Latest Posts by vitzi9 - Page 13

he's kinda weird ngl :/

The devil works hard but fanfic writers work harder

Ps. Y’all are amazing and the most creative writers ❤︎. keep up the amazing work ✩

el gato

some sketch stuff?

me when characters experience the devastating consequences of their own actions:

why does it correspond to the riddler im in tear

Me and My Husband

✤ summary: [Calvin & reader] It seemed like every fibre of your being was written just for Calvin.

✤ word count: 1.4k

I recommend listening to Me and My Husband, or any Mitski songs, while reading this! This is a bit different from my usual fics, so please lmk what you think. <3

𝄥𝄞────────── 𝄇

❝I steal a few breaths from the world for a minute and then I’ll be nothing forever, and all of my memories, and all of the things I have seen with my eyes, with my body, with me.❞

Calvin was the ideal lover. He always swept you off your feet, making you feel like the most important person in the world. It was like you were written to be right for each other. Star crossed lovers. Inseparable.

Here and there, he mentioned his previous relationship. A girl named Ruby Sparks. Whenever she was bought up, Calvin spoke about her with a deep loving, it was evident from the look in his eyes that he still longed for her. His eyes would shine with a kind of passion he never showed for you.

❝But me and my husband, we are doing better.❞

You couldn’t remember exactly how you and Calvin met. The memory was hazy, like a dream you can’t quite recall. You asked him about it and he always blew it off.

“It doesn’t matter how we met, what’s important is we’re together now.”

Even constantly being in Calvin’s presence, you were lonely. No friends. No family. There was no one else you could hang out with other than Calvin. Your isolation was nothing but a “temporary issue”, as Calvin called it, but temporary had been months, bordering on years.

❝It’s always been just him and me together.❞

It didn’t help that Calvin locked himself away in his office. Though he hated being called it, he truly was a genius. His style of writing was lyrical and poetic. The words would dance across the page as you read them. Calvin’s novels would become classics, you were sure of it.

You celebrated every achievement together. The two of you were always going to countless award shows, book signings and parties. He encouraged you to try make friends at the party, but everyone there was so different to you. Previously, you loved parties but one day, you didn’t. It was if someone had rewritten your code, changing your programming and you’re very being. Now it felt like everyone at those parties were complete strangers. Strangers who led successful lives. You couldn’t relate to them any less. You had nothing to your name. Calvin had everything.

❝So I bet on that furrowed brow and at least in this lifetime, we’re sticking together. Me and my husband, we’re sticking together❞

It was late at night, Calvin has spent all evening writing, hurled up in his office and practically ignoring your existence. He kissed your cheek before he went to bed but you couldn’t sleep. Tossing and turning, every position you laid in felt uncomfortable. The lights on the clock flickered. 3:08am, the read numbers read. You glanced over to Calvin, who laid peacefully at your side. You knew things had been hard for him. Writing was no easy task and you felt guilty about taking that time away from him. You softly kissed his forehead and got out of bed, quietly tiptoeing through the hall to his office.

The harsh brightness burnt when you flicked the light on. His office was fairly tidy except for the occasional empty coffee mug left around. Calvin always forgot to put them away which left coffee stains on all the furniture. You made a mental note to clean them in the morning. With a yawn, you sat down in Calvin’s office chair. He didn’t let you read what he was currently working on. That was the case with most writers though, so you never took it personally but you couldn’t help your curiosity.

You hesitated whether you should read the pages or not. It was Calvin’s private work but the curiosity itched at your skin. You sighed and grabbed them, beginning to skim over the first few pages and immediately you felt deja vu. In front of you, laid out in crisp black ink, was your entire life. Every word, every letter. It was your life. Had Calvin been writing about you? You knew he did the same about Ruby, maybe it was just a habit he had with all his partners. As the pages flicked by, his writing changed. His previously lyrical writings changed into short, blunt sentances.

“[__] doesn’t hang out with anyone other than Calvin. He is their only friend.”

You felt sick. Yours hands shook as you continued turning the pages. All your little habits which had came and gone were all laid out in front of you. Your personality changes and actions, even the smallest things had all been recorded. You shuffled the pages back in order and placed them back down on his desk in the exact spot.

❝ And I am the idiot with a painted face. ❞

You ripped open the draws, going through them in search for some kind of answer. Tucked away, was a black leather journal. You peeked up at the door to make sure Calvin wasn’t watching you. You began to read the journal. Day by day, your entire relationship with Calvin had been written down and analyzed by him.

“Tuesday, May 16th,

Tonight is the 6 month anniversary of my second novel’s release. The publisher is holding another party and inviting everyone. I know I said I would stop, but I wrote about them again. Ruby was supposed to be a one of phenomenon. So when I thought up another person and they appeared all the same, I couldn’t just get rid of them. It’s not the same as with Ruby. I’ve learnt since then. I’m not completely altering their personality but I did change something small today. [__] used to love parties. It was exhausting. So now they’ll just stand in the corner. Have I done the right thing? It would just make me feel more at peace if they weren’t chatting to other men. They found it again last night. Once again they were snooping around my office and found the pages. I wrote that they forgot it an everything is back to normal. This keeps happening. I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up for.”

❝ In the corner taking up space.❞

Silently, you put the journal back. You couldn’t bare to read any more. What did he mean you had found out before? Surely, you would’ve remembered it. You didn’t know what he was doing but whatever it was, he did it to Ruby and now he was doing it to you too. You felt numb as you returned to bed. Calvin woke up when you laid down.

“Where did you go?” his voice was hoarse.

“Bathroom,” you whispered and he went back to sleep.

You didn’t sleep that night. In the morning, it was difficult to pretend that everything was fine when it clearly wasn’t. Calvin had betrayed you. Anxiety bubbled up in your chest as he went about his day completely normally. He went upstairs while you distracted yourself with breakfast.

Calvin sat down with a sigh, moving the empty mugs off his desk and onto the shelf. He played around with the typewriter, fixing the paper and giving the keys a few test clicks. The crunching of paper under the chairs wheels grabbed his attention. He leant down and picked up the crumbled page. The black text read:

“[__] hates parties. They don’t relate to the kind of people that go to them.”

Calvin instantly knew you had been in here. Frantically, he crumpled the paper and slammed his fingers against the keys as he began typing. When you heard the familiar echo of the typewriter you ran upstairs, about to scream at Calvin that you knew. You knew everything. He was writing about you and lying to your face about it.

But as you stepped into the door, your mind blanked. Whatever had been worrying you floated away. You stared at Calvin in confusion.

❝ But when he walks in,❞

“Why was I coming up here?”

Calvin shrugged with a smile. You let out a chuckle and walked over to him, giving him a forehead kiss. He pulled you onto his lap, squeezing you tightly and making you giggle.

“I love you,” he mumbled into your shoulder.

“I love you too,” you responded, getting up off his lap. “You need to stop leaving mugs in here.” You took the dirty dishes downstairs and left Calvin alone in his office.

❝ I am loved. I am loved.❞

Y/n: *holding their favorite paul dano's characters* i only had him for a day and a half, but if anything that happens to him i will kill everyone in this room and then myself.

𝐃𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐌𝐒 𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐓𝐑𝐔𝐄 | 𝐬𝐢𝐦𝐨𝐧 𝐟𝐞𝐜𝐤 𝐱 𝐟𝐞𝐦!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲 | even though you can’t afford to break rules, you manage to with your own asset, the nerdy genius that created the zephyr. 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 | simon feck (knight and day, 2010) x fem!reader 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬 | smut— handjob, loss of virginity, sub!simon, slight dom!reader, mommy kink 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫'𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞 | WHY IS THERE NO CONTENT FOR OUR NERDY BABY SIMON IM MAD ANYWAY HAVE THIS | follow @cremebruhleewrites to be notified when i post a new story!

You had one objective for the night, only one thing that Roy had told you to do: keep an eye on Simon. Make sure he stays in the hotel room. He could do whatever he wanted, but he needed to stay there. It was similar to how Roy was supposed to watch June; “Just make sure he stays safe,” Roy had told you. 

You stood next to Roy as he explained to Simon the situation, and as he gave the younger man a pin that said Hall & Oates. Wherever Roy had procured that pin in Salzburg, Austria was beyond you, but your boss and trainer often seemed to do impossible things. He had only briefly told you about Simon— how he was the genius who created the Zephyr, how he was just out of high school and smarter than any scientist employed by the government today. 

You had expected a scrawny, lanky kid that had nothing going for him. Instead, you met Simon Feck. Six feet tall, ginger hair hanging at his shoulders, wire glasses perched on a pert nose, with the most pathetic excuse for a mustache and goatee you had ever seen on a man. Simon had been quick to try to rectify some of the information that Roy had given you. “I’m 21,” he told you on the train, over the sound of the hydraulics pumping. “I don’t know why Roy said I was just out of high school. And I’m not as smart as he says. I-I did come up with the battery, that wasn’t a lie, but I’m not Einstein or whatever.”

On the train, you and Simon had gotten along. He had a small iPod stashed in his pocket and, once he was finished with gawking and admiring the train and speaking to the conductor in clipped German, you sat with him and, sharing his earbuds, listened to music with him. He was funny when a song he liked would come on, he’d bob his head and mouth the words, and it made you smile. Then, as always, June’s presence seemed to fuck everything up, and suddenly your own presence made sense. Roy was the muscle, and you secured the asset. 

But the hotel was calm, and there wasn’t a lot to do. Sitting in Simon’s room wasn’t very eventful; he sat on one end, reading and listening to his iPod (Hall & Oates, no doubt), and you sat at the other end, trying to watch television but actually watching him. It was dull, truth be told, and you sighed. You had left a little space between you and Simon, just in case he didn’t like you sitting too close, and he looked up from his book. His cheeks were just a little pink, almost like he had been outside and gotten a little sunburn, and he said, “You okay?” 

“Yeah,” you told him. “Don’t worry about me. What’re you listening to?” 

Simon grappled with his book to retrieve his iPod, and he clicked the screen on. “Hall & Oates,” he said simply. 

“I figured as much,” you giggled, reaching out and playing with the pin on his shirt. “What song?”

Simon smiled softly as he looked down at where you were messing with his shirt, and he said, “Do you like Hall & Oates?” 

“Not as much as you do,” you told him, and you let your hand drop off and into your own lap. “But I know the big songs. Maneater, Rich Girl, Out of Touch, you know.” 

“You’re Making My Dreams Come True,” Simon told you. “I-It’s one of my favorites.” 

“That’s a good one,” you said, and you folded your legs up underneath yourself as you got comfortable. “Do you like all 80s music, or just Hall & Oates?” 

“Just Hall & Oates,” Simon chuckled. “Since high school. I’d be in my little lab, working on the Zephyr, listening only to them. It makes me feel safe, y’know? My mom listened to them a lot.” 

“I get that,” you told him. “I’m the same way with Elton John. It’s just comforting to me.” 

Simon nodded, and he pulled out one of his earbuds and offered it to you. Just like on the train, you moved close to him to listen, but something felt weird. It didn’t feel like the train anymore. Maybe because you were alone now, the energy felt different. Your thigh touched his with the proximity, and you watched his hand come down onto your thigh gently, almost as if he didn’t realize what he had done. That was the final straw for you, and you whispered, “Hey, Si?” 

Simon looked at you, silently prompting you to speak, and you pulled the earbud out hastily. You couldn’t. Roy could sleep with June all he wanted because he was Roy and he operated under a different code than you did. You could not do that with Simon. The heat in the bottom of your stomach betrayed you, though, and you couldn’t help but sigh. “I need to go,” you mumbled, but, before you could properly get up to leave, Simon grabbed your hand. 

“Did I do something wrong?” he asked. “You were fine a second ago.” 

“Yeah, I was,” you started. You couldn’t tell him that you had to leave because he turned you on. The smell of his soap was enough to trigger it, and you stepped back, away from him. “I-It’s not you, Si, I just, paperwork, y’know? Government entities run on paperwork.” 

Simon watched you with his big eyes, examining you, and he said, “I did something wrong.”

“No!” you told him quickly. “Simon, you did nothing wrong, believe me. Please don’t think you did. This has nothing to do with you.” 

“Is it because I touched your leg?” Simon asked. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“No, no,” you said quickly. You sighed, your chest heaving with it, and you looked at the door, where you had last seen Roy before he left. “Okay, it kinda was that, but not how you think it is. I… Simon, you’re just really attractive, y’know that?”

He looked surprised to hear you say that, his eyes widening and his eyebrows raising, and he shook his head quickly. “Don’t be mean,” he mumbled, and you sat back down, squeezing his hand.

“I’m not,” you insisted. “Simon, c’mon. Your big green eyes and your smile, you’re just so cute. I kinda… My heart races when I see you.”

“Really?” Simon asked. He looked down at his lap, and, mumbling, he added, “People in high school used to…”

You frowned. “I’m sorry, Simon,” you told him gently. “That sucks. People kinda suck in general. I was teased a lot in high school too.” 

“Most people have their first kiss by 17,” Simon told you, and he pushed up his glasses. He seemed to have a habit of fiddling with his glasses whenever he was nervous. “And here I am, I’m 21, and I doubt it when a girl calls me pretty. It’s just… It sucks so bad, being hurt like that, y’know?”

“I know,” you told him. “I’m sorry, that really does suck a lot. I-I wasn’t teased like that, but… Fuck them. You’re better than they’ll ever be, okay? You’re a bigger man than them.”

“A bigger man,” Simon repeated. “That all means so much, thank you. But I can’t help but feel just so inadequate. You know what I mean? It feels like nobody wants me, and that shouldn’t hurt so much, but it does. It hurts really bad.”

You shrugged, squeezing his hand again. “”I think you’re handsome, Simon,” you told him. “I think you’re adorable, actually.”

“You’re just saying that,” Simon said, and you watched a flush come over his cheeks, accentuating the tiny freckles he had on his face.

“I promise I’m not,” you said quickly. “In fact, I’d really like it if I could kiss you… Can I?”

“You…” Simon began, his flush glowing deeper in his cheeks. “I’ve never—”

“I know, baby,” you told him. You gently smoothed his wild hair out of his face, and you watched his bottom lip tremble in anticipation. “That’s why I asked.”

Simon readjusted his weight on the sofa, and he shyly mumbled, “I… I really like when you call me that.” 

“What?” you asked. “Baby?” Simon nodded, and you smiled sweetly at him. You had figured that he was a virgin, but his blush made it all the more obvious that he hadn’t ever felt the touch of a woman. “Aw, you’re cute. Can I kiss you, baby?” 

Simon nodded quickly, his shy nature keeping him quiet and mellow, and you quickly moved closer to him. Your thighs touched again, and his hand landed on your leg once more, and that fire returned to your belly. It was stronger than before, now knowing everything you did about Simon, and suddenly a different fire emerged. You wanted to ruin this poor man. You wanted to help him explore and discover himself. You needed to. You carefully leaned into him and touched his burning cheek, and you gently pressed your lips to the corner of his mouth. You heard his beautiful gasp as his breath caught in his throat, and he whimpered, actually whimpered at you. “Please…” he whispered. 

“Please what, baby?” you asked. “Use your words.” 

Simon seemed flustered, and you almost worried that you had taken things one step too far, but he finally sighed, almost lovingly simple and soft. “Please kiss me,” he whimpered. “Please.”

You couldn’t help but oblige his begging, and you finally pressed your mouth to his. He was soft, and he sighed as you kissed him, and it made your heart melt. Your hand on his cheek titled his head a little so you could better kiss him, and Simon made a soft sound as he finally kissed back. It was obvious he didn’t really know what he was doing, but his inexperience was cute. His hands twitched next to his body, and you smiled into the kiss before breaking it. “You can touch me, if you want,” you told him. 

