[ID/Start

Something made her look up, tired eyes squinting into the distance. The sound suddenly leaped in volume as a shining rectangular shape came roaring around a far corner. Her eyes popped as the vehicle bore down on her, showing no sign of altering its path. She had to scramble to get out of its way.

Panting and waving an angry fist after the landspeeder, she raised her voice over the sound of its passage. "Won't you kids ever learn to slow down!"

Luke might have seen her, but he certainly didn't hear her.

Mercia and Tiger’s June Prompt Challenge #2

Pairings: KageHina, HQ!!

The summer months before Karasuno were quiet. Stagnant days of too warm weather and water beading against the fogged up plastic of his water bottle, the steady rise and fall of a the ball against his hands again and again. Endless days that bled into the next.

This summer, the heat is just as intense as the last. Hot rays that scorch the top of his head and makes him jerk his fingers away sharply. And he's spent most days playing volleyball too, the satisfying pop of sound that makes his lips curl and his heart light no matter how many times he hears it.

But this summer he has friends.

He has the team. Each day is different to the last - whether that's a weekend camping at the beach, burning their toes on the sand as Suga calls them back for sunscreen. Or a trip to the aquarium with the other first years, Tsukishima rolling his eyes but reading the information display next to the Komodo dragon with a glint in his eyes, as Hinata presses his face against every glass panel and tugs Tobio in every direction. They have barbeques  in every one of their senpais' backyards at least once, the grills manned by Daichi, of course. One memorable time, they even sneak into school's pool for a party.

Today, though, it’s just Tobio and Hinata. The sun has been at their backs the whole day, and his knuckles feel stiff from gripping the handlebars of his old bike for far too long. Sweat has been dripping down the side of his temple for at least an hour now, and never has he envied Hinata so much for his seemingly boundless stamina.

"Fuah!" Hinata plops down beside him, uncaring of the cool grass that probably tickles the decoy's tanned calves. His eyes are bright, Tobio thinks. "We rode so far!"

"Dumbass, who told you to start racing?" There's no bite in his voice, despite the annoyance that should behind it. In the shade of the tall tree, the breeze soft and soothing against his skin, it's barely much more than a soft mumble.

Hinata hears it anyway, stupid cheeks rosy from the heat and probably sunburnt. "I didn't! You were the one that starting speeding up!"

"You were getting too far away."

The tips of Hinata's ears are probably sunburnt too. Tobio squints a little, trying to see him better against the backdrop of the summer sky. They look soft, and flushed pink. They'd probably be really warm if he touched them. "W-well - " He snatches his gaze from Hinata's ears to his face, which doesn't look any better to be honest. Not that it looks bad. Just - pink. And a little splotchy. "I turned around and you had a really scaaary look on your face and you were pedalling reaaally intensely." His arms flail as if to make his point - "Of course, I started trying to go faster!"

"That's just my face." Tobio deadpans back, eyes flicking up to the sun through the leaves. His phone is in his pocket but he can't be bothered enough to check it for the time, so the sun will have to do.  Hinata is still trying to justify the racing in his ears, voice as loud as his hair. And it's not that he's not listening, just that he's still catching his breath and the grass is pleasantly cool against his bare neck and Hinata's calves arms have so many more freckles than they did at the start of the holidays.

"Oi! Are you listening?" The sun is abruptly blocked out by Hinata's face, cheeks puffed out in annoyance. "Don't ignore me, Bakageyama!" But he's not really listening any more. Tobio's chest feels strange and fluttery, tight and far too full like the moment as the ball leaves his fingers for a set, and Hinata's smells of grass and sweat and the sticky-sweet ice cream they had several hours ago.

"Hinata -" He croaks even as he pushes up on one elbow.

Hinata's lips taste like he smells, salty and sugar sweet and soft beneath his own. His breath is just as shaky as Tobio's and his fingers are far too warm where they are clutched at the neckline of Tobio's t-shirt and the smaller boy is half hunched over him, arms crushed awkwardly between them. Hinata's mouth is warm and wet and clummsy, and makes him feel too shivery to keep his eyes open.

