Give me Simon who, because of his family’s history of addiction, and his fear of losing control, he hardly ever drinks.
Give me a Ghost that, despite his size, is a bit of a lightweight.
Give me a Ghost who can't have a couple of "casual" beers cause he still gets slightly buzzed
Give me a Ghost that never went drinking with teammates (before 141) cause he was afraid of what they think. A big man like him getting drunk after only a few drinks.
Give me a Simon Riley who feels so safe with the 141, and with Johnny, that he agrees to go to the pub and have some drinks.
Give me a Ghost that's a goofy drunk. Doing little things to mess with the others. Snort laughing at his own dumb jokes, laughing so hard he nearly chokes.
Give me a clingy drunk Ghost. Absolutely demands to know where the other is going if someone gets up from the table. Is leaning onto Soap so much he's practically crushing him. Has to hold someone's hand when Soap goes to the bar to get more drinks. Complains the whole time Johnny is gone.
Give me a Ghost who is stumbling between Gaz and Soap, knocking into them and holding their hands as they walk. Give me Soap and Gaz laughing and Ghost laughing with them, not realizing they're laughing at him.
Give me Ghost who is finally healing his inner young adult, doing fun stuff while he can, drinking and being merry. We all know those years were stolen from him.
posting WIPs before vacation. got a whole load of nothing queued.
Weird how “masturbating and falling asleep in the late afternoon” isn’t regarded as a cherished summertime tradition
i hate how "being a girl's girl" has replaced feminism. I hate that enforced conformity has replaced genuine compassion for and solidarity with other women. I hate how women call each other "pick me's" for not conforming to femininity or for daring to critique something other women like. I hate how we just keep finding new socially acceptable ways to bully other women for being unattractive or outspoken or difficult or complicated or weird or ambitious or for not performing femininity. I hate those front facing camera "comedians" whose whole thing is making up a straw-woman to make fun of. I hate the obsession with "girlhood" and clinging to being a girl instead of a woman. i hate "the girl version of the roman empire" and "girlhood" and it's just consumerism and I hate the characterised of girlhood as passivity, niceness, sweetness, helplessness and frivolity and I hate the revival of gender essentialism even as a joke!!!
a/n: it's nice until the very end. it hints at baby trapping. one solid sentence that's kinda degrading (i couldn't help myself ok) this was in the works for so long, i did so much research just to use words. english is hard. and ignore the plot holes, for my sake. my sanity.
this is SMUT. 18+mdni please (if im missing anything else, lmk)
ty to my wonderful beta readers @waves-against-a-cliff & @xoxunhinged
wc: 3,1K
Simon 'Ghost' Riley x F!reader
You're awoken by a loud noise. At first, you think you dreamt it. Exploding head syndrome, maybe. You strain your hearing but it's quiet, save for the occasional creak of the house settling, its old bones creaking in the dead of night. Rain gently patters against the windows, blurring the world outside.
A flash of sudden light illuminates the bedroom, casting elongated shadows across the floor, followed by a loud crack that rattles the glass. Thunder. You should've guessed.
The frantic beating of your heart slows to a gentle roll, and your eyes leaden with sleep. The soft pillows beckon, the warm blankets cradle you as you sink back onto the mattress.
Only for you to be snapped back into reality, drowsiness dissipating like a morning mist.
Someone's knocking on your door.
Your heart is in your throat as you quickly peel off the blankets, the chill of the floorboards underneath your bare feet seeping into your bones.
In the bookshelf sits the gun Simon had given you before he had moved out, the rumble of his voice a ghost in your ear. "For protection," he'd murmured, placing the cold metal onto your open palms. "Jus' in case."
Your trembling fingers fumble as you search for it in the dark, flinching as a couple of books spill from the shelf onto the floor, pages rustling in your urgency.
The knocking persists.
The metal of the grip is unyielding in your clammy hands. You've never tested it before, never had the displeasure. As you hold it close to your chest with a quivering breath, you hope tonight won't change that.
Simon's instructions echo in your mind as you approach the front door. "Thumb the safety. Hold the grip with both hands. Do not, under any circumstance, put your finger on the trigger unless you're plannin' on sendin' hate. Clear?"
