeline, stumbling back a few feet, and you realize that she’s pushed him, too. You’re a bit impressed.

He looks affronted for a moment, but then your presence catches his eye, and he turns to you with wide eyes.

“Y/n-”

“As your new PR rep, Tsukishima-” Nariko says, stepping around the corner to face the both of you and create a bit of privacy. She winks at you when she calls herself by that title. “-I’d recommend not getting into a fight at a contract signing that only happened because you stopped getting into fights.”

Tsukki has the decency to look ashamed, and you nearly hug Nariko. But she just looks between you before glancing over her shoulder.

“You know… No one will notice if you’re gone for ten minutes.”

You don’t wait for any other signal, only wrapping a hand around Tsukki’s wrist and dragging him all the way down the hall to a storage closet. You throw him in and slam the door, whirling on him.

“Are you fucking insane?”

He points out the door, jaw slack in shock. “You heard what he said to me!”

“Are you lacking self-control in every way?!” You throw your hands out. “This is your day , and you come that close to ruining it?”

His jaw clenches and unclenches as he stares at you, his eyes flicking between yours. “I won’t let people talk to me like that. Not about you.”

You stare back. “I won’t let you put everything on the line for me. You can’t ruin your own life for something stupid-”

“This isn’t stupid !” He explodes. “Everything before you was stupid!” He starts to pace. “I had a shit temper, and it was easy to bait me into a fight, and I would end up in the tabloids for the dumbest shit . And you helped me! You fixed me, just like I asked you to! I’m not the same guy I was before, Y/n. But this -” He points out the door. “ You ? I can’t do it.”

You breathe hard, shaking your head. “Then let’s end this.” When his eyes only widen, you swallow. “Let’s end this now. If I’m this much of a weakness for you, let’s make them stop talking about me. We got what you needed – I fixed you, like I said I would. Your contract’s secured. You can go back to dating girls that all look the same, and we can take some time apart so I can get over you, and-” You’d started to pull the door open, but Tsukki crosses the room in two strides and slams it shut again, his hand flat on the wood.

“Y/n.” His eyes are sharp, but you can see the fear in them. “I need you to stop running from me.”

“Then stop making me run.” You reach for the door again, but he won’t budge. You stamp your foot in frustration. “Tsukki! I’m doing everything I can to preserve this friendship, but I can’t keep doing this !”

“You’re not doing everything! All you have to do is fucking listen to me -”

You back away from him into the room, shaking your head. “Why, Tsukki? So I can listen to you tell me that night was a mistake? That you ‘ never meant for it to get that far ’, that you ‘ wish things had been different ’? Well, so do I!” You yell. “I wish things had been different, too! I wish I would have known what you would do to me, so that I wouldn’t be stupid enough to go fall in love with someone who doesn’t love me back- ”

“ I do love you back!” He yells, strong and loud and full of anger. Your head snaps up, eyes finding his. His gaze is furious and hurt, and you can’t say you’ve ever seen him look at you like that before. It makes your heart ache and your chest tighten, the way his lip wobbles once before he clenches his jaw and fixes it.

“...What?” You finally say, your breath caught in your throat.

“I love you back. You stupid fucking girl.” He sounds tired. Exhausted, really.

You stare. “That was rude,” You whisper weakly. He just laughs, but it sounds like he’s near tears. He hasn’t sounded like that since high school, since that fight on your doorstep.

“Sorry, but that’s what you get with me.” He reaches for the doorknob, opening it an inch. “So now’s your time to back out.”

You stay right where you are. “Or what?”

The silence that follows seems to go on forever.

His eyes search yours, and the sliver of hope you see kills you. “What?”

“Or what, Tsukki? What do I get if I stay?”

He stares, unmoving. “You get me.”

You think you might cry.

You move to the door, watching the fight leave his eyes when he realizes you’re leaving. But you just put your hand on the door, nudging it shut. It clicks, and he stares down at you, confused.

“How long?” You ask.

His eyes flick between yours a moment as he processes your question. “I think it’s probably telling that I wanted you to be my fake girlfriend at all, Y/n.”

You blink, realization hitting you. “Did you know? This whole time?”

“No,” He laughs pathetically. “And Yamaguchi’s never going to let me live it down.”

“Why did you call that night a mistake?” You need to know, even if you’re not sure you want to hear the reason. It’s been killing you.

“I didn’t-” He sighs, rubbing at his brow. “I didn’t say it was a mistake. I said I wish I had done it right.” He meets your eyes, his own so close and golden and honest. You’d missed them. “I wanted to tell you I loved you first. Because I didn’t want you to worry that it was just a hookup.”

You hadn’t realized that his answer would drain you of all your energy. You slump, letting out an exhausted sigh. “And you couldn’t just say that?”

“Well, you couldn’t just listen .” He rolls his eyes, and you see a twinge of irritation in his brow. You laugh softly, and it worsens. “You think that’s funny, huh?” He says, staring down at you. “This could have all been avoided if you’d just heard me out, but you like to act insane.”

“And you like to say the worst things at the worst times!” You argue, half-laughing and half-angry. “Why couldn’t you wait until the morning? Why did I have to wake up and find you contemplating your whole life in the dark?”

“Because I felt guilty!” He snaps, and you’re taken aback, a little offended. He’d felt guilty for sleeping with you? “Because I was terrified I had ruined your first time by not doing it right and making this official between us beforehand. I hadn’t wanted you to be self-conscious the first time.”

You find it in you to be a little appreciative of that. That he had wanted you to know how sure he was, that you were safe with him no matter what.

And also-” He rolls his eyes. “Not for nothing, but we were drunk, and I couldn’t tell if I was too rough, and I really hadn’t wanted to hurt you -”

It seems your moment of appreciation is over.

“ Why do you keep treating me like I’m fragile?” You bite. “You kept asking, over and over again, if I was okay. If I was sure I wanted to keep going. You were so careful with me, Tsukki – Get over yourself! I’m not going to break!”

He just stares. You realize what you’ve said. You remember who you’re talking to.

“Not gonna break, huh?” He mumbles, eyes flicking down to your lips. He seems like he wants to say something else, but he holds back.

You don’t.

“Yeah. Want me to prove it?”

You watch in real time as his eyes fill with understanding.

“Are you sure you’re okay with it?” He says, eyes flicking between yours. You start to argue, because he’s doing it again , but he cuts you short. “With me? So soon?”

Oh.

He must not realize how badly you’ve missed him. How much it’s hitting you, now that you understand what had gone wrong between you. That you’d been stupid. That he’d been stupid.

Would it be wrong to rile him up? Probably.

“Why, Tsukki? You got a lot to take out on me?” His eyes flicker dangerously, and you take a single step closer, craning your neck back to look at him. “You got your work cut out for you. Apparently, I’m not good at listening.”

His resolve goes out the window, and he dips his head low, lips brushing yours. Your soul aches for him.

“ I can make you good at listening. ”

You smile. “ Well, you’re not gonna do it by being gentle. ”

He drags you out the door before you can even process that it’s been opened. He pulls you down the hall toward the back entrance of the conference venue, and you laugh, glancing back toward the main room.

“People are gonna notice that you’re gone, Tsukki-”

“I’ll make it up to them.” He hauls you outside, all but carrying you down the steps to the limo. There are no reporters out here, probably because they’re all inside, so it’s no issue for him to quite literally toss you into the back of the limo with reckless abandon. Your hands find him before he’s got the door all the way closed.

And then his mouth is on yours, and you feel all the things that had fallen out of place finally align again. His lips are warm and urgent, and your fingers are tight in his hair. He knocks blindly on the window separating the back from the driver’s side of the limo, and the car starts to move just as he’s pushing you down on the seat. You topple back, and Tsukki climbs over you, his mouth attaching to your throat.

“ Tsukki ,” You breathe, relief filling your lungs. He groans quietly, hands sliding your dress up your legs and over your thighs.

“ Fuck, I missed you ,” He mumbles into your skin. “This is real, right? Not a dream?”

You giggle, your chest pressing up into his, and you feel him smile wide against you. “You saying this isn’t a dream come true, Tsukishima? I can leave, if you want-”

“God, I can’t wait to fuck that attitude out of you,” He says, spreading your thighs and slotting himself between them. “How has your mouth not gotten you in trouble yet?”

“I’ve been waiting for you to do something about it,” You say, shrugging. “Might be too late, now. I’m getting pretty good at it.”

“Don’t complain when I break you,” He whispers before biting down hard on your shoulder. You moan loudly, slapping a hand over your mouth in embarrassment because the driver of this limo does not need to hear that. Tsukki laughs against you.

“You asked me not to be gentle. Are you regretting it?”

You shake your head furiously. Your stomach flips over and over on itself, and there’s that warm buzzing filling your skin that you’ve come to associate with him.

“No?” He whispers. “You like it?”

“ Mm- “ You wriggle under him, your dress sliding up as you push yourself against him. “Yeah-yes. Mhm .”

His hold on your hips tightens. “Lucky me,” He responds, a little breathless. He uses his grip to drag you down the leather seat a little more, forcing your thighs open so he can press his hips against you. You moan quietly in his ear, feeling him against your core, already half-hard.

“Need you, Tsukki.”

“Yeah? Am I supposed to give it to you just because of that?”

You get the feeling this night won’t be easy on your pride, but that’s okay. You think you might be desperate enough by the time you get home.

“I suppose that wouldn’t be fair,” You whisper, and he snickers against your skin.

“No, I don’t think it would. You’ve got a lot to make up to me.”

“How do you want me to make it up to you?”

“Patience, sweetheart,” He murmurs. “I don’t plan to do anything until I have you in my bed.”

You whine, but you can also feel the limo starting to make the slow turn into Tsukki’s driveway. He sits you up, watching you fix your dress and smiling when your cheeks flush at the state of yourself. Your skin is hot, and your thighs tremble a little, and your hair’s come undone. And yet, Tsukki looks perfectly put together.

You hide behind your hair as he helps you out of the limo and walks you to the door. Lights flash behind you, and you hear one of the reporters mumble ‘ I didn’t realize the event ended ’ to the person beside him. Tsukki starts laughing the moment his front door closes, and you groan loudly while trudging toward the stairs.

“They’re gonna know , Tsukki.”

“You embarrassed?”

“Yes! Of course I am-” Before you can turn to him, you’re air-lifted over his shoulder. You start to scream, flailing while he takes the stairs to his room.

“Good. Then I want them to know.” He sets you on your feet by his bed, and you huff, fixing your dress.

You look around while he closes the door. You haven’t been here in ages, all of your time with him spent at your place. You turn slowly, taking in the familiar sight of his room. It’s so different being here, after all this time.

You’re so distracted by his room that you aren’t prepared for the fingers he puts on your forearm or the way he spins you toward him.

You’re equally unprepared for the hand he plants on your shoulder before shoving you hard. You yelp, falling flat on your back and bouncing on his mattress. By the time you find his eyes, he’s standing over you, loosening his tie.

His eyes are cold. “What do you want to apologize for first?”

“What?” You say dumbly, watching the tie come loose. His jacket goes next, and then his white dress-shirt.

“Which one, Y/n? Listening to too many people on the internet? Not believing me when I’d flirt with you?” He leans over you, his hands flat on the bed on either side of you. “Or not hearing me out that night? Causing this whole mess.”

“I didn’t cause that alone,” You argue, and his eyebrows lift with humor.

“You’re still talking back?” He stands, reaching for the button on his pants. “Guess we’ll start here then.”

“Gonna put my mouth to use?” You joke, but there’s a rush of heat that, funnily enough, soaks your panties right through. You stare down at his hands, watching the zipper slide down and feeling your mouth water a little bit.

“You ever done this before?” He mumbles, eyes trailing down your body hungrily as he hooks a thumb into the waistband of his boxers. You nod quickly, but he just raises a brow and lifts his other hand, still holding the black tie. “Like this?”

You stare, your heart thumping with excitement. “No,” You breathe. “Can’t say I have.”

He smirks down at you, beckoning you to him with two fingers. “On your knees.”

You scramble to kick your heels off and get into position at the end of the mattress. He stands over you and holds one hand out, looking down at you in amusement when you put both wrists in his hand.

“You’re a bit eager.” When you nod, he just drops your wrists.

Your heart drops a little. “Wha-” You gasp, because he’s sliding the tie over your eyes and knotting it in the back, whispering ‘ So close, sweetheart ’ in your ear. You moan, your thighs sliding open on the bed.

“Pinch me if something doesn’t feel right,” He murmurs distractedly, and you hear the shuffle of his pants on his skin. “ Hard, Y/n. You hear me?”

