add a little bit of spice ✨

Your legs are crossed as you sit on his couch, something of habit, but there is a connotation that differs from the normal. This time, you’re patiently waiting for him, lashes fluttering and anticipating.

Your breathing, calm and steady, is opposite to his. A contrast. Ryland is anything but calm and steady, his heartbeat an overwhelming tempo.

The distance he had always set between the two of you, the same one that had been sheltering him, is closing in as he sits next to you. It almost slams into him when you twist your body to face him.

“Will you kiss me now?” There is a questioning lilt in your voice as you ask him, looking at him with a waiting mouth.

Ryland swallows, Adam's apple bobbing in consequence.

His warm, larger hands are coming to hold the sides of your face with such tenderness. To calm your nerves or his, he’s not so sure.

(It’s definitely the latter.)

“Yeah.” He shocks himself from the stable way his word had left, shocked because every other part of him is buzzing with nerves all bundled up and tangled.

Ryland has always had thoughts of kissing you.

They have been too much work to dismiss, because there are things you do that induce them. It comes to him when you take his hand, a touch that feels alive. It comes when you smile at him a certain way, like the way you are right now.

The silence between you is tranquil, full of anticipation, like the pause after lightning, counting seconds in search of the thunder.

And just when he thinks that his pupils won’t dilate anymore, he finally presses his lips onto yours. What a shame you’d never see them blow up tenfold, eyes shut and letting yourself concentrate on the feeling of being kissed (and him, the feeling of finally kissing you).

It’s a soft brushing at first until his lips are gliding over yours, warm and soft, and kissing suddenly seems so easy. It feels natural when you kiss him back.

A thrill runs down your spine at the feeling, his thumbs rubbing gentle circles to your cheeks, and he hopes you keep your eyes closed in fear that you’ll see his embarrassing, longing, yearning face.

Your hands grip his shoulders to steady yourself, and Ryland feels his heart lurch forward in the rattling cage of his ribs. His bones are buzzing. You’re so good at kissing him back.

He tilts his head in the opposite direction, and you’re quick to follow, and Ryland swears he’s going to scream or pass out, or anything. You’re a way too fast learner, and it seems like you know what you’re doing more than him.

He doesn’t understand how he’s feeling anymore. He wonders how you feel.

Your words have been echoing in his mind since you uttered them—no feelings attached. But who is Ryland, if not a person with feelings attached to you. He is just a man making more room in his mind to tattoo this moment there and keep it permanent, tucked away from the forgetting spirit’s pursuit.

You make a noise into his lips, and Ryland almost vomits at the heavenly sound.

He’s so nervous, he’s going crazy. His mind is no longer a safe space. His couch is no longer one, too. He will now forever remember how your lips feel and taste when he sits here.

Because Ryland no longer wants this to be a dream, to be a mere favor he grants you. He wants this to be his reality. There is embarrassing desire, and yearning, and love-love-love.

When he pulls back, you’re blushing and just as breathless as he is.

And Ryland is light-headed at the sight of your swollen, kiss-bruised lips now stained in a darker shade despite your lipgloss being transferred on his own lips. And at the darkness in your cheeks that makes him run delusional thoughts that he has to burst before they can foster.

“So that’s what kissing feels like.” You say into the space between your faces, which is still so narrow that you must be breathing each other’s breath. “I see now, the appeal of it.”

“Good?”

Something is setting inside of Ryland, greater than yearning. He doesn’t have the word for it, but it feels like every atom in his body is vibrating with the need to kiss you again.

“Really good.”

“Do you want to… do it again? For practice, of - of course.”

The first thing you notice when you wake up is the stickiness on your arms and legs. It’s slightly soft, not gooey or greasy, but strong in its grip. You try to wriggle and are met with firm resistance. Panic begins to creep in through the haziness of your still sleepy mind and you take a few quick, deep breaths, trying to keep yourself calm as you survey exactly what sort of trouble you’ve landed in. 

You aren’t hurt, which is good. The last thing you could remember from before losing consciousness was falling for what felt like–– well, not that long, actually. Time had stilled for seemingly a moment or two and then there was nothing. You must have passed out before you’d landed in…. what exactly did you land in? You shift your head from side to side as much as you can in order to get a better view of your surroundings. 

At the far edges of your vision, you can see the dark grey rock walls of a cavern. You aren’t sure how big it is because you can’t quite see the cave room floor, the little bit of sunlight trickling in from above quickly being swallowed up by shadow. Around you, intricately braided ropes of white stretch from wall to wall, forming a spindly basket of shapes and patterns that glisten like crystal shards.

It’s a web. A gigantic spiderweb. 

All the warnings you’d been given about the humongous arachnids local to the area start flooding back to you. ‘Avoid the deeper parts of the forest,’ your neighbor had told you when you’d first been moving into your new cottage. ‘The underbrush is so dense, it makes the entrance to underground caves— spider holes, we call ‘em— almost invisible. If you’re not careful, you’ll fall right in!’

Internally you curse yourself for not heeding their advice. If you had listened more seriously to their rambling, maybe you’d have some idea of how to get out of this situation, but as it stands, you’re stuck. Which is not ideal. 

You spend a few minutes attempting to tug yourself free, practically thrashing in your efforts, but the web holds you tight, merely bouncing back and forth with your movement. You go until you’re panting hard before finally relenting and relaxing again. It’s probably best to conserve your energy. You take a few minutes to catch your breath, feeling the web slowly return to its previous stillness beneath you. 

And then it wobbles again. 

You freeze. The dip you feel can only be caused by something very large and very heavy. Your eyes jump from shadowy crevice to shadowy crevice, searching frantically for whatever had just made its presence so purposefully known, and then your gaze flits upwards and your stomach drops. 

Eight eyes, black and glittering, stare down at you from the dark. Despite not being able to see its full form, you can tell the spider is monstrously huge. It keeps itself hidden, tucked away from the sunbeam peaking in through the canopy. You’re frozen in place, both literally and figuratively. There is a long moment where nothing moves but the web, still swaying slightly under the spider’s weight, before something suddenly crawls out from the shadows beneath the giant arachnid. It takes a second for you to register what exactly it is. 

Another spider: much, much smaller than the first, so small its presence doesn’t disturb the web at all. It creeps down towards you in graceful, careful strides, its movement slow, almost hesitant. You feel like you should be trying to get away from it, but instead you just watch, stiff as a board, as the little thing stops an inch from your face, its multiple tiny eyes surveying you with what seems like curiosity. 

It shifts a bit closer, and you can almost picture it cocking its head to the side like a puppy. One minuscule leg reaches out, brushing against your cheek, so light it almost feels like the tip of a feather. You’re so baffled by the sensation that you don’t even realize the spider has moved until you register it crawling onto your head. 

Your face screws up in discomfort and you go even more still, as though maybe if you just didn’t move, the spider would grow bored of you and scurry away. It doesn’t. You clench your fists tight as you feel it move from your hair, to your forehead, to your temple, down your cheek, under your chin… 

Oh. That tickles. 

Your expression scrunches for a very different reason now. The spider’s little legs slowly making their way across your throat feel like someone is brushing a miniature feather duster across your skin. You try very hard not to react, squeezing your eyes shut and pressing your lips together in a stubborn attempt to supress the wobbly smile spreading across your face. It’ll move away from your neck eventually. You can handle this. It’s not that bad. 

Something tiny and soft rubs up against your wrist and your eyes shoot open. 

It seems you’d been so focused on that one baby spider’s actions, you’d failed to notice the arrival of many, many more, none of them larger than your fist, some of them smaller than a coin. They surround you almost completely, blinking at you with the same curiosity as their sibling. You and the army of little spiders stare at each other for a long second… and then you jolt when the one by your wrist begins to crawl up your arm, a handful of its brethren following suit. 