He pulls away for a second (Hinata's lips chase him, a little), just to catch his breath - because somehow Hinata always makes him feel a little breathless, but this time it’s different. Weird, but a good weird.

Hinata's eyes are wide but his mouth - soft, and warm, and - is curled up into the slightest smile. "- Oh."

"Woah." Tobio corrects, as his stomach flip-flops, as he sits up properly, so he has better balance this time.

My parents and their impulse buying is causing me so much stress rn. Like, they took my phone to replace it with a new one (and they’re also buying themselves new ones). Typically getting a new phone is great, but since it’s an impulse buy on their part I had absolutely zero warning in order to save any of my stuff. 

I had to speed-save several art pieces and photos of my deceased dog to my google drive because of this. I was made to do it so fast that I’m not 100% sure if they all saved properly or if they’re corrupted. 

Chances are I’m going to lose most if not all of my music and photos. The majority of photos I can live without (at the very least, the ones of my dog should be on my google drive now), but several of my music files aren’t saved anywhere else and I was given no time to upload them to my computer. That’s a solid twenty songs I probably lost. 

Also, I had this big Knights of The Old Republic art peace I was working on, that I’ll never be able to finish now (because the way the sketchbook program I was using works). I’ve been working on that WIP on and off for a little over a month, and it was nearing completion, and now I’ll probably just not get to finish it because they took my phone. So much work is just down the drain... 

The Moomin plushie I mentioned before came like 5 weeks early! He’s small and soft and cute!

Pairings: Drarry

Words: 1389

Love at first sight - it was the sort of notion that Draco admired. In his firm opinion, it took a very strange sort of mindset to even believe in such a thing in this day and age. It was true - he thought - that people could certainly find lust at first sight. Most relationships started like that - on the basis of how hot the person was, or how much you fancied them. Love - the non-platonic sort anyways -  was a lot more complicated.

He liked to think he knew what it was. The quiet contentment that his parents luxuriated every time he visited them in France, the youthful plastic and political smiles that made them a very handsome couple during his childhood, replaced by wrinkled lines and soft gestures. He liked to think he saw glimpses of it, little windows into other people's lives and their intertwined hearts. It was in the way Pansy and Astoria would burst into laughter, overexuberant and almost hysterical, until it should have made them nearly sick with it but instead beaming from ear to ear so hard it seemed like they'd caught the stars between their eyes. Sometimes, he saw it in strangers too - the way an elderly woman held open the door for the older gentleman behind her, fingers flicking through sign language fast and a teasing glint in her eyes; or the face someone made when stepping out of a flower shop - somewhere between proud and bashful.

But it wasn't something he could say he had experienced for himself.

He'd had plenty of his share of partners, of course. Draco knew he sometimes came off a little too strongly, but he liked to think that his personality and his looks weren't not attractive. He was twenty-five, in the prime of his life, why shouldn't he have his pick? Of the four serious relationships he'd been in, none of them had made him look at them the way he'd seen other people look at their significant others. Not a single one. After the initial flutter of novelty, the routine would sink in and then suddenly Draco would find himself glancing across the table on a date and thinking - was this better than nothing?

His job as a photographer meant he had to travel a lot - and thus, was usually his go-to excuse for a break-up. "I'm sorry - this long distance thing isn't working - we should just - " was his typical spiel and his mother seemed to think he'd gotten it down to an art. It wasn't that they were bad relationships, or shitty partners, just that he wanted something special - as cliché as that sounded. He didn't want to just settle for who he could get.

"Oh, and what do you think I did?" His mother would say primly over the phone, her tone light and airy, "I settled for your father, you know, and now I have a wonderful son, and a loving husband - you've grown up so much, that I forget what a child you are sometimes, Draco."

So perhaps, he had no idea what love was after all.