“ Mhm . Pinch,” You say, panting slightly. When he laughs, your panties start to stick to your skin.

“God, you want this so badly, don’t you?” The tip of his cock touches your lips, and you dart your tongue out right away, swirling it around the head. Tsukki sighs heatedly over you, and then his fingers tangle in your hair. “My own personal little whore.”

You groan, trying to take him in your mouth, but he uses his grip to hold you back.

“Say please.”

Your stomach flips hard, because you know ‘ please’ wouldn’t be enough.

“Please, Tsukki,” You whisper. “Make me your whore.”

He inhales sharply, and you decide right there that you want to hear him fall apart. When he touches your lips again and tightens his grip, you know you have no control here. So you just let your mouth fall open.

The first time he slides into your mouth, his cock hits the back of your throat, and you gag.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” He chuckles. “Thought you wanted it rough.” You recover as quickly as you can, breathing deep through your nose and sucking hard when he pulls back. He groans under his breath and thrusts his hips again, humming when you take him properly. “ That’s it, Y/n. ” He pulls you off of him for a moment, and you whine quietly. “Can you keep taking it like that?”

“Stop-” You croak, breathing heavily. “- fucking asking , Tsukishima.”

There’s silence over you, and then he yanks your head back, talking right over the yelp you let out. “If you say so.”

You get no more chances to recover, your breath sputtered and coughed around him as he sets a pace that stings. You moan loudly while he fucks your throat, drool pooling at the corners of your mouth and falling to your chest. Your fingers twitch on his thighs, and, after a few moments listening to the soft groans he lets out over you, one of your hands moves down to your thigh and slides to your core. You barely get two fingers on your clit when his voice bites out.

“ Don’t -” He snaps. “- even think about it .”

You whine around him, earning a particularly hard thrust that slams against the back of your throat. You latch onto his thighs again, digging your nails in.

“Not so mouthy now, huh?” He pants. “Not so fucking annoying. No choice but to listen.” You nod shallowly, unhinging your jaw a little more, until it hurts. He moans quietly. “Maybe you’ll listen when I tell you how pretty you look like this, baby. So fucking pretty, drooling all over my cock.”

Your whine is loud this time, and he laughs breathily. “You like that? Didn’t know you were into this, sweetheart – good to know.”

And then he pulls you right off him, your gasps echoing in his room. You cough, your chest heaving, but he doesn’t give you more time than that, his hands on your shoulders again. You’re less shocked when you’re shoved onto your back, and you’re too busy catching your breath to do much more than moan when he takes your ankles and drags you to the edge of the bed.

Tsukki hooks his fingers into your panties and rips them down your thighs, laughing cruelly. “Aw, look at you. You’re a mess just from that?”

You dig your fingers into his comforter, still blindfolded. “You’re an ass- mm! ”

Tsukishima Kei’s just stuffed your own soiled panties in your mouth.

“Still talking too much,” He mutters, and you hear something hit the floor. You only realize it’s his knees when his fingers grip your thighs hard enough to bruise and his tongue flattens over your clit.

You scream, muffled, and arch your back on the mattress. Your fingers fly into his hair just as he’s dragging his tongue over your folds a second time, but he pulls away. He bites down hard on your thigh, ignoring the jolt of your body.

“I didn’t say you could touch me.” Your fingers cling to the covers again, and it takes everything in you not to grab him when he spits hard on your clit. “Better.”

He eats you out like that, his face buried between your thighs as you scream and moan and nearly make your fingers go numb from how hard you fist the blankets. You have no clue how long it’s been or when it had happened, but you realize eventually that he’s slipped two fingers into you, curling and spreading them against spots you didn’t even know existed. Your body twitches when he pushes up against your g-spot, and you grind your hips up toward his mouth unconsciously.

You pay for it immediately, his mouth and fingers leaving you. You start to complain, but it’s turned into a scream when his hand comes down hard on your overly sensitive clit.

“I really do have my work cut out for me, huh?” He pants, breathless and raspy. “You’re a lot of work, sweetheart.” Your eyes prickle with tears, and you shake your head hard. He huffs out a laugh, breath cold on your heated core. “No? You’re not a lot of work?” When you shake your head again, he coos at you condescendingly. “You promise to be good?” You nod, and he laughs again. “Okay, then. Spread your legs for me.”

You peel your aching fingers off of the blankets and hook them around your thighs, spreading your legs and pressing your knees toward your chest until it starts to hurt. You hear Tsukki’s pants hit the floor, and he groans openly down at you.

“God, you look so good like this,” He mutters under his breath. “Can I take a picture?”

Your heart jumps. You’d always thought you would never be comfortable with something like that, but the thought of Tsukki having a picture of you on his phone – a picture of you looking like this – has you clenching hard around nothing. You nod firmly, unconsciously pulling your thighs open even further.

He lets out a surprised breath, and then you hear him scrambling for his pants on the floor. “ Fuck- ” He hisses, throwing things around, and you hear the thump of his phone hitting the rug under his desk. “ Fuck, fuck- ” You start to giggle, the sound muffled but still audible. “Don’t fucking laugh at me, you fucking asshole – I wasn’t expecting you to say yes-”

Your laugh is loud now, but when you hear him stumble back over to you and feel his hand on the underside of your thigh, your stomach flips and your breath cuts short. The camera shutter goes off, and goosebumps break out over your skin, a soft moan leaving you.

“You’re into this too, sweetheart?” He asks, laughing to himself. His phone hits the bed somewhere beside you. “You like when I take pictures of you?” You nod, your face flushing hard, but he slides his cock through your folds before you have time to be embarrassed. You moan, feeling the tip bump up against your clit with each shallow thrust. “Maybe one day we can film it.”

You moan wantonly, and his own moan joins yours as he sinks into you in one slow thrust. Your breath leaves your lungs as he pulls back and slams his hips into yours. “You took me all at once, baby,” He groans, anchoring himself to your hips. “You must have missed me.”

You nod desperately, and you feel his weight drop over you on the mattress. His fingers hook gently into the blindfold, despite how roughly his hips collide with yours, and he tugs the material up to your forehead. You blink rapidly, squinting when the light hits your eyes and trying to readjust while Tsukki drives his cock into you.

When you finally do gain your bearings, the first thing you find is him. Your eyes lock with his, and your own widen drastically as you take him in. His face is flushed, a sheen of sweat glinting off his skin. His eyebrows are furrowed with concentration, and his arms are flexed as he drags you down to meet him halfway with each thrust.

Your eyes roll back into your head almost immediately, the sight too much to handle while he fucks you. Your moans come out louder now, and – although you’re still muffled – you’re infinitely glad you’re not doing this at your apartment, surrounded by thin walls and neighbors. Here, you can moan as loud as you want. Here, you don’t have to care about the way his headboard slams against the wall. Here, you can arch your back and scream his name, over and over again around your panties.

He hears it the third time it comes out, the syllables of his name garbled but clearly his. His expression changes, those furrowed brows creasing even more and his lips parting as he lets out a series of quiet moans every time he hears his own name.

“ Fuck, ” He says, letting your waist go and dropping down hard over you, his hands hitting the bed on either side of you. “ Fuck , Y/n. I love you-” Your vision gets blurry, and your eyes burn, but you only notice you’re crying when the tears stream down toward your ears. “Listen to you, screaming my name like that,” He pants, his hips stuttering for a moment. The realization that he’s close to finishing sends you hurtling toward your own orgasm. “So fucking perfect. Fucking perfect for me.”

His fingers dig into the material in your mouth, and he pries it out, tossing the panties somewhere behind him. Your jaw aches, but you forget it when he meets your eyes.

“Say it for me, sweetheart.”

“Tsukki-” You cry. “ Please, Tsukki- ” Your fingers itch to touch him. “Please, I love you – Can I-” You start to cry harder, your vision gone completely as you sob, the feeling of him slamming into you too much now.

“Yes, baby, yes-” His breath hitches when you clench around him, and he nods tightly. “You can touch me-”

Your fingers fly into his hair, and you drag him down roughly, smashing your lips to his. You both moan, and you ramble deliriously against his mouth. “ Love you, I love you, I- ”

He shudders over you, groaning as he stills with his hips pressed tight to yours. He spills into you, his body shaking against yours as he fills you. The feeling of it throws you right off the edge, and you cry against his lips while you come, your back twitching and arching toward his.

He’s collapsed onto you by the time you’re done, breathing hard in your ear. “ Fuck , Y/n,” He sighs. You wrap your legs tiredly around his waist, exhaustion taking you over.

“How did we do all that with my dress still on?” You whisper weakly, too tired to even smile when he starts to laugh.

“God, I love you. You’re so fucking stupid.”

That one does make you laugh. You feed off of each other, worsening until you’re both wheezing together.

Finally, he buries his face in your neck, sighing. “I’m sorry.”

Your heart lurches. “For?”

“Everything,” he says. “ Everything, Y/n. For saying the opposite of what I meant. For not saying the things I wanted to.”

You say nothing, just wrapping your arms tight around his neck. “I’m sorry, too. For not listening to the right person. And for thinking the worst of you just because I was scared.”

He stays quiet a moment, just breathing you in. “Does that mean you aren’t breaking up with me?”

You chew on your lip, suddenly nervous. “Does that mean we’re together?”

“I don’t think any of this was ever fake for me.”

You bring his face up to yours, kissing him deeply. “I don’t think it was for me, either,” You whisper against his lips. He smiles, pulling back to look down at you.

“Can I still ask you to be my girlfriend? My real girlfriend?”

You stare up at him a moment, and then your brow furrows. “I don’t think you ever asked me to be your girlfriend at all.”

He blanches.

“Oh, fuck.”

You remind him of it for the rest of his life.

289 notes View Post

whydoyoucare866

1 year ago

108K notes View Post

whydoyoucare866

1 year ago

i just watched wonka again and jesus christ the things that man does to me

window pains | jason todd

Summary: He's got a habit of coming in through the window. You want him to start staying... and using the door.

Pairing: Jason Todd x gn!reader

Word count: 1.6k

Warnings/tags: injured Jason Todd (he's okay dw), angst, pining, mentions of Jason's death.

A/N: sooo.... i guess i'm a dc girlie now. just a reminder that every character i write will always be 18+!!! this is probably canon divergent but we make our own canon.

If you like this fic and want to see more, please let me know through reblogs ♡

the divider

"Can't you enter my apartment like a normal person?"

"You know who you're talking to, right?"

"You're getting blood on my carpet, Todd."

It doesn't really matter. He'll come back and scrub it out as soon as his ribs are whole. And fuck if he's not good at getting blood out of surfaces. Jason Todd ought to start a housekeeping column.

You catch his limp as he climbs over the windowsill. It almost topples him, but he gets to the couch before it does. He doesn't make a sound.

That had freaked you out the first few times he'd stumbled through your window. Once, he came with part of a windshield wiper impaled in his shoulder. He'd lain on your couch so still and so quiet, you'd thought Red Hood had croaked in your apartment. Which would not have been a good look for you. Or maybe it would. Depends on who you ask.

Sometimes you want to tell him to make sounds. To hiss and grunt and complain. To grab your wrist so you'll slow down as you pull thread through flesh.

But it's not your place to request such a thing. You don't know where you reside in Jason Todd's life, but it's not somewhere where you can request to hear him hurt.

Outwardly, his injuries aren't bad-looking. He takes off his helmet and tosses it somewhere under the coffee table. You offer a hand to help him lie down on the couch—he doesn't take it.

"Jesus Christ, Jay." You suck in a sharp breath and peel back his bloody suit. "What'd you do?"

"Took a midnight stroll in the Botanical Gardens. Why, what'd you do?"

You frown, eyebrows pinching in the center of your forehead. Jason's stomach is mottled with purple and red bruises. There's a sticky gash right above his hip. A knife. Or a sword, maybe. Apparently, swords are commonplace in Gotham.

"How'd they get you?" you ask.

It's a rule-break. Jason's number one policy: don't ask questions.

You always do. Even when it was new, this… thing between you two, you'd ask. Who were they? Why did they hurt you? Did you hurt them back?

The last one, you always know the answer to.

"There were, like, ten of them," he says. "Cut me some slack, will ya?"

He has a cut across his lips. A ringed finger that caught on his skin, you guess. You wonder if he'd wince if you kissed him. If he'd wince at the pain or the kiss itself. If you'd know the difference.

Rage suddenly cuts through you. It makes your hands careless, cruel; you pull the bandage around his waist too tight. Jason coils up slightly.