The sensation of them on your forearm isn’t too horribly ticklish, but you can feel your sensitivity rising as their feathery feet move towards your shoulder. You squish your lips together in a tight line to try and fight off the inevitable as one spider meanders across your collarbone, another lingers in the crease of your elbow, another slips beneath your sleeve, and very quickly all your defenses collapse. Your upper body jerks, making the web twinge yet again, and the remaining spiders shift and scurry around you, drawn in by the sudden motion.

“Ah–– eehee––! Wait!” You squeak a little as more tiny tormentors start to close in. “W–– Wait! Wait!”

Your protests fall on deaf ears, the spiders seemingly only encouraged by the sound of your voice. One wiggles its way under the fabric of your tunic and you can feel it taking slow, exploratory steps across your lower stomach. When it reaches your naval, it stumbles, surprised by the sudden dip in terrain, its fuzzy leg falling into the depths of your bellybutton. This earns another squeak from you. 

“Ack––! Get–– get out ohohof there–!” 

You wiggle your hips in a fruitless attempt to dislodge the spider, and you can hear it softly clicking in distress as you do. Unfortunately this does little more than bring more of its concerned siblings beneath your shirt to investigate the commotion, their downy feather bodies brushing like teasing fingertips over the sensitive stretch of your tummy. 

Crap, crap, crap. The little spiders aren’t stopping. They’re also not attacking you, or trying to eat you, which you suppose is a good thing, though it’s hard to appreciate your luck when you’re busy trying not to dissolve into helpless laughter. Your eyes frantically jump from side to side before landing on where the giant mama spider is still skulking in its shadowy corner. Its multitude of eyes haven’t left your squirming form for a single moment. 

What is the purpose of this? Is this what giant arachnids are known for? Are they tenderizing you, preparing your body for consumption in some weird, horribly ticklish way? Or maybe they’re just genuinely curious about your warm squishy flesh and the way it writhes when touched. Your neighbor had spoken like people falling into spider holes was commonplace, but maybe they were exaggerating and this is the first time these creatures have ever seen a human. Gods, you wish you’d taken the time to learn more about the stupid magic forest surrounding your town. If you had, maybe you wouldn’t have— 

“Aha–– eeheehee––!” Breathless laughter interrupts your thoughts. “Nn––nnnahahaha!”

One of the baby spiders moves up your side and your giggles jump as it softly crawls over your right ribcage. There are a lot of them on you now. Thankfully only a select few have figured out how to access the soft, sensitive skin beneath your clothes, but the ones that had are quickly proving to be your biggest concern, finding tickle spots even you were unaware of. 

A particularly small spider nestles itself into your navel. When it reaches the bottom, it keeps crawling, trying to move deeper and supposedly very confused by the warm little tunnel ending so abruptly. The sensation makes you squeal and thrash. A separate but equally effective spider skitters around your ear, barely a whisper against the cartilage. The waistband of your trousers are— thank the gods— too tight for any of the little pests to wiggle past, but your relief at this quickly morphs into even gigglier distress as one of the ones by your left boot finds it way under your pant leg. You try your hardest to kick your feet in instinctive protest as you feel it crawl from your ankle, to your calf, to the back of your knee, where it seems to settle itself comfortably into that sensitive concavity. 

“Ahaahaha! Oh–– Ohoho gohohods–– stop ihihit!” 

Your voice pitches up into a squeaky hiccup. There’s so many of them and they’re everywhere, only a few precious stretches of your skin left untouched by the spiders’ ticklish skittering. It’s overwhelming, it’s all-encompassing, it feels like it will never end, and then, out of nowhere, all movement stops. The tiny creatures on your body come to an abrupt halt and everything around you stills. 

Almost everything around you stills. 

The web is wobbling yet again. It moves in deep, dipping shudders as something very large and very purposeful makes its way down towards your trapped, helpless form. You want to run; you want to tear yourself from the sticky prison encasing you and hightail it all the way back to your little cottage, but your limbs are too tired from squirming to even attempt an escape. You pant, skin prickling under the frozen touch of the baby spiders covering it, and wait for the inevitable with your eyes shut tight. 

But the inevitable doesn’t come. A gargantuan shadow is cast behind your eyelids and you tense yourself in preparation for the sting of a bite, yet in place of white hot pain you instead feel a small, careful tug at your tunic. As your mind races to grapple with the lack of fangs sinking into you, the fabric of your blouse is gently but unceremoniously ripped open. Goosebumps erupt as the cool air of the cavern hits your torso and your eyes shoot open. 

Those eight glittering eyes stare down at you, each one as large as your head with a color akin to polished obsidian, your own terrified face reflected back at you from within their inky black depths. The spider shifts its giant maw downwards, fangs speckled with saliva, inching closer and closer to your now very exposed and very vulnerable stomach. 

I’m gonna die, you think. I’m going to get eaten by a giant spider and I’m gonna die. And I just paid off the mortgage on my stupid cottage. 

Except the giant spider does not eat you. The feeling of its jaws pressing into your skin is not followed by white-hot pain; in fact you don’t think it even broke the skin. For a moment you’re completely baffled as to its motivation, the reason behind its apparent mercy, and then everything clicks into place when its mandibles twitch, gently tweaking the sensitive bit of tummy beneath your bellybutton.

“Wh–– wha––ahahAHA––!”

You can’t even properly react to the new stimulation before the various baby spiders dotting your body start to chirp and shift, almost vibrating with contentment, seemingly very happy that their mother is joining in on this new experimentation of theirs. You’re instantly overcome by squealing laughter as your trapped form is riddled once again with soft, quick, horribly ticklish sensations, now with the added torment of the giant spider’s gentle mandibles squeezing and pinching your stomach. 

If the little spiders’ fuzzy bodies were akin to feather dusters, their mother’s rounded fangs are like deft, nimble fingers. It’s an absolutely torturous combination. You aren’t quite sure what tickles more: the ghosting of barely there plumage all over your skin or the pointed, concentrated teasing above your waistline, practically digging into your sensitive flesh. 

“AhahAHAHA! St–– stohoHOHOP–– EEHEEP––!” Your noises hit their crescendo. The giant spider, silent and stoic in the face of your helpless hysterics, stares down at you as it pokes and prods and pinches endlessly. “I–– I cahahAHAHA–– I cahahan’t–– pleaHEEHEEHEASE––!!”

Every inch of you is thrashing against torturously ticklish touches both light and forceful; it’s all you can feel. Even the stickiness of the web entrapping you has long since faded into the background. In the deepest recesses of your mind you suppose you should probably still be worried about being eaten, but currently all you can think about is the sensation of little eight-legged menaces scurrying over your overly sensitive body and how their mother’s mandibles are so, so horribly effective at tickling that you almost wonder if they were designed specifically for tormenting you in this way. 

Your vision blurs; your insides hurt from laughter. You aren’t quite sure where you are anymore. Is this your life now? Are the spiders going to tickle you until you pass out, or explode, or die? Any or all of those options feel equally likely with the way your brain is starting to melt, lost in the overwhelming experience of being utterly and completely overcome with tickles. You think you might not be able to take a single second more…..

And finally, finally, it stops. 

It takes you a moment to realize the spiders are retreating. The feeling of them slipping off of you is so similar to the earlier tickling, you don’t notice your torment has been paused until suddenly your skin is a lot more bare than before. Your ears are ringing. All you can hear is your own ragged breath as you take in gulps of cool cavern air. When your eyelids crack open slightly, you just barely register the gigantic blurry shape of the mother spider and its hundreds of children backing away from your exhausted form. God, are you exhausted. You’ve never felt so tired in your life. You can’t fall asleep here, you absolutely should not fall asleep here, but despite your best efforts you can feel yourself slipping into the oh-so tempting arms of unconsciousness.