Your throat tightens, a phantom snake coiling around the narrow passage, and panic grips your heart as you reach for the blinds, slowly hooking two fingers and carefully pulling down to look at who is—
Simon.
Simon?
Sweat-slick fingers flip the light switch before quickly undoing the locks, the hinges groaning in protest as the door opens.
"What the hell?"
It's Simon, disheveled— maskless— swaying on his feet. His eyes are half-closed and unfocused. Johnny's holding him up by the arm, struggling to keep him upright.
"S'ry, bonnie. We wen' out fer a few 'nd clearly, he's out 'is face. Quite crabbit, too. He said ye'd let 'em sleep 'ere," he slurs.
Simon's not the only one who's pissed. With a resigned sigh, you gesture at the couch with your free hand. "There, I guess."
That he thought of you even in his drunken haze tugs at your fragile heartstrings.
Johnny guides him to the catch, a quiet C'mon LT to spur him forward. Heavy boots thud against the floor as they stumble toward the living room while you carefully place the gun on the kitchen countertop before reaching for a water bottle in the pantry. Johnny snickers under his breath as Simon collapses onto the sofa, the springs protesting his weight.
Two bottles, then.
You watch Simon's head loll as you hand Johnny the water. "Tell me you aren't the one driving, Johnny," you grumble.
He takes it with a quiet thanks. "Naw. Cap'n's stone cold sober."
Small mercies.
Johnny gives Simon a rough slap to the side of his leg as he bids him goodbye, pulling you in for an embrace tight enough that your spine pops before walking out the door.
You let out another sigh as the lock clicked back into place. The tangy, sour scent of stale alcohol mixed with stings at your nose, as does the invasive smell of smoke.
His boots are mud-caked, and you'll be damned if he stains your nice furniture with his mess. "Shoes off." He groans but complies. The laces come undone quickly, and you tug his shoes off with a grunt. "Simon."
His glassy eyes meet yours. "Drink your water." The burning need to chuck it at his head is one you have to vehemently smother into embers. Moron. Only Simon would have the gall to show up unannounced months after the separation. And drunk.
You push the bottle into his chest roughly and make to go back to bed when he encircles his hand around your wrist and the world spins on its axis, suddenly finding yourself beneath him with his face nestled in the crook of your neck.
Simon's breath is hot against your skin, the weight of his body pinning you down so achingly familiar. It stirs up past memories that would have you pressing your thighs together if he wasn't right there, using his broad waist to spread them apart.
"Missed ya, love." A confession. "S'much."
The breath you draw is jagged, his slow-spoken words hanging in the air. You want to push him away, scream at him for stumbling in and disrupting your night, your rest, your carefully crafted peace. But there's a part of you that can't help but soften at the tenderness in his tone.
"Simon," you whisper. "You're drunk. You don't know what you're saying—" his lips find your fluttering pulse. You find purchase in his shirt, shaky fingers grasping at the hem.
"'M drunk, no' no liar." Your resolve wavers. No, he never had been. Honesty hadn't been the reason for the split. It wasn't the truth he'd spoken but the truths he'd kept to himself. A fortress around his heart, the bridge to its gates raised. Unwilling to share a burden, share a life.
His warm tongue licks a hot stripe up your neck reaching the lobe of your ear where his blunt teeth sink into it. A choked gasp spills from your mouth, spine arching in reflex— your treacherous body remembering his touch, yearning for it.
"Simon—" your words get caught in your throat; snag like fishhooks when he undulates his hips, arousal creeping along your veins like ivy.
"Don't ya miss me, pet?" You've asked him to not call you that because it never fails to stoke the fire in your belly, to sodden your knickers. Before you can chide him on his choice of words, he shifts. One arm, an inked column under the soft light of the living room, holds him up just enough to bring his rugged face into focus. His eyes, like a stormy night's sky, swirl with untamed desire.
You know it's dangerous to play with fire. Touch it and burn, ache, blister. But the passion of this old flame beckons like a siren with sharp teeth. Each drag of his prominent erection against your core only succeeds in pulling you away from the shore of clarity. It's disorienting, insistent.