"Jesus—ever heard of bedside manner?" he asks, looking at you through his lashes.

"Ever heard of not breaking into someone's apartment and making them patch you up?"

"I don't make you," Jason says easily. "You wouldn't do it if you didn't want to."

That only increases your rage. Because he's right. You wouldn't be here if you didn't want to be. You'd have kicked him out four first aid kits ago if you minded.

You yank down his shirt and pack up the kit. Jason shifts on the couch. A sliver of skin above his waistband is still exposed. You have to turn your head to force your gaze away.

"No bandaids?" he asks. "All my cuts'll be exposed to the elements."

"You can put them on yourself."

His cheek could use one. And his eyebrow. You're not in the mood.

Jason doesn't say anything in response to that. You get up to put the kit back under the sink.

"Can I crash here?"

"Do what you want," you say, suddenly exhausted. Like it's you who just went six rounds with Gotham's scumbags.

You peek over the kitchen counter when you hear rustling and the couch springs squeak. Jason leans heavily on the arm of the couch, reaching for the window. You walk over and stand in front of him.

"What're you doing?" you ask.

"You want me to go," he says flatly. "So I'm going."

"I didn't say that, I said—"

"I can read between the lines."

"If you could read between the lines as well as you think you can, we wouldn't be in this situation," you say.

"What situation?"

You turn your head. "Nothing."

Jason steps towards the window. You block him again.

"What is the matter with you?" you ask. "You're injured. Lie down."

"I'm not your responsibility," he says, glaring. "I'm leaving."

"No, you're not. And since you're allergic to using the door, you don't have a choice."

Jason's eyebrow rises. "Are you saying you'd physically prevent me from leaving?"

You lift your chin. "If that's what it takes."

"Hm. Can't tell if your confidence is stupid or brave."

"Lie the fuck down, Todd."

His lip curls. "I don't stay where I'm not welcome."

Sometimes you forget how young he is. Not that you're not also young, but, well… you don't feel your youth as acutely as other people your age might. It's something you two have in common.

Here, in the gritty glow of Gotham, you are reminded that Jason Todd died once. Before he finished school. Before he fell in love.

Your stomach churns every time you see that Y-shaped scar on his torso, strapped over him like a chain.

"I didn't say that you're not welcome," you say.

"Yeah, well, you didn't have to."

He sags against the couch and it occurs to you that he's as exhausted as you feel.

"Can you just—" You touch his bicep. He winces even though there's no injury there. "Can you just lie down?"

You stare at each other for another minute. Slowly, Jason lays down. His eyes are alert instead of heavy with sleep. Instantly, you feel guilty for making him think he has to be cautious around you. His hand curls protectively over his stomach.

"Do you want a blanket?" you ask.

He squints. "It's August."

"I know, I… I thought maybe the blood loss made you cold."

"'M fine. Perks of being risen from the dead."

You watch him get settled for a minute. He shifts his weight to his uninjured side and meets your gaze. His eyes are gray in the weak light.

"You're tired of me," he says.

Your head snaps up. "No, I'm not."

"You are."

"I'm not tired of you, Jay."

You see it. The fear. He thinks this is the last time you'll let him in. He doesn't know you can't lock him out. You won't.

You get up and go to get the kit from the sink again. Jason follows your movement the whole time. His face scrunches in confusion when you sit in front of the couch and unzip the kit.

You pull out the tiny red bandaids. You'd bought them as a joke, initially. It had made Jason laugh and that had been reason enough to keep buying them. And then he let you actually put them on.

You peel the adhesive off of one and gently stick it on his cheek. He blinks at you, thick, dark lashes kissing the corners of his eyes.

"I'm not tired of you," you say softly.

"I'd be tired of me."

"You keep this city safe. How could I be tired of Gotham's defender?"

Jason scowls and turns his head into the cushion before you can put the second bandaid.

"I'm not its defender. The others protect this city a hundred times better. Nightwing does it with a smile on his face."

"I like that you go out there even when it's hard, Jay," you say.

He doesn't respond. You lean in, so close that you can count the freckles on his neck.

"Can I finish putting the bandaids on?" you ask.

"I don't need 'em."

"You do. You need another on your forehead."

"It'll heal fine without it."

Your shoulders bunch like a cat on defense. You grab his cheek (gently, always gently) and his head whips to yours in surprise.

"Jason Todd, I am not tired of you. I'm tired of the fact that you only come by when you need fixing."

He scowls. "I never asked you to fix me. If you want me to leave, I'll leave."

"I don't want you to leave, I want you to stay!" you burst.

Jason scoffs. "No, you don’t. I'll overstay my welcome real fast."

"Maybe I care about you on purpose!" you say, voice rising. "Maybe I didn't stumble through a window; maybe I walked through the door and bought the bandaids and learned how to stitch wounds because I wanted to."

He suddenly looks overcome by grief. The agony in his face startles you.

"I don't know how to use the door anymore," he says quietly. "All I do is stumble through windows."

Your hand slips off of his cheek. Jason closes his eyes; they fly open when you stick the second bandaid above his eyebrow.

"You can come in any way you want to," you say, face an inch away from his. "As long as you come back to me."

His gaze darts to your mouth. You don't kiss him hard. He breaks anyway.

You avoid the right side of his mouth entirely, not wanting to pull at his cut. Jason shudders into your mouth. You cup his pulse through his neck and it quickens.

His eyes are wet when you pull away. His chest heaves like he's been swinging through the city.

"I wanna try to use the door," he says.

You touch the bandaid on his cheek, humming.

"Then I'll leave it unlocked."

4K notes View Post

whydoyoucare866

9 months ago

NO WAY TODAY IS OIKAWAS BDAYY HAPPY BDAY BBY

genius. [akaashi keiji x f!reader] chapter three.

>>You struggle to pay rent on your limited graduate student salary, and your worst enemy agrees to help you out.

You realize you need to find a partner for your faceless porn account, and Akaashi Keiji is the only man who meets all your requirements.<<

series status: [ongoing]

previous. || masterlist. || next.

a/n: so much to say and so little time to say it

[feel free to buy me a cup of coffee!]

When you come to, you’re completely slumped over Akaashi, your head buried in the crook of his neck and his arms hanging loosely around you. He’s breathing hard, jostling you where you lie flat on top of him.

“Shit,” he breathes, lifting one hand to his hair and curling his fingers into the locks. You make a small noise, one that’s neither awake nor asleep, and he taps his other hand on your back lightly. “You good?”

You nod groggily and try to lift onto your hands. Your arms shake, so you adjust, but the motion has you both flinching, because Akaashi’s still inside of you. “Fuck,” you whisper to yourself, oversensitive, and he drops both hands to your hips, breathing out shakily while he lifts you off of him. You start to fall sideways onto the bed, but he catches you, throwing his body toward yours and catching you so that you don’t hit the mattress too hard.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” he says, a furrow in his brow when you glance up at him. “I put you through a lot.”

“Yeah, you tend to,” you joke weakly, your head lolling to the side as he sits up. You both sigh hard, Akaashi barely managing to crawl to the end of the bed for your phone and both sets of underwear before he returns to his spot. “Thanks,” you mumble when he hands everything to you, and, as you’re sliding your panties on (and ditching the bra, because you can’t be bothered right now), you look down at the sheets. “The bed’s dirty.”

“Don’t care. Need a nap.” He digs the heels of his hands into his eyes, groaning. You curl up on your side next to him, your eyes heavy and your muscles aching. A nap sounds glorious.

Before you can drift off, however, his words are ringing through your head.

‘You know me better than that.’

Your eyes crack open, and you stare at the side of his face. His head is bobbing slightly as he starts to fall asleep, eyes flickering open and shut, and you feel distantly bad for interrupting.

“You’re really not doing it on purpose? Any of it?” you whisper, half-hoping it doesn’t wake him at all.

His eyelids flutter, and he turns his head groggily to meet your gaze. When he sees you looking, he turns onto his side, achingly slow, until he’s facing you, too. And then he shakes his head, the exhaustion clear in his every move.

“Not at all,” he whispers back, surprisingly open with you in his tired state. “Are you?”

You frown slightly, confused. “What could I be doing on purpose?”

His eyes slide shut for a moment. “Everything.”

You get the feeling that what he’s just admitted is bigger than what you have the space to process right now. So you just shake your head, too, and echo his words back. “Not at all.”

“Okay,” he breathes, after a pause that’s so long that you’d wondered if he’d fallen asleep. “That’s settled, then.”

“I don’t think anything’s settled.” You could probably stop whispering, but the world outside is starting to grow dark, taking this room with it, and the only light in the house comes from the kitchen, so far away from the space between you and Akaashi. And his pinky is brushing up against yours, twitching as he falls asleep, but he’s reaching sleepily for it anyway, hooking your fingers together just before his breath evens out. You’re not sure that he realizes he’s done it.

You want to let him sleep – you want to sleep. But you need his answer. So you squeeze your pinky against his once, and his brows twitch as he wakes again. He hums softly, marking his attention.

“What do we do?” you ask, your words as vague and unclear as your head feels. He swallows, unknowingly shifting marginally closer to you.

“Told you,” he breathes, a little slurred. “Not doing it on purpose. Jus’ happens.” He lets out a tired sigh and shifts again. “Everything jus’ happens…”

“So, what d’we do?” you say again, eyes flitting all over his face for an answer.

“Nothin’,” he says, shaking his head slightly. “Nothin’ to do but let it happen.”

You stare at him so long that he falls asleep again, his head tilted toward yours. You wonder if you can do that – just let it happen. Whatever that means – whatever it is. You wonder if you can just give in to Akaashi Keiji like that.

‘You know me better than that.’

You suppose that’s alright. Because he’s giving in, too.

When you finally drift off to sleep, it’s with your forehead pressed against his and his finger curled around yours.

–

Keiji flies up in a tangle of limbs and a gasp that wakes you.

“Shit-” His eyes fly to the window, seeing that dawn’s well past come. You groan, still curled up on your side, and his head whips around to the bedside table, his phone snatched up in an instant.

It’s almost 7am.

“Fucking shit-” He rolls out of bed, missing his footing and tumbling right off of it. He hits the floor in a pile of his own body, groaning and shaking it off as best as he can, and you sit up quickly, caught off guard by his crash landing.

“Akaashi-”

“Shit, fuck-” He trips over his own feet, still half-asleep, and tries to locate his clothes. “It’s almost 7. I have to get home and shower and get my shit. I have to teach at 9.” He snatches his shirt off the floor and pulls it on, letting out a frustrated groan when he realizes it’s on backwards.

“Take an Uber. I’ll pay for it,” you try, but he just shakes his head, rushing to twist the shirt around.

“Need my bike later–wait.” He looks at you, in his boxers and his half-on shirt and his crooked glasses. You stare back, in your underwear and your bedhead and a pillow pressed to your chest in order to hide your body from him in this new daylight. “We only filmed one thing.”

Your eyes go wide, and you’re breathing ‘fuck’ as you stare up at him. He looks around the room, blinking hard. “What do we do?” he asks, still standing there like an idiot.

“I’m free tonight if you want to come back,” you offer. He nods – he thinks he’s free, too.

“Yeah, that works.”

“Okay, then take an Uber home, since you’re just coming back,” you push again. “And leave your shit here.”

“Okay,” he sighs, searching for his jeans. “That’s fine.”

He finds them on the other side of the bed, entirely unsure how they’d gotten there, and starts to hop into them. There’s a moment of silence, one where he goes through the mental list of his things – wallet, keys, phone – before you’re speaking.

“Akaashi.”

“Hm?” he hums, taking one last hop to get his jeans up to where they need to be before he’s wrestling with the zipper.

“You said last night that there’s nothing we can do except let things happen.” Keiji pauses with his fingers on his zipper, back turned to you and eyes flicking down at nothing while he thinks. Had he said that? “Did you mean that?” you ask quietly.

He tugs his zipper up and does the button, blinking rapidly. His ears start to warm with some unknown embarrassment. “I suppose I did.”

“So… are we just gonna…” You don’t finish the question, but he hears it, anyway, and his heart flips in his chest.

Are we just gonna keep doing this? Whatever we want?

He glances over his shoulder at you, turning slightly while he tightens his belt around his hips. “What is it, huh?” he asks, a soft smirk lifting on his lips. “You attracted to me, Freak?”

You scowl, but he sees the interest in your eyes. It’s the same interest that plucks at his nerves now, as he’s doing up his belt and staring down at you where you sit, naked in the bed that he’s fucked you in twice this week.

