littera scripta manet

And with that question, you have approximately a second to decide what your next course of action will be. Luffy’s partially descended down the ladder to the library, and while he keeps his distance across the room still, it’s only because he’s fairly confident that he’s right. You can either choose to lie, and say everything is okay, pretend you haven’t heard him at all, or tell him the truth, that you’re actually quite annoyed with him, enough so that you’ve decided to bury your head in a book until the feeling abates, but none of these options will avoid a conversation, now that he’s initiated one.

You’re just as bad a liar as him, and he’s as direct as you are indirect at times.

Choosing not to speak, you give him a glance, then look back to your book. He freezes for a moment, then decides to risk it anyway, making his way over and sitting beside you on the edge of the bench. You turn away slightly, and he frowns, and his hand hovers over your shoulder for a moment, before deciding to keep them at his sides.

“What are you reading?”

“Luffy, does it matter? Do you want to read it?” you snap.

He sighs.

“You didn’t answer my first question.”

Back to this again. You turn your head again, a little thrown off when you realize he’s closer than you expected him to be, but give him a scowl.

“Well, I’m mad now.”

Not really a lie, not really the truth.

He’s unfazed as usual, and instead of the childish pout he would give if the situation were lower in stakes, his mouth remains a thin, neutral line, as he watches you carefully, as if the words to decipher your current mix of emotions will be printed on your skin if he looks hard enough.

“It’s been a few hours.”

“It’ll be more if you don’t get away from me, Luffy.”

The neutral smile curves downwards just slightly. The two of you lock into what’s almost a staredown if a staredown could be one-sided, then too quick for you to perceive, your book is out of his hands and dropped on the other side of the room, several feet away.

Your eyes widen.

“Hey!”

You rise, but his other hand stops you gently. 

“I’ll give it back to you, I promise.”

You tilt your head in defiance.

“If you don’t return my book right now, I’ll…” but you trail off, because Luffy is not going to budge at all - his face is unchanged from the slight concern he’s had since he’s come down to the library, and you feel a little silly pressing the issue. You deflate slightly, sitting back down, then pulling your knees to your chest.

He doesn’t say anything as you gather your thoughts, simply watching the way he usually does - people, insects, the clouds in the sky, the stretch of the sea, but you can see him lean just slightly inwards, as if he’s drawn to the settling storm in your head.

“Tell me,” he says, softly. 

“It’s stupid.”

Your lower lip pulls between your teeth.

“Good. I’ll understand it.”

You blink, then unfortunately, you can’t help but laugh. But he isn’t smiling immediately, gaze still focused on you, and you almost feel a bit guilty for laughing but also for pressing the issue. You shift a bit in your seat, running a hand idly through your hair for a moment, then press your chin onto your knees. Luffy does keep his hands to himself, but he also crosses his legs, now balanced atop the bench, facing you. 

“You’re…” you trail off, looking away at the ground, then back at him.

“I’m…?”

“Handsy.”

He blinks, then tilts his head slightly.

“Like touching you too much?”

He recognizes he’s trying very hard not to touch you right now, but it doesn’t seem to add up to him appropriately, and you shake your head.

“Not me.”

Luffy pauses for a moment. He knows he’s grabby, he knows he likes to hug, he knows he doesn’t always know where his hands are, but why would you care if he’s not touching you when you don’t want to be touched?

“I…” he scratches his chin, then chooses to listen instead. It seems to have the opposite effect, because your nostrils flare, annoyed.

“Are you really going to make me spell it out for you?” you ask, now with the sensation of your face hovering over a hot stove.

“I mean… maybe?” Luffy asks. He’s keeping an internal record of who he may have accidentally dragged, pushed, hugged too tightly, or intentionally fought - he knows sometimes you have an issue with fighting - or if he’s not listened when you told him to stop touching something you were working on in the lab or-

“Stop touching other people so much, it’s kind of…” your voice trails off again.

Luffy’s mouth twists to the side.

“Are you going to finish your sentences?”

Your hand balls into a fist but you don’t even have the energy to tap him on the shoulder. You deflate further then look towards your book across the room.

“It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing because you’re sad and won’t finish your sentences,” he insists, and there’s a bit of an edge to his voice, although it reins in when you look at him again. And then you’re embarrassed that you’re so pitiful.

Jealousy is such an embarrassing feeling. Feels too immature in a world like this that’s in need of love, unfiltered, and feels too selfish when you’re with a man that cares about you as much as he does, but it’s just hard to swallow at times.

But Luffy won’t leave unless you talk - you’ve given the cold shoulder long enough, and even if he won’t understand, if he doesn’t hear something, you’ll end up in this situation again.

