Just a typical Witch

The position didn’t look all that comfortable, and you’d asked him a long time ago if his shell bothered him. To you it seemed like it would be troublesome with the rim arching behind his shoulders like that so he couldn’t recline his head fully back, but he’d simply shrugged. It was just how he was made and it didn’t bother him. Anyhow, a small pillow worked wonders when he needed it to. And you’d certainly seen him sleep all sorts of ways by now.

The sound of his gentle snoring was strangely endearing, and you never liked to wake him up, but by now you’d done just about everything you could as far as his skin went. You’d picked over his shoulders, neck, and arms with diligence, and now you could admire all the new shining springtime scales and patterns. The texture of his skin was so interesting that you never thought you’d get enough of touching it, but right now you were ready to get out of this tub. Your neck ached, for one thing, having been hunched over for so long, and your fingers had turned into complete prunes.

The second you tried to stand, however, Donnie’s lungs expanded with a deep inhale, followed by his eyes halfway opening and again showing you that flash of his third eyelid.

“I’m done,” you state, and try to hide your smile as Donnie’s hands automatically find your hips again under the water and halt your attempt to stand.

“Did you get it all?” His voice is low and groggy sounding. It was a soft timbre that you loved very much.

“What I could. But now my fingers are getting pruny and you’ve been asleep for the last twenty minutes.”

“Hmmm.” Don makes a noise low in his throat as his fingers gently massage the swell of your behind. “Human finger pruning is a nervous system response believed to improve grip in wet conditions.”

You don’t think he meant for that to be an innuendo, not with the drowsy way he blinks at you. When just waking or falling asleep, the poor man had no filter and it was likely just one of the many random facts he’d absorbed over the years springing to the forefront of his mind. One time when you’d caught him falling asleep in his lab chair he suddenly told you the heat in tropical climates keeps some varieties of oranges green when they ripen because the chlorophyll is a natural protection. He’d presumably done that because you’d just eaten an orange and he could smell it on you, triggering the memory.

“Come on. Let me up. I gotta pee, anyway,” you tell him, and with a lopsided smile you lean in to kiss his snoot.

“So romantic.” He huffs, but releases you.

The water sloshes slightly as you get out and pad over to where the towels are, and a few moments later you hear Donnie get out as well.

“Do your shoulders feel any better?” You look up at him as you wipe your arms dry and he rolls his shoulders like he’s testing them.

“Yeah. Not so tight anymore. Thank you.”

“Anytime,” you smile, pleased to have done that for him.

“Still a weird couples activity,” Donnie grumbles. “Some people get massages, or, I dunno, pedicures. Not…this. Although pedicures are weird, too. What is the point of adding color to toenails?” The furrow between his eyes is somehow adorable.

“At least your toenails would be real easy to paint. They’re huge. And there’s only four of them,” you point out and he shoots you a look and you shrug. “Hey, if it’ll make you feel more even, I’ll let you brush my hair and you can see all the ones that fall out. You’re not the only one who sheds.”

“Like I don’t already find your hair all over my stuff anyway, you hairy mammal.” He huffs a soft laugh and wraps you in a hug and you melt into him for a moment, completely content.

The rules of the soaking tub followed Japanese bath house rules: wash before you get in, rinse after. However, instead of using the adjoining shower room again, you opt for the bathroom back in Donnie’s room, which requires a walk down the hall in just your towels. That was no big deal to you, as the guys' everyday towels were essentially beach towels. Anything smaller would have been comical, given their size.

However, even though you are fully covered Don sort of crowds you as you walk back to his room. It was a thing he started doing as soon as his season started, keeping close and acting a little as if his brothers might be potential rivals to lure you away. You mentally snort at the very idea, and doubt he’s even aware he’s doing it—most of the time, anyway. Just now you can practically feel his plastron against your back as you reach the bedroom door and you bite the inside of your cheek to hide your amused smile. Just another of those funny turtle quirks you’d accepted when you accepted him.

Donatello’s room—your shared room—had finally reached a balance of both yours and his. Before it had been more of a crash pad than a bedroom, containing only cobbled together furniture and older, sentimental childhood things, but once you two got together he encouraged you to make the space yours, too. Since then he’d gotten an actual bedframe and replaced his worn out mattress, and you’d bought a nice bed set for it, along with a proper dresser for clothes. And once Donnie rigged up a timed grow light system you added some house plants, too, and now it felt like a proper bedroom rather than a glorified storage room.