“O-Okay,” Simon said, and he pushed his glasses up his nose. “Umm, actually, can we… Can we stop?”

Your heart sank, and you quickly shifted away from him. “Of course,” you told him. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable—”

“Oh, no, you didn’t,” Simon told you. “I-I just…” 

“What’s wrong?” you asked. “Are you okay?” 

Simon swallowed thickly, and he mumbled, “I-I’m just…” He paused and his blush grew deep, creeping into his ears and neck, and he added, “I-It’ll go away in a minute, I’m sorry.”

“What will go away?” you asked. “Si, if you don’t want to kiss me, that’s okay.”

“No, I do!” Simon groaned. “Y-You just can’t make fun of me, alright?” 

“I would never,” you told him, and Simon wordlessly took your hand and settled it on his pants. It took you a moment to understand what he meant, but then you felt him through his jeans. “Oh, Si. Are you hard?” 

“I-I said it’ll go away in a minute,” Simon stammered.

You chewed your lip for a moment as you thought. You definitely wanted to be able to help him, and he seemed like he would be open to the idea. “I could help you,” you offered. “If you’d like that?”

“Help me?” Simon echoed. “Y-You’d want to touch me?”

“Yes, of course,” you told him. “You’ve masturbated and stuff before, right?” Simon nodded, adjusting his glasses again, and you leaned forward and kissed him again. “Have you ever cum?”

“No,” Simon told you. "I could never make myself..."

“Oh, my poor baby,” you said gently, kissing him once more. “I’ll help you cum, if you’d like.”

“Yes,” Simon said, choking out his answer through a thick throat. “Yes, please, t-touch me.”

You took his hand and led him from the sofa over the large hotel bed, and you sat down first, kicking off your shoes and taking off your trousers and shirt. You figured he would be greedy for the feel of your skin, and you pulled him close to you and kissed him. You edged a little closer to him, pressing your chest to his, and you took his hands and settled them on your hips. “If you want me to stop, just tell me,” you said, and Simon nodded. “I’m gonna lay back and you’re gonna put your back on my chest, okay?”

His skin was warm against yours as he settled himself between your legs, and you took care to remove his glasses from his thin nose and set them on the table next to the bed. You softly blew on your hands, trying to warm them up for him, and you lightly reached around and touched his chest. Despite your gentle and slow movements, he still jumped, and you shushed him softly. “I know, baby,” you whispered. “Tell me to stop and I will.” 

“Don’t stop,” Simon said, his voice a little higher than before. “Please don’t.” 

“I won’t,” you told him. Your fingers itched in his shirt, tugging it up a little high to expose the happy trail of thin hairs on his belly, leading down to where his hard cock strained at his jeans. Carefully, you helped him tug his shirt over his head, and you kissed the side of his face as you discarded his shirt. He was incredibly thin, his chest pale with just the sparsest hair speckling his skin, and you gently smoothed your hand down his chest to his jeans. He sighed heavily, almost like he was comforting himself, and you kissed the side of his head again. “We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” you whispered, and Simon shook his head quickly. 

“I want to,” he said. “I-I’m just nervous.”

“That’s alright,” you said. “I’ll be good to you.” You were quick to undo his jeans, and you snaked your hand inside his pants and down past his boxers to feel the burning skin of his cock, so impossibly hard. You sweetly kissed the side of his face as you withdrew your hand, and you pushed at his pants, trying to move them as far down as you could.

Simon got the message, thankfully, and he shoved his pants down his legs, kicking them off hastily. He seemed eager, and it eased you to know that he did really want this. Your hand lifted to his cheek, and you turned his head to look at you as you sealed your lips together again. Simon moaned softly, deep in his chest, and his hands lifted as he turned slightly to face you better. You expected him to go for your face, just how your hands were, but he quickly pawed at your tits instead. 

“C-Can I?” Simon asked, and you smiled. 

“Yes, baby, you can,” you told him, and Simon turned fully around and settled himself just above your tits, and his fingers worked to push your bra down. You went to help him, but he did it fully by himself, and his mouth attached to your nipple in an instant. You gasped in shock, but you still writhed beneath him when he sucked hard. “Oh my God, Si…Yes, baby, just like that. Do you still want me to touch you?” 

Simon grunted softly, nodding as he sucked at you, and you licked your palm before lowering your hand down to his cock again. This time, you wrapped your hand fully around him and slowly started to stroke him, and Simon’s mouth faltered around your nipple as he moaned.

“Good boy,” you whispered, smoothing his hair out of his face. Each stroke of his cock made Simon moan and buck his hips up into your fist, and you loved seeing the flush in his cheeks draw down onto his chest. “Here, baby, turn around,” you told him, and Simon gave a high whine when you tried to pull him away from your tits. “I know, baby, but I’ll be able to touch you easier if you turn around.” 

You almost didn’t hear what your baby said in response, something muffled against your tit, and you smirked when you finally understood it. “Say that again, baby,” you told him. “Because it sounded like you called me Mommy.” 

“M’sorry,” Simon said quickly. “I-I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s okay, baby, don’t worry,” you told him quickly. “I liked it. Call me that again.” 

Simon nodded quickly, and you swiped your thumb across the sensitive head of his cock to elicit a sound from him. Thankfully, he did as you wanted, and his words came in a mumble as he keened back against you: “Mommy, please…” 

“I will, sweet boy,” you told him, kissing his cheek. “Stop squirming, baby, let Mommy touch you all nice.” Your hand quickened on his cock, moving just a little faster, and Simon’s head fell back onto your shoulder as he moaned again. His hands were twitching by his sides, obviously wanting to touch you somehow, and your free hand reached down to take his. Your poor boy already looked close to cumming, what with the way that his hips bucked up to meet your hand with every stroke you gave him, and you squeezed his hand. “Are you getting close, baby?” 

“Yes,” Simon whined. “A-Are you gonna—”

“Just warn me before you cum, baby,” you told him, soothing whatever anxiety he had, and Simon nodded quickly. “You’re being so good for Mommy, such a good boy…” 

“This,” Simon started, and he moaned as your thumb smoothed over the head of his cock again. “Th-This isn’t how I thought this night would go.” 

“Me too, honey,” you told him. “But I like the way it’s turning out, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Simon laughed, and you let go of his hand to turn his face so that you could kiss him. His mouth was warm, already used to the feel of yours, and, as he kissed you, you could feel his cock twitch in your hand. “Mommy,” he mumbled. “I-I think I’m gonna cum.” 

“That’s it,” you told him. “Turn around, baby, I’ll let you suck my tits while you cum.” 

“Can I…” Simon began as he hastily turned back around to face you, his eyes zeroing in on your tits. “Can I cum on them?” 

You smiled at his boldness to even ask, and you reached behind yourself to undo your bra, and you tossed it across the room. “Be my guest, baby,” you told him, and you dragged him down into a kiss. He was open for you, your tongue pushing into his mouth in an instant, and he moaned into you as his own hand started on himself. 

“I’ve done this plenty,” Simon chuckled as he broke the kiss, and you giggled at him. “Never thought I’d do it with a pretty girl, especially one who saved my life earlier.” 

“You’re welcome for that, by the way,” you told him, and Simon smiled as one of his ginger waves fell into his eyes. “Your hair just won’t stay back, will it? Got a mind of its own.”

“You should see it in the morning,” Simon told you. “It’s all flat and it’s everywhere, it’s not good.”

“Maybe I will,” you said, and Simon’s eyes all but sparkled as he took in your words. 

“Y-You’ll stay?” he asked, and you nodded. He huffed out a pant as he neared his finish, and he said, “Cool. I’d like that.” 

“Good,” you said. “You gonna cum, baby?”

“Yeah,” Simon nodded. “And you promise you’re okay with…?”

“Yes, baby,” you told him, and you dragged him down into another kiss. “Please, Simon, I want it.” 

“A-And what would that be?” Simon asked, and you laughed. 

“Trying to be a little dominant,” you mused, and the blush in Simon’s cheeks grew deeper as he laughed with you. “Alright, we can try that.”

“Use your words,” Simon said, more of a caricature of dominance than actuality. “What do you want?”

The way that the same words had previously come out of your mouth made you laugh, and Simon smiled. “Cum on my tits, Simon. Please, baby, that’s all I want.”

“Good,” Simon mumbled, and his fist worked faster, hurrying to cum. “I-I’m… Fuck.” 

“Oh, you’re cursing now?” you laughed. “What happened to my sweet boy?” 

“Call me that again,” Simon said, his voice high with a whine, and you watched his legs and thighs jerk as he grew closer and closer. 

“My boy,” you told him. “Are you my boy, baby?” 

“Wanna be your boy,” Simon mumbled. “Wanna be your boy so bad.”

“You can be my boy,” you said. “If Roy gets to be with June, we can be together.” Fuck your code, you decided. If Roy could do it and not receive repercussions, then you could too.

“Yeah,” Simon whispered. “Oh, fuck, Mommy…” With one more tug on his cock, Simon’s mouth fell open and his eyes squeezed shut as he came. His cum spurted out in thick ribbons, landing on your chest, and the flush in his cheeks grew deeper still as he moaned. His breathing hitched in his chest as he gave you his release, and he finally fell down on top of you, exhausted and spent. You couldn’t help but smile in his mess of hair, and you kissed his temple. 

“Good boy,” you told him. “You’re my best boy, Si.” 

“Thank you, Mommy.” 

You were thankful that you and Simon were quick to shower and redress because, not even an hour later, Roy came into the room unannounced. Simon had fallen asleep in bed after his shower, wearing just his boxers and little white wife pleaser, and you had settled yourself back on the sofa, where everything started. 

“Anything eventful happen while I was gone?” Roy asked.

You shrugged, looking from the television to where Simon slept. “Nothing,” you told him. 

“What did you do?” Roy asked, sitting next to you. 

“Oh, you know,” you started, and laughed. “We fucked.”

Roy rolled his eyes. “Whatever, you’re making fun of me, I see it,” he said. 

Then, from across the room, you heard the high whine of your best boy, and your body froze as he spoke: “Come back to bed, Mommy, m’cold.” 

Favorite Customer: Edward Nashton x Gn!reader

description: (based off of this concept and this concept) Eddie's picking up shifts at the diner where he's quickly gained a favorite customer who comes in without fail, every saturday. when eddie though, is the one who fails to show up one saturday, his favorite customer realizes how much they enjoy his company, so they make an effort to make sure they'll never miss eddie again.

content: crushing!!! so much crushing!! eddie has a huge crush. no real established timeline (can be pre- riddler or riddler era eddie, whatever your heart desires!), lovesirck, nervous, stuttery eddie <33 (he's too cute) this fic is pretty much pure fluff! no real warnings to be given :)

word count: 4775

a/n: i have had THE biggest diner!eddie brainrot since i started discussing the concept a few days ago... him as a shy waitier with a favorite customer who he just adores :(( TOO CUTE... so here's a short little drabble while i work on some bigger fics.

-

Edward felt his chest tighten as he looked across the crowded diner, an increased foreboding feeling filled the space between his ribs. His stomach churned with a certain disquietude while laying his eyes on the sea of people surrounding him. Chattering customers sat about, making more noise than Eddie knew how to deal with, their incessant ranting and raving filling his brain to a capacity that he could not stand. He let out a shaky exhale, desperately preparing himself for the Saturday dinner rush that had already begun.

"Nashton!" An unnecessarily loud call came from directly behind him. He tried his best not to cringe at the sound, Edward could spot the voice of his shift supervisor anywhere, he loathed the sound of her thick New Jersey accent, and shrill, scratchy tone that could only be found in a woman who's been smoking for far too long. Her rough voice alone made Edward contemplate quitting his own nicotine addiction, not wanting to end up barely over 60 and already sounding like he's decaying. But with the anxiety caused by shifts like these, he found himself desperate for a cigarette. His long fingers lightly grazed the front pocket of his work pants, making sure the half-empty package of cigarettes still remained where he left it.

Edward turned around to face the voice, looking at his supervisor with a big, lost look plastered all over his face. He did little to hide the nameless dread that swarmed every cavity of his being, his low-hanging head, and god-awful posture all alluding to his negative state of mind.

"Ya regula' is here sweetheart, table 8, go make ya-self useful it's too busy for ya to just be standin' around like that."

At the announcement of his regular being there, Edward's entire demeanor changed. Suddenly he's standing up straight, and his eyes are wide and attentive, he'd hardly even noticed his supervisor's condescending tone. An involuntary smile crept on his face and his stomach began to do loops.

"Y-yes," Edward nodded, an overwhelming excitement threatened his stuttering voice.

Edward began to make his way over to table 8, the anxieties of the crowded diner slowly drifting away as he caught a glimpse of you from across the room. You were sitting there, with a strained look on your face as you hunched over a beat-up notebook. Edward worried you'd be able to feel his eyes burning into you from how intensely he was looking in your direction, but he couldn't help himself, he was infatuated with you.

Ever since he started picking up shifts at the diner on weekends to help out with rent he'd notice you come in every Saturday. You'd always come in on your own, sometimes with textbooks, or notebooks, maybe even a computer. Over the course of weeks spent serving you, he'd come to find out that sometimes you would come to the diner to study and as the two of you grew closer he'd even on occasion helped you out with your coursework. Usually on nights where it was late, and the diner had gone nearly empty, but you and he still remained, you'd let out a frustrated sigh, and Edward would ask to take a look at your work. Edward wasn't always the greatest in school- he was smart but too miserable to ever put in enough effort to apply himself properly. But you, you gave him the boost he needed and he was more than happy to put in as much work as necessary to show you his capabilities. That being said most of the time he did understand the work you were doing, and he'd sheepishly look around the diner, making sure no one else needed his help, and once he was in the clear he'd sit next to you and try not to stutter too hard while explaining whatever concept it was to you.

Those nights were Edward's favorite. You always looked so cute with that exasperated look on your face, asking Edward for help. Edward sort of liked the feeling of someone needing his help. Even if it was just for some schoolwork.

But, regardless of whether you were studying or not, every Saturday night without fail, you'd come in completely on your own. Edward always wondered what someone like you would be doing all on your own at a cheap diner on a Saturday evening, after all, Saturdays were for having fun, right? He'd wonder if you were lonely like he was, or if you just liked to take time to yourself. Maybe spending your night surrounded by rude, rowdy strangers was your idea of a fun Saturday night.

He wondered a lot about you actually, even outside of his Saturday shifts. He thought about you often, he couldn't help himself. Your weekly appearances made the job worthwhile, your pretty smile and sweet demeanor were Edward's escape from the usual verbal abuse and beratement he suffered at the hands of most of the customers while on the job. You treated Edward like he was real, like he was a person, your quick waiter-to-patron exchanges were warmer than any of the treatment he'd ever gotten in his life thus far.

So, when Edward had fallen ill last weekend after a co-worker at his day job had come into work with a nasty cold he was absolutely devastated he'd miss his weekly encounter with you. While Edward sat home, sick, fever overcoming his body, he continued to wonder. He wondered if you even noticed that he was missing, or if you were maybe even glad he wouldn't be bothering you tonight. He worried maybe you'd like your server tonight more than you liked him, maybe you'd gotten one of his more confident, more "conventionally attractive" co-workers as your server and maybe the two of you really hit it off.

The worries plagued his aching head until a calmer, more appealing part of his consciousness took over, one that dreamed up a fantasy of you sitting alone at a booth by the window, completely on your own, unhappy with tonight's waiter, missing him. The thought of you even just recognizing Edward's absence put a smile on his face. Of course, it also made him feel a little guilty, he didn't want you to be unhappy, only, unhappy regarding the fact you weren't with him.

But now, Edward was back, and in good health once again. He wiped his clammy palms against the thick fabric of his pants. His thighs tremble under the firm touch of his hands. Something catches your attention and you suddenly drop the pencil in your hand and look up from your notebook. Your head turns to the side and all of a sudden you and Edward are making eye contact, Edward feels his body go stiff as a large smile spreads across your face.

