#ack fic

for anon. thank you for commissioning me. <3

The first time was after their first date. It wasn’t really a date, they explain to friends, even though it had every component of one. The movie they saw wasn’t spectacular, but nothing that comes out in March ever is. Mike had walked her to her car and they stood awkwardly with equally as awkward smiles. He leaned in first, and every hair on her neck stood on end, watching with the attention of a hawk, the anxiety of a fly, his arms opening for her and waiting for her to give in. They met somewhere in the middle, Nanaba’s arms encircled below his rib cage, his wrapped around her shoulders. He brought her close, pressed his cheek against hers, the stubble of the day scrapping against hers. She could feel the smile there, smell the cologne from under his Carhartt jacket, and she ran her hands across his back to feel just how broad he was. He was a wall, a mountain, a barrage. He held her as if protecting her from ocean waves, or worse--from wandering eyes. He made her feel secure. Safe. He squeezed hard, but she squeezed harder, locked together like a padlock, the seconds drawing on into a panicked self realization that they were too close. He would get get grossed out if they stayed together like this any longer. This isn’t how friends hug. This wasn’t a date. Mike couldn’t like her--that’s just not how this worked.

The second time was another first time. Nanaba tried, but she had parts that didn’t belong to her, and even though Mike reassured her, she didn’t believe him. She wrapped the blankets around her body tightly, so tightly that Mike would need a pair of shears to get her out. The pillow was wet with tears, her head swimming and pounding from dehydration, and all she wanted to do was disappear in the shadows of the dark room. It had been almost a year since they had been together. She knew Mike wasn’t going anywhere. But what if he did? She wasn’t who she wanted to be. Mike was so special, and this moment couldn’t ever be right. Couldn’t ever be everything she would want it to be for either of them. She was broken and ugly and every breath hurt because all she could feel was her skin over muscle and bones that were too dense and narrow and all she could hear was a voice that was too low escaping from her lungs and so she stopped. She stopped breathing and laid still, until the breath needed to come, and it came in gasps, short deep gasps that made her dizzy, made the darkness turn inky, and Mike took her. Tightly. His body against her back, his arms tight around her chest, his cheek on hers, and he held her. Stabilized her. A rock against the wave of emotions. He kissed her cheek, he shushed her, he held her tighter, dissipated the pressure on her chest with his own weight, buried her in a love she never thought she could have. Breathing through him came easier, and even though she felt like crying, there was nothing left. She turned her head to kiss him, to thank him, to appreciate him. And in return, she felt beautiful despite it all, and she gave in to the sturdiness of his love.

tea time #122: bath

tea time #121: ice cream

prompt: ice cream submitter: @ask-commander-eyebrows notes: we got ice cream

things were going well. some could say: too well.

"don't look a gift horse in the mouth" or "don't count your chickens until they hatch" or whatever other nonsensical animal related idioms one could say in this situation. levi had them like a book in his pocket, took them out every time his new date said anything charming, intelligent, downright expectant from some perfect fairytale man he had created in his head... that this had to be a trick, this had to be a man that was "all bark and no bite"--the bark being him talking to the waitress in fluent french, and that his bite wasn't so bad either, as it had good upscale taste in foie gras (and the matching table manners).

it didn't make any sense, honestly. like, who the fuck was this guy? how was he not taken? he'd checked. erwin already offered up his full name and social media profiles, almost gave up his social security number because levi had fast talked too fast (because even for being a man of few words, he had a past that could make a mobster sweat). and even though he didn't need all this information from erwin (he had done his fair share of research before anyway, he didn't need his help), he figured he should try to give these ok!cupid matches a fair shot of honesty... but only because his friend petra forced him to.

tea time #119: demi

----

Lavender was a color first, a smell second, a taste third.