“Don’t let me forget to feed the plants in here. It’s been almost a month already,” you say, eying the calathea as you discard your towel on the back of Donnie’s desk chair and walk into the adjoining bathroom.

“Already have the reminder programmed for tomorrow,” he assures and follows you, also sans towel. Donnie was so good like that, making schedules for things. He also loved putting things on your shared calendar, you’d noticed. Perhaps because it was another reminder that you were now a unit.

Still having to pee, you perch on the edge of Don’s robust, modified toilet and quickly do what you need to as he turns on the shower, then switch places with him. That was another weird thing couples did, you muse. Pee while in the same room. One of the ultimate signs of intimate familiarity. You two were somehow the weirdest and most normal couple you knew.

The water is almost instantly hot thanks to Don’s recirculating heating system and the shower space is big and roomy with a curtain instead of glass because curtains were just more practical when you owned a large, hard shell. The curtain is printed with The Great Wave off Kanagawa and was something you’d picked out together.

Almost as soon as you’re both under the hot spray you can feel his broad hands sliding up your back and tracing the groove of your spine with his thumbs. He’d always been so fascinated with your back, even now after he’d seen it countless times over. Then again, you felt the same way about his shell and had likely spent even more time tracing the grooves of his scutes.

“Pass the shampoo?” you ask, but he doesn’t comply, not exactly. Instead he takes the bottle himself and applies it to his own hands before getting his fingers in your hair. You’re not all that surprised because Donnie loved washing your hair. From that very first shower you took together, he was hooked and you were more than happy to indulge him, especially because the sensation of his fingers massaging your scalp always seemed to pull an involuntary groan out of you. 

“Tip your head back. No soap in the eyes,” he directs, moving your head where he wants with gentle pressure from his fingers. You let your head loll back, supported in one of his wide palms, and with the hot water sluicing over your shoulders and down your back, you can feel that tightness in your shoulderblades lessen.

Once the shampoo is rinsed and Donnie gets your conditioner in you need to let it sit for a couple of minutes, so you step aside and watch as he gives himself a quick rinse off. You don’t think you’ll ever tire of looking at his long arms and legs, especially glistening with water, but when he catches you looking he gets that familiar gleam in his eye and twitch in his fingers. Before he can reach for you, however, you put your hand up.

“Nope, scoot. I need to shave my legs first,” you inform him. You had meant to do it earlier before getting into the soaking tub, but Donnie had been trying most ardently to persuade you to forget the whole ‘shedding assistance’ thing, so you’d foregone shaving in order to get him in the tub before he changed his mind completely.

“You don’t need to shave your legs,” he informs you back and slides one of his hands along your hip to pull you towards him. Craning your neck up to look at his face, you again take in the vibrant fresh stripes that adorn his neck and creep a little onto his chin and are reminded that it is the start of his season, and you have been taunting him with your naked body for well over an hour now.

“Society says I do,” you scoff weakly, trying to hold out just a little longer so you can get this last thing done. His grip on your hip flexes.

“Ah yes, societal pressure. Excellent reason to do something.”

You roll your eyes. “Oh shut up. I know you love the feeling of a freshly shaved leg.”

“I just like your legs, period.” He dips down to nuzzle along your jaw and all you can do to hold back the soft moan that wants to escape is to bite your lower lip.

 “Please. I’ll just be a few minutes,” you half plead, half declare, and with a sigh of reluctance Donatello pulls away, vacating the shower so you can hurry up and be done already. He does not go far, though, and you can see his shadow moving from the other side of the shower curtain, no doubt drying himself off.

“Did you know that Queen Elizabeth the First made eyebrow removal fashionable? Would you shave your eyebrows if that were the thing?” He asks suddenly and your hand stills as you’re halfway up your shin with the razor. The randomness of the question makes you laugh. Always keeping you on your toes was Donatello, both mentally and physically with that genius brain of his and his height. Many, many kisses had been had on your tiptoes.

“I’m glad it’s not the thing, that would look super weird,” you sputter and resume the methodic removal of your leg hair and he chuckles from behind the curtain.

“Hey, I don’t have eyebrows.”