Relentless.
"My pretty little love," he mumbles. Simon's gaze drags from your glassy eyes to the delicate contours of your collarbone. His fingers trace lines of intimacy onto the swell of your breasts before using the pad of his thumb to swirl the stiffened peak of your nipple. "Say the word 'nd it all stops."
The scent of alcohol clings to him, a bitter reminder of the loss of inhibitions it brings as it warms one's chest. Blurred lines he might not mind, but you do. Lost boundaries. Rejection sits on the tip of your tongue, on the edge of your teeth when he says something that frays the last threads of your resolve.
It comes undone.
"Please. Jus' tonigh'. All I need." His words sound like footsteps in winter mire, slushed, syllables blending together.
You'll just have to kick him out on his arse in the morning.
"Okay," you breathe. Just one night, you tell yourself. He's always been good to you in the bedroom. One last hurrah wouldn't hurt. Maybe it'll allow you to finally close this painful chapter in your life and start anew, with pristine white pages and fresh ink.
Your hands, trembling with nerves and anticipation, cradle his face. The roughness of his stubble in contrast with the softness of your palms is grounding, keeping you from being pulled under your own swirling emotions.
" 'M righ' 'ere, love. You're safe with me, always." He whispers the last words reverently, a vow. Simon's breath mingles with yours as he leans in for a kiss.
The world around you fades, your senses tunneled on the feel of his lips, the taste of him— mildly sweet with a hint of peppermint. He slants his head to deepen the kiss, and the bruising ache in your heart is replaced by another, one that burns brightly and threatens to sweep you away.
The lulling sound of the pouring rain outside is drowned out by the beating of your racing heart.
The bed creaks when Simon perches you on the edge of it, quietly ordering you to take your top off.
"What about my bottoms?" You bite down on the gummy inside of your cheek when he pins you in place with a look— a predator eyeing its prey.
"Those are mine." Resounding. Final. A gavel in a courtroom.
You fling your shirt off, tossing it into some forgotten corner in the room, and cheekily watch Simon undress. It's not methodical like it used to be. No longer a means to an end. Experienced fingers undo the buckle of his belt before he takes it off, the leather material snapping in the air, slicing through the silence.
A quip tumbles out of your mouth faster than you can stop it. "Gonna spank me with that?"
The air around you thickens— or thins, you can't be sure— when his eyes flash to you. He kicks off his jeans, one foot after the other, wobbling as he does. "Tha' wha' you want?" The words he didn't say ring out loud and clear.
Don't rattle the cage, sweetheart. This dog isn't muzzled.
You sink your teeth into your bottom lip to keep from saying anything else, something that he might take you up on, instead focusing on the way his heavy cock hangs in between legs (dangling with each step forward—)
"M'eyes are up 'ere." Your nose scrunches at his joke. Cute.
He lowers himself onto his knees, your legs cradling his face as it hovers over your sex, close enough to feel the warmth of his breath on your heated skin.
The sleeping shorts you're wearing are ratty and worn. They're thin too, practically translucent from constant use. Which means that he can see that you're not wearing any undergarments underneath.
"Hope you know I can—" Heat licks up the sides of your jaw, pooling in your cheeks as you cut him off with a snappy remark.
"Yes. I know."
The tip of his pointed tongue drags along the seam of your shorts, right along your slit. Your breath hitches, and you clench your jaw to keep from making a sound. Your back bows involuntarily, the feeling startling, intense.
"Can see tha' clear as day, as if lookin' through a windowpane, pet," he taunts. The words that are forming, almost ready to spill out, freeze in place when his mouth comes in direct contact with your slippery cunt. He licks once, twice, through your folds, slightly dipping into your slick entrance, only pulling away to nuzzle your pearl with his misaligned nose.
"Sweet as a peach, jus' like I remember," he purrs, the timbre of his voice buzzing against your puffy lips. "Missed this." A mewl slithers past your grit teeth when he gently sinks one thick finger into you, curling and twisting. Arousal drips onto his knuckle, tracing a hot path down to his wrist. He coos at you when he adds another digit, hissing at the sharp but brief pinprick of the stretch.
