Drunk In Love (bnd Legal Line) ˚ · .

and his voice is a familiar sound | scaramouche

forced proximity + childhood friends reuniting, humor, kissing and tension. suggestive implications and suggestive humor, a bit of scara’s mommy issues, wc 5k

ft. a down bad jealous bf scaramouche, bffs heizou and kazuha, and aether bc aether always has to be there

“If I ask you to come with us for a vacation, would you say yes?”

Your bedroom was already too cramped for one person, with what you could afford with your money after quitting your part-time job. It made it incredibly difficult for all parties involved when you invited someone over, especially when that person had no concept of personal space. You barely looked up from the pages of your book, humming halfheartedly to whatever Heizou is saying. You heard vacation and instantly decided to not waste your time.

Heizou must have sensed these thoughts, too, because he forces himself into your field of view by nearly climbing over your lap. “Hey, look at me. Would you say yes?”

“Heizou!” you hissed, pushing him off before Heizou could wrinkle the pages of the book that’s definitely overdue for borrowing time. You started to think about taking another part-time job if your friends kept inviting themselves over and invading your personal space.

Heizou looked at you, his face doing a complicated combination of a frown and a smug grin. “Come on. You never join us on trips…”

“For good reason,” you said, gesturing to the lapful of Heizou you are currently getting bombarded with.

“You’re so mean,” Heizou laughed, thankfully getting off your lap. He refused to let go of you, however, immediately wrapping an arm over your shoulder and pressing up against your side. This must be one of his techniques to make the people he was questioning feel restricted. It was working. “How will you get yourself to settle for a nice, young man with that attitude? What are you even reading?”

“I grabbed whatever book had a pleasing cover so I can tune your nonsense out.” It wasn’t exactly a lie.

“What?” Heizou clapped the book shut and turned to you with the eyes of a reprimanding mother. “I swear I’m being serious. Can’t you consider it for even a minute? You’re breaking my heart. Plus, Kazuha’s the one who’s inviting us out.”

Hmm. What a compelling argument. Heizou knew that no one could ever say no to Kazuha. You wouldn’t really care if your absence would break Heizou’s heart, but Kazuha’s disappointed eyes were enough to put a god to their knees.

You zeroed in on Heizou’s wording. “Who’s ‘us’?”

Heizou started listing each with a raise of a finger. “Just Kazuha and Aether—and a friend we met recently. Kazuha invited him.”

You frowned. You didn’t know Aether visited again. “How the hell did Aether get invited?” Then, upon careful reflection: “And who’s the new friend?”

“If he was around, why not, right?” Heizou laughed, carefully setting the overdue book aside from your view. “The new friend’s Scaramouche. Have you met him before?”

What a strange name. Kazuha always managed to befriend people from all over, like a child bringing home turtles and a new species of bugs. You made a note to look him up. “Never heard of him.”

He hummed. “Said he came from Sumeru but he looked pretty Inazuman to me. Funny guy. He’s like a disgruntled baby brother.”

“And you only met him, what, recently? Why is he invited to our group already?” you asked, like the territorial person you are. How come it seemed like you were the last to know about this guy?

Aether was alright. Aether came back every few months to check up on everyone and got roped into all kinds of things with your friends, so you knew him well enough already. You liked his long braid. Heizou and Kazuha had been your friends for as long as you could remember being a college student.

Heizou grinned, patting your head. “Scaramouche’s nice, I promise. You wouldn’t even notice he’s there.”

At your dubious stare, Heizou amended, “C’mon, do you think I’m the type to befriend an asshole?”

Yes, but Heizou wasn’t the type to befriend a major asshole whose opinions he vehemently disagreed with, and he thought belonged better in jail, so you had to think about it for a bit. At the very least, this new guy didn’t seem like a criminal.

Your friends loved traveling, with Kazuha mostly being the culprit, but you liked staying inside most of the time. They never forced you to go with them, so why was Heizou being suspiciously persistent today?

“I think he’s your type,” Heizou finally said, caving in.

“You’re trying to hook me up with him?”

“Not exactly… but you two would seem cute.” He went silent for a thoughtful moment. “I mean, I wouldn’t be opposed if you slept together.”

You made a face.

Heizou laughed brightly. “Alright, alright. You can go back to being the good poster student you are if you promise to think about it. Seriously. Kazuha’s moving to Liyue soon—he’s probably inviting us out because of that.”

“I’ll think about it,” you said, reaching around for your book.

You would. What Heizou said about Kazuha made you remember that there are only a few weeks left until this is all over—then, after that, you all might go your separate ways. That thought floated around your mind for a little while as Heizou made himself comfortable on your bed, sighing before he dozed off.

You sighed, shuffling to give him space. “If this is your way of trying to make me get laid, try to at least be subtle and not weird me out before I even meet the guy.”

You stalked Kazuha’s Insta to search up this Scaramouche guy and nearly dropped your phone.

scaramouche11206. It was empty, entirely useless for your research. Scaramouche’s profile was a public account, had zero posts, and had four people he was following. It was Kazuha, Aether, Heizou, and a Vahumana Darshan update page.

You checked the tagged posts, and your jaw dropped to the ground.

Scaramouche was Kunikuzushi.

Heizou was taking a group selfie in the image, his tongue stuck out and winking while the camera showed two other men. On the left was Kazuha, with his ever-polite smile, then on the other, with the all-black getup was what the tags said was scaramouche11206.

It was a little difficult to tell why you were enamoured with the masked face with a short hime cut for a moment, but the piercing stare to the camera couldn’t be mistaken. It was a minute of staring before it clicked. This was your Kunikuzushi.

You dialed Heizou before you could even think about it.

“What…? It’s five a.m.” He sounded like he just woke up, “What’s up?”

You swiped back to the image of Scaramouche, as if staring at it any longer would imprint each pixel to your brain and bring him to life before you. “Hey, where’s Kazuha? Tell him I’m going.”

YEARS AGO.

Summer. The cicadas rang in your ears. They chirped about as you and Kunikuzushi trudged further into the forest. Sunlight peeked through the leaves, splashing Kunikuzushi’s beautiful face in a delicate glow.

Komorebi. Shadows scattered on the ground. Kunikuzushi lifted his head and turned to you. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

His voice was quiet, but even with the wind and the singing cicadas, you could hear him loud and clear. You could pick out his voice from a crowd. Your heart would know where to find him.

“I like looking at you,” you said. “I like you.”

He accepted the answer and continued walking. You beamed. Usually, Kunikuzushi would scoff and bat your words away, hiding his flustered face. But he didn’t.

Longing. Kunikuzushi turned back to you, stopping in his steps. You nearly bumped onto his back. “Do you like me enough to marry me?”

Was this a marriage proposal? You tried to think of you and Kunikuzushi, walking down aisles and reciting vows, and almost laughed. But then you tried to think of anyone else. You tried to think of a life without Kunikuzushi.

You thought of Kunikuzushi with anyone else and nearly threw up in his face. “You’re the only one for me.”

“Even if I hurt you?”

You frowned. “You would never hurt me, Kuni.”

Kunikuzushi’s expression crumpled. He could never hide anything from you; he was too expressive, eyes round and lip trembling. Your heart sunk to your stomach. You reached for his hands and forced him to look at you. “Kuni, what’s wrong? Did something happen?”

He looked at the ground. “I said I didn’t want to live with her anymore. I didn’t really think Mom would make Aunt Nahida take me.”

The cicadas faded. The world fell into a hush. Your grip on his hands grew weak. “What?”

Kunikuzushi didn’t have a good relationship with his mother; you knew that. They were complicated. They always fought and he grew up to loathe her. You knew that. But you didn’t think…

You breathed in deeply. It was not Kunikuzushi’s fault. It was not Ei’s—and definitely not Nahida’s fault. It was just the way things go sometimes.

You forced a laugh, hoping to ease the troubled expression on his face. “Were you proposing because you’re moving away?”

Kunikuzushi blushed. “Shut up.”

Your face softened. He was always so cute when his face was as red as the red by his eyes.

Kunikuzushi inhaled sharply, taking your hands and looking at you with a determined glint in his eyes. “If I were going to ask you out, I would do it better than anyone who would try to marry you. So don’t entertain them.”

The trip’s plan was basically swimming when you could, staying at a hotel, driving out of the hotel to eat somewhere cheaper, and it would be stretched out for a few days. All in all, it didn’t sound too bad. With the type of people you were going out with, you were expecting a lot more drinking (Kazuha) and near-death-related activities (Aether). Although Heizou said it was Kazuha’s trip, he was apparently mistaken.

“It was originally for Scaramouche and his family, but his mother had last-minute changes and couldn’t go,” Kazuha explained as he helped you fit your luggage in the trunk of Aether’s car. “Scaramouche said it would be a waste and told me to invite my friends.”

“Woo-hoo, Scaramouche’s mom!” Heizou cheered.

“When we met her, it seemed like you hated her,” Kazuha mused as Heizou climbed inside the car. You were in the passenger seat while the two were shoved in the back. It seemed that even if you moved to a bigger apartment, you’d end up suffocated by Inazuman men either way.

“Hard not to after hearing Scara’s contempt for her. I’m an empath or something.” 

Aether adjusted the side mirrors. “Are we forgetting anything?”

“Where’s the Scaramouche guy?” you asked.

Heizou cast you a sly smile. “He’s already at the hotel, probably buying us other rooms.”

At least another thing about him hadn’t changed: he’s still disgustingly rich. You did some digging about the hotel, and it was the kind of place you could only dream of even looking at. You suddenly felt severely underdressed for a five-star hotel, with only sweatpants, a duffle bag, and a dream.

“Hmm, I don’t think so,” Kazuha said, and weirdly enough, you caught him looking at you curiously from the sideview mirror.

“No?” Heizou crossed his arms behind his head. “I doubt Scaramouche’s the type to willingly share a room with anyone.”

Aether scoffed, laughing under his breath. “Definitely not with us.”

You looked outside to hide a smile. It seemed that your Kunikuzushi hadn’t really changed drastically. This made you feel better about meeting him again.

“What made you change your mind?” Heizou asked.

You sighed and fell into step along with him as Kazuha and Aether went on ahead. There are families crowding the lobby, draped in gold that matched the fabric of the chandeliers overhead. Their jewelry was brighter than your future. Even the floor smelled expensive.

“Scaramouche did,” you mumbled.

Heizou’s brows lifted to his hairline. “Oh?”

“I mean—I don’t know, I’m not sure yet.” You were absolutely sure, but it’d be embarrassing if he didn’t recognize you at all, and Heizou would think you were just lying. It had been years.

Heizou tilted his head. “Well, whatever it is, I’m rooting for you. And if he fucks up, I know how to pack a punch.”

You didn’t doubt it. Heizou definitely knew how to pack a punch.

The hotel was so fancy and so meant for only rich kids that you and Heizou stood out like sore thumbs by looking around. Some woman your age walked past, her chin high and her steps light. You and Heizou looked at each other, then tried to mimic the same grace as you pair sashayed towards the desk.

“What are you idiots doing?” Aether asked as you reached them.

“Fitting in, unlike you,” Heizou said.

A new voice cut in. “Took you losers long enough.”

Scaramouche turned around after speaking to the clerk, his mouth in a thin line and his stare piercing. He also stood out next to the men in polo with his fingerless gloves and gold rings. He looked like he belonged better on an Inazuman fashion magazine cover than on a hotel vacation with a bunch of losers.

Heizou beamed. “Scara!”

“Hey,” Scaramouche said, then his eyes landed on you.

It was hard to tell if there was any reaction on his face because Heizou went up to him to ruffle his hair, stealing away his attention.

“Thanks for inviting us out. I didn’t know you were the type to want to snuggle with his friends.” Heizou waggled his eyebrows as Scaramouche pushed him away with a hand to Heizou’s face.

Scaramouche wrinkled his nose. “I am not sharing a room with any of you three. You snore, Kazuha snores louder, and I would wake up to Aether’s leg on my stomach the next morning.”

“That was one time,” Aether muttered, blushing.

“How many rooms are reserved?” Kazuha asked.

Scaramouche sighed, craning his neck. He had a really nice side profile. “Still two. The other one with a king and the other with two queens. I was supposed to have the first, but you didn’t tell me you were inviting someone else. This shithole’s booked full now.”

Your gaze fluttered away as they all turned to you. You bit your lip, frowning. Did Scaramouche not recognize you? He was acting like he didn’t. He was treating you like he would any stranger. That upset you, but for the entire car ride, you were also preparing for it. It probably would’ve hurt worse if you hadn’t mentally prepared yourself.

Heizou grinned, slinging an arm over Scaramouche’s shoulder. “I suppose you have no choice but to share a bed with us.”

“No.” Scaramouche picked up his luggage and started rolling away. “Heizou, Kazuha, Aether, you share the king.”

The three men turned to you instead, surprise visible in their expressions. It was exactly because Scaramouche decided to share a room with you, whom he never acknowledged since you arrived.

You wanted to protest. If Scaramouche didn’t recognize you and opted for a choice that didn’t involve sharing a room with anyone, you’d rather sleep on the floor in Kazuha and the others’ room. But Scaramouche was already stepping inside the elevator and was holding the door for you.

You held your gaze to the floor the entire time as Scaramouche pointed at a room and told the three they would sleep there. Scaramouche flashed the card against the door of your room, then stepped inside.

“This one’s ours,” Scaramouche said. You couldn’t detect any hint of emotion.

The room was bigger than the two rooms at your apartment. It had two beds, as Scaramouche said, and a TV across. The room was cold as fuck. You shuddered, and Scaramouche remained unbothered with his layers of clothes that probably cost more than you.

As Scaramouche set his luggage on the bed closest to the window, you gathered the courage to not make this trip any more awkward.

You breathed in deeply. “I’m Y/N—”

“I haven’t forgotten.” He arched an eyebrow as he sat on the edge of his bed, staring at you. “Have you forgotten about me?”

“No, no, of course not,” you said. “I could never forget you, Kunikuzushi.”

You stiffened, thinking it was a mistake and there must’ve been a reason he was called by another name, but you took a look at him and got distracted. His face relaxed when you said his name.

I could never forget you. It was sickeningly true. You can never forget about Kunikuzushi. He was your first love. He was so cute with his wide eyes; and he was very clingy, too, which made him all the more endearing.

But looking at the present Kunikuzushi, with his intense stare and permanently bored expression, he was hot, and you started to think that maybe your type was just Kunikuzushi.

Horror settled in your stomach as Scaramouche flashed a wicked grin.

“Then you wouldn’t mind sleeping with me, would you?”

“He said what?” Heizou cackled, hitting the wall as he threw his head back, laughing.

Scaramouche meant it as sleeping in the same room, but he could have— no, should have worded it better. Scaramouche laid down on his bed right after and went on his phone as if he didn’t say anything at all. You blurted some half-baked excuse and left the room to cry about it in your friends’ room.

When Scaramouche said their room was assigned a king bed, you didn’t expect it to fit five people—and Scaramouche said he wanted it for himself? The bed was incredibly big, almost in a lonely way. You have never seen an Alaskan king bed before, but now, sitting on the edge of it, felt as if you could fit your entire apartment on it.

Kazuha was in between Heizou and Aether, their backs resting on the headboard. They were about to sleep, too, but as soon as you burst in, they settled into position and listened intently. Except Aether, kind of; he was texting his sister, who was demanding a room tour.

“I never thought he would be this bold. I mean, demanding to share a room the moment he laid his eyes on you? Wow,” Heizou said, looking terribly criminal with his expression.

“It is surprising,” Kazuha mused. “I’ve witnessed how women flock to his feet and how he bat them all off like he never saw them.”

An unpleasant feeling washed over, which was weird because why would you be upset? Of course they’d flock to him—with a face like that. He had the looks and the personality that would garner him a lot of masochistic fans if he were a character in a drama.

“Does that happen a lot?” The way you spat it out spelled exactly how upset you are.

“No need to get so jealous, now. After that display, I’m positive that he wants as much as you want him,” Heizou laughed, falling forward and resting his elbows on the mattress. He moved his chin to his palm. He looked like he was going to ask if you wanted to paint nails and curl hairs the next second.

Your face felt hot. What was this conversation? You’d much prefer painting nails than talking about this. “I don’t want him!”

Heizou arched an eyebrow. “No?”

Even Kazuha looked doubtful, which was enough of a blow.

“I’m just confused,” you insisted. “You know what happens when you’re in a room alone with an objectively attractive guy? You get confused.”

“I get it,” Aether said, setting his phone aside to share his insight. “This is your sexual awakening.”

“What? No!”

“It definitely is,” Heizou agreed. “Why else are you crying about this to us?”

There was a sense of impending doom at realizing that Heizou was brewing some horrible, horrible thoughts in that head of his. “To stop feeding into my madness!”

Heizou clicked his tongue. “How do you think he feels? His childhood best friend came back to his life looking like that—I’m surprised he hasn't eaten you right up yet.”

You didn’t know what was more horrifying: Heizou implying he thought you were hot, or him implying that he thought Scaramouche thought you were hot.

Your face must’ve looked like a constipated mix between flustered and horrified; Kazuha chimed in to tell Heizou, “You should be more careful with your words. I’ve never met anyone as possessive as Scaramouche.”

“It’s already a miracle he even remembers me. He wouldn’t get jealous. I doubt he actually wants me that way,” you sighed.

“Oh, but you want him that way?” Heizou asked.

You wanted to slap that expression off Heizou’s face. “Of course I do. He was so cute when we were little—I already liked him then. I didn’t think he’d grow up to be so…”

“Sexual awakening,” Aether said again.

“Ow,” Aether whined when you hit him square on the head.