“I think you know the answer to that,” you bite, but it’s lacking its usual edge. You’re nervous.

He doesn’t have it in him right now to fuck with you, because he’s nervous, too. “Yeah. I do.” He scoops up his phone and runs his fingers through his hair. “Okay, I have all my shit, I think.”

You tap quickly on your phone with an uncertain nod. “Okay,” you say after a moment. “Uber will be here in two minutes.”

He nods, rushing to the door. “Thanks,” he breathes, and then he stops himself with a hand on the door frame. He shouldn’t leave like this.

Backing slowly into the room again and eyeing you where you sit, he sighs. “Freak.”

You look up from your phone, frowning. “Is that just gonna be your new name for me-”

“I’m attracted to you, too.”

Your mouth drops open, and his splits in a smug grin that hides how terrifying it had been to admit that.

“But you probably figured that out, didn’t you?” he asks quietly. When you just swallow and nod shallowly, he nods back. “So, yes. We’re ‘just gonna’.” He quotes your unfinished question and offers no ending. The rest of it sits between you, the silence empty and full at the same time.

You let out a long breath after a moment. “Okay,” you whisper.

The sound of it – of your agreement to the unsaid proposal he’d just made – makes his fingertips go numb.

“Okay,” he breathes back. “I’m gonna go.”

“Okay.”

As he sits in the back of the Uber, Keiji tries to remember what he’s in such a rush for.

–

The time between October 25th and November 11th passes in a blur.

You and Akaashi find a flow, one that’s surprisingly easy. He comes over twice a week, as planned, and the world around you – outside of you – reduces to nothing but the things that happen inside the walls of your apartment. You both leave everything behind and enter into the suspended disbelief that carries you through this arrangement.

He bends you over every surface in the spare bedroom and forces you to forget who you are, not that that’s hard with the way he handles you. You talk back as often as you can, because the way his eyes light up when you do tells you he likes the challenge. That no one challenges him quite like you. You bump heads throughout the day, over and over again, only to fall into each other at night in a way that’s wonderfully in sync – two pieces of different puzzles that fit together as though they’d been made that way.

You start to think after a while that every argument you find yourself in with Akaashi Keiji only serves to make this thing between you stronger when you’re alone. Because on the days that your tension is particularly bad, you find it that much easier to give in to him. On the days when you’re particularly combative, he’s that much more eager to mold you into what he wants. Easy, like putty under his fingertips, you give for him – and he gives right back, just like he’d promised.

He still won’t let you touch him, not in the way that you want. After two weeks, he still won’t let you show him how to get out of his own head. He spanks you, ties you up, bends you in ways no one ever has before and makes you do things that would be completely humiliating if not for the fact that it’s him making you do them. You know that – you’re aware enough to know that it’s because it’s him.

That it’s always been because it’s him.

So even if he won’t let you do the one thing you keep asking for – tears in your eyes, a pout on your lips, anything that might make him give in to you – you can’t find it in you to be too upset. Because a deal is a deal, and Akaashi Keiji’s good for his word. And in return for giving him what he wants, he fucks you in your favorite position, once and then twice more in the same night, because you’re just that good at listening.

You listen to him, no matter the request, and he makes it worth your while without fail.

It bleeds into your everyday life without either of you realizing it.

Not the sex – never the sex. But things are different now. That suspended disbelief reaches, aching and stretching, into the corners of your days, touching the tension between you and then slipping away before you have a chance to recognize that things are changing.

Akaashi sits in the back of the LEM meetings now, where no one can see him. He lets other people take the round table, slipping in at the last second and taking a seat against the wall instead of coming five minutes early like he always does. He does it on purpose – you know he does, because he makes two choices.

The first is that – on days when you don’t present – he sits right behind you and taps his foot ever so lightly on one of your chair legs, just to remind you he’s there. And when you inevitably inch forward, he’s quick to adjust, because the universe had cursed him with long legs and he’s more than willing to use them. If you grow annoyed enough to turn and glare at him, you’re always unlucky enough to catch the smirk tugging at his lips and the heated look in his eye, because he gets off on you snapping at him.

You both know that now, and he’s not ashamed to admit it, anymore. Not to you.

The second – much, much worse – comes on the days that you do present. Because you’re forced to speak to a group of your peers and advisor for twenty minutes straight. Twenty minutes where Akaashi Keiji sits in the back of the room and undresses you with his eyes. His long, dark eyelashes flutter as his gaze travels across your body, and his bottom lip gets trapped between his teeth without hesitation. His head tilts this way and that, giving him the angles he needs to ogle you.

A few seconds on the hem of your skirt, giving way to thighs that, when pressed together like that, hide the marks he’d left only the night before. A few seconds on your throat, because, if he strains his eyes enough, he can see the traces of himself there, purple and slathered in concealer. A few seconds on the buttons of your blouse, the same buttons you’d had to sew back into your shirt because he’d accidentally ripped them off in his rush to undress you last week.

But maybe that’s your fault for wearing one of your roleplay blouses to campus that day. Maybe you’d done it on purpose. Maybe, over the last two weeks, you’d come to anticipate the shiver of nerves that would run down your spine when your day to present would come back around. Maybe you’d started to look forward to the way he would inevitably grill you with questions after spending twenty minutes flustering you, because – as you’d come to learn – Akaashi Keiji’s preferred form of foreplay had always been psychological.

Maybe that’s what you get for choosing him.

Maybe that’s why you’d choose him again in a heartbeat.

It takes too long to notice that other people are starting to see it, too. That, when Bokuto digs through your fridge and holds up a container of kung pao chicken in confusion, your stuttered excuse of having Akaashi over to grade exams together hadn’t passed over with Kuroo as well as you’d hoped. That, when Akaashi beckons you away from lunch to go to Syntax lecture together, Tsukishima’s eyes follow you out of the dining hall, watching you two walk closer together than usual. That, at Bokuto’s parties, Yachi had started to realize that Akaashi was careful with her personal space on that couch, but not yours.

It takes too long to notice those things, for both of you. Because you’re both too busy noticing each other.

At night, Akaashi doesn’t text you anymore. He just logs on to xxxvids .com and pings you, no matter how many times you tell him to stop being weird. He pings you there and takes up most of the time you could be spending responding to other messages, talking about absurdly normal things like grading and dissertation progress. It adds to the suspended disbelief, and you think that maybe you both know it. He always drops a five-star review at the end, and, after a week of it, he starts gifting you the in-chat badges and stickers that cost money. He sends them without hesitation, the money adding up so quickly that you start to threaten to block him.

‘You won’t block me,’ he always messages back. ‘You like my attention too much.’

You hate how well he knows you.

So you start to text him your solo videos before you post them. Because you know him, too. Because you know that all you have to do is attach a cheeky message – ‘since you liked it so much the first time ;)’ – before he comes running, your phone ringing angrily every time.

‘You better cut it out,’ he always says.

‘What’re you gonna do, punish me?’, you say. Because you know that he will.

You know that Akaashi will always give you what you want, no matter how far you push his limits outside of the bedroom. Because as long as you give him what he needs when it matters, he’ll do just the same.

That understanding becomes real in ways you hadn’t predicted, much too soon.

–

Keiji tugs on the collar of his turtleneck in annoyance, the fabric rubbing against his skin in a way that irritates him. He passes through the mass of people in the dining hall, grimacing when his shirt sticks to his skin, the heat a bit unbearable.

It’s still too warm out to be wearing something so clearly meant for winter, but he’d been in a rush this morning, and he hadn’t had time to cover up the hickies you’d left on him two nights ago. He’d cursed you and your family line when he’d spotted the marks in the mirror, because he certainly did not have time to cover them up with the concealer you’d bought him. He’d picked out the first high-neck item he could find in his closet, which just so happened to be this awful wool sweater that’s heavenly in the cold and absolute hell any other time.

You’re already at the table with Bokuto when he finds you, and he sees your eyes drop to his neck. Your eyebrows go up with interest, and you’re hiding a smirk, because you know exactly why he would ever have chosen such a bad outfit for today’s weather. He sits with a sigh, his loudly clattering tray one of the many micro-decisions he’s making to let out his irritation today.

“Hi, Bokuto,” he says quietly, only acknowledging you with a nod of his head. You nod back, seeing when he rolls his eyes subtly at you. It makes you smile, so you turn it on Bokuto, because that’s more natural than smiling at Keiji.

“Kou, have you heard back from the Expo?” you ask, giving the larger man all your attention. Keiji’s eye twitches slightly, and he digs into his lunch, trying not to let you see. But he knows you have, because you always do.

Sometime in the last two weeks, you’d picked up on the way his shoulders tense when you talk to Bokuto, on the way his jaw clenches and unclenches when you touch him. On the way he’s just that much meaner in bed afterward.

He’s not stupid enough to believe he’s not a little bit possessive. He’d felt it enough times over the last few days.

It always starts with an annoyance that strums in his veins when his best friend hugs you – because there’s a heat map on your body that only Keiji can see, one that shows him all the places he’d put his hands the last time he’d fucked you. And he has to sit there and watch Bokuto’s hands cover it all up.

It’s worse when Bokuto lingers, friendly and unassuming, in your personal space, because Keiji knows you won’t smell like you afterward. He always tenses when it’s not your perfume in his nose when you pass him by. His mind goes blank when it’s Bokuto’s cologne instead, stronger than his own and not at all suited to your skin.

It always leaves him feeling like a fucking dog, overcome with some strange urge to pull you close – in public or otherwise – and drown you in things that smell like him. His cologne, his shirts, his coat, he doesn’t fucking care. It irritates him. And you’d noticed.

Of course you’d noticed – because you’re annoying like that. You’re annoying enough to feed into it, giving Bokuto extra smiles and extra sweetness when Keiji’s around, because you know that, the next time you’re alone with him, Keiji will make you cry and beg for forgiveness.

And it doesn’t matter how many times he reminds himself that it’s not his business to be jealous. It’s not his business to be possessive, because there’s nothing for him to be possessive about. You’re not his.

But you lean into it. So he does, too.

You lean into it now, touching your fingers down on Bokuto’s arm when you ask him about the conference. It starts on Friday, and the results still aren’t out yet. It’s concerning, enough that it’s made everyone more high-strung than usual – conference results coming out with less than a week for speakers to prepare is unheard of.

But Keiji’s not thinking about that. He’s thinking about the fingers you have on Bokuto’s wrist, wondering if you remember that, two nights ago, you had those fingers wrapped around his-

“No, I haven’t!” Bokuto exclaims, snapping Keiji out of his growing frustration. “It’s so weird and annoying! Have you?”

You shake your head, pouting slightly, and Keiji’s rice spoon shakes in his clenched fist. He’s really not in the space to do this today.

“We haven’t, no. Our advisor’s starting to get a little pissed,” you say in faux contemplation. You press one fingertip to your bottom lip and tap thoughtfully a few times. Keiji wonders if it’d be okay for him to throw himself across this table and tackle you.

When your eyes slide to his, catty and challenging, he loses his mind.

Dropping his spoon in the metal bowl with a jarring clang, he leans back, sighing performatively. “God, I think I chose the wrong outfit for today.”

Bokuto looks him over, nodding enthusiastically, but Keiji keeps his eyes locked on yours. You know to be wary of him, at least – your eyes narrow, and his even out, your challenge accepted.

“Yeah, dude, you really did. It’s way too hot to-” Bokuto goes quiet, staring. His eyes are locked on the place where Keiji has a finger hooked into his collar and is tugging it down, presumably to air out his warm neck.

His warm neck, where there are some rather you-shaped love bites marking his skin.

Your face drops, mouth hanging open and eyes wide as you stare at him. Keiji doesn’t react, because Bokuto’s looking at him, not you, but he does turn his gaze on his friend and tug on the collar a few more times with a relieved sigh.

“So hot in here. I made a mistake.”

“Dude.” Bokuto stares, open-mouthed, and then reaches for him, yanking the collar all the way down and exposing Keiji’s hickies completely. “Have you been sleeping with someone?!”

Keiji stares you dead in the eyes when he says–

“Just someone from my department.” He watches your gaze turn deadly, and he smiles politely at the glare you shoot him, turning back to his friend. “I don’t think you’d know her. It’s really casual.”

Bokuto immediately turns to you, and you fix your expression with impressive speed.

“Do you know who it is?” he asks excitedly, practically vibrating in his seat. “Y/n, please tell me you know who it is. Please, please, please-”

“Uh-” you stutter, laughing nervously and shaking your head. “Our department’s pretty big, Kou. And I’m not really in the habit of getting in Akaashi’s business.”