Indeed he did not. There was not a single hair on that man’s body, and you were ok with that.

“You could always draw them on, I suppose,” you tease him.

Donnie’s hand suddenly darts in from the other side of the curtain and manages to smack your behind before you even register the curtain moved.

“Hey! No ninjaing when I’m holding a sharp slicey thing!” you protest with a gasp and you can practically hear Donnie’s grin from the other side of the curtain when he speaks.

“At least you have a safety razor. It was invented all the way back in 1895. Just think, you could still be trying to remove hair with a pumice stone, or in the Middle Ages they used chemical pastes with quicklime and arsenic. Doesn’t that sound fun? Back then it was more for pest management, though, rather than beauty. Have you ever had lice?”

You make a face at the question.

“Ugh, yes. Once. In elementary school. All I remember is feeling dirty and my mom brushing my hair over and over with that nit comb.”

“I mean, she could have shaved your head. That was the most common method for dealing with louse infestation once upon a time.”

“Gross. Don’t call it an infestation. Makes me feel like I had fleas.”

“Well, you kind of did. Technically you have mites that live in your eyelashes full time, too. Demodex folliculorum. Think of that.”

“I don’t want to think of that,” you grumble and fight the urge to wipe your eyes all of a sudden. “You know what? Shoo. You’re distracting me and I’m going to nick myself.”

Donnie doesn’t listen to you.

“Did you know that the modern-day idea of body hair being ‘unwomanly’ can be traced to Darwin? He postulated that natural selection made humans see body hair as more primitive, thus making having less hair more sexually attractive.”

“Well in that case fuck you, Darwin. Could have saved me a lot of trouble.” Trouble that you’d at least finished for now and you place your razor back in its place on the shower caddy and finish rinsing.

You turn the shower off and pull back the curtain, only to find Donnie standing there waiting for you with an open towel. You’re quickly wrapped in both the towel and Donnie’s long arms, followed by some vigorous rubbing when he flips the towel onto your head and cheekily ‘assists’ with drying your hair as you try pushing him away. When he finally releases you you glare up at him.

“Why on earth do you know so much about the history of shaving?”

He shrugs. “I dunno. It was something to look up one day.”

You continue to eye him with amused suspicion.

“Was it prompted by porn? I bet you wanted to know why they were all hairless, didn’t you?” It seemed like a rabbit hole Donnie would definitely have gone down into.

By the way he puffs out his cheeks and notedly does not look directly at you, you can tell you hit the nail on the head.

“That’s not not the reason,” he drawls, stepping back just enough to give you the space to finish drying off properly. Your mind, however, has latched on to the information. Was that just curiosity, or something he’d be interested in? On you? You’d considered shaving clean once or twice before, but the upkeep was ridiculous and…Would he like nothing but smooth skin down there?

“Do you want me to shave mine?” Your voice is calm as you offer, though you secretly feel that little creep of insecurity, the one that still wonders, just a little, if your human body and all its hair and smells and quirks ever displeased him.

He blinks down at you, perhaps considering.

“No…” he finally says and moves to stand behind you. His tall frame looms and his hips bump you forward until you’re just pressed against the edge of the sink. Then he leans over you, and with a hand on either side he grips the counter as he dips down to nuzzle along your jaw and murmurs into your ear, “...Besides, that’s where all the good smells are.”

You shudder at that, at the idea he knows you so intimately well, and that niggling bit of insecurity gets pushed aside once more. Of course Donnie loves your body, just as it is, as much as you love his. Closing your eyes you arch your neck to the side to give him more access and soon his lips are pressing soft yet eager kisses along your pulse point and his tridactyle hands are slowly kneading your hips through the towel.

“You said if I let you pick at me I could have my way with you later. Is it later?” He all but groans against your skin, and with a slight tug you feel your towel fall to the floor, exposing all your lovely skin to his restless hands. The motion of the falling fabric catches your attention in the bathroom mirror and you look up and find Donnie’s reflection staring back at you with hungry eyes.

“You were a very good boy, I suppose,” you say shakily as your skin heats up under that ravenous gaze.

That little, shy smile he gets when you praise him flashes across his lips for a moment before he presses his face against your neck again.

“So…that’s a yes?” he pants.