"Bloody fuckin' tight." Simon rises off the floor, the quiet sound of his knees popping swallowed up by your harsh pants. "Gotta let me in, love. Relax."
He keeps the thrusts shallow, his fingers dragging deliciously along your nerve endings. The sting soon fades, giving way to a gentle warmth that unfurls inside of you, letting Simon reach deeper until—
Your muscles stiffen, tight like a spring when he brushes over the rough patch of skin that has bursts of light appearing across your eyelids.
"Look at ya. Droolin' like a mutt with my fingers stuffed up your pretty cunt."
There's a pressure in your lower belly that's steadily building with each sloppy thrust of his hand, pulling squelching noises from your sodden pussy. He finally, finally, latches onto your neglected clit, lightly sucking on it in tandem with his fingers.
Your chin drops to your chest as everything nears a breaking point. The pressure inside you has your body wound tight. The fibers of your muscles contract, almost painfully, preparing for the release of what's to come, what can't be ignored.
The swirling of his golden tongue pushes against the boundaries of your endurance, pushes you to the precipice, where you finally hit the point of no return. You can feel something about to give, ecstasy trickling through the cracks in your foundation, uncontrollable, raw. Your fingers thread through Simon's hair, curling tightly, pulling it taut when you feel something about to give—oh fuck—
Snap.
The structure that holds everything in place collapses.
A sudden release of pent-up energy and emotion erupts like a dam bursting, a cleansing flood that washes away the grime of old wounds, of bitterness, leaving the edges softened so they can heal; knit closed and scar over. Closure. It touches every part of you, filling you with a sense of liberation.
Your heart beats freely, it throbs with life as a wave of relief washes over you, soothing, a balm over scraped flesh, a rush of cool air into starved lungs.
A lightness that comes after being weighed down with burdens for so long.
Simon's hands encircle your arms firmly— fingers digging into the meat of your biceps— and effortlessly maneuvers you toward the center of the bed as if your lethargic form were a feather caught in a breeze; weightless, insignificant.
Gentle but unyielding.
There's a ringing in your ears that muffles his voice, blurring the edges of his words, an unintelligible hum, as if you were underwater. The sensation leaves you feeling adrift in a tranquil sea, cradled in its silken embrace. The only anchor you have to the muzzy reality is his warm touch.
"'M sorry, sweetheart. I can't," he apologizes, hooking your right leg over his shoulder. You let out a sibilant hiss as he leans forward, pushing your knee to your chest, the corded muscle of your hamstring pulling to its limit. "Can't wait anymore, 'm sorry."
Simon gives you a sloppy kiss as his heaving length prods at your swollen entrance, the tip breaching your pussy with a warm burn that starts from under your navel and only flares, radiating from your core outward. It's searing, the initial bite of the stretch disrupts the haze in your muddled mind, bringing the world around you into cutting clarity.
A guttural noise claws up his throat as Simon sheathes himself halfway, his growled words not the salve he was hoping for. It only grates at already raw nerves, abrasive.
"Jus' a little more, you can take it." He winds a hand downward to draw messy circles on your slippery clit, to stifle the roaring fire in your stomach, your chest. "You already have."
His jerky touch does its job, transforming the sharp burn of him wrenching your walls apart fiber by fiber into a quiet glow; smoldering heat now simmering. You soften, mellow and pliant, accept him into your body as he sinks to the hilt with a quiet groan.
"There's my girl. Takin' all of it like you were made f'me." Simon's words of praise tangle around your spine, electric, prickling. Your heart gallops like a herd of horses, wild and free. "Liked tha' did you? Jus' about strangled my cock with your tight cunt."
He rolls his hips once, twice, searching for signs of discomfort, but when only warm pleasure laps at your heels, when the barest of moans spill from your open lips, Simon begins to put his weight behind his thrusts.
Through half-lidded eyes, you see a raw, primal hunger reflected in his eyes— his soul, the one he'd claimed to have lost long ago, back with his reason, his sanity.
