7+2
Yandere Noi x reader
...
"She's not picking you up today?" Your coworker spins her chair around to look at you, staring from behind her thick-rimmed glasses.
You smile and shake your head gently in response to her question, tugging the soggy teabag in your mug, which had long been chilled by time. "She's… busy. You know how it is sometimes."
"I get it," she nods slowly, eyes sympathetic. She rolls to the automatic water dispenser and fills her cup. "I remember the first time I saw her, and- you know how I am, I'm not interested in dating at all, but seeing a sweetheart pick you up after a shitty work day is so… ugh!"
She makes an arching motion with her free hand, as if a rainbow blasting off from her head. "I swear, half the department saw her, and we all went: Luh! Key!"
"The secretary was so gagged he fell right in front of her." She spins in her chair, round and round. "Got picked up like a teddy bear right after! Cute shit."
You stare at the rippling orangish tea in your mug, listening to the giggly voice of your coworker. She had always been a great conversationalist, talking about anything and everything. It puts you at ease. Your leg bumps into the duffel bag under your desk.
You'll miss her dearly.
All the work is done for the day, and everyone seems to be jovial, chatting until it is time to clock off.
You close your laptop and throw your duffel over your shoulder. "See ya."
"I still don't get why you would ask to leave early on such a chill day," she mumbles. "It's free money."
"…Life happens," you shrug weakly.
"Don’t forget to bring your laptop!" She calls after you.
"Thanks, but I don’t need it tonight."
"Oh, okay. Bye-bye."
You hear the rush of wheels as she flies back to her desk. That familiar sound makes your heart ache, and so you find yourself walking briskly back towards her.
"Yeah?" She's peering at you beneath the familiar thick-rimmed glasses again.
You place your hand on the plastic rest of her chair for a brief moment, trying to breathe slowly despite the growing anxiety pounding in your ribcage. "I-if… if that lady tries to hurt you, tell her that if anything happens to you or anyone else in this building, I would hate her forever."
"Who's her?" Her voice is confused as you wave and disappear inside the elevator.
You walk calmly out of the office building, then immediately duck into the nearest narrow alleyway. Laptop at work, phone in the dumpster, with one scheduled text which will be sent once you're long gone. Some money and valuables to be pawned and a few changes of clothes. The entirety of the life you choose in one bag, the rest, all abandoned. How grim it feels.
The rhythmic dripping of water from a pipe to the side and two scuttling mice, your only witnesses. Double-checking for security cameras and finding none, you raise your hand, fingers trembling furiously like twigs on an old rickety tree. The scattered smoke particles bloom out from the tip of your index finger. With a hazy puff, a flaky door appears.
Turning back, perhaps still reluctant, understanding there are things which tether you to this place. You see the bright vitality of the sorcerer world behind you, framed by the dull brick walls of the alley. Masked people walking by, the absurdity in the way they live and carry themselves, appears so vivid now. But soon to be a window of the past, the cracked concrete path stretches between you and those lights of society, as proof you're some sort of alien irrevocably not part of them anymore. Back then, you’d think it would be your forever home. Born in a terrible place, yet it is home where you'd allow to embrace your cold corpse.
The shivering of her visage drifts across your memory like a thick fog, sharpening into the incarnadine pupils and ghostly wisps of silver, some sort of beautiful, haunting apparition. You wave that away as if a disease, or a certain distrustful fear, you might yearn for it. You'd decide then, and there you'd rather not reminisce anymore. Tucking these memories carefully into a box, you gave it to that bright window behind you, asking them to take care of it from then on.
Too useless and weak to do anything other than run away. Smiling thinly to yourself, the world behind the door devours you completely.
…
"Table 2 says they're allergic to shellfish," you say, sticking another order list on the wall.
"But they ordered clam chowder?" The chef glances up from the cutting board, scoffing scornfully.
"Clam chowder without clams." You force a grin. "And they don't want too much salt."
"Aight," he mutters in resignation.