ᥫ᭡—————————————————————Leo

Thinks this plan is the most juvenile, cliche thing he’s ever thought up. That won’t stop him from stepping up and offering to be the one to ‘date’ you, though. His plan, his responsibility. Besides, this one involves the possibility of you getting targeted and probably hurt, too. He needs to have control over the situation from the inside, and he can’t do that if one of his brothers is gonna be the one to ‘date’ you.

Is so incredibly awkward with what fake dating actually entails. Forget the touchy bits, he can’t get over having to make it obvious he’s heading to your place. He’s a ninja, he moves in the shadows, he’d never slip up and let himself be tailed. His pride gets in the way of a lot of things, and carrying out the very mission he came up with is one of those. You’re more likely to get fed up than all shy and nervous if you fake date Leo. 

Once that particular hurdle is cleared though. Watch. Your. Feelings. By god can Leo do something if he puts his mind to it. His charm is turned up to the maximum, even when he’s being a little nervous about it. This fake dating schtick needs buildup to work. Leo is a master of buildup. He ends up getting so good at it he almost fools you. Key word: almost. With how much he texts you to debrief after every late night in your apartment or on a roof you couldn’t possibly misconstrue his actions as being anything other than performed. He practically sends you a three page document every time- going over the likelihood he was tailed, the plan for next time to lure the foot out, and how you could improve your act (you get incredibly ticked off over time with that last one. Who does he think he is?)

Leo would probably awaken a ton of urges through your little fake dating act. He’s no doubt stupidly touch starved, as are all of them, really, but he subconsciously gets addicted to the contact. It has to be very obvious, unmistakeable contact so the soldiers creeping on the two of you and using their binoculars to peer through your tiny apartment window will get the message. Leo starts to touch you casually without realising, even while you’re down at the lair. Hand on your shoulder, on your waist to move you out of the way, on your face to brush off a stray eyelash without asking. At your apartment he’s getting a kickkk out of having you in his lap, backing you into walls, feeling you touch him and hold his hand. Leo’s getting spoiled.

Is a massive fan of looming over you. Even if you’re tall, he’s finding a way to loom. Seeing you embarrassed and unable to brush off the fake dating stuff the way you’ve brushed off so many other things on so many other missions gives him some weird satisfaction. He’s a bit of a weirdo like that, but it pushes the two of you a step closer to dating for reals.

Cheek kisses. For literally the longest time. From an angle it looks like he’s actually kissing you so the two of you were banking on that being enough. Alas, it isn’t. The first kiss the two of you have is right in front of the window, but it doesn't feel fake at all.

ᥫ᭡—————————————————————Mikey

He was nominated for this one! Mikey is the best at putting people at ease and lightening the mood, and his brothers decide by majority that he’s going to be the one to ‘date’ you. Leo is probably most likely to step down if he believes Mikey can do a better job and make you more comfortable than he can. Mikey is ecstatic, he’s already planning extravagant ways to fool the foot and thinking up matching fits to really sell the image.

Mikey gets shy when he does actually have to follow through, though. He’s completely fine with everything until he gets too caught up and turns around and finds his face inches from yours; that silly goofy grin falters and you can see his eyes get all wide. Expect him to back away and hastily call ‘time out, time out, time out’ when he gets too flustered. It serves to make you nervous too, so now both of you are an awkward, bumbling mess. Mikey never quite gets over that particular habit.

He ends up being a little too obvious if that’s possible. “Come here,” and he’s dragging you over to the window or a more visible place to repeat that cute little action you just did so the people tailing you can spot it. This turns into him doing it for everything. You hold his hand; he’s pulling you to the window and letting go of you just so you have to do it again in the soldiers’ line of sight. Maybe it’s a subconscious thing; Mikey wants you to repeat it, and this is just a perfect excuse. His reasoning is that he’s totally acing the mission. Though, from an outside perspective he might as well lean out of the window waving your intertwined hands yelling “we’re dating!” Not the most subtle but the tangerine turtle has good intentions.

Three words to sum up how it all goes careening off the rails: touch starved Mikey. Again, like Leo, he’s getting too comfortable with the increased touchiness. Is it really fake dating when he kisses your forehead as a ‘hello’ even when there’s no one there to fool? The same goes for petnames; they slip into everyday conversation, though with a lot more intent than the actions. Playing a game with his brothers means Mikey is throwing an arm around you and waggling his (nonexistent) eyebrows as he says “we can be a team, right babe?” and shoves a controller into your hands. Will absolutely use the fake dating thing as a way to pair the two of you up for everything.