Yet he looks down at you as if you were his only salvation. A lifeline he grabs onto with an unyielding grip, his only tether to hope, purpose. A lighthouse shining in a raging storm, a beacon calling him home.
Simon presses a large hand onto your lower stomach, his work-worn palm pushing until you wince, brows furrowing at the fleeting whisper of pain.
"Can feel myself right here," he sluggishly mumbles, drunk of the feel of your cunt, the taste of your skin on his tongue— sweet like ripened figs. The sensory overload has him sinking his fingers into your flesh until it dimples.
He murmurs something under his taxed breath, something akin to mine, only mine as his lips leave a slick trail of saliva on the dip of your collarbone, the gentle curve of your shoulder, the thin, soft skin of your bicep up to your inner wrist, where he laps at your pulse.
As if savoring the present. The precious gift he's unwrapped, here and now. The last taste of you, which he hopes with a reverence that borders on prayer, lingers on his tongue long after the fruit— the sweet evidence of this one last intimacy— falls from the bough.
Simon comes with his teeth in the crook of your neck, biting down with a crushing pressure that has an acute pain digging its spurs into your consciousness, cutting the blazing euphoria of your own release short.
His cock is still twitching as he fills you with his spend when he takes his thumb and collects some of your slick to take you over the edge one last time.
"F'me. You can take it, yeah? I'll go slow, I promise."
Simon presses a kiss on your sweaty temple, his large hand cupping your jaw as he lazily watches you succumb to sleep, your breath evening out.
He reaches for your arm again, feeling for the birth control implant you'd had there when the both of you were still together.
Gone.
Sweet girl. You'd let him in without a fight. (He makes a mental note to wash the beer off of his clothes tomorrow.)
He knows your cycle better than the lines that are etched onto his palm. Better than the voice of the captain who rumbles in his earpiece, ordering him to go for the throat.
From the moment you'd stepped into his life with eternity in your eyes and the warmth of the sun on your lips, you were his. And he'll do anything to remain in your orbit.
(left unable to distinguish prison from paradise when each poison-coated kiss softens the world he'll build for you and what's to come.)
More Simon who doesn’t like being touched but he slowly becomes more affectionate, he seems more willing to bare himself to you, he has a hand on your shoulder blade, it’s very platonic touching, but considering it’s Simon, it’s the equivalent of a French kiss.
Simon rarely kisses you, but you’ve notice that whenever you’re sitting on a counter, he dips his head slightly, temple near your lips. “Where’s my kiss?” He’ll say gruffly.
You smile and press your lips against his hair. “Need ta wash your hair.”
“You do it.” He grumbles.
He loves it, being babied by his girlfriend in a platonic way, you’ve seen each other but never in a sexual way, which he appreciates but you’ve been very strict that nothing would happen until after marriage.
He learns to be vulnerable with you. It actually heals that part of him that he pushed aside thinking he was shameful and dirty for being sexually assaulted but he’s not.
And you handle him carefully. He’s like fractured glass that you’ve remelted and then slowly moulded into a man who is loved. And he is.
You don’t say it. Never wanting to saying first. You show it. Being together for almost two years throughout deployments and such and coming and goings you strive to be there for him. He does the same for you.
“Thanks lovie.” He says as you’re both in bed. You preen under the nickname, snuggling close to him, smiling to yourself. You think that’s the closest you’re going to get to an ‘I love you’. And that’s fine. Simon Riley shows love differently but he does it so there is no doubt in your mind.
Get in loser we’re going uhhh killing
✷ Your Last Embrace ✷
the ghosts of the past were the only thing that truly scared the ghost, the man who if someone'd seen him walking towards them from across the street at night, they would've started calling the first helpline number available and saying their prayers, even if they weren't believers .
in truth, ghost wasn't a troubled man, he barely was what was left of one, simon.
ghost wasn't a troubled man, but he was all that was left of one. every time the thick balaclava slipped on simons face, he'd turn off the few emotions that were still left in his body, mind running on autopilot as he coldly shut off his scarred heart. simon needed that, both a relief and a way to turn everything off, he needed to know it wasnt him killing people. it made his heart rest better to know it was ghost, not simon.