You walk back to the front and begin to clean up the table left by another group of customers. It had been a bit more than a week since you started living in the Hole. Finding a job was arduous, but most are okay with hiring someone willing to work for pitiful, meagre pay. The bossman, also the chef, allowed you to crash in the storage room where he keeps all the cleaning supplies, while you continue the search for a place with cheap rent. The work is not crazy difficult; it's the typical demands for a front-of-house serving role.
It may be a far cry from your life in the sorcerer realm, but you are satisfied. There are endless possibilities in the future with your new freedom. It’s not difficult living without magic at all; you didn’t have much smoke output in the first place, and your magic is hardly impressive enough to even casually mention in conversations. When Fujita met you for the first time, a very long time ago now, the relief he struggled to conceal from his expression said more than enough.
As a sorcerer so painfully mediocre, the humans in the Hole did not raise a single eyebrow at anything you did, because they thought you to be one of them.
You stack the dirty dishes and take them to the back. Seeing the bones on the plates, you still think of her when you try not to. Before everything went awry, the first place you always visited when grocery shopping was the Deli. You often wondered how she could still stomach meat when she sees the piles and piles of flesh she tore apart with her bare hands. The stickiness of the dripping red meat, with the putrid, nauseating smell radiating off it. The grisly sight of rubbery heads, bouncing eyeballs and ensanguined flesh lumps tumbling out of the black plastic bag...
The sickly, pallid light bulb above you bathes the plates in the sink like a mass of stony bodies. You avert your eyes and wipe your hand with the dish towel hanging over the faucet. It brings a sense of Déjà vu seeing the metallic gleam of the faucet, the artificial light of the room and the mundane artefacts of daily life. It's a scene you've gotten so used to ever since she stopped letting you go outside the apartment.
You walk back and wipe the table with a rag. It took so many nights of pleading with her to get outside, albeit only for part-time work. How the first job you had fell apart before the long stretch of entrapment, you cannot recall. Work sucks, but it was the only reasonable excuse for her to let you out of the apartment for an extended period. She appeared tense for a few weeks before relaxing again. It was an easy guess that there was probably a tracker on your laptop or phone, or both, to put her at ease. You'd never think of an idea so outlandish in the past, but people change.
She's cheerful and occasionally impulsive, but not dumb. She doesn't inform you that she does certain things, but she does not necessarily hide it either. She asks odd questions on days you go out of the office for lunch. The laugh she gave you when you asked her about your suspicions was the start and end of the conversation. Though she probably didn’t expect you to run away at all. Most people in relationships don’t, unless they are aware they have committed something heinous.
Perhaps the madness of living made her indifferent to what most consider cruel. Or she lives in her own dreams, like you find yourself slipping into on occasion, also.
The bell clinks from the kitchen, and you carry the steaming clamless clam chowder to a lady with fiery red lipstick. She dips her head stiffly as you set it down carefully for her.
"Enjoy," you smile.
Your smile fades as soon as you turn away from the table. The lingering heat of the ceramic bowl you just held is still warm on your fingertips. You miss her, just the littlest bit. A small, sinful secret you cowardly hide from the anguish in your chest, in the fear it might squeal in betrayal. You have nothing to offer to your dignity, and the only other person who wants something from you is the one who wants something you can no longer afford to give.
A shrill voice cries behind you. "Excuse me, I need more salt!"
You quickly grab a small salt shaker, turning around, using the same bright grin you learned from the past precious her.
…
The pale, blue evening light seeped into the dark restaurant. The room smells of disinfectant, the tables and chairs are washed in grey, standing still like tombstones. You put the mop back into the bucket and wipe the sweat from your brow.
The bell jingles, and the chilly air rushes inside.
"I need to go to my daughter's recital tonight. Remember to lock up the place," the bossman calls.
"Yes!" You peek from the back, flashing him a smile and thumbs up. "Good night, sir!"
The door thumps back into place.
Face falling, you clumsily untangle the bow of your apron with pruny fingers. Another day gone, and you're left all alone again.
Black, dreary days.