Reluctantly, you returned to your room. Heizou, Kazuha, and Aether told you to get your shit together and face this not-sexual-awakening like a man. Kazuha didn’t say it, but you could feel that he was also thinking it. And if he ever said it out loud, you’d tell him to go fuck off to Liyue already.

Scaramouche was awake. The door clicked shut, and you faintly felt like those heroines locking themselves up in a room to hook up with someone who they didn’t think was the murderer on the front page right now.

“Where did you go?” he asked.

You tried not to let your surprise show, but Scaramouche was staring so intently that you would’ve failed miserably either way. “The other room.”

The longer you looked at him, the more you realized that Kunikuzushi felt like a fever dream. Being only a few feet away from the guy you used to be so fond of, now grown and had an air of haughtiness that would’ve been a turn-off had it been anyone else— it was doing things to you.

“Are you scared of me?”

You laughed and nearly choked on it when registering that Scaramouche was still looking. It wasn’t something like embarrassment. It was more like laughing unabashedly and then sensing that your hallway crush walked past. Maybe it was a bit of embarrassment.

“No. No, I’m not scared.” You moved to sit on your bed, eyes trained on the wall. “You didn’t tell me you were back.”

“You changed your number. You moved out.”

“Oh.” You did do that. Your apartment was very far from your home.

“And I figured you forgot about me or wanted to forget about me because of what I did to you.”

“Oh.” You wanted to say that he didn’t affect you that much. Life goes on; you meet new people and lose them every day, and all that. But Scaramouche was affecting you that much, especially when he’s only a few feet away from you, looking like he wanted you to pounce him.

Scaramouche grinned lopsidedly. “But I guess I don’t have to worry about that anymore.”

What the hell does that mean? Your heart skipped a beat. Did he figure it out? Were you that obvious with your thoughts about pouncing?

Scaramouche stood up from his bed, moving towards yours slowly. “Are you seeing anyone right now?”

You tried to avoid getting too close by leaning back, but he kept drawing his face closer, bending towards you. You’re one last tilt away from him pinning you down on the bed.

“No,” you blurted before you could even think about it. It was a little difficult to think about anyone else when you were a breath away from kissing. “Why?”

Scaramouche’s eyes narrowed, electric indigo. “Do you still have a crush on me?”

“You’re asking too many questions.”

“We’re catching up. This is how it works, doesn’t it?”

No, it was definitely not how this worked. Your neck was starting to ache with this awkward angle, and he hadn’t even answered your question.

“Do you?” he repeated, hovering above you.

You gave up on the painful angle and laid flat on the bed, frowning up at him. You crossed your arms to achieve the stance of someone who will not back down easily. “How are you so sure I even had a crush on you?”

“You’re telling me I’m wrong?”

What was this? Some fucked up game of 21 questions, but Scaramouche was too high and mighty to follow the rules? You didn’t know what to say to that. You wisely decided to stay silent, glaring up at him.

You probably didn’t look intimidating at all. Scaramouche smiled, much less sharper. Almost fond as his eyes flicked down to somewhere below your nose. “Am I still the only one for you?”

Okay. You would back down easily if he kept looking at you like that.

“You didn’t hurt me, Kuni.” You sighed. “You never could.”

Scaramouche straightened, his face carefully blank. It was much harder to read him like this. You sat up, wanting to ask if it was the wrong thing to say. You couldn’t get the words out because he lunged for a kiss.

You might have gasped. You might have made some embarrassing noise while a laugh rumbled from the back of Scaramouche’s throat. But that was all thrown out the window the moment your eyes fluttered shut and you lost yourself in the sensation of his warm mouth on yours.

He pushed closer, and you were pulled back on the mattress, his arms on either side of your head. Your eyes flew open when Scaramouche nipped at your lip. As if suddenly remembering where and who you were, you forced his chest back and gaped.

“What?” He looked irritated you interrupted him.

“At least say it back!”

“You didn’t even say it,” Scaramouche said, one eyebrow raised.

“I like you, Kunikuzushi.”

Scaramouche turned red and then looked humbled that you saw it. “I still like you, too.”

You looked at him up and down. You asked, but you didn’t want to hear the answer. “And you didn’t have anyone while you were in Sumeru?”

“Of course not,” Scaramouche scoffed. “You think anyone there was worth my time? You think I’d settle for less than you?” He scowled. “How about you? Nevermind, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know. I’d do it better than any of them.”

You laughed, tugging him close with your arms around his neck. If anyone were to come in, they would assume the worst. Then again, maybe Scaramouche had plans to indulge in the worst.

wake up! let’s eat breakfast at the restaurant we saw yesterday!

ask scaramouche. so he can pay for us

Despite the freedom and space of lying on separate queen beds, you and Scaramouche were huddled and pressed close. And despite books in your bag, you were occupied with huddling and pressing close against Scaramouche. You were lying on his chest while he had an arm resting on your stomach.

As soon as Heizou’s texts appeared on the top banner of your screen, you looked up, and Scaramouche looked like he was going to murder someone.

“It’s a joke, probably,” you said. “They don’t see you as a wallet.”

“It’s not a joke,” Scaramouche said. “I don’t really care about that. You and Heizou close?”

“He’s the one who introduced me to Kazuha and the others.” You sat up from the comfortable position and stretched.

“So you’re close.”

“Oh, very much so.” Then you laughed at Scaramouche’s thunderous expression. “Idiot. Why are you jealous? He’s not the one I’m sharing a room with and was making out with last night.”

Scaramouche’s gaze cut down to your neck. He looked extremely pleased.

You and Scaramouche took the elevator down, holding hands throughout. You felt a little giddy. What must this look like to everyone else? They’d all assume you were out with your boyfriend. As you reached your friends, Aether had just started the car. Kazuha slipped into the passenger seat, and Heizou waved at the both of you.

Then Heizou gasped. Aether turned to you and gasped as well.

“What happened to you? You look like you were mauled by a tiger,” Aether asked, scandalized.

“If the tiger had a short hime cut and a thick wallet, maybe,” Heizou mused. You flipped him off and climbed inside the car. Heizou laughed and sat beside you.

Aether frowned. “What kind of tiger would that be?”

You groaned, burying your face in your palms and wishing that lightning would strike you down. You needed coffee. Or a beer. Maybe if you bat your eyelashes and kissed him on the lips, Scaramouche would buy you bottles of wine.

As if summoned by your thoughts, a figure forced himself in between you and Heizou. Scaramouche worked fast. He glared at Heizou and tugged you away from him.

Heizou’s eyes went wide. “What’d I do?”

“Know your place, Shikanoin,” Scaramouche said. You just wanted to at least not be half-sitting on his lap, but he was proving a point and didn’t let you budge.

Kazuha smiled. “I warned you, Heizou.”

“Damn,” Heizou said. He looked exhausted. He was the one who suggested you and Scaramouche hook up in the first place—did he not expect his intuition to be right this time? “Didn’t take you for the clingy type. Two more days of this?”

“This is not some fling,” Scaramouche hissed. “You think I don’t take this seriously?”

You smiled as your heart fluttered. Scaramouche could be so unintentionally sweet sometimes, not that you’d tell it to his face, because he would grumble and hide his face. You rather liked his face. It was pretty, and you knew that if you tugged his hood down, you’d see a bruise on his neck as well.

“Didn’t take him for a romantic as well,” Kazuha said, thoroughly entertained.

“Wait, are you actually a thing now?” Aether made a face. “What the hell happened in that room?”

Scaramouche smirked. “You sure you wanna know?”

a/n it was already so hard for me to not turn it into a heizou fic dude. That entire first part was so unnecessary i was just hopelessly infatuated. BUT ANYWAY!!1 thank you so much for reading i hope u liked it <3 if u do, leave a comment or a reblog so i can see your thoughts :DD

also, another note: on the day i wrote this fic the insta acc of scara didnt exist. so if it does by the time youve read this fic, its pure coincidence and i have nothing to do w it. or maybe i did, because i came up w the name HAHA

"don't you think you should say thank you to me?" chigiri watches as your eyes light up and you grab the popsicle in his hand, shoving it into your mouth like it'll disappear if you don't consume it immediately.

you roll your eyes, ice balancing on your tongue. "i ask you to buy me one thing-"

"a kiss will do, you know." he arches his eyebrows at you, waving his matching popsicle in the air. "i'm not picky."

"you think you're so smooth, don't you? don't your friends call you princess? no wonder you want a kiss."

chigiri smirks at that. "can't be a princess when i'm with you, then there'd be two of us, and then who'll buy your popsicles?"

you look at him like he's just given you a new fear, so adoringly sweet that he brings you in close with a laugh.

"besides," he tilts your hair back over your shoulder, fingertips gently brushing against your neck. "i'm not the kind to just lie down and take it. a girl like you though…"

you shove him, your face heating up, but your hand meets hard muscle and he doesn't budge, just smiles wickedly.

୨୧⸝⸝ : and i promise, this time i won’t be late.

PAIRING! idol!wonbin x fem!reader GENRE! fluff, angst (quite a bit this time i think) WARNING! just wonbin tryna be a good bf alsooo not proofread WC 2.5k

NOTE! smth shorter to make up for the fact that i haven't written anything in ages, sorry for disappearing off the face of the earth it will happen again

wonbin finds himself praying that you're still awake right now. he looks down at his phone for the thousandth time, wincing every time the minute changes.

it is currently 1:06 in the morning. running an anxious hand through his hair, he continues to glare at the time being displayed as though it would go back a few hours if he stared hard enough. he thinks about sending you a message to verify whether or not you're still up, but decides against it with a shake of his head. he already feels terrible, and he thinks that if you happen to be asleep right now and wake up to his sorry, pathetic message the next day, it'd only make him feel worse.

lost in thought, wonbin doesn’t even feel the arm that wraps around his stiff shoulders until the person touching him decides to speak. “you’re coming with us, right?” sungchan asks, causing wonbin to look up for the first time in what feels like hours.

all the boy can utter is a “what?”, meeting the eyes of his taller group mate. “the corner store down the road is still open,” sungchan explains, “we’ve been talking about stopping there since practice ended. were you not listening?”

wonbin takes a deep breath, running a hand through his hair once more. he hadn’t been listening, of course, because the moment practice ended the only thing on his mind was getting back home to you. it wasn’t a rare occurrence, but practice only seemed to drag longer than normal today, and while wonbin knows that you’ve always been understanding of the fact that he comes home late, he can’t help but feel apologetic. he tells himself that he owes it to you to come home on time just once, and he’s blown it again.

1:10 in the morning. “sorry,” wonbin breathes, “i can’t go.” he doesn’t say anything more than that, and he doesn’t have to. sungchan drops his arm from the younger boy’s shoulders, instead opting to pat him on the back reassuringly. in the same sense that this isn’t wonbin’s first time coming home late, it also isn’t the first time he’s had to bail on his friends in exchange for arriving at your shared apartment just a bit earlier, even if it doesn’t make much of a difference. despite everything, wonbin is still late, and there’s no changing that.

sungchan nods, “next time, then.” wonbin offers him a nod in return, and the older boy only gives him a smile and a wave before turning around to catch up with everyone else. wonbin is frozen for a moment, watching the silhouettes of his group mates get smaller and smaller before he finally begins the journey back to you.

1:45 in the morning. wonbin holds his breath as he opens the door to your apartment, making very minimal noise. he still prays that you’re awake, but can’t blame you if you aren’t.

he wants to call out to you, the same way he wanted to send you a text earlier, and the same way he wanted to arrive at a reasonable time for once. he keeps his teeth clenched.

it’s 1:50 by the time wonbin stops in front of your shared bedroom. you’re sleeping— he’s sure of it. despite this, he still can’t find it in him to regret making an attempt to come home sooner. he knows that you’d appreciate it if you knew.

he pushes open the door and there you are, a tense look adorning your face as you sleep. he takes note of how you likely weren’t even sure if he would be home on time or not, yet you still stayed to your side of the bed. whether it be due to routine or simply because you were hoping that he’d show up, his heart drops nonetheless.

he quietly walks over to you, pausing when he reaches your side. he had wished for you to be awake up until this moment, but finds it ironic that he currently doesn’t want to wake you. he doesn’t even realize that he’s subconsciously moving hair away from your face until it’s too late, and does nothing to stop himself once he notices.

letting his hand drift down slightly to stroke the side of your face, he releases a shaky sigh. “i’m sorry, my sweet girl,” he whispers, watching with somber eyes as your expression softens as if you’re able to sense his presence in your sleep.

he makes his way over to his side of the bed and he knows that you won’t be affected by the way the mattress dips slightly as he lies down, because he’s done it so many times and you’ve never once woken up from it.

2:01 in the morning. wonbin hates that he can only lie beside you for a few hours before having to leave again, before you even get the chance to open your eyes. it’ll be as if he was never there. it’s completely out of his control, and wonbin knows that, but he hates it. you’d tell him that it’s alright, the same way you’ve done several times, but he hates it. he hates every bit of it.

it’s 11:01 in the morning by the time you wake up, and you don’t need to turn around in order to know that you’re the only person in the room. wonbin had been here, this much you know, and you wish that you had stayed awake longer if it meant being able to see him, even for a moment. you wish that you had woken up abruptly at some point last night if it meant being able to see his sleeping face.

you don’t dwell on the thought for long— you never do, knowing that it’d only make your situation a lot harder to deal with. you feel around your bedside table in search of your phone, not having the strength to get out of bed just yet.

strike one, you think to yourself. on the rare occasion that you wake up and wonbin is by your side, he always lightheartedly scolds you for checking your phone first thing in the morning. he’d disapprove if he saw you right now, but he isn’t here to stop you, so you do it anyway. coincidentally, the only notifications on display are from the boy in question.

[6:23 AM] my bin <3: hiii babe

[6:25 AM] my bin <3: call me when u get the chance!!!!! i’ll be available (i will literally drop everything and pick up)

[6:26 AM] my bin <3: i love u pretty ….. 🤮

your mood lifts just by seeing his name on your screen, a surge of energy coursing through your body. you decide to go about your normal routine, the idea of calling your boyfriend never leaving your mind.

it’s 11:20 by the time you make it downstairs, everything looking the exact same way you left it. wonbin is nothing if not organized; if there’s any disarray in your apartment, it’s all from you. unfortunately, this means that there’s not many traces of your boyfriend left behind, and you often hope for him to forget to hang up his coat or line up his shoes by the door just to prove that he’s there.

you walk into the kitchen and the first thing you take note of is that you still haven’t taken out the trash. strike two, you think.

you made a mental note to take care of it a few days ago and you still have yet to do so. wonbin hasn’t been around enough lately to notice, but you know he’d jokingly give you a roll of his eyes if he saw the way it’s practically overflowing right now before proceeding to take it out himself. he’d do the same with the dishes piled up in the sink, chatting away with you while he took care of everything like it was no problem, and to him, it really wasn’t.

god, you miss him.

you pull out your phone, disregarding everything else as you click on his contact and hold the device up to your ear. it rings only 4 times before you hear wonbin on the other end.

“i was hoping you’d call,” he says, and you faintly hear the voices of his group mates in the background. you almost let out a laugh at his words, just to fill the silence, but it only comes out as a quick exhale. “why wouldn’t i? you told me to. and i would’ve, even if you didn’t tell me to,” you murmur, your words leaving you faster than you wanted them to.

“i just don’t feel like i deserve it, i guess,” he replies. you’re about to ask him to elaborate before he continues. “i stopped by last night. i’m sorry i couldn’t come sooner, i really tried.” you pause at his choice of words, wondering if he even noticed that he said “stopped by” rather than something along the lines of “came home”, as if the two of you don’t live together.

you shake your head, deciding that you’re looking too much into it solely because not being able to see your boyfriend is taking a toll on you. “don’t apologize, bin,” you exhale, “i’ve told you a million times i understand. there’s not really anything you can do about it.”

you know he’s probably shaking his head on the other side of the phone, or running a nervous hand through his hair the way he always does. “i know, just- i’m sorry. i want to see you.” you nod, and he doesn’t see it. “i want to see you, too,” you reply. “should i wait up until 3am today?” your words are meant to be taken as a joke, but wonbin immediately retaliates. “you better not! your beauty sleep comes before anything else.”

you talk with him about anything that comes to mind and it’s as easy as it always is. when he tells you that he has to leave and get back to practicing, the two of you exchange prolonged “goodbye’s” and “i love you’s” before you finally pull the phone away from your ear with a sigh. you think that hearing his voice only made you miss him more.

when you look up from the phone you’re once again greeted with the trash can, as filled to the brim as ever, and you think taking it out would make for a good distraction. not far from it, the dishes are still piled up, and you consider washing them. you don’t, though. strike three.

you spend the rest of the day going through the motions, body moving on autopilot as it does quite often lately, and at the end of it all you look back on everything and think that it had all been normal— aside from the fact that wonbin doesn’t come home.

despite his initial protests, you’re awake until 3:26 in the morning. you’re not sure what time he arrived home last night, but you think that it couldn’t have been later than this.

you had made sure to take a nap at some point during the day just so you could be awake at this moment, to see your lover, talk to him, even if it had only been for a few minutes.

you shoot him a text, praying that the urgency you feel can be expressed through the little amount of words you send. you fall asleep waiting for his response, only to wake up to an empty phone, and an even emptier bed.

if there was barely any traces of wonbin in your shared apartment before, there definitely isn’t now; his lack of presence was evident the day before despite the fact that he had been there for merely a few hours, but after last night?

for a moment, it almost feels as though you live by yourself.