You wake up, much to your surprise, in the infirmary. As your village’s healer feeds you a foul-tasting concoction, you learn that apparently unsuspecting townsfolk falling into spider holes is a regular occurrence, even more so than your anxious neighbor had implied. It’s so regular, in fact, that there are nightly patrols of the forest and underground caves to check for any unfortunate victims. You want very much to ask if every person who finds themself stuck in a giant spider’s web winds up being tickled to tears, but you can’t quite force the words out. Perhaps you really were just particularly unlucky. 

It was a quiet, calm, and extremely boring shift in the sick bay. Being Saturday night, most people were either sleeping or drinking, letting loose on the one night a week they could sleep in, since Sundays were the designated day off for most people on the ship.

Ryland didn’t usually stay with you this late when you worked nights, understanding that sleep was vital for his job here. When he didn’t sleep, he got a little stupid. Stupid and Astrophage did not mix. But since Sundays were his days off too, he insisted on staying and keeping you company, claiming that he was worried you might die of boredom.

He’d already done so much to help- bringing you a late dinner and sweeping and mopping the floors- so you’d begged him to go to his room and get some shuteye. You could tell he was exhausted after a long week, dark bags under his eyes and eyelids at risk of sealing shut every time he blinked but he insisted he stay.

Your shift wasn’t scheduled to be over for another couple of hours and you were pretty certain Ryland was not going to make it that long. 

While you organized and restocked the cabinets of supplies, distracting yourself with mundane busywork to keep your mind from shutting down too, the scientist kept the conversation flowing as he usually did to keep himself awake.

In response to his fun fact, you held up a cotton ball- the whole reason he’d brought up a fact about cotton in the first place- between two gloved fingers and raised a brow at him in disbelief. 

“This is a fruit?”

Ryland had dragged the rolling desk chair from the office to lounge on, as it was a little more comfortable than a stool, and proceeded to spin around in circles for several minutes.

Feet catching on the chair’s leg to stop himself, he squinted at what you were holding. His glasses had been discarded on one of the examination tables and he made no move to reach for them.

“In a way.”

“I don't believe you.”

“Cotton comes from a flower and has seeds; ergo, a fruit.”

You hummed, rolling the cotton ball between your fingers before putting it back in the sterile container. Moving on to the next container of supplies that needed refilling, (bandaids) you snorted.

“So you’re telling me that the clothes I have on right now, which are partially or entirely made of cotton, are made of fruit.”

You tugged at the seam of your scrub bottoms, stretching the fabric to make your point. Ryland made a sound of denial.

“Well no- obviously it’s not a fruit anymore. It’s just technically a fruit while it’s growing, then it loses its fruit status when the boll dries and opens up. Also, I don't think your scrubs are made of cotton.”

“Maybe not entirely but I’m sure there’s some in there. My underwear is definitely made of cotton, though. Want to come check?”

The poor scientist stammered and his face warmed. “N-No, I’m sure you’re probably right, but that cardigan isn’t cotton. 100% wool. It’s the only thing I own that I can’t just throw into a washing machine.”

Indeed, when Ryland had joined you earlier in the sick bay, saw you only wore a short sleeved scrub top and had a dusting of goosebumps on your arms thanks to the circulated ship air, he hadn’t hesitated to throw his signature fox cardigan over your shoulders. It was warm, soft and smelled like him- coffee, a tiny hint of whatever solvent he used in his lab, and chypre cologne. He said he was warm enough in the hoodie and sweats he wore so he insisted you take the knitwear for the night. You didn’t complain.

Ryland was spinning again.

“Baby, stop doing that. You’re going to get sick.”

“No I won’t.” His head was hanging over the back of the chair, staring at the ceiling as he went in circles.

“Do you not remember your first day on the ship? Your cone? I’m not in the mood to mop up the chicken alfredo you had for dinner.”

“This is different. That was all flight induced.”

You sighed. Stubborn.

Snagging a lollipop from a little bucket on the counter, you unwrapped it and meandered to Ryland. What a bucket of lollipops was doing on a military vessel, you weren’t sure, but it sure had come in handy several times with some of the patients you’d treated. And the man you’d struck up a little… something with. You hadn’t put a label on your relationship yet.

Ryland didn’t stop spinning until you grabbed the armrest and popped the cherry flavored candy into his open mouth. He looked surprised, rolling the sweet around his mouth and ogling up at you through his lashes.

“Eat that. Some sugar to keep you awake.”

“Thank you,” he smiled, eyes lighting up and twisting the stick around with his fingers. The lollipop worked, Ryland stopping his whirling to focus on watching you again. While you began checking expiration dates on antiseptic, your companion couldn’t help but fill the quiet.

“Do you know how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie pop?”

You threw your head back to giggle. “I don’t. Was that part of the research you did for your dissertation?”

He snorted. “No, I was just really bored during one of my classes.”

“And what were your findings?”

“Well,” he hummed, kicking his feet up on a stool that sat nearby. “It took about 285 for me. My tongue started to hurt around 150 so I think that’s a big factor why there’s no definitive answer; people just give up because it starts to hurt or gets too boring. It depends a lot on technique too.”

“Does it?”

“Yeah. Do you do small licks,” he took the cherry candy and swiped it quickly over the flat of his tongue, “or more of a,” he put the whole thing in his mouth and pulled it out, “kind of lick? And the whole experiment is a bust if you bite it.” He did just that, biting the cherry sphere and breaking it in two, crunching on the piece in his mouth. 

What an endearing man. 

He held out the parts that remained on the stick. “Want the rest?”

You shook your head with a smile, gesturing to your mouth. “I don’t think I’d look very professional with a bright red tongue.”

Ryland’s own tongue slipped out to wet his lips when he glanced at your smile, biting the rest of the sugar off of the stick. “I think you’d look good.”

“Yeah?” Your heart skipped a beat.

“Yeah.”

Glancing to the cabinets of supplies, you decided you’d done enough mindless work for one night and wandered back over to Ryland’s relaxed form. He straightened a little when you approached, swallowing the cherry flavored saliva in his mouth and gave you a lopsided grin. His lips were red. 

The scientist dropped his feet from the stool so you could stand between his legs and his eyes alternated between yours. You leant forward to bracket his body with your hands on the armrests.

“Can I have a taste?”

His smile faltered. “But I already-”

“From here,” you pressed a thumb onto his bottom lip, parting his mouth just enough to expose his bottom teeth.

“Oh…”

You didn’t let him respond more, leaning forward to press a featherlight kiss to his mouth. It was barely enough to taste anything, but that didn’t stop Ryland from craving more. His palms found your face, tilting his head to slot his mouth over yours.

“Ry, there’s cameras,” you protest against his lips, not trying very hard at all to pull back. Ryland retreated a centimeter to pout. “But… there’s none in the office,” you suggest, with a waggle of your eyebrows.

You’d never seen someone roll in a chair so fast. Ryland kicked off of the ground and scooted himself and the chair back into the little room hidden from anyone watching in surveillance, knocking the armrest against the metal door frame in the process. 

The sick bay was quiet- no faroff footsteps, dim lights and empty. There was no harm in having a little fun to pass the time as long as you weren’t caught.

Your scientist was already looking eager and more awake than he had all night, haphazardly shoving some of the miscellaneous office supplies that littered the surface of the desk out of the way so a perfect, you-shaped space was cleared.