You slump into a chair, the torrent of exhaustion all collapsing onto you at once, your legs no longer able to support the heaviness in your body. Loneliness makes the mind wander to things you try not to think about. But sometimes you think it's silly to try to forget them, they're like a tattoo which will brand your mind forever. Funny, how could you just pack them in a bag and leave it all behind? So impossible.
A few young men are tumbling down the lane outside with a skateboard, hooting with laughter. A few ravens caw overhead. Then, all is still, but the fastidious mind continues.
One lump of flesh by the doorway. Two in the bathroom. Three in the living room.
All these images are a twisted, incoherent tumour in your brain. You can't explain why these images come to mind; they seem to be yours, but not yours. All you knew was that, after a dazed, white period, no dissenting voice ever insisted you break up with her again. The sudden quietness left you in a state of disorientation, which you had yet to recover from.
Walking around the square, rectangular rooms of your shared apartment, the square, rectangular space at work, everything was just walls like a mouse cage, driving your mind to a dullness. Locks on everything, you can't even go to the balcony. Familiar faces distorted in pain surface from the vast ocean of black that is your mind. People in your memories and dreams seem to say things to you, but you can’t hear them clearly. Her hands were clawed over your ears, but you chose to shut your own eyes.
The heart within your ribcage thrashes in a stifled, hateful rage, trapped in a dome of confusion. The same hurting, bleeding emotion which spurred you to give up everything. Anyone would tell you you’ve absolutely gone mad, or simply, very emotional for a very long time.
You stare off into the bleak nothingness of the restaurant, the dark wooden door frame and scattered paper orders in your messy handwriting. The wood is nibbled at the bottom corners, probably due to a past infestation from a certain, small, furry creature.
You had heard a rumour that a sorcerer lives in the Hole and can change faces with his magic. That'd help escape her. You got this weekend off, and you pray he will be where people say he is.
A part of you says there’s no need. No one cares that much. She might have given up after a few days at the maximum. The world is so big, and whatever she feels for you is such a limited, conditional thing. What a pity to be wasted on you, a field of infertile soil unable to bloom the same infatuated flowers. At least, not the same garish colours as she.
You are still scuttling in the circles of the same emotions, unable to walk out of them. So confusing.
The bell jingles. You jolt, standing up quickly. Did the boss forget to flip the open sign the other way?
Spinning around, you smile.
"I'm so sorry, we are closed…" You turn and trail off, blood running cold.
Two giants step over the threshold, big bodies of purple and black.
"Well, well," Shin sighs, trudging behind Noi. "Finally."
He slaps her on the shoulder, who is standing as still as a statue. "Happy now? I'm going to nap outside; you sort it out between yourselves. I haven’t slept properly in over a fucking week."
The same rush of cool air brushes your cheeks, and you two are left alone.
She stands there wordlessly, a faint sheen of fresh blood on her gloves. A few crimson drops splattered on the polished wooden floor. Her silvery strands catch the evanescent evening light, making it glisten, cold and unworldly. Her long earring slips forward, the crosses glinting as it sways.
You shiver and squeeze the table ledge behind you, taking a small step back. There is an emergency exit at the back, but you doubt you can outrun her; the fear locks your legs in place. She can tackle you easily at this distance.
"…Hey." Noi scratches her cheek, her eyes averted. Upon realising her hand is dirty, she hurriedly wipes her face with the bandaged sleeves of her jumpsuit, also caked with dried blood. Her voice is quiet, the timbre low and lovely. Yet seems to be stretched into a higher, cheerful pitch by force. "It’s been a while! Let’s go home."
You take another step back, eyes never leaving her face.
She wipes her face again, before hiding her blood-soaked hands behind her back guiltily, deciding that is the reason for your fear. She does that all the time now. Why? Can’t remember.
Don’t want to remember.
Her crimson eyes seem to gleam amidst the deepening grey of the room in a sort of desperate want.
"C'mon." She prowls cautiously, with one step forward at a time, treating you like a frightened mouse. "Please?”