It’s a solid save, Keiji will give you that. But he can’t help but smirk, because he can tell you’re not going to be letting this one go any time soon.

“Um, but-” He plasters an embarrassed grin on his face, nudging Bokuto in a way that’s meant to be sheepish. “We’re keeping it kinda quiet, okay? So don’t tell anyone?”

The man’s eyes go wide, and he’s nodding very solemnly. “Yeah, I totally get it. I won’t say anything!”

Your chair screeches when you push it back, standing to full height. Keiji watches you with disinterest.

“I just remembered,” you say through gritted teeth. “We were supposed to go over that handout before lecture. Should we go?”

Keiji just lifts his brows and looks down at his lunch. “I’m still eating.”

Your nostrils flare, and a rush of excitement flies down his spine. Picking up your bag, you smile sweetly down at Bokuto. “Sorry, Kou. Let’s get dinner tonight?”

Keiji can’t wait to get you alone.

He and Bokuto watch you go, Bokuto waving and yelling ‘see you tonight!’ across the crowded room. Keiji eats his meal silently, watching when Kuroo, Tsukishima, and Yachi break through the mass of bodies and make their way over to the table. The two men are stealing glances at each other as they walk, but Keiji’s learned that if he minds his own business, then Tsukishima tends to do the same.

And it’s important to him that Tsukishima does the same.

“Was that Y/n we just saw?” Kuroo asks as he sets his tray down. Bokuto nods bouncily.

“She said something about a handout that she and Akaashi need to go over.” He looks down at Keiji, who’s stuffing his mouth full of food at record speed. “Shouldn’t you go with her?”

Keiji nods, cheeks stretched to their limits as he tries to swallow it all. “Mhm,” he says, grimacing as the food goes down and then shoveling more in. He picks up his bag as he’s still eating, swinging it over his shoulder and snatching his tray up. “Gotta go-” He chokes a bit, barely recovering as he’s waving goodbye over his shoulder. He feels Tsukishima’s eyes on him for only a moment before the sensation passes, and he’s grateful he and the blond have come to a silent agreement.

He makes a beeline for the door, all but bursting out in a run as soon as he hits the sidewalk. His phone buzzes in his pocket, and he yanks it out, heart pounding at the thought that it’s you.

[2:38PM]

Bokuto: DONT WORRY AKAAAASHI!!!

Bokuto: I WONT TELL ANYONE ABOUT YOUR SECRET SITUATIONSHIP!!!

Keiji laughs to himself, pocketing the phone again as he heads straight for the Linguistics building.

He only makes it to the corner before he’s being dragged around the side of the dining hall and slammed against the brick wall.

“You asshole-”

He closes his eyes and laughs, your voice washing over him in a giddy wave. “This doesn’t look much like a Syntax handout-”

“You told him.” You lean in close, and he meets your eyes with ease, the grin tugging at his lips satisfied.

“No, I didn’t,” he says. “I told him I’m fucking a girl in my department. It could be anyone.”

“He’s gonna figure out it’s me-”

Keiji takes your face in his hand, squeezing tight and pulling you close, not unlike the way he’d done it in the stairwell two weeks ago. There’s something about the way you’d said it – like you really don’t want Bokuto Koutarou to find out you’re hooking up with him – that makes him angry. Irrationally so, because it’s not his place to be angry at all. But still, he grabs you. He grabs you, and then he turns you around, pushing you up against the wall with his body.

“You wanna play with me, Freak?” he mumbles, his voice cold as he stares down at you. “You wanna flirt and touch and smile at him like that when I’m around?” Your eyes are heated, so different from his own, and he wonders if you realize that it turns him on when you look at him like this. He leans down, close enough that he watches your eyes drop to his lips in a slight panic, because every breath you let out passes through his lungs next.

He hopes you feel it in yours when he whispers, “Then I’m gonna play with you, too.”

Your gaze hardens on his, but he’d felt the shiver of anticipation that had just wracked your body. It eggs him on, makes him want to do worse.

“If you wanted to fuck Bokuto, you should have asked him instead,” he says, his voice hard. “But you asked me. Not him.”

Your eyes flick between his, and then your gaze clears of its anger. Keiji’s brow furrows.

“You’re jealous,” you whisper, amazement coating your words and sticking to him like honey. He scoffs, shaking his head.

“I’m not fucking jealous-”

“You’re so fucking jealous, Akaashi-”

“Y/n,” he growls, pushing you up harder against the wall, but you just stare up at him, a wild look in your eye that makes him completely and utterly nervous. “I’m not jealous.”

“Well, you’re something,” you breathe, the smile on your face unable to be stopped, even with the way he’s squeezing your cheeks together. “What’s wrong, huh? Worried I might not just be yours to play with?”

His veins run cold, and there’s a terrifyingly significant part of him that wants to take you right here, just to prove a point. To make you scream right here, in public, so close to the dining hall where anyone – maybe even someone in particular – might pass by and discover you. It makes him crazy.

You make him crazy.

“If you fuck anyone else–” he whispers, cold and hard and laced with a threat. “–then this is over. You hear me, Y/n?”

He thinks you’re going to be angry. He’s saying something completely irrational. He’s being possessive and gross and terrible, and you should be angry with him. It’s not his place – none of this is his place. You can fuck whoever you want to. It was unspoken that there would be no one else, but it was never part of the rules. You should be kicking and screaming and fighting him with everything you’ve got.

But you don’t.

“I hear you, Akaashi,” you just breathe, staring up at him with wide, twinkling eyes. You look excited, like you’d been waiting to bring this out of him. Like you’d wanted this from him, because there wouldn’t be any other reason that you would–

Keiji blinks, realization filling him. “You… aren’t attracted to Bokuto, are you?”

You grin wide, evil and wicked as you search his eyes. “God, you’re possessive.”

He wants to crawl into a hole and die.

–

You don’t see Akaashi again until Tuesday morning. He’d sat through Syntax lecture the day before with his head in his hand, ears burning and phone buzzing uselessly in his pocket with the teasing texts that you were sending him. He hadn’t checked his phone once, because he could see you typing and, based on the shit-eating grin on your face, they weren’t texts that he was safe to check in public. He’d booked it from the lecture hall the moment your advisor had stepped away from the podium, and he hadn’t answered any of your calls. At some point he’d just turned his phone off, but you couldn’t bring yourself to be worried about it, because, like clockwork, he’d pinged you online.

[9:07 PM]

tokyohandsome: i hate you.

tokyohandsome: youre the worst thing thats ever happened to me.

You’d just sent him another text to his phone, a voice note of you laughing and asking if he would still give you five stars even if you don’t message him back. He does exactly that, and then he texts you back – a middle finger emoji.

You look forward to seeing him on Tuesday, but every thought of Akaashi Keiji leaves you when you check your email in the morning.

[06:22 AM] Notification of Conference Acceptance – Poster Presentation

You stare at the email, a mix of excitement and dread swirling in your gut. You’d gotten in. You’d gotten into the conference. A poster presentation isn’t as much of an achievement as a full talk – you’d have to stand around in the poster session for an hour just talking to whoever would be willing to drop by and listen for a few minutes, instead of having the attention of a dedicated audience for twenty minutes plus a Q&A session – but an acceptance is an acceptance. It’s an accomplishment and a point of pride to be accepted to conferences, especially to one like Ling Expo.

Ling Expo, which starts in three days.

Three days to make a poster, with teaching responsibilities, pilot data to analyze, and a dissertation chapter due to your advisor tomorrow afternoon.

Right. Okay, then. Time to get to it.

–

You don’t think you’ve ever had a day quite this bad before. It’s barely 11am, the LEM meeting something that you’d consider a break right now, and you feel like you’ve been put through hell. You’d spent the morning analyzing data and trying not to cry when your code for the analysis had returned an error message for the sixteenth time. You’d gone through your advisor’s comments on your last chapter draft, trying not to cry again when you’d seen the major revisions he’d left in the margins for the section you haven’t done yet. And then you’d taught your Semantics class, trying not to cry again when someone had asked a question that you’d just answered four minutes prior.

By the time you flop down at the round table in the lab room, your head is screaming and you’re about one minor inconvenience from sobbing in front of everyone.

When Akaashi silently sets a steaming hot latte down in front of you, you think you might start sobbing anyway.

You look up at him, eyes wide and bloodshot. You don’t see that everyone else is looking at him too, the whole room falling silent as they watch him act out of character. “Why?”

He doesn’t look much better than you. “Poster or talk?”

You blink. You hadn’t told him you’d been accepted. “Poster.”

He smiles, not like he’s proud of you but like he’s satisfied that he’d been right. “I got a talk.”

The room relaxes – he’s just gloating. Your advisor laughs low next to you, almost like he’s relieved that the universe isn’t turning on an odd new axis. But you keep your eyes on Akaashi’s, because you can see he’d meant it for what it really is.

He’s checking on you.

He takes the seat on the other side of your advisor, and you hear him breathe a sigh of relief when he sips from his coffee. You try yours, feeling your life come back to you just a little bit.

Your advisor casts a look around the room, clearing his throat as he surveys you all.

“Based on the varying states of despair I’m seeing, we got a few acceptances to Ling Expo.”

The group of you laugh, and you feel that interesting wave of camaraderie fall over you that always comes around the time of this conference. That reminder that, even if you’re all different people working on different research, you’re just a group of twenty-somethings who landed in the same school, in the same department, working for the same advisor at the same time.

At the finish line, you’ll be vying for the same jobs – the same research positions, the same professorships, the same industry careers. But for now – for one weekend a year – the ten of you in this room represent the man at the head of the table, and, as brutal and unrelenting as he can be, there’s a reason it’s his lab group that gets invited to the biggest conference in Japan every year.

There’s a piece of you that’s glad that things between you and Akaashi had smoothed out this year – that, even if you still wage an academic war with him every chance you get, things between you will be different this weekend. Because, of the ten of you, there are exactly two PhD candidates in the room. Only two who will be watched above the rest, because only two are on the job market at this very moment, their competence on display in front of the brightest linguists in the country.

Two, who sit on either side of the head of the table at this very moment.

The stress comes down on your chest harder than before.

“I know it’s really short-notice,” your advisor says, shaking his head and staring down over his bifocals at his laptop screen. “The organizers have been a little scattered this year, but I guess it happens to the best of us.” And then he claps loudly, you and Akaashi flinching at the noise. “That said, they didn’t book enough rooms for everyone, so we’ll have to do some sharing.”

You nod emptily, too caught up in your mental to-do list for the rest of the day to really register what he’s said. It’s happened before, anyway – the larger, interdisciplinary conference always ends up drawing massive attendance records across all departments. You’d had to share a room two years ago, with a girl who works for one of the top three translation companies in the world now.

If you manage not to fuck up this weekend from the sheer lack of preparation, you might impress someone long enough to land a similar job.

Your mind lingers on that for the next few minutes, the pressure to represent your advisor well weighing down heavy on your shoulders. You should start your poster after this meeting – if you skip lunch, you might be able to finish it before the Syntax lecture. And – if you aren’t stopped for questions by students on the way out – you might be able to troubleshoot the data code for the rest of the day. You could probably afford to order takeout for dinner. That way you don’t have to waste time cooking, and you can even take a break afterward by hauling your stuff down to the coffee shop by your apartment and working there on the dissertation draft until morning. Oh, but there’s grading that needs to get done by Thursday night, and you won’t have time tomorrow-

“-eiji and Y/n. And I think that’s it.”

You blink, turning to your advisor. He’s already looking back at you, eyebrows raised.

“That is fine, right?” he says, smiling innocently. You hear the scattered snickers of your lab-mates, and you can only look over the man’s head at Akaashi. He’s staring back, eyes guarded and ears tinted pink.

Sharing a hotel room with Akaashi?

“What?” you say dumbly. “Sorry. I was doing damage control in my head for my workload.”

It eases Akaashi’s tension, his shoulders relaxing as he laughs with the rest of the room. Your advisor nudges you good-naturedly.

“You and Keiji are together for room placements,” he repeats. “I know it’s not ideal, but we’ve got an odd number of guys and girls, so we need one co-ed room.” He looks between you lazily, as though his logic had been obvious. “And you two know each other best, so…”

Somehow, Akaashi looks more guarded now.

You’re not sure you’re in a place mentally to unpack everything this man’s just said. So you just nod along, ignoring the look of surprise Akaashi gives you when you only mumble ‘yeah, that makes sense’.