Mikey starts hankering after your touch. He’s always joking around, but when things get a little too serious as you both put on an act for the foot soldiers Mikey stops kidding. His earnest, honest feelings shine through and he acts like he really likes you, enough to make you wonder if this whole fake dating thing isn’t entirely fake after all.

Mikey is too shy to properly kiss you to make it convincing, the most he can bring himself to do is kiss nearrrr your mouth and pray it looks real enough. You have your arms around his neck and he has his hands on your waist, like clockwork he leans in to slowly plant a kiss next to your mouth and you can feel his heart hammering hard through his plastron. It never drops in pace, no matter how many times he does it. You think he’d pass out if he properly kissed you.

ᥫ᭡—————————————————————Raph

Surprisingly the most casual of the brothers. He’s all for teasing and being playful, so fake dating is easy peasy. Raph is the least likely to be trusted with the task of ‘dating’ you, purely because he’s very emotionally volatile and there’s always a risk of things not working out right. However, he ends up doing a pretty good job, even by Leo’s standards. Make no mistake, Raph is super gruff and awkward about it, but the two of you ease into it and it gets reallll simple with time.

Raph does this arm-swing+pivot-in-a-circle combo when he’s embarrassed and awkward, like he’s attempting to be all casual about it but he just isn’t. If you grab his hand and show that you’re making an effort to really get this mission to succeed, he’s going to be incredibly reassured and will do the same for you. He gets super serious when he’s discussing the plan with you down in the lair. You will end up getting embarrassed. That’s when his evil, teasing side kicks in. Don’t worry, Raph makes up for it by being the most casual about the rest of the arrangement. You’ll feel comfortable in a way you wouldn’t with his other brothers.

He’s got no problem pulling you onto his lap where the two of you are easily viewable on a rooftop or through your apartment window; this is all for the mission, even though he is a little shy. Most of his confidence comes from knowing that if the foot soldiers tracking the two of you try anything, he’ll be able to protect you. 10/10 bodyguard over fake boyfriend. Raph pulls his phone out and gives it to you so you can do whatever you want on it to pass the time, because it’s not like he uses it for much and you can’t reach your phone with him holding you. He’s got the ‘cut up fruit on a plate instead of apologising’ kind of affection but he’s got this stuff down.

The king of touch starvation followed closely by Donnie. This man trails behind you like a lost puppy after you’ve established the fake dating thing. Leans his face into your hand and kisses the swell of your palm under your thumb oh so tenderly. He’s so egregiously weak for your touch, even if it’s all fake. Let him have this, just this once. Pretend you don’t notice him relishing getting to grab you and squish you to his chest until you’re both laughing. It's for the mission ofc.

Raph would’ve straight up kissed you had you not shied away the first time his face got super close to yours. He resorts to pecking the tip of your nose. Anytime you guys need to fake a kiss, he kisses your nose and affectionately noogies you as though trying to cancel out the intimacy of the former action. Every time without fail.

In private Raph muses over the kisses a billion times over and mentally analyses the look on your face, whether or not you shrank away in embarrassment or fear and if he could get away with doing that more often with you. His feelings go allll over the place. Raph is 50/50: worried you don’t want to be doing this with him and not particularly paying much attention to it because it’s just for a mission. He views it the same as training or patrols, just another task to do. And then he proceeds to over analyse it again. Real muddle of emotions he is. Expect him to get too caught up in the act while he’s at your apartment and end up actually kissing you.

ᥫ᭡———————————————————Donnie

Donnie thinks this whole thing is very slightly stupid. But he too is sometimes stupid and that leads him to go along with it. Either he pulled the short straw or there was heavy peer pressuring from his siblings to ‘date’ you for this one; I don’t see him involving himself in a plan like this beyond being support. However, you’re a good friend so this can’t hurt! He’s interested in the trial and error aspect of fake dating too. This whole thing is basically just a social sciences experiment. Leo backs off because he trusts Donnie to calculate things like how long you’d need to ‘date’ to ensure the foot clan would be confident in the legitimacy of your ‘relationship’.

