prev — next

LONDON Niall Connelly adjusts his scarf. The soft merino wool—red and black plaid with a thin ribbon of pale blue—is knotted at his throat, and too warm. He tugs at it. Unwinding the wool until it's hanging loosely from his fingers. Twists the fabric between bent knuckles a few times before looping the scarf back around his neck with a sigh. He glances at his phone. 10:57. The alley café in his Brixton neighborhood is practically empty, only a few occupied tables. Winter sunlight streams into the narrow cobblestoned space. The sound of frothing milk greets the whir of an espresso grinder. The cheerful patter of ceramic.  Niall slouches against the alley wall, cold brick seeping through his sweater and overcoat. He curls the edge of a nail into skin, scrapes the valley between his thumb and finger as his heart rabbits inside his chest. Blood pumps electric through his veins, his pulse faster, louder, than it's been at any of his recent pop-up shows. Any interview he's given these past five months. He swallows, and his throat protests with a dry click. “Idiot,” he mumbles to himself. “You saw him last night.” He sang with him. On a catwalk in front of thousands of people. Niall sang a song he hadn't performed in years, in a new arrangement, harmonizing in real time, and he still hadn't felt as nervous as he does right now. He rolls his shoulder blades against the rough brick. Checks the time again. 10:59. Niall looks up, and freezes.  Dev stands beneath the arched entrance to the alley, as still as a painting, his shining dark eyes locked with his. He's wearing his creamy knit sweater. The one that makes him look like a sexy archivist, its front hem tucked into off-white trousers cuffed above checkered Vans. His hands are tucked into the pockets of his wool overcoat, also off-white, because Dev can never resist a curated monochrome, his dark hair unstyled, curly waves going every direction in liberated disobedience. He is every dream and desire Niall has had since he was old enough to know what it meant to want somebody.

I published the final installment to i do not regret you last week. If you need a small reprieve from the stress and terror of the world, I gently place this story into your hands. Brew yourself some tea, wrap yourself up in a blanket, and rest in the beauty of queer love. The whole fic honestly feels like a balm.

Here's a section from thee, thine, mine I quite enjoy:

“That's always been our song.” Niall is instantly swept back in time, into their personal history, to the precise moment when Dev sent him the look, as he lay stretched on his back against the floor of Baz and Niall's tiny apartment. Baz had gone to bed hours before. The clock edging past two am. Guitars and notebooks in a demi halo around the two of them, the floor littered with mugs and emptied packets of crisps, the smell of coffee dregs loitering in the air.  In those days, late-night songwriting was one of Niall’s favorite things. Not because of the dark pressed up against the windows or the unique texture of stillness that hit the air after midnight. No, these sessions allowed him to spend uninterrupted time with Dev. Watch the charismatic Dev Pitch unwind, unfurl, into his most relaxed state. His secretly brilliant mind whirring, like wings of a hummingbird, breaking language apart, spitting out lyrics a word or line at a time, most of them terrible, as the songwriting process goes. Dev would fidget with something in his hands, a pencil, a guitar strap, the drawstrings of his hoodie, and growl with frustration when the lines refused to land. Crow with delight when they did. Laugh with his entire belly when language or the lateness of the night tipped into the absurd. Niall would observe the crinkle that appeared at the bridge of Dev's nose. The flash of white teeth, the stretch and pull of his face when he smiled. The glitter of his eyes beneath fairy lights, rich dark brown threaded with amber.  He observed and he wanted. Privately, secretly, harboring a crush that only continued to grow as time spiraled forward. 

protect one another out there. 🩵

@artsyunderstudy @leithillustration @orange-peony @whatevertheweather @monbons

@stitchy-queerista @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @theimpossibledemon @confusedbiqueer

@rimeswithpurple @letraspal @shrekgogurt @brilla-brilla-estrellita @alexalexinii

@iamamythologicalcreature @best--dress @valeffelees @drowninginships @messofthejess

@youarenevertooold @cutestkilla @thewholelemon @emeryhall @monbons

deniall | explicit | 10.6K words

"Have you ordered yet?" "No." "What d'you want?" Niall's brain short-circuits at the frankly overwhelming number of responses to that simple question, none of them related to coffee. So many wants, one after another, in rapid succession. He goes briefly lightheaded.

Dev and Niall finally have their coffee date.

It's later than I had hoped, but it's here. It's here. The final piece to the ICARUS collection and i do not regret you AU. I really love this one. Enjoy. 🖤

I'm joining in today. Similar to @artsyunderstudy, I had an incredibly difficult week in my personal life (not the mention the ongoing horrors that persist in the world), and I want to share something small and good.

Remember how I said there was still a final one-shot for i do not regret you? It's almost done. It's ended up to be nearly 10k but ykw? It makes me happy. If you love Dev and Niall, I think it'll make you happy, too.

Snippet under the cut. I hope to publish this week!

prev — next

STOCKHOLM It's raining. Dev hears the fleck of water against glass. Faint. And muted, as though the weather exists far removed from … wherever he is. He stretches his legs, presses his toes into soft cotton, his spine sinking into a slope of pillows. Bed, then. And judging from the crisp smell of linen around him, he's in another hotel room. But he remembers a hospital. Scuffed walls and the sharp fangs of astringent. Fingers probing his skull, the length of his neck. Bright light in his eyes. He opens his eyes now, and sees a long expanse of wall, hotel white, split in half by an oversized painting. A chaos of angry strokes. Black and fuchsia and red. The light in the room is thin and hazy, steeped in the blue of morning. There's a rustle of fabric at his side, and Dev turns his head. Niall sits in an armchair next to him, his chin propped in the cup of his hand, his big brown eyes fixed on Dev. His heart skips, a stone flung across water, buoyed by air and force and hope, before sinking once more. "Is this a dream?" he croaks. Because why else would Niall be here, in Europe, after all the ways Dev failed him?

Read the full one-shot on ao3.