“Great!” you advisor beams at you, returning to the rest of the group. “Now, about the presentation schedule-”

You tune out for the rest of the meeting, certain you must have fallen asleep with your eyes open, because Akaashi’s nudging your shoulder as he passes behind you on the way out. You blink, seeing that it’s already noon.

You rush to your office, barely hearing when there’s a knock at your door two hours later. A dark head pokes past, but you just keep your eyes locked on your double monitor setup, your fingers flying across the keyboard of your laptop as you fill in the text boxes of your poster.

“Y/n.” You just hum at the call of your name, watching the screen fill up with the literature review you’d boiled down to just a few bullet points. The dark head becomes a whole body, tall in the doorway of your office. “Y/n, it’s time for lunch.”

You blink, only pulling your eyes away from the screen because you’d filled in the whole section and could afford the break in your concentration. Akaashi’s at the door, staring down at you expectantly. When you don’t move to join him for lunch, his eyebrows go up.

“You have to eat.”

“Oh,” you say, shaking your head and going back to your screens. “I’m good. Too busy.”

“To eat?”

“To eat.”

He sighs hard. “Are you going to lecture after?”

You nod absentmindedly. “Have to. ‘s my job.”

“And you’re not going to eat?”

“Akaashi,” you say with a distressed laugh, turning to him again. “Please. You’re killing my concentration.” You gesture generally to the door. “If you don’t go eat soon, you’ll be late to lecture.”

He only steps further into the room, glancing out into the hall before shutting the door behind him. When he rounds your desk, it’s to examine what you’re working on. You recognize that, only weeks ago, you would never have let Akaashi Keiji see the state of your workspace.

But now, you just let his eyes fly across your laptop and monitor, too tired to do much more than lean back in your chair with a sigh. You’ve got the poster template up on your big monitor, zoomed in to the 300% mark so you can fill out the boxes. Your laptop screen is split in two, one side filled with a previous version of your talk slides and the other taken up by your dissertation chapter, the glaring red strikethroughs and lengthy comments left by your advisor popping out against the text.

He doesn’t comment on the state of your draft — on the mistakes and lack of understanding, on your flaws as a researcher, your places of improvement. He doesn’t comment on all the ways you don’t match up to him, even though the difference between your poster presentation and his talk presentation speak loud enough for both of you.

He doesn’t comment on your shortcomings or the state of your stress, loud and angry and visible in everything about you. He just sighs and crosses his arms and says —

“Do you want to cancel tonight?”

Your blood runs cold.

You forgot he’s supposed to come over tonight. You didn’t count him in your schedule.

Still, the idea of not seeing him makes you feel weird.

You don’t look up from your screen. “Only if you’ve got too much going on.”

You leave it up to him. You want him to say he’s free, that he doesn’t want to cancel. You don’t want to cancel, even though the extra five hours would probably save you from drowning just a little bit. But you don’t want to tell him that — you don’t want to tell him that the thought of him cancelling makes your stomach hurt and your chest twinge with disappointment. You don’t want to show him that you’d rather throw yourself into worse stress tomorrow rather than giving yourself more time tonight.

You don’t want him to see how badly you want to see him tonight.

“I’ve got time tonight,” he says quietly, and you don’t turn to look at him, even though you really want to. Even though you can hear that there’s more in his voice than the words he’d said. Because you know he doesn’t have time, either.

“Okay,” you say, nodding once and then sitting up to return to your poster. “If you don’t go eat now, you’ll be late to Syntax.”

He leaves without another word.

When you join him in lecture, he drops a banana and a protein shake in your lap. You eat silently, swallowing over the lump in your throat.

–

Something’s not right.

By all counts, everything is fine. Everything’s as it should be. Akaashi has one hand planted firmly on your bare waist, the other locked tight around both your wrists as he keeps them pressed to your stomach. It feels good, the way he’s pushing his hips into yours – it always feels good. Never once has sex with Akaashi not felt good.

But now – even as your back is arching against the mattress and your legs are spreading further to let him in, the silence filled with the sound of your breathless pants mixing with his – something’s not right.

It’s not him that’s not right.

But it is.

It’s the way he’s staring down at you, cyan eyes cold and detached. It’s not new, and normally it works wonders for you. Normally, it plucks at a strand of pleasurable desperation in your soul, one that wants to please him and give him anything he wants, even when he doesn’t tell you what it is.

Tonight, that strand is plucked over and over, harder and faster until it’s wound tight. Tight enough to snap, because the way Akaashi Keiji’s disinterest is pulling at you is starting to hurt.

“What’s with you, huh?” he mumbles, half-distracted as his eyes roam your body and linger on how your breasts bounce when he thrusts hard into you. “You’re not so bratty tonight. You losing interest?”

You shake your head, the string pulling at your spine. “No, it’s not-”

“If you’re losing interest-” he starts, cyan eyes snapping to yours. Filling with looming disappointment, like you’re not doing enough for him tonight. Like you’re not doing enough to keep him here. “-then I’ll lose interest, too.”

You’re not enough.

You feel your face twist before you can stop it, brows pinching together hard and eyes squeezing shut. Your mouth drags down in a deep frown, and your chest stutters as you try to keep a sob in, your eyes burning with tears all at once.

“‘m sorry,” you gasp, wanting to hide behind your hands but finding them trapped in Akaashi’s grasp. “I’ll try harder, I promise-” You cut off, body jerking as you sob, tears hot and angry as they fall down your cheeks. Your nerves are frayed, shocking and sparking at your skin and forcing every new sob to the surface. Your breath comes short, and you can’t find more no matter how hard you look for it.

You notice too late that Akaashi’s stopped moving.

You want to play it off, want to feed into his dacryphilia, if only to save face. “I can do better, baby-” you try, but it comes out weak and pathetic. Covered in the kind of tears that couldn’t possibly do much for him. “Just tell me what to do-”

“Y/n.”

You gasp, not expecting the hard edge of his voice or the sound of your name. Your eyes fly open, vision blurry and eyes stinging. He’s staring down at you, his own gaze full of alarm. “What’s your color right now?”

Your chest caves in.

“Yellow,” you cry, shaking your head and tugging at the restraint on your wrists. He lets you go, and you slap your hands down over your face, crying hard. “Yellow, it’s yellow-”

It’s red.

But you don’t want him to think it’s because of him – it’s not because of him, and you know that. You know, even in your anguish, that it’s because of how stressed you are. You can feel it in the cruel voice that taunts you, whispering that you’re not enough. Not enough for this program, not enough for your advisor, not enough for your dissertation or the field or anything else that you absolutely need to be enough for.

You’re not enough for Akaashi, either, but that’s not his fault. He hasn’t done a single thing wrong.

So you tell him your color is yellow.

But he hears it for what it is.

Hears you for what you mean, even when you don’t say it.

You sob when he pulls out of you, because you don’t feel like you’re enough to keep him here, but you don’t try to convince him to stay. You just cry into your hands, your frayed edges made more jagged by the wail of your own voice, viciously loud and echoing off the walls as you curl up in place and let the sobs wrack your body.

You hear him moving around the room, hear him swear under his breath, hear your phone hit the bedside table. And then the mattress moves, shifting with his weight as he clambers back over you.

“Hey.” His hands find your biceps, palms steady and warm on you. He pulls you up, and you let him move your body however he wants. You just cry, embarrassed and hurting and wanting so desperately for this whole thing to be over. “Come here-” He lifts you into his lap, maneuvering you until you’re sitting chest to chest with him, legs wrapped around his waist.

You throw your arms around his neck and press your body to his, crying loudly into the crook of his neck. His chest is warm against yours, and you can feel the fabric of his boxers sliding against your thighs. And his arms are strong and anchoring, belting around your waist and pulling you as close to him as you can physically be.

Akaashi Keiji feels safe, and you so very badly want him to stay.

“I’m sorry,” you sob, face hidden in his neck. “I’m so sorry - you didn’t do anything wrong.”

“It’s okay,” he says, and you feel him speak more than anything else, his voice low and vibrating in his chest and in yours. He’s pulling the comforter around you both, and you’re safer still, wrapped up in this little bubble with him. “It’s okay. I was too mean tonight-”

“No, you weren’t!” you argue, angry with yourself for making him doubt this. “You weren’t too mean – everything was fine-”

“Y/n, you’re crying in my arms right now,” he jokes, but his hold on you never falters. He only pulls you closer.

“But it wasn’t you,” you say, shaking your head against him. His throat is warm, and you can feel his heartbeat on your cheek. It pulses hard with anxiety, and you hate that you’ve done that to him. “It was everything else, I’m just-” Your tears are still flowing, but your chest doesn’t hurt so much. Your breath is easier to find. “I’m just not in a good place tonight.”

“I know,” he mutters. You feel his lips pass over your shoulder. “I know you’re not, but I still wasn’t nice enough. I should have been nicer.” His mouth is warm as it pushes gently against your skin. “I should have read you better,” he whispers.

“That’s not your responsibility,” you protest weakly. But his fingers are drawing warm shapes in your back, and you’re coming down from your peak of stress-crying, and all you feel now is extreme exhaustion.

“Yes, it is,” he breathes with finality. His lips are against your ear now, and his breath is sending waves of shivers down your spine – it usually sets you on edge, but in this moment it calms you, the feeling of him pressed against you completely as he whispers in your ear. “I have to know how to read you – how to know what you need from me.”

Your brain, worn and frayed, likes the sound of that.

“Okay.”

He stays quiet for a moment – mere seconds where he sits completely still with you in his arms. Where your chest presses firmly against his, your heartbeat slowing to match his, and then both of them slowing together, back to normal. Where your face presses to his skin, and his face presses to yours, the two of you breathing in time.

The thing that had slid into place and locked tight all those weeks ago – when you looked into Akaashi Keiji’s eyes the first time you’d slept together, the first time you’d gone over the edge with cyan in your mind – rattles now, chains jangling against your spine and pushing hard behind your ribcage. In the spot where your soul sits.

“Okay,” he says.

And then he stands, taking you with him. He wraps you up in the comforter and takes you, completely naked and wrapped around him like that’s all you know how to do, out of the room and into the living room. He pads through the room with you obstructing him in every way, and he does it with ease, pushing his way into your pantry and snatching the box of pop-tarts off the middle shelf.

He drops the box haphazardly on the coffee table and takes a seat on the couch, careful not to hurt you but still rough – certain and final – about the way he turns you in his lap. You sit with your back against his chest, swaddled and a little confused but otherwise allowing him to do as he pleases in any way he pleases. Your mind is too hazy to make any decisions, too cloudy to question his. Your brain is too hot, the jagged edges of your judgment too muddled and eroded away for you to do anything except trust him.

You leave your life and your body in Akaashi Keiji’s hands, because it’s Akaashi Keiji who knows what to do with them.

When he turns on the nature channel silently and comments ‘series about whales today’ with a half-interested hum, you start to cry in your hands again. He lets you, his thumb rubbing circles into your skin the only indication that he’s got his attention wholly on you.

He takes one hand off of you after a moment, only to hand you a pack of strawberry pop-tarts. And then to pick up his phone, previously discarded on the cushion. You watch through strawberry pop-tart and blurry vision as he orders Chinese food – wonton soup and two orders of dumplings.

Comfort food.

You cry harder, one hand clasped over your mouth as you listen to the narrator talk about whale migration. When Akaashi’s done ordering, he tosses his phone down and pulls you close again, letting you turn halfway so you can bury your face in his neck.

“Ready to talk?” he mumbles, soft and coaxing. You’ve never heard him speak to you like that before.

“Just stressed,” you whisper weakly, unable to give him more. Too tired to say more.

His thumb pushes warmly against your hip on its path around the circle. “Ling Expo?”

You nod. “Dissertation, too.”

“Yeah,” he says, nodding once. “I saw his comments on your draft. Er–” He laughs lamely. “The size of the comments, rather.”

You don’t respond. You know he’s further along in his dissertation than you are – he’s probably past the point of major foundational issues. It feels like you’ll never get there.

“Just feels like nothing I do is good enough.”

You don’t question why you tell him that. You just recognize that you’re comfortable enough to.

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, just nodding and keeping his eyes on the TV while he runs his thumb across your skin.

“I didn’t mean what I said earlier,” he finally says. You keep quiet, curled up against him and wondering where this is going. “I feel like you know that,” he adds. “But I just… thought I should make it clear.” His fingers find your hair, tangling tight and pulling you away with a firm hand so he can look at you. His nose brushes yours while he flicks his eyes between yours, searching you. Reading you. And then he shakes his head.

“I didn’t mean what I said. About losing interest.”