Makes it super obvious, but in trying not to make it obvious. “No, just sit there and look pretty and they’ll buy it, I promise. Turn a bit. More to the left. Perfect! Are the candles too much?” You end up getting fed up like two minutes in because him being nervous is making you nervous. You grab his face and snap him out of it. “Donnie! You’re stressing me out!”

He’s a ball of nerves but keeps things resolutely professional. He schedules out an abundance of fake dates and sends you a list of potential activities that aren’t too demanding but will work in your favour. Honestly once the two of you get into the swing of things it gets pretty fun; you devise games and place bets on who can play the most convincing partner. Be prepared to be hounded with all sorts of tracking devices in preparation. He tries to reassure you the emergency buttons are just in case, but follows that up with “well to be accurate you are bait, so…”

He chills out with time, however, his touch starvation kicks in and shoots his nervousness back up. Is he kissing the top of your head too much? Should he stop holding your hand, or should he hold your hand more? Is it wrong for him to knock his nose to yours and tell you to kiss him on the cheek for the foot soldiers no doubt watching you from the rooftop across the street? Please keep fidgeting with his fingers and sitting in his lap. Your pupils dilated 35% when you looked at him. Have you always been so soft?

He’s also the most likely to do accidental boyfriend stuff when the two of you aren’t faking. He carries your bags, pulls you casually into his chest out of the way of Raph and Mikey when they’re bantering, takes care of you when you feel sick and rubs your back. Like Leo, watch your feelings!! Donnie doesn’t let extremely touchy habits stray into interactions outside the ones where you have the enemy as an audience, but he does get a bit more comfortable with joking around with you. If anything fake dating him will make you two closer friends.

His way of faking kisses when the two of you are on a ‘date’ is to kiss your forehead, or between your eyes. He turns his back to the general direction he knows you’re being watched from and smooches your forehead and pinches your cheek gently afterwards to get you to smile at him, which relieves his own anxiety. You actually commenting on anything related to touching (asking if you can hug him, mentioning how warm he is) will take him out if the fake touching itself hasn’t already. He’ll sooo let it slip that he wants to kiss you for real.

ᥫ᭡—————————————————————Leo

Thinks this plan is the most juvenile, cliche thing he’s ever thought up. That won’t stop him from stepping up and offering to be the one to ‘date’ you, though. His plan, his responsibility. Besides, this one involves the possibility of you getting targeted and probably hurt, too. He needs to have control over the situation from the inside, and he can’t do that if one of his brothers is gonna be the one to ‘date’ you.

Is so incredibly awkward with what fake dating actually entails. Forget the touchy bits, he can’t get over having to make it obvious he’s heading to your place. He’s a ninja, he moves in the shadows, he’d never slip up and let himself be tailed. His pride gets in the way of a lot of things, and carrying out the very mission he came up with is one of those. You’re more likely to get fed up than all shy and nervous if you fake date Leo. 

Once that particular hurdle is cleared though. Watch. Your. Feelings. By god can Leo do something if he puts his mind to it. His charm is turned up to the maximum, even when he’s being a little nervous about it. This fake dating schtick needs buildup to work. Leo is a master of buildup. He ends up getting so good at it he almost fools you. Key word: almost. With how much he texts you to debrief after every late night in your apartment or on a roof you couldn’t possibly misconstrue his actions as being anything other than performed. He practically sends you a three page document every time- going over the likelihood he was tailed, the plan for next time to lure the foot out, and how you could improve your act (you get incredibly ticked off over time with that last one. Who does he think he is?)

Leo would probably awaken a ton of urges through your little fake dating act. He’s no doubt stupidly touch starved, as are all of them, really, but he subconsciously gets addicted to the contact. It has to be very obvious, unmistakeable contact so the soldiers creeping on the two of you and using their binoculars to peer through your tiny apartment window will get the message. Leo starts to touch you casually without realising, even while you’re down at the lair. Hand on your shoulder, on your waist to move you out of the way, on your face to brush off a stray eyelash without asking. At your apartment he’s getting a kickkk out of having you in his lap, backing you into walls, feeling you touch him and hold his hand. Leo’s getting spoiled.