simon, who'd gone through hell and back, watching his friends, honourable soldiers, fall by the hand of a simple yet fatal mistake.
simon, whose family was slaughtered and he felt so helpless and unworthy, because why join the military and train to fight when he couldn't even protect his three years old nephew?
feeling so low he could barely keep his brown eyes open, he didn't think he was a man who deserved to live. why, when nobody was there to live with him? sure, johnny and kyle could try to cheer him up and distract him as much as they wanted, but they couldn't follow simon to his flat by the railways, in front of the man united stadium. price regularly called him: every other day to check up on him, ask him if he fancied a pint. simon rarely said yes, but he was grateful price didn't forget about him the moment they left base, it made him feel like he was, after all, someone. more than once even kyle booked a cheap hotel room near simon's place so he could spend time with him. forcing him to go outside and meet up with him and price. sometimes even johnny could make it, hopping on the first train from glasgow to see his lieutenant.
simon studied the pub. ironically, kyle always decided to drag him to the pub where simon spent his late teens with his mates from the time. that was, of course, before simon turned eighteen, and without speaking a word to anyone, left to join the military a week after his birthday. when he'd first come back, almost a year later, all his friends had either moved out of manchester or thought he'd moved out too, cutting off contacts. it was a shock for the few ones left to see his dog tags underneath his shirt when he first showed up again.
it was meaningless.
he was meaningless. flesh on bone, a heart pumping his veins full of life without him being able to stop it.
simons complete view of life was of suffocating suffering, a meaningless amount of time he had to spend on this earth for what he used to believe was for a greater good. there was not such a thing, simon was sure of it now, a bottle of beer in his left hand as his right one brought his cigarette to his chapped, pale lips. he looked down the river irwin, the city noise muffled out by the quiet and calm chatter of people walking past him. he felt almost envious. they had someone to talk to.
but he'd never been the loquacious type either, tommy always did the talking, simon usually dragging both of their arses out of the messes tommy brought them in. that's how it worked, their dynamic. his brother talked, too much sometimes, even for him, and he made sure nothing happened, as easy as that. simon was the one who stepped in when things got bad, in any situation: outside of the pub with a drunk man that tommy'd pissed off with his witty remarks, older boys at school when they were children, or at home, with their father. needless to say, simon got the most of the beatings, scars adorning the skin of his back even before stepping on the field. the cigarette burns on his arms and legs itched every time he'd think too much about it.
ever since finding his brothers corpse on the stairs of his own home, front door unlocked, his wife and son dead on the master bedroom's bed, he'd been craving what it felt like to love someone again. he craved loving someone, craved the feeling of something so strong it would change every fiber of his being, that would alter the chemistry of his brain. it was almost visceral, the need he had to satisfy. he despised everything good there was in life, anything that should bring happiness bothered him, but he was still a human being, and being human meant longing for someone else, another half.
throwing the cigarette butt in the river, he turned around, not ready to be home in less than fifteen minutes. the feeling of getting swallowed in the darkness and silence of his own home made him almost paranoid, he was driving himself crazy. simon would have chosen to throw himself in the river if given the choice to pick between that and going home, but the early rays of the dawn started blinding him, and the shadows under his eyes were becoming darker by the second. maybe he'd take a longer route.
simons restless nights became quickly part of his life, following him everywhere around the globe during the years. he found in the lack of sleep a way to control his life, he desperately needed control. when all was to shambles, control was all he needed. sleep, exercise, food, sex, attitude and performance were things he could control, and the less he let himself slip into, the more in control his tired body felt.
"five hours of bad sleep every two days won't keep you alive." price'd told him, and simon groaned.
"good then."
"we need you alive, simon."
"ya need a soldier, not me."
"we need you, simon." price insisted, shaking his head. "you're a good man, we need you."
"i'm not a good man."
until his seventh year of mourning, simon never thought he would find peace of mind, but he found it coming along with spring's sweet scented flowers and chilly breezes; you.
Y/N: I cant believe we're locked in this room together Ghost, throwing the key out of the window: Truly unfortunate