Sdv Sam - Blog Posts

FEBRUARY 2025 FIC RECOMMENDATIONS — STARDEW VALLEY

NOTES: I didn’t read a ton this month! so apologies for the short list. I’m really into Sambastian atm. Also, please feel free to recommend fics, as well as your own!

LIKE YOU DESERVE — megriddle333, @megwritesriddles

[Sebastian/Female Reader, Smut, Friends to Lovers, Filming, Shane Bashing, Dirty Talk]

Reader is left adrift after a disappointing relationship with Shane comes to an equally disappointing end, but Sebastian wants to show them how they deserved to be treated all this time.

STEAL ME AWAY — burekforsatoru, @whatdoidosatoru

[Sebastian/Female Reader, Fluff, Childhood Sweethearts, Mild Sexual Content, Pregnancy, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Childhood Memories]

from a young age, you had a distinct presence in sebastian's life. throughout your childhood, your awkward years, your adulthood... you were always there. always with him, only in different forms.

THERE WILL BE ANOTHER MOMENT WE’LL MEET AGAIN… — Anonymous

[Sam/Sebastian, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Angst, Hurt/No Comfort, Suicide Notes (Voicemail), Ambiguous/Open Ending]

A part of Sam knows it's unrealistic to hope. To think he's just overreacting, that when he gets to his house, Sebastian will be curled up in bed, that Sam will yell at him for making him worry, that at least he'd be okay. But he knows better. alt; Sam isn't too worried when Sebastian disappears in the middle of the Stardew Valley Fair, until he realizes he really, really should be.

PERFECTLY ANNOYING — Annetastic, @annetastic1981a

[Sam/Sebastian, Smut, Love Confessions, Blowjobs, Consensual Sex, Sebastian's Slutty Frog PJs]

Sebastian's best friend Sam has always been slightly annoying with his charisma, charm, and perfect good looks. But the most annoying thing is how Sebastian is in love with him.

WAIT YOUR TURN — hauntedhopefuls

[Sam/Sebastian/Female Reader, Smut, Cuckolding, Dom/Sub Dynamics, Consensual Sex, Degradation, Humiliation]

Sam’s got a kink, a wonderful girlfriend, and a best friend who are willing to help him realize his fantasy of being cucked.

GUYS BEING DUDES — ketchhup

[Sam/Sebastian, Smut, Porn Without Plot, Pining, Mutual Masturbation, Friends to Lovers]

It's not technically sex, and it's definitely not romantic.

LIGHT, CAMERA, ACTION — A_little_snail, @glazedsnail

[Sam/Sebastian/Shane, Smut, Camera, Established Relationship, Blowjob]

Shane has been hired by Sam and Seb for a little project involving his camera.

— PLEASE GO SUPPORT THESE AUTHORS!

THE BACHELORS’ VOICES — STARDEW VALLEY

SUMMARY: What I think the bachelors’ voices sound like (w/ attached video)!

CONTAINS: sfw, nothing worth mentioning

NOTES: This took a lot of work to find voices that I think suits them best but it's something I've been wanting to do for a while now. Let me know if you agree, or if you don’t, who else you think they’d sound like!

— ELLIOTT

Alucard Tepes - Castlevania (Netflix)

— HARVEY

Soichrio Yagami - Death Note

— SAM

Denji - Chainsaw Man / Singing Voice: Josh Katz - Badflower

— SEBASTIAN

Aki Hayakawa - Chainsaw Man

— ALEX

Shining Armor - My Little Pony

— SHANE

Johnny Silverhand - Cyberpunk 2077

— HAVE A REQUEST? SUBMIT IT HERE!

FLUFF ALPHABET W/ SAM — STARDEW VALLEY

SUMMARY: The Fluff Alphabet by @snk-warriors featuring Sam!

CONTAINS: sfw, gn! reader, fluff, established relationship

NOTES: My second favorite bachelor, I love this fcking guy <3

A = Activities - What do they like to do with their s/o? How do they spend their free time with them?

Sam really enjoys playing the guitar for you! And if you play too, even better! He loves having jam sessions together.

B = Beauty - What do they admire about their s/o? What do they think is beautiful about them?

Sam loves your lips and eyes. He loves that your eyes can be so cute or so seductive, and that your lips always look so kissable.

C = Comfort - How would they help their s/o when they feel down/have a panic attack etc.?

Hugging is Sam’s go-to for comforting someone. He’s a very good hugger. He’ll hold you close and let you hide in his chest. He’s not always good with words so he’ll take to petting your head while reminding you that you’re okay and safe.

D = Dreams - How do they picture their future with their s/o?

He likes the idea of being your rocker boyfriend/husband; having you along for the ride as he tours or in the studio when recording a new song. After that, he’s sure he wants to be a dad and raise a family with you!

E = Equal - Are they the dominant one in the relationship, or rather passive?

He’s neither dominant nor passive. He respects you and your work and hopes you do as well! He never wants to intrude on your work and he’ll only help if you ask him to.

F = Fight - Would they be easy to forgive their s/o? How are they fighting?

He hates arguing. He avoids it at all costs. If you start arguing, he’ll roll over like a dog and apologize, saying he was wrong (even if he wasn’t—something he’s working on). After you’ve had some space from each other, he’s the first to apologize, coming up behind you with a hug and kissing your neck and shoulders. Try as you might, it’s so hard to stay mad at him!

G = Gratitude - How grateful are they in general? Are they aware of what their s/o is doing for them?

It’s not something he dwells on too often. Not that he isn’t grateful—he is!—but the thought doesn’t really cross his mind. When he does, he gets a big, goofy grin on his face when he thinks about all the ways he’s grateful for you and your life together. He feels like the people in his life don’t take him seriously, except you and he’s grateful for that.

H = Honesty - Do they have secrets they hide from their s/o? Or do they share everything?

Sam is a very honest person! He’s always had trouble lying to his mother. He doesn’t really do anything worth lying about either and he’s very open. He’s likely to forget to tell you about something but he’d never keep anything from you intentionally, unless he thought it was in your best interest that he did.

I = Inspiration - Did their s/o change them somehow, or the other way around? Like trying out new things or helped them overcome personal problems?

You’ve both changed each other in different ways! Sam has taught you to have more patience and you’ve helped Sam to be more organized. You’ve helped people to see that he’s not an immature kid anymore but a responsible young man with a sense of humor.

J = Jealousy - Do they get jealous easily? How do they deal with it?

He rarely ever gets jealous—he trusts you with his whole being! But if he does, he doesn’t get mad or anything but he starts getting really clingy and physically affectionate. More than usual.

K = Kiss - Are they a good kisser? What was the first kiss like?

He was ready to kiss you the minute you entered your relationship. While he is a good kisser, he is also sloppy. Your first kiss together was a little intense because he kissed you like a man starved. It wasn’t planned either so he definitely tasted like pizza or cola.

L = Love Confession - How would they confess to their s/o?

Like any desirable man, he sneaks you through his bedroom window and hides you from the prying eyes of his mother.

M = Marriage - Do they want to get married? How do they propose? What would the marriage be like?

Sam doesn’t feel one way about marriage. He’d be happy as your boyfriend or as your husband! But if he were to… he’ll initially want to propose to you on stage at one of his concerts. Luckily, his friends talk him out of that, saying that could put pressure on you to say ‘yes’, or you saying ‘no’ could be humiliating for you both. He asks his parents for advice; Kent suggesting somewhere sentimental and Jodi suggesting somewhere romantic. He ends up not being able to contain his excitement long enough to go through with any plan. He proposes to you as you’re walking back to the farm one night. It actually proves to be perfect; the two of you alone, under the stars.

N = Nicknames - What do they call their s/o?

Babe, baby, cutie, girly/pretty girl (if you’re a woman), mama/daddy (if you have children or are expecting). They’re basic and a little juvenile but you love them! He gets nervous when you don’t call him a nickname, assuming the worst lol.

O = On Cloud Nine - What are they like when they are in love? Is it obvious for others? How do they express their feelings?

Sam is already a bubbly and optimistic person. But when he starts dating you, he can’t wipe the dopey smile off his face! He no longer dreads going into work (which Shane quickly picks up on), he practically slips through town, and he can’t keep his hands off of you. It’s obvious, to say the least.

P = PDA - Are they upfront about their relationship? Do they brag with their s/o in front of others? Or are they rather shy to kiss etc. when others are watching?

He’s so excited to announce that you’re dating when you start! Definitely not shy to kiss or hug you in public. He’s physically affectionate with all of his friends though so unless he kisses you, an onlooker might assume you’re just friends.

Q = Quirk - Some random ability they have that’s beneficial in a relationship.

Sam is a very good listener! He’ll listen intently as you boast, complain, cry, or talk about nothing. He’s also very agreeable. Did someone piss you off? Yeah, they suck! Got cash-back and want to use for a getaway together? Sure, he’d love to spend some quality time with you!

R = Romance - How romantic are they? What would they do to make their s/o happy? Cliché or rather creative?