Is a massive fan of looming over you. Even if you’re tall, he’s finding a way to loom. Seeing you embarrassed and unable to brush off the fake dating stuff the way you’ve brushed off so many other things on so many other missions gives him some weird satisfaction. He’s a bit of a weirdo like that, but it pushes the two of you a step closer to dating for reals.

Cheek kisses. For literally the longest time. From an angle it looks like he’s actually kissing you so the two of you were banking on that being enough. Alas, it isn’t. The first kiss the two of you have is right in front of the window, but it doesn't feel fake at all.

ᥫ᭡—————————————————————Mikey

He was nominated for this one! Mikey is the best at putting people at ease and lightening the mood, and his brothers decide by majority that he’s going to be the one to ‘date’ you. Leo is probably most likely to step down if he believes Mikey can do a better job and make you more comfortable than he can. Mikey is ecstatic, he’s already planning extravagant ways to fool the foot and thinking up matching fits to really sell the image.

Mikey gets shy when he does actually have to follow through, though. He’s completely fine with everything until he gets too caught up and turns around and finds his face inches from yours; that silly goofy grin falters and you can see his eyes get all wide. Expect him to back away and hastily call ‘time out, time out, time out’ when he gets too flustered. It serves to make you nervous too, so now both of you are an awkward, bumbling mess. Mikey never quite gets over that particular habit.

He ends up being a little too obvious if that’s possible. “Come here,” and he’s dragging you over to the window or a more visible place to repeat that cute little action you just did so the people tailing you can spot it. This turns into him doing it for everything. You hold his hand; he’s pulling you to the window and letting go of you just so you have to do it again in the soldiers’ line of sight. Maybe it’s a subconscious thing; Mikey wants you to repeat it, and this is just a perfect excuse. His reasoning is that he’s totally acing the mission. Though, from an outside perspective he might as well lean out of the window waving your intertwined hands yelling “we’re dating!” Not the most subtle but the tangerine turtle has good intentions.

Three words to sum up how it all goes careening off the rails: touch starved Mikey. Again, like Leo, he’s getting too comfortable with the increased touchiness. Is it really fake dating when he kisses your forehead as a ‘hello’ even when there’s no one there to fool? The same goes for petnames; they slip into everyday conversation, though with a lot more intent than the actions. Playing a game with his brothers means Mikey is throwing an arm around you and waggling his (nonexistent) eyebrows as he says “we can be a team, right babe?” and shoves a controller into your hands. Will absolutely use the fake dating thing as a way to pair the two of you up for everything.

Mikey starts hankering after your touch. He’s always joking around, but when things get a little too serious as you both put on an act for the foot soldiers Mikey stops kidding. His earnest, honest feelings shine through and he acts like he really likes you, enough to make you wonder if this whole fake dating thing isn’t entirely fake after all.

Mikey is too shy to properly kiss you to make it convincing, the most he can bring himself to do is kiss nearrrr your mouth and pray it looks real enough. You have your arms around his neck and he has his hands on your waist, like clockwork he leans in to slowly plant a kiss next to your mouth and you can feel his heart hammering hard through his plastron. It never drops in pace, no matter how many times he does it. You think he’d pass out if he properly kissed you.

ᥫ᭡—————————————————————Raph

Surprisingly the most casual of the brothers. He’s all for teasing and being playful, so fake dating is easy peasy. Raph is the least likely to be trusted with the task of ‘dating’ you, purely because he’s very emotionally volatile and there’s always a risk of things not working out right. However, he ends up doing a pretty good job, even by Leo’s standards. Make no mistake, Raph is super gruff and awkward about it, but the two of you ease into it and it gets reallll simple with time.

Raph does this arm-swing+pivot-in-a-circle combo when he’s embarrassed and awkward, like he’s attempting to be all casual about it but he just isn’t. If you grab his hand and show that you’re making an effort to really get this mission to succeed, he’s going to be incredibly reassured and will do the same for you. He gets super serious when he’s discussing the plan with you down in the lair. You will end up getting embarrassed. That’s when his evil, teasing side kicks in. Don’t worry, Raph makes up for it by being the most casual about the rest of the arrangement. You’ll feel comfortable in a way you wouldn’t with his other brothers.