"N-Noi, how did you…" You quiver. If you bolt, she will chase, but if you don’t, in a few short strides, she will have you.
She gives you an exhausted, close-eyed smile.
"It's been more than a week. Searched for you for some time, and figured you might have come to the Hole. We were just planning to ask around after combing the outside,” she explained. “I guessed you didn’t want to be on the outskirts where all the sorcerers frequent.”
"You didn't get my text?" You slide another step back, closer to the exit, closer and closer.
She takes a step forward in response, unwilling for the gap to increase. She hums. "Yeah, I did! You said we need distance for a very long time, and… and…”
She freezes, lips opening and closing with no sound, unable to repeat the rest of your message. Noi grimaces. "… it has been quite a long time now, right?”
She takes another step, reaching to touch you. You shy away from her attempt. You knew that once she gets her iron-clad grip on you, she’ll never let go again.
"No, I'm fine here," you swallow thickly. "Please go back."
There is a pause. She blinks at you slowly, the words seemingly unable to register in her mind, an unfathomable idea she never considered possible. You can see her amidst the dimness of the restaurant. Her eyes are bloodshot, and there is a sallowness to her usually glowing ivory skin. There are dark bags beneath her eyes. Her upturned lips twitch a little, as if her muscles are becoming tired from this forced joviality.
She shakes her head, her fluffy pale strands bouncing on her shoulders. "… C'mon! Let’s go home."
"I don’t want to."
"Why…? Did I do something to make you angry?" Her long lashes flutter, creating jagged shadows on her cheeks. "I agreed to let you do different stuff because you asked, yeah? We can talk stuff out, like we always did! Anything, once we head home."
Flesh and blood and veins squirt into the air like confetti. Blood and blood and blood and more-
You grip your head, your heart pounding wildly. Closing your eyes tightly, you attempt to squeeze those strange memories out; something feels lodged in your throat. "Noi, please."
Another silence falls between you.
The restaurant has descended completely into a sepulchral eigengrau. She looms over you like a ghost, ghastly and glittering across your vision as if borne from a Lovecraftian story. The forced smile finally drops from her visage.
When Noi speaks again, her voice is flat and slow, not a hint of decipherable emotion. "…It’s really not funny anymore. It's been a long time since we've seen each other, with you running off without telling me where you are. I-I was really worried. Is this all you have to say to me?"
There is an unfocused wildness in her pupils as she takes a big step forward, her blood-soaked hand smearing a blackened claw mark across the table. "Hey, say something. I’m… upset. But I'm starting to get kind of mad-"
You dart towards the back. In the same half second, something seizes the back of your shirt, and you're wrenched backwards. Your shoulders collide with the floor, making your teeth chatter. Opening your mouth to scream, they are quickly covered by a rough, gloved hand. You can taste the putrid, metallic taste of blood. Gagging, you bite down. Yet, Noi remains unfazed by that feeble attempt at a struggle. Her face did not flash even a tinge of pain as she pries your jaw open with two fingers.
The table leg scrapes across the floor. You writhe and squirm like a feral animal beneath her. Wrenching one arm free, you try to hit her, but Noi's other hand catches your wrist. She pins your arms over your head, one knee slamming both your legs down on the ground, ensnaring all your limbs with only half of hers.
After wrestling for a while, you go completely still. The shock, adrenaline and cortisol all leave your system at once, like you're playing dead to plead mercy.
You feel a warm puff of air on your cheek. Noi sighs, staring at you with lidded eyes. Scarlet orbs dulled by exhaustion or disappointment or some other emotion, you can no longer tell.
"…Must we be this way?"
Mute, you stare at her blankly, a single tear dribbling down the corner of your eye.
She lowers her head into the crook of your neck, pretending not to see it, or simply not wanting to any further. Her soft hair tickles your cheek. She reeks of a stale scent, like meat beginning to rot. Her skin is slightly sticky from sweat.
"I miss you," she murmurs, warm lips grazing your skin. "Tell me you miss me too."