Purple was a color not often seen among the underground--the dyes too rare and expensive to accent the course, cheap linens of the local textiles. Levi could barely tell royal blue from purple at times, until he had to train his eyes to see the difference--to realize that one yielded more coin from their purses than others. It came to the point that the color itself gave him a rush of adrenaline, a high, a promise of food in his stomach and clothes on his own back. A euphoria when his knife sliced through leather straps, the jingle of coin falling into his open palm, purple. Purple was a feeling, heavy, cold, and full. An absence of empty. A shot of dopamine.

And a smell. Purple was a perfume reserved for whores and businessmen with bad business practices. He had heard it was lavender, but Levi didn't know what that was outside of some books he had scoured from a house he squated. It was purple, and grew in open fields under equally open skies. Levi wasn't sure it even existed under such wild circumstances. But there was a day, when the skies were turning grey with an oncoming storm, that the hooves of his horse stamped out a patch of them, the aroma dampening the smell of dirt and rain and animal, bringing him back to a place, a darkness, a life long past lived. His shoulders tensed, grip tight on the reigns. His horse slowed.

He asked what was wrong. A whole head taller even on horseback, his voice strong even over the sound of their horses. Levi responded by relaxing his shoulders. Shaking his head. Purple was home, or it used to be. He was over purple, or so he thought--the color, the smell, the mystery and the desire and the fullness. Purple was a crutch, his world was more vibrant now.

"What's this?" The smell, it was familiar, like it was covering something dirty underneath it.

"Lavender," he responded. His voice was soft, collected, crafted in a tone that Levi had noticed was catered specifically for him.

"Why is it in my tea?"

"Have you tried it?"

Purple was not for consuming physically. It filled him in other ways, but not like this. He was not a whore, a businessman, an open field. He wanted to say all these things but couldn't. His silence filled the space where his words couldn't, being deciphered by the man that had become the other half of his whole.

"What is it about lavender?" He asked, bringing the tea cup to his lips and taking a sip. His icy eyes never wavered from Levi, either as a challenge or as an act of confidence, or a bit of both.

Levi shrugged.

He placed his tea cup onto its saucer on his desk and leaned back. The gem of his bolo tie glinted in the candle light, and Levi swallowed once before adverting his gaze. "I picked these myself."

"When did you have time to do that?"

"On our last expedition. On the second day, I went and picked them when the dew was still present. I know it doesn't make a difference, but I like to think it enhances the taste."

"You left camp?"

He chuckled, "Yes, but I was safe."

Levi shifted. The smell of purple conflicting his senses, making him feel full and empty all at once. "I wasn't watching you."

He raised an eyebrow.

"Erwin." First name. Levi licked his lips once, tasted the purple in the air on his name, and hesitated the tea cup to his lips before placing it back down again.

"Would you have preferred I woke you up to set you on a fool's errand?"

"I'd have preferred you had me do the errand in the first place."

Erwin leaned back, took a long while before taking his cup and sipping it again. "What kind of man would I be to have you pick your own present?"

"What?" The word tumbled out, his fingers tightening around the rim of his cup.

A brief shrug, shoulders falling back to ease, his eyes failing to catch Levi's as he raises his cup again.

Levi stared at the dark liquid, the color evaporating through steam. Purple never came to him--he always worked for it. An unachievable color, an unsettling smell, the memory of home that was no longer a home. A color that fed him, filled him, connected dot to dot and sparked feelings. Emotions. And here it was, a thought, a gift, an action in reaction to his inaction, and Levi couldn't find the words, again. Instead, he wrote them in the air, and Erwin read them.

"If you do not like it, I understand," but it sounded hurt in a way. Levi had never heard his voice so fragile, so easy to break.

Levi shook his head. He swallowed. The memories, the things they meant, the layers of feelings piled like pages of a book. He took it, tore each page, burned each edge, breathed in the purple with the taste on his tongue--hot and earthy and fresh, like rain. Like all the things that were good up on the surface--like the man sitting across from him. Like the gentle smile curving the edges of his lips.