"Eddie!" You exclaim the moment he gets within a few feet of your table. Edward feels his heart begin to beat faster as the sound of your voice. He can't help but melt every time you call him Eddie, you were the only person who'd ever called him that.

"H-hi y/n," He smiles, approaching the small table.

"I missed you last week Eddie," You lean forward against the table, resting your chin in your hand. You noticed. Edward felt his breath get caught in his throat and he had to try to think really hard for a moment about how to remember to breathe. The way you looked up at him had him in a daze, the way the soft diner light's reflected off your eyes, and how this lighting perfectly flattered your skin. Edward had never in his life gazed at something so beautiful.

"Oh-oh yeah, someone at my other job got me sick so I couldn't come in."

"Aww, my poor Eddie." You whine, giving Edward an overexaggerated pout, looking up at him with big, sad, puppy-dog eyes. Edward's head begins to go a little fuzzy, who's Eddie? YOUR poor Eddie? Edward worries he may pass out, but the thought of how embarrassing it would be to faint right there in front of you is enough to keep his consciousness half-working. "You're feeling better now though, right?"

"Yeah, yeah- i-it was just a cold."

"Good," You smile, "I'm glad, it kind of sucked without you here, I was looking forward to seeing you and all- I even brought this really hard crossword puzzle I found in the newspaper for us to do together." A crossword puzzle? Together? Edward can't believe his ears. He's sure he looks absolutely insane right now, eyes blown wide, and his usually pale cheeks a deep, rosy pink.

"Did you um- finish it yourself?"

"No," You shake your head, "It's still on my coffee table." You let out a small, soft chuckle at the end of your sentence, and Edward swears he's fallen in love the instant the sound of your stifled laugh hits his ears. It's only been two weeks since he last saw you but god did he miss your voice.

"Well, if you bring it next time I'll do it with you." Edward nods before once again wiping his palms against his thighs. His hands tremble slightly as he tries to relieve them of some of the moisture they've accumulated from his nerves. It doesn't work. Edward's eyes quickly dart from you, to the notebook that's open in front of you, "What are you studying today?"

"I was really hoping you'd ask" You pick your head up from your hand, 'Remember how I was telling you how I was taking that forensics class?"

"Mhm." Edward rocks forward slightly.

"We're studying the Zodiac Killer right now, and as a challenge, my professor gave us the 408-cipher to try and solve for extra credit, and, god, this shit is hard." You let out an exasperated sigh.

Edward's face lights up upon hearing this news, excited that he now has the opportunity to help you out with something he knows he's good at.

"Do you want me to take a look at it when I get my break?" Edward asks, trying his best to not talk too loud or too forcefully out of pure eagerness.

"Would you please, Eddie?" And there you go again, looking up at Edward with those soft, sweet eyes, and he's weak in the knees now.

"Of course," He nods eagerly. Just then he's startled by the feeling of someone's hand on his shoulder. His body flinches slightly, caught off guard by the sudden sensation.

"Hey- hurry it up Nashton, you've got other customers waiting." Edward turns to see one of his fellow waiters standing behind him. Edward's jaw clenches tight in frustration at both being touched and being interrupted. Edward stares the man down, a long string of expletives brew in his vocal cords and he bites down on his tongue to stop himself from saying something that would get him fired or even worse make you upset. His teeth are puncturing his tongue so hard that a slight metallic taste seeps into his taste buds.

"Sorry." Edward barely mumbles out through gritted teeth. Who does he think he is, interrupting such a moment? Edward quickly turns back to face you, your brows furrowed slightly at the waiter who'd just reprimanded him. "Oh-uh I should probably take your order. The usual?"

"Yes please," Your expression quickly softens to a smile as the other waiter leaves your presence. You hand Edward back the menu the hostess had placed at your table, "You know me so well."

"I'll get that to you as fast as I can," Edward says, taking the menu back from you, rocking forward back and forth slightly on the balls of his feet.

"No rush Eddie." You assure.

-

It had been nearly two hours since Edward had cleared the dishes from your table, and you still sat there, in that booth, nose down in your notebook. Edward stared at you from across the diner, admiring your every move, he felt a little creepy but he just could not take his eyes off of you. A faint smile grazed upon his small pink lips as your brows knitted together and you let out what seemed to look like a sigh.

The diner had cleared out substantially as the late-night dinner rush faded into the early hours of the morning.

"You can take ya' 30 now Nashton," his supervisor said, pushing past his shoulder with a mostly empty coffee pot in hand. He nodded in response, despite no longer being within the woman's line of sight.

Edward makes his way over to the dessert case that sits right at the front of the diner. He slides open the case and takes out a slice of pumpkin pie that sits on one of the shelves, before heading to your table. Edward places the glass plate down and it rattles against the plastic tabletop, before taking his place on the seat opposite you with no warning. Your head popped up from your notebook immediately as you heard the sound of someone in front of you.

"Edward!" You said with a small gasp, "You startled me."

"Oh- I'm sorry." Edward frowns, his cheeks flush, hoping he hasn't upset you too greatly.

"It's no bother," You shake your head, "Come sit next to me," you scoot yourself over in the booth and pat the cheap pleather next to you.

Edward is quick to get up from his spot- anxiously taking the opportunity to get at least a little bit closer to you.

"Is this for me?" You smile, pointing at the slice of pumpkin pie that sits in front of you.

"Yeah, it's on me."

"You're too sweet to me Eddie," You say grabbing the plate and bringing it towards you. "You want to share?"

"No, it's okay, only if you don't finish it." He shakes his head and puts up his hands, motioning that you can keep the pie to yourself.

"Okay," you pause, "Should we get started?"

"Mhm."

-

"See? You got it." Edward said handing you back your pencil. "And this shape here... this would also be..." His voice trailed off as he extended a long finger to point at a square-like shape on the cipher.

"L...?" You asked, looking over to Edward for reassurance.

"Exactly! See? It's easy." his voice full of nothing but adoration and praise.

"Easy to you Eddie, you're like... a genius." You giggle. Edward's cheeks begin to turn a soft shade of red in response to your compliment.

"Oh," He sighs and shakes his head, "Not a genius, look, you did most of the work."

"With your help Eddie."

Edward's entire body gets hot and he can feel your eyes on him, he can't think of anything to say, no words will come out. You sound so kind, so appreciative, it has Edward in a trance. He's almost glad that his words are stuck in his throat, worrying that if somehow, someway they were able to climb their way out of his mouth he'll say something dumb. In a weak attempt to escape your unrelenting gaze Edward glances downwards and while doing so gets a quick look at the watch that wraps around his wrist. The ticking minute and second hands instill dread within him as he looks down at their surface.

"Shit." He sighs, "My break ended 5 minutes ago."

You frown, "Well, I'm not leaving until I finish this cipher, so, I'll probably still be here when you get off."

"Alright," Edward looks back up and pushes his glasses back up his nose, glancing back up at you he notices a sudden change in your face, your brows hang lower and your mouth points downwards. He can't quite explain the way your look makes him feel but he knows its not good. Edward looks around, noticing the lingering customers that are still scattered about. It's not that many people, he sighs "I- I'll be around a few more times." He sets his hands on the table and nods reassuringly.

"Okay," You respond in a hushed voice, barely above a whisper. Edward usually loves to hear your voice, but not now, you sound dejected, disappointment radiates off those two little syllables and he's well aware he's the one who caused it. Edward tilts his head as he looks at you, the corners of his mouth involuntarily falling just as yours had done seconds prior.

"You've got this," he barely lifts his finger to point towards your open notebook, he gives you a wholehearted smile, cheering you on in an attempt to hopefully lift that frown off your face.

"Thanks, Eddie." Your lips perk up slightly in a small smile, and Edward is relieved slightly that he is able to make at least a tiny change to your disappointed appearance.

He wants to stay sat down, helping you with the rest of the cipher, praising you every single time you get something right. He wants nothing more than to sit next to you for the rest of the night, and he contemplates just saying fuck it and doing just that. But the rational part of Edward's brain knows he can't risk getting fired, can't risk losing this job, and in the long run spending an extra few hours with you was not worth losing out on potential weeks' worth of diner visits.

So, unwillingly, he begins to send himself back to reality, away from your warmth and delight. He looks back around, noticing that the old couple that has been harping on him all night is still sitting at a booth in the far corner of the diner. A long breath falls from his lips, wishing that all of his customers could be as sweet as you, greeting him with a kind smile and attentive eyes. But even then Edward knows no one could ever compare, he knows he would never get as much pleasure from serving anyone as he does you. You were an experience he could not find anywhere else, and that's why it pained him so much to once again leave you alone in this booth, left to try and solve this cipher on your own.

Edward slowly stands up from the table, his hands warily pushing into its surface, reluctantly supporting him as he makes his depart.

"I'll be back soon," He smiles, stepping out of the booth.

"See you, Eddie."

-

A brisk wind hits Edward's face as he takes a step out of the overwhelming confines of the diner, slipping out into the dark Gotham streets. He sighs as he leans up against the building, his fingers slipping into his pocket to fish for the battered cigarette package. His hand wraps around the flimsy cardboard and takes it out of the tight confines of his trousers, flipping open the top and taking out a cigarette. He places the long, slender stick in his mouth before placing the package of cigarettes back in his pocket, and searching for his lighter in the other one. The cigarette sits between his teeth as both of Edward's hands come up close to his face, one cupped around his mouth to protect the impending flame from the wind, and the other holding his lighter, ready to strike. A calloused finger flicks down on the cold, metal flint, eliciting a bright orange flame from the cheap green lighter. The soft glow from the flame casts a small amount of warmth against Edward's face as he lights the end of his cigarette.

Edward inhales the warm smoke, letting the cool taste of menthol coat his mouth and throat, his prior urge to quit dissipates just as quickly as the smoke that exits his mouth does when it hits the wind. Edward's vaguely aware of each inhale's toxicity, but people fill their bodies with garbage every day, so really, how much more harm could a cigarette be doing?

Edward suddenly turns around, startled by the rattling of the diner door behind him. His gaze now falls upon you, who's just exited the diner, bag full of books slung over your shoulder, ready to leave. Your sudden appearance catches Edward way off guard, causing him to stifle his inhale, the smoke getting stuck in his throat. The once comforting warmth is now burning as he begins to viciously cough, nearly dropping his cigarette in the process. You stand there next to him, a vaguely worried look on your face.

"You alright, Eddie?" You ask, tiliting your head to the side.

"Yeah-yeah," Edward barely chokes out after a few more coughs, his face flushed with embarrassment. Finally, he catches his breath and straightens himself out, and a more relieved look washes over your face.

"I finished the cipher." You state, "I- uhh- I left a copy of it on the table- right next to your tip- if you wanted to take a look at it."

"Of course I do," His face lights up, "That's good. I told you you could do it." Edward's free hand taps anxiously at his side, his fingers pattering at the fabric of his pants.

"Well," You look down at your feet, a shy smile tugging at your lips, "It was mostly you, Eddie."

Edward wonders why you're being so bashful, you should be proud of yourself.

"Don't discount your work, I merely just helped,"

"I guess." You shrug, "Well- I just thought I'd let you know it's there for you on the table, I didn't know if you're staying 'til close- but I'm getting pretty tired so I figured I should go."

"No-uh-yeah that's alright, I still have a bit left on my shift." Edward nods incessantly. "Thank you for letting me know."

"Of course Eddie." You smile, "Goodbye," You shift towards Edward slightly and open your arms. He freezes for a minute, all of his joints simultaneously feeling like they've just locked up. He needs to take a second to process what your open arms are inviting before he anxiously opens his up slightly too.

Your arms find themselves on his torso, just barely giving his upper body a squeeze. Edward is completely thrown off guard, you've never hugged him before. He wants nothing more than to throw his arms around you, pull you into a bone-crushing embrace, and show you the full force of his affections. But he stops himself, only wrapping one arm fully around your back, and the one with the cigarette loosely around you, keeping it stuck out slightly to keep the flame away from your body.

Even in your friendly embrace, Edward can't help but admire the warmth that radiates off of you. Not just physical body heat, but the way your arms hold him, and your headrests just gently on his shoulder, no one has ever handled him with such delicacy. He couldn't even tell you the last time he had a hug, years probably, and one like this? Literally never.

"Goodbye." He choked

He desperately suppressed the urge to tell you how much this meant to him, to get comfortable in your arms, to let you hold him there- but Edward knew this was no more than a friendly goodbye hug between two acquaintances. Your arms slowly pulled away from him as a small yawn escaped from your mouth. He couldn't even be disappointed at the sensation of you letting him go, the afterglow of even the simplest affection, was so heavy on his face.

"See you soon!" You wave, beginning to step away from Edward.

"Please be safe." He urges, unable to not worry about the possibilities of wandering around Gotham late at night.

"I will Eddie," You sport a content grin across your face as you turn around and walk away. Edward's gaze follows you down the sidewalk until he sees you get into a car that he presumes is yours.

He brings his cigarette back to his lips, inhaling, desperate for some relief now that his mind is once again moving at a million miles a second. The nicotine does little to calm him down now, still all too stunned from your sweet goodbye. If anyone were to pass by now he'd surely look like a madman, his body entirely stiff and locked up, smiling like an absolute maniac. But he didn't have half the mind to even care about his perception to other people because you hugged him. How could he ever possibly stop thinking about that? How could literally anything else in his life matter?

Edward quickly finishes his smoke, eager to see your work on the Zodiac cipher. What remains of the cigarette falls from Edward's fingers and onto the cold, hard ground below. He steps over the dwindling flame, crushing the cigarette with the heel of his boot and scraping the rubber sole against the rough pavement to make sure it's been put out. He anxiously steps back inside where he b-lines right to your table. The first thing he notices is a generous $15 tip, way over 20% for your meal. The sight of the wet bills sitting under a cup covered in tiny droplets of condensation brings a small smile to Edward's face, even though it makes him feel a little shallow.

Next to the bills, however, Edward notices a copy of the Zodiac cipher penciled out on the same notebook paper you had been using, on a separate sheet, the answer to the cipher, both of which he'd expected to see. However, Edward is slightly caught off-guard by a third sheet of paper, containing the same symbols of the 408 cipher, but of a different length in order, with a simple"Solve me :)" scribbled at the top.

Edward quickly realizes that you've left him your own cipher to solve, and he's even more excited now than he was before, just getting to see your solution to the Zodiac cipher. But now you're actually partaking in a puzzle for him to figure out? Could you get any more perfect? Edward's chest moves so rapidly, his breathing so present, that he's positive that it could probably be heard from tables away.

Despite all his eagerness to immediately drop everything and begin to decipher your message, he can hear his supervisor calling his name from across the diner. He gives out a shaky sigh, collecting the things from the table before returning to his job.

-

It's after 2 a.m. and Edward's finally home, his aching back hunched over his large wooden desk, papers sprawled throughout, illuminated only by a single, blinding lamp. He chews on his lip as he scribbles out the last remaining letters of your cipher before stepping back to read your work.

To my favorite waiter,

I know you love puzzles, so I wanted to try my hand at one I hope it's not too easy to solve, when you get the answer, give me a call!

The cipher then spelled out a series of ten single-digit numbers. Edward's pen fell right out of his hand straight onto the ground and his jaw went slack once he put everything together. Those numbers spelled out a phone number your phone number. You wanted him to call you. HIM!

Edward runs a hand through his sandy-blonde hair, lightly tugging on the strands as his fingers pass through in pure disbelief. Had his apartment always been this warm? His vision always been this blurry? Anxious fingers fumble towards his back pocket, quickly whipping out his phone. His hands are visibly shaking as he holds his phone out in front of him, typing the numbers onto the keypad. His nervous shakes causing him to hit the wrong number more than once.