You take a deep breath, then close your eyes before speaking.

“If you’re that handsy and affectionate with everyone, it just makes it feel less special, you know?”

It stays quiet long enough that your eyes do open to check his expression, and as usual it’s hard to read.

For someone so kind, he’s often so, so hard to read.

“It’s not less special,” he says first, as you expected.

“I know,” you rebut quickly.

But tears prick at your eyes anyway. He’s not going to understand this no matter how hard you try, and it’s not something you should repeat anyway.

“It’s fine, it’s just-”

Luffy moves suddenly, pulling you into his arms tightly.

“I’m not trying to make you sad,” he says into your ear. You can feel your pulse quicken for a moment. As your bodies stay pressed close, he adds, 

“It’s always different when it’s you, I promise.”

“... I know.”

“Every time, it’s special when it’s you.”

“...”

You don’t know what else to add. You don’t want to limit the love he gives to others, you don’t want to make his smile less wide, and you can’t help the love he gets from others.

“I understand.”

He laughs to himself for a moment, then adds.

“If you let me touch you ten times as much-”

You slap him on the shoulder gently.

“Don’t push it.”

He pulls apart from you, then kisses your forehead.

“Never.”

Another pause as you behold each other, and your unique affections.

“But if I start getting touchy, you have to promise to pull me away instead of getting mad.”

His hands close gently on your face, a small amount of pressure squishing your cheeks out.

“Promise.”

“You know I can’t do that,” you laugh.

“Or frown really big, okay?”

“Luffy, that’s even more unreasonable.”

“I don’t care what you do, as long as you’re not sad, okay?”

His forehead presses gently against yours as he insists.

“Promise. I want you to feel like you’re special to me, because it’s true.”

You pull back just a little bit, appreciating the smile returned back to his face, the same one that makes you feel tender and loved, and yes, unique to you and your shared love.

A crazy man with a fringe in a black jacket stands in front of your car just as the green light beckons. You step on the brakes centimeters from him.

"What the fuck, dude?!"

"Miss, I'm sorry, but I need your car."

"Excuse me?"

He grabs on your arm hard, hard enough that you wonder if it'll break as he pulls you out of your door. And in pure spite, you open the door behind the driver's seat before he can pull away, barely making it into the backseat as he drives away. Leon almost stops the car entirely, but he doesn't have time. "What the hell are you doing in the car?"

"This is my car!"

Leon schools himself with a few deep breaths. In, out. "Look, miss. This is a federal emergency. I just need to borrow your car, and I need you to get out of the car." Leon swerves around the next car, running a red light. Definitely not cop behavior.

"Give me one good reason to believe you."

Leon aggressively pulls his badge off his belt and shows it to you.

You could almost roll your eyes. "Yeah, like I'm gonna believe that. You can get those at the Dollar Tree." You click open your phone.

"What are you doing?" He tries to glance back despite the fact that he should be focused on the road.

"I'm calling the police!"

"I'm the police!"

! gn reader !

warnings: all that apply to aftg. ( trauma, s*xual a*sault, violence, alcohol, drugs, etc. )

a/n: sorry it's been so long! hope ya'll didn't miss me too much (please tell me i was missed my ego needs it). just as a heads up, it's been a while since I've read aftg and the most recent book I read from Nora was the Sunshine Court so keep that in mind lol. I'm mainly referencing the main trilogy when writing. Kind and constructive criticism is ALWAYS welcome!!

disclaimer: these prompts don't belong to me! i have long since lost the name of the person who made them, so if you know who did please let me know and i'll credit them!! a few letters/prompts are missing because i didn't feel like writing for them. :p

unedited and barely proof read

it’s so fucking annoying that your phone keeps buzzing though, vibration against the glass table that’s making him have a headache even worse than he already is from the crowd. he’s pretty gruff when he tells you to shut that off. you’re all apologetic when you tell him it’s your ex-boyfriend, who’s clearly being really adamant.

“Just block him.”

Sukuna remembers your fight, your disdain, your contempt upon being here. You look at him like that even when he fucks you, even when he sweeps an orgasm out from under you, wretches it from your body no matter how unwilling you claim to be. It's cute, really. You grit your teeth at him even as slick drips down your thighs, never make peace with who you are now compared to who you want to be. He might even be able to respect it, holding onto your desires so tightly, never adapting to what the world has made you.

You're asleep now, though. And your face is awfully peaceful.

Sukuna laughs when he sees your scornful look under his chin. "I have never seen a more unwilling offering."

He looks larger than life, two arms crossed in front of him, the other two resting easy on either side. But despite looks, he is still a man — this is what you tell yourself.

Your jaw clicks. "You razed my hometown."