You wriggle your arm, and her hand around it noticeably tightens. She waits, and hearing no response, she raises her head. Those sombre incarnadine orbs look at you searchingly with an innocent yearning, rose petal lips pursed.
"Then kiss me, you can do that, right?"
She cups your cheek with her free hand, lips close so you can lean forward and touch it with your own. Instead, you twist your head sharply to look to your side. The cream-tinted wall, with yellowish oil splatters. The paint peels off like a ragged flower. You swore not to look upon her visage when you left everything behind.
Noi exhales through her nose, hands leaving your face. She grabs the back of your shoulder, the other under your knee, lifting you effortlessly. "We can talk later.”
You begin to squirm hysterically again, legs kicking and arms swinging wildly. The cold water of reality and the impending future seemingly fill you with an abnormal strength you'd thought you lost.
“Let go! I don’t want to go back! Why aren’t you listening to-”
"I haven't slept well for ages because of you. Stop it," she says, holding you firmly, the edge of her weary voice frayed with impatience.
You continue to twist stubbornly, letting out a cry in pain as her grip becomes alarmingly tight around your shoulder. Yet, that squeeze of warning seems to spur you into a greater level of frantic insanity, as you struggle harder and harder. It just feels that if you don’t, you cannot answer to the tornado of torment in your heart that has haunted you for so long. To survive, a part of you will die if you return with her.
Noi sighs, a slow, deep breath, and drops you. Your body crashes onto the ground, the side of your head hitting the wooden floor with a loud thump.
Blinking from pain, that initial, bleary vacuity of her expression, which was such an abstrusity before, is so clear to you now. The fury she was actively trying to suppress this whole time. Her hands are in fists, twisting together so tightly the blood from her gloves is dripping again.
A small whimper leaves your throat as you try to slide your body away from her in alarm. Only for her foot to stamp down onto your leg. A white-hot pain flashes across your entire body, and your vision is blurry from the sheer agony and tears. Your leg is bent in an odd direction, throbbing violently like there's a thousand needles in your flesh.
She picks you up into her arms again, not sparing you another glance. “We're going home."
Your tears soak her purple jumpsuit into black, unable to see the wrangled state of your lower limb.
Like a cat dragging her meal out of their dark burrow, a cool rush of night air brushes your cheeks. It promises it’ll be the last time they come by for a very long time.
…
Noi throws you roughly onto the bed.
Another searing flash of pain, like a lightning bolt, goes through your mangled leg. Fresh tears roll down your already tear-stained cheek when you thought you had no more tears left to shed. It hurts so much, everything hurts.
She pounces on top of you, one hand holding down your chin before you can recoil. The mattress dips beneath her weight, and instantly her hungry lips are over yours, tongue slipping inside your mouth from your gasps of pain. Her knee bumps your broken leg, sending aching ripples you cannot ease.
You can taste something metallic in your mouth, a faint sting on your bottom lip. Noi had been gnawing and biting your lip so hard that it got split open. From the mess of tears, you can see her eyes are slightly open, as she sucks on your tongue. You don't wish to see what expression you're making for her to study you like that. You close your eyes in surrender, tired of fighting a fruitless fight. The metallic taste appears to please her, as her wet muscle delightfully swipes your lip over and over, even when there is no blood left, akin to lapping milk.
You shiver as her lips move onto your neck, sucking it as if she’s gulping water. She then inhales deeply, drinking in your scent, her nose brushing the top of your throat.
“N-Noi,” you whimper weakly.
She ignores you completely, tilting her head, pressing a small bite across the place beneath the purplish spot blooming across your skin.
“It hurts.” You tremble under her. Your leg, your lip, your neck, your entire body.
She almost purrs, engrossed in her own world, trailing her tongue across your collarbones, unable to hear anything. It wasn't until your dried tears became a sticky, slick film across your face, the agony dulling into a distant throb and half your body claimed by her mouth, that she finally stopped.
“I'm… so glad,” Noi sighs, pressing her forehead to yours. A faint rosiness blossoms from her pallor.