Once he finally has the number down he sits there, staring at his bright screen reflecting back onto his face. He's lost, he has no clue what to do. You said to call him... but what if you're asleep? It is pretty late. What if it's a cruel joke and that's not even your real number? What if he says something stupid and embarrasses himself. Edward is at a loss, but he can't give up this opportunity, no way.

Edward screws his eyes shut tight, fuck it, he presses the bright green call button that shines in his face. The phone begins to ring, each high pitched toll feels like a growing mockery of Edward's own anxieties.

And finally, the ringing stops, the line picks up. Edward's heart drops down to his stomach.

"H-hello," He stutters into the speaker.

"Eddie!" A familiar voice says on the other side, comfort reigns over Edward as his body finally slumps back into his chair, "You called!"

𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙄 𝙡𝙤𝙫𝙚, 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙄 𝙡𝙚𝙛𝙩 𝙗𝙚𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙙 || the riddler/edward nashton x reader

𝙨𝙪𝙢𝙢𝙖𝙧𝙮 || for the most part, you've managed to let go of the life you lived so long ago, fighting to survive in an orphanage with your best friend at your side; you thought it was the only way to cope with the trauma and move on so you could start living in better means. but the cost of selling out is higher than you thought, and lying to yourself is harder than lying to everyone else. good thing there's a new vigilante in town who really, really hates lies.

𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙙 𝙘𝙤𝙪𝙣𝙩 || 15k (yeah.... strap in y'all)

𝙬𝙖𝙧𝙣𝙞𝙣𝙜𝙨 || SMUT (penetrative sex, loss of virginity, emotional sex, slightly dom!edward), best friends to strangers to lovers, some reader x male oc stuff, explicit violence/murder, minor character death, mentions of previous childhood abuse, bullying, stalking (implied), voyeurism, ANGST!!, hurt/comfort, young reader and young edward doing kid stuff (and sometimes adult stuff but it's not explicit), somewhat non-linear timeline, possessiveness, overall just a lot of emotions

𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙨 𝙛𝙞𝙘 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙩𝙖𝙞𝙣𝙨 𝙖𝙙𝙪𝙡𝙩 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙣𝙩, 𝙢𝙞𝙣𝙤𝙧𝙨 𝙙𝙤 𝙣𝙤𝙩 𝙞𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙖𝙘𝙩

Everything is so oppressively cold and damp; your fingers are pruned just from the moisture in the air, but your lips are somehow still chapped from dehydration.

You would think that stripping naked would go against all instinct in a cold like this, but the rags you call clothes don’t do anything for you anyways. They can’t keep in warmth you don’t have, all they do is shield you from the wintery draft blowing through the crack in the wall.

But something else can do that, and so you strip to nothing but your barest of undergarments, and join him under the blanket— it’s thin, but it’s wool, so it does the trick. There aren’t enough of them for everyone, and you try to forget what you did to get yours. You’re both so freezing that at first it doesn’t do much, but over the course of the hour your combined body heat is just enough to fight off the chill. He holds you tighter the first time you relax from the growing warmth; your teeth finally stop chattering.

It’s too cold to sleep, but neither of you are really awake, either— embracing each other and living in that in-between state where there are no dreams but real life isn’t too close, either. Tears run down the bridge of your nose, into the crook of his neck where you’ve buried your face, and it’s by far the warmest thing either of you have felt in days.

“Why are you crying?” he whispers. Even just his voice can soothe you.

“Don’t leave me, Eddie,” you whisper back. “Don’t ever leave me… we need to always be together. Promise me.”

“We will always be together,” he assures, hand tightening on your shoulder. “Always, always, always.”

You startled awake from the dream, already crying. Ironically, you were sweating— you threw off the blanket and felt the blast of air from the ceiling fan above on your sticky skin. It made you shiver.

You never thought you’d miss the cold.

The man beside you stirred awake with a groan. “Are you okay?” he asked groggily.

“Y-yeah, I’m fine, baby,” you assured, giving his arm a squeeze with your hand before you sat up on the edge of the bed, “I just need a shower. Go back to sleep.”

“I should go, actually,” he decided, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. “Denise is probably wondering where I am.”

You looked back over your shoulder and noticed the way the ring on his finger catches the light, even when there’s so little in your bedroom at midnight.

The door shut across your apartment while you were in the shower; you just barely heard it past the sound of hot water streaming past your ears. You tried not to think about what you did to afford a living space so large; you tried not to think about why you were so desperate for a taste of luxury.

But some nights, you can’t keep the memories down. Some nights, it’s like he’s right around the corner of your mind— and you just want to reach around and touch his fingers with yours. Some nights, love is almost enough to make you wish for the past, because even though things got so, so, so much better and you’re never hungry or cold… they got so much harder, too.

Always always always.

Some nights, you let yourself wish he’d kept that promise.

~

You’d been sipping on your champagne pretty much non-stop all night, social lubricant to help you tolerate the bustle of cocktail party guests crowding your home, but you stopped as your loitering took you by the window and you caught a glimpse down into the street— children, playing in the snow. They reached right into it with their little hands wrapped in mittens, pressing it into globes in their palms and chucking them at each other, chasing and running around.

Chet’s hand on your lower back didn’t even get your attention, you were so used to it by now. “What’s got you thinking so hard, beautiful?” he wondered with a jovial, tilted smile.

“What are they doing?” you asked, looking at him quickly— his hair was getting longer, and grayer at his temples, but it looked good slicked back— before returning your gaze to the scene below.

“What, the kids?” he clarified as he followed your line of sight. “Sweetheart, they’re having a snowball fight.”

He laughed a little, softly, but he stopped and wrinkled his brows when he realized you weren’t joking.

“You’ve really never had a snowball fight before?” he tilted his head. You understood, then, that if you talked anymore about this that you’d make him confused and concerned and that wasn’t what you wanted to do. Over time, you gained a talent for sensing that you were about to make people uncomfortable with the reality of your childhood— Chet knew you were adopted out of the Wayne House for Orphaned Children, at least, but very few others did.

“I guess it’s just been too long,” you dismissed with a nervous laugh.

"Yeah, it's been a few years since it snowed," he recalled. "Do you remember that one winter, record lows in Gotham for the past hundred years or something? Oh, it must’ve been almost ten years back— I can’t remember what year it was exactly, but the whole city got a foot of snow, and almost half of downtown lost power.”

You threw back the rest of your champagne in one go, but it tasted more sour at the back of your throat than you remembered.

“Everybody was having fun the first day, my kids made a snowman,” he remembered with a laugh. I wasn’t having fun the first day, you wished you could snarl at him. “But then it got old fast, thankfully our side of the city never lost power— and we had a back-up generator, just in case.”

A friend of Chet’s appeared beside the two of you, the cigar in his hand emanating a noxious odor; you hated the smell of cigars because it reminded you of your “father” as he was legally considered— the man who took you out of the orphanage for his own twisted benefit. Turns out a rich man isn’t likely to adopt a sixteen-year-old girl with nowhere else to go out of the goodness of his heart.

“Surprised to see you standing by a window,” the man addressed Chet with a hearty laugh, “with that Riddler going after politicians— aren’t you afraid of getting sniped?”

“Don’t make me laugh, Hugh,” Chet replied. “I’d love to see him try— I’ve never had a good excuse to use that fingerprint-activated gun safe under my bed. I wish that punk would give me a chance.”

“You should be more worried about standing at an open window with me,” you joked, and both of them laughed.

“Aw, baby, you know I can’t help but show you off,” Chet cooed as he wrapped his heavy arm around your shoulders left bare by your dress. “Especially when you’re wearing what I bought you— doesn’t she look gorgeous?” he addressed Hugh. “Don’t I have great taste?”

“In dresses, or mistresses?” Hugh wondered. “Oh, doesn’t matter— the answer’s yes either way. It’s just a shame you don’t share.”

“That’s sweet of you to say, Mr. Haverford,” you returned bashfully, “but I don’t think the dress would fit you.”

Hugh and Chet laughed; you were good at this part, the ‘charming girlfriend of the respected senator’ thing. It was an open secret in this corner of society that Chet played the role of a family man for the cameras but kept you on the side as his plaything. Sometimes he said he loved you, but you figured he just loved how owning you made him feel about himself. And he wasn’t cruel, not sadistic or excessively controlling, and he gave you a great life in exchange for your companionship and silence. Your apartment, for example.

Well… it wasn’t really your apartment, it was his apartment, that you lived in. The apartment he bought specifically for you to wait for him in, specifically as a place where he could meet you in private and use your body and vent about the stress of his facade.

You didn’t know if Denise, his wife, knew. Chet seemed to imply that she didn’t since he always told you about coming up with ridiculous alibis for time he’d spent with you; but you wondered how she couldn’t have figured it out by now, when you’d met so many of his friends, so many of her friends…

If she really didn’t know, that was almost sadder than if she did and just pretended not to. But you tried not to think about her… and Chet certainly spent most of his time with you not thinking about her. I just need to get my mind off things, he’d tell you often, and that was his way of saying he wanted to lay back on the couch with his arms and legs spread wide while you got on your knees and sucked him off. That’s also what he meant when he said I’ve got a headache or is that new lipstick you’re wearing? or remember when I bought you that bracelet?

Now that you thought about it, about half of what Chet said to you really was just code for ‘I want a blowjob.’

“Maybe it’s about time to kick all these people out,” he mumbled to you, squeezing your waist for a moment, “end this re-election campaign afterparty a little early, hm?”

That was code for ‘I want to fuck you.’

~

Chet said goodnight to the last of the guests shuffling out the door as you finished rinsing out glasses in the sink. “Thanks for coming out,” he nodded at them, shutting the door behind them and letting out a long sigh when the apartment plunged to silence again.

You heard him coming up behind you, but pretended to be surprised when he started to rub your arms, kissing your neck playfully.

“You look so beautiful tonight, sweetheart,” he mumbled, starting to move one of the rhinestone-coated straps of your dress down your shoulder. “You always look nice in the things I pick out for you.”

“Mm, I do,” you hummed in agreement, drying the champagne flute and setting it aside so you could focus your attention on melting into his strong embrace.

“You need some diamond earrings,” he decided as he kissed the shell of your ear for emphasis. “These rubies are nice, but a girl like you needs diamonds all over.”

“Stoooop,” you whined playfully, purring as his hands moved to your hips, pulling you back into him.

“A girl like you needs a diamond on her finger,” he added, his voice even lower, squeezing your left hand. You gasped and turned around, looking up at him with wide eyes.

“Chet, you’re not serious,” you assumed.

“Oh, I am,” he insisted. “I wish I could give it all to you now— but re-election is the worst time for things like this, even though all I really want is to be with you. Believe me, I’m gonna divorce her and I’m gonna marry you, after I win and after that moralist vigilante is thrown into Arkham.”

“Batman?” you furrowed your brows.

“No, that Riddler guy,” he corrected.

You rolled your eyes. “Are you really worried about him?”

“Obviously not,” he scoffed, “but still, a psycho who posts crazy videos online and doesn’t like politicians… I don’t know anything past what I read in the papers, but I bet he’s not a fan of guys like me getting girls like you— cause he could never get a girl like you.”

No, you figured someone hellbent on exposing corruption and manipulation was not likely to be sympathetic to a man nearing his sixties with a much-younger mistress running on the platform of family values. It was too bad the man who adopted you had died peacefully in his sleep three years ago, or maybe a man like the Riddler would’ve given him a little suffering for doing what he did to you— for making the money he made selling the pictures he took, for barely managing to wait until you were eighteen to essentially trade you to Chet in exchange for his support on a tax break bill.

You wondered if he would target someone like you, though, for being complicit in so much. You hid so much more than yourself in this apartment… you kept a lot more secrets than just an affair.

“Is that really why you think he does it?” you wondered aloud. “Jealousy?”

“Baby, let me tell you something,” he began, raising an eyebrow and wearing a somewhat condescending smirk. “Everything is about sex.”

You snorted out a nervous laugh.

“I’m serious,” he insisted, “everything men do— it always has something to do with women. And guys like that, who need to hide behind a mask… well, if they didn’t have to do it to get women, they wouldn’t do it, that simple.”

“You think Batman puts on a mask to get women?” you giggled.

“I think whoever he is, he must not have what it takes to attract attention with the mask off,” he asserted confidently. “He’s probably not ugly, but I bet he’s broke.”

“You think women can be bought?” you said, only letting an acceptable amount of your irritation seep into your tone— you were trying to be the amount of offended that a guy like Chet saw as a sexy challenge, rather than an actual threat.

“I think women like power,” he offered instead, pulling you closer. “Who doesn’t?”

You smiled, looking up into his eyes and then down at his lips. “I think I’d like you even if you weren’t such a big, important politician.”

He let out a proud little groan and kissed you; you were amazed that he fell for that. He was so logical, cynical even, and yet he believed any lie you told that was flattering.

He carefully pulled you along with him, both of you stumbling out of the kitchen and across the apartment— straight to the bedroom, of course. You were laughing together, somewhat mischievously, as you navigated by memory through the dark and toppled onto the mattress.

His weight on top of you would be crushing if you weren’t used to it; he wasn’t quite fat, per se, though he was medically at risk of being overweight. He was just sort of massive, towering and thick everywhere with a stubbiness to his form everywhere you looked… cock included, the one rubbing up against your inner thigh as he writhed on top of you.

Acting like you had sexual desire for him was one of the easiest parts of all of this, just because it was the most feignable emotion. What you couldn’t fake was physical desire— you had to close your eyes and retreat into your mind to find something stimulating enough to get your body prepared for this.

There wasn’t any one person or idea that you turned to in search of arousal, no handsome actor or erotica sampling or kinky pornography you’d committed to memory; it was more just… ideas.

Warm, safe. Loved. Whole.

You felt your panties sliding down your thighs, you heard a groan from above you. “You want me that bad, beautiful?” he purred. “You’re so wet…”

“Yeah, baby, all for you,” you cooed.

He pushed the skirt of your dress up higher and flopped back down on top of you; you winced when he slipped inside you, not reaching very deep but thick enough to give you a little sting when you weren’t expecting it.

Chubby fingers slid your loose strap down lower, exposing half of your chest, and he sighed as he groped your breast with a clammy palm.

“So fucking gorgeous,” he praised. You had trouble taking comments like that personally. Beauty felt so passive for you.

The room was dark, the only light coming in from the living room through the open bedroom door; it cast a big orange rectangle on the wall just past where you could see over Chet’s padded shoulder. You wrapped your arms around him and held onto his suit jacket as he grunted into your ear.

Your eyes fell shut, and the concepts in your mind started to narrow in and gain specificity, culminating towards something you couldn’t describe.

Shared secrets. Ink smudges on your fingers. Scraped knees wrapped in bandages, tears wiped away.

Clutching tighter at his clothes, you whimpered aloud— and he seemed fine believing it was because of how he was making you feel and not because of your runaway memories.

Soft hands gripping at your back, pulling you closer and holding you steady. A language only the two of you speak. The plastic rim of eyeglasses bumping into the side of your face. Always always always.

“Oh god,” you moaned aloud.

“Yeah, you like that?” Chet chuckled proudly.

You hadn’t been expecting to hear his voice, even though he was the only man you’d been with for years; the realization made you shoot your eyes open.

The shape on the wall was now a big orange rectangle… with the shadow of a man inside it.

You were so paralyzed you couldn’t even gasp, you couldn’t breathe at all. Chet’s head was in the way, you couldn’t look at the door and see who was standing there, watching you; for some reason, your instincts didn’t tell you to alert Chet to the ominous presence… you just laid there and let him keep going, because that was basically your whole fucking purpose.