12:03 in the afternoon. swallowing the sudden lump in your throat, you make an attempt to go about your routine as normal. you can already picture the sight you’ll be greeted with downstairs— an overflowing trash can, the accumulating dishes in the sink, only this time, there’s no messages from wonbin asking for you to give him a call or telling you that he loves you.

to your surprise, by the time you manage to trudge downstairs, you aren’t greeted by any of those things.

the trash can that had been previously close to spilling over has been emptied, an empty bag now taking its place. there’s no dishes in the sink, all of them instead sitting in the dish rack waiting to dry. before you’re able to turn around and demand an explanation, you feel arms wrapping around your waist, and you swear that your eyes almost fill up with tears.

“my sweet girl, i missed you,” wonbin utters from behind you, and in an instant, you’re spinning your body around and returning his embrace. he can sense that you’re about to ask him a myriad of questions, and opts to continue talking before you can get a word in. “i’ve only been here for about an hour or so. i’m sorry i couldn’t come home last night, baby.”

you shake your head, about to offer him the same reassurance you always do, when he begins to speak again. “i practiced until super late last night. i wanted to finish learning the choreography as fast as possible—“ you open your mouth to scold him, pulling away from his chest momentarily when he cuts you off for what feels like the thousandth time. “—and before you yell at me, it was for a good reason,” he pouts, waiting for you to press your lips into a tight line before starting to speak again.

“i overexerted myself a bit, i think, but it was all worth it. i’m all yours for the next few days,” he finishes, a hand stroking the back of your head. the two of you stand there for a while. “i love you’s” and “i missed you’s” are exchanged rather than goodbyes, and neither of you are willing to move from your positions, blissfully unaware of the passage of time for once. it’s alright, though— you both have time. a lot of it.

for a moment, wonbin gets the urge to apologize again, whether it be for all the times he’s arrived home late, or for leaving you alone with an overflowing trash can or a sink full of dishes, but it’s almost as if you’re able to read his mind. “don’t feel sorry anymore, bin,” he hears you say, voice muffled against the fabric of his shirt. he only nods, the words dying on his tongue. he decides that he’ll accept your reassurance just this once.

wonbin isn’t sorry, because this time, he isn’t late.

AUTHOR’S NOTE! beabadoobee my wife

12:07am — sano manjiro

“(y/n), truth or dare.” baji smirked as the bottle pointed to you. you rolled your eyes at the sinister look baji was giving you before nodding. “truth.” 

“pussy.” “just ask the question.” baji hummed in thought before letting out a wolfish grin. 

“do you like someone right now? like a crush.” you weren’t fazed, you knew that having baji as a best friend would lead to being asked this question. baji’s always been invasive with asking and you never once minded. but now that said person you liked was in the vicinity, you couldn’t help but look away and nod. 

“eh?! who?” chifuyu couldn’t help but prod for details. “a friend.” you respond curtly, not knowing that mikey’s big black eyes were staring right through you, awaiting for your answer. 

“a friend?!” chifuyu parroted. you nod once, not indulging more into the conversation, but toman wasn’t done yet. 

“who?” you roll your eyes “if you want to know, you have to wait for the bottle to point to me again.” you say as you reach for the bottle, giving it a spin. 

you hear the groans of the group reverberate in the room, but stop once the bottle lands on poor takemichi who hesitantly chose dare. 

the dare he had to do was promised to never be retold.

all through the night, the bottle never landed on you once more, keeping your secret crush intact and their curiosities peaked. 

“why do you need to talk to me, baji?” you asked as baji pulls you over to the side, baji looked at you a bit worriedly before he heaves out a sigh. 

“(y/n)...” “what?” you were so confused at this point. you had no idea what baji was thinking nor do you have any idea what he wanted to talk about. 

“about this… friend that you like.” you tilt your head to the side, still confused as you gestured for him to keep going. 

“are you sure you’d want to tell him how you feel?” “what?” 

“don’t make me say it.” “keisuke, i am genuinely really confused right now. just tell me.”

“i don’t like you that way.”

“huh?” 

baji sighs out, as if he were explaining to a child. “look… i know we’re close, and that we’re considered best friends but you need to realize that i only see you as that. nothing more, nothing less.” “kei–” “like, bro, i know i’m attractive. but i can’t recipro–” “keisuke–” “–cate your feelings, it wouldn’t be fair…” “baji, that’s no–” “look, i know you can find someone else, someone actually deserving of your love, but that’s just not me… so i’m so sor–” you cut him off with a slap to his cheek. 

he looked at you, scandalized, as if you murdered his first born. he looked at you as if he were asking what the fuck was that? and you raised a brow at him. 

“and where did you even get the disgusting rumor that i’m in love with you?”

“you’re not?” “gross.” “hey!” baji cleared his throat. “but didn’t you say that you liked a friend?” 

“keisuke… you’re not the only friend i have.” you deadpanned, internally scoffing at the audacity he had. 

“if it isn’t me, then who?” “none of your business.” 

“(y/n), you don’t need to hide what you feel, but just know i can’t return those feelings. you don’t need to lie but i think it would be better for me to tell you strai–” “keisuke, shut the fuck up.” 

you rubbed your temples, feeling a headache coming up at the baseless confidence that was budding in your best friend. 

“i like mikey. okay? now stop it with the assumptions, you’re giving me the shivers.” “mikey?!” baji’s jaw dropped, “as in, sano manjiro? the leader of toman? my childhood best friend? that mikey?!” you roll your eyes at his dramatics before nodding and vocalizing an exasperated yes. 

“now will you shut the fuck up and stop?” baji nods, before a terrifying smirk enters his features, before you could even question him about it, he spoke in a loud voice, obviously talking to someone besides you. 

“aww. i wanted to keep up the charade longer, but i guess there’s no point in overthinking.” you were about to call him crazy. 

“i told you she likes you back, mikey.” 

your eyes widened as you fling your head back, jaw dropping at the sight of the fearsome toman leader with red cheeks adorning his normally soft features.  

“wha– how– keisuke–!” a firm pat on your shoulder was placed before baji walked away, nudging mikey on the side and slapping the back of his head, hearing him bid the leader good luck before leaving. 

the silence was suffocating. it would be so laughable that the usually loud sano manjiro was reduced to a quiet, blushing, idiot. 

“so–” you cursed at the crack in your voice. “uh…”

“you like me, huh?” you gulped, feeling your face burn, his lips twitch into a smile as he realizes that your silence means yes. and all the blonde wants to do is kiss you silly. but he needed to milk this out. 

it wasn’t everyday that the sano manjiro has his feelings reciprocated, but what would he know? he’s only had his eyes set on you from the very beginning.

“hm? why can’t you answer me, (n/n)-chin.” you didn’t even realize that mikey was already right in front of you, a smirk on his face as his fingers were under your chin, forcing you to look up at him.

“ne, (n/n)-chin, do you like me?” you remained mute, willing your racing heart to calm down. but knowing that you were not about to let yourself be embarrassed by his teasing, you took a step forward, catching him off guard. 

“eh? but what about you, i did hear baji saying that you liked me back.” you gave him a sickly sweet smile. 

at this point, it was a battle of who would cave in first. you knew that you would win, because if there was anything to know about mikey, is that he stakes his claim the first opportunity given. 

“i do.” he gives no hesitation as he pulls you closer, foreheads touching as he whispers out, smile still on his face now. 

“you’re mine now. (y/n).” as he dips you down and presses a peck on your pouty lips. 

you pull away, as if he had cooties before pushing him away. mikey was hurt, but before he could express it, you pushed him on the wall behind him, a smile on your face. 

“you’ve got it all wrong, sano manjiro.” you purred sweetly, hands cupping his cheeks before you placed a deep peck on his lips, smirking at the way he chased after your lips after you pull away. 

“you’re mine now, manjiro.” you say before he pulls you back to his lips, twin smiles on your faces as you pull him closer. 

sano manjiro was undefeated, everyone knows that. he’s the boss. he’s always on top, but damn, he doesn’t mind being under your control.   

notes: wow i can't believe i managed to write something despite my schedule but whEW hi mikey *tucks hair behind ears* i think mikey grew on me a bit too late but all of you better expect me to be writing for him often bc this man!! won't!! get!! out!! of!! my!! head!!

꒰ 𝐇𝐎𝐓 𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐋𝐋 𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐄𝐑 ꒱ 박성호

summary : you and your husband were throwing a bbq party, and sungho has somehow convinced you he was going to grill

genre : fluff, husband!sungho x afab!reader, girldad!sungho, non-idol!au, bbqdad!au tws : kisses, language, bad bbq puns, father sungho author notes : this is zanna's fault for indulging my delusions word count : 1.3k

“hey babygrill.” 

you turned, “sungho—”

“is it hot grill summer?” he asked, a wood-handled, metal spatula clutched between his fingers. “because you’re smoking hot.” you cringed, holding back a laugh as he leaned sideways, fingers turning the dial on the front of the grill. the vein in his neck strained with the angle, making it prominent against the midday sunlight. the defined muscles of his arms flexed, and you stared like you’d never seen him before—even though you’d been married to him for two years now, dating him for three before that. you reached out, tracing the lines, feeling the heat from the grill and sun combine against his untainted-tan skin. 

“i’m going to get our daughter ready,” he ignored your touch, knowing it wasn’t anything new. he liked it though, knowing you weren’t like that before him. “myself, too.”

“sure, babe.” he replied, hovering his palm a few inches over the metal rack he had cleaned just a couple minutes ago. “go ahead. i’ve got this all under control.”

who was he really trying to convince? you thought. your husband wasn’t a master chef by any means, but when you craved late-night snacks, he was definitely the man for the job.

“are you sure,” you quizzed. “maybe don’t start until i get back?”

“my love,” he met your eyes, head still slightly hung as he adjusted the heat. his longer hair fell to the side effortlessly, cascading like a waterfall. “i’ll be fine.”

“oh no,” you laughed. “i’m worried about my house, sungho.” 

he faked being offended. “what the hell? i’m a great chef!”

“you’re great at a lot of things, baby, there’s no doubt about it, but cooking just isn’t one of them.” his fake started to become genuine, arms crossing over his broad chest. you tried hard not to stare again. “right now!” you added, “practice makes perfect! but, just wait for me to supervise. i would like for there to be a backyard to have this party in…” you kissed his shoulder. “please?” 

ultimately, you always won him over. “fine, i’ll cut up stuff for the sides instead.” you weren't sure about that either, however it’s something you’ve made him do often for you. so, it should go fine, shouldn’t it? “but, hurry, i’d like to get these burgers sizzling. you could say, the steaks are high, right now, y/n. want them to be grate for our family and friends.” 

you mentally facepalmed. when did you marry such a cheesy guy? you guess it's for the best that he became a dad after all, with these (terrible) jokes of his. 

you left him to attend to the vegetables for the burgers, finding your daughter in front of a fan on the couch, basking in the air that blew directly in her face. bluey was playing on the TV, the accents rubbing off on her slightly. 

she lit up, “mommy!”

“hi, baby.” you plopped down next to her, and she instantly nozzled against your side. “do you wanna bet on daddy burning something?” 

she eyed you, then nodded, “seven fruit snacks.” you hummed, seemingly thinking it over. but before you had the chance to agree, she added, “and 45 minutes past bedtime.”

you cocked your head, slightly in disbelief, but mostly in amusement. 

“deal.” you held your hand for her to take, which she did (hand significantly smaller than yours) closing the bargain. “i have faith in my husband.” 

you lied, but regardless, you honestly wanted your miniature version to win.

you silently watched a couple more minutes with her, glancing at the clock on the wall. you threaded your hand through her hair, thinking about the styles you could put it into today; ultimately knowing what your kid would prefer. 

“first one ready gets dessert before dinner!”

she jumped off the couch, small legs carrying down the hall and presumably to the bathroom. you followed after a moment, hearing the water start to run.

once finished, you joined sungho outside again, prepared for guests to start showing up. he had to do a double take when you walked out, and if this was a cartoon, you feared his eyes would’ve been popping out of his head. 

“woah,” he snaked his hands around your waist, after abandoning the grill carelessly, planting a couple kisses against your lips and surrounding skin. “damn, are you a5 wagyu?” he murmured, eyes roaming over your figure, “‘cause you look expensive.”  

you caught the look your (almost) three year old daughter gave him; the same one she gave tomatoes. you stifled a laugh against his lips.  

“ew, daddy!” she shrieked at your kiss, wiggling in your arms to push him back. “that’s my mommy!” she argued, throwing her small limbs around your neck and puckering her lips against your cheek. 

“i’m sorry, baby.” he put his palm to your daughter's head gently, kissing her temple. “I’m just letting your mom follow my apron’s instructions.” he revealed said tightly-tied clothing: kiss the chef adorned with fake abs (not that he needed them) printed on it. once again, you wondered when you married such an unserious guy. 

she began to hysterically laugh, and you guffawed, sungho taking her from you gladly. she hugged around his neck, “damn girly, you got a grip.” she squeezed tighter, kissing his cheek too. “i almost passed out!” that prompted a competition between the two, giggles sounding throughout the backyard as your daughter hugged tighter and tighter. 

you were only interrupted when his parents voices cut through the noise, “where’s my pretty princess of a granddaughter?” suddenly said girl was pushing from your husband, trying her hardest to be put down; her grandparents were arguably her second-favorite people. they took care of her during your date-nights and any other time sungho would ask. you’d never had a good relationship with your parents, but you were glad that they took you in for your daughter and husband's sake. 

they met your side, gaining a hug from you. 

“daddy! put me down!” she whined, causing you to giggle at the sight, “please!” 

he shook his head, attacking her with more hugs and kisses. 

it was refreshing to see such a man who wasn’t afraid to show his love and adoration for someone–especially his daughter. 

finally she broke free, running the short distance to sungho’s dad and jumping into his arms. she resumed the game with him, arms wrapping around his neck. 

“i made you something last night!” her attempt to get put down was easier than before, and once she hit the ground she was off, ushering her grandma and grandpa to follow into the house. “c’mon, it’s for your fridge!” 

sungho met your side once again, arm around your midsection, your head laid on his shoulder. you were glad you started a family with him of all people, even though when you were younger you weren't sure you would ever have wanted kids; but everything just felt so safe and secure with him. every doubt and uncertainty was put to rest when he was around. 

“she converted me into a girl-dad.” 

you laughed, “babe, you’ve always been a girl dad. do you remember when we found out, no one cried harder than you did.” 

he waved you off with a pfft sound, “she’s just so adorable, you can’t blame me.” he broke away, arms up innocently, standing back. “she’s a miniature version of you.” 

you spun to face him, “no, she’s exactly like you, baby. terrible humor, no respect for bedtime, fluffy-ass hair.” 

a hum resonated. he was staring again, eyes flicking over you casually. “should we have another, you think? another girl, but i’d love a miniature version of me, too.” your eyebrows rose in amusement, until your attention found itself locked behind him on the copious amount of smoke. 

“it’s burning.” 

“yeah, i know.” he said in a duh-tone, words adorned with his eyes rolling, “you’re hotter than the grill.”

“no, babe.” you grabbed his bare shoulders, spinning him around. “there’s actually a fire right now.” 

“oh my god!” you didn’t need to be facing him to see his eyes go wide, shoulders tensing under your grip. you giggled, sungho moving quickly to grab the tongs from the side table and move the food from the flame that had developed. “why didn’t you tell me sooner?” he asked, slightly frantic. 

“i guess you could say… missteaks were made.”

he turned slowly, a shit-eating grin across his face, “i knew you liked them.”

of course you did. it was sungho. 

suddenly a voice called out, “mommy, you owe me my fruit snacks!”

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۫ ꣑ৎ . HIS ULTRAVIOLENT PROSE. mydei

summary, even with half-bitten pomegranates between tongue, teeth and heart, the prince of Kremnos tries to make amends with you.

mydei x gn!reader. mildly lovers to enemies. tension and arguments. hurt with comfort. mentions of arranged marriage and eloping (love this trope with him) soft and gentle mydei, might be ooc. lore-inclined city-state ceremonies. [2.0k wc]

It’s merely an alliance ceremony.

And yet here you were, being dressed in foreign silks and heavy accessories. Compared to your usual attires the fabrics are lightweight, enough for a cold rush to scrape your skin despite the torch lit by the corner of your room.

Your face must’ve betrayed you, for the maidens that attended to you murmured about it being part of Kremnoan traditions and that you had to endure it, only with such a solid statement do you deflate, settling stiffly and defeatedly on the chair, allowing them to continue their decorations on you, to peel you bare of your sea-state city garments and pool Castrum Kremnos‘ silk clothes, sandals and cape over you.

At this very moment, you looked like a raw and beguiling warrior, a far cry of what you truly were, an ignorant coward.

“You look beautiful.” A more elderly woman speaks from behind, you stare at her through the vanity.

“…I look like a fighter.”

“Are you not?”

You hesitate to answer her, biting your lip to prevent yourself from speaking something you might regret.

Are you still labeled a fighter after losing your city to Castrum Kremnos?

You were anything but triumph, you lost your kingdom, your pride, your people—and only this alliance union can salvage whatever scraps of glory you have left, it's the only thing you could do for your folks since you disappointed them as their leader.

The elder woman’s hand lands softly on your shoulder, despite such a gentle manner you cannot help the flinch from echoing through your bones. Your nails bury into your palms.

“I assure you, young one, that shame is the last thing Castrum Kremnos would dare to offer you and your city-state.”

She pauses.

“Our prince would not dare such a thing from you.”

You wanted to laugh, to cry and scream and ruminate frustrations. But you swallow instead, “I see.”

You did not utter another word after that. The maidens have left long ago and you pondered with your own thoughts, recounting the gradual yesterdays you spent mourning over fallen friends and a broken city. You recounted tidbit memories of the remaining council that pushed you for this alliance—forcing you to succumb and kneel towards the very people that took your everything.