He was quick to pull you close when you casually rounded the desk, hands gliding down your sides and over your ass to cup the backs of your thighs, lifting you onto the surface without a hint of a struggle. 

Ryland’s lips were soft and impatient when they found your jaw, searching and feeling while you carefully peeled the latex gloves off of your hands. You were in no rush. The stubble along his cheek brushed over yours when he mouthed at the arch of your ear, a silent plea for your attention. You loved having this effect on him- having him so incredibly desperate for your touch that he wouldn’t hesitate to get on his knees and beg. It was fun to tease him and you knew he secretly loved it just as much as you did.

He could stand and cage you in against the desk as much as he liked, but you both knew who really controlled the room. 

You did just that- leisurely brushing your fingers under the hem of his hoodie enough to expose a sliver of skin. He shuddered at the touch of your circling thumbs that barely made enough contact for him to feel and when you didn’t make any move to continue exploring his abdomen, a breathy plea was mumbled against your neck.

His kiss was searing when he finally began chasing your mouth. The cherry flavored lollipop he’d enjoyed earlier coated his lips, giving you a taste every time he came back for another kiss. Several desperate kisses were planted on your mouth which you smiled at, before you squeezed at his waist, a quiet request to slow down. He did, keeping his lips a hairs breadth away from yours but staying still until you came to him. 

A deep-throated groan rumbled out of him when you sucked his bottom lip into your mouth, teasing the flesh with your tongue.

You controlled the pace from there, slow and steady, while Ryland followed your lead. His lips would wait for yours to part, only opening when yours did. His tongue stayed dormant until yours sought it out. It was a delicate dance, one you could sense he wanted to deepen but refrained from doing so.

Peeking your eyes open just a touch when he tilted his head to bring your faces closer, you couldn’t help but smile against his mouth; his eyes were screwed shut and brow furrowed, eyelashes fluttering over the apples of his cheeks. The source of his discomfort was prominent where it pressed firmly against your thigh.

He’d been patient enough, you decided. A sigh of relief brushed out of his nose and dusted over your cheek when your arms slid from his waist to trail over his pelvis, stopping at the waistband of his sweats. A light groan of approval rumbled over your mouth when you palmed him through the material, feeling the tented, radiating heat and the smallest hint of dampness. He was straining; painfully hard. When you opened your eyes again, you could see the tension in his neck through the prominent tendons and veins pushing against tan skin.

You pulled away from his mouth with a light laugh, watching as he grunted in annoyance and ran his tongue over his lips to gather up any remnants of your saliva. 

“This looks uncomfortable,” you tease, poking a finger at the wet spot on his pants.

Ryland made a sound that almost sounded like a growl. “It is.” His hands were balled into fists on the desk next to your thighs.

“Do you have any blood left in your brain or has it all traveled here?”

“All of the blood in my body is definitely in my head, just not the head my brain is in.” He said it so seriously, head hung and eyes shut like he was concentrating.

You couldn’t help the snort of laughter that escaped you. Ryland rarely ever made sexual jokes, even when it was just the two of you. Maybe it was the teacher in him, but it was always a treat when he snuck in a little quip out of the blue.

“I can help you with that.”

He was mumbling please like his life depended on it.

Ryland’s head ducked to your neck when you slid a palm into his sweats, leaning most of his upper body weight onto you for support in order to stay upright. His happy trail was soft and a perfect guide to where he needed you. You took your time with his navel, brushing your fingers through the short trimmed hair. He thrust into your palm with a whine.

“‘S not fair,” he grumbled, voice muffled by the wool of his cardigan that still warmed your shoulders.

“What’s not fair, sweetheart.”

“You haven’t even really touched me yet but I’m already this hard. How do you do it?”

Your fingers inched toward the base of his shaft. “Magic, I suppose.” 

The both of you already knew the real answer to his question; Ryland’s body naturally reacted this way after any kind of attention from you, even after you’d been seeing each other for months. He was embarrassed by it, but you hoped it would never change.

The blonde’s hair shifted against your face and his mouth dropped open against your neck when your fingers ghosted around his cock, languidly smoothing down the length until you found the head in the confines of his boxers. The damp fabric and pre that dribbled from him in a slow, steady stream wetted your hand, making the brush of your thumb over the tip easy. 

Ryland’s teeth sunk into your shoulder. Not to hurt but to ground himself.

He was pulsing in your hands, thighs quaking where they barely held him upright. 

“Y-Your hands are really cold,” he breathed, tongue wetting his lips and your skin.

“Sorry.”

You weren’t sorry at all, not when he only seemed to get harder. Ryland’s shampoo permeated your senses while your hand explored every inch of him, mapping the veins, squeezing his balls. It was easy to find your rhythm whenever you returned to his cock, calm and gentle pumps of your hand to keep him wanting but not pushing him to the edge too early.

Hands palmed at the meat of your thighs, gripping and tugging you closer to the edge of the desk. His whole shaft was wet in no time, the muffled plap of your hand against him filled the otherwise quiet room.

The two of you melded into one, lost in the feel of each other as you did every time you were intimate. There was something about him that sang to you unlike any person you’d ever been with. You didn’t necessarily believe in soulmates, but if such a thing did exist, you wouldn’t be surprised if your universe was meant to be entwined with his.

Ryland seemed to be trying to bury himself under your skin, pressing his face impossibly close to your neck and hips jolting in tandem with each pump, squeeze and twist of your wrist. You trailed gentle kisses on the hairline behind his ear and preened at the fact that you held Ryland’s pleasure in the palm of your hands.

You sat entwined for several minutes and eventually, beneath the sounds of Ryland’s moans, the slick of skin and the creaking of the ship, there was another noise your mind nearly missed. A dull noise, rhythmic and echoing- the clang of rubber on metal. You’d heard it a thousand times during your time in the sick bay, most often as you worked day shifts.

Footsteps in the hall, coming towards your post where you were supposed to be working.

Anyone coming into the sick bay could see right into the office once they entered the threshold, meaning they would see the two of you locked in a steamy embrace with your hand shoved down The Ryland Grace’s sweatpants. It was not an image you needed being spread to every person on the ship. 

Not because you were ashamed; no, it was quite the opposite. You were proud to walk around the ship with the man, not at all secretive about your feelings towards each other. No one really cared anyway- everyone was hooking up with everyone after being trapped on the aircraft for so long. You just didn’t want people gossiping about the private aspects of your relationship. And gossiping was one of the only things the people here had to talk about nowadays.

Ryland didn’t have any time to process your next move.

Ripping your hand out of his pants, you pushed his torso where it rested against yours to get him off of you and shoved a hand into his hair, pressing firmly enough to his head to signal to him that he needed to get down. 

You didn’t stay to see where he ended up behind the desk, how he reacted to the sudden retraction of your hand from his cock or if he even knew what was going on; you just heard him make a strangled “oof” when he hit the deck before you launched off of the desk. You dropped his fox cardigan onto the wooden surface before you circled around to the door. 

Straightening your scrubs and shaking your head to rid it of the hazy fog Ryland tended to cast on it, you strolled out as casually as you could to greet the person coming in.

It was a random crew-member, a cook from the kitchen who’d been working late to do some prep for breakfast and cut her hand with a knife. She was sweet, and none the wiser to what you’d just been doing as you carefully washed your hands of everything that Ryland had been slowly coating it with minutes before.

You made useless small-talk, not at all paying attention to the words that came out of your mouth- mind completely filled with the scientist who hadn’t made a peep in the office. After some liquid bandages and a sterile wrap, the cook was on her way out the door and the room was quiet again.

Tossing your gloves and giving the silence a minute to make sure she was certainly gone and no one else was coming, you wandered back into the office to peer behind the desk.