You’re enough for me.

Your throat tightens and your eyes well up, and his mouth is tugging into the ghost of a smile. “Don’t cry again,” he whispers.

“I’m gonna cry again,” is all you say.

He’s kind enough to let you hide your face from him again before you do.

When he has to go downstairs to get the food, there’s a hole gnawing at the center of your chest.

That’s new.

You sit in silence, wrapped up in blankets and staring emptily at the TV. Thinking about the anxious knot in your stomach – about the angry tug of emotion in your throat, threatening to force tears into your eyes again.

When Akaashi slips back through your front door, the knot eases and the emotion mellows out.

That’s definitely new.

You eat in silence while staring at the TV – you in your swaddle and Akaashi in the jeans and hoodie he’d been wearing earlier – and then you stare at the TV some more, your mind turning over and over on itself as you try to figure out where this feeling had come from. The one that needs him.

After an hour, he says something quietly about getting home. You just apologize for cutting the filming short, and he offers to come over tomorrow. Your chest pulses with unplaced emotion.

He leaves.

You sit on your couch and stare at nothing, the TV off now.

The knot is tight and making you nauseous. The emotion is rolling up into a painful lump in your throat. Your eyes burn with tears that won’t fall.

–

Keiji sighs and pulls his fingers through his hair, tugging tight and searching the shelves of the convenience store.

He doesn’t know why he’s here. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. There’s nothing in this store that will make you feel better. He keeps picking random shit up – cookies, chips, snacks that he thinks you might like – and putting them back, uselessly trying to find something to ease your stress just a little bit. The clerk at the front is starting to stare at him, a bored teenager with judgmental eyes watching him be indecisive in the middle of the store.

He feels like throwing up. His head is hot and there’s an irritated pull in his gut, like he’s forgotten something. He keeps closing his eyes, willing it to go away, but every stupid snack he picks up and puts back down – a claw-machine stuck on repeat – makes the feeling worse.

He picks up a can of coffee. Stares down at the label. Puts it back.

You only drink almond milk.

He needs to get home and shower, to use the rest of the night to work on the slide deck for his Ling Expo talk.

He walks one aisle over and surveys the sweets again. Picks up a package of cookies. Stares down at the label. Puts it back.

You like oatmeal, not oatmeal raisin.

He needs to grade and work on his dissertation chapter.

Over to the far wall, the last shelf before the freezers. Picks up a bag of chips. Stares down at the label. Puts it back.

You don’t like this brand of shrimp chips.

There are a million things he needs to do.

His eyes drift slightly to the right, to the pints of ice cream lined up behind the lightly frosted freezer door.

You do like cookies and cream.

He stares at it, at the label that stares back at him, and the tug in his gut yanks hard at his nausea.

He’s not going to get anything done like this.

Reaching over with an irritated sigh, he rips the door open and plucks the offending pint of ice cream off the shelf. He takes it to the clerk, too embarrassed to make eye contact.

“Girlfriend upset about somethin’?” the teenager asks.

Keiji doesn’t answer him, glaring down at the counter while he pays.

–

There’s a knock at your door thirty minutes after Akaashi leaves.

You’re curled up in the middle of your bed in oversized clothes when it comes, stomach turning as you try to sleep. Disappointment seeping through your skin, because you feel like something’s missing.

When the knock sounds, you turn in bed, surprised. You climb out slowly, padding through the apartment to the front door and peeking through the peephole.

Your heart sends a pulse of electricity through your whole body. You pull the door open, eyes wide.

“Akaashi?”

He stares down at you, lips pursed with frustration and ears tinted pink. He thrusts a hand out, a plastic bag dangling from his fingers.

“Here.”

You take it, peering inside. “Ice cream?”

“Yeah.”

You blink up at him. “Thank you?”

He just nods. You wait for him to say more, but he doesn’t. He just lingers, staring down at nothing.

And then he takes a step toward you, and his eyes meet yours.

Your breath catches in your throat.

You let him in wordlessly. He sets his shoes neatly in your foyer before moving to his spot at the couch and dropping his bag right where it was half an hour ago. He turns to look at you, scratching awkwardly at the side of his head.

You almost miss the way his eyes flick toward your bedroom curiously and then down at your pajamas.

Your bedroom. Not the spare room.

Your eyes well up when you realize that he means to stay the night.

He exhales in disbelief, but you just cross the room in three strides and throw your body against his, arms wound around his neck and face lost in the collar of his hoodie.

He scoffs, even as his arms snake around your waist. “You’re such a crybaby,” he mutters, but any mockery he makes of you is overshadowed by the way he lifts you off your feet, pulling you closer. The bag falls from your hand, hitting the ground, and you wrap your thighs around him and lock your ankles behind his back.

He takes it as permission and carries you to your room without another word.

When he drops you to your mattress, it’s followed up by the shedding of his jeans and hoodie and the press of his body to yours, warm and safe and terribly confusing – because your body is used to this in a different room, in a different context. Not in your own bed, and not for any purpose that allows you to keep your clothes on.

But Akaashi just clambers toward you, hands rough on your body as he pulls you toward him. You hug him close, heartrate picking up when he throws himself between your thighs and wraps his arms tight around you, his face burning when he presses it to the crook of your neck.

You hold him like that, crying into his hair and feeling shivers race down your spine when he presses one kiss to your throat, and then another.

“Just go to sleep,” he whispers. “Everything’s fine. Just go to sleep.”

It takes you almost an hour to drift off, because your heart won’t calm down, but neither will his. It’s loud against your torso, and you can only imagine how annoying your own must be in his ears. You can only imagine how embarrassing your body’s being right now, because every brush of his lips against your skin makes your pulse beat just a little bit harder, and you know he can feel it.

You know he can feel it, but he keeps kissing you, anyway.

His heart skips against your body, too. But he keeps kissing you, anyway.

You’re asleep before you can piece together that the aching nausea and the disappointment under your skin have faded away.

–

You wake up on Wednesday morning without an alarm.

It’s weird, because you always need an alarm. You always set an alarm.

But there’s a shift in the mattress beside you, so you don’t need one today.

You turn, peeling one eye open and staring up at the man leaning against your headboard.

He hasn’t noticed you yet, because there’s a paper in his hand. A paper covered in sticky notes and highlighter and handwritten comments.

Your handwritten comments.

You watch him for a moment, watching the way he squints down at your comments and turns the pages this way and that so he can read the sideways ones better. His glasses sit on the end of his nose, and his hair is askew from sleep, pillow creases on his face and neck. The sunlight filters in through your sheer curtains in a way that makes his skin glow, but he sits in an otherwise dim room, not a single light in sight as he reads your thoughts on his work.

You blink groggily, and a thought crosses your mind – distant and strange – that it might be nice just to stay here like this. You, curled up in your comforter, watching Akaashi Keiji read quietly in the early morning light in your bed, shirtless and disheveled and entirely at peace with you.

You wonder if it would be too much to ask.

Akaashi sighs quietly and shakes his head at something you’d commented, and you can’t help but alert him that you’re awake.

“Somethin’ you don’t like?” you ask, watching him blink and turn to look down at you.

He sighs again, shaking the paper in his hand with slight frustration. “Why don’t you say any of this shit in LEM?” When you don’t answer, he shuffles through some previous sheets, searching the margins and then pointing. “Like this. Why didn’t you tell me that these counter-examples exist? This is important data.”

You smile to yourself, too sleepy to argue with him. “I was worried that you’d thought of it already and just hadn’t written it there. I didn’t want to look stupid bringing it up to you.”

He cuts you a glance. “I’ve never thought you looked stupid.”

“No?” you say, smiling when he rolls his eyes. “You talk to me like you think I might be.”

“I don’t,” he sighs. And then he gestures to something you’d scratched into the edges with massive red question marks. “I think you’re the only one in that room who could think of this.”

“You really think I’m smart?”

It’s a remnant of last night, that insecurity. You tell yourself that it has to be, that you wouldn’t be asking him something so vulnerable otherwise. It’s too personal, asking him to evaluate your intelligence when it’s the one thing you’re measured most critically on.

“Yeah,” he says plainly. Answering you plainly, like he’d never thought twice about it. “I do. And it pisses me off when you don’t.” He sighs again and then shuffles to the edge of the bed, waving the paper at you again. “I’m keeping this. I need it.”

The thought that he could ever need something from you makes your heart lodge uncomfortably in your throat. “Okay.”

“It’s 6:30,” he adds, standing and stretching his arms high above his head. You watch him, eyes lingering on his chest and the way his boxers slip under his hip bones when he lengthens his body like that. You tamper down the urge to put your mouth on those two spots, to press kisses there that taste like comfort and early morning. “Just so you know.”

“Okay,” you say again simply, wishing so dearly that you could just stay here. Knowing you could never ask him to stay here with you. “What time do you teach?”

“Nine.” He eyes you a moment, long enough for you to wonder if he’d seen you watching him wistfully. “I don’t have clothes here.”

“Oh.” The thought of him leaving makes your chest hurt. You recognize the feeling from last night. “Do you need to go back to your place?”

“Yeah.”

Oh.

You swallow, pushing away the odd, aching panic that’s rising in your chest. You don’t want him to leave.

Akaashi chews on his lip. You reach for your phone slowly, like you want him to stop you. “Do you want me to call you an Uber?” you ask.

“Sure.” He swallows, watching you a moment. “Do you-” You lift your eyes. He looks away. “Do you want to go with me?”

Your nerves sizzle and snap, but the anxiety is washed away instantly.

You don’t know what to do with these feelings.

“Okay,” you whisper, staring up at him with wide eyes. His eyes flick to yours nervously, and then his lashes flutter as he looks away.

“Okay. Get dressed.”

You listen, that strand of desperation plucking away at you in ways that it really shouldn’t.

Neither of you says anything about the pint of melted ice cream in your living room.

–

When Keiji shoulders his door open, it’s with a panicked glance around his apartment. He’s normally tidy, but this week has been especially difficult, and he doesn’t need you seeing the extent of his stress in the way he stops taking care of his space.

You stand awkwardly in the foyer, glancing around and then back at him. He’d noticed on the ride here that your face is more flushed than usual, that your eyes linger on him more than usual. He wonders if you feel the same strange need to be near him, or if there’s something else going on.

Because his eyes keep lingering on you, too.

He feels an itch under his skin, one that prickles and irritates him until he’s with you. He’d felt it this morning, when the threat of leaving your apartment without you had been on the edge of your conversation.

It had started last night, in that stupid convenience store.

Even now, as he ushers you into the room and gestures for you to sit on the couch, he feels weird about leaving the room. He’s only going to shower, for fuck’s sake. He needs to shower, because it’s already 7:15 and he still needs to prep for his class. But he lingers, rushing into the kitchen to make coffee in order to buy more time.

“You can raid my pantry if you want,” he calls from the coffee machine, hurriedly scooping coffee grounds into the basket. “You can eat whatever you want – it won’t take me long to get ready.”

“Okay,” you say, much closer than he’d expected. He turns, surprised, and finds you lingering at the entryway. Glancing at him and then away, flushing with embarrassment as you hover for no reason.

The thought that you hadn’t even wanted to be a room away from him makes Keiji’s skin burn with desire.

Something’s off. Something’s new, and he doesn’t know how to handle it.

You drift past him into the room, opening cabinets at random and peering inside with blank curiosity. Peering inside this little piece of his life, not necessarily searching for anything in particular but curious all the same. Keiji’s chest swells with emotion – a need to be nearer to you, closer to you than this.

He feels insane.

He shouldn’t need you the way he does.

You open the pantry door, leaning halfway inside as you poke around. “‘s really neat in here. Only you would be this neat.”

He’s got his hands on your waist before he can process that he’d crossed the room.

You gasp, eyes wide as he spins you around. “What-”

He shuts the door to the pantry by pinning you against it. Your breathing picks up when he presses flush to you, but your fingers are in his hair regardless. Your body opens up for him regardless, welcoming and familiar and trusting.

He wants to ruin you for anyone who’s not him.

Keiji drops his mouth to your throat, pushing his lips hard to the pulse point and breathing you in. You shiver, your head dropping back against the door. He tugs your hips against his to make a point – a point he probably shouldn’t make.

“‘Kaashi-” you gasp, and his entire body lights up with dangerously frayed nerves, the knot in his chest sparking and hissing with the threat of worse.

He doesn’t feel close enough to you. He wants more.

Your fingers tug through his hair hard, and he groans quietly against your neck. He feels when your skin warms, feels when your fingers start to tremble. He’s making you nervous, nervous enough to shake in his arms.