After all, as the last remaining royal blood, that’s the least you can do.

The Kremnos’ heavy bells finally billow, and you inhale sharply.

“It’s time for you to step into the ceremony hall, lord.”

And you stand, your heart heavy with pressure. When you followed a counselor towards your destination, the older man gave you a quick rundown of certain rules and traditions you needed to adhere to, you half-listened to the convoluted rules until the very last statement that catches your attention,

“At the end of the blessings, you are to share a cup of pomegranate juice with the one you are to join alliance with.” he starts,

“In this case, you are to drink from the same cup with the representative of our city, Kremnos’ prince Mydeimos.”

His name is an echo through the shell of your ears, leaving a bitter aftertaste between your teeth. You stopped listening after that, until you both faltered at the end of the corridor.

Your heart is pounding in your chest when the large, looming doors split open, by now, the hall is packed and standing at the very front was the ceremony priest and Mydeimos himself, awaiting your arrival. When you step beside him on the podium, your gaze dare not shift towards the prince.

You let the withered voice of the priest wander you through the prayer, he lifts an iron chalice brimming with liquid as red as blood—you watch quietly as he lifts a smaller glass of honey, letting the golden liquid pool into the red cup before blessing the drink.

The priest turns to you, with a nod he beckons you to mirror the oath spoken. With parted lips, you follow along, pledging allegiance and alliance to Castrum Kremnos, “And with the glory of Strife and blood intertwined in allegiance with Castrum Kremnos, I, the succeeding lord of my city shall share the same devotion of valorous death before glorious return.”

You tilt your chin, lips pressed against the iron. The tangy yet thickly sweet taste of pomegranate rinses through your tastebuds. When the red liquid hits the middle line, you retract, turning towards the direction of the prince.

You look at him, only to find his heavy resin eyes already on you.

Mydeimos’ blank stare traces every bare action you do, and for a split moment you try to hold his weighty stare, trying to dissect his expression—trying to see what he thinks of the whole thing, and yet you find none.

You’ve dropped your gaze then, before extending the chalice in his direction. You slightly stir when you feel his fingertips brush your knuckles, you are quick to let go when he grabs ahold of the cup—too quickly.

How audacious, you cannot help but wonder when the priest speaks the same oath to him, Mydeimos recites it but his eyes never stray from you. Truly, he’s like a prowling lion assessing its prey.

There’s a prickling sensation of self-consciousness with such a look pinned on you.

“And with the glory of Strife and blood intertwined in allegiance with Castrum Kremnos, I, Mydeimos the succeeding prince of my city shall share the same devotion of valorous death before glorious return…” he rasps, then he downs the remainder within the chalice, his golden eyes still on you.

You cannot help yourself but settle your gaze on his exposed collarbones, laddering your way up the column of his neck where you watch the way his adam’s apple bobs at the swallow of the juice, a few clumsy droplets run down his jaw before he retreats and wipes it with the back of his hand.

The bells sound once, then twice at the successful union but your mind is a flurry of thoughts, though all of them stop at one concluding statement, you desperately need to get out of the banquet hall.

So when you’re finally released from your duties, instead of lingering and talking with the folks you spin around towards the exit. Nobody seemed to bat an eyelash at your hasty departure, nor was there anyone in the hallway outside which allowed you to break into a sprint—you don’t know where you’re going, quite frankly the layout of the city is still foreign to you, but you needed to get out of there.

At the fall of your impatient footsteps, you barely hear another set chasing after you.

Only until you feel larger hands gripping your waist do you stop.

“Where do you think you’re running off to?” You don’t need to turn to know who was speaking, the plates of his half-naked front are pressed hard against your back, it acted like a furnace almost.

“Unhand me.” You try to sound casual but it ends up in a bite. “This instant, Mydeimos—“

“And what?” He challenges back. “Let you run around like a headless goose until one of the counselors finds you? Do you wish for trouble that much?”

Instead of answering, you try to pry his hands around your waist. Your attempts are obviously futile however you are wracked with frustrations, fury and confusion. Your actions only fueled the prince’s impatience.

“Quit squirming—“

“Then let me go!” You try to glare at him. “I wish to be anywhere but in your arms right now—“

That must’ve struck a nerve.

Mydeimos’ grip on you only tightened, he pulls you towards an empty corner between the heavy flaps of curtains and presses you against the wall. His hand grips your jaw—but despite such a harsh action his hold on you remains feather-light, gentle.

His face draws close to your own, until you can feel his raspy voice on your cheek. At this distance, you can smell his scent of bonfire, tender smoke and something sweet, like pomegranates, he smelled awfully fruity.

“Says the one that wishes to marry me, isn’t that what you confessed to me months before?”

The jab brings heat to your cheeks, you lift your hand with the intent to slap him but Mydeimos captures your wrist before your palm could collide with his cheek. His thumb runs up from your wrist to your palm, intertwining your fingers together and laying it on the wall beside your head, his bangs brush your forehead, face so, so close that if you tilted your head your lips would be brushing his own,

“You wanted to elope with me.” Mydei tells you. “Have you forgotten? Or do you wish for me to tell you the exact words you told me that day.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, this was before my city was attacked by your warriors!”

The tension hangs gauche, the silence between the two of you almost unbearable. The man before you sighs heavily, “There are a handful of things that are at my disposal, even with the title of prince—the issues of prophecies is something I cannot control.” Mydei soothes a thumb over the pulse in your wrists.

“You of all people are aware of this fact.” he pauses. “Or maybe you weren’t, after all the sea-side states are nonbelievers, you and your people don’t revere the Titans, only the arithmetics and logarithms of the world.”

“You're right, I wasn’t.” You snap. “I did not know Castrum Kremnos was prophesied to destroy my home, Mydeimos. If I had known, I wouldn’t have uttered such preposterous words to you, I was made out to be an ignorant fool because of it.”

Mydeimos’ whole demeanor takes a polar shift, you’re unsure why those eyes had melted like butter, was it your shaky voice, the pitiful wallow in your tone? Or did he truly feel an ounce of empathy for your situation?

“You're not an ignorant fool.” He lets go of your wrist but his body remains pressed up against your own, despite the position his body heat grounded you, especially with his follow up of, “to me, you’re the wisest person I know. A leader with a heart of gold, I apologize for causing you so much agony and for being unable to aid you when you need it most.”

He takes your hand, smearing his lips against your knuckles. “I wish to make amends with you but if you hold such vengeance in your heart—” he tugs your wrist, digging your fingers to his chest just above his heart. “You can scratch my heart out and kill me, stab me in the back for as long as you want if it means your desires would be satiated, then so be it.“

“…Mydeimos.” To say you were shocked was an understatement.

He softly bumps his forehead with your own. “Do you hate me, kardia mou?”

This was the very reason why you fell for him, the prince from the city of warriors. Despite the harshness of his textures and tones, when it came to you, he was honest and open. Those universal stone-cold expressions fissure as soon as he sees a glimpse of you in the distance. He spoke in uncharacteristic gentleness and his fleeting skinships sent butterflies within your chest. You cannot be angry with him, much less hate when he acts like this.

You feel him interlace your fingers, weaving his own with yours. Then he leans down once again, pressing his lips against the corner of your mouth, the intent of apology willing to spill from the nonexistent gaps between the two of you. “I’m sorry.”

Your eyes turn glassy. Maybe it was due to Mydeimos’ comfort that every drowning pressure that you’ve bottled up comes cracking at the seams.

A sob spills between your lips.

“I don’t hate you, Mydei.” Your voice trembles when he tips your chin towards him, brushing his thumbs over the tear staining down your cheeks. “Truthfully, it is I that I loathe the most, not you—never you.”

“So please, never say that I find thrill in killing you.”

Mydei’s hand comes tangling through your tendrils, you weep on his collarbones, his woody scent engulfing you in comfort.

“I’m so sorry.” He repeats. “I’ll never speak of such a thing to you, so cease your cryings, my love.”

✶ FOCUS — p.sunghoon

사랑 tutor!sunghoon x f!r . . . 📁 warning. kissing, use of pet names ! + FLUFF ★ seiu msg: yk i had to go feral, rbs/feedbacks are appreciated

sunghoon sighed after feeling your intense stare for the the past 15 minutes “is there something on my face, yn or the stuff i’m teaching not piquing your interest” you tilt your head “why would you think that” he sighed again “because when you were assigned to me by the teacher for tutoring, i didn’t expect you would be staring at me the whole time instead of learning” sunghoon might be the heartthrob of the school but to you he was just a normal friend, in fact an unbearable one but this is all weird, why did he looks so hot all of a sudden?

“i wasn’t staring” you said as you looked down at your book “yeah sure whatever, so as i was saying this should go over-” blurry, his voice was blurry, he was so pretty, those glasses framed his face well, his long sleeves folded to show his veiny arms, his long and smooth fingers holding the pen “so if you carry this here” he cleared his throat to get your attention back at the book.

“are you getting turned on by my charms,yn” sunghoon smiled still not looking at you “shut up, it’s just the glasses” you looked at the book infront of you again “didn’t know you are into that stuff” he said smirking “it’s not that, it’s just- um new” you mentally cursed yourself for hesitating so much, it will just get to his head.

“yeah sure” he said sarcastically as he brushed a strand of hair from your face, at this point he just trying to get a reaction out of you “your cheeks are red” he said as he brushed over your cheeks, you looked at him, all weird this is all weird, why would this get you worked up? why would your best friend get you all flustered?, glasses really suited him, he looked so gorgeous “are in love yn” he said giggling “no, nothing lovable about you” you said with a pout, he leaned in as he pecked it

you were caught off guard, eyes widen but he looked so composed like all of this was meant to be “idiot” he said before kissing you again, this time it wasn’t short it was soft, his warm lips moved against yours as his hands cupped your face, smiles erupted on his face when he pulled away “you look like an idiot” he said going back to the book infront of him “OH HELL NAH! you can’t just kiss me and call me an idiot then go back like nothing happened” you pulled him back so he was facing you “do you want something to happen then” he said confused “look i know you hate me”

“who said i hate you?” you said still looking at his lips which were now coated with your lipgloss, it’s now time for sunghoon to go wide eyes “you’re making it awkward just staring at me like that” you said and before you know it he leaned in for another kiss, you smiled as he kissed you, he pulled back trying to remove his glasses but you stopped him “so you really get turned on by this huh?” he laughed as you smacked him “you just look good with it”

“i look so good that you keep messing your solution, hmm darling” he spoke softly in your ear, his breath tickling your eyes with his breath “stop making it sound so creepy” he giggled as he pulled himself back against you, his hands around your waist as he whispers against your lips “if i had known that these glasses would be the enough for you to confess your feelings for me, i would have worn them sooner” you bit his lips “ouch what was that for?”

“i didn’t confess yet” you said facing the books again “now teach me before i find your replacement”

“as you say princess”

pairing: neighbor!wonbin x f!reader

genre: neighbors to lovers, babysitting!au (kinda)

warnings: reader has a baby brother, mentions of reader blushing, 2k

a/n: my first riize fic ^^ i hope yall enjoy this hehe

back to masterlist !

“you know, you shouldn’t even be here right now.”

“yn.”

wonbin’s tone is stern and you cross your arms, letting out a loud huff to show your discontentment. from your position in the kitchen, you can stare at your neighbor-turned-babysitter all day, but you’re currently angry, so you opt to pout and grumble instead.

you can clearly hear wonbin sigh in defeat and you watch him lean back on his arms on the floor from the corner of your eye. he’s a few feet away from your little brother, giving him enough space to draw in his coloring book.

the handsome boy (you’re angry, but not blind) turns to you, black hair perfectly framing his stupidly pretty face. your eyes fall to his lips for a second. one second too long apparently because soon he starts to grin and you have no other option than to look away and pout again.

a chuckle leaves his mouth and it annoys you more than it should.

he tilts his head a bit and looks at you, eyes raking over your casual outfit. you’re really trying to not look his way, simply because you refuse to give him the satisfaction of knowing your attention is on him but you’re still curious as to why he seems more concentrated on you than on his job.

don’t look.

your hand covers your mouth as you spin your pen with your fingers, swiftly clicking on it before writing a new sentence in your notebook, elbow propped up on the kitchen island.

all the while you flip a few pages in your textbook to get to a new chapter of history, wonbin hums, high fiving your brother when the latter shows him his colorful drawing.

you swear you’re not paying attention, but the way you can hear him smiling as he speaks softly makes your face burn, ears turning red. he’s good with kids, and although you’re supposed to be pissed at your parents– and thus him– you can’t help but admit he’s doing a good job.

you would have done a good job too, you tell yourself.

your hand stills over the counter, pen inches away from the paper. in not even one second, you went from being productive and finally getting some homework done to thinking about wonbin and his pretty eyes.

you hate this, because you swear you’re angry at him. or at least you’re supposed to.

deep down you know that the so-called hatred you have for him right now is a way to stop you from thinking about what you really feel for your neighbor.

gosh, his eyes are just so pretty.

maybe you’re overreacting a bit too. maybe you’re being a bit dramatic, because the way wonbin starts to frown as he notices your brows furrow makes your heart throb.

you had decided to sit at the kitchen island to do your homework, because the kitchen table seemed a bit too close to the living room. but now that you’re actually in the kitchen, you realize you’re facing him (and your little brother, of course) and if you’d even look up for one second, eye contact would be guaranteed.

this sucks, you think, as you slide off the barstool and wander deeper into the kitchen. maybe if you’d fake looking for something to eat in the fridge, he would finally look away.

without really being thirsty, you grab the first carton you find and move to pour yourself a glass of whatever said carton contains. ah, apple juice it is.

you think you’re finally starting to get more comfortable in your own home after wonbin’s arrival but then he lets out a giggle– one that you find absolutely adorable too– and your lips freeze on the brim of your glass, head snapping towards the living room. “what.” you almost bark out, eyes fierce.

“it’s nothing,” wonbin has to swallow a laugh and divert his eyes, waving his hand in front of his. “don’t worry about it!”

you put your glass down on the counter and put a hand on your hip, eyes big and confused. “tell me,” you just watch as he lets out another giggle at your desperate tone, “c’mon! i’m gonna think you’re making fun of me if you don’t tell me.”

“your slippers,” this time wonbin looks at you, really looks at you. he sees how your eyes go wide and how your nose twitches in surprise. he sees how your lips fall open and gape at him and he sees how eyelashes flutter when you blink rapidly. he speaks up again, still looking at you, “they’re cute.” you’re cute.

“ah,” you nod, a bit surprised.

“you can compliment me back, y’know”

“i can literally kick you out right now.”

wonbin only puts his two hands up, a teasing smile clear on his lips as he admits defeat.

–

it’s slowly getting darker outside, the sun disappearing behind the houses in your neighborhood.

you’re on the last page of your essay when wonbin closes the living room curtains and finally agrees to your brother’s request of watching his favorite film. you find it rather domestic, how he’d hauled your brother from the floor to the couch and how he’d draped your blanket over the both of them.

the disney film is on pause as your brother babbles about his classmates, excitedly recounting yesterday’s events. you go to turn on the stove to prepare dinner and smile to yourself when your brother mentions the solar planet you had helped him make for his science fair. you smile even bigger when wonbin applauds him and makes him promise to show him one day, because he has to see how good you two are (his words).

when the water is boiling in the pot and you’ve stacked and pushed aside all your school work to prepare for dinner, you don’t directly realize you set the table for three until wonbin points it out, leaning casually against the fridge.

“i didn’t know i was invited for dinner.”

you shrug in an effort to act as casual as he is, but it comes off as rather stiff so you just turn away, mindlessly stirring the pasta. “well, i wouldn’t want you to starve. who else would my parents turn to when they’re in need of a babysitter?” certainly not me.

you’re clearly still a bit bitter that your parents don’t trust you to babysit your own brother.

wonbin just laughs, like he’s having the most fun knowing you’re irritated at him for replacing your “part-time job”. you send him a nasty glare and it only makes him chuckle more, obviously entertained by your displeasure.

he goes to lean on the counter next to you as he watches you do your magic, as per your brother’s words, and lightly bumps his elbow into yours. “c’mon, i know you’re not really mad at me for being here.”

you flick his crossed arms and check to see if the pasta is not overcooked. “i just don’t understand why they’d waste money to get a babysitter for him when i literally exist and live here!” okay, so maybe you’re not being hundred percent honest and are more pissed about the babysitter being wonbin than the waste of money but he doesn’t have to know that.

wonbin continues to stare at your face, tracing your side profile with his eyes. “i offered to babysit, and your dad knows i’ve been saving up for a car...” his smile is teasing when he shrugs as you send him a glare.

“and what if i was saving up for a car? you’d be ruining my chances to do so.” you’re stubborn and not letting go.

your neighbor, who’s actually way too close to you for your liking (you’re sure he can count your beauty marks with how close he is) stifles a laugh. “we both know you’re not saving up for a car,” his voice insists on the ‘not’ and you know he sees you rolling your eyes. “besides, you don’t need one.”

the pasta looks good as you go to grab two oven mitts, glancing at wonbin from the corner of your eye. you’re confused and he knows because not even a second later and he’s grabbing the oven mitts from your hands and carrying the pasta to the kitchen table. “i can always just drive you around, y’know. contrary to what you think, i do actually enjoy your presence, babe.”

when his words register in your brain, you can’t seem to move from your spot in the kitchen and wonbin finds it all too cute, smiling while ushering your little brother to sit at the end of the table.

babe. babe? “babe?” your fingers find wonbin’s hand, wrapping slowly around his wrist when he walks past you to get some glasses. he stops in his tracks, tilting his head a bit and smirking at your surprised gaze and vulnerable tone.

he just nods, the top of his cheeks blushing only for a fraction of a second. unbeknownst to you, his heart is beating like crazy. “shouldn’t i have called you that? you don’t like it?”

you shake your head, still startled from him calling you by an affectionate nickname, something he had never done before and something you would have never guessed he would ever do.