He’s got no problem pulling you onto his lap where the two of you are easily viewable on a rooftop or through your apartment window; this is all for the mission, even though he is a little shy. Most of his confidence comes from knowing that if the foot soldiers tracking the two of you try anything, he’ll be able to protect you. 10/10 bodyguard over fake boyfriend. Raph pulls his phone out and gives it to you so you can do whatever you want on it to pass the time, because it’s not like he uses it for much and you can’t reach your phone with him holding you. He’s got the ‘cut up fruit on a plate instead of apologising’ kind of affection but he’s got this stuff down.

The king of touch starvation followed closely by Donnie. This man trails behind you like a lost puppy after you’ve established the fake dating thing. Leans his face into your hand and kisses the swell of your palm under your thumb oh so tenderly. He’s so egregiously weak for your touch, even if it’s all fake. Let him have this, just this once. Pretend you don’t notice him relishing getting to grab you and squish you to his chest until you’re both laughing. It's for the mission ofc.

Raph would’ve straight up kissed you had you not shied away the first time his face got super close to yours. He resorts to pecking the tip of your nose. Anytime you guys need to fake a kiss, he kisses your nose and affectionately noogies you as though trying to cancel out the intimacy of the former action. Every time without fail.

In private Raph muses over the kisses a billion times over and mentally analyses the look on your face, whether or not you shrank away in embarrassment or fear and if he could get away with doing that more often with you. His feelings go allll over the place. Raph is 50/50: worried you don’t want to be doing this with him and not particularly paying much attention to it because it’s just for a mission. He views it the same as training or patrols, just another task to do. And then he proceeds to over analyse it again. Real muddle of emotions he is. Expect him to get too caught up in the act while he’s at your apartment and end up actually kissing you.

ᥫ᭡———————————————————Donnie

Donnie thinks this whole thing is very slightly stupid. But he too is sometimes stupid and that leads him to go along with it. Either he pulled the short straw or there was heavy peer pressuring from his siblings to ‘date’ you for this one; I don’t see him involving himself in a plan like this beyond being support. However, you’re a good friend so this can’t hurt! He’s interested in the trial and error aspect of fake dating too. This whole thing is basically just a social sciences experiment. Leo backs off because he trusts Donnie to calculate things like how long you’d need to ‘date’ to ensure the foot clan would be confident in the legitimacy of your ‘relationship’.

Makes it super obvious, but in trying not to make it obvious. “No, just sit there and look pretty and they’ll buy it, I promise. Turn a bit. More to the left. Perfect! Are the candles too much?” You end up getting fed up like two minutes in because him being nervous is making you nervous. You grab his face and snap him out of it. “Donnie! You’re stressing me out!”

He’s a ball of nerves but keeps things resolutely professional. He schedules out an abundance of fake dates and sends you a list of potential activities that aren’t too demanding but will work in your favour. Honestly once the two of you get into the swing of things it gets pretty fun; you devise games and place bets on who can play the most convincing partner. Be prepared to be hounded with all sorts of tracking devices in preparation. He tries to reassure you the emergency buttons are just in case, but follows that up with “well to be accurate you are bait, so…”

He chills out with time, however, his touch starvation kicks in and shoots his nervousness back up. Is he kissing the top of your head too much? Should he stop holding your hand, or should he hold your hand more? Is it wrong for him to knock his nose to yours and tell you to kiss him on the cheek for the foot soldiers no doubt watching you from the rooftop across the street? Please keep fidgeting with his fingers and sitting in his lap. Your pupils dilated 35% when you looked at him. Have you always been so soft?

He’s also the most likely to do accidental boyfriend stuff when the two of you aren’t faking. He carries your bags, pulls you casually into his chest out of the way of Raph and Mikey when they’re bantering, takes care of you when you feel sick and rubs your back. Like Leo, watch your feelings!! Donnie doesn’t let extremely touchy habits stray into interactions outside the ones where you have the enemy as an audience, but he does get a bit more comfortable with joking around with you. If anything fake dating him will make you two closer friends.

His way of faking kisses when the two of you are on a ‘date’ is to kiss your forehead, or between your eyes. He turns his back to the general direction he knows you’re being watched from and smooches your forehead and pinches your cheek gently afterwards to get you to smile at him, which relieves his own anxiety. You actually commenting on anything related to touching (asking if you can hug him, mentioning how warm he is) will take him out if the fake touching itself hasn’t already. He’ll sooo let it slip that he wants to kiss you for real.