Levi's shoulders relaxed, not even realizing they had tensed. Erwin nodded once and finished his own tea. Lavender lingered in the air, silent, but writing words there when they could not. And Levi finished his tea, feeling full, feelings high, opinions changed.

tea time #120: hunter

prompt: leather jacket submitter: anon notes: first person pwp blowjob

i think he knows.

he looks at me like he’s seen me before, and i know he has. but i think he knows i’ve been looking, and i wonder if he knows it’s difficult not to. i’m sure he does. he inhales his cigarette like it’s more difficult to breathe without it, keeps his lips parted like he’s ready to lick them, eyebrow arched like he’s in constant contemplation. he paints himself as if he’s always being watched, so how could he not know?

he’s a hunter, it’s clear. he’s baiting me, it’s obvious.

people can be broken down into simple categories of wants and needs. if you watch them long enough, you can figure out where they lay without even talking to them. i do this quicker than most--pegged everybody in the room already from body language alone. however, he is different. he’s a hunter, that’s all i know, but i’m not sure where he fits. is he here for sex? money? drugs? alcohol? violence? his body language suggests them all and yet none at all.

he licks his lips when our eyes meet this time, rolls them to look toward the bar, mutters something to nobody, but ends up with a drink anyhow. he blinks once, slowly, like a cat, before his eyes drift up and catch mine again. seizes them. my jaw goes tight, my fists clench. he sways into my direction, direct, and with purpose, and everything flares up in me. he’s here for violence, i’ve decided.

“oi, you keep lookin’ at me,” he says. he’s short, barely stands past my shoulder despite his martens. “what’s yer name?”

i look down at him, through him, try to place him, try to pin him under my thumb. the seconds tally up, and i answer: “erwin.”

tea time for anon. prompt: worship---he is marble, his shape etched out of ancient stone, the relief of a man under sediment, compressed, heated, folded, molded. a man, not much unlike himself, but carefully constructed, smooth to the eyes but rough to the touch. mind as unfathomable as an artist, heart as unwavering as a scholar, skin as cold as ice but somehow as warm as the waking sun, evaporating the morning chill like hot sighs of yearning mouths, reaching for each other, hotly. insistently.

and he is bone and flesh and sinew and light and dark and mystery and alive; he’s so alive and he roars life from every pore, a sweat that mattes his hair and stings his eyes and makes him smell like the dirt and sky and the woods and leather and linens and he is a man, not much unlike himself, but so haphazardly constructed, rough to the eyes but smooth to the touch. and he melts the ice and leaves the hairs standing on end until long after his departure, his voice captured in the bottle in his hand, like an ocean wave crashing, startling awake with sweat that evaporates like the morning chill. like hot sighs of yearning mouths. reaching. hotly. insistently.

he is grace and intelligence and strength and silence. he is loud and deceiving and cruel and love.

and they are two of the same, stone and blood, light and dark, two wings stretched to the sky, rising like smoke. fingers entwined, breathing hot sighs of yearning mouths, and the words come out like scripture, like etchings, like carvings on skin: “i could worship you forever.” 

M a r o o n e d

chapter 2: the name

She moves closer to Leland and wraps her arm around his, placing a warm cheek on his shoulder. “What happened?”

What didn’t happen? Why did he waste all his time with this life? Why, why did he let Eric fuck him in that shitty apartment--the one with the hole in the ceiling and the freezer full of frozen pizzas? Fucked so good, so stupid, that he thought he could find happiness in it--thought that he could bury two syllables under four in the feeling of it. For two years, he continued with the name, a name that he gritted his teeth at, that felt as flimsy as the papers that made it legal. But for two years, why, for two years, did he let this happen? What kind of fucking disgusting piece of shit, what kind of fake liar, what kind of hack, hoax, hypocrite...

“Lee.”

Leland looks down at his hand, his fists curled tight, fingernails digging crescents into his palms. He relaxes his grip. “I can’t...” The feeling grabs his chest again, squeezes it so hard that he wants to scream. “I fuckin’ can’t.”