But it was something of a personal project of his to capture it in a frame. How did a slight smile differ from a look of love? What changed between shaping an expression on your face to looking at someone with love? He had thousands of snapshots in his studio of the faces of his friends that he'd bribed into being used as subjects on film, or black and white stills of people going around their everyday lives, whilst Draco tried to understand their expressions, just a little.

Despite all of that, he'd yet to actually capture the cliché 'love at first sight' - ironic, since that was the theme the fashion mag was going for in their May issue. They'd been flown out from London to Los Angeles and driven to the shoot location the next morning with little preamble in order to set up before the models arrived. The weather was far too hot for anything Draco would deem Spring, but at least the urban sets meant air conditioning. As usual, he'd brought Pansy with him to manage and assist - her official title was as his P.A. but that had somehow devolved into meaning he was responsible for giving her feedback on her selfies and getting updated on the gossip that he missed while focusing through the lens.

The shoot had run overtime, lasting several hours because the models just wouldn't move their face right for a theme like love at first sight and Draco was hot, and irritated, and wasn't nearly as recovered from his jetlag as he'd liked, which was why he flop down beside his unprofessional P.A on the sofa in their trailer with a grunt and tried to do his best to imagine something cold and sweet right about now.

"Ooh! Food's ready," Pansy's voice was annoyingly cheerful, "I can hear the caterers setting up."

"Not hungry," He mumbled into the cushions, macramé threading tickling his nose. "Lemme sleep."

"Draco."

"Nuh."

"Draco."

He closed his eyes.

"Fine - I'm starving, so I'm going." She said pointedly, before the clicks of her heels got quieter, followed by the sounds of the door.

There was another shoot after this, swapping the idyllic urban street they were in for an office shoot with chrome and metal finishes and glass several hundred metres above the busy streets. The six models (six now, because he told the seventh to go home) would be modelling an outfit each, and he'd need enough full body and close-ups to keep the stills intimate enough for the theme but also show off each garment.

Then after that, there was the reviewing process - he'd need to get the photos sent to the editor's office before eleven tonight and to do that, he'd need to go over the hundreds of frames on the memory card, and -

A loud knock interrupted his thoughts, plans vanishing in his head like smoke. Draco scowled, trying to find the tail end of the idea - right, the memory card and then the -

The knock repeated itself louder this time, and he'd just opened his mouth to tell Pansy to fuck off when the door opened of it's own accord and a distinctly not-Pansy stepped through with a fierce scowl on his lips. The man didn't even look up, breaking left away from the door to set down a tray with little finesse and not at all gently, the soup inside the bowl sloshing dangerously near the edges. He had dark hair, black and thick, glossy and messy like it would catch between his fingers at the slightest tugs. Framed by a pair of rounded glasses, were bright green eyes that were bracketed by a smattering of barely-there freckles on the man's dark skin.

He wasn't a model - he didn't have the build for it, lean though he was and well-muscled from what Draco could see under the white caterer's uniform that clung to him slightly  in the heat. The man - because he was definitely a man - bared a flash of white teeth between rosy-pink lips, mumbling things that Draco probably wasn't supposed to hear.

"Stupid Garcia, send your fucking sous chef on your fucking errand, why don't you?" The man hissed to himself, in an English accent, strangely; laying out the silverware into the tray. "Fucking celebrities, why do you need a fork for fucking bisque?" There was a clatter and a sigh as the man - sous chef, hot sous chef - finished up and made to turn, and abruptly Draco realised he was about to be caught staring at the man, having overheard opinion's he was most likely not supposed to -

"Motherfucker!" The man spat, broad shoulders jerking in shock as Draco finally got a chance to see the nametag on his breast pocket.

Harry.

Quite a shame his mouth wasn't as sweet as it looked. Maybe it could have been - not love, no, - but something like it. A warm, heady feeling uncurled in Draco's chest.

Pairing: Draco/Harry

Harry loves Draco for it - no matter how often he gets ribbed for it. The way his boyfriend can't resist just checking passing windows on the street for a glimpse of his own reflection, a hand twitching upwards wanting to adjust a strand of soft hair but restraining so that the movement becomes much more aware of itself and subtle. He still stops to fix it, though.

