First of all! Harlequin’s energy is a bit more chaotic and relentless in this piece, and I wanted to capture that sharp, provocative tension between him and the reader. I hope you enjoy this wild ride!
You can visit my blog for more stories; I publish new chapters regularly every week!
(I'm still new to this, so there aren't many chapters yet, but I'm doing my best!)
Pairing: Harlequin x Female!Reader (F/M)
Rating for this post: PG-13 / Teen (No explicit content in this prewiev)
Overall Story Rating: EXPLICIT 18+ (Only on AO3!)
Word Count (Preview): ~1.5k words
Warnings for this part: Alcohol consumption, drinking games, breaking & entering, heavy tension, teasing, invade of personal space, monster/non-human elements (tentacles reveal)
⚠️ IMPORTANT NOTE: This is only the clean/safe-for-work preview of the first chapter. All explicit 18+ action happens in the second half, which is available only on AO3!
The rain had just stopped.
Warnings for this part: Alcohol consumption, drinking games, heavy petting, kissing, non-human tongue/saliva mention, biting (mild), extreme height difference, tease.
The night air slipping through the balcony door you’d left ajar was still heavy with dampness; the scent of water pooling on the asphalt drifted all the way up to your small apartment. Your shoulders ached as you kicked your shoes off haphazardly at the door and leaned heavily against the kitchen counter.
And there was a reason it felt even longer than it actually was.
All thanks to a terrifyingly large clown who had frequented your workplace the entire day.
The first time, he bought coffee. The second time, he brought water. Okay? But by the third time, it was so painfully obvious he had come in just to stare at you without buying a single thing, that even one of the customers asked, "Is he your boyfriend?"
For some reason, that question had been stuck in your side like a thorn all day.
Because you didn't know the answer.
Because you didn't know what you two were.
And because feeling the weight of his big intense eyes bearing down on you had begun to feel entirely suffocating.
You yanked the cabinet open and grabbed the first bottle of liquor you could find. The moment you slammed a shot glass onto the counter, the distinct sound of metal gliding along the balcony tracks echoed through the room.
When you turned your head, you saw a hand gripping the edge of the window.
Then you saw that obnoxious neon green and black.
Oh, hell no. You really did not have the patience to deal with this tonight.
"Have you ever considered using a door?"
Harlequin perched himself comfortably on the balcony railing, smirking down at you. The pale glow of the streetlamp left the paint on his mask unfinished in the shadows, making his eyes look far darker than they were.
"I have, actually," he mused. "But where's the fun in that?"
When he vaulted inside, his movements were far too silent. Less like a human and more like a shadow. A shadow that followed you relentlessly, yet never truly belonged to you.
"So, scaling my building in the middle of the night and breaking in through my balcony is fun for you?"
The scent of jasmine quickly overpowered the smell of rain—that same sickeningly sweet fragrance that reminded you of the time you’d hugged him. His eyes immediately darted to the bottle on the counter. Feeling like you'd been caught red-handed, you hid the bottle behind your back, but it was too late. He had already seen it.
"Ooh." The corner of his lips curled upwards. "Somebody had a terrible day."
He left your question unanswered. What were you even expecting? For him to sit you down and give you a therapy session? You’d probably leave that therapy with double the trauma, needing to be strapped to a hospital bed.
"Having someone stalking you all day probably didn't help. Poor little thing~”
You shot him a glare. He wasn't going to shut up, was he? Always with the teasing and implications...
"Ah," he said slowly, the shit-eating grin on his face widening entirely. "So it was that bad."
The infuriating part was the distinct edge of satisfaction in his tone.
Like he was genuinely thoroughly entertained by your misery.
He closed the distance between you with a few slinking steps. You tried to step back, but your third step ended with your back hitting the edge of the counter. Taking full advantage of the moment, he caged you in.
He leaned in, his face inching closer to yours, and you watched that delicious smirk stretch even wider across his lips. His fingers trailed toward the spot where your hand was resting on the counter, taking it hostage.
His other slinking hand snaked around your lower back, pressing against you and stealing your breath. You saw something feral flash in his eyes at your reaction.
He plucked the bottle from its hiding place behind your back, inspected the label, and raised a brow.
"Were you planning on drinking this all by yourself?"
"That was the plan, before you showed up."
The way he made himself at your home was disturbingly natural. Having achieved his goal, he pulled back as if nothing had happened and strolled over to the dining table in the corner, still inspecting the label of the bottle he’d snatched from you.
"You really shouldn't drink things with such high alcohol content, darling. Especially around me~"
He pulled a chair out, flipped it around, and straddled it, resting his chin on the backrest. The bells on his hat settled against his shoulders, ceasing their restless chiming for a brief moment. His long fingers picked up one of your shot glasses, holding the tiny glass up to the light.