Ryland was sitting on the floor, propped up against the small column of drawers attached to the desk and staring blankly at the wall opposite of him. The cardigan you’d put on the desk had made its way into his lap, draped over his thighs where his hands fisted the fabric. Sweat shone on his forehead and his hair was wild. You’d never loved a sight more.

“Are you alive?” You asked quietly, moving to crouch next to him and brushing a hand over his head.

His nod was shallow, the scientist mentally somewhere else. His cheeks were pinker than they had been all night.

When he didn’t move to speak, you gestured to the cardigan. “Are you cold?” The office wasn’t cold at all in your opinion, if anything it was stuffy and hot after what you’d been doing.

Hair scraping along the drawers, Ryland shook his head. “No.”

“What’s this about, then?”

You picked up the sleeve of the knit top with a questioning look. When your fingers brushed the cream fabric, his hands tightened like he was scared you were about to take it from him. “Nothing.”

An odd reaction, but one you began piecing together based off of how flushed he looked and how determined he was to not let you see what lay beneath.

“Sweetheart…” you started, slow and gentle like you were talking to a cornered animal. Ryland’s eyes swiveled to yours for a second before turning away. “Did you come in your pants?”

A gulp. “No.”

Lie.

Heat bloomed through your body. He hadn’t come with the help from your hand, at least not at the end. You got him to that point but he’d come after you’d left, meaning he’d finished himself off because he couldn’t wait for you (which seemed unlikely) or he’d come untouched.

Ryland’s throat bobbed as you brushed a thumb over his cheek, feeling the heat of his blush. If he was this bashful, you had a feeling it was the latter.

“That might just be the hottest thing I’ve ever heard.”

He seemed to become even more flustered at the fact that you liked the idea of him making a mess of himself. His hands slapped over his face and he groaned in embarrassment. “I need to go take a cold, cold shower.”

You laughed and pressed a kiss to his temple before standing back to your full height, offering your hands out to help him up when he peeked through his fingers. “Not too cold, Ry. I don’t need you back in here within the hour with the sniffles.” He carefully took one of your outstretched hands and clamored to his feet, the other hand keeping a steadfast hold on his sweater to keep his crotch covered. You had half a mind to ask him to let you see even though you knew he would refuse.

“Uh,” he adjusted the cardigan. “Sorry, but I think I’m going to have to bring this with me. Do you want my hoodie instead? I don’t have a shirt on underneath but I can probably just zip this up and it should be long enough to cover-”

“It’s ok, hun. I only have a couple more hours before my shift ends and I’m not very cold right now anyway.” No, you felt plenty warm- inside and out.

Your scientist nodded with a small ‘okay’ and tied his cardigan around his waist. You smoothed out his rumpled hoodie, fixing the strings and pressed a long kiss to his sternum. Ryland sighed and cradled the back of your head with one of his beautifully large hands to press his own kiss to the top of your head.

The two of you walked hand in hand to the entrance of the medical wing in companionable silence, trying to soak in every minute you had together before parting. Between his constant meetings, experiments and jobs, it was hard to find time together outside of collapsing on his tiny bed and passing out on top of each other at night. So this steamy encounter, no matter how short, was a pleasant gift.

“Keep the bed warm for me?”

Ryland cheesed at you, perfectly white teeth glinting in the dim light. “Of course.”

You didn’t know who he was or what he studied, nor did you care to find out.

In general, you were pleasant with everyone you crossed paths with and your first time meeting Ryland Grace wouldn’t have been any different from seeing any other random grad student if he hadn’t immediately pissed you off. To his credit, he didn’t even know he had done something to irk you and it hadn’t been his intention to be a thorn in your side- not at the beginning at least.

If you hadn’t already been having the worst day of your life (woke up late, missed bus and denied scholarship application, to name a few of the events that morning), maybe the two of you could’ve hit it off and been fast friends. He was probably nice enough and besides occasionally being a smartass, he had a good head on his shoulders. Smart, confident and easy on the eyes- all things that pointed to a person you could get along with.

So how had he immediately put himself on your shit list?

Well, he was sitting in your spot.

No, the little nook in the University’s library did not have your name on it, nor did it actually belong to you.

But you’d been sitting there, in the same sunny little spot of the library that you’d come to call the closest thing to heaven you’d experienced during your doctorate studies, every day since you began your research. After extensive lab work, you’d disappear into the almost always empty corner of the library to type up your findings for hours at a time. 

No one had ever been in your nook before. Until Ryland Grace decided he wanted to sit there too.

You’d already had a day from hell so stumbling up to your spot midafternoon only to find that someone else had already claimed it with all of his stuff immediately infuriated you.

He seemed to be around your age, most likely working on his masters or PhD like you were. A spread of papers, books and packets were strewn over the desk surface, no apparent rhyme or reason to their organization. The guy was tapping away at a laptop where a huge spreadsheet of data was displayed, completely ignorant of your presence until you cleared your throat.

Any other day, you would’ve grumbled about it but found a different area to plant yourself for the night. But not that day. You were too irritated and too tired to let this dirtbag take away the last scrap of peace you would get until the sun set.

The blonde haired intruder jumped at your pointed grumble, pulling a pair of wired earbuds out of his ears and looking you up and down from his seat. You most definitely looked like a hundred miles of bad road but you couldn’t have cared less.

“You’re in my spot.”

The quirked brow he gave you had you seeing red.

“Pardon?”

“You’re in. My spot.”

He seemed at a loss for words, pointedly looking past you where you knew a slew of other perfectly empty desks sat. “Uh… can’t you go sit somewhere else?”

You ground your teeth together. “No.”

Gesturing to all of his stuff on the table, he shrugged in a half-assed apology. “Sorry, I’m pretty comfortable here and I’m kinda busy, so…”

The stare off the two of you had for several seconds was charged with tension. He wouldn’t back down and you didn’t want to either, but he had the advantage. He had already claimed your nook and if you went and complained to one of the library staff several floors down, they would look at you like you were crazy. Every spot in the library was first come first serve, you had no special claim to this specific spot.

So you moved. To a table very close to the one he occupied. And spent the better part of your evening glaring daggers at him. 

He’d look up occasionally, meet your gaze and go back to his studies, like he wasn’t bothered at all. It sure bothered you that he was so nonchalant about everything. You could only watch with a sneer as the sun slowly set, bathing your perfect little nook in warm, golden sunlight and in turn making the messy jerk look ethereal while you were stuck in the library’s shadowy interior.

You’d been the one to leave first. It was late, you were exhausted and you had a 10 minute walk home in the dark. The stranger didn’t seem to be ready to leave at all, dutifully typing on his laptop and occasionally shuffling through the mess on the table for a notebook or sheet of paper marred with scribbles.

He’d looked up when you stood, giving you a smug grin that nearly had you flying into the booth to wring his neck. Unfortunately, there were laws against that so you just settled for a middle finger and left.

You thought that would be the end of it.

A one off encounter that you’d fume about for weeks and a man who you’d never see again. The university was big and hopefully you’d made your point that the spot was yours so he’d find somewhere new to study.

When you walked up to your spot the following day in much higher spirits, your good day shattered when you saw the familiar fluffy haired head over the back of the booth. He’d come again. And deliberately sat in your spot.

You decided right then and there that Ryland Grace was the bane of your existence.

For two weeks the man hogged your little piece of heaven. Try as you might to come earlier and claim it yourself before he could, he was always there. Did he ever do anything besides study? Did he eat? Did he sleep? Surely he didn’t spend the night at the library, but you wouldn’t put it past him to hide when the library staff shut the place down and stay until morning. The jerk would probably do that to be petty.