“It’s alright,” you say, voice suddenly shakier than usual, “i didn’t expect it, that’s all.”

your fingers let go of his wrist but he doesn’t directly move away, staring at the way your other hand is holding tightly onto the kitchen counter. he notices how you’re reaching for the utensils but your mind is focusing on something else, your fingers absentmindedly pulling the kitchen drawer open.

suddenly, wonbin feels a pang of guilt. he can’t seem to decipher what the expression on your face means but he’s worried he might have gone too far, or that you’re too far gone in your head.

“hey,” his voice startles you out of your thoughts, “are you sure it’s okay? i can stop if you want–”

“no!-” your panicked tone startles him a bit and you clear your throat, fiddling with one of the rings on your fingers, “i mean, i– i didn’t mind it? i quite liked it.”

wonbin’s eyes widen a bit, surprised but thrilled. “oh.”

“yeah.”

the short awkward silence between the two of you gets interrupted by your younger brother’s complaints, and you quickly move past wonbin to serve the youngest one in the house a big plate of spaghetti (his favorite).

it’s only when you’re seated at the table that you realize wonbin’s marched over and took your plate, serving you before him. he looks almost ethereal under the warm kitchen lights and you can’t help but stare, this time not caring about getting caught.

the pasta looks extra good when he puts your plate down in front of you and your stomach grumbles at the sight, earning a slight chuckle from the boy in front of you.

your baby brother’s focus is entirely on his dinosaur shaped fork, which wonbin takes as an opportunity to reach over the table and grab your hand, drawing a stifled gasp out of you. his thumb is rubbing circles on the back of your palm and your hand feels heavy but comfortable in his grasp.

your gaze travels from your intertwined fingers to his face and you almost melt at the soft look in his eyes. it almost looks like he’s in love.

he is, but you don’t know that. yet.

“let me take you out on a date, please.”

the way his voice gets stuck in his throat and his tone gets breathier tells you everything you have to know and you squeeze his hand lightly in a comforting manner. he anxiously bites the inside of his cheek while he waits for your answer and he’s glad you don’t see his leg bouncing up and down under the table.

“i would love to, wonbin.” your cheeks turn red and your lips automatically curl, revealing the smile wonbin likes so much.

the stress leaves his body the second the words leave your mouth and he suppresses a nervous laugh, free hand coming up to push his hair back.

“yeah?”

“of course,” your smile is contagious when you nod, “how could i say no to you?”

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please do not copy, repost or steal any of my work. all content belongs to @odxrilove

vanilla soft serve

Word count: 14.7k

Warnings: smut

Summary: you smile foolishly, the smile of a loser in love

Nagito Komaeda doesn't like himself.

He feels he's established it a lot with his class already. There was little to question when the island only had 16 students and two of them were already dead. Though, he supposes that it isn't that much. He wonders who's going to feed him. He scared Mahiru out, after all. Maybe Mahiru would die from the second motive! That would surely bring his class hope, would it not? He shifts uncomfortably on the wood, trying to get on his back. How pathetic of him.

Little light spills through the room. He had forgotten to ask Mahiru to turn the lights on before she left. He gives up halfway, staring up at the ceiling instead. Would you visit him? His precious little lover? Maybe you would. Who knows. You seemed pretty fine when he had gone insane during the first trial. Maybe you'd leave him for another ultimate. Maybe Hajime? Who knows. Trash like him doesn't deserve to hang on to you anyways. You're such a symbol of hope, yet you were dirtying yourself with him.

The door to the room opens, and the light turns on. He hears you cough twice.

"Did you come to visit trash like me?"

You ignore his words.

Ah. You're mad.

Komaeda holds his breath as you step in front of him, staring down at him. You crouch to his level, buttering the toast, crossing your legs, holding the bread to his lips.

"Angel, are you ma-"

You shove the food in his mouth, forcing him to chew. You stare blankly at him as he does, and he swallows. You press the cup of water to his lips, being kind enough to give him a straw. Komaeda drinks without speaking, understanding that you wanted some sort of quiet. He finishes the rest of the food with your help, staring at you blankly once the tray is finished.

"I'm sorry." The word feels dry on his lips, and he keeps his head hung.

You stare at him for what seems like forever before you stand up with the tray. "I'll be back for lunch."

Komaeda watches the door to the room close, but the light remains.

How kind of you.

You come back during lunch as promised; this time, the atmosphere much gentler.

"Open up," You blow on the rice and meat, holding it to Komaeda's lips. He chews, sitting up this time, his stomach in less pain. He was bony all over, now that he thought about it. You stare at the way his skin sticks to his ribs, and you get another spoonful of rice.

The two of you sit there, Komaeda eating silently, and you lost in thought. You finish the bowl, no rice left behind, and you help the straw to Komaeda's lips. He finishes the juice and pauses.

"Do... you have the key?"

"Give it a moment." You wait for the body announcement to be made, and Komaeda watches as you have Monomi untie him. You follow behind him as he rushes to the bathroom first.

You're still not talking to him.

You wait outside the door as he finishes, and he takes your hand as you reach out to him. You step to the game, and you play. Komaeda instructs you from behind, and the two of you finish. You stare at the prize. Between the killing and executions, Komaeda wonders if you even like him all that much. You hand him the image, and you stare at him. Ah, you want him to talk.

"Well," Komaeda smiles. "I know who the killer is."

"I know you do." You stare at the picture in your hands.

Komaeda thinks you've been strange. Ever since meeting him in middle school, the only thing you had obsessed over was what year it was and what would happen. You had gone to the point of obsessing it to the point of madness, Komaeda thinks. The only thing you had ever talked about when you woke up on the island was who was going to reveal what and what was going to happen to who. You had accurately predicted the death of Twogami, revealing Teruteru as the killer, yet Komaeda had gone mad anyways. You had told him to stay sane during the trip. It wouldn't be the first time someone's been frustrated with him.

Komaeda feels something familiar for you.

You stare at the photo with such a strong sense of nostalgia that it seems hard to believe that it could be anything else. Nagito Komaeda knew something that you did as well. Maybe that was why you picked him. He had the fastest brain that even Hinata couldn't use. Maybe he was meant to be a pretty tool to display in your arsenal that you would never touch. You never let him touch you first, and you never let him do anything without consulting you first. It was as if you had to control what he did.

Yet, he doesn't find it in himself to question you.

He had spent a year in Hope's Peak with you. What did you mean he was eighteen? It was already messed up from the start to you, maybe. Komaeda had watched you panic and only calm down when the future seemed to play out how you predicted it would. You were terribly anxious, chewing on your lips and biting your nails. Komaeda wonders if you had just dated him in order to have a caretaker. Komaeda supposes he spoils you rotten. Well, nothing wrong with spoiling an ultimate.

"What's wrong?" He stares at you as you stare at the sun.

"I miss my home."

Right. There was that too. You had always mumbled quietly when you were fazed out, silently praying for something to kill you. Komaeda didn't understand why you wanted to die so desperately. You were an ultimate, and you had everything you had seemed to want, yet you always talked about home. You missed... your home. It was strange to think that the only constant in his life was desperate to leave him. Maybe he was just destined to be alone.

You had stuck next to him even as Hinata was passed out, and you had rocked on your feet anxiously as he had met the other students, memorizing voice lines and counting fingers. You seemed to hate when you were unfamiliar with things. Komaeda held a hand over yours when you ran out of fingers, helping you keep count of whatever it was you were counting. When you counted to sixteen, you had stopped. You had looked at Komaeda, lips pulled into a frown. "Complete."

Komaeda's handbook had struck a chord when you finished meeting everyone and told him it was complete. His memory of you wasn't like that the more he thinks about it. You had always tried staying positive in the past, even when you seemingly appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the street, head spinning. You didn't know what he was saying. You didn't understand him. You were just a foreigner lost in the streets of Tokyo, and Komaeda had been kind enough to take you in. There was nothing more to it, and there was nothing less.

It's strange to think that you were now fluent in Japanese after only a handful of lessons from Komaeda.

When Komaeda won the lottery into Hope's Peak, you had written a letter to the Steering Committee, claiming you were an isekai victim. Komaeda had vouched, and after some digging into records, yours didn't come up, leading to your admittance. He doesn't know what you had to do in order to join the school, but when you headed home quietly and slumped into the pillows, he knew better than to ask.

The ultimate unknown.

You hated the title, but you had accepted it. In exchange, you were to reveal nothing to the class and stay silent at all times. Komaeda had watched you stop talking to the class, going mute, only communicating with your body language. Even when you had asked Komaeda out, it had been through drawing on his palm away from the sight of the rest of the school. He didn't understand why you had listened to them so thoroughly or why you had grimaced whenever you saw the underclassmen. Though, Komaeda doesn't remember who the underclassmen were either.

His second year at Hope's Peak was on an island. There was no way he would know.

On the island, you still kept silent. The class knew you were quiet, so no one questioned it, but Komaeda had hoped you would at least speak to him. You didn't like to. You spoke even less when he pissed you off. You had known that he would kill Twogami and tried to interfere, and the only thing that resulted in was the murder being pinned on you. Komaeda had half-expected that you would thank him when he explained he planned it, but instead, you had stared quietly at him. It was as if you hadn't cared that he was pining the blame on you and taking it back.

When you had searched the body, you had stared at Komaeda. You hadn't spoke, but you had mouthed the words. He knew what you meant. He definitely knew what you meant. You were just waiting for him to make the decision himself. Even as he was being dragged off and begging for you to understand, you had stared lifelessly at him. It was as if you were desensitized and didn't care at all. Komaeda doesn't know how a person like you exists.

You were weird.

You wander into Mahiru's room, staring at Komaeda, telling him to investigate without a word.

Komaeda thinks he was chosen to be your servant as you leave the cottage.

Yet, as you smack him in the back of his head and bow to Chiaki and Hinata in apology, he thinks you take more than enough responsibility.

Before the trial, you always scribble down what you can and can't remember to hand to Hinata. It's a cheat sheet that Komaeda isn't allowed to look at. He wonders if they're love letters sometimes, but as you're crying and holding back quiet tears in your cottage in the dead of night, he leaves you be. Even if it was a love letter, he wasn't going to let you keep everything to yourself. Hinata had pushed through each trial without error, and Komaeda suspects that you had been behind everything. You were the puppetmaster, maybe.

You even got to punt Monokuma when you were mad enough.

Though, Komaeda stares at you during trials, forming words with your hands and crossing your arms when a student got something wrong. You were charismatic. He didn't deserve you, the class didn't deserve you, the world didn't deserve you. You knew what was going to happen, clinging onto Fuyuhiko with your life as he tried running to Peko, face burrowed into his arm as the rest of the class helped you hold him back. You couldn't speak in front of them, Komaeda had realized. You pull on Komaeda's sleeve desperately. He supposes that's all you need to do.

"Do not atone for a crime you did not commit." Komaeda reads your eyes. "You must survive for her. You must survive for Peko..." Komaeda gets on a knee to wipe the tears from your eyes. "The crime was not instigated by you, so there is no need to-"

"What do you mean it wasn't instigated by me?! I was the one who told her to kill her!"

"A lie." Komaeda holds you to his chest as you cry quietly. "It's a lie. She killed her out of her own volition."

"She-"

You pass out in Komaeda's arms, and Fuyuhiko grabs him by the shirt as Chiaki reaches to catch you.

Ah.

"I was just conveying my angel's words." Komaeda holds his hands up innocently.

You wake up the next morning to Hiyoko's memorial for Mahiru. The class berates the girl as you blow out the candles and replace them one by one. You have Nekomaru help you remove the skull, replacing it with flowers instead. You finish by the time of the announcement that a new island had popped up. Komaeda stares at the memorial, and you pull him with you as you go explore the new island. He praises you quietly under his breath, and you answer quietly too. You stick close to Fuyuhiko with Komaeda, peering at the shorter every now and then to make sure he's alright. Komaeda is almost jealous of how much attention you give him. Yet, you keep Komaeda close anyways.

As expected, the next day, Fuyuhiko tries cutting his stomach open to repent. You react immediately as soon as he speaks, knocking him down and throwing the knife from his hands, cutting your own in the process. You stare at him wide-eyed, holding your hands up in the form of an X. He stares up at you, furious that you would interrupt him, but you stare down at him sternly, only getting up to take the knife before he could. Komaeda watches everything unfold, wondering if he had done something wrong for you to straddle another. He doesn't question it.

Especially not when you press your lips to his cheek later that night before bed as he bandages your hand.

When he wakes up, he brushes his fingers against your hair, mumbling about how pretty you were. You were pretty. He doesn't know what draws him to you, but you're pretty. Maybe he'll wake up every morning to you.

"ah... how filthy," Komaeda doesn't register that his words are coming out wrong. He continues to pour praises about how pretty you are, the fever making it so that he thinks he's praising you. That's when he realizes he's sick. He's feverish all over, and you hadn't spoken when he draped himself on you, eyes fluttering, almost drunk. When the two of you make it to the restaurant, you sit down in a seat, mumbling quietly. You pull him with you as Monokuma explains the new motive. Komaeda's sure he's mumbling nothing but disgusting words into your ear as you support him, but you seem unphased.

As Mikan tends to him in the hospital and you sit in his room, you start speaking.

"Komaeda-kun, I'm sure you won't remember any of this," You hum, turning to look to the side. "But I love you a lot, alright?"

"I hate you too."

Komaeda clings on to you as you sleep next to him, wrapping his hand around yours tightly, squeezing it every now and then. He stares down at your sleeping form. He could kill you here. He could end the motive right there. He has a weak body, and he isn't sure if he could survive if he continues to be sick. He loves you a lot; he mumbles. He's pathetically in love with how pretty you are. He wonders if the words reach you.

The days in the hospital are boring at first. You try playing cards with him, only to find that he's too sick to do so. That only feeds your boredom. At some point, you grow so bored that you start playing smash or pass with Komaeda. He has no idea what you mean, but you show him images and recall celebrities, asking Komaeda smash or pass. At some point, you start naming classmates and students.

"Hinata."

"Half pass."

"Me?"

"Pass."

"Really?" You spring out of your seat, eyes wide, staring down at him.

"You heard me. Pass." Komaeda grimaces at you, and you blink at him happily.

"I'd smash you too."

Komaeda really wants to tell you how lovestruck he is with you, but he supposes he doesn't need to as you climb into bed with him. You blink at him curiously, and he moves his hand to pinch your cheeks. He frowns, his mind telling him that he's smiling. He sneers when he thinks he's mumbling, and he coughs when he thinks his breath is caught in his throat. There are so many weird things going on with his body.

"When was the last time we fucked again?"

"We've fucked plenty."

"I guess that makes sense," You close your eyes, leaning your ear on his chest. "Your heart is beating quickly."

"It's 'cause you're disgusting."

"Whatever you say," You drift off, and Komaeda finds himself staring down at you. He wonders what his eyes look like. Does it look the way that his parents and the couples on the street did? Maybe he does. He wonders how much he could love a person. His heart feels as though it's going to burst at any moment. You were... he brushes your hair to the side, pressing his lips to your forehead. Maybe he wouldn't remember this once he recovered.

How pretty.

In the bright morning, Komaeda feels his lungs tighten and starts coughing. You get out of bed, blinking slowly. Ah. You caught it too. Yet, you call Mikan into the room anyways, watching as she starts tending to Komaeda full-time. You try your best to blink the disease off and come off as fine. You don't know how you're acting. Yet as Mikan holds the pillow in her hand, you remember something. You push her to the ground, eyes animalistic, chest heaving, a psychotic grin on your face. You stare down at her, straddling her, nails bloodied with her skin and blood.

Mikan scurries off in fear, and you sit on the ground, blood from Mikan's skin in your nails.

You bite your nails, lucking the blood, staring at Hinata as he enters the room.

By the time you're conscious again, there are two bodies.

Komaeda's the one to wake you. You sit up on the hospital bed, rubbing your eyes as Komaeda stares at you. The room is an eerie shade of white, and your head spins deliriously as you try and recall what had happened. Komaeda stands there, staring down at you, waiting for you to adjust to the feeling of being conscious again. You hold on to him as you steady yourself, and your mouth opens as you're conscious again.

"Two people died."

You nod slowly.

"Come on."

You follow Komaeda as he starts investigating, and you glance at the two dead bodies. Ibuki is hung on the rope, and you stare up at her body as Hinata lowers it to the floor. You stare quietly; lifelessly; almost as if you were the body itself. You don't feel real, still. Komaeda rubs his hand on your back gently, and you blink slowly. Then, you stare at Hiyoko's body as the ladder is put up to search the body and check for clues. You have a couple of hours, you think. You know who the killer is, and you were so sure that Komaeda might have died if you had not stayed in the same room as him. The rest of the class decides to search for more evidence elsewhere as you and Komaeda stay behind.

"It's a shame," You mumble under your breath as Komaeda searches Ibuki's body. "I liked Ibuki too."

Komaeda stares at you.

"Do you like me too?"

You only nod in response.

He doesn't remember. Komaeda thinks he's forgetting something as he progresses through the investigation. He did something with you. You did something with him. You call Hinata with movie tickets, waving your hand for him. You leave Komaeda in his place as you enter the movie theatre with Hinata. Komaeda only knows to wait outside the theatre, and halfway through the movie, you open the door to pull him in as well. Maybe you didn't forget him. Though, Hinata was sitting next to you. It makes him uncomfortable.