"I'm vain," Draco always says, his nose in the air just so. "Everyone is, I'm just not afraid to admit it."

Harry thinks that true of a lot of people - that vanity is a side effect of pride and perfectionism. Pride, something people always get told to watch or be un afraid of. Too much pride, too little pride - both are undesirable. Perfectionism too - something that makes you a hard worker, determined, but fussy about getting things right. Pride in what you do.

And Harry admires that about Draco. That his boyfriend can stride down the street without having to drop his hand, head held high and grip warm against his own. That Draco, used to the sneers and the sheer snideness that accompanies politicking and the public eye, gives him a reassuring smile, a warm hand on his back, far better than his own half-grimace, for every journalist or photographer who interrupts their dates.

But there are bad days. Days when he comes home from the Corps' Training Centre to drawn drapes and dark rooms, a curled shape beneath the sheets of their bed. On those days, Draco doesn't move - like the barest change in his whispered breaths will disturb the world beyond the window.

Or the world will disturb him.

Harry doesn't understand as much as he'd like. He's never been much of the thinker. He's not like Draco, who lies silent and still. When he's upset, Harry throws cheap objects - cushions, ugly plates, the like - and blasts them out of the sky above the backyard with his wand. He moves.

It's not healthy for either of them, he knows, but he's not sure what else he can do beyond curl in beside him and warm Draco's cold feet with his own.

Ron is actually the one he has to thank - which should be surprising though it really isn't. "Found her on a patrol in Knockturn," He says, dropping to his knees just inside the door.

The wooden crate in his hands looks like it's been nicked from the back of the Leaky Cauldron, the wood slightly damp but looks to be far too light to hold the number of butterbeer bottles it should.

"Not really in the mood for a drink." He says, trying not to angle his body back to the closed door of their bedroom.

"I'm not an idiot," Ron huffs dryly, somewhere between a laugh and something tinged a little bitter as he leans back from the opening of the box. Inside the ball of fur is barely recognizable, no bigger than his forearm and shivering so hard the Auror Corps' issued towels shake with it.

"A - "

"A puppy, I know." Ron interrupts, hands lifting to stall any questions. "I would take her back to ours, but you know what Mum's like, and that fussy old cat of 'Mione's." The puppy is hopelessly soft looking, with treacle-dark ears and wide eyes that watch him warily from its crate.

"I …"  He says, listening to the telling sounds of the bed springs and quiet steps on floorboards. Harry flicks his eyes away from the puppy, gorgeous as she is, and to the closed bedroom door… "I guess."

"Thanks, mate." Ron says, turning to leave after a clap on his back, "I'll go in with you tomorrow to figure the rest of it out."

It's not until the door is shut and the flat is dark and quiet again that the bedroom door opens. Draco wanders out in an old t-shirt, crinkles in its faded fabric as deep as the purple-grey bags under his eyes.

"Ron." Harry says, by way of explanation, walking across the room to slip his fingers between Draco's. He follows, slowly and lethargically, like walking exhausts him, breathing exhausts him, as Harry tugs him back towards the entryway.

He doesn't let go, fingers closed over Draco's dull pulse, not until his boyfriend stops in his tracks behind him. Draco makes a small sound, soft and wounded, slate grey eyes fixing on the tiny head peeking out from the box. "Oh." He says, in a gentle whuff of air. He pulls his hands away from Harry's and lowers oh-so-gingerly to the floor, eyes bright and warm again.

And Harry -

Harry doesn't really know the first thing about looking after dogs - real dogs, not Animagus ones. Doesn't know what the difference between wet food and kibble is beyond the obvious. Whether dogs should be showered and cleaned. How often they should see a vet or a Healer. Harry doesn't have a clue - but that evening, Draco settles on calling her Bonnie and his cheeks flush a pleased pink the first time he manages to coax her into sniffing his fingers.