He tries to be romantic but he’s a bit clumsy. He tries to make you your favorite food but messes up the recipe. Or he runs a bath for you with rose petals and scented oil but when you enter the bathroom, the tub has overflowed. It’s the thought that counts!

S = Support - Are they helping their s/o achieve their goals? Do they believe in them?

Absolutely! He’ll assist you in anyway you ask him to. He feels it’s only fair since you’ve helped him so much before with his band and defending him from his mother and Mayor Lewis.

T = Thrill - Do they need to try out new things to spice out your relationship? Or do they prefer a certain routine?

Sam loves some thrill and adventure! He’s so happy being with you but he gets a bit antsy so every week, you two go out and do something new. Attend a local concert, eat at a different restaurant, go dancing—whatever strikes you interest!

U = Understanding - How good do they know their partner? Are they empathetic?

He is very empathetic. He’s not very confrontational so while he will get mad on your behalf, he’s more inclined to feel sad when you are. He absolutely hates seeing you cry and might shed a few tears when you do (but he’ll never let you see).

V = Value - How important is the relationship to them? What is it’s worth in comparison to other things in their life?

All of Sam’s relationships are very important to him! He wouldn’t think twice before sacrificing his stuff, or Yoba forbid, himself if it ever came down to it. He’s quite impulsive already so he definitely has before when it really wasn’t necessary. But it goes to show just how far he’s willing to go for you.

W = Wild Card - A random Fluff Headcanon.

Sam teaches you how to skateboard, if you don’t know how to already! He makes you wear knee and elbow pads (partly for his own amusement). He’s so proud of you once you start to learn! He also offers to teach you how to play the guitar. You have little jam sessions together where he leads, while you’re still learning.

X = XOXO - Are they very affectionate? Do they love to kiss and cuddle?

If you didn’t already know how, Sam has taught you how to skateboard! He insists you wear knee and elbow pads (even though you hate how dorky they make you look, that’s part of the fun for him). He’ll also teach you how to play guitar if you don’t know how to either! He loves bonding with you this way and he’s always so excited when you get something right!

Y = Yearning - How will they cope when they’re missing their partner?

He’s kinda very clingy and hates to see you go! He texts you every so often to check in and remind you not to overwork yourself. Huge golden retriever vibes in the sense that he’ll greet you at the door, kissing your face and hugging you tight. Expect him to be all over you for a while after you come back.

Z = Zeal - Are they willing to go to great lenghts for the relationship? If so, what kind of?

He’d do just about anything to prove himself to you. One way he does this is by learning your favorite songs and playing them on the guitar for you! He makes sure he gets them just right before he preforms. Sometimes, he offers to sing and play them softly to you as you fall asleep.

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BACHELORS’ MUSIC PREFERENCES —STARDEW VALLEY HEADCANONS

SUMMARY: The bachelors’ favorite songs, artists, and genres!

CONTAINS: sfw, nothing worth noting

NOTES: Wrote this instead of an essay for college :) Spotify playlist links included! (tap the music notes beside each bachelor’s name)

— ELLIOTT ♪

• Genres: Classical, Britpop

• Artists: Pulp, Hozier, Pearl Jam

• Songs: This Is Hardcore, She’s Got a Way, Work Song

Elliott might as well have walked straight out of a sappy romance novel. He romanticizes life and that’s partly shown through the music he listens to. He loves poetic, slow songs about passionate love, or one that’s been lost. He likes to have classical music on while he writes/works. Classical piano music is what inspired him to play when he was younger. He loves the sound, the aesthetics, and the movement (plus, it was the easiest instrument for him to learn). He immerses himself in music, imagining himself twirling around his lover as he listens to Hozier, or loving his partner passionately while This Is Hardcore plays. Elliott himself is a passionate man in all regards and the music he listens to only encourages him further.

— HARVEY ♪

• Genres: Oldies, Lofi

• Artists: Pink Floyd, Queen, New Order

• Songs: Can’t Take My Eyes off You, As the World Caves In, Baby I’m Yours

Harvey enjoys calming, upbeat music. Preferably something he can turn on in the background as he works. Maru introduced him to Lofi. Since then, he keeps it playing in the clinic during work hours. He likes the calming mood it sets, as for some of his patients, going to the doctor can be anxiety-inducing. When he’s in a relationship, he loves to turn on the radio and dance with his partner to Frankie Valli or Queen. But if he’s not, he’ll day dream about doing just that, imagining himself deeply in love. Nothing warms his heart more than upbeat love songs!

— SAM ♪

• Genres: (80’s/90’s) Punk, Alternative Rock

• Artists: Misfits, Nirvana, The Cure

• Songs: Rebel Yell, Mrs. Robinson (The Lemonheads version), Astro Zombies

Sam loves everything about punk: the chaos, the rebellion, the energy, and volume. From an early age, he pictured himself on stage above a sea of people that enthusiastically sang along with him. Bands like Nirvana and the Misfits inspired him to pick up the guitar and rock out until his fingers became numb (or his mom complained about the noise). His and Sebastian’s favorite music influence how their band sounds. Therapy to Sam is jamming out to his favorite songs, getting completely lost in the music. When his dad was deployed and his mom became overwhelmed with his little brother, blaring his music was the only thing that could center and energize him enough for the day.

— SEBASTIAN ♪

• Genres: Emo, Post-hardcore

• Artists: Deftones, The Used, My Chemical Romance

• Songs: Dragula, Angelfuck, A Box Full of Sharp Objects

It was a phase until it wasn’t. After Sam introduced him to punk in their early teens, Sebastian found early 2000’s emo music through bands like Thursday, My Chemical Romance, Deftones, Taking Back Sunday, ect. They give him a safe space to feel and sit with his emotions without question or concern. He feels that these bands understand him when no one else does, bringing him rare moments of genuine peace through the constant cloud of angst that surrounds him. He likes to have it on whenever he’s in his room or working on his motorcycle. He could easily listen to the main emo classics hundreds of times over again without it becoming repetitive—which he has. Nothing feels better than drowning out the world (and his family) with blaring, emo music.

— SHANE ♪

• Genres: Metal, Hard Rock

• Artists: Alice In Chains, Korn, Soundgarden

• Songs: A.D.I.D.A.S, Bed of Roses, Closer

Shane has a lot of angsty feelings that are undealt with. Loud, aggressive, and angry music is usually his go-to, as well as some slower songs about heartbreak. He grew up listening to bands like Korn, Metallica, and Black Sabbath. After the deaths of his best friends (Jas’ parents) is when he really started to depend on metal to drown out his sorrows. He felt so angry and mournful but had no way of expressing that. He leaned into the hostile, melancholic sounds Alice In Chains and Soundgarden provided, along with other bands that produced the same. He’s also incredibly horny but you didn’t hear that from me.

— ALEX ♪

• Genres: Hip Hop, Lofi

• Artists: 1nonly, Tyler The Creator, The Neighbourhood

• Songs: The Beach, Darling I, Boys Don’t Cry

Alex likes to drown out to music, mainly while he works out (and recently, while he reads). He prefers music he can tune out so he can focus all his energy into his hobbies, and not have to worry about being distracted. He’s constantly listening to music—on runs, in the shower, in his room. He keeps a small speaker turned on in his room almost all day that plays a Lofi station. He found that he can spiral very easily into his worst thoughts if his mind isn’t occupied with external noise.

— HAVE A REQUEST? SUMBIT IT HERE! • READ MORE

BACHELORS & THEIR SWEARING HABITS — STARDEW VALLEY HEADCANONS

SUMMARY: The bachelors and if they swear, what swears they use, and their opinions on it!

CONTAINS: sfw (?), coarse language, a little sexually suggestive in some parts

NOTES: This is a remake of an old post from my old dead account. I think I have a better understanding of the bachelors than I did when I made that post (because I was still new to SDV). I’m sorry if this isn’t great, I haven’t done this in a while :’) Enjoy!!

— ELLIOTT

• He’s the least likely to swear and you’ll almost never hear him do it

• Unless he’s very passionate about something or feeling very intensely, like if he’s very angry or sad

• I think he was more likely to swear when he was younger but the older he gets, the less he‘s prone to

• When he does swear, it holds that much more weight and meaning compared to someone who swears frequently

• It’s kinda sexy when he does too 👀🤭

• Also funny, depending on the context and situation

• Like I’ve said before, I believe that when he’s drunk, he has a lot less of a filter, making those the most likely times you’ll hear him swear

• “Oh, fuck me—so sorry, darling!” “I’m quite ‘shit-faced’, if you will.”