It’s a dangerous realization, the fact that he can make you feel this way.

He knows that once you figure him out, too – because you will – he’ll be done for.

“Akaashi, we can’t,” you whisper.

He hadn’t considered fucking you in his apartment, but the fact that you had makes him want to cancel his class and keep you here all day.

“I know,” he breathes, his head spinning and his face radiating heat against your skin. “I know, I just-” He sighs hard. “Fuck.”

There’s a low noise that climbs up your throat, one that he feels more than hears, and a part of him – the irrational part that wants to fuck you against this pantry door right now – wants to ask if you want to shower with him.

God, he doesn’t want to be apart from you, not even for that.

“You have to shower,” you mumble quietly, like you’re reading his mind and coaxing him gently away from the thought. He hopes that you’re coaxing yourself away, too.

“Okay,” he says, swallowing hard. He doesn’t want to let go – especially since you’re not letting go, either. “Okay. I should go.”

“You should go.”

He’s not convinced.

“I should go,” he says again, a little stronger. Stronger, because his hands are slipping under the hem of your shirt and pulling you closer instead of pushing you away.

“You should go, Akaashi,” you say, too, but it’s weaker this time. You’re weak to him – weak for him.

He’s so fucked.

“Y/n,” he breathes, a warning inlaid and his pleas embarrassingly audible. Begging you to be strong with him, because he can’t do it on his own.

Your fingers slip out of his hair and clamp down on his shoulders, and you manage to peel him off of you. “Akaashi,” you say, your tone wavering but sharper than before. You’re trying. “You have to shower. We’re gonna be late.”

He meets your eyes and regrets it instantly, that swimming feeling filling his head and his face burning that uncomfortable, sticky hot again.

“Yeah,” he whispers shakily, swallowing hard. “You’re right. I have to go.”

Your eyes drop to his lips, filling with a yearning that’s painfully clear for him to see.

Fuck.

He pushes off of you, backing away quickly and scrubbing at his brow. “Yeah. You’re right,” he repeats, louder this time. It doesn’t help, the thought of kissing you slamming into him hard enough to make him dizzy. “You’re right.” He turns away, padding quickly out of the kitchen and leaving you in the kitchen. “I’ll be back.”

The time away from you doesn’t help clear his head.

He just spends it thinking about kissing you.

–

Akaashi’s acting as weird as you feel.

The walk to campus happens in silence. When you walk into your usual coffee shop together and immediately run straight into Yachi, he flushes hard and mutters something about ordering first before making a beeline for the counter. You know there’s nothing you could say to save that moment – not with Hitoka staring knowingly into your soul – so all you’re able to do is smile weakly and chat with her in line, three customers behind Akaashi. She doesn’t pry, and you wonder briefly if all of your friends can see what you and Akaashi are trying so hard to hide.

He keeps it up throughout the day. But so do you.

So do you, because the way he’d acted in his apartment – taking up your space like it’s his own, like he’s unable to do otherwise despite trying – makes you think it’s okay to feel this way. To feel like you need more, even if you’ve already taken too much.

In your office, finalizing your dissertation draft and sending it off to your advisor, your mind is muddled, drifting often to the office just across the hall and the man sitting just inside. Your head is staticky, fuzzy, and you have to fight not to go over there. You have to fight, because half of you feels like you’ll be able to concentrate better on your work if he’s around, but the other half of you knows there’s no chance in hell of getting anything done if he’s in the same room.

It turns out there’s no need to fight, because he makes a decision for you.

A knock comes to your door an hour before lunch, the silhouette on the other side of the frosted glass all too familiar.

The way he drags his eyes over your form when he walks in and then glances back into the hall with his bottom lip caught between his teeth makes you shiver visibly. He sees it – you know he does, because his eyes fly right back to you, heated and examining. Like he’s looking for something.

When he mumbles ‘change of scenery’ under his breath and then crosses the room to fold into the chair on the other side of your desk with his laptop, you know he’s found it. The two of you don’t speak, but you can feel him watching you while you work, and you’re moving with a slight wobble in your step by the time you head to the dining hall.

At lunch, he sits right across from you, in Bokuto’s usual spot. You don’t say anything about it, not wanting to draw attention. Not wanting him to know how much you notice him.

You don’t say anything about the way he presses his knee between your legs, either. It shakes you to your core, that gentle nudge of his knee against the inside of yours. Your body sparks with nerves, but you don’t say anything, because he’s still talking to Tsukishima about jobs as if he hasn’t just rattled you of your ability to act normal at lunch.

You say nothing, just letting his body heat nestle between your knees and trying your best not to burn at the feeling. His eyes flick to yours just briefly enough to mean nothing to everyone else – but it means everything to you, because he drops his gaze to your mouth before he looks away, and suddenly you’re back in his apartment, pushed against his pantry door with his mouth less than a breath’s distance from yours.

He swallows hard and returns to the discussion Tsukishima’s having with Yachi, Bokuto and Kuroo caught in their own conversation about the conference this weekend. You breathe deep and try to respond to Kuroo’s comment about the group meeting up at the hotel bar in everyone’s free time, but then Akaashi’s shifting across from you. He stretches his leg out under the table and takes up your personal space with purpose, and your words are lost in your throat.

It’s a reminder that Akaashi Keiji is possessive.

You wonder if he realizes how much you like when he’s like this.

You make it through lunch, somehow, and then walk in silence beside him to the Syntax lecture. You make uncomfortable eye contact with your advisor when you enter the lecture hall – uncomfortable, because he’s flicking his eyes between you and Akaashi and then smiling to himself as he turns away.

You promise yourself that you’ll make it through lecture without incident, but that goes out the window the second Akaashi shifts and bumps his thigh against yours, halfway through the class.

Your breath catches in your throat sharply. He bumps your leg again and then leaves it there, thigh pressed firmly to yours. Only a moment passes – a moment where you trick yourself into thinking it means nothing, for your own sake – before his hand is sliding across your thigh, heat searing through your jeans.

You stiffen, scanning the room nervously. But you always sit in the very back of the hall, so no one’s able to see what’s happening. No one’s going to catch anything Akaashi does, which you’re confident he’s already calculated. Still, you don’t want to risk anyone glancing back, so you don’t speak to him.

You just wrap your fingers around his wrist, squeezing tight in warning.

He just slips his hand between your clenched thighs, curling warmly around the curve of your thigh and digging his fingertips into the plush give of your body. Your skin erupts in goosebumps, and you become needy almost instantly. The way he rubs circles into your jeans with his thumb makes you needy. The way he handles your body with ownership – the way you’d let him handle you last night, like you belong to him – makes you want him much more than you should. Makes you want him physically, but also in ways that you never had before. Not before last night.

You glance at him out of the corner of your eye. And then you shiver, because you realize that he’s hard in his slacks.

Oh.

He meets your eyes when your body reacts to him, and that gnawing, yearning feeling in your chest worsens.

His eyes are glazed over, distracted and hot. Distracted by the same terrible neediness that’s plaguing you.

Oh.

He looks away, squeezing your thigh again before moving his hand away and tugging his cardigan down over his tented pants subtly. Your chest swims with disappointment for the moment it takes him to extract his phone from his pocket, and then it fills with hope.

Your own phone buzzes in your bag a second later.

[3:44 PM]

Akaashi: am i still coming over tonight?

Oh, dear god.

–

“That’s it, princess.”

Your mind fogs over with the feeling of him – of Akaashi’s voice in your ear, of every whisper that heats your brain that much more. Of the tingles that had started plaguing your every nerve the moment he’d started this – this praise – and simply don’t seem to be anywhere near easing up.

You rock your hips back where you sit in his lap on the couch of your spare room, arching your chest forward into his and breathing roughly when his arm curls tighter around your waist. You’ve got both hands on his shoulders, anchoring yourself to him like it’s your only link to sanity, and he’s using the hand he doesn’t have wrapped around you to push and pull at your hips, guiding you against him whenever you’re unable to do it yourself.

You feel full of him, warm and safe and muddling every thought that crosses through your mind while he fucks you. He fucks you slow, slow enough to trick you into thinking that it’s you who’s leading here. He fucks you slow and whispers that cursed praise in your ear and against your throat, knowing without ever having asked that it’s what you need from him tonight.

“Just like that, baby,” he breathes, his cock twitching against your walls when you moan to yourself, genuine and quiet and just for him. “You’re doing so good, fucking me so good.” You whimper into his hair, struggling to remember that there’s a camera and that you have a job to do. That your sounds can’t just be for him. That your pleasure can’t only be his.

But you want it to be, even just this once. You want to be his, just this once.

“‘m close,” you whisper, feeling that familiar, welcome tug under your navel.

“Come for me,” he breathes back, his lips brushing against your cheek. “Give it to me. You can do it.”

You can’t help it. It’s entirely out of your control, spurred on by this entire week and the way he’s treated you. The way he’s handled you, in ways only he can. By the need you’ve been feeling, acknowledged and echoed tenfold in him, too. You really can’t help it.

And, looking back later, you can’t bring yourself to regret it.

“‘Kaashi,” you whisper against his temple, your pleasure washing over you in waves that are so close to what you need.

Akaashi stops moving his hips before you can get there.

Your heart stops at the same time.

He lifts his head, leaning back just enough to look you in the eye. Your breath cuts short, and you let him search your face – eyes flicking between yours before they fly across your other features. You let him search you, because you can’t bring yourself to hide anything.

“What did you say?” he whispers, alarm in his expression but not in the way you’d expected. Alarm that checks you, alarm that betrays a lingering anticipation in eyes that you can only see because you’ve spent so long learning him.

You purse your lips together, too scared to say it again.

He doesn’t need you to.

He just drops his gaze to your mouth, shoving you right back into that moment in his apartment, and all you can do is part your lips in surprise. All he needs to do is lift his head, just a few more centimeters.

He tastes like quiet desperation, the kind that’s been building for far too long.

He curls his fingers into your hair and swallows audibly, his lips still on yours even as he tugs you closer. You’re more than happy to follow his lead, breath stuttering nervously against his mouth.

Each push of his lips against yours is more heated than the last. Until his grip on the back of your head stings a little, until the pass of his tongue over the seam of your lips makes your stomach flip and your limbs go a little more numb. Until he’s angling his head against yours and pulling you close, his grip tightening and his body shifting under you.

You don’t realize he’s putting you on your back until your skin meets the soft sheet on the couch, until he’s hooking a hand under your knee and keeping your legs spread while he pushes his hips against yours, his lips warm and urgent.

You flush nervously, your head going hotter than before and your thoughts scrambling without warning. You can’t take it – the feeling of his mouth on yours while he fucks you, the feeling of his moans traveling down your throat whenever your walls clamp down around him, the most turned on you’ve ever been.

That familiar tug comes back stronger than before, rushing you to the edge with each push of his lips and each pass of his tongue against yours.

And when he murmurs your name into your own mouth, quiet and soft and tinged with warning, your fingers and toes go numb.

“Say my name again,” he breathes, angling his hips in a way that has you seeing stars. “Please. I’m really close.”

You pull your lips from his and wrap your arms around his neck, pushing your mouth close to his ear and moaning quietly when his thrust has your head bumping gently against the arm of the couch.

“Come for me, baby,” you whisper, your own orgasm following close behind when you hear how he moans in your ear, quiet and just for you. “Please, ‘Kaashi – I need it. I need you.”

He groans into your skin, and you bask in the warmth that he fills you with, his hips stuttering and your name pressed into your throat. You fall quietly over the edge with him, different from before. It washes over you this time instead of hitting you hard, in waves that feel like comfort and sun on your skin. In waves that make you all the more aware of his hands on your body and his breath fanning over the crook of your neck, of the way he whispers your name on the last push of his hips against yours. Of the way you whisper ‘thank you, thank you, thank you’ against his shoulder absentmindedly when you come.

It’s hazy, the way you fall with him. And you realize, with your heart pounding and your head swarming sleepily with gratitude, that it’s just what you needed to put all your broken pieces back together.

That Akaashi Keiji puts all the pieces back together.

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whydoyoucare866

1 year ago

If the batkids had a podcast

Redhood: I was a pretty easy child-

Nightwing: You were.

Redhood: Straight A's and everything. Like, I would be hanging out with Batman- (laugh) I would be- You know right?

Nightwing: Yeah.

Redhood: Just chilling. No patrol day. And he would be like "what do you want to do?" and I would be like- "Read! :D"

Nightwing *chuckles*: "Homework!"

Redhood: "Homework!". And then- And then I fucking died-