“Kiss me,” you breathed, and Chet sat up slightly to hover above you with a self-congratulatory smile.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he pouted, mocking you, before he leaned down and gave you a hungry, sloppy kiss. When it ended naturally a few moments later, you guided his head to rest on the other side of yours— which gave you the freedom you needed to turn your head and look at the man standing at your door, while you felt Chet’s thrust gain speed and lose accuracy (not that they had a lot of that to begin with…).

You’d guessed it based on the jagged edges of his shadow, and at his presence in a time like this, but you were still shocked to see the Riddler standing there— cast in a golden glow from behind, his face impossible to make out while he was backlit like this. Obviously, his face wouldn’t do you much good when it was masked, but for some reason you wished you could see his eyes… you thought maybe it would make his visage less viscerally haunting, give him some humanity; right now, he looked preternatural, otherworldly, when all you could see of him was a vaguely human shape in tones of muddy brown and deep black. Two things stood out in his appearance when he was lit like this: one, the roll of silver duct tape in his hand, which reflected the light rather obviously; and two, the clear plastic frames around his unseeable eyes, which seemed to almost glow with the light shining behind them, though they too disappeared into blackness in the middle with everything else.

There were a few logical responses for you to choose from: scream for Chet to get his gun, scream at him to leave, scream with no particular goal besides expression of terror.

Instead the terror just stayed inside, and you couldn’t look away, and you felt it all building and swirling and making pins and needles wash over your body in waves. You choked on your breath; and the two of you just stared at each other. Shame hit you just as much as sick pleasure at the knowledge that this man was watching you be ravaged by someone else’s husband, by a father and elected official and the man who swore to crack down on prostitution and get ‘whores’ off the streets.

But he had one in his bed. A tear rolled down your temple; you hated yourself, then, as much as the Riddler must have hated you seeing the living hypocrisy you were. Seeing the way you’d debased yourself for a scrap of luxury. But if he knew— if he knew what you’d been through and where you came from and why you spread your legs just to stay off the streets— he’d understand.

Too bad the only person who could ever understand probably still hated you… if he was still alive.

The invisible, overwhelming stare of a terrorist— and the crushing self-awareness you spent most of your waking moments running from like a track star— was having an… unexpected effect on you.

“Oh, fuck, are you close, sweetheart?” Chet groaned loudly. “I can feel your little pussy squeezing me…”

Well, any chance you had of not giving away to this terrifying stranger that you were about to come from being watched by him was out the window.

“I’m close, too,” he continued, “I’m gonna come so deep inside you.”

Not that deep, but, sure. Live your dream, pal. “I— I want you to,” you gasped.

“I want you to come first,” he insisted. Wow, what a gentleman… it was almost like you didn’t fake your orgasms nearly every other time.

You honestly tried not to give in, you already felt horrifically vulnerable with this man watching you, and now he was about to watch you come. He was about to make you come, without even touching you. Or saying a word.

“Come on and come for me,” Chet encouraged— but as you and the man in the doorway contemplated each other, you were sure that he knew you were really coming for him. For some fucking reason.

Your moans got sharper, louder, needier; after being frozen for so long that you would’ve worried he were a statue if not for his heavy breathing, the Riddler stepped forward into the room. You heard every step of his boots as he circled the room and came to stand by the side of your bed, staring down at you much more closely, but Chet didn’t seem to notice… apparently he was distracted at the moment.

“Oh, fuck,” you whimpered, tears welling in your eyes as you looked up at the faceless man above you; he tilted his head and you felt your channel clench even tighter. “I—!”

You didn’t get a chance to finish your warning as the heat hit you like a paradoxically-pleasant suckerpunch right to the gut. You choked out a loud, pathetic whimper and went limp beneath Chet’s broad form.

His own grunts got louder and louder, erratic thrusts culminating in one rough slam of his hips against yours as he came inside you. “Fuck, sweetheart,” he sighed, sinking his weight down into you, “you’re amazing…”

The Riddler raised his arm and you realized he was brandishing a massive metal pipe in his hand, preparing to bring it down on the back of Chet’s head. You tried to reach up to stop him, but the man on top of you was too wide and heavy to give you that much mobility, and you winced as the weapon came down with a clang.

“Damn it,” you hissed, shoving on Chet’s shoulders, but the dead weight of an unconscious two-hundred-pound man was well past your strength ability. “Will you help get this guy off me?”

The intruder reached down and grabbed Chet by his jacket, both of you heaving to turn him over on the bed.

“He was about to fall asleep,” you explained with a groan as you rushed to cover yourself, pushing your dress back down over your legs and sitting up on the side of the bed. “You could’ve waited and saved yourself the trouble of knocking him out— you’re gonna have to wait a while for him to wake up if you want the combination to the safe, I don’t know it.”

You stood up and noticed his head was tilted down— the light finally gave you enough of a look at his eyes and they were pointed down at your chest. You glanced down with him and realized your dress was still pulled down.

“Shit,” you grumbled as you corrected your strap and covered yourself. “Thanks for letting me know my tits were out, Jesus,” you snapped sarcastically. “You already got a free show, get a grip.”

You brushed past him and he was still just standing there, so you turned around and crossed your arms.

“Well, aren’t you gonna use that tape for something?” you shrugged. “By the way— lead pipe, really? Is this fucking Clue? The Riddler in the bedroom with the lead pipe?”

“You’re in no place to question my methods,” he spoke, finally, and unrolled a long stretch of tape with a sticky, tearing noise.

~

You tapped the eraser end of your pencil rapidly on your open notebook, desperately hoping for the energy to focus on Mrs. Gilliam’s lecture on Wuthering Heights. You jumped slightly in your seat when you felt something brush against your back through your shirt— you waited until the teacher turned her back to write on the chalkboard to reach behind and grab the piece of paper.

When you unfolded it, the letters were randomized and made no sense… to anyone except you. You smiled as you turned your pencil around and began to work to solve the cipher. It only took you probably less than a minute, and you grinned when you read the decoded message:

IF I DIE OF BOREDOM IN FRESHMAN ENGLISH, BURY ME UNDER THE BLEACHERS

Just as you started to snort a laugh, you covered it with a cough and no one seemed to notice.

“Now, two of the most important themes of Wuthering Heights are childhood, and love,” the teacher continued. “You should all have a pretty good understanding of the first one, but, whether you believe it or not, you’re a little too young for the second.”

You flipped the page over and started working on your code for the other side; it came to you like second nature now, it was how you and Eddie kept your secrets in a place like the Wayne Orphanage where there was never really privacy.

I WANT TO FIND ONE OF THESE WUTHERING HEIGHTS AND JUMP OFF, your message offered in reply, if he could find the key— which he would, quickly, you imagined.

You folded the paper up and turned to pass it behind you, but you jumped in shock when Mrs. Gilliam was suddenly standing right in front of you, having appeared out of nowhere.

“O-oh, we were just—” you began to make up an excuse on the fly.

“Principal’s office, both of you,” she ordered with crossed arms.

“Wait, it was my fault,” Eddie insisted, “she didn’t do anything.”

“Except write a note to you? I have eyes, Mr. Nashton.” She rolled them for emphasis.

She snatched the paper from your hands and unfolded it; you instinctively reached to try to stop her, but sat back down when you realized it was useless.

“Wow, riveting stuff,” she spoke sarcastically as she displayed the paper for the class. “Random letters? No wonder you’re not interested in English class, you apparently can’t actually write in English.”

The classroom erupted into laughter, and you shot a sympathetic glance at Eddie who was looking down at his knees, cheeks starting to turn a little pink. Getting picked on by upperclassmen and even other freshmen wasn’t really new to either of you, being orphanage kids and all, but you wished the teachers wouldn’t do this kind of thing as well.

“I-it’s a cipher,” Eddie attempted to sheepishly explain.

“I don’t care,” she insisted, “you can explain it all to Mr. Waters and see if he cares enough to keep you out of detention for disrupting my class.”

“Actually,” you interrupted, “we were just passing notes. You were the one that disrupted the class.”

A few astonished laughs and ‘ooooh’s echoed around the room, and Mrs. Gilliam gave you a glare of pure fury. “Be sure to explain that attitude to the principal, too, missy,” she snapped.

And, to be fair, you tried… but it didn’t go over well. You cringed as Mr. Waters glared at you over the thick tortoise-shell rim of his glasses.

“I’m surprised to see you here,” he said, “especially for an issue in class. You’re such a good student.”

“I— well, I try to be,” you offered meekly. “I’m sort of distracted today. So is Eddie— we didn’t sleep much last night, there’s no power at the orphanage and it’s so cold—”

“While I’m sympathetic to your extenuating circumstances,” the principal offered, “I can’t allow you to disrespect teachers on account of a poor night’s sleep. Many of our students lost power in this winter storm—”

“Yes, but our walls aren’t insulated—”

“I wasn’t finished speaking,” he informed you sternly.

“Right, sorry,” you mumbled.

“My point is, there are always excuses,” he continued, “but they never mean much. You’re responsible for your behavior at school, and I would encourage you to consider the company you keep and how that affects your performance.”

You wrinkled your eyebrows together. “You don’t mean Eddie…” you hoped.

“Edward is a bright student,” Mr. Waters mitigated, “but his attitude is… concerning, at times. I think you might be better off with a wider social circle— maybe not latching on entirely to someone so isolated.”

“He’s not isolated,” you defended, “he has me.”

“Yes, well, clearly the two of you have a strong connection.”

“No, we— it’s so much more than that. We don’t just have a connection, we are connected,” you explained defensively. “That’s not a choice, that’s just… how it is. You just wouldn’t understand because you’ve never needed anybody the way we need each other.”

He laughed a little, looking down at where he rested his elbows on his desk, shaking his head. It was so fucking condescending you wanted to scream. “Listen,” he began, “it’s normal, at this age, to feel like you’re the first person to discover feelings this powerful. And it’s normal to think someone you have a crush on now will always be the most important thing—”

“Wait, wait,” you shook your head, leaning back as if you couldn’t physically process his words as fast as they were traveling through the air. “A crush?”

“I’m sorry— love,” he corrected, semi-sarcastically.

“It’s not— um, we aren’t—” you stammered, looking down and feeling your face get a little warm. “It’s not romantic, really. We’re more like siblings, I think.”

I think being the operative phrase there. Siblings sometimes still didn’t feel like enough to capture it, but more than that, things had happened last night that you weren’t sure how to explain. You knew enough to know that it wasn’t technically sex, but… it wasn’t something best friends normally do— definitely not siblings. Even though you’d been thinking about it every moment since, you still hadn’t figured out what it meant. Was it just respite from the cold, survival instinct? Was it a moment of weakness as the winter seemed to seep right into your mind and make you a little delirious?

Regardless, it was perfect. It was a moment of perfect in a life of so much suffering. Three days of blistering cold— the weekend, plus the Monday when the school called a snow day and other children must have celebrated while you cried for hours knowing you’d be separated from your chance at warmth and a decent lunch that much longer— and one night in each other’s arms feeling like you might just be okay.

“I’m sorry,” Mr. Waters coughed, “I didn’t mean to assume. But that is the prevailing assumption, when a boy and girl spend this much time together.”

“Well, the prevailing assumption is generally wrong,” you informed him, “because people are generally very stupid.”

He snorted. “I guess I can’t argue with that.”

“I’m sorry for being rude to Mrs. Gilliam by passing notes in her class,” you concluded. “I’ll write her an apology letter.”

“Considering the circumstances, it may be more fitting to apologize verbally,” Mr. Waters noticed.

“No,” you shook your head, “I’d like to prove to her that I do know how to write in English. Will I be receiving detention?”

“Yes, after school today, until 6,” he nodded, and you nodded back in acceptance. A few more hours in the heated building, with ample time to do homework without the distractions of screaming babies and kids getting into fistfights, was anything but a punishment in your mind. You stood up to leave, slinging your backpack over your shoulder. “Would you send in your, uh, brother on your way out?”

“Sure,” you agreed, and you slipped out of his office, past the receptionist— where you caught a glimpse through the glass wall of Eddie surrounded by four juniors shoving him around, forcibly roughing up his hair and laughing at him as he anxiously shoved his glasses up higher on the bridge of his nose. One was already midway into dumping the contents of his backpack onto the ground as Ed weakly begged them not to.

You glanced back at the receptionist behind you in exasperation, finding her caught up on a clearly-personal conversation on her phone instead of either noticing, or caring, that this was happening just a few feet away. Sighing, you stormed out of the waiting area and into the hall.

“Where do you get off?” you snapped at the leader: Darren Blanchard, you knew him much better than you wanted to.

“Hey,” he grinned at you— and though it did intimidate you to see him and his gang step closer to you, you were just relieved that it took their attention away from Eddie. “What’s a goody two-shoes like you doing in the principal’s office?”

“What’s an illiterate dumbass like you doing in a school?” you returned, and his buddies sarcastically laughed at your comment.

“You know, it’s a shame you waste all your time with your Loser of the Year over here,” Darren continued. “All us junior guys agreed you’re the hottest freshman girl. You could be popular if you let one of us take you out.”

“Oh, really, you all agreed?” you chirped. “Did you take a vote in between jerking each other off?”

“Listen, bitch,” one of the others— you thought maybe his name was Craig but you weren’t sure— snarled as he grabbed you by your shirt and shoved you back against the glass wall.

“Stop,” Eddie demanded, and they all turned to look at him.

“Ed, don’t,” you breathed.

“Don’t touch her,” he continued anyways, and you sighed in frustration.

“Or what?” another thug challenged. “What are you gonna do?”

“I— I don’t—”

“C’mon,” Darren grinned predatorily. “Tell me what you’re gonna do if I touch her.”

“I…” Edward began again. “I’ll kill you!”

They all laughed, and you hung your head in shame. “Oh my god,” Darren croaked out between cackles, “oh, that’s sad. That’s really sad.”

Probably-Craig grabbed your wrist and Edward made good on his promise— uh, sort of. He threw a punch and hit one of the other boys in the jaw, but it landed like a fly on a dinner plate; the punch he got back, meanwhile, knocked him straight to the ground.

You broke free from the grasp of the boy holding you and knocked him back long enough to get one kick between the legs in, and he crumpled to the ground— but Darren grabbed you and held you back as the other two still standing dragged Eddie up off the ground.

“Let me go!” you whimpered, struggling against Darren’s grasp but finding it totally useless.

“It’s cute when you put up a fight,” he grinned. “Get up, Craig— this little bitch needs to be taught a lesson.”

Obviously resisting the urge to hold his injured groin, Craig clamored up and walked up to where Darren was holding you back… and suckerpunched you right in the stomach, so hard you worried for a second you might wretch. “Stop!” Eddie shrieked, but his own cry was cut short as he got a similar treatment— except much more unrelenting.

You had to blink the tears out of your eyes to catch a glimpse of Eddie getting absolutely pummeled, and it only made you sob harder. A punch to his cheek knocked his glasses off onto the floor, where they were promptly stomped on. “Leave him alone,” you croaked out, “please—!”

Darren dropped you to go get in on the action, and you fell to your hands and knees atop the scattered contents of Eddie’s backpack all over the tile floor; you scrambled up and dashed to the receptionist’s desk, all but slapping the phone out of her hands.

“Look!” you demanded, pointing to the glass wall, and she frowned as she stood up.

“Hey!” she shouted at them, and they all stopped and turned to look at her. “Break it up!”

Principal Waters, apparently overhearing the commotion, stormed out into the waiting room and that definitely got their attention— the boys holding Edward dropped him to the floor unceremoniously and straightened themselves. “You four!” he bellowed. “In my office, now!”

They awkwardly shuffled past you. Darren shot you a glare and Craig waited until the receptionist returned to her phone call to whisper, “snitches get stitches.”