Hinata looks frazzled as you sit back next to him, and you tilt your head.

It was a bad movie, according to Hinata. You point at the ticket, and Komaeda opens his mouth to help you translate. Hinata cuts him off.

"Keep the ticket, right? Thank you," Hinata smiles.

Komaeda gets insecure easily, now that he thinks about it. He stares at you as you slip something to Hinata before the trial, and Komaeda fiddles with his fingers. Maybe you would leave him for Hinata one day. You step back next to him, taking his hand in yours, playing with his fingers. Komaeda's breath catches in his throat, and he swallows thickly. How painful. Were you going to play him even until you decide to leave him? How could you be so cruel?

Maybe he would tell you he's scared one day.

You argue from next to Hinata, explaining everything from start to the end of your memories.

Ah.

Komaeda watches as you blaze next to Hinata, and his heart sinks. You... looked much better with him. Was that your fate? To leave him? Maybe he would be a stepping stone for your hope. There was no way you would love him so much. Komaeda keeps the trial moving as you stare at him. It's like he's reading a script out of your eyes. And the culprit tumbles out of your eyes right onto Komaeda's lips as he turns to stare at Mikan.

"Mikan was the killer." Komaeda stares at Mikan, tilting his head. "Ultimate Despair."

You want to leave your podium and yank him, but he goes on a tangent, and you stare at Komaeda until he notices.

"Ah, angel," He swallows. "Sorry."

Hinata continues with the trial, and you go silent to stare at Komaeda. He... had ruined your streak, didn't he? Of course, he wasn't worth sticking around you, but he had thought just for a moment. Maybe. Maybe you would let him. Turns out he was wrong. He stays quiet for the rest of the trial, letting you do what you were supposed to before he had interrupted.

Mikan is deduced as the killer, and Mikan is executed. You stand on an orchestrated stage, and Komaeda tries going up to you after the trial. You let him stand next to you, but you don't let him talk to you. You aren't responding. Not even with your eyes. You avoid his gaze as he follows you. Even as you sit down in the cottage and pull him into bed, you don't talk to him. Komaeda catches your eyes once. You look hurt.

He's scared to touch you tonight.

Yet, as you snuggle to his back as he seems to be asleep, maybe you'll find it in your heart to forgive him.

Another island is unlocked the next day, and Komaeda's scared to face you.

You get out of bed without reaching to wake him, and you shower first thing. It's strange. He sits in the room as he stares at you leave the bathroom, tower wrapped around your chest.

"I'm sorry," the words tumble out of his lips. "let me... make it up to you?"

You stare at him, tilting your head. "how?"

He steps up to you, getting on his knees, glancing up at you.

"Can I?"

You stare down at him, swallowing. "Yeah."

You pull him to the bed, and he shakes slightly as you sit on the bed.

You're naked before him. In front of him. You're naked from head to toe. Komaeda takes your body in quietly. When was the last time you were bare before him? When was the last time you had let him touch you like this? God, what if he doesn't remember what you like? Maybe you'd push him off. Maybe you'd get even angrier at him. He doesn't realize he's shaking until you're speaking.

"Stop thinking so hard," You frown, reaching for his face, propping up on your elbows.

"Sorry."

Komaeda eats you out desperately. You don't recall a moment when he wasn't writhing to please you to the moon and back. You suppose he drinks up whatever reaction you give to him. His eyes are half-lidded, pressing a kiss to your clit before starting. Komaeda likes taking his time. He's spent hours between your legs drawing orgasms out of your body before finally tending to you, usually leaking and in pain. You wonder if he can feel how painful it is.

Komaeda likes sitting between your legs. He feels it's fitting for someone who should be nothing more than a mere tool to the ultimates like you. You were being kind enough, letting him dirty you with his body. He's a little messy, he thinks, but you like it when he makes a mess. You never berate him for making a mess. Maybe you were a blessing just for him. Who knows.

Your fingers tangle in the sheets as Komaeda sits between your legs, hands keeping your legs opened, tongue prodding and twisting inside of you. Your breathy moans fill the room, your breath quickening as Komaeda grows more desperate to get you to cum. It's strange. Nothing feels right. You usually cum from his tongue alone. Was he getting worse? He's so lost in his own thoughts he doesn't realize you've already cum and you're writhing in overstimulation.

"K-ko," You whine. "S-stop,"

Komaeda stops immediately, apologies spilling out of his lips in terror.

Your chest heaves as you catch your breath, and you close your eyes.

"We'll be doing that a lot more soon," Your breath catches in your throat as you sit up, and Komaeda grabs a towel to clean you off.

Komaeda doesn't understand your words until Monokuma is telling the class that they're stuck with no food until someone commits a crime. You rock on your feet, glancing at Komaeda. He thinks he understands now. Yet, as you leave him outside, heading into the final dead room, Komaeda's uneasy. You bet Monokuma that requires five bullets in a revolver of six. When the sound of a gun goes down and you stare at your hands, you know you won. Glancing at Monokuma, he hands you the file begrudgingly, complaining about how it was pure luck that you had won the file.

Your own name is found, and you stare blankly at the file.

Komaeda watches you return to bed that same night, still silent as ever. He coughs twice, and he stares at you.

"Hungry?" You stare at him.

Komaeda holds his breath.

"What's wrong?"

"You'll find out."

Komaeda has dinner as you do.

Komaeda drags you downstairs with him as the two of you head to Monokuma Tai Chi. A body announcement is made, and you stare across the room. Komaeda helps investigate, and he turns to stare at you. You lead him to the final dead room, laughing dryly as you look at the door again. Komaeda waits for you to get it out of your system before asking you anything. He's the ultimate luck. It'd only make sense for him to enter the room.

"May I..."

"Come back alive." You stare at Komaeda as he opens the door to the final dead room.

"Ah." Komaeda stares down at the book, heart quivering. He has to make a choice, doesn't he? He has to worry about.

This trial, Komaeda keeps silent. You don't tell him to speak, and you don't speak through him either. He feels as if he's stuck. A crossroad of destiny, perhaps. Star-crossed. It feels terrible. Komaeda doesn't know what this does to the two of you. Were you even considered lovers? How could Komaeda date someone that was the ultimate despair even though he was one too? Even as the two of you return home and you don't speak, Komaeda feels his own words caught in his throat, unsure how to ask.

"I'm in a coma," You stare at Komaeda.

"And you're... an ultimate despair."

You blink slowly.

"Yeah."

"What does..."

"We're on even ground," You exhale. "The world ended at our hands. It's that's simple."

Komaeda's voice catches in his throat, heart breaking. He shakes as you sit there, staring at him back in the room of your cabins. The stars spill secrets that neither of you speak up about, and you don't dare to meet his eyes. It was terrifying for you. You didn't know if he would leave you or do something. You get out of bed for the first time since arriving on the island, and your voice shakes as you speak.

"I'll... sleep in my cabin tonight." You mumble, rushing off.

Komaeda sits there without moving until the sun rises.

You're... an ultimate despair. You were an ultimate who caused despair. The entire class was. There was a single person on the entire island that didn't cause despair and it wasn't you. But. But. You had. You had just. You were. You were his entire symbol of hope. How could it be that you had known the entire time? You knew everything. From start to finish, you were orchestrating it all? Was that... what you were? Was he actually just a puppet in your play?

Komaeda checks on you the third day, wondering if you had spiraled as bad as he did. You're in your room, biting your nails, connecting red strings to others, desperate to get your thoughts in tow. There was one last trial. There was one last trial. One final person had to die. You couldn't let a single flaw escape from your fingers for this last trial. You chew on your lip, mumbling words to yourself over and over again. You're going to end up in tears. You don't remember the last time you felt this terrible.

Your hair is disheveled as you arrange the papers again, desperate to find the pattern. You have to know. You can't do it. You can't live knowing you'll never wake up and Komaeda one day will. You can't let him die. He can't die. How could you just let him die? You can leave the death to yourself. Worst comes to worst, you die with him. It's not that hard, right? You were just in a coma in real life. You don't know if you'd wake up with the rest of the class when they're all discharged.

Komaeda stares at you quietly.

"Angel?"

You turn your head to stare at him, deer in headlights, heart racing, dried tear stains on your cheeks. Komaeda has never seen you look so disheveled before. He lowers himself to his knees, brushing your hair back, pausing to see what you wanted. what you needed. You needed him, perhaps. You needed him just as badly as he needed you. He had to remember that. He was useless without you just as you were without him; even if the two of you were an ultimate despair.

"What's wrong?"

You burst into tears, coughing from the tears and pressure of it all. You hack furiously, hiccupping and sobbing into his arms. Drool slips past your lips and snot gets all over Komaeda's sleeve as he reaches to catch you before you collapsed onto the ground and bowed all the way to the ground. He couldn't let you do that for trash like him. But why... why were you crying like that? You looked more terrified than miserable.

"Don't die." You mumble, staring at the floor, still dissociated. "Please don't die. I'll kill myself if you don't do it. Please." Your fingers dig into his skin, and he pauses. You break his pause with more words. "Please don't kill yourself. I'm... I'm begging you. don't die. don't die. Please, don't die. Don't die, Ko. I'll kill everyone else on the island if it makes you feel better since I'm a dirty sinner anyways. I'll-"

"Angel," Komaeda cups your face, tilting your chin to stare at him. "Angel, it's okay. It's going to be okay. Come on-"

You cough, a mess of snot and tears in his arms. You lean in his arms pathetically, throat dry, eyes dead with exhaustion. Komaeda feels bad. Was he the reason you looked so terrible? He should make up for it somehow. Yet, as you cough furiously in his arms and only quiet down after he shushes you quietly, drawing circles on your skin. You look beyond repair. You look as though your entire life was crashing before your eyes, and you were without hope.

"Angel," Komaeda lowers his face to yours. "What's wrong?

You sniff pathetically.

"What's going to happen?"

You refuse to tell him. You stand up instead, staring at the scattered papers on the ground, kicking them all out of order, picking them up, and making Komaeda stand outside as you do so. You go back to sticking around him without telling him anything. You need the final motive, sure, but you wanted Komaeda to stay. Was it selfish? Komaeda reads the words off of you in waves. He sits in the dining room. Maybe reading you was harder for him.

He's not opposed to the idea of killing himself for the better hope. He obeys your word, after all.

"Why are you helping?" Komaeda watches as you tie the rope to him.

You decided dying with him was the best option.

"I'm going to miss her," You sit down next to him, legs tucked to your chest, leaning your cheek on your knees.

"Chiaki?"

"She doesn't have a body," You hum lowly. "You won't ever see her again."

"Ah." Komaeda's eyes widen as you stab yourself with the same knife. "What about you?"

You smile.

You avoid the topic.

"You know, Ko," You trace his face on your arm, "I love you a lot."

"Really?"

"Yeah," You smile. "I hope you remember that."

You die with Komaeda. The two of you sit in the room talking before the rest of the class breaks in, the poison killing the both of you instantly. You don't remember much after that. You wake up in the darkness, looking around. It's boring, you think. It would take at least a day or two for the game to wrap up. The pixels form before your eyes, and you stare at your hand as you end up in the void.

You find yourself wandering in the void, running at some point, walking in others. You're waiting for the system to be shut down so you can go back into the comatose state. Chiaki appears after searching for a little while. You run over to her, sitting down next to her. She smiles at you, handing you a notepad in case you needed it. You ditch it. She's a robot. It wouldn't kill to tell her.

"Are you well?"

"I hope we get to meet again," You blurt.

Chiaki blinks slowly. "You... speak."

You grin. "I do. My real talent has nothing to do with being the ultimate unknown. I am just a fortunate isekai victim."

So you talk with Chiaki. While Komaeda's mind forms a world where which isn't demented, you sit in the void, talking to Chiaki, playing imaginary cards and spilling your secrets. You don't know when you'll wake up. Chiaki reports what's going on outside every now and then, explaining who's awake and who's yet to wake up. Komaeda holds on to his fantasy that everything is normal. You know he does.

Chiaki speaks up one day.

"Your body is showing signs of waking up."

You pause. "Really?"

"Komaeda woke up two days ago. According to Hinata... he's also," She doesn't know how to tell you.

"Just say it."

"Komaeda got hit by a truck. He's conscious but severely injured."

"Is that why I'm waking up?"

"Yeah." Chiaki laughs lightheartedly. "I'll miss playing imaginary cards."

"I will too," You smile at her.

You wake up a day later, sitting up in your pod, blinking slowly at your hands.

Your legs have no strength, you find.

Naegi is kind enough to put you in the same hospital room as Komaeda, and you pull the curtain between the two beds down, grinning at Komaeda.

"Good morning." You smile.

Komaeda smiles back at you.

You do physical therapy with Mikan's help in the room, and your legs are restored as Komaeda is recovered.

"We should get married," You sit by his bed, leaning on your palm as he blinks at you slowly. Komaeda laughs airily, coughing when his lungs start hurting.

"I wonder what kind of suffering I would have to go through if we do."

"I'll bear half of it," You grin cheekily. "Til death do us part, after all."

"But we're not married," He hums.

"Not yet," You rest your head on his hand, humming to yourself. You stare at his ring finger, lips pulled into a smile.

"You plan on marrying trash like me?"

"You're not trash," You close your eyes. "You woke me up from an indefinite coma, did you not?"

Komaeda sighs. "But you were still injured."

"It's better than nothing," You doze off. "love..."

You stay quiet for the most part, making noises and showing improvement in vocal therapy. Komaeda sits with you some days in the wheelchair as you open your mouth to speak. Other days, he does physical therapy on the side while you learn to speak. The two of you return to your hospital room and talk about everything when you finish. There was no need for security when the island was only with so many people.

"What did you learn today?"

"Names," You start counting on your fingers. "Komaeda, Hinata, Fuyuhiko, the list goes on."

"That's it?"

"We start verbs tomorrow since I accidentally pronounced your name a little too well."

Komaeda chuckles, wrapping an arm around your waist lazily. "Is it fun?"

"No," You mumble back, voice just as sleepy as his. "I hate it."

There's little to do in a hospital, you think. You play cards with Komaeda when you're bored, and other days you play chopsticks. The majority of the time, the two of you sit there in silence during the day. When it's night, the two of you are too tired to do anything, so there's little to no conversation. Komaeda offers to pretend to teach you how to speak so the two of you can communicate. You refuse him.

You decide a miracle would be funnier.

You start speaking to Komaeda during the day to see who notices first. The two of you bet on different students. Komaeda bets on Hinata, and you bet on Mikan.

You win the bet as you're rambling about how shit the school is to Komaeda on a Thursday afternoon immediately after class and Mikan walks in to check up on you. Komaeda needs to be discharged, so you win the bet instead of him. You think it's a trade-off you're fine with. Komaeda being healed at the cost of anything for you was more than worth the price. You just wished he cared a little more about himself.

"I-If you can speak fluently," Mikan stares at the papers in her hands. "Th-then it's completely pointless to k-keep you here!"

You smile. "I've been able to talk. I just—" You pause to think of the word. "have been told to keep quiet."

Hinata runs check-ups with Mikan on you as you speak to them normally. You're fine to go; you're told. Komaeda takes you back to your shared cabin, grinning from ear to ear as you stretch your arms. It's surprising that you could speak so well. You don't know what to do. You don't know the amount of time that passes from one event to the next, and you chew on your bottom lip as you sit in your room.

Komaeda pulls your bottom lip from your teeth, handing you a cup of tea instead.

"What's wrong?"

You blink slowly. "We have one final event. Has Hinata looked for Mitarai?"

"He has. Why?"

You pause before closing your mouth. You grimace slowly, and Komaeda sits on the floor with you, tilting his head to stare at you properly. You look older. You've aged. Your anxiety is much worse than while in the simulation, and he does his best to fix you. You can't fix someone if you're broken as well.

Komaeda finishes therapy and accompanies you to your sessions, easing you into the sessions slowly. It's an improvement. You learn to calm down and loosen up. It's something about how you have to let go of control. It's scary. Komaeda's told to take care of you to whatever extent he can manage, and make you feel as though you have something to lean on that isn't predestinated knowledge. Komaeda doesn't know if he's really suited for the position, but he doesn't find it in himself to doubt you.

You recover slowly, and it seems as though your recovery process reverts as soon as the third killing game begins. You stare in horror at the livestream while everyone on the island starts gearing up. You don't know what to feel. That was the last you knew about the series. It was the last you knew about anything. It was. It was terrifying. You wouldn't know anything about the future, and you had been living off of the knowledge you had. How... how do you survive? What happens to the remnants? Do they return to the island? Do they go somewhere else? Wasn't the final killing game on the island?

When Komaeda returns on the boat, he brings a small gift with him. You collapse on him as he exits the boat, and Komaeda stays on the ground even as he helps you up. You wipe your tears with a frown, and you pause when you notice he hasn't stood up. You tilt your head, getting back on your knees to stare at him in curiosity. Komaeda laughs awkwardly, getting up. He... he can't just ask you to stay with him in front of everyone. It might make you feel obligated to say yes to him. He presses kisses to your forehead instead, laughing airily and joking about how you took his breath away. You smack him lightly in retaliation, embarrassment all over your face.

But days are mundane to Komaeda once they return to the island. You walk with him in the mornings, and you sit with him during mealtimes. The rest of the class gets along with you well, and the two of you do everything together. Komaeda fears you'll grow bored of him. His hesitation seeps into the things the two of you do normally, and you notice his change in behavior immediately. You never mention anything as he tries to pull away slowly, and you find yourself sitting in empty bedrooms, waiting for Komaeda to return. Some days, he doesn't. Other days, he returns when it's morning and the energy has been drained out of your soul.