“have you ever taken a man before?” he asks you, a gruff, low tone behind your ear. you don’t answer, can’t, with how his thick cock starts to slam into you a little harder.

He's amused enough to let you stay, or moreso that the estate he lives in is much too large for one person, even one as large as him. You could live in one of the outermost rooms for a century and never come across him again if you so wanted to. You think some of the other offerings he was given — girls, concubines, of varying degrees — must've done the same. That would explain how there's crops growing in the greenhouse furthest from his lodgings, or the garments in various sizes laid neatly in boxes.

"You're gonna stay here? How boring." A beautiful woman leans against the wooden doorframe, kimono almost entirely open, draped down over her shoulders to expose her cleavage. Smoke caresses her like a distant friend, a long-stemmed smoking pipe in her hand. "This is where girls go to die."

Your face pales. "He kills those who live here?"

The woman laughs. "No, silly girl. He barely notices those who live here. They just live out their days eating and staring at the walls and the sky until they die." She floats herself into the room, scans her eyes over the blank walls. "If you come live with us near the main house, there's books and ink. Sometimes he brings us out to the city. He'll buy you whatever you want, more if you're a little sweet about it."

"You let him fuck you, though."

The kitchen’s dark, same as the living room. The blinds are shut, like usual, the faint glow of the streetlights below creeping through and coloring the ceiling with thin yellow lines.

He sets his bags on the table - one overnight, one takeout - and goes looking for you when you don’t come greet him.

Your door swings open when he knocks on it, and he steps into your room. His eyes have adjusted well enough to the dark to notice the small things - your laundry basket in the corner, the stray clothes scattered in and around it. Your bed, half-made, your cute plushies with embroidered smiles left under crumpled pillows and partly-folded blankets. The bathroom is lit, dimly - the night light you bought because “you hated the horrible overhead light” is on, covering the bathroom in soft pink and white stars.

He finds you curled in the bathtub, tucked into the far wall of it. You don’t look at him when he opens the door to your bathroom, nor when he comes closer and crouches down next to you.

His hand hovers gently above your back, though he doesn’t let it rest until you give him a quiet “Mm,” of permission. He rubs between your shoulder blades for a bit, before asking, “Need help?”

He feels more than sees the way you shrug, can practically hear the unsaid “Do what you want.”

He runs a thumb against your skin before going to roll up his sleeves. “It’ll be cold for a second.”

You nod your head once, uncurling yourself a bit, and by the way you tremble at the cold air, you must’ve been curled up for a while.

He doesn’t mention it, though, only turns the water on, set to a nicer temperature. The water begins to pool at the bottom of the tub, and when you stiffen when the cold water reaches your legs, Oliver reaches down and mixes it with the warmer water that’s running so it’s not as jarring.

“Turning the showerhead on now,” Oliver warns, and you nod again. He’s glad you have one of the detachable ones, so he can turn it against the wall for those few seconds of cold water before it catches up.

He guides the showerhead over your body, letting the warm water run over your back and letting out a quiet sigh of relief as you untense under the steady stream.

“Hair?” he asks, and you nod again, so he guides the water over your head. He runs his fingers over the nape of your neck and you shiver - Oliver huffs out a laugh, and even though your head is still down, he knows the exact look you’re giving him, an endearingly exaggerated frown.

“Head back, sweetheart,” he instructs next, and even he can hear the affection the words hold. There’s a small huff of your own, but you still listen, uncurling yourself to tilt your head back so he can see your face.

You’re still frowning, but it’s softened into a gentle pout, one that makes Oliver want to drop the showerhead and pull you close to kiss you senseless. Instead, he cups the back of your head and lets the water soak through.

He asks you to reposition occasionally, and you acquiesce each time, doing your best to help him as he lathers your body and rinses it once more. He offers an arm when you’re done, helping you clamber ungracefully out of the tub before beginning to pat you dry with a towel. You stay quiet during this process, and Oliver does his best to make the silence comfortable for you, asking questions easy to answer with a nod or shaking of the head.

When he asks, “Do you have clean pajamas?” he sees a familiar shaky inhale, and finally gives into the urge to pull you close. You try to pull away, a silent protest of “I’m still wet,” but he holds you all the tighter for it.

Your body is lit by pale stars when you finally start shaking, your chest heaving against him as you start to cry, wordless. Oliver feels an unnamed knot in his chest start to unravel as you weep against him, a sense of relief-sympathy-heartache. He holds you and he holds you and he holds you, and when you look at him still teary-eyed, he kisses you, slow and sweet as your lips tremble.

“S’okay, sweetheart,” he mumbled against your lips. “I’ve got extra clothes, and food for when you want it. It’s okay.”