You could’ve found another spot. Surely there was another booth a floor up that was the exact same layout and would get just as much sun. But you refused out of principle. You wouldn’t let this asshole get his way. He wanted to sit in your spot? Fine. If your glares weren’t enough to deter him, you’d turn to another method to smoke him out.

The shocked face the man gave you when you slid into the booth opposite of him one day was worth every drop of fury you’d endured for those couple of weeks. His look of distress when you shoved all of his things to his half of the desk, leaving your half clean, was priceless.

“Hey! Why??”

“You want to sit in my spot? Fine. We’ll share.”

You began unpacking your things while the blonde tried to straighten out his. “You messed up my system!”

Neatly setting your own books on the desk and opening your laptop, you laughed incredulously. “That was your system?”

His scowl was searing. “Yes. I don’t expect you, of all people, to understand my method of madness.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

You’d parted ways very angry that day. 

The next day, you did the same thing: sat opposite of him and pushed his things to his side. And the next. And the next. And the next. He slowly started to learn to keep his things on his half of the desk to save himself the trouble of ‘reorganizing’. 

One time, you were surprised to find you’d beat Ryland to your nook and nearly jumped for joy. Finally! Your persistence must’ve paid off and he’d found somewhere else to plant himself. You were all smiles- up until a thick book was dropped onto the table, scaring you half to death, and that stupid messy mop of hair plopped into the booth with a smug grin. Said mop of hair then proceeded to give as good as he got; shoving your things from his side of the table back to your side.

Thus began your slightly hostile relationship with the man you eventually learned was molecular biology doctorate student, Ryland Grace (you read his name on one of the papers that snuck across the invisible line on the table).

For the most part, neither of you acknowledged each other during your joint study sessions- any conversation was clipped and tense. You didn’t try to learn anything about him and he made no effort to learn anything about you. In fact, you weren’t sure he even knew your name which was fine by you.

While you rarely conversed, there were small things you began learning about Ryland just by observation alone. 

Number one, while he was studying molecular biology, he seemed to have a specific interest in the stars; life in regards to space and the possibility of life outside of our planet. You knew as much because he had this annoying habit of grumbling while he worked- speaking out loud and working through his thoughts verbally.

He also had a smorgasbord of space and science related stickers on the back of his laptop you occasionally stared at when you were trying to think. NASA, planets, beakers, science puns and the occasional fox sticker stared at you every day. You weren’t sure why the foxes were thrown into the mix but you weren’t about to ask. 

Ryland couldn’t ever seem to sit still. He was always bouncing a leg or tapping a pen. The one time you got after him for it, he only did it more so you never brought it up again.

You also noticed something that Ryland didn’t seem to even know about himself. It took a couple of days to work up the willpower to actually ask about it.

“Do you have contacts?”

It was rare that you spoke to him, so Ryland looked up from the notebook he was writing in with a blink of surprise. “Huh?”

“Contacts. Y’know, the things in your eyes that help you see? Or glasses?”

“No?” He seemed truly flabbergasted.

You hummed and sat back in your seat. “Looks like you need them.”

“Wh-”

“You’re always squinting at your laptop so I was wondering if you have some but are so stubborn that you refuse to wear them. If you don’t, it might be worth getting your vision checked. I can’t imagine your eyes and brain appreciate the strain you put on them every day.”

Ryland didn’t speak to you the rest of the evening, which wasn’t too odd, but then didn’t show up in the library for a week. You wanted to say you loved the extra space, but you begrudgingly realized the table felt too big with him gone. You didn’t want to say you missed him, per se, but maybe somewhere adjacent.

When you saw Ryland after a week of absence- outside of the library for the first time- you had to do a double take. 

It was early in the morning- so early you could barely stand on your own two feet, which was why you were standing in the ever growing line at one of the cafes on campus for a cup of brain fuel.

You weren’t paying attention to who you stood behind in line, absentmindedly blinking at the slew of texts you received from a friend about a huge frat party happening that weekend that you weren’t planning on attending. A familiar notification sound jolted you out of your tired stupor.

Ryland had a unique chime that played any time he got a notification. It was the satellite phone jingle from the 3rd Jurassic Park movie. You suspected Ryland was a huge nerd about science fiction media but he’d probably rather die than admit that to you. In and of itself, the sound wasn’t that annoying but you’d heard it so often that it had seared itself into your brain and ‘Pavlov’s dogged’ you into feeling annoyed when you heard it.

Sure enough, a familiar set of shoulders stood in front of you, all covered by a cream sweater.

“Ryland?”

The science student turned on his heel. He seemed just as surprised to see you as you were him. It felt like seeing a wild animal, seeing Ryland outside of the library. You were surprised in turn, to find a new addition to the man’s outfit. Gold rimmed glasses sat on his nose. 

Ryland’s ears quickly became tipped in red.

“Oh. Hey.”

He seemed embarrassed, like he’d been caught red-handed. 

“Nice glasses.”

“Thanks…”

Your interactions were always awkward but this felt different. “Farsighted?”

“Yep.”

“Knew it. They fit you though, if that’s any consolation.”

“Thank you.”

Coffee suddenly didn’t sound appealing any more- not if you had to endure one more second of this horribly uncomfortable encounter. Your regular chats together weren’t always pleasant but they weren’t this odd. What changed? Was he angry that you’d been right and pointed out something he himself hadn’t noticed? Was he embarrassed that you’d proved him wrong? Was he that egotistical?

You stomped off without another word.

-

There was a hot, steaming cup of coffee with your name on it sitting in front of Ryland the next Monday. 

You hadn’t expected to see him at all in the library anymore, not after your last altercation, so you didn’t get a chance to turn and flee before he spotted you standing a couple of paces away, giving you a crooked smile.

You were too proud to run away now. You feared you’d look weak if you did. And Ryland Grace was the last person you wanted to look weak in front of.

So you pressed on, pointedly not looking at the scientist and pretending he didn’t exist. Ryland watched you the whole time, You could feel his stare and you wanted to slap yourself silly when you felt your cheeks heat up.

When you made no move to talk to him after you settled, Ryland nudged the coffee closer to you with an uncomfortable clearing of his throat. 

You pursed your lips and kept your eyes on your notes.

“I feel like we started off on the wrong foot.” His voice was cautious, like he was talking to a cornered animal. “I’m sorry for being an ass when we first met. I’d had a rough day and I know that’s no excuse but it’s the truth. I was feeling stubborn.”

This was the most he’d ever said to you in one go. You peeked a glance.

God did those glasses suit him. They made him look softer, somehow. Maybe they made his eyes bigger? Yeah that was probably it. Big eyes, like an alien. 

“Can we start over?”

He stuck a hand over his laptop and held it out to you. A handshake. His fingers were trembling. Did you make him nervous? Your confidence took a nice little boost from the thought alone.

You didn’t hate Ryland. Not really. As much as it pained you to admit, you enjoyed his company and had missed it while he was hiding from you. He just annoyed you sometimes with his snarky comments. But even those weren’t that bad. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to give him a chance?

Chewing on the inside of your cheek, you carefully clasped a hand in his and gave him one firm shake. 

His ears bloomed red again and he held onto your hand a little longer than you thought he would.

“Yeah, ok cool! Didn’t think you… would actually accept my offer so this is awesome. Your coffee order, I think I got it right? I’ve been peaking at your coffee cups for a little while to read the labels. Is that creepy? I didn’t mean it in a creepy way, I just wanted to make sure I knew what you liked if I ever got you anything.”

This was a new side of Ryland- unsure, stammering and sweet? Maybe he’d always been this way and you just hadn’t seen it.

You didn’t know how to feel about it.