You think you're doing something wrong. You don't understand why he's so desperate to leave you. Maybe you're doing something wrong. Maybe you're of no more use now that you don't know the future anymore. It eats you away slowly as you sit at the diner, chewing down breakfast slowly. Teruteru asks if it's because you don't like the food, and you assure him it's not. You wonder if you just have your emotions written all over your face. Though, no one else on the island mentions anything as you eat less and less. You wonder if Komaeda eats at all.

Well, communication is key, you suppose.

You rub your eyes slowly as the sun rises, and you mumble to yourself. Komaeda hasn't come back again.

You close your eyes and fall asleep on the couch. The bed is too big without him around.

Komaeda returns to the cottage to grab his things.

His heart drops to his stomach as he sees you sleeping on the couch. You... you don't like him. Why are you eating yourself away so that you'll continue to like him even if he treats you terribly? You have so many more people that could fall in love with you and date, yet you were killing yourself over someone as unimportant as him. He grabs the blanket from the bed, and he covers you with it, turning around to get his stuff.

"Nagito Komaeda." Your voice comes out surprisingly clear for someone who was asleep. You don't move, but Komaeda can tell you want him to stay.

"I'm sorry." He grabs what he was looking for, and you sob quietly as the door to the cottage closes with a click.

The depression chips at you slowly. You stay pooled in your cottage, relying on classmates sending food to you and only eating small portions. You wonder how bad you must have it when even Teruteru's cooking doesn't lift your spirits. Your talent no longer exists. Is that why Komaeda no longer wants you? You sit there in your room, rotting away, the blanket wrapped around your body, your existence slowly slipping away, dissociating, fading in and out, sometimes bleeding at the wrist and other times bleeding at the fingertips.

But the depression disappears one day as your brain goes into autopilot. You pack your things by yourself, and you stare at the photo of you and Komaeda on the coffee table, putting it face down as you open your laptop to reach Naegi. You want to leave the island. Your talent is the ultimate unknown, so it'd only make sense that you end up somewhere that no one knows about.

You leave the island in the dead of night, your presence completely erased along with it.

You sit in the helicopter, staring at the setting moon and rising sun, watching the stars twinkle out of life and clouds grow more visible. Maybe it was something you were supposed to do from the start. Maybe it was something that you were meant to do. You were supposed to be isekaied by now, right? That was the plan? You chew on your bottom lip as you land in the future foundation headquarters, and you go through the process with a new identity, making your way of life in the remnants of the city, the broken buildings now slowly coming back to life. You try to ignore the lack of consciousness as you do everything.

Komaeda thinks he hallucinated your entire existence when he steps into your shared cottage the day you left. You hadn't been at breakfast for the seventh time that week, and he drops the tray of food at the sight of a clean and neat cottage. It was impossible for someone who was as shattered as you to do. It's impossible. He looks around the cottage urgently, crying, begging, praying that there was a trace of you to remember just for a moment.

There's nothing.

So instead, Komaeda runs back to the restaurant, opening the doors panting. The class turns to stare at him, and his breath catches in his throat as he doesn't know how to explain that you had just disappeared without a trace off of the island. His breathing turns static as he coughs and cries, trying to explain through his pathetic sobs that you had just disappeared, and you were gone without a trace, and that you had just left as if you were never there, and that he wanted to apologize and try to talk it out with you but he had found an empty cottage without anything that could possibly remind him of your existence; it was a terrible thing to think of, and his head spins dizzily. He was going to tell you that his illness was gone and that he would be able to spend time with you again, but you had just disappeared— you were— you just— you just left him alone on an island of ultimates, people who he considered nothing more than classmates and friends when he cared, but you, his lover, the only person in the world to ever tell him that he was worth something and not insult him, was gone, and he couldn't live withou—

Komaeda passes out before he can say anything else, the stress of everything collapsing on him at once. The class rushes him to the hospital, and Mikan and Hinata check his vitals, trying their best to calm his heart somehow before he died of a heart attack. His body fights it, almost as if desperate to die and shatter and break. Komaeda's consciousness doesn't want to live or come back to life. Yet, the two succeed anyway, the boy jumping awake as he's defibrillated back to life.

Komaeda doesn't know why he woke up within a day. He would have rather just died now that you weren't on the island anymore. He starts crying immediately upon waking up, the tears making him choke, snot running down his nose and tears staining his cheeks with tracks and tracks of salt. He thinks he's going to die from how hard he's crying. His breath catches in his throat, the hiccuping killing his lungs. God. Is this how pathetic he was? Was he really nothing without you? Why did he push you away? He should've just let you destroy him next to you—

You suppose you don't suffer any less.

You sit in the coffee shop in the city, and you press the coffee to your lips, planning your next route to nowhere. You want to wander. Your backpack is packed and ready, and you're excited to leave something behind for once. Yet, the sense of dread that plagues your whole body at the thought of leaving your only pillar of support in the universe hurts you. You don't know how to let you. You don't know if you want to know if you even know how to let go.

You receive a letter from Naegi from the island. A letter that was several papers taped together. A letter that rolls on the ground as you open it in front of the man, and a letter that's longer than a senior thesis paper. You read the first two lines, and you recognize it as Hinata's writing. You refuse to touch it at first, waving Naegi off, but all it takes is a mention of Komaeda's name.

It's every single doctor's report for Komaeda's illness starting from the day you left the island.

"What's... wrong?" Naegi watches your resolve waver.

"Komaeda is bedridden and had a heart attack the morning I left the island," You read every single report, and you pause when you reach the end. He still hasn't been discharged.

"Do you have paper and an envelope?" You stare at the man.

Komaeda receives a letter passed on from Hinata detailing a single word, and Komaeda runs.

He takes a helicopter to the mainland, and his heart races in his chest the entire time. He has to find you. It doesn't matter if you'd slap him or break him or shatter him into pieces like he had done with you, he has to have you back in his hands. He knows where you want him to be, and he doesn't know what time it is or why his bones hurt, but he knows where you're waiting, and he'd hate to keep you waiting even longer than he's had you wait. He doesn't know why the two of you are stuck. He doesn't understand why everything hurts him in the way it does, but he does know that he misses you terribly.

He reaches where you want him, sitting down on the same bench when he had met you, and he pulls out the blades from his jacket, cutting two lines to make sure you wouldn't leave before he could apologize. The blood stains his jacket, but he could never be too safe. He grimaces.

You leave your bag with Naegi, stepping up the stairs into Monaca's old tower. You're surprised that there was still one left, and you sit at the top of the stairs, glancing down at the rest of Towa city. You wonder if Komaeda would know that you're referring to here instead of the bench. Maybe he'd realize it after a little while.

So, the sun sets, and you start back down the tower. The walls of it are torn, the brick showing through the wallpaper, and the mold and moss from the natural tragedies during the tragedy. You wonder if Komaeda would remember this place at all. You don't know how many years you spent in the tower with him, doing everything you could for Junko. It wasn't even despair, now that you think of it. You were just enamored with Komaeda. That desperate. Desperate to the point that you'd do anything for him. You wonder if your memories were erased. You don't know.

The place brings bad memories. Maybe it was time to leave.

The sound of running upstairs causes you to stop in your steps, and you stare down at Komaeda.

Komaeda stares up at you, stars in the background, the wind brushing your hair gently, and his legs give out. You rush to him immediately as he cries at the sight of you, and his lungs burn as he tries to catch his breath despite the tears. He clings onto your forearms, mindless babbles slipping past his lips as he cries and tries to explain himself. You catch little comprehensible words. Words like "help" "sorry" and "fault", and you wait until he calms down enough to speak to you, assuring him that you wouldn't leave.

Your heart twists and burns in your chest. You want to cry just as badly as he does.

Komaeda cries in your arms, hiccupping, clinging onto your arm pathetically. It looks familiar. It's like watching yourself break down before the fifth trial, except its Komaeda crying harsh tears over you leaving him. Maybe you came full circle. You don't know. All you know is that you should've never left the island and rotted in your place for a little longer. Maybe Komaeda wouldn't have had heart problems if you had never left. You don't know. You think you hurt him enough.

Komaeda calms eventually, wiping the snot and tears from his face, staring quietly at the tissue. He really was pathetic without you.

"I'm sorry." He manages. "I was going to—" He pauses, averting his gaze to the side. "I was going to... give you a ring when I got off the boat as a promise but I didn't want it to seem like I was proposing because then that would be like forcing you to marry me in front of the entire class—"

"You were going to what?" You stare at Komaeda in your arms, blinking, eyes wide.

"give you a ring?"

"You brought me a ring from the mainland?"

"Y-yeah?"

"How'd you even get one?" Your arms tighten around him, and you rest your chin on his head as you stare down at the stairs.

"Uh," Komaeda stumbles over himself. "I dug around my old mansion."

You laugh, pulling him close to your chest. "From your dead parents?"

"Mom's engagement ring," Komaeda smiles at the sound of your laughter.

"Do you think that's why we fought? The dead's vengeance?"

"Mother doesn't approve," Komaeda hums. "Mother knows best."

"Motherrrrr," You grin, "knows best." You pause, staring at the sunrise. "Would you say yes if I were to propose?"

"I can't live without you."

That's all you need to hear.

Some days you think too hard. Komaeda grows used to it, sitting down with you, the fireplace on, tea in your hands as he sits next to you. He doesn't know what to feel about living a casual, retired life. The two of you are back to a mundane life. The two of you swing back and forth, the sun counting your days. You wonder if Komaeda's going to propose or if he was just saying it to get you back with him.

Though, you suppose thoughts are fleeting.

You grow tired of waiting for Komaeda to propose. You stumble into Souda's cabin one afternoon, staring at him in the eye until he notices you. He yelps as he does, and you as him if he has a metal band. You wonder where you get the talent for being able to do everything as long as you have the audacity to. You bring a mirror into your old cabin, playing with polymer clay and making flowers, gluing them onto the mirror, sanding the ring and making sure you remember Komaeda's ring size as you fall asleep next to him each night.

Komaeda thinks you're up to something, but he stays put. Maybe you were going to surprise him.

The anxiety is much quieter these days, and he finds himself sitting in your shared cabin, waiting for you to come back. You go missing more often. Maybe you're running around the island exploring. You always liked wandering more than anything else. He wonders if you'd pass away on accident one day. Your ultimate talent was scary. Your real one. You could be taken away from him at any time.

"I have a surprise." You peek through the door, blinking at Komaeda rapidly.

"A good one or bad one?"

"Good one," You hum.

Komaeda follows you as you drag him to your cabin, and he pauses at the sight of roses.

"A... angel?"

"I made us a mirror." You fiddle with your fingers.

Komaeda pulls you with him as he steps into the place, and he stares at the heart-shaped mirror. The clay flowers around it cause him to pause, and he stares at the metal band that glistens, hiding in a piece of clay. Komaeda pauses at the sight of the other hole, and he pulls the ring from his pocket, slipping it into the slot, turning to grin at you.

"Ah, it seems-" He pauses at the sight of you on one knee.

"I had this whole speech prepared about how I had fallen in love with you the moment we met, but the second you put my ring in the slot my brain completely malfunctioned and I forgot half of it," You pull another ring from your pocket, and you hold it up for him. "I'm in love with you. Marry me?"

Komaeda blinks at the ring, and he stares at you, rummaging through his pocket.

Your heart rings in your head as he pulls out a ring of his own, holding it to your face.

"If you'll take mine."

You yank him onto the floor with you, wrapping your arms around his neck and laughing.

There are a lot of smiles and giggles with Komaeda while the two of you plan for a wedding. Komaeda lets you do what you want, offering his suggestion when you ask, finding that it's getting easier to read what you want and what you don't. In the meantime, while he does, you tell him how sweet he is to you, pressing kisses to his cheeks, letting him know you were sure about what you were doing. It was turbulent, you think. Komaeda seemed scared you would change your mind at first.

You remind him that you care about him quietly at night, tracing circles on his chest.

He watches you fall asleep at night, and he can't help the nasty thoughts that spiral in his mind as he bites back quiet moans as you're asleep next to him, bare skin kissed by the moon and water from the shower still fresh in your hair. He feels bad, whimpering and gasping as he plays with himself next to you, but surely you wouldn't mind, right? You never have; You've let him do whatever he wants. You've even mentioned letting him do whatever he wants to you while you're asleep, but he couldn't possibly soil your body with him.

You don't wake up. You've always slept deep, he finds. He could completely defile you head to toe and you wouldn't even notice as long as he cleaned you up. He parts your lips with his thumb, pressing a kiss to your lips before wiping himself down with a tissue, snuggling his head into your chest, falling asleep to the sound of your heartbeat.

Komaeda is less slick than he thinks he is.

You wake up earlier than him some days, staring at the stain on the sheets, stretching your arms, and reaching into his boxers. He tends to wake up with morning woods, his hormones still unbalanced despite his age. You don't know. You never studied the human body extensively. So, you do what you normally do, fingers freeing his cock from his boxers, spitting in your hand before running your hand through the slit to collect his precum and giving him a handjob. Some days, Komaeda wakes up with your mouth around his tongue, other days he wakes up to you reading a book while your hand is wrapped around his cock. Either way, he wakes up to himself moaning pathetically while you suck him off. He caught you kicking your legs once. He doesn't understand why you enjoy pleasing him, but he doesn't find it in himself to complain.

"I want snowdrops at the wedding," You pause. "On the dress, not the wedding. I'm not planting more flowers on the island when we already have a farm."

"It wouldn't hurt to get flowers planted."

"We're having a beachside wedding because you insisted it be one to match my fantasies," You glance at the flower catalog Naegi sent you. "Maybe I'll get a blue iris bouquet."

"Anything you want," Komaeda hums, staring at a suit catalog. "Can I just wear white?"

"Yeah." You pause. "I'm kicking you out when I pick the dress, by the way."

"And let Hinata take your nude measurements alone?"

"Sonia and Peko are going to be there," You grumble. "They've had it done before."

Komaeda pouts.

"You'll get to see it at the wedding. Isn't that enough?"

"Can I paint something for the wedding?"

"We have to plan gifts for each other, do we not?" You hum. "Like... I don't actually know what I'm going to get you."

"It's fine," Komaeda closes his eyes, the vibrations from his humming warming your skin. "I'll just spoil you rotten."

"What if I get used to it?"

"Then that would be the greatest blessing possible." Komaeda smiles.

Some days, you wonder how you ended up with Komaeda. You had been blinking slowly in and out of consciousness over a world that wasn't yours when you landed out of nowhere on top of Komaeda, and now you were planning a wedding with him. Other days, you wonder how you asked a complete stranger in English to live at his place temporarily, and now you were his home. You, a human, are his home. You gasp and twitch as he curls his fingers in you, cutting off your thought process.

"What were you thinking of?" Komaeda stares up at you from between your legs.

"A-ah," You whimper as he goes back to fingering you. "You-" You exhale. "I was thinking of you."

"Me?"

"Y-yeah," You hide your face in your hands as he presses a kiss to your clit. "H-how we met."

"You were an angel who fell out of heaven, I was convinced," The rest of Komaeda's words are muffled as he goes back to eating you out, eyes half-lidded as he focuses on you feverishly. You don't know where he gets the energy to stay between your legs when he can barely survive a round with you. The sounds of his tongue in you fill the room as you flush from how lewd it all sounds. You're embarrassed again.

"K-Ko," You whimper.

Komaeda raises a brow to stare at you, drawing hearts on your thigh as he goes back to eating you out when he notices it's just embarrassment. The coil in your stomach tightens as your hand threads through his hair, your thighs closing around his head as your orgasm approaches. You squirm before you do, and you let out a salacious moan as you cum on Komaeda's tongue for the nth time that night. You squirm from the overstimulation as the orgasm fades, and Komaeda wipes the cum from his face, licking off of his hand as he spreads your legs.

He pumps himself twice before pressing the tip of his cock to your clit.

"What's wrong?"

"S-sorry," Komaeda mumbles, kneading the skin on your hip. "T-thinking."

"About?"

"How far, ah," He whimpers as he fills you, resting his forehead on yours. "we've come." He blinks slowly as you push his hair back, leaning up to kiss him. "And how you're," He starts thrusting, slowly, almost as if he were cherishing you slowly, "underneath me, bare skin, and all." Komaeda thrusts steadily as you murmur for him to speed up, cheeks warm and skin flushed. Komaeda thinks you're pretty like this. He always thinks you're pretty, but you're just breathtaking under the moon, the white haze making you look holy. You were his angel. The angel that dropped into his life as he felt his life shatter in his hands that same day.

Komaeda's brows furrow as he feels himself get close, thrusting growing desperate, thumb on your clit, rubbing desperately. The coil in your stomach tightens, and your eyes widen, reaching for Komaeda's neck, squealing about how you're in love with him and how you're desperate to marry him and settle down, your overstimulation making your head spin, the words not registering as you cum on his cock. Komaeda's head rings from the praise you give him, a waterfall of pet names spilling. "Y-you're so pretty," You gasp. "Gorgeous. I think you were blessed by Aphrodite or something. Pretty. Pretty, pretty boy." You whine as he chases his own orgasm, your nails digging into his shoulders. "i love you so much. So much. K-ko, I'm so p-painfully in love with you-" You gasp as he cums, spilling into you with something between a whimper and moan.

He stays inside of you for a moment, waiting to catch his breath as you wipe the sweat from his forehead.

"Good boy," You smile, running your hand through his hair. "Such a pretty, good boy."