• He just has a way of always sound polite, despite what he’s saying

• He’s overall not opposed to swearing and he doesn’t mind or care if other people do

• Elliott has a wide vocabulary and therefore, more supplements for swears

• But he also understands that some situations call for swearing and that certain words can’t be replaced

• But that doesn’t mean he believes he’s better than anyone because he doesn’t! Swearing just doesn’t work for him

— HARVEY

• He’s absolutely dropped a few swears while working

• Harvey is a doctor and he understands better than anyone that swearing can be healthy

• Swearing can help cope with pain or deal with situations that someone might otherwise feel they have no control over

• He’s definitely been in stressful situations where mumbling a ‘fuck’ under his breath helps to center him enough to stay focused

• He understands there’s a time and a place, of course, he wouldn’t just drop an f-bomb in middle of your annual check-up lmao

• You’ll likely only hear him swear when he’s angry or stressed, but he will apologize soon after, even if it’s unnecessary

• Or during sexy times 😎 to which he doesn’t apologize

• Other than that, those type of words just don’t seem to frequent his everyday vocabulary

• He also kind of prides himself on being professional and swearing just isn’t

• Like Elliott, Harvey swears so little that when he does, it’s kind of off-putting and holds more significance

• Like if he swears while reprimanding you for passing out in the mines, you’ll be more likely to listen because it’s just that jarring

• It’s not that he feels one way about swearing, he doesn’t even think about it

— SAM

• You might disagree with me but he rarely ever swears

• In a lot of the fics I read, he does and it makes sense to me, him being a 20-something year old guy and all

• But I also think his parents have it so ingrained in his mind that swearing is bad and impolite, like it’s a cardinal sin or something

• They also want him to set a good example for Vincent, which Sam does

• But when he was younger, he’d get Vincent to say swear words and then crack up, only encouraging Vincent more

• Yeah, his parents were not happy lmfao

• Nowadays, he only justifies swearing to himself when he’s singing a song with swears in it

• He feels a little alarmed at how freeing it feels to swear when he sings at first, and he kicks himself for enjoying it

• He’s likely to swear the most when he’s with his friends (Sebastian is not a good influence on him in this regard lmao)

• Sam says the family-friendly versions of swears unironically, like ‘freak’, or ‘shoot’

• He was probably also the type to flip people off in school with his ring finger so that he technically couldn’t get in trouble (I literally did the same)

• He’d probably benefit mentally and emotionally by swearing more often if he didn’t take so much pride in trying to be perfect :(

— SEBASTIAN

• I mean. Let’s be real.

— He’s a moody teenager who hates his family and everything around him (not literally), of course he swears, and frequently too

— Playing a lot of online games with voice chat while he was growing up, he started picking up swear words pretty quickly

— Demetrius corrects him whenever he does, and because I believe Seb likes to piss him off, he intentionally swears in front of him lol

— Robin doesn’t care so much, unless it’s in front of Demetrius then she’s like, “Seb, c’mon.”

— And he just looks at her like “😏”

— Now that I’m thinking of it, he probably learned some swears from her as well

— Like if she was arguing with his dad on the phone or accidentally hurt herself while wood-working

— Despite Robin’s warnings that those are bad words, she couldn’t keep him from repeating her, so she instead told him the ‘time and a place’ rule

— They’re similar in the way that they probably don’t have much of a filter and Sebastian probably influences her more than she realizes lol

— He doesn’t really have a set way of swearing, he just does at any given time

— As a kid, he’d influence Maru to swear and then act all shocked when she did and his parents blamed him lmao

— Sam too, which Jodi was very upset by, considering Seb to be a genuinely bad influence on Sam

— As an adult, he no longer does that anymore and has developed a major soft spot for the way that Sam “swears”

— I think Sam unconsciously influences Seb to be less vulgar with his language

[ ALEX ]

— He actually canonically swears the most of all the bachelors! If you consider ‘damn’ to be one

— Like Jodi, the Mullner’s have taught Alex that swearing is impolite, but not necessarily bad

— I can imagine Evelyn covering her ears when he does and saying something like, “oh, my poor old ears cannot handle such harsh language!”

— He doesn’t have much of a reason to anyway

— He remembers his dad swearing a lot at him as a kid, or when he would yell at his mother so I think those kind of words can trigger bad memories

— He’s very aware of trying to be better than his father and if swearing is something his father did, he doesn’t (at least, not nearly as often)

— He’s careful not to swear in front of his grandparents, which I think is all their really concerned about anyway

— To them, it shows respect, and he respects his grandparents very much!

— I think they let it slide if he’s cheering for a game on the television or if he’s complimenting his granny’s cooking

— “Damn, granny! That’s incredible!” And she just smiles and scolds him half-heartedly

— You’ll probably hear him swear the most in the bedroom 🤭

— Or if he stubs his toe

— Equally arousing, if you ask me

— He sticks to the less harsh swear words like ‘hell’, ‘ass’, ‘damn’, and occasionally ‘shit’

[ SHANE ]

— You know CA wanted to make this man say ‘fuck’

— Swears the most out of the bachelors, regardless of… well, anything

— There’s ZERO filter on this guy

— Unless Jas is around, then he’s mindful of what he says

— Not that he or Marnie are worried about her picking anything up, she’s a good kid and very well-mannered

— If Shane does slip up, she’s the first one to scold him lmao

— He’s glad though, he feels like this means he’s doing well raising her

— He swears when he’s happy, sad, excited, angry…

— Seriously. No filter.

— He probably doesn’t even realize it much either

• I feel like when he and Jas first moved in with Marnie, she was quite strict about him swearing, especially since he’s raising a child

• But overtime, she’s grown accustomed to it, she probably even swears slightly more now because of him

• Jas has helped him to be less crude and he can now catch himself much better before he slips

• “Are you fu-” *Jas stares daggers into him* “freaking kidding me?”

• It is Shane after all, and people have learned to expect it

• When he was new to town, it definitely surprised people

• Pelican Town is small, no one really ever swears and swearing isn’t taken very lightly

• And then this guy just walks in and swears so casually

• It shocked people at first, to say the least

• Overtime, the townsfolk have come to learn that’s just how Shane is and that he’s a good guy once you get to know him!

• All that’s not to say that Shane just throws out swears all day, everyday though

• He is respectful and polite and only swears when it’s mostly appropriate, like around friends or in the comfort of his own home

• He’s just not shy about it :)

— HAVE A REQUEST? SUMBIT IT HERE! • READ MORE

For the new Stardew Update I decided to redraw Sam from 2021 and dang, I kinda slayed.

Jojamart, before Sam got himself headphones for his shift with Shane

ERE DAY MY BESTIE POSTS IS A GOOD DAY!!!!

Nobody's Son, Nobody's Daughter

TW: consumption of drxgs, smoking, talk of sex

Read it on ao3

Thirteen.

I hadn’t been off my farm for a couple days. The only reason I would leave would be to buy seeds or go forage in the forest. I couldn’t get my mind off of my sister but we called everyday when she got out of school but the phone call would only last during her walk home, she’s afraid of what Dad might say if he knew she was talking to me. I’m collecting eggs from my chickens and ducks in my coop when the door swings open and startles me, making me drop one of the eggs.

“Shit!” I hissed and looked down at the broken and runny egg.

“Where the fuck have you been?” I hear Sam’s voice echo throughout the coop.

“Fucker, you made me drop an egg,” I say while picking up the shell. 

“Are you good, dude? You and Seb disappeared from the venue that night and I haven’t heard from you since!” Sam exclaimed while taking a rag off the wall of the coop and helping me clean up the broken egg. I guess I did owe him an explanation since he is my closest friend in the valley. I told him what happened as we made our way to the farm house. He didn’t say much, only listened. I told him how the last song on his set really hit home and it felt surreal when my sister showed up.

“I didn’t mean to make you cry,” Sam says as we enter the farm house. I set the basket of eggs on the counter and shush him.

“I love the song, Sam,” I say, “and it’s comforting to know that there are other people in the valley that have felt what I feel… It just broke my heart to see that my sister is seeing our Dad for who he is. I hoped that he would be better for her.” I flop down on my couch in distraught and run my hands down my face. Sam, who’s still in my kitchen, stares at me for a while before turning quickly on his heel to my bedroom. I’m shocked by his sudden movements but am too exhausted and overwrought to get up. I hear him rifle through something in my bedroom and a couple minutes later he comes out with my backpack slung over one shoulder.

“Jesus christ this thing is heavy,” he says and sets it down on the kitchen table.

“What are you doing?” I ask while sitting up a little. 

“You’re coming to the sleepover,” he says, “you don’t have a choice. I’ve packed everything for you, except for your undies ‘cause I don’t wanna rifle through that drawer.” I laugh as he rambles and I get up from the couch. I take my backpack from him and empty some of the things in there like my coal, ore, and fiber. I grab a quick pair of panties from my dresser and stuff it into my backpack. 

“You better have not picked a whack ass outfit for tomorrow,” I say to Sam as I pet Miso goodbye and we walk out the door. We took the shortcut up the mountain to Sebastian’s house. “You do sleepovers at Seb’s pretty often?” I ask. 

“Yea since we were kids. Seb has the most privacy and space and Robin isn’t like mine or Abby’s moms, always checking in on us,” Sam says as we pass by the bus stop. 

“What do you do at the sleepovers?” I ask, looking down at my boots as we walk.

“Oh, Farmer, don’t tell me you’ve never had a sleepover before?” Sam asks and I look up at him and on his face is a shit-eating grin. Yoba, he sees right through me. I blush.

“Hey man, with a dead mom and a dad who hates you, you end up being the weird kid,” I say, “besides from my roommates in college, I’ve never had a sleepover.” Sam shakes his head from side to side. “My sister would get invited to a ton.”