-

Being ‘friends’ with Ryland lasted about a week.

All too quickly did you regularly find yourself hidden in a far corner of the library between the endless shelves of academic literature, kissing each other senseless. Or making out in a quiet study room. Or whispering weak protests against his shoulder when he laid you back in your shared nook to suck a mark on your neck.

Turns out, Ryland didn’t hate you. Never did. Except maybe for a second the first time you got after him for sitting in your spot but other than that, he was just smitten (and terrified) of you which was why he kept coming back. He was still arrogant and a smart ass, usually when you asked him a question related to his field- like you were supposed to know what the boiling point of liquid helium was- but you found yourself enjoying his quips.

It was just another Wednesday when your relationship shifted.

You had Ryland pressed up against a line of shelves, cradling his head in your palms and soaking up the feeling of his glasses brushing over your cheeks while your lips slowly worked against his. 

The library was silent at this time of day, especially being in such a far off corner of it, so the only sounds you could hear were the creak of the shelves when Ryland pressed too far back into them, your mouths, and your breath. It was your favorite pastime when you were tired of writing essays.

When Ryland pressed his thumbs into your hip bones, you pulled away an inch to give him space. His glasses were smudged from your skin and barely hanging onto his nose. His stupid t-shirt (a navy blue top with a ringed planet graphic and the words “Jupiter? I hardly know her.” stamped below it) was rumpled and riding up on his navel, allowing you a glimpse of his happy trail.

“I start a new job on Monday.” He breathed, eyes jumping between yours.

You pulled back even more in surprise. Ryland kept his hands on your waist so you didn’t go too far.

“Really?”

“Mhm. It’s a part-time lab technician job. The pay isn’t great but it’ll help boost my resume once I get my doctorate and I need the extra income anyway.”

You beamed. “That’s great! Are you going to be able to juggle school and work, though? Will it be too much?”

Ryland’s eyes fluttered when you ran a thumb over his cheek. “I should be ok. But…” He hesitated. “I won’t have time to come here anymore.”

Oh.

Neither of you put a label on… whatever it was the two of you had together, so you never had a reason to meet up outside of your unspoken joint study hours. Ryland stopping his visits here meant you wouldn’t get to see him.

Your hands slid from his face to his shoulders as you tried to put on a nonchalant face. This was just a hookup- a little fling that probably never would’ve worked anyway. Ryland would continue his life and you would continue yours. It shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did to find out you would rarely, if ever, see the prospective scientist after Friday.

“I’ll miss my desk partner,” you smiled, hoping it wasn’t obvious how sad his words made you.

One side of Ryland’s mouth quirked up in a smile. “Yeah, me too.” He seemed awfully nonchalant about the whole thing. You kicked yourself for being so blinded by the handsome ass that weaseled his way into your life. Ryland fiddled with the hem of your shirt and straightened it out a bit, tilting his head to gesture down the aisle.

“So… should we go back to our spot and hash out our schedules, then?”

Now you are confused. “Our schedules?”

“Yes? To find times that work for both of us to meet up? Like… between labs and such. Or in the late evenings. Or weekends. Or you could stay the night at my place- uh, unless I read this thing wrong?” He let go of you to gesture between your bodies, beginning to fidget on his feet. “Did I read this wrong? If I did, forget everything I said because it was all just a funny joke-”

You flew onto your tiptoes and flung your arms around his neck, only slightly shoving him into the shelves behind him to claim his mouth. Ryland made a noise of approval and wound his arms around your torso to lift you into him. 

Schedule swapping would have to wait a little longer and you offhandedly hoped that there were no security cameras this deep between the stacks of books because if someone was watching them, they wouldn’t enjoy what they were about to see.

——————

If anyone were to ask on any regular occasion, you’d consider yourself a pretty lucky hunter.

Sure, the life of a hunter can get dangerous- and even more than that, it can get boring. You see so much of the same exact thing every day. Vampires, shapeshifters, vengeful spirits, maybe a Tulpa if things shake up enough, rinse, repeat. But you, well, you never seem to be bored.

How could you be? What, living in a house with the world’s two most interesting people and all. At least on the days that you can consider them people, which are few and far between given that you usually land on something more akin to wild, yet non-aggressive stray dogs.

Er- they’re non-aggressive to you. And even that’s debatable.

See, you’re not the only one that knows how to keep entertained, and you’re made painfully, brutally aware of that fact every day.

You’re a very competent hunter, in almost every aspect of the job. Your expertise is not so much the field work as it is the book work, but you can still handle yourself well in a fight, and you’re incredibly intelligent. You can recite lore and history off-rip that it would take Sam hours of research to accurately source.

They know it too. You’re not just a work partner. You’re their best friend, and they each hold such deep rooted admiration for you. They have never once questioned if you were capable enough for a job. You’re smart, you’re strong, you’re independent…

They respect you.

…but really.

What do you expect them to do?

On top of all of those wonderful things that you are, you’re cute.

And oh so devastatingly ticklish.

So, yes. You’re their work partner, their best friend, an absolute genius, and also their personal plaything. And you have learned that they each have very different ideas of “playing”.

Anyone that’s ever met Dean knows what kind of man he is. He’s rambunctious, loud, sometimes a little reckless, and he’s rough. He is, at his core, an adrenaline junkie. He loves the sound of his heart thudding loud in his ears, the rush he feels course down his spine, and in a way, he craves control.

Everyone knows it, but you know it better than anyone. So, when his focus turns from whatever menu he’s studying or weapon he’s cleaning to you…

And his eyes darken just enough to be noticeable and you watch that charming, pearly white smile turn into a silly, crooked smirk, your heart sinks to your stomach.

It’s unpredictable, but the shift is immediate. He doesn’t have to tell you to run, you do it anyway, and he chases. He’ll chase you around the entire bunker as many times as he has to, or in circles around whatever shitty motel you’re staying in for as long as your legs will allow it. Once he’s got his sights set on you, that attention is unbreakable, and running only prolongs the inevitable.

“Come on, sweetheart”, he’ll call from behind you, “The more you make me chase you, the worse it gets when I catch you”.

And he will catch you.

He’ll corner you first, run you somewhere with your back against a wall and nowhere else to go. It’s quite honestly a little deranged. He likes to watch the way panic flares in your eyes when you realize you have nowhere to go, and you can always see something hungry and a little feral burn behind baby blues.

He just stands in front of you, maybe a few feet back, but still a hard barrier between you and mercy. Sometimes you try to reason with him, not that you ever expect it to work, but you can’t do anything else, and every instinct in your body tells you to get away. He’ll take a jolting step forward, hands coming up as if he’s lunging at you, just to watch you jump and hear you squeal.

When he finally decides to stop jump-scaring you out of your poor little mind, he has no qualms about manhandling. He’d never in a million years hurt you, but he knows you’re tough. He’ll throw you over his shoulder, carry you to the bedroom squirming and writhing and all. And if he has to wrestle you down after he throws you on the mattress, then he’ll wrangle wild desperate limbs and pin them down as he needs to.

God forbid you start giggling before he gets started. It rushes straight to his head.

“Oh, c’mon, sweetheart… what’re you so nervous for, huh? You can’t be that scared of me, can ya?”

And when you nod, because ‘yes asshole, I’m scared of you’, he’ll just grin something bright and brimming with pride.

“Yeahhh, I know”.

You know he won’t keep you in wait long. He doesn’t like it. He loves those nervous little giggles, but that’s not what he’s after. He wants to pull squeals and cackles and desperate pleas from your lips as quickly as possible.

You never know where he’s going to start, and his hands are sporadic, digging into your ribs and drilling into your hipbones and pinching up and down your sides. He doesn’t like to linger in one spot too long unless it’s noticeably driving you much crazier than the other spots, and even then he’ll constantly switch methods.