Komaeda laughs airily, pressing a kiss to the palm of your hand. "I love you too."

You turn your head to stare, and you pause. "We left the window open."

"Pray that Souda doesn't scream at us tomorrow," Komaeda pulls out of you, his cum trickling out of you, causing Komaeda's voice to catch in his throat. "You're pretty."

"You tell me that a lot," You sit up, pressing a kiss to his temple.

"I mean it," Komaeda relaxes at your touch, tension leaving his shoulders. "I mean it."

"I know you do," You get off the bed, grimacing at the sweat on your skin. Komaeda lies on the bed as you walk into the bathroom, coming out with a rag to wipe him down. Komaeda lifts his arms weakly as you wipe him, exhaling when you finish, pulling you for a kiss.

"Can I sleep first?"

"Of course," You press a kiss to his forehead. "Always."

The moon spills past the windows as you stare at Komaeda's chest rise and fall, skin paler than normal. You rest your hand on his hip, tracing circles on his skin, lashes fluttering as sleep threatens to take you. It's quiet, you think. A nice quiet. the type of quiet that you could grow used to, and a type of quiet you had wished for before getting isekaied. You don't want to leave him. You hope he reincarnates with you when the two of you die.

Komaeda blinks slowly in the morning, body sore. Though, his arms aren't as sore as they used to be. He blinks slowly, turning around to face you. He stares up at you, lashes fluttering, lips parting as he presses a kiss to yours. You're pretty. When the sun illuminates the room and the waves recede, you're gorgeous. The golden streaks of the sun reflect on your hair, and each individual cell of your body. Komaeda doesn't know what he could consider prettier.

"Mm?" You furrow your brows, Komaeda sitting up to cover the sun from your eyes. "Good morning."

"Good morning," Komaeda smiles.

"You're so hot," You yawn. "I'm so happy I'm marrying you."

Komaeda's cheeks redden, his heart racing. "love you too..."

The clocks on the walls pass quicker as the two of you get ready for the ceremony itself. Komaeda doesn't know what to feel. He's going to get to call you his wife. His spouse. He's going to be married soon. If he told himself back at Hope's Peak, he doubts he would believe himself. He's marrying you.

You sit up and rub your eyes, exhaling slowly. You stare outside the window, tossing the covers over your head again.

"I'm going back to bed."

Komaeda blinks slowly, snuggling closer to you. He doesn't want to get up either. He closes his eyes, only pausing when he remembers something important.

"You have to pick the dress today." He mumbles into your ear.

"Nevermind!" You jump out of bed, stretching your arms. Komaeda smiles as you yawn. "Do you want to see me in anything?"

"Do whatever you want," Komaeda smiles.

"I'm going to wear your servant chain to the wedding if you tell me to do whatever I want," You deadpan.

Komaeda chokes, coughing uncomfortably.

"Or the bedroom," You rub your eyes. "I think it'd be cuter in the bedroom."

"You kept my clothes?"

You blink at him owlishly. "I kept everything you ever had."

Komaeda doesn't know what he's supposed to feel when you actually pull out the chain that was originally around his neck. Komaeda returns home, supporting himself on the wall, pulling his shoes off, pausing at the sight of you in his sweater and chain.

"I swear this isn't-"

"Stay in it." Komaeda tosses his jacket to the side, stepping up to you, pressing his lips on your temple, smothering you in kisses. "Can I fuck you in that?"

"Yeah," You scrunch your nose as he kisses further down your neck, biting, tracing circles on the teeth marks, staring quietly. "God, you're so pretty."

You flush from his words, and he pulls the bottom of his shirt up, revealing your boobs. He pries your lips open, having you bite on the hem as he thumbs the bud of your tits, pinching it to get a reaction out of you. Your skin jumps as his lips close around the other bud, swirling his tongue around it. Your leg wobbles, and Komaeda has you sit, the tips of his hair tickling your chin as he continues his ministrations. Your fingers dig into the sheets, soft pants slipping past your lips as Komaeda takes your quiet moans as a sign of encouragement.

He pulls away, a string of saliva following him, and he blinks slowly at how your legs have bucked. You stare at him as he pulls away from your chest, deer caught in headlights, heart ringing in your ears. You don't know when he got so perceptive. The hem of the shirt is still between your teeth, and Komaeda pulls the cloth from you.

"Pretty angel, doing such a great job," He kisses you as a reward, lowering his head, pressing a hand to your thigh as he scrunches the shirt up to reveal your pussy. He pushes your legs open wider, pulling you closer to him, getting onto his stomach, pressing a light kiss to your clit before mumbling quietly. "itadakimasu," He delves in, sticking his tongue in first, making sure to savor your taste. Your thighs quiver, and he holds them apart as he continues, stopping you from suffocating him. You throw your head back, muffling the sounds from your mouth with your palm.

"Angell," Komaeda slurs, replacing his tongue with a finger. "please let me hear you..."

You move your hand slowly as Komaeda sits, hand reaching for the chain, pulling on it, forcing you to lurch forward, the collar cutting your breath off. You gasp as he does, whimpering as you feel Komaeda curl his finger in you, looking for the place you liked it best. You gasp, propping yourself onto your elbows to try and breathe. Your breath hitches as he slides a second finger in, your arms shaking.

"K-Ko," You gasp as he pulls on the chain again.

"Yes, angel?"

"I wanna cum," The coil in your stomach tightens as you tighten around Komaeda's fingers. Komaeda obliges, letting the chain go from his hand, pressing his thumb to your clit, drawing rapid circles. You cum with a cry, drenching his fingers, your legs shaking. You whimper as he pulls his fingers out and licks them. Your eyelids flutter, chest heaving for air.

"Can," Komaeda swallows slowly. "can you ride me?"

You nod slowly, waiting for Komaeda to strip and lie down. He makes a show for you, unbuttoning his shirt painfully slow, pulling his belt off, body weight resting on one side of his body, hips jutted out. You swallow the saliva threatening to spill from your lips. You climb over him, letting the cum from your orgasm lube him, positioning him slowly. You watch as Komaeda wraps his hand around the chain again, pulling lightly as he bottoms out in you. You pant, whimpering, the remnants of your orgasm making your walls still sensitive.

"So pretty for me," Komaeda pulls on the chain lightly. His shirt scratches and causes your body to itch, the fabric painfully uncomfortable. You remember why you didn't like it anymore. Well, as you start bouncing on his cock slowly, one hand on the chain and the other tangled in the sheets. You stare down at him as he pulls the collar, forcing your chest to his face, and you whimper as his lips latch onto your nipple, sucking ever so gently. You force your body weight onto your elbows, your bouncing turning erratic.

Komaeda helps you, thrusts matching your rhythm. You whimper as his other hand rests on your hip, drawing lazy circles as you feel your orgasm approach again. You gasp softly, biting your bottom lip harshly as you feel your orgasm approach again. Komaeda forces your chest to his face, letting go of the chain and moving his other hand to your ass. You cum on him with a cry as he bites on your nipple, the hickey bright red on your chest tightening on him like a vice. Your chest heaves as he chases his own orgasm, your legs shaking from overstimulation. You whine as he spills into you. Komaeda babbles incoherently as you collapse on top of him, pulling the shirt from over your head. The collar and chain remain around your neck, and Komaeda pulls you down to press a kiss to your cheek.

"You're so, so beautiful," Komaeda mumbles on your lips, pressing lazy kisses to your skin.

"I love you too."

Komaeda's anxiety charts as the wedding gets closer and closer. He finds himself staring at sharp objects for far too long and foods that he knows would be bad for him even longer. There's a certain sense of anxiety as he stares a little too long at dangerous items nearby, and you find yourself tracing circles on his skin and reminding him that it was fine. You didn't mind his luck cycle. Even if it rained on the big day, you could just run down the aisle with an umbrella.

You sit in your cabin, smiling as Hiyoko arranges your hair with a huff, complaining about how you had such nice hair but never took care of it. You laugh as she weaves flowers into your hair, and Sonia has you hold still as she does your makeup. Mahiru moves between cabins, snapping photos of both you and Komaeda. Ibuki arranges the music as Peko invites the few future foundation members to their seats. You don't know how you got here, really. Your heart causes your breathing to get anxious, and you grimace slowly.

"Hey," Sonia pauses, having you stare at her. "It'll be fine. No anxious thoughts. It's your wedding day."

You exhale as she has you breathe, and your shoulders relax.

"It looks like it's going to rain," Mikan mumbles. "Did we bring an umbrella?"

"I did!" Akane closes the umbrella, stepping into the room. "Wah, how pretty!"

"Thank you, Akane," You smile.

Komaeda's words serve true, rain pouring down on the day of the wedding, and you laugh as the tail of your dress stains with rainwater. You'll think of it as a fond memory. You know you will. It'll be fun to explain to people who ask why your dress is stained brown and say that you got married in the rain to the love of your life. It's a sense of acceptance. You blink at Komaeda as you get ready to walk down the aisle, and you decide to run. You're excited. Komaeda's dressed head to toe in white, and he looks ethereal. You'd love him forever, you decide. You ditch the umbrella, only stopping as you bump under his. It was big enough to fit the two of you.

"Would you like to swap shoes? Running in heels in the rain is a little..." Komaeda raises a leg to slip his shoe off before you stop him.

"I want to run in the rain, in heels, with the love of my life," You laugh, resting your hand on his bicep, leaning your head onto his shoulder.

Impostor gives the opening speech, and you grin happily as you open the letter you had written, holding a newly brought, clear umbrella.

"To Nagito Komaeda," You clear your throat carefully. "I landed in your lap in the blink of an eye, crashing into you on the street from above. It was comedic, it was strange, and it was new. I had never gotten hit by a white truck before, and I was nowhere expecting to end up in this world of all places. You're a fan favorite in my world, and the fact that I'm being blessed with an opportunity to marry you like this is incredible. It feels strange. It felt like just yesterday when I was asking you in a foreign language whether or not I could stay with you until I found a home, and now today we're getting married. I know you like to say that it's a blessing to marry me, but I think the real blessing was falling in love with you."

You pause to breathe, glancing at Komaeda, wiping his tears already.

"I was horrified when I saw the letter detailing your frontaltemporal lobe dementia. I was determined to find some way to fix it, whether it be through someone as obscure as the ultimate neurologist whom I had only heard of once or twice. I was blissfully in love with you as I had always been. I do not remember a moment when I haven't loved you to the moon and back." You swallow, tears welling in your eyes. "Even when you were nothing more than a mere servant under Monaca, I was desperate to do anything for you. I had forgotten that the tragedy was something that you would have despised had you found out I was an ultimate despair, but I was so desperate to love you and to show you how far my love went that I went insane."

Komaeda thanks Hinata as he takes the handkerchief, crying silently into it.

"But I knew that we would love each other. I knew that you and I would love like no other, and that the sun would die and the moon would break, but there would never be a moment where I wouldn't stop loving you because I couldn't stop loving you. You were as vital to my existence as any basic commodity was. I could wither and die like the flowers you picked for me at Hope's Peak and I would still love you desperately." You pause, collecting yourself. "Because you were just that important to me. You were something that I desperately, insanely wanted. You meant the world to me, and I was willing to let everyone else burn just so I could see you live."

You cough, trying to hold back tears. "And when we had fought, I was so desperate to leave because the only thing I knew how to do was to run away. Yet, I don't know why I stayed in that tower all night until the sun was peeking from the east. I don't know why I had held onto you so desperately as you had cried in my arms, but I'm so terribly elated that I had stayed, because I wouldn't be here if I had just ran away like I always did. I wouldn't have been in our room, staring at the ceilings and counting the stars in your eyes, watching you breathe peacefully, because I would have never been able to experience anything if I didn't stay with you. I read once that love was a choice," You exhale. "So my choice, in the simplest terms," You wipe a tear from your eye. "Is to stay by your side, for better or worse, for life or for death, and until the universe would forcibly tear my heart and soul and mind away from you, I will stay with you until all that is left of me is nothing, for I know that I would love you for all of my days, even if it decides to kill me. Because even if I'm the ultimate isekai victim in my next, life, you'll always be my husband, lover, and my home in a world that despises me so much."

Komaeda wipes his tears, eyes puffy, brows furrowed, slightly embarrassed at how much of a mess he probably looked. He coughs, waiting for his tears to calm before staring at his letter. He sniffs a little, opening the letter carefully, almost as if he were scared to break the wax. He adjusts the umbrella in his hand, and he opens the letter carefully. There are words written on the front and back.

"To my angel," Komaeda reads, adjusting his umbrella. "When you had first told me to write you a letter, I thought you were saying just to write down whatever thoughts I had."

You thank Sonia as she hands you a handkerchief.

"When I first met you, I thought I was insane." Komaeda laughs to himself. "I was just thrown out of the trash, a couple million dollars on a lottery ticket. I had the ticket in my pocket, and I remembered how each year, each terrible year, I had prayed at the shrines during visits that somehow, somewhere, there would be someone who would make living worth all the suffering I had to go through. I was so desperate to be in love and to have someone who cared about me to the point of destruction like my parents were with each other. I was dying for someone to love me, and as if the universe had heard my prayer that built up over the years, you appeared. You fell from the sky, and for that short moment in my life, I was starstruck at the sight of you." Komaeda sniffs. "I was painfully in love with you. You, who had spoken barely any Japanese upon meeting me, and you who had tried drawing a white truck killing you, I was in love with you. You were so charming in my eyes. I didn't think of a day where I would have to live without you."

Komaeda wipes his tears again, coughing quietly. "I had fallen in love with you so naturally that by the time I was a remnant of despair like you had predicted, I thought that the only way to cause despair was through the death of you, but my consciousness couldn't allow it. I was frail, broken, shattered, so I thought the best sort of despair would have been to work you to the bone and have you fall out of love with me. I failed. I'm glad I failed." Komaeda sniffs, glancing at you in tears, crying into the handkerchief, hiccuping.

"And during that killing game, I died with you." Komaeda laughs airily. "I thought you would surely leave me and try to survive. I had given you a gas mask, yet you stabbed yourself to make sure that my plan would go along, and the two of us were gone. Dead. You were in a coma because I had forced you into one before leaving for the island, and I was in a coma because I had prayed and prayed for a world where everything was together and in one piece. I wanted a world where the two of us could live without the tragedy. A world where we were all classmates, and Chiaki was still alive. To me, it was a world where the two of us were in love and my luck wasn't killing anyone. I woke up and cried. I had to be in a world with you in it, so I thought it'd be chance that my luck would save you. I'm glad it did."

Komaeda turns the paper.

"I love you to the moon and back, and I love you until the sun burns out and the moon dies from heartbreak. My life is supposed to be a mosaic of everyone I've loved, but instead, it's just a painting of you. From start to finish, from the moment we met to the moment we'll die, everything will be influenced by you and you alone. I'll fly you to the moon and burn from the sun just so that you could live without worry. And when I wake up in the morning, I'll hide you from the sun's rays burning your eyes and kiss you until you grow tired of me. I'll do anything and everything so that you'll know how much I love you, because I finally, finally, found the person that I wake up each morning, smiling all silly at because of how much I love you." Komaeda exhales shakily. "So this is my vow to love you until the world shatters and my soul can't reincarnate with you anymore. Know that no matter how much the world will kill me, I'll never leave or break you. I love you, my angel, my world, my heart, and my home."

You wipe your tears quietly, and Souda hands the two of you the rings. Komaeda slips it onto your ring finger, pausing to stare at it. You hold his ring, pausing when you notice the tears pricking the corner of his eyes. You reach to wipe the tears, wiping his tears with your handkerchief as he sniffs quietly. He mumbles a quiet apology, lifting his hand so that you can put his ring on. He wipes his tears as you wait for his vision to clear a little so that he could look at you.

You slip the ring on, a stupid smile on your face, the smile of a lovesick fool.

Impostor starts again. The moment you think you've been waiting for your entire life. Your heart rings in your head, and you can almost hear Komaeda's heart beating in his chest.

"You may now kiss the—"

You feel bad for interrupting Impostor, but as you press your lips to Komaeda, throwing your arms around him in glee, the umbrella falling to the side as Komaeda's caught off guard, you decide it's fine. Though, Komaeda doesn't complain as the familiar feeling of your lips on his causes him to relax into your arms, hands wrapping around your waist instinctively. His lashes flutter as he tilts his neck to get more comfortable, and the rain soaks his hair. He might catch a cold from this, but he supposes he would only get married once. It didn't matter how his luck cycle would affect him.

The rain ceases over your head, and you pout when you pull away. "I wanted to run in the rain with you."

"It'll rain later," Komaeda hums. "We can run when it's later at night. Just the two of us"

You blink slowly, staring at Komaeda as you pause.

"I love you."

"I love you too."

last updated: June 24th, 2023 ~ 1:30 am

.oOo.

Ouran High School Host Club

Headcannons

~ The Host Club and their Sleepy, Cranky SO! ~

Smut

Kyoya Ootori

Lady In Red

Series

Kyoya Ootori

Lavender Roses (updates: slow and steady) ~

- - - - Starting Today, You are a Host! (pt. 1, pt. 2, pt.3, pt.4,)

- - - - The Job of a High School Host! (pt. 5, pt. 6)

- - - - Beware The Physical Exam! (pt. 7, pt.8)

- - - - Attack of the Lady Manager! (pt. 9)

- - - - The Twins Fight! (pt. 10, pt.11)

- - - - The Grade School Host is the Naughty Type! (pt. 12, pt. 13)

- - - - Jungle Pool SOS! (pt. 14)

- - - - BONUS! Weekend Movie Night (here)

- - - - The Sun, The Sea, and The Host Club! (pt. 15, pt. 16)