As if he were appraising an ancient artifact.
"You have no idea how heartbroken I am."
"One question, one shot," he said dismissively. "Two if you lie."
"Then why haven't you kicked me out yet?"
"Because you wouldn't leave even if I did."
"Ah, how hurtful. I may have invited myself into your home, but I’m not rude enough to force my presence where I’m entirely unwanted, gatinha."
He was smiling, but his eyes weren't; they looked slightly faded.
You studied the hunger in his gaze as he looked between you and the glass in his hand. You had to be out of your mind. But you desperately needed to numb your brain.
With a heavy grunt, you pushed yourself off the counter, grabbed another chair from the edge of the table, and straddled it backwards just like him, resting your arms on the backrest. Harlequin raised a brow at you mirroring his posture.
"You either answer, or you drink."
"Oho~ Then whoever takes a shot has to answer the next round. How does that sound?"
And there it was. It didn't reach his eyes, but if you hadn't known him even just a little, the way his gaze tracked you would have made your skin crawl.
This was what Harlequin did.
He spoke like it was all a joke, but his words left a suffocating weight on your chest.
Sitting right across from him, practically hurling battle spears at each other through menacing, unspoken thoughts, you weren't entirely sure if this was a joke anymore.
With a pleased hum, he hooked the edge of his claw under the bottle's cork and popped it with a satisfying *thwack*. He poured the amber liquid into the tiny glasses. (And then he could take those glasses and shove them up his ass—)
"I'll start," he said smoothly. "What bothered you the most today?"
It sounded like an easy question, but the answer caught in your throat.
Pierrot's watching eyes... the touch he left on your shoulder while you were waiting at the register, your hands sticky with flavored syrups.
"I was tired," you finally admitted, giving in.
A short scoff escaped Harlequin's nose. He shook his head, the bells on his hat jingling sharply with the movement. With the tip of his finger, he slid the glass across the table toward you.
"Ah, ah. Wrong answer, darling..."
You stared at the glass. You really didn't want to play this game, but he had confiscated your bottle, and right now, this was the only way you were getting a drink.
You picked up the small glass, swirled the liquid twice, then knocked it back in one go, slamming the glass back onto the table.
"My turn," you said, your eyes narrowing. "You're not human, are you?"
A second of dead silence. Then he pressed the palm of his hand to his forehead and burst into a full-chested, roaring laugh. It made you so deeply uncomfortable that when his laughter abruptly died out—just as suddenly as it had started—your shoulders tensed.
He reached for the bottle again and refilled your empty glass. He was deliberately leaving his own empty, and it was grating on your nerves. It was only the second round, and you had already taken a shot.
"Hah! How observant of you... I'm actually a monster who wants to eat you and hides under your bed at night~"
He said it with such a deadpan expression that goosebumps erupted across your skin.
But the moment he flashed a loose, lazy smirk right after, your exhausted mind couldn't tell if he was joking or not.
"You're not giving me a serious answer."
The pet name caught you off guard. He always called you these things, making the air between you feel thick and sticky. Ignoring the sudden heat rushing to your cheeks, you gripped the back of your chair and leaned forward.
"You already know the answer to that, don't you, meu amor?"
His voice had dropped an octave, instantly making the air in the room unbearably heavy. Matching your movement, he leaned even closer to you.
Then, he relaxed, pulling back and casually resting his arm on the edge of the table.
He was doing all of this on purpose; pushing and pulling you. And you couldn't even bring yourself to tell him you hated it.
"My turn," he declared again. "Are you afraid of me?"
This time he actually laughed. Unlike the previous one, this laugh was more alive, lingering in the air instead of cutting off abruptly.
As if he were trying not to spook you, but at the same time, testing exactly how close he could get. He grabbed the chair, moving it out of his way, and instead of approaching you directly, he began to slowly circle around you.
The scent of jasmine was dangerously close now, wrapping around you like an intoxicating, seductive haze.
"There have been plenty of moments where you should have run," he murmured. "But you're still here, right in front of me, seizing every opportunity to challange me. How sweet."
"I'm just living my life. You're the one invading it."
He offered the glass to you.
His fingers brushed against yours for a second too long. But instead of taking it, you set the glass right back down where it had been. He watched your movements intently.
"You could have told me to leave, couldn't you?"
"Maybe I'm just curious."
"Mm." He tilted his head slightly. "Or maybe you just make terribly bad decisions."
Harlequin's gaze dragged slowly over your face. Your eyes. Your mouth. Your neck.
As if he wanted to dissect you under a microscope.
"My turn," you blurted out, a little faster, a little more breathless than you intended. You hoped he wouldn't notice. "You did something to Pierrot, didn't you?"
This time, he didn't answer.
You heard the faint clicking of his teeth grinding together, and the breath fanning against your ear abruptly hitched.
Even without looking at him, you could practically hear his smirk.
Your heart hammered violently in your chest. And the worst part was, Harlequin looked like he could hear it too.
He reached for the shot glass—not the one left on his side of the table, but yours. Without a second of hesitation, he knocked it back, and you heard the soft, relaxed sigh he let out as he swallowed. His alcohol-laced breath washed over your ear once again.
He tapped his fingertips rhythmically against the table.
"Let's raise the stakes. What do you say, gatinha?"
"Don't call me that again."
You turned your head, shifting to meet him face-to-face. But he was much closer than you anticipated. His breath ghosts directly over your lips, making them tremble.
Realizing his eyes had dropped to your parted lips, you immediately pressed them firmly together, but it was useless.
"Ah, you like it, don't you~?"
Harlequin's eyes gleamed dangerously.
You were finally fighting back.
He leaned in just a fraction more, and you shrank back against your chair. Closer. Closer. Your nose was practically brushing the cold, painted surface of his mask.
But then, he suddenly pulled away, and your eyes landed on the bottle in his hand again. Damn it. For a split second, you genuinely thought he was going to cross the line—that he was actually going to kiss you—
"Hmm... that pretty pink blush is already burning up your cheeks, isn't it?"
"Alright," he purred softly. "Then answer me this."
His knees were practically flush against yours now.
"If I kissed you right now..." he murmured, his voice a dark caress, "...would you actually stop me?"
A car drove by outside. The sound of rainwater dripping onto the pavement echoed through the room, slow and steady.
But Harlequin didn't flinch. He just stared at you, searching your face for an answer he already looked like he knew.
An uncomfortable, pooling heat settled deep in your lower belly. It hitched and throbbed. It wanted something from you that you couldn't even name.
Or maybe you already knew exactly what it was, but were just too damn stubborn to admit it.
"You know I'm not fully drunk yet, right?"
The corner of Harlequin's mouth twitched upward. His breath fanned across your lips, making the heat in your stomach bubble and boil. He watched you shift restlessly in your chair.
His thumb dragged up to your jaw. Agonizingly slow. He let it hover just near the corner of your mouth, as if waiting to see if you would part your lips for him.
"Meaning, you're still completely capable of stopping me," he said in a low, vibrating hum. His thumb brushed over your bottom lip, dragging a shaky breath out of you.
"Do you think I'd want to?"
When you volleyed the question back at him, a sharp glint flashed in his eyes.
There's that look again. The look that thought it had you completely figured out.
You watched him, and he watched you. You knew exactly how far you could push him. Even that damn ticket booth guy never hesitated to remind you of your boundaries, and frankly, you rarely had the drive to cross them.
But was Harlequin like that?
He obliterated every boundary placed in front of him, as if trying to prove that with him, you could go as far as you wanted. Even though you were certain that wasn't his actual goal, around him, it felt like limits didn't exist. And while you had always been morbidly curious about what would happen if those boundaries shattered, you personally never wanted to be the one to cross them.
Because he drove you absolutely insane.
Whenever you saw that filthy smirk on his face, you wanted to plant your fist right in the center of it.
But at the same time, you couldn't deny that the way he crawled under your skin made your legs weak.
And his sheer audacity. God have mercy on your soul, if you gave him even an inch, you could swear he would drag your dead body behind him into the boundless edges of eternity, doing things to you that defied all reason.
He deliberately brushed his knee against yours. A test. He was waiting to see if you'd pull back, growing bolder with every passing second.
You were just as curious as he was to see where the hell this was going to end up.
You reached out, grabbing the golden-yellow knotted ribbons holding the black cape around his shoulders, and yanked. His breath caught sharply in his throat, his teeth flashing in a startled twitch right before your eyes.
"Be careful, kitten. It's a dangerous game, and I might love that~” he finally growled.
"You're the one who climbed through my balcony."
A short, wicked chuckle rumbled in his chest.
"Ah, but you're the one who left it unlocked."
You expected him to pull his hand away from your chin, but instead, he slid it down the side of your neck. You swallowed involuntarily as his thumb pressed right over your racing pulse.
Even without seeing it, you could tell the smirk beneath his mask had grown feral.
"Your heart is racing, darling. I can hear it."
"Yours is too. You're terribly loud, you know that?"
His fingers measured your pulse, while his thumb stroked back up to gently graze your bottom lip. A stuttering breath escaped you.
"Ah..." he crooned softly. "So you've finally stopped just looking at me and started listening."
"And you're far more observant than I thought. Color me impressed~"
You could hear the violent thudding of his heart. A cold-blooded, heavy rhythm pumping furiously through his veins; for some reason, hearing it so clearly was intoxicating.
"A few days ago..." you said abruptly.
You watched the glint in his eyes sharpen into something dangerous, his lips twisting down in displeasure. A direct hit, wasn't it?
Suddenly, you remembered what he had told you. He had talked about your hearts beating together. And now, you could feel his. But you weren't entirely sure if it was the alcohol in your blood, or the rapidly heating tension between you.
"What were those things touching me?"
The sound of crickets echoed loudly in the room. For a moment, you thought of the overgrown orchard next to your apartment. It was surrounded by high walls, so neglected that you sometimes thought an entire new forest would sprout from it.
Ah, maybe that was how he climbed up to your balcony.
"You're asking this now?"
"You lost your right to a shot. You have to answer."
His face finally stopped suffocating your space. You didn't know how long you had been holding your breath, but you only just realized your lungs were burning as you finally took a deep, clear drag of air.
Your shoulders tensed when you noticed his gaze drop down to the dark fabric of his uniform. He untied the ribbons, his black cape slipping off his shoulders with a heavy rustle and pooling around his feet. His long fingers trailed down to one of the straps on the side of his costume.
"Curiosity..." he mused darkly. "Truly a terrifying thing."
There was movement beneath the fabric. At first, you thought your eyes were playing tricks on you, but then you remembered the moment you had hugged him. The strange, thrumming squirming beneath the cloth when you wrapped your arms around his torso.
Without ever breaking eye contact with you, Harlequin allowed something to slither out from beneath his uniform.
The very thing you had seen in the dark. Long. Its slick, glossy surface catching the light like wet oil.
The tentacle slowly rubbed against the side of your leg. At first, it was just a feather-light graze. Then, it coiled thickly around your knee, squeezing your thigh.
When he noticed your muscles involuntarily lock up, Harlequin's eyes narrowed into half-moons.
"Well?" he asked with a soft, mocking lilt. "Are you satisfied now?"
You watched it writhe up your knee, winding around your leg like a thick, heavy vine, its tip teasingly flicking at the hem of your pants.
You even knew that if you shoved him away, he would back off.
When you didn't answer, he rolled his eyes, and the tentacle slithered back down your leg, retracting upward to hide back inside his obnoxious green uniform.
But just before it completely vanished, you managed to catch it, pulling the bizarre, textured appendage toward you.
"If I had seen more of it that night..." you said slowly, "maybe I would be more satisfied."
You saw his pupils blow wide; for a split second, he looked genuinely stunned, maybe even a little disgusted by your sheer audacity.
You ignored his reaction, running your hand boldly over the damp, slightly ridged texture of the tentacle. It coiled eagerly in your grip, thrumming, vibrating, even flinching. You flicked your eyes up occasionally to gauge his reaction, yet you refused to let go of the slick appendage.
A muffled, breathless laugh escaped from beneath his mask, sounding far more feral and restrained than before.
"Ah..." he rasped. "Are you actively trying to drive me insane now?"
The tentacle abruptly yanked itself out of your hands and immediately whipped around your waist, binding you tightly.
Because it didn't look like he was playing anymore.
His hands shot out, gripping the back of your neck. He dragged you forward on the chair, his knee sliding assertively right between your thighs.
"There's a problem, sugar," he murmured right against your lips. Again, the same maddening cycle. He kept leaning in and pulling back, leaving you completely off-balance, constantly questioning whether he was actually going to push past the brink on his next move.
"The more you look at me like that..." He tilted his head slightly. "The less I want to stop touching you."
The tentacle writhed around your waist and finally found the hem of your shirt. You bit your bottom lip hard as the cool, slick texture slithered against the soft, sensitive skin of your stomach.
And finally, Harlequin rested his forehead—mask and all—heavily against yours.
"This doesn't seem like it's going to end well."
"Just do whatever you're going to do, rattlesnake."
🔞 THE SHOW CONTINUES UNDER THE COVERS... (18+) 🔞
The lessons are about to get much more hands-on, much warmer, and a whole lot wilder.
Want to know what happens next?
To read the full, explicit version containing smut, tentacle play, overstimulation and power struggle, click the link below to head over to my AO3! (You might need to be logged into your AO3 account to view it).
👉 [CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY ON AO3]
Btw, the owner of the DNI banner: @circusofdelirium