“Just worry about the stitches you’re gonna need,” you returned, glancing at his crotch— which yes, he was clutching still, though he was probably overexaggerating the injury for a sympathy appeal to Mr. Waters.

As the principal shut the door behind them, you ran back into the hall to find Eddie trying to lift himself up off the floor.

“Oh god, Ed, it’s all my fault,” you whimpered as you reached under his shoulders to help him up. “Your lip is bleeding,” you sighed as you reached up and dotted the blood away.

“I-I’m fine,” he assured, unconvincingly, as he blinked down at you.

“Your glasses,” you remembered. “I’ve got tape in my backpack, hold on.”

You picked up the two halves off the floor, and sat down on the bench in the hall (where he sat down next to you as well) to open your backpack and take out the roll of Scotch tape you kept at the bottom. With a decently-sized strip stuck to one of your fingers, you held the snapped bridge of his frames together and carefully wrapped the tape around.

“There,” you smiled as you turned to the side and gently slipped them onto his face. “It won’t fix the cracked lens, but, it’s a start.”

You noticed the way he was looking at you through the spider-web splinters in the glass, and it made you feel all warm inside. He looked away nervously. “I wish I could protect you,” he mumbled.

“You do, Ed,” you assured as you reached forward to squeeze his hand— but he pulled it away.

“No,” he denied, “you’d be better off without me. I’m the reason they treat you like that. If it weren’t for me you’d be the pretty popular girl.”

“That doesn’t matter,” you scoffed. “Popular is for normal people, and I hate normal people. Pretty is for shallow people— the only ones worse than normal people.”

“Well, you’re still pretty,” he explained, and damn it, there was that feeling again— you didn’t know what to say, but the subject changed itself when the tape on his glasses gave way and the two halves fell limply at the sides of his neck, still hooked onto his ears. You couldn’t help but laugh, covering your mouth with your hand instinctively.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you giggled, “I’m not laughing at you— it just looks funny.”

“No, it’s fine,” he promised, “it’s worth making you laugh.”

“I’m sorry my tape didn’t work…”

“Oh, that’s okay! I’ve got my own—” he looked at the assortment of his belongings all over the floor, pointing to the duct tape roll that had rolled its way across the hallway— “right there.”

He got up to get it and you sighed a little as you got down on your hands and knees to start gathering the papers and notebooks strewn about, while Eddie was busy using his teeth to snap off a small piece of tape and carefully repair his glasses.

“Can you see those well enough to fix them yourself?” you asked, still working on stacking things neatly enough to fit back into his backpack; you glanced up at him and saw him holding the glasses about an inch from his face as he repaired them, making you chuckle to yourself. You looked back down at the papers around you, mostly homework and notes with a few doodles here and there (Eddie liked to draw little things while teachers explained things he already knew everything about), and you tilted your head as you caught a glimpse of one page specifically. It was a cipher— a symbol cipher, not key, and most interestingly it was one you didn’t recognize. There was a legend on the side, and a message in the middle; you could see so much erased and scratched out, clearly he was still working on this specific code. Distracted, you sat back on your feet for a second to try to solve it. You glanced back and forth between the message and the key, decoding it one letter at a time.

I SHOULD HAVE KISSED YOU

You tilted your head when you realized what it said, and just then Eddie snatched the paper out of your hand. “D-don’t look at that,” he mumbled awkwardly, gathering more papers of his own and haphazardly shoving them into his backpack. Before you could ask more, Mr. Waters stepped into the hallway, and you and Edward stood up nervously to await your sentencing.

“Is it true, Mr. Nashton, that you punched Kyle Mitchell in the face?” he asked.

“I… I don’t know, sir,” he admitted, making the principal raise an incredulous brow. “I just swung— I wasn’t sure who I hit… I kinda can’t tell them apart.”

You tried not to laugh at that. “But you did hit someone,” Mr. Waters presumed.

“Yes, sir,” he sighed.

Mr. Waters’ attention turned to you next. “And you… did you kick Craig Johnson in the, uh…”

“Johnson?” you repeated.

“Watch your language,” he frowned.

“N-no, I really didn’t know his last name,” you insisted.

“Oh,” he cleared his throat, “well… you admit to kicking him, then?”

“Yes,” you agreed, “in self-defense—”

“Regardless,” Mr. Waters interrupted, “school policy dictates that any involvement in a physical altercation merits an out-of-school suspension of at least one day—”

“Out of school?” you repeated, choking up instantly. “Principal Waters, please—”

“It’s not up to me,” he assured.

“It’s so cold,” you whimpered, “there’s no food, please, you can’t keep us out of school!”

“I can, and I have to,” he repeated, firmer.

“Please, just an in-school suspension, detention for a month, anything!” you offered.

“Suspend me for the whole week,” Edward bargained, “and let her come back tomorrow. Please.”

“Eddie, no,” you whined, but Mr. Waters stopped you both.

“Student discipline is individual,” he explained, “and not something that can be traded or transferred to someone else. You’ll be sent home with a letter to the head of the House explaining your suspension, and you may return to campus on Thursday. I’m sorry.”

He turned and left, leaving you to fall into Eddie’s arms with shaky sobs. “It’s my fault,” you choked out, “it’s all my fault, if I just hadn’t kicked him—”

“Shh,” he soothed as he stroked your back. “Hey, it’s gonna be okay…”

“How?” you whined.

“When we get back from school,” he began, speaking quietly against your ear, “we’re not going to give them the letters. You know they aren’t going to notice anyways… and tomorrow, we’ll wait for the bus, but we’ll get off at the next stop— and we’re going to go spend some money.”

You leaned back to look up at him through your tears. “What are you talking about? What money?”

“Craig Johnson’s money,” he explained, holding up a wallet— which you quickly snatched out of his hand to hide in your backpack, glancing to make sure no one had seen. The receptionist certainly hadn’t, she was laughing hysterically at something said by whoever she was on the phone with.

“Where did you get that?!” you whispered.

“Off the floor— must’ve fallen out of his pocket after you kicked him,” Ed smirked proudly. “We can stop at a diner and get a hot breakfast first, then buy coats at the mall and snacks to hoard when we get back to the Home—”

“Oh my god,” you squealed excitedly as you hugged him tightly. “Eddie, we’re not gonna be hungry tomorrow, or cold—”

“No, we’re not,” he agreed, holding you even tighter in response. “We’re gonna be safe… and we’re gonna be together. Always.”

~

You sniffled and discreetly wiped a tear off your cheek, forcing yourself out of the memory and back into composure as you stood up straight in front of the bathroom mirror.

Stepping out into the living room, you found that the Riddler had arranged a little scene mid-progress; he sat your unconscious boyfriend up in a chair, walking around it to encircle him with the tape. He only had it wrapped around once when he stopped to stare at you.

"Am I next?" you asked. "Are you gonna tape me to another chair and… torture me, kill me?”

You considered saying the other thing he might be likely to do to you after restraining you, but you didn’t want to give him any ideas. Even though if that was what he wanted to do to you, he could’ve done it by now.

“I thought about it,” he admitted. “The thought upset me. So as long as you don’t interfere and let me carry on, I’ll leave you be.”

You let him go on for about a half second longer, before you had to interrupt him: “Wait,” you mumbled, and he sighed and set down the roll of tape, barely leaving Chet’s limp form stuck to the chair. "Don't kill him," you pleaded. "I know he's not perfect, but he doesn't deserve to die. Wouldn't it be better to keep him alive and use him— like a man on the inside?"

"I have no interest in the usefulness of a bribed senator," the Riddler insisted firmly, "or in the advice of his whore."

You scoffed at the term even though it wasn’t exactly wrong, and made your cheeks sting with heat. "Listen, you don't know me—"

"I know everything about you," he interrupted in a growl, stepping closer to you. "I like to do my research."

“If you know me, then you know why this is what I had to do,” you replied. “Did your ‘research’ show you how awful that orphanage was, that not a cent of Dr. Wayne’s grant ever made its way to us after he died? That we fucking starved? And just when I thought I was free, adopted by an important wealthy man and sent to the best private school in Gotham… well, you must have seen the pictures my dear old dad took of me—”

“You—” he choked, sighing and looking down. “You don’t have to worry about those anymore.”

You knitted your eyebrows together. “I— what?”

“There weren’t a lot of copies left,” he explained, “most of them were never digital but, either way, I destroyed them all.”

“Wh—” you choked, looking down at the ground because suddenly looking at his masked face was a little overwhelming. “Why would you do that for me?” you whispered.

“I… you were a kid,” he answered, apparently struggling with an explanation of why he would go out of his way to save your dignity. “I don’t like pictures of kids being out there, I don’t think that makes me particularly special.”

“Of course it does,” you breathed, holding your own arms tightly. “It makes you special to me…”

“Well—” he coughed, “I just wish I could kill everyone who ever bought them, or saw them. I wish I could kill everyone that exploited you— I’m about to kill that senator, because of what he did to you.”

You blinked up at him, thin tears gathering at the corners of your eyes. “Because of me?” you whispered. “What… what does this all have to do with me?”

“You’ll see,” he promised.

Just then, you only got a split-second warning as you heard Chet yell, and he dashed in out of nowhere to tackle the intruder to the ground. He landed with a powerful thud and you yelped in shock.

“Son of a bitch,” Chet sputtered as he wrapped his fat hands around the Riddler’s neck. Gloved hands reached up and tried to fight him off, but Chet was stronger— and most of all just heavier, leaning in with all his weight.

It’s impossible to describe what came over you then, an instinct so natural you didn’t even realize what you were doing, until you came to and that damned pipe was in your hand, and Chet was collapsed on the floor beside the masked man. The whore in the living room with the lead pipe… but you still needed one more clue to solve the mystery.

“Oh, oh god,” you sighed, falling to your knees; the Riddler was looking up at you, apparently surprised that you saved him— of course he would be, so were you after all. You caught his stare from behind his glasses, which had cracked when he hit the floor, and you leaned in a little closer. Reaching up, your fingers brushed over the leather covering his face, and your lip started to quiver— green eyes looked right through you from behind the shattered glass, and you pulled the frames away gently so you could lift the hood and see his face.

Well, it was a little distorted covered in plastic wrap, but it was still obviously him. He still looked so young and boyish, he looked just like he did in your memories, even though he must’ve aged just as much as you.

You smiled just in time for a tear to slip past your lip. The taste of tears brought back memories too. “Eddie?” you whispered.

“Hey,” he said, and his voice was muffled but familiar, casting a cloud of condensation around his mouth on the clear material. You laughed and started to pull at the plastic so you could hold his face unfettered but he reached up to hold your wrist and stop you. “I need to keep that on— so I don’t leave any hair behind…”

Before you could stop yourself, you leaned down and pressed a long kiss right on his lips: obviously there was plastic in the way, but you just needed to kiss him at that exact moment and a little Saran wasn’t gonna stop you.

You felt his gloved hands reach up and brush gently over your back, delicately pulling you closer, and you smiled. It had to end sometime, though, and the taste of whatever chemical gives this stuff its self-stickiness wasn’t entirely pleasant. You broke the kiss to laugh again, you couldn’t help it with the joy so pure running through your veins that it made you all shaky and tingly like you skipped lunch or something.

At the same time, you both said the same thing to each other: “I thought you forgot about me.”

“You thought I— what?” Edward responded to you. “I could never—”

“Of course I couldn’t forget you,” you breathed. “I know you didn’t want that man to adopt me— you were right, in the end, but I thought you wanted me to stay more than you wanted me to be happy… and you promised to write letters, and you didn’t— I thought you hated me for leaving you behind, but I wanted us to be adopted together, but he just wanted me—”

“Hey,” he interrupted your neurotic ramble with a hand on your shoulder, “I never hated you— I couldn’t hate you, I just knew you wouldn’t be safe with him. And I did send letters, every day. I thought you ignored them all— did you never get them?”

“No, he must’ve thrown them away,” you sighed, “of course he would.”

“I figured you just wanted to forget about everything from before…”

“I did— I tried to, after I moved in here, but I could never stop thinking about you for very long,” you admitted, looking away and feeling your cheeks warm. “What did you end up going into— like, what do you do now?”

“Uh, I do this,” he answered, motioning to his khaki-green get-up and the unconscious man beside him.

“I mean other than this,” you giggled, rolling your eyes.

“I’m a forensic accountant,” he explained, and you beamed.

“Oh, Ed— that makes so much sense for you!”

“Did you ever get a chance to be popular at the private high school?” he asked. “Since you didn’t have me dragging you down.”

“Well, not really,” you hummed, “he only sent me there because he was a big donor and he knew they’d ignore me when I tried to tell them what he was doing… the other kids weren’t as violent as they were at South Gotham High, but they didn’t like a charity case in class with them very much. I hope it wasn’t so bad for you after I transferred…”

“Uh, yeah, it was fine,” he muttered.

“Eddie, don’t lie to me,” you sighed.

“I-I got beat up, a lot,” he shrugged, “but it wasn’t that bad— I mean, I never had to go to the hospital or anything.”

You whimpered and wrapped your arms around his neck, resting your head on his chest as he sat up and held you tightly. “I didn’t even know if you survived that place… I’m just happy you’re alive.”

“I wasn’t really alive,” he whispered, “until just now, having you in my arms again.”

A groan made you both turn your heads to the side, finding Chet staring dazed at you both. His eyes trailed over his arms around you, your hands on his chest. “Wh…what?” he mumbled groggily.

Edward sighed and reached for the hood you’d left on the floor, tugging it on. “You’re a tough old bastard, huh?” he grumbled. It must’ve been the mask that changed his voice, he sounded pretty different with it on.

“N-no, please,” Chet began to sleepily beg for his life. Edward grabbed the pipe one more time (even though it had proven to be less of a permanent fix insofar), but turned to you before he did anything with it.

“I would, um, kinda prefer that you didn’t see this,” he told you nervously.

“Right— sure,” you agreed, standing up, even though he’d already seen plenty you would’ve rather him not see tonight. “I’m gonna take a bath, just… come get me when you’re done?”

“Okay,” he hummed happily, turning back to Chet who looked bewildered to say the least. “Where were we?”

You were walking to the bathroom to draw your bath, but you heard a bit more of their conversation on your way.

“What’s going on?” Chet asked, almost accusatory. As if his girlfriend having some bizarre connection with the serial killer in his apartment was more important to him than, you know, the serial killer in his apartment.

“You love her, don’t you?” Ed asked him, and apparently Chet must have nodded before he continued. “I can’t blame you. But I loved her first.”

You shut the bathroom door behind you, in time with the loud sound of the weapon coming down on Chet’s head; you winced, trying not to notice the icky, wet crunching sort of noise a lethal blow like that made.

Turning on the faucet— hot water first, then a bit of the cold side just to keep it from getting scalding— the loud rush of water mostly covered the sounds of Ed unrolling more tape, hopefully enough this time to keep Chet down for good (although you didn’t think he was coming back from that last hit, but you weren’t an expert on these things).

You stripped down out of your dress, letting it fall to the floor in a pile of black silk before you stepped into the rising water.

A sigh of relief fell from your lips as you relaxed into the warmth. Realizing you still had all your jewelry on, you slipped off the bracelets and rings, setting them on the edge of the porcelain tub; you took out your earrings and centered them inside the bracelets delicately.

On accident, you nearly fell asleep right there in the bath just because you were so… at peace. You never felt as safe as you did with Edward nearby, even if he had always seemed worried that he couldn’t protect you. Every good memory from the orphanage came rushing back, every moment of joy born from the suffering: sharing a warm bread roll, hiding under your bed and whispering to each other, carving your secret language with its scrawled shapes and symbols into the wall. On the day before your birthday one year, he’d taken a snack cake home from school and stayed up until midnight with you just to unwrap it and strike a match to stick in it, telling you to blow it out and make a wish. Chet had gotten you a three-tier custom red velvet cake last year, with sparklers and golden lettering sticking out of it, and thrown you a lavish party to serve it at… but when you closed your eyes and tasted the first bite on your fork, you found yourself longing for that empty room and pre-packaged plastic-wrapped cake with the artificial cream and the waxy legally-not-considered-chocolate coating with a wooden match in it. Really, of course, you were longing for him, for your soulmate, your best friend— your always.

As is to be expected with almost falling asleep, you didn’t realize how close you were to it until you were brought back to full consciousness by Eddie opening the door. You blinked your eyes open and smiled up at him, noticing the way his eyes trailed over your body left exposed by the clear, still water. “Hi,” you greeted.

“Are you ready to go?” he asked. “You might want to pack a bag… some stuff to bring to my apartment. Unless you wanna wear my clothes.”

He was obviously being sarcastic, but you were obviously tempted by the idea with the way you bit your lip and glanced away. “I’ll get a few things,” you decided. “I don’t know what kind of money you’re making doing accounting, but if I pawned some of my jewelry we could live large for a while.”

He knelt down, resting one of his elbows on his knee, and gently pulled off a glove. Reaching out with a bare hand, he brushed his fingers over your cheek, and you smiled and took a deep breath. You leaned into his palm and felt him cradle your jaw gently; “We shouldn’t waste any more time,” he breathed, “the police will be here in a few hours, when they see my video.”

“Are they going to be looking for me?” you asked.

“I warned them not to,” he sighed, “but they probably will. You’ll be safe with me, though… no one will ever find you.”

You smiled contentedly, reaching up out of the water to rest your hand on top of his where it held your face, before turning to give his palm a small kiss. “Let’s hope not. I want it to always just be us.”

~

You leaned down over the edge of the crib, smiling at the sweet, chubby face looking back up at you; she smiled when she saw you, and you reached down to let her grab onto your finger. “Hi!” you greeted excitedly, cooing at her as she kicked her feet up and wiggled around. “I wish I could come visit you every day, but I’m not gonna be able to from now on… you gotta stay tough, okay? My little trooper. You made it through that winter, you can make it through anything.”

He didn’t make a sound or move into your line of sight, and yet you somehow sensed Edward’s presence in the doorway; you turned your head up and back to look at him as he watched you. “What are you doing all the way in the nursery?” he asked.

“Saying goodbye to baby Hannah,” you explained, looking down at her again. “I’m gonna miss you, little dumpling!”

She giggled even though she obviously had no idea what you were saying, and you continued babbling at her meaninglessly. Eddie stepped up behind you, and you jumped straight up when you felt his hand on your back. “Stop hiding from me,” he demanded— not angry, not sad, just… flat.

“Eddie, I’m not—”

“And don’t lie, either,” he requested.

You sighed, pulling your hand out of Hannah’s crib and facing him properly.

“You’re leaving tomorrow, and you’re not coming back,” he reminded you.

“I said I would visit—!” you denied.

“You’re not coming back,” he insisted. “You shouldn’t. There’s no reason to be in this place a second longer than you need to. But you’ve been spending all week preparing to go without even saying goodbye to me.”

“Ed, I—” you began, starting to tear up already. “I don’t even know where to start… if I try to imagine not seeing you every day, not living with you and going to school with you, it just makes my brain go blank. I don’t know what life is without you.”

“Well, you’re gonna find out,” he smiled. “You’re gonna do what we always promised we would do… escape.”

You glanced away so he wouldn’t see how hard you were fighting not to cry, as if you could ever hide something like that from him. “But we were supposed to do that together,” you whimpered. “Eddie, I begged them to take you, too, but they said—”

“It doesn’t matter,” he assured, “I’m not going.”

“But you’ll write to me?” you interrogated. “You’ll visit me? Arkham College Prep is kind of a long bus ride, but I think my new parents are gonna give me an allowance so I can send you the fare—”

“Of course,” he interrupted. “We’re gonna see each other as much as we can, and in a few years we’ll be really free and…”

As he trailed off, you swallowed thickly. You’d spent years planning your lives as adults, but the older you got, the less fantastical your dreams became. You could still remember when he wanted to be an astronaut and you wanted to be a ballerina. Then it was secret agent and rockstar. Then it was engineer and teacher.

By now, it was just the hope that you’d make it that far. Even in a place like the Wayne House where life was near-constant torment, certain things were guaranteed. In adulthood, there’s no promise of shelter from the rain or one meal a day. Worst of all, there’s no one by your side through it all; you were both forced to wonder if it was ever feasible to dream that life wouldn’t keep you two apart one way or another.

You reached up and slipped your arms around his neck, pulling him into a hug. He hugged you back, but it felt different— distant. It felt like he was trying to let you go already, and accept that you were leaving for another life without him; you hated that. You couldn’t let this be the end, and you couldn’t let him pretend this didn’t matter so it wouldn’t hurt as badly because it was killing you inside.

Just as you started to hold each other tighter, one of the adult staff happened to walk by the door. “Hey,” she snapped at you both, and you pulled away from each other. “Lights out in ten minutes. You shouldn’t even be in the nursery— go back to the adolescent wing, and stay on your side of the hall.”

Her last warning was especially aggressive as both of you had been disciplined excessively for being in the opposite-gender rooms after hours. It was never anything inappropriate— well, there was that one night that toed the line pretty hard, but the point is your intentions were never as nefarious as they assumed. Thankfully, you only got caught about one-third of the time.

“Yes, ma’am,” you and Eddie nodded at her simultaneously, and she continued walking along.

“After lights out,” you whispered to him, “wait a half hour and then meet me in the courtyard…”

You reached up to rest your hand on his chest and felt his heart racing; your was, too.

“And we’ll say goodbye,” you finished, “properly. The way we need to.”

The time you spent staring up at the ceiling that night, counting the ticks of the clock in the hall outside, was excruciating. Minutes had never been longer in the history of time, probably.

Honestly, you never had a chance at sleeping anyways: a few of the girls most jealous that you had been adopted and were leaving tomorrow had threatened to jump you as soon as you fell asleep. You knew one of them had already been caught with a shiv she made out of an old soda can… so, beyond just excitement to have your secret rendezvous with Ed, you were never exactly in a position to get any rest.

When the time came, you slipped out of bed as quietly as you could (which took an intimate knowledge of the creaky springs in your half-rotted mattress) and crossed the floor delicately (which took an intimate knowledge of the creaky floorboards in the half-rotted floor), dragging your blanket behind you.

Peeking out into the hall, you knew none of the adults would be back to check on anyone for a while… they were supposed to stay overnight to make sure no one got hurt, but even they couldn’t stomach sleeping in a place like this and had a tendency to go back to their homes and return in the morning as if the children wouldn’t notice. Still, you needed to be careful in case one or two stayed behind and would catch you and force you back to your room— or in case you woke up another ward, especially one of the more unsavory boys who might take advantage of finding you alone.

Blanket draped over your shoulders like a cape, you navigated the circuitous path around the House that would take you into the courtyard while passing the fewest dormitories— this place was a maze, but thankfully, you were good at solving puzzles.

When you emerged barefoot into the stone courtyard, shivering when the soles of your feet collided with gravelly rock and the grass that grew in the cracks between, you found Eddie already there, his own blanket under his back as he leaned against the big tree and looked up at the sky. You smiled just seeing him, and scampered over to shorten the time you had to spend away from him (and walking on the cold and mildly-damp ground, if you were being honest).

He looked at you when he heard you coming and smiled back, opening his arms for you to jump into. You draped your blanket over the both of you and nuzzled into his chest, looking up at the sky with him. “I hate that we can never see stars here,” he sighed. “It’s just fog and planes.”

“I think the fog is sort of beautiful,” you admitted, “in its own way.”

“Of course you do,” he laughed softly. “You see the beauty in everything.”

You turned your attention away from the sky and to his face above yours— he was still looking away, so you took a moment to appreciate the shape of his jaw and the way you could just see his eyelashes past his cheek. His glasses reflected the moonlight, so much so that when he looked down at you, you couldn’t see his eyes past the glare on the lenses.

But you still felt his stare, and it made you feel exposed in a way that was unexpectedly pleasant.

“I came up with a riddle,” he announced suddenly.

“Hit me,” you challenged.

“I’m blind, but with me, you see everything a bit more clearly,” he described. “What am I?”

You cycled through a few ideas in your mind, but cracked into a grin when you figured it out. “Love,” you answered.

“Yeah,” he agreed, “you got it…” He reached up and brushed his thumb over your cheek as he slipped his hand around the back of your neck— but then he just… didn’t do anything. He just looked at you and you looked up at him and waited but nothing happened.

“Why haven’t you kissed me yet?” you asked, whispering.

“I— I don’t know,” he whispered back, “I guess I’m just afraid.”

“Kiss me, Eddie… please,” you begged, and finally, he did.

It was everything you hoped it would be: sweet and soft and patient. He pulled you closer and, without breaking the kiss, you sat up a bit so you could climb into his lap and straddle him.

You gasped when he pulled you into him and kissed you harder, tasting your tongue with his own, even starting to let out the quietest moans against you. As you shifted in his lap, an instinctive motion to address the growing warmth in your core, you felt his erection and it made your head spin.

When you broke away, the two of you held your foreheads together and just caught your breath; you carded your fingertips through his hair while his hands held your back. “We never talked about that night, when it was so cold we didn’t know if we’d survive,” you panted.

“I didn’t know what to say,” he explained. “I didn’t know if it was just because of the cold…”

“It’s a beautiful night,” you breathed. “I’m not hungry or scared or lonely. I’m happy, Edward, because I’m with you— and I… I wanna feel you again…” you swallowed and barely managed to find the courage to finish your thought, though you still had to speak under your breath: “inside me.”

He just nodded and kissed you again, and you both rushed to get your bedclothes out of the way just as much as you needed to do this. A kiss on your lips helped keep you quiet when you whined at the initial sting of being penetrated; and more breathless kisses trailing down your neck and over your shoulder soothed you as he promised it wouldn’t hurt anymore— but you didn’t even care. You’d braved so much worse pain for him, and you never regretted a moment of it.

You breathed with each other and moved with each other and it was the most natural thing in the world. Everything good you’d ever had, you shared with him. And now you were sharing pleasure together and you couldn’t think of anything more perfect.

“Tell me we’ll always be together,” you pleaded one last time.

“Always,” he promised.

The physical element of it was over rather quickly, from an objective standpoint, when he needed you to stop so he wouldn’t risk getting you pregnant even more than he already was. But that finite moment felt like its own forever, and even though he apologized that he couldn’t hold out longer, you were anything but disappointed. The night itself was just beginning, and the two of you held each other and talked and kissed and dreamed until the sun started to rise and melt the fog away.

You needed to be back in your beds soon for the morning, but you stayed together until the absolute last second. You made promises— maybe he knew already how hard they would be to keep, but you believed them completely. And you never imagined how long it would take you to really make good on them.

~

You set your duffel bag down as he locked all seven deadbolts behind you. “Cute place,” you mumbled, looking around at the shabby— yet homey— interiors. It looked so much more comfortable than Chet’s apartment, which was populated with geometrical, sterile, white furniture. You saw polaroids he’d taken of himself, in and out of his Riddler garb, taped up to one of the cabinets atop the peeling paint; there were a few empty takeout cartons with chopsticks sticking out of them, which he dashed past you to awkwardly scoop up into his arms. He looked so adorably… puffy, in that massive bomber jacket, and you stifled a giggle.

“Uh, sorry— I would’ve cleaned up, if I knew you were coming back with me,” he defended as he dumped them in the trash. “Obviously.”

“It’s okay,” you grinned.

“Are you, uh, hungry?” he asked. “There’s probably something in the fridge I could make for you—”

“Ed, I was just at a campaign dinner a few hours ago,” you reminded him.

“Well, maybe you worked up an appetite,” he smirked nervously, “with everything that’s happened…”

“I just wanna get settled in,” you explained. “Is there somewhere I should put my stuff?”

“Anywhere,” he shrugged. “The bedroom’s this way, if you wanna hang your clothes up in the closet…”

As you followed him down the hall, you caught more glimpses of his work— contraptions he’d designed, schematics and puzzles and information on his targets. You saw a blurry picture of yourself under Chet’s arm, taken from across the street; a big red ‘X’ in marker covered your dearly-departed ex-boyfriend’s face, and you smiled to yourself.

“In here,” he pointed as he opened the door for you. The bedroom was… efficient. A double mattress on an old steel frame, and just enough room on each side to get around it. There were some books scattered around, cryptography books just as one would expect, and a lamp on a nondescript bedside table, but that was about it. "I need to hang up my jacket anyways…"

He slipped past you when you opened the closet door, stepping inside to unzip his jacket and drape it on a hanger. He was wearing just an undershirt beneath, and the short sleeves gave you a good look at his arms which were… much more toned than you remembered. He was still lean like he'd always been, but not as scrawny as his teenage self, like he'd really grown into his frame.

Apparently, he noticed you ogling him, because he cleared his throat and pushed up his glasses slightly on the bridge of his nose. "Is everything okay?" he asked.

"You look good, Ed," you answered with a smirk.

"Oh, thanks," he hummed. "You've always been beautiful…"

A little flustered, you looked down at the floor where you saw his boots take a step towards you.

"I… I still think about the night before you left," he admitted, "when we made love to each other."

Finding the strength to make eye contact again, you found the most beautiful storm brewing in his stare… behind those damn cracked glasses. "I do, too," you replied. "I thought about it a lot, actually— it was the only way I could get through, um… through nights with other people. I only ever wanted it to be you, Eddie—"

"Shh," he interrupted, soothing you with warm hands gripping your shoulders, "it's alright— that's over now. We're together and nothing else that happened in between matters anymore."

You sniffled and slipped your arms around his back to hug him tightly. "You don't hate me for what I did, right? And who I did it with?"

“I could never hate you,” he promised gently. “I… I hate that anybody else ever got to have you, though… that you belonged to someone like him.”

"I was always yours," you sighed, "all I've ever been is yours."

He grabbed your face and kissed you; you didn’t remember Eddie being this forward, but you couldn’t blame him for growing up— and you certainly weren’t complaining, in fact you were immediately melting into it and kissing him back and letting quiet moans slip out when you couldn’t help it. You yelped as he pushed you back onto the bed and climbed on top of you, but initial surprise melted into a needy, happy groan. "Mine," he growled as he started to roughly push your clothes out of the way. "Say it again."

"Yours! Fuck, Eddie, I'm yours— you know I am. Everything, all of me, I belong to you," you whimpered.

"My beautiful girl," he cooed proudly, "my angel. I was so lost without you… I'm yours, too, I need you so bad…"

"Take me," you offered. "Whatever you need, just take it. How long has it been since somebody made you feel good?"

"I… I can't even remember," he mumbled into your neck.

"Please, Eddie, I need to feel you inside me again," you begged, "I'm yours, I'm yours—!"

He groaned loudly and reached down to hastily open and push down his pants. He was already hard and he began to rock his hips so he could rub himself against you.

Shouldn't have been too much of a shock that all of him had grown since he was sixteen— and he wasn't lacking back then to start with. You felt a little intimidated, but even more excited. Grabbing him by the hair and pulling him into another kiss, you giggled when his glasses bumped against your face. You moaned and arched your back into his touch as his palms groped at your chest; you could feel his smug smirk against your lips growing as your legs instinctively spread wider.

His fingertips gently pinched your nipples and, lacking any desire to suppress your arousal— you had nothing to hide from him, anyway— you whimpered desperately and started begging. “P-please,” you choked, “don’t make me wait anymore… I’ve waited so long, I just need to feel you, please—”

“Shh,” he soothed softly, moving his hands down from your chest to the waistband of your sweatpants which he pulled down just a little too slowly; you mewled impatiently. “M’gonna give you everything, don’t worry…

You whined and wrapped your arms around his shoulders, hiding your face in his neck, but he didn’t tolerate that for long.

“No, baby, I wanna see you,” he explained as he sat up slightly and guided your head back to lay on the bed again. “That’s better… look up at me?”

You bit your lip and blinked away the tears suddenly gathering in your eyes; afraid he’d think you were strange for crying, you began to explain. “I-it’s just so much, Ed—”

“I know,” he cooed, “it’s a lot— it’s everything. It’s the only thing that matters.”

A little shaky gasp filled your lungs as you felt the head of his cock press up to your opening, and your insides clenched around nothing in anticipation.

“Keep your eyes on me,” he instructed quietly, staring down at you intensely; his green eyes were so dark when he hovered over you like this, the light on the ceiling above him making the edges of his light brown hair glow golden like a halo. You reached up and brushed your fingers over his cheek, then moved down to hold onto his shoulder. He thrust his hips forward somewhat abruptly and you cried, but worked very hard not to disobey him by closing your eyes or looking away. You hadn’t even realized he wasn’t all the way in yet until he gave you the second half, burying himself to the base of you, and you let out a high-pitched whine.

"Oh god," you hissed, "Eddie, you're so deep… fuck, I can feel you all the way up here…"

You guided his hand to your lower belly, pressing it down so he could feel, too, how well he was filling you. His expression changed as he felt it, and you caught the way his gaze emanated so much power as he started to move inside you and feel the way your stomach shifted under his hand.

You were completely at his mercy, and both of you were becoming addicted to it.

He took his hand off of your belly and lowered down to rest his elbows on either side of your face, hovering above you. Watching you closely, his eyes darted all over your face while he set an unhurried— though not specifically slow, either— pace with his hips.

Being watched by him was already having a similar effect on you now as it did earlier this evening, even when you didn’t know it was him: your walls were pulsing with need and you heard your moans getting so loud they started to echo around the small room.

The pleasure made you tilt your head back and shut your eyes, but he gently grabbed your chin and pulled your face back down. “I told you to keep looking at me,” he reminded you, just a bit more stern than you expected him to be. “I wanna see the look in your eyes when you come apart for me.”

You whimpered but nodded in agreement, a silent promise to follow his instructions and let him see every moment of your orgasm— which was building so much more quickly than it had any right to, making your walls pulse and your toes curl as your legs wrapped around his hips.

“We’re never gonna be apart ever again,” he promised quietly, his voice a little deeper and rougher as his breathing got heavier from the exertion.

“That’s all I ever wanted,” you breathed. An extra rough thrust slammed his head right into your spot and you yelped, feeling your channel bear down on his cock so forcefully it was almost painful— but in the most pleasurable way. “Fuck, E-Eddie, I love you, I love you…”

That phrase was rarely spoken between the two of you, it always seemed sort of obvious. But it felt good to just say it point-blank, and even though you figured he must’ve already known it, he smiled down at you proudly. “I know, baby,” he soothed, “I love you, too.”

“I-I’ve never loved anyone else,” you continued.

“I know,” he responded again.

“I— oh god, Ed, m’gonna come…”

“I know,” he replied finally, lowering his voice this time.

You did your best to focus your attention up at him as you held the back of his neck to keep yourself steady, but the energy coursing through your body seemed to make your vision go a little blurry. You longed to let your eyes fall shut and give in to the dark calling for you, but you needed to stay right here with Eddie— he was going to take you there if you just kept your promise not to look away. The last thing you wanted to do was forget who was making you feel this good, who you belonged to.

“You can let go, angel,” he encouraged you softly. “I’m right here, okay? Just do it, for me, come for me right now.”

You didn’t mind giving away that he had that control over you— he’d already proven it before, exhibiting the power he had over your body just from standing in a doorway. So, it was no wonder that when he was actually inside you, you would do whatever he asked. And he asked you to come, so you came; your eyes stayed open and trained on his, miraculously, as a heavy wave of ecstasy crashed down on you. Just past the deafening sound of your own moans you heard him pant and grunt a little.

“There you go, just like that,” he praised darkly, “such a good girl for me. I can feel you, coming on my cock.”

You could feel him throbbing inside you, too, and it was oddly soothing as you started to come down from your high; going limp beneath him made each thrust rock your body on the mattress, and he kept moving faster and faster.

“I can’t last much longer,” he admitted in a rough whisper. “You’re too perfect, it’s been too long without you—”

“I want you to come,” you assured, tangling your fingers into his hair and tugging slightly though you didn’t really mean to. “I want it so bad, I need you!”

"I'm not pulling out this time," he warned, fucking you so fast and hard now that you had no chance to recover— it felt like you were going to come forever. "I need to come inside you."

"Yes," you moaned, "oh fuck Eddie, please! Please please please…"

“Keep looking at me,” he ordered, even though your gaze hadn’t faltered since his last demand. “Look at me while I fill you up— fuck, I-I’m coming—”

His verbal warning was sort of moot considering you could feel it, every pump of his cock filling you deeper than you thought possible; he gasped and held your hips so he could slam all the way in, deep enough that your eyes would’ve rolled back if you weren’t so damn obedient.

Finally, the minutes-long eye contact was broken as he grabbed your face and kissed you hard, both of you shutting your eyes tightly and pulling each other into an embrace. He rolled you onto your side but stayed inside you, and even just that slight friction on your overstimulated walls made you shiver and whine. Thankfully, his hand stroking your back gently soothed you a bit in that regard.

Cuddling up in bed together, you were so relaxed that you didn’t really remember falling asleep— it was just that you woke up what must’ve been hours later, blinking your eyes open to find him contemplating a sudoku puzzle with a pencil in between his teeth. You smiled and started to shift around, but he quickly grabbed your hips to keep you still.

“N-no, baby, don’t move,” he cooed, “you’re keeping me warm while I work on this.”

Yes, he was still inside you; your body was so accustomed to him that you didn’t notice the stretch that much, except when you moved, and then there was a delicious sting that made chills run up your spine. You would’ve already been sore after he fucked you like that, but keeping him inside you for so long afterwards made you sure that soreness wouldn’t leave you for another week or so. Not that you wanted it to. “How much have you solved?” you asked sleepily.

“Most of it, but it’s a tricky one,” he explained. “Any ideas for me?”

He moved the booklet in front of your face and you blinked the blurriness out of your eyes to examine it. Of course, your attention wasn’t on the puzzle anymore when you noticed his little doodles around the free space on the page. Some of them had to do with trying to solve the square, but most were just miniature sketches— most notably: your face as you slept; a greeting card, like one you remembered seeing on the news addressed to ‘the Batman’; and a diamond ring.

“I’m glad you still draw,” you announced, reaching up to run a finger over the silvery etchings in the page. “You’ve gotten even better.”

“Oh, well, it comes with practice,” he dismissed. He turned the page around and looked at the puzzle again. “Would you wear a ring like this if I gave it to you?” he asked, pointing at the doodle with his eraser.

“I’d wear anything you gave me, Ed,” you informed him.

“I know it’s kind of silly for you to have a ring when you won’t be able to leave the apartment for a long time— but I wanna see it on your finger anyways,” he explained, smiling slightly. “I’d wear one, too. Even under my gloves when no one can see it. And that way just you and I know they’re always there.”

You smiled back at him, reaching up to gently touch his face; he hummed and set the puzzle book aside, closing his eyes as you pet his cheek. “You know we don’t need anything to show how we feel,” you reminded him. “It doesn’t make it more important or more real. We love each other more than most people who wear rings like that could even imagine.”

“Of course not,” he breathed, “but it might be nice, I think…”

“I think so too,” you agreed, nestling your face back into his chest and drifting into sleep again.

And so, even though it was a bit superfluous at this point, he got you both rings— and although they looked quite typical to someone passing by on the street, they were anything but usual. Edward carefully designed the mechanism that made them interlock; he described it as just another way that you ‘solve’ him. His ring had a sort of keyhole, little notches arranged in a circle that he kept turned inside his palm, and they fit perfectly with the setting of the stone on your ring. When you used yours to unlock his, a panel in the gold pulled out of the way and showed the engraved message inside, written in symbols only the two of you knew how to read: Always.

Me when I go to the riddler’s apartment for the first time

so unswag of the batman to use edward nashton instead of edward nygma for the riddler. oh i'm sorry you're okay with the man dressed up as a bat but you draw the line at the riddle man being named e. nygma. absolutely bitchless behaviour

I love that everyone in batman is just like “our sweet prince of gotham <3” and it’s an antisocial thirty year old still stuck in his emo phase

batman did not take a single nap that entire film. man’s surviving off one hour of sleep (from getting knocked out by the bomb), an adrenaline shot, and a crumb he found in his pocket 

batman did not take a single nap that entire film. man’s surviving off one hour of sleep (from getting knocked out by the bomb), an adrenaline shot, and a crumb he found in his pocket 

i like him a normal amount..

chronically online

paul dano doodle dump send help

hi tumblr i return with little puppy klitz

Coffee Freezer // Brian x Reader

(This isn’t proof-read so please bear with me I’m heavily sleep deprived)

Notes: Female reader, slightly ooc (maybe? I don’t really know)

——

“Jesus,” you sighed running your hand through your hair walking into the harsh lighting of Mickey’s. It was 9 pm and you found yourself wandering down sidewalk after sidewalk until you ended up here, an empty Mickey’s save for the employees and an old man sitting in the corner picking at his leftover fries.

Your shoes made clicking sounds against the floor as you walked up to the register to be met with an empty counter except for two guys behind the window. You glanced up at the menu before just settling on a coffee freezer, deciding that you should just get a small treat since you couldn’t stomach a whole meal. Still staring at the menu you hear whispers start from behind the till.

“Holy shit dude look”

“What”

“Hottie 5 ‘o clock at the register”

“Shit where’s Amber?”

“On ‘er break, go take her order man”

“Why me?”

“‘Cause I said so, now go”

Chucking to yourself you hear shifting from the window and a tall angsty looking teen shuffles to the front, obviously annoyed and tired. You couldn’t blame him, customer service jobs sucked.

Brian had seen you before around school even though you had just transferred. You were new, a fresh face wasn’t something seen around often so you stood out to him,and others, more than usual.

He had thought you were insanely hot ever since you waked past him during the break between first and second period. During that next history class you had introduced yourself at the front of the room stating that your family had just moved to the area and something else he didn’t catch. He was busy observing how your jeans hugged your hips and how your shirt was tight around your chest. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t practically drooling onto is desk.

And now here you were, standing right in front of him in a tight low cut long sleeve that definitely complimented your figure.

“Hey your in Mr Bruce’s history class right,” your voice got his attention, you met his gaze with a warm smile.

“Yeah, uh Y/n right?” He cleared his throat before speaking.

“Yeah I’m surprised you remembered,” you laughed “Could I just get a Coffee Freezer?”

“sure…” He trailed, typing your order into the computer “that’ll be a dollar”

You reached into your back pocket and pulled out a semi crinkled bill, handing it to the boy in front of you. “Thanks…” taking a moment to glance at his name tag just realizing you ever formerly introduced yourself to him directly. “Brian”

“Yeah don’t mention it” He said and walked back to behind the window feeling like his chest was going to explode.

“Holy shit dude you know her?!” Said Andrew after watching the whole ordeal from behind the order windo

“Not like personally” Brian mumbled, going to start on your coffee freezer

——

Amber came back to the register to see you sitting at the bar the had right across from it staring at the window.

“Y/n?” She said trying to get your attention “What are you doing here so late?”

Snapping you out of your thoughts you got up and made your way back to the counter. “Oh shit, hey Amber” you smiled, Amber showed you around the school on your first day. You guys exchanged numbers and have been texting on and off over the week.

“I went on a walk and wound up here and ordered a coffee freezer”

“Cool” she smiled, clearly tired and ready to go home. It being 9:35 meant that her and Andrew’s shift ended in a little under 30 minutes meaning that Brian would be left to lock up.

“Hey I’m gonna head to the back to grab my stuff, stay here” She said and quickly shuffled to the back.

In perfect timing Brian came out with your drink, “One Freezer”

He said placing it on the counter about to walk away when your topped him. “Hey, when does this place close?”

“10 but since no one’s in here except you I might close up early”

Brian answered, slightly confused at your question. Just then Andrew and Amber came out holding their things.

“We’re gonna head out Bri, make me proud okay” Andrew said smirking while heading for the door.

“Yeah Yeah, shut the fuck up man” Brian retorted

“Okay Brian I’m out, Bye Y/n,” Said Amber following Andrew stopping in the doorway of the restaurant before leaving turning to you, “Oh Y/n if you need help with the English homework just shoot me a text okay?”

“Alright!” You called out as she left before picking up your freezer and taking a sip. Brian watched as you did, your moisturized lips wrapping around the straw while your hand waved goodbye.

Suddenly he felt hot, his hands feeling clammy. He swallowed in an effort to calm himself down before he made himself look like a dumbass in front a hot girl. Suddenly, you turned towards him catching him staring making you smile when he looked away.

Clearing his throat to brake the silence Brian quickly spoke up, “I’m uh gonna close up now, you don’t have to leave until I’m done”

——

A text from your mom made your phone buzz in your pocket, ‘You alright?’

‘I’m okay’

‘On my way home now’

You quickly shot back, you had forgotten how late it was, surprisingly enjoying the ambience of the empty Mickey’s. The sound of boots and the odd jangle of a chain making you look up from your phone. Brian had taken his uniform off and was now clad in a black sweat shirt and his usual black jeans and combat boots, silver chain hanging from his belt loop.

“You ready?” You piped from your seat, standing up and shoving your phone into your back pocket.

“Yeah, let’s go,” Brian said walking towards the door with you close behind, “Thanks for uh, staying with me by the way”

“Of course,” you said smiling up at him as you two walked out onto the sidewalk, “Are you driving or walking home?”

“My car’s in the shop right now ‘cause of some stupid shit with my engine so I’m walking. How ‘bout you?” He asked running his hand through his hair, hoping it was just the cold air making his cheeks flush.

“I’m walking too, which way are you going?”

“Jaker Avenue”

“Oh sweet, I’m heading the same way”

You two walked in silence until you saw a flyer for an underground band that was going to play at a local venue on Friday , “Oh shit I didn’t know they were from here” You exclaimed taking the flyer down from the telephone pole it was taped to.

“You listen to them?” Brian questioned

“Hell yeah I do, I pirate their shit off the internet all the time” you laughed, your joke finally tearing away the tension and causing Brian to laugh with you.

That flyer caused the walk to let you guys take time to know each other, talking about music, video games, work drama and whatever came to mind.

“I’m telling you, my manager probably keeps 4-5 grand in that safe man” Brian exclaimed as you guys neared your house,

“Well if you ever need a getaway driver let me know” You joked, the two of you stopping at the front of your house

“This your stop?” He voiced, gesturing at your house

“Yeah this is me, thanks for walking me home” You smiled, turning around to head in before he stopped you, grabbing you arm. You turned around surprised at the sudden contact.

Brian instantly let go, his ears starting to burn. Why did he grab you.

“Hey you know the show on Friday,” you nodded, “would you wanna go with me?” He asked, avoiding your gaze as he waited for your response.

“Yeah of course!” You grinned, elated. “Here take my number, so we can talk about it later” You out stretched your hand for Brian to give you his phone so you could tap your number in.

“Yeah, right sure” He said handing his phone to you, his sweaty hands almost making him drop it.

You opened it to see a text from someone named Andrew

‘U BANG HER YET?’

hai danonation ^_^

The Riddler

By Sarah

DYING RN

Credit to @spaghetty-betty

She keeps making memes for my chunky Paul addiction 😩🙏🏻