He just loves to put you through whatever rips the loudest noises out of you, and he is so very responsive. It seems like he never stops talking in fact, especially if you have a tendency to beg.

“Did you say stop? You want me to stop?”, a pause “Can you say please?”

….

“Mmm, nah, I think I’ll keep going.” He definitely has spots he's partial to, like your hips and tummy, but his favorite spot is whichever one makes you the most frantic. Sam scolds him for being sadistic, which you think is ironic coming from him, but you know better than to say so much as a word about that. To hear Sam call anyone sadistic in regards to tickling you- well, quite honestly, it's laughable. He and Dean are a lot more alike than he would like to admit. Everyone looks at Sam and sees a big ol teddy bear. A gentle giant, and one that looks at you like you hung the moon and the stars at that. You can't disagree. It's undeniable that Sam is much more gentle than his older brother, but that doesn't mean he's nicer. He's just slower. Methodical. See, Dean is impatient, but Sam likes to take his time, and it always seems like he has nothing but when it comes to you.

It’s not hard to tell when Sam is in a mood. It’s written all over him. His demeanor changes almost entirely. He gets less chatty, and you never really realize it until you look at him, sitting across the room from you, and you see him looking right back at you like… like he’s already caught you.

You’ll look away of course, red from your neck to the tips of your ears and suddenly much more aware of your own heartbeat. He may not say anything about it at first- he also very well might- but it certainly doesn’t go unnoticed either way.

You become acutely aware of every little thing he does, and he knows it. Even when you pretend to be engrossed in some book in your lap or a video on your laptop, he’s completely aware that he’s got your undivided attention, and he takes advantage of it as much as he possibly can.

Maybe a slow tap tap tap, just one finger tapping idly against a hardwood table. And he’ll go on and on like that for minutes before it turns to a rhythmic drumming, 4 fingers, now a much quicker, and significantly less ignorable sound. You’ll huff in frustration, glaring at him before turning back to whatever you’re pretending to focus on, but soon that tap-tap-tapping will stop, and the silence is heavy. You can feel his eyes on you, and when you look up, his head is tilted down just a bit, looking at you through his eyebrows. You’re first drawn to that sly, tongue-in-cheek smirk on his face before your eyes flit downwards to his hands that are tracing slow, mindless, swirly patterns into the dark oak.

When he finally decides he’s spent long enough etching anticipation into your little brain, it’s a daunting process. You know better than to run from Sam, and he doesn’t let you anyway. If you even so much as think to try it, you’ll find yourself lifted off your feet before you get the chance to strike out. So, when you watch him stalk over to you, or feel him creep up behind you, towering over you, you just shrink.

He’ll always take you to the couch or to the bed, your comfort being his number one priority, and he’ll pin you down, or hold you against him. You often times think Chuck was personally setting you up by making Sam Winchester so goddamn big. He knows exactly how affected you are by every little thing he does, and he loves it. He’ll drop his voice just a bit to something a little softer, right above a whisper, a nearly patronizing tone soaking every last word, and he’ll coo in your ear about how nervous you seem, or how sensitive you are.

“Tickle” is apparently just his favorite word in the entire Webster, and on top of him muttering it as many times in your ear as he can possibly manage, he’ll do everything in his power to coax you into saying it. And you have to deal with all of that before he even actually starts tickling you.

It’s not fair, and you tell him that so very often. He doesn’t care, but he’ll tell you how brave you are for speaking up about it, and then he’ll show you exactly why you should have kept your mouth shut.

He’ll make you watch his hands, slowly trailing just one or two fingertips around your belly, barely enough to tickle, but the anticipation makes it maddening, and if you close your eyes or look away, he’ll stop completely just to make you watch him do it all over again. He teases. A lot. Verbally, physically, mentally, any way he can think of, and he’ll trail his nails so gently over every part of your body just to watch you get more and more desperate for him to just get it over with.

“Get it over with? What do you mean…? Oh! Are you asking me to tickle you? You want me to tickle you? No? Then I’m gonna need you to be a little more specific.”

And when he does “just get it over with”, even that takes forever. He’s going to explore and poke and prod at every little spot. He doesn’t like to be jumpy or sporadic, he focuses on one spot until you’re pleading with him to just go somewhere else.

“Not there? But I love this spot. Okay okay, fine.. How about here? Not there either? Well, then what do you expect me to do?… Stop? Cute, but no.”

He is so obsessed with your tummy, and on the rare occasion that he grows out the beard or gets a little too scruffy, you are so very screwed, because he’s rubbing his face anywhere he can get it.

He’s a little cruel, but he’s not a monster- at least not most of the time. That persona of his tends to stay tucked away.

Unless his brother gets involved.

The two of them have this way of drawing out sides of each other nobody else can really tap into. Dean can almost always rile up the playfulness in Sam, but Sam’s also scarily good at convincing Dean to do things his way. The two of them together is a lot. Even when they’re frustrated with each other or not exactly seeing eye to eye, they can always agree on one thing.

Tickling you to pieces.

You never get used to, and you can never adjust, because it’s unpredictable. Not to mention that everything between them is a competition. Everything. Who can make you laugh the loudest, who can get you to break the quickest, who can get you to make that one little embarrassing noise they like, and they don’t stop until someone has been deemed a “winner”.

You’re pretty sure you’re the only one in this little arrangement that can be considered a loser.

It’s such a conflicting feeling. Sam on one side fluttering gentle fingertips against your sides and hips while Dean is on the other side, scratching and digging into your ribs and armpit. You never know what to focus on. Not that you could focus on anything if you tried.

You had learned fairly early that one thing you never ever do is ask one for help if the other is on you, because they will in fact help. Just not you. Dean had once ran you around the entirety of Bobby’s place, including the junkyard, and when you ran back through the house, you turned one corner and you ran face first into Sam’s chest.

You hit him hard enough that it knocked you back a little bit. He of course caught you, wrapping his arms around your shoulders and making sure you were okay. You could see worry shining in his eyes as he kept glancing behind you, but when you finally managed to mutter out something about Dean and needing to get away, worry shifted to something else entirely.

Before you could even read his reaction to know how fucked you were, you watched his eyes lock on the hallway directly behind you, and when you turned, Dean was just a few feet away from the two of you, and not nearly out of breath as you.

You pleaded with Sam to help you, but you inevitably found yourself situated on the couch, your back to his chest and arms pinned up while Dean took advantage of every spot he could get his hands on.

They’re so mean to you, poor thing, and they know it. Their absolute favorite thing to do is straddle your arms and hips and take advantage of allllll that wide open space from your hips to your armpits. You do everything in your power not to end up in that situation, but they’re the biggest men you’ve ever laid your eyes on, so everything in your power really only includes pouting and asking very nicely.

Sometimes they let you get away, but it’s a short lived freedom once long slender fingers take a grip around your ankle, or a strong arm wraps firmly around your waist and drags you right back to where you were.

The worst part about it is listening to them bicker over you. Where they should start, how they should start, and they completely ignore your input on how they could just… not start. They've never crossed the line, but they know how to get awfully close. They usually don't decide you've had enough until coherency is long lost to babbled pleas and pitiful squeals and giggles. They don't usually push much further- not unless you provoke them, anyway- and they're great about taking care of you. Anything you could want or need is immediately within arms reach. Your wish is their command. Need a nap? Need to cuddle? Want a warm bath? A snack? Some water? There's absolutely nothing you could ask for that they wouldn't go to the ends of the earth to get for you. Nothing is ever off the table. Which means you can always ask one for help if you really want revenge on the other.

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