Lying on the pillow like a limp toy, you allow her to nuzzle you affectionately. The bedsheets smell like the floral shampoo Noi likes to use, now mixed with sweat and the slight, grimy stench of blood she is unconcerned with. The mixture has a nauseating, flowery smell, like the chemicals used to embalm a body.
“Who told you to run away?” She murmurs.
“…What?”
She blinks at you, light lashes fluttering again. The female cleaner rolls to her side and props her body up with her elbow. She strokes your arm tenderly. “Someone told you to leave me, right? Or threatened you?”
"You wouldn't go by yourself..." Her fingers pause. "…You would never unless…"
The side of your face twitches at her strange line of questioning. You don’t know when it started exactly, when she started to make conclusions on matters without solid evidence or due to minute gestures someone does. The mark of extreme rumination she used to not display. Sometimes she stares off blankly into space, overthinking and justifying information when in the past she’d take it as is. Even worse, twisting it to match whatever she wishes to believe.
“Your friends and family never liked me much anyway,” she lowers her gaze to the wrinkled bed sheets.
Rubbery flesh sails into the air, squelchy and splattering as it falls all over y-
“Why are you bringing this up?” Your voice is faint, almost inaudible. You wish she could stop talking about everything; it's making you sick, and your head pound.
She presses a light kiss to your arm, with a dry chuckle. "Yeah, doesn't matter now."
Silvery, diaphanous strands fall over her face when Noi lifts her head; she blows them away with a breath. “I asked your coworkers, and they don’t seem to know anything.”
“They’re all alive,” she added quickly to your unblinking stare. “It doesn’t matter because you’re not seeing them again. But you know I don’t like to rough up people unless…”
She shuffles even closer than she already is, now showing immense interest in the hem of your shirt. She rolls the fabric between her fingertips absent-mindedly. “They get in my way.”
Noi smooths the wrinkles loose, but then immediately kneads them into a ball again. There's a playful idleness, like she's playing with a roll of yarn, letting go and pawing it right back. A red-hot knife seems to stab into your heart; her nonchalance cannot extinguish the fiery magma which bleeds from it.
“Nobody told me to run,” you say, your tone hard.
She shows no sign of surprise or denial. Letting go of your clothes, she sits up fully, gaze no longer on you. Instead, Noi chooses to observe the wall covered in framed pictures of all sizes. All the happy memories of her life, yet the present person does not appear so cheerful. “Mm.”
You prop yourself up with difficulty, another violent sting of pain rushing through your shattered leg. “And no one planted ideas in my head.”
Noi listens to your words coolly before sliding off the bed. She runs her fingers through her hair in a languid manner, the other hand on her hip. Her attention flickers to your broken limb, a red, purplish lump of swelling flesh created by both people's choosing. Two dark rubies, clear as day.
“Then this should be no issue," she says quietly.
You stoically wipe at the salty trail on your cheeks.
“A punishment?” You couldn’t help but give her a thin, sardonic smile, unable to conceal the bitterness of a loser.
She shakes her head gently. One knee dipping back into the mattress, she leans forward and takes your hand, placing it over her chest. You can feel her heartbeat, thumping strong and calm as always against your palm. Her voice comes out in airy and light puffs of sound. "Back then, when you saw it, you told me that we all pay for our choices."
Noi kisses your palm, her mouth feather light and loving. The corners of her eyes crinkle when your fingers squeeze her hands lightly out of instinct, despite your heart screaming out every agony she was culpable for rooting. “…We both have a lot to offer, and much to pay back.”
A small muffled screeching is heard in the silent room, scratching from the ceiling above. Mute scuttling noises, circling a few times, before fading away.
“Once that heals, I’m going to break it again." Noi smiles now, the corners of her lips stretched to the very top. “You left for around a week and two days...."
She walks to the door with a soft hum.
"So we’ll do it eight more times.”
.
.
.
Afterparty:
Don't you guys think it's so interesting that healers like Noi can fuck someone over and choose if she wants to heal them?
7+2 makes a mouse! Isn't that cute?