“Well, we will sometimes play Solarian chronicles, watch movies, play video games, listen to music, we talk… As soon we all became adults we added weed and alcohol into the mix,” Sam says. 

“It sounds like fun,” I say, “do you all sleep in the same bed?” I ask. Sam shakes his head.

“Abby takes Seb’s bed and Seb and I sleep on his pull-out couch. But now you’re here, so you can take the bed with Abby.” The only other person, besides a one night stand, that I’ve ever shared a bed with was my sister and that was when we were little. I hoped and prayed that my nightmares wouldn’t be bad tonight. After the gig in the city, my nightmares became frequent again and I’ve started remembering bits and pieces. They’re not as clear as the one about the car accident but I know they’re about Brynne. I’ve been thinking about telehealthing my therapist but the more I think about it, I highly doubt Dad has kept me on his insurance and getting insurance as a self-employed person has been hard. I’ve been trying to have better coping mechanisms but in doing so I’ve relapsed on cigarettes. Alex and I chat once a week and my fill-the-void lust feelings have been low but my lungs were not happy with me. I would be embarrassed if I woke up the three of them at the sleepover because I couldn’t get my childish nightmares under control. 

We show up at the house in the woods and walk through the front door. We say hi to Robin as she finishes up some paperwork at her desk and tread downstairs to where Sebastian’s room is. Abby’s already down there, laying upside down on the couch while Sebastian works on his computer.

“Seb keeps saying one more line but then does like twenty more! Sam, pull him out of it!” Abby whines when she sees us. I look over at Sebastian and his eyes run across his computer screen over and over again. I sit down next to Abby and she moves her body to the side so that her legs rested on my lap and her head near the arm of the couch. “Hey girl, I haven’t seen you in forever! I need my fill of farmer gossip. Are you still hooking up with Alex?” she asks. Sebastian’s head snaps up and his candy colored eyes look into mine.

“What?”

“So that’s what gets you to look up from your computer?” Sam sighs and throws his backpack down.

“It’s been a couple months,” I say, “we decided we’re better as friends.” Sebastian exhales then goes back to his work.

“What the fuck!” Sam yells at him.

“You told me you used to fuck around in college?” Abby asks. I nod. Her questions are genuine and strictly girl talk and it’s what I love about Abby. There’s no ulterior motive, she just genuinely wants to have more girl friends and they’re hard to come around in the valley. “You know who else used to fuck around?” She holds her hand up near her face and points in Sebastian’s direction.

“I can hear you, you know,” Sebastian says and then gets up from his computer.

“Finally!” Sam exclaimed while digging in his backpack. “I brought an indica, sativa, and a hybrid. I also brought my extended pack for solarian and Mario Kart, and a couple frozen pizzas,” he says while taking each thing out of his bag. Sebastian gets off his computer and pulls down a sheet and sets it up on the wall opposite of his bed and sets up a projector.

We watched movies, played Solarian, talked, and smoked weed. The only time I stepped out was to accept a phone call from my sister. It was short and quick and I mentioned I was hanging out with friends. Her praise for me making new friends warmed my heart. As I was walking inside, Robin came pounding down the stairs from her room. She’s holding an old photo album.

“There you are!” she says, “I have to show you these photos of Sebby when he was a kid.” She shows me a photo of him with spaghetti on his head, him with a stuffed Jumino, him holding baby Maru, all the classic baby photos. My heart swells when I look at his chubby cheeks. I’ve never been one for kids but I always loved baby pictures of my friends. 

“He’s so adorable,” I say while pointing to a picture of him, Sam, and Abby when they were kids. The basement door opens and Sebastian comes upstairs.

“Absolutely not,” he says while grabbing my wrist. His movements are aggressive but his grip on me is surprisingly gentle. 

“Aw c’mon,” I say as he drags me down the stairs, “you were so cute.” He shakes his head back and forth. 

“What are you saying I’m not cute now?” he quips as he opens the door. Abby with her second-hand high is curled up on Sebastian’s bed watching the projector and Sam’s in the bathroom. I laugh to try and calm down my pounding heart and hide the blush from my face

“Hmm… You’re pretty cute,” I say, “but your chubby cheeks and ginger hair take the cake.” He nudges me in the shoulder and we sit back down with Abby who’s watching Three From Hell. Sam comes out of the bathroom and sits on the bed with us, Smushing me between Sebastian and Abby. Sebastian drapes his arm over my shoulder to get more comfortable and I hook one of my legs over Abby’s as Sam lights up another joint. 

###

I’m jolted awake by whatever dream I was having. My breathing is heavy and small beads of sweat coat my hairline on my forehead. Abby’s still crashed out next to me and I think I see Sam on the pullout bed still asleep. My hands shake as I rip the covers off of me and get up. I dug in my backpack for the pack of cigarettes I had bought at Joja. They were the most disgusting cigarettes I’v ever smoked but they’re the only thing around. Once I secure my pack and lighter and make my way towards the lake. The cold fall air sent a chill down my spine and I wrapped my hoodie around my body tighter. A tall silhouette stands near the lake as well and I can only assume it’s my formerly ginger friend. I stand next to him and light my cigarette. He jumps a bit but realizes it’s just me.

“Can’t sleep?” he asks. I take a long inhale and sigh out the smoke. 

“I assume you can’t either,” I say and take a seat at the edge of the water.

“Never can,” he says and follows my lead by sitting down next to me. We sit in silence for a moment and chain smoke before I break the silence.

“So… you used to sleep around?” He laughs and shakes his head.

“I was wondering the same thing about you,” he says, “Yea, I did. There were a couple of forums online I used to frequent when I was eighteen. Mainly married couples looking for someone to cuck the husbands. Some turned into affairs, others were strictly for fun… I stopped when I was twenty-three after having a really weird situationship with a married woman,” he takes a long drag of his cigarette, “Sam and Abby only know about the cucking. Not the affairs.”

“You lose your virginity to a married woman?” I ask teasingly. He shakes his head.

“Nah. Lost it to Haley when we were fourteen. We’re still friendly, she told me later on that I helped her come to terms with her being gay so I guess it was for the better,” he says, “don’t mention anything though, I’m not sure how out she is.” I wouldn’t have pegged Haley as gay but it made sense. 

“They used to call me the ‘man maker’ in college,” I say, “as I’m sure you’ve figured out I have a guilty pleasure for gridball players and by the time I was a sophomore I had gone through everyone on the team that liked women. I started hooking up with the freshmen and then they started sending their friends who were virgins to me. I didn’t know they were calling me that until I became friends with one of them.”

“Did you lose your virginity in college?”

“Nah, I was sixteen. I was too young, honestly. I should’ve waited,” I said. Sebastian nods his head. 

“I should’ve too.” We’re silent again for a second but this time he’s the one to break it. 

“So… You’ve hooked up with Alex?” he asked. I nod and light another cigarette. 

“Was filling the void. I think he was too.”

“And this was around that time you had the dream about the crash?” he asks me and tosses the filter aside.

“You remember that?”

“I remember everything.” He lays down and looks up at the stars. I pull my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around them.

“Do you have trouble sleeping often?” I ask him. He sighs.

“Yea. Not sure why. I do stay up late for work, a lot of my clients are overseas so the deadlines are in the middle of the night…But ever since I was a kid I’ve never been a very good sleeper. I’m sure my mom has permanent bags under her eyes,” he says, “I assume your restlessness started after your mom passed?”

“Yes but it wasn’t just because of the nightmares. Dad took up drinking and would be up all night,” I say and lay back next to him. The stars were beautiful and clear, not like how they are in the city. The light pollution downs them out so much you can barely make out the big dipper. “Do you see any constellations?” I ask Sebastian. The only ones I could point out were the big and little dippers. I didn’t do much stargazing and I regret not asking Grandpa more about it. 

“Um, let's see,” Sebastian says. He looks around the sky and then eventually points. “That one’s Orion.” I scoot closer to him so I can properly see what he’s pointing at.

“The rectangle?” I ask.

“Yea! The three stars in the middle are his belt… Over there is Pisces.” He points a little further west from Orion. I squint and try to follow his finger.

“The alligator mouth?”

“Uh huh. It looks like two fish tied together, right?”

“I think I can see that,” I say and squint a little harder.

“It’s supposed to be her and her sons, Eros and Cupid,” says Sebastian. He puts his arm down. I shiver a bit as a gust of wind blows over us. As if he knew, he wraps his arm around me and pulls me into his chest. My heart starts slamming into my chest and I can’t control it. I know he can feel it, there’s no hiding it. I shiver again but not from the cold. “I’ve always been fascinated with Aphrodite. When I was hooking up with older women and getting into situationships and getting my heart shattered, I wondered if she was watching over me,” he continues. I want to look up at him but I can’t tear my eyes away from Pisces. I always thought that Aphrodite had abandoned me long ago. 

“But isn’t she the Goddess of love, not heartbreak?” I ask. He gives me a squeeze and my breath gets caught in my throat.

“As much as it hurt, I figured she had a plan. Accepting those thoughts helped me separate myself from that part of my life,” he says and moves onto his side to face me. I want to look at him but my body won’t let me. This is the moment I’ve thought about over and over and my body can’t bring itself to pull through. I feel Sebastain’s finger slip under my chin. “After all,” his finger pushes my chin up so that I’m looking at him. His dusky eyes are sparkling in the moonlight and it takes every brain cell I can muster to not get lost in them, “ending that part of myself has brought me here, hasn’t it?” I want to tell him that I know exactly what he means, how I’ve never felt more accepted and understood by a person until meeting him, but his finger and thumb hold my jaw and he gently squeezes my cheeks as our lips lock.

Nobody's Son, Nobody's Daughter

TW: consumption of alcohol, light daddy issues

read it on ao3

Eleven.

Fall six. Year One. 

The chill breeze of the fall evening nipped at my cheeks and nose. I didn’t sleep much last night, haunted by why my sister is calling me and what she possibly could want. How did it come to a point where I’m afraid of my own little sister? I dress myself in a gray pleated jean skirt, old ripped fishnets that I can’t bring myself to throw away, and a simple white baby tee. I tie the outfit together with my black doc martens that I haven’t worn since college. They’re better than wearing the work boots I bought from Marlon. I make my way towards the bus stop, shuffling as I do. I didn’t realize how tired I was from lack of sleep and working on the farm most of the day. Many people are gathered at the bus stop: Sam, Abby, Penny, Emily, Maru, Elliott and Leah, Shane, and Jodi and Vincent. 

“Are you sure Vincent can come?” Jodi asks Sam with a nervous look on her face, “a metal show isn’t a place for a boy as young as him.”

“The venue is all ages, Mom,” Sam says, “Vincent sits in on band practice sometimes.”

“But you don’t use very nice words,” Jodi says and Sam rolls his eyes and squats down to Vincent’s level. 

“Vince, you know not to repeat the bad words we say, right?” Vincent nods his head.

“Mommy would be sad if I said bad words,” Vincent says.

“Very good and what else?”

“I can say bad words when I’m your age, Sammy,” he continues.

“I know you know a lot of the words to our songs but can you sing the bad words?” Sam asks.

“Not around Mommy,” Vincent says with a head shake. Sam looks up at Jodi with a weak smile, hoping to not get his ass beat. Jodi rolls her eyes.

“Fine. But if a single bad word comes out of your mouth young man, all three of us are going home,” Jodi says sternly. Both of her sons agree and that’s when Sam notices me.

“Hey Farmer! I think this is everyone, let's load up the bus.” Everyone trickles on. Pam, who’s the most sober I’ve ever seen, stops me before I get on. 

“You don’t look so good, kid,” she says. I shrug. 

“Didn’t sleep very well.” 

“Here,” she digs in her pocket and hands me a small energy drink, “drink this. It’ll keep you pumped up for the show.” She smiles at me and we all get on the bus. I sit down next to Sam, across from Jodi and Vincent. I chug the energy drink Pam gave me before realizing I didn’t see Sebastian anywhere.

“Where’s Seb?” I ask Sam. 

“Oh, he decided to take his motorcycle. Don’t ask why, I never know what’s going through his head,” Sam says with a laugh. I thought back to a conversation we had a couple weeks ago and he mentioned he liked to take his bike out at night and ride as far away as he can. It’s probably a good time for him to decompress, forget the constant demands of life for a second. 

“He must already be at the venue,” Maru says from behind us, “he left like an hour before we did.”

“Makes sense,” Sam says, “he likes to be punctual. And he said he would take care of talking with the owner and getting everything set up. Apparently this place is like half bar, half concert venue.”

“We’re going to the Julius, right?” I ask and Sam nods his head yes in response. “I love the Julius! The patio section is screened off but you can still hear the music in the bar. Sometimes I’d go in for a drink and listen to the music inside and if I was jammin’ out, I would buy a ticket and watch them. It was my favorite bar to go to in college,” I say. Plus it’s a Saturday night, people are going to end up filling out the patio. Sam has played me a couple samples of what they’ve been working on and many patrons of the Julius are alternative music fans. 

“Sick! Oh, here,” Sam says while handing me a piece of paper. “It’s the setlist. Those samples I played for you a few days ago, we also played for the manager of the bar. He thinks that his patrons will enjoy it so he gave us an extra time slot.”

“Holy shit,” I say while looking at the setlist, “there has to be like an hour's worth of songs here.” Sam beams at me with pride. The Julius is also a place where producers like to scout out new alternative music. If the band is lucky, someone might want to be in touch with them. We finally arrive at the venue where Sebastian is waiting for us. Abby, Sam, and Sebastian unload the bus while the rest of us trickle inside. I ask Jodi if she wants a drink but she’s ushered out to the patio with Vincent by a bouncer. No kids in the bar except to use the bathroom he had said to her. So I take a gamble on what she might like. She always has a glass of white wine with dinner and I figured a sauvignon blanc would do her some good. I order myself a shot of Jameson and an orange juice for Vincent. Down the bar I see Penny pleading with Pam.

“Please don’t drink too much,” I hear Penny say, “you have to drive us back home.”

“I’ll be fine,” Pam says with annoyance, “push comes to shove, you can drive it.” Penny sighs and marches out to the patio while Pam stays put at the bar. I called over to the nearest bartender and I’m pleasantly surprised when I realized it was Jean. Man, he’s been working here for like six years now?

“Well well well,” he says, “I hear you’re a farmer now. Is that why I don’t see my favorite regular anymore?”

“Sorry I didn’t mention. I kinda had to get the fuck outta here,” I say. He waves his hand.

“Yea, I get ya. What’s up though?”

“Do you see that lady at the end of the bar,” I ask.

“Yea, what about her?”

“She’s kinda my ride… actually a lot of people’s rides tonight. The band playing are some people from the valley so we’re out here to support them. Could you serve her n/a beer tonight and not tell her?” I ask. Jean laughs and pats me on the shoulder.

“Can I charge her for a real drink?”

“Do whatever. I need her blood alcohol level under the legal limit,” I chuckle. 

“Alright. Come back more often, would ya?” he says and we say goodbye to each other. I took the drinks over to Jodi while Vincent checked out the front of the stage, watching his brother and his bandmates set up.

“You’re a lifesaver,” Jodi says as I hand her the wine. I take my shot as she takes her first sip of wine. “I’m a little anxious,” she says.

“What for?” I ask before my tongue goes a little numb from the alcohol. 

“He’s… just not my little boy anymore.” She watches him carefully on stage while he helps Abby put her drum kit together and tune his guitar.

“But wouldn’t you say he’s grown into such a great young man?” I asked her as I also watched Sam on stage, testing the microphones and making sure you could hear Sebastian’s bass. Jodi chuckles a little bit and takes another sip of her wine.

“You sound just like your grandfather.” Jodi and I chat while we watch the band finish setting up. I was itching to hear what they had, especially the one song Sam and Sebastian kept teasing me with. 

“It’s going to blow your mind. Strike you to the core. It took me weeks to get through playing it without tearing up.”

The only metal song I’ve cried to is Fade To Black by Metallica so what could Sam have written that he thinks will give me a core striking experience? I go inside to get one more shot before the band comes on stage. I’m expecting an introduction from Sam but they go right into the music. Sebastian, with his bass strapped on his back, presses a button on one of his keyboards which resembles a faint ringing sound before Abby clashes her symbols and Sam comes in with a heavy guitar riff. Sebastian then slides the bass to his font and comes in with a deep bassline. I search in my pocket for the setlist Sam gave me earlier and find the name of the first song. Artificial Suicide. Sam shocks me with such heavy vocals I nearly drop my shot. I sling the Jameson down my throat as Sam switches up with clean and angelic vocals. I nearly choke. I’m so impressed by the raw talent they all ooze I barely notice anybody moving. Emily is swaying her hips as she stands at the front of the stage but nobody else is moving. I move away from Jodi and Vincent and make my way closer to the stage as the song ends. More people fill in from the bar after that outburst of a song. I find Leah and Elliott with their eyes wide, shell shocked after hearing the first song. Before I can ask them what they thought, the band goes straight into another heavy song. Hypermania is the name I remember reading under the opening song. The three of us watch Sam bounce around the stage before I finally decide that the crowd is too still. I grab Leah and Elliott’s hands and force them to dance with me. I had just enough liquor in my body to loosen me up. Leah, Elliott and I had some conversations at the saloon but not many so I didn’t know them all too well but Jameson absorbing into my liver didn’t care. 

I made Elliott take down his hair and head bang with me as he had the perfect hair for head banging. Thick and wavy and long. I looked around the crowd once more and pouted. It definitely wasn’t thick enough to crowd surf and Yoba I was itching to. My attention is turned back to the stage as Abby and Sam pause for a second and the sound of Sebastian’s bass fills the patio. I watch his long fingers glide across the neck of the bass while his other hand licks the strings near the pickguard. As I stay stunned from Sebastian’s mesmerizing fingers, Elliott and Leah start to dance with each other and I leave them be. I go deeper into the crowd and find Shane in the middle. He’s nodding his head to Abby’s beat. The song ends and Shane looks down at me.

“These guys are pretty good,” he says. I nod my head. 

“You a metalhead?” I ask.

“I indulge.” I give him a shit eating grin and for a second I swear I see a glint of fear in his eyes.

“Should we open up the pit?” Before he can answer, Sam speaks.

“We’re Goblin Destroyer! This next song is about screaming into the fucking void!” and immediately they start the next song. I don’t even hesitate to give Shane a hard shove and he almost loses his balance. He bumps into the person standing next to him who shoves him back to me. As soon as it started people started to fill into the pit, shoving each other and creating a circle. I play in the pit until the song ends. Sebastian throws his bass over his shoulder and takes place behind the keyboards. He starts playing the same three notes over and over and then presses a button which makes it loop. All I want to do is watch him, see what he does differently for each song, especially this one as it seemed a little different than what we had just heard. Unfortunately, the crowd filled in a little tighter and I got stuck behind a really tall man. As I do my best to see around the man, Shane taps me on the shoulder and gives me the universal ‘do you wanna get on my shoulders?’ concert hand gesture. I gladly accept and Shane squats down. I straddle his neck and hold onto the tall man in front of me for support while he stands up and lifts me over everyone’s heads. Now, if I was drunk, this would be the time that I would flash the band my tits but I did not have enough liquor in my system nor would I do my friends like that. Sam comes in with the lyrics but he isn’t screaming. His vocals are clean but the extra microphone he had grabbed from Sebastian earlier must’ve had something to distort and reverb his voice. I needed to ask them how they did that because it sounded so good. 

After that song, Shane puts me down, the crowd starts to get bigger and they start hollering for more. Sam takes a swig of his miller lite and the band recuperates for a second. I feel a tug on my skirt and I look down and find Vincent.

“Hey bud,” I say, “where’s your mom?” Vincent points to the entrance of the bar.

“She went to get another drink. I can’t see Sam,” he says with a pout. He probably saw me on Shane’s shoulders earlier. However, I’m not as tall as Shane so I grab Vincent’s hand and lead him closer to the stage. I shot Jodi a quick text telling her that her son is with me and hoped that she would be able to see him on my shoulders from the back. We found a spot decently close to the stage and I got him on my shoulders. Surprisingly, he wasn’t that heavy. He’s a pretty skinny kid and will probably grow up to have a similar physique to Sam. He couldn’t have been more than fifty pounds, all that work on the farm must be paying off. Sam gives the autotuned mic back to Sebastian and walks back to his own mic stand.

“This is an old one.” And they go back into the heavy stuff. As Sam is performing, he sees Vincent on my shoulders, points to him and makes his hand into devil horns. Vincent removes one of his hands from resting on my head and I can only assume he imitated Sam’s devil horns. I kept Vincent on my shoulders for another song before returning him back to Jodi. Her face was a blush pink most likely from her wine. 

“Thank you, Farmer,” she says, “did you have fun Vinny?” she asks her son. He goes on about how cool it was to see Sam up close and I excuse myself back to the crowd. A couple songs go by and all I’m fixated on is watching Sebastian go from bass to keyboard to bass again and sometimes doing both at the same time. Each song better than the last. I hoped and prayed there was a scout in the audience listening to their talent. If they lived in the city they definitely would’ve been already signed to a record label, album out, and touring by now. At least in my music connoisseur opinion. 

I ended up in the middle again with Shane who was sweating profusely after being in the pit for most of the show. I think I caught him off guard when we started the pit but once it was open he was in there like a fly on shit. 

“Alright guys,” Sam says breathlessly into the mic, “we’re gonna switch it up a bit. This is our newest song as well as our last of the night. And to be straight forward this song is not metal. Goblin Destroyer as a band likes to experiment and write what’s on our minds. This is called ‘Like Him’.” Sebastian fully takes his bass off and starts playing the keyboard. The notes are clean and he plays the same three over and over until he ends with a little chord and Sam comes in with vocals as light as a feather. Sebastian plays a mix of jazz and classical chords as Sam gets through the first verse. Like him. Like him. Like him. Sebastian slides his hands down the piano keys, creating a glissando, and starts putting more passion into the keys. Mama, I’m chasing a ghost. I don’t know who he is. Abby adds a light harmony as Sam sings and the further into the song we go, Sebastian starts hammering the piano keys and Abby comes in with her drums. As the chorus fades out, Sam slips into a guitar solo but it doesn't sound like your regular guitar. It was almost like he was playing the theremin but on the guitar. It was slow but smooth and attention grabbing. 

I couldn’t take my eyes off of them even for a moment. As Sam gets into the second verse, I start to really feel the lyrics. How can I miss something that I never had? I thought about my Dad. I can’t remember what he was like to me before Mom died. I can’t recall a look of pride or love for me. A scowl is plastered permanently on his face in my memories. Everytime he looked at me all I was met with eyes filled with disgust and distraught. I always prided myself on being able to read people well but I could never get a decent read on my father. I never knew what he was thinking or what was about to come out of his mouth. Yet, I missed him. I yearned for the father that he might’ve been when Mom was around. He couldn’t have always been so bitter towards me, right? At one point when I was in high school, he told me he couldn’t stand the sight of me. Is it because I look like him? Like Grandpa? Everytime he looked at me, was he reminded of his own father? What did Grandpa do to make my father hate the sight of his first born daughter? I couldn’t judge him as I also ended up being better off without a dad. I wonder if he thought about how history repeated itself or maybe he didn’t think about me at all. But everytime. Everytime I asked him what Grandpa did to make him so bitter, all my questions were swept under the rug. Mama I’m chasing a ghost. I don’t know who he is. 

As the second chorus ends, a swift movement catches my eye. Sebastian had turned to his other keyboard- the one that plays more electronic notes. He tilts his head to the side, like he’s cracking a bone in his neck then immediately lays down a beautiful set of notes just as Abby and Sam harmonize. The crowd around me starts to thin until we’re left with the people from the valley and a couple of stragglers. I look up at my three friends in awe as they finish the song in an explosion. 

“We’re Goblin Slayer! Thank you!” Sam yells then he, Sebastian, and Abby group hug. I smile and watch them and the rest of the villagers trickle into the bar. 

“Farmer?” I snap my attention to my left where Shane’s standing next to me. “You okay?” I knit my eyebrows together as he takes the knuckle of his finger and gently wipes under my eye. Oh shit. Have I been crying?

“Huh? Oh yea, I’m alright,” I say as I gently pat the tears away, careful not to ruin my makeup, “I guess that last song hit a little close to home.” I force a smile and suggest we go in for another drink. As we do, we walk past Jodi and Vincent. Vincent looked a little embarrassed as his mom stumbled a little bit. She was definitely wine drunk. Shane and I give each other a look and head over there. Shane and I were developing an unlikely friendship ever since that night in the saloon. He’s been giving me tips on my newly acquired chickens and ducks and lately he’s been telling me to raise rabbits as well. 

“Jodi, you alright, hun?” I ask her as I take Vincent’s hand.

“Farmer! Did you see my boy? Did you see Sam? He’s a rockstar!” she says while swaying. Vincent yawns and his eyes look droopy. Shane links his arm with Jodi’s and we make our way towards the bus. Hopefully they’ll both sleep a little before we fully pack up and go. We set them down in their own seats and Vincent passes out quickly. Pam was already in the driver's seat, doing crosswords.

“Pam, do you mind watching those two?” I ask before I step off the bus.

“Of course! I’m the most sober I’ve ever been. I had seven beers and I don’t feel a thing,” she says. I give her a fake smile.

“Well, if it ends up hittin’ ya. I can always drive back,” I say and Shane and I exit the bus. 

“Saw them givin’ her the n/a beer,” Shane whisper to me.

“I told them too,” I whisper back and we share a laugh as we walk back into the bar.

Nobody’s Son, Nobody’s Daughter

Nine.

TW: smoking

Dear Farmer, 

Tonight at around ten o’clock PM, a rare and beautiful event will take place. The moonlight jellies will be passing by Pelican Town on their long journey south for the winter. We’re all gathering at the beach to watch. You don’t want to miss this! 

See you tonight,

Demetrius. 

My parents would always pick me up from Grandpa’s before the dance of the moonlight jellies. When Mom was around, Grandpa would plead with her for me to stay another night and that he would take me to the city. It was Dad’s rule though. He didn’t pick me up or drop me off and Grandpa wasn’t allowed to come to our home. Looking back, Mom probably wanted me to stay but knowing Dad, it wasn’t going to happen. I’ve begged Dad to tell me why his relationship with Grandpa was so strained but he never went into much detail. “He was hard on me. Just leave it at that.” I would beg Grandpa for answers too. “That’s something for your father to tell you, when he feels ready.” I haven’t spoken to Dad at all since I moved to the valley. I wonder if he feels deja vu.

I’m making poppy seed muffins as my summer flower garden has been more than bountiful this year. I figured a little late night snack would do the town good and maybe improve my friendliness with some of the villagers I haven’t gotten to know that well. I’ve learned that I can’t be cold and off putting like I was in the city. If I want to live a good life here, I have to be like Grandpa. 

“Smells good in here, Farmer,” I recognized Sam’s voice immediately. I’m making a honey glaze for the muffins that are baking in the oven. I look over my shoulder and catch a glimpse of the trio of people I’ve been able to call my closest friends. 

“What have I told you about breaking into my house?” I ask Sam with a chuckle. 

“‘Ts not breaking in if the doors are unlocked,” he says. I shove my mixing bowl into Sam’s hands.

“Keep mixing. I have something for you guys,” I say as I go into the other room. I hear the faint sounds of the wooden spoon scraping against the metal bowl. Sam never fought me on things, I feel like he trusts me or whatever he doesn’t understand, he knows I have a good reason for it. 

“Are you making these for tonight?” Abby asks me from the other room. I find the chest I keep at the end of my bed and pull out three crystals. 

“Yea, I had some freetime. I gotta get people to like me somehow, right?” I say as I reenter the kitchen. I take the bowl from Sam’s hands and set it down. “Alright, close your eyes and hold out your hands.” The three do as they’re told. 

“It better not be a bug,” Abby says.

“I hope it’s a bug!” says Sam. I place a crystal in each of their hands. Amethyst for Abby, Frozen tear for Sebastian, and Tiger’s eye for Sam. My trips to the mines had been successful and I had made my way down to the eightieth floor. It was hard work but I didn’t have much to do besides farm work and fixing up the old community center. The community center was going to take me a while so I figured I might as well slay some monsters and make a profit from the gems I find. 

“Open your eyes.” They do and their faces light up when they see the gems. 

“How did you know I love this?” they all ask. I shrug.

“They just seemed like your vibe,” I said. That was a lie. While foraging, cutting down trees, and just being in the valley I stumbled upon some notes. One was a page from Abby’s diary as I had recognized her handwriting. She mentioned she liked keeping amethyst under her pillow. Another was Sam’s shopping list, I also recognized his chicken scratch. He mentioned that Sebatian liked sashimi and frozen tears. I didn’t know what that was until I stumbled upon it in the mines. I remember Grandpa collecting around one hundred of them one summer and then giving it to Robin. He mentioned she wanted to make a chandelier. Sam was a little trickier though. I was having tea with Jodi one afternoon and she was telling me stories about my Grandpa and how kind he was to Sam. Even after I would leave when the summer was done, Grandpa would still watch Sam when Jodi needed it. One day Sam came home with a large yellow and brown crystal and was so overjoyed about it. He still has the tiger's eye Grandpa gave him all those years ago. 

Abby wraps her arms around my neck and squeezes me. “Thank you thank you thank you thank you!” she says. The boys also nod and thank me. 

“Well, thank you guys for caring about me,” I say, “you’ve made my adjustment to the valley a lot easier.” My nightmares aren’t as frequent, I’m smoking less even though I do miss when Sebastian would brush my lips with his fingers every time he gave me one, and I just feel better overall. 

“Are you going to the dance of the moonlight jellies tonight?” Sebastian asks, “it’s the one festival I actually enjoy.”

“I think I will,” I say.

“Finally! You never got to seem them when we were kids, I remember being sad for you,” Sam says. My kitchen timer goes off. The muffins are ready. I pull them out and carefully dress them with the glaze. Abby goes to grab one but I slap her hand away.

“You’ll get one tonight,” I say and she pouts. 

“Oh! I almost forgot,” Sam says while digging in his pockets. He pulls out a crumpled flyer and hands it to me. “We’ve got a gig next Saturday in the city. Some old songs, some new songs. You should come.”

GOBLIN DESTROYER

Julius Ballroom Patio

Fall 6

6PM

“I can’t wait to go,” I say and place the flyer on my fridge. “I’m glad you got out of your writer's block.” 

“Write what you feel. That’s what you said. I also had help from Seb and Abby so I couldn’t have done it without all three of you.”

###

I wanted to wear something other than my usual farm get-up. Like being at the beach in the rain, there’s something surreal about being at the beach during the night. I took my hair out of my usual braids and pinned my bangs back with a white bow and then threw on a light blue sundress. It was a little chilly out but I felt okay with my arms exposed. Fall is my favorite season and I couldn’t wait for the weather to break. As I step out of my house, I see that Sebastian is waiting for me. I can see I’m not the only one who decided to wear something different. He’s wearing a different pair of black ripped jeans than his usual and is wearing a dark gray button up with the first three buttons unbuttoned. 

“What a surprise,” I say, “what brings you over here?” As I get closer to him, I inhale his scent. His cologne had hints of cedar, tobacco, and vanilla. His lit cigarette added an extra layer of tobacco. He smelled like heaven. He takes his half finished cigarette and puts it between my lips and before I could protest, he swiftly lights himself another one. 

“Needed to get away from my family. I figured we could walk together,” he says as we make our way off my property. He seemed tense and I could tell that he had been chain smoking the entire walk here. “You look nice,” he says. 

“Thank you. So do you,” I say, trying to not let my eyes linger.

“Demetrius wanted to take a family photo down at the shore. When he saw me in this, he seemed pissed off. Before I left I could hear him and my mom quietly arguing. I don’t know about what and I assumed it was about me. I just got the hell out of there,” he says while anxiously smoking his cig. “He’s known me since I was three. He raised me. I don’t understand why he hates me so much.” He kicks some rocks as we make our way through the town square. I wrap my arm around his and lean my head on his shoulder.

“You deserve better.”

“Ah, that’s just shitty father figures for ya,” he says, his mood shifting. I take my head off his shoulder and I see that he’s smiling at me. He knows I get it. We both finished our cigarettes before reaching the beach and I unlink arms with him. Him and I separate. He goes to Robin and I start chatting with the other villagers. When we separated though, it felt hesitant. Like he didn’t want to leave my side. Occasionally, I’d look over my shoulder and catch him looking at me. 

“Farmer!” Vincent exclaimed as I approached him, Jodi, and Sam. 

“Hey kiddo,” I say and reach into my pocket. Yes, my dress has pockets. I pull out a grape and he gasps.

“Wow! How did you know I like grapes?” he asked. Sam’s discarded shopping list. I press a finger to my lips.

“Santa told me,” I whisper. He looks up at me with wide eyes. I also give him a poppyseed muffin and pass those out to the other villagers as well. I look across the docks and watch Haley take pictures of Sebastian and his family. If I’m being honest, I felt a little jealous but I knew not everybody was happy in the family. Could I even create a happy family and break generational trauma? As I start to spiral, Haley approaches me, snapping me out of it. 

“Seb wants a family photo,” she says. I look at her confused.

“Didn’t he already do that?” she rolls her eyes at me.

“Like with you, Sam, and Abigail.”

“Oh.” Yoba, you’re so dense, Farmer. I can hear Sebastian say in my head. I follow Haley to where Sebastian is and eventually Abby and Sam join us. Sam and Abby are on the end and Sebastian and I are in the middle. I’m smiling but genuinely smiling. I haven’t felt warmth from others in a while. I look up at Sebastian, seeing his face flushed out with his own version of expressing happiness. He’s feeling the exact same feeling I am. 

the consequences of desire

chapter two - adjustments (read it on ao3 here!)

i woke up the next morning to the sound of one quiet knock and three louder knocks at my door. from my bed in the corner, i heard two voices - one: timid and unsure, the other: enthusiastic and confident. i knew immediately that these must be the two friends i’d already heard so much about, whether from lewis (who has a strong dislike for the blond boy), or robin (mother of the raven-haired boy). 

to keep them from waiting much longer, i dragged myself out of bed and answered the door.

“hello?” i said, still wiping the sleep from my eyes. 

the blond smiled brightly as he introduced himself, “hi! i’m sam. this is sebastian. we’re your neighbors! i know it’s only your fourth day in town, but we haven’t met yet, and we wanted to introduce ourselves!”

the other man stood next to him, reddening more and more as his friend rambled on about his family, his job, and the younger people in town. eventually, sam stopped and gestured for sebastian to say something to me. 

“h-hi,” he stuttered out, “welcome to the most claustrophobic place north of the gem sea.” 

sam punched his friend as i chuckled. “most claustrophobic, huh? i take it you’re not a huge fan of the valley..”

he shook his head in response.

i smiled before saying “well, i can’t say that i blame you. i sure didn’t think that i’d be out here farming for a living before last fall!” 

he gives me a small smile showing off his snake bite piercings and all i can think is that lydia would love this man. there’s not much i miss about the city, but, yoba, did i seriously consider stuffing lydia in a suitcase and bringing her with me. i smile absently.

the two men must be able to see i’m preoccupied because they take their leave but not before inviting me to the saloon on friday night. i thank them for the invitation and tell them that i’ll be there.

as they walk down my porch steps and off in separate directions, i linger a moment longer before getting ready for the day.

–

that morning is spent mostly watering and clearing more space for crops to cultivate. i’d finally gotten my hands on a solid number of cauliflower seeds which i was itching to grow. 

as i planted nearly four dozen cauliflowers, my mind wandered back to Harvey… how had he known i’d been avoiding him? why didn’t that make him less inclined to get to know me? what kind of person avoids the local doctor? what was Harvey doing right now? was he thinking about me? would it be so terrible if he were? what would i say if he appeared at this very moment while my dirt-covered overalls sagged with the weight of these damned cauliflower seeds?

it didn’t matter what i would have said, though, because he didn’t come. i didn’t see him again for three days. 

and, when i saw him three days later, it was while drifting in and out of consciousness as he carried me to the clinic.

hope u enjoyed <3333 see y'all next chapter ;)

Stardew Valley has been consuming me the past couple of days and I am SCREECHING because Sam, Alex and Sebastian.

I need all three of them. At the same time. I CAN'T choose between them. My first playthrough has also become my first time using mods. PolyamorySweet save me plz.

i like to think that ppl come to farmer for comfort or jst to genuinely hangout... requesting sam coming to farmer's house in the middle of the night as he confides in them w hot chocolate / coffee / tea 👉🏻👈🏻

apple cider

pairing: sam x reader

wc: 1.6k

tags: MILD hurt/comfort, pre-relationship, they are friends here!!

synopsis: sticky summer nights always make you feel a little restless.

a/n: its been 2 months with no sam fic!!!! here is my sincere apology hehe. title from apple cider by beabadoobee. this ask is so cute anon mwa mwa

Nothing ever truly rests during the summer; not even during the night.

Fireflies flicker and fly, weaving through the sparse grass beds sprouting from under your porch. The dark is hardly dark, your eyes have adjusted to the sparse light emanating from your dingy porch light. Your cardigan is haphazardly thrown off, draped over the hand-carved trellis. Bare feet meet the grass; damp and cool against your heated skin.

Energy thrums through the air, electrifying it with the undercutting buzz that leaves you wide awake. The season leaves the nights tepid, leaving your skin sticky. 

You can’t sleep; not one bit tuckered out after a whole day toiling the fields. Though your mind is blissfully blank, your hands are preoccupied with bringing your mug to your lips.

The cacophony of crickets chirping echo through the flat farmlands of your property. It’s quiet, peaceful. Yet you are wide-eyed and awake, sipping on  herbal tea—a mixture of herbs from your crop beds—in the hopes you can knock yourself out. 

You are hyper aware of your surroundings, unable to pull yourself into the sleepy state you want. You feel the sheen of sweat drying on your skin, the warm summer breeze tickling the nape of your neck, the sweet smell of almost-ripe melons growing on your farm. The rhythmic sound of trees swaying with the wind.

The odd sound of a twig snapping is enough to pull you out of your reverie. 

Your gaze snaps to the side, past your mailbox and to the dark path leading to town. Eyes adjusted to the dark, you see vague impressions of familiar surroundings. You drag your eyes to and fro, scanning.

A head of blond hair flashes through the otherwise dark veil of night, lamplight catching the brilliant golden hues of it. Doubting your eyes you furrow your brow; squinting your eyes, shifting on the porch steps, aiming to get a clearer look. Your mug is forgotten on your lap.

The figure shifts, tilting their head upwards and towards your direction. Then blue eyes lock with yours, the warm light of your porch lantern illuminating his expression. Recognition dawns on your face—

“Sam?”

Sam stops mid-step, face contorting into shock that outdoes your own. He flails, struggling with his words as to why in the world he’s caught on your farm in the wee hours of the night.

Both of you freeze, staring at each other in silence. Your fingers tighten then loosen around your mug. A tight line is made out of your lips.

“What are you doing?” you ask, tilting your head in confusion.

“It’s not what you think!” he holds his hands up in immediate surrender. “I was walking, and—and, my mind was blank. I just followed the path, I swear.”

You blink, once then twice. “Sam—”

“And–and,” he blabbers, “I guess… your farm was the best bet… The safest.”

That eases the nervous pitter-patter of your heart. It’s rare you get anyone on the farm aside from Lewis this late. You’re relieved, perplexed by his skittish behavior. It goes against what you already know about him. 

Your eyes crinkle whilst you squint up at him, giving him a once-over. Like this, he reminds you of a teenager caught red-handed, eyes practically bulging out of his head with anxiousness.

An amused chuckle slips past your lips before you register it, smiling. “Sam. Can I speak?”

Sam turns back to face you, finally still. It gives you a clearer look at his appearance. Wild flaxen locks are tapered down by the beanie shoved over his head. His shirt is inside out, hanging awkwardly on his frame. He looks like he just rolled out of bed. 

“Oh—oh yeah… my bad.”

A hand goes to pick back up your mug. “You’re good.” You take a sip of your tea. “Plus, I’m not bothered.”

“Oh…” Relief lets his shoulders go lax with a puffed breath. Then he looks back at you, conflicted on his face. “Hang on...You think me walking into your private property is—nothing?”

You snort. “You’re the last person I’d think would be worried about that.”

Sam paces, rocking back and forth on his heels, sporting a grim frown on his face. His gaze drops back down to the path, kicking at the pebbles. You wince internally; he doesn’t seem in good enough shape for jokes. It tugs at your heartstrings, a deep sigh pulled from your mouth and out into the humid air.

“Kidding. But it’s really no biggie.” you wave off. “Come by whenever. I’m always restless during the summer.”

He stares, breathing uneven and nervous. “Seriously?”

You nod, unusually calm in the face of his supposed trespassing. “It’s a me problem. It’s too humid to sleep comfortably. I even get more tired once I wake—”

“No, I mean,” he interjects, eyes wide. “I can come over? Anytime?”

“Yeah,” you shrug, rolling the muscles in your shoulders. “I’d love your company.”

“But what if you’re busy?”

“You’ll have to help me in the fields, then.” you tease, eyes crinkling. “You’ve got good legs for it already.”

A grin cuts through the grim lines of his face, “Are you 100% sure?”

You nod, eagerly. “Mhm.”

“Ah,” he rubs the back of his neck, suddenly sheepish. “That’s good. Super good. I wanted… well, I was kinda hoping to see you too.”

“Well now you’ve seen me.”

“Yeah, I’m glad. But ugh—I dunno, I guess my head’s a little messed up right now.” He runs a hand over his face, a frustrated groan along with it. 

You watch him. There is never a part of him that keeps still, even now. 

Maybe that’s why the words seem to come out so naturally when you’re with Sam. The restlessness—always grasping, bouncing, and shifting. “D’ya wanna come inside? Maybe it could help.”

“Yes, yeah. I want to.” he replies, instantly but then he double takes, checking in with you. “Can I?”

“I invited you too,” you laugh, pulling yourself up. “Calm down Sam, you’re fine.”

“Come in,” you call, pushing open your door. You do not turn and wait for him, traveling through the dark with the familiarity one has only in their own home. 

You hear him pulling off his shoes by the doorway, then the padding of his feet trailing after yours.

Humming, you switch on your lamplight, propping it up on your kitchen table, pulling the chair back for Sam to sit in. You set your mug down on the opposite side.

The cabinet creaks when you swing it open, revealing your countless containers of seasonings and spices collected over the seasons. The rich smell of all of it mingling together wafts through your nose. 

A pack of apple cider bottles stands by the cinnamon sticks, a welcome gift from months ago you haven’t gotten into yet. 

You tilt your head back to glance at him, finding him sitting statue-still in your chair, then turn back to your cabinet.

“I have some apple cider, you want some?”

His eyes snap to yours, “Oh, yeah.”

Nodding, you tiptoe, grasping the glass bottle by the neck from the far end of the cabinet. 

You sit the bottle down on the counter, popping off the cap with the flat edge of a knife. The cider fizzes, bubbling up until the neck then reducing. The sharp fruity scent of carbonation and apple mingles with the humid air. Sam takes it from your outstretched hand with a murmured ‘thanks’.

You sit opposite him. With your legs pulled up to your chest, you wiggle in your seat, leaning your cheek against your knees. Your eyes low as you cradle your own drink in your hands. Sam takes slow sips of the cider, the bubbles painting the edges of his lips then fizzing away. 

It feels natural to watch him like this, like all normal neighborly decorum has flown out the window, making room for this—whatever this silent companionship may bring. 

Curious, you break the veil of silence. “So what brings you here?”

Sam runs his tongue over his bottom lip, catching the stray drop of apple cider by the corner. His gaze goes faraway, eyebrows furrowing automatically without him aware. He’s silent as he thinks over your question, face contorting.

“Just—something at home, I guess. I wanted a breather.”

You swirl the string of your teabag, looking up from under your lashes. “Family stuff?”

“...Yeah, family stuff.”

You hum, voice low. You have a faint idea on what he’s talking about. Sam’s father, Kent, has been having a difficult time adjusting back to civilian life after being discharged—you heard. 

Your eyes track over his form, his shoulder hunched and lower than you’ve ever seen them. Under the low light of your kitchen table, you pinpoint the signs of weariness marking his face—eye bags under his eyes and a perpetual wrinkle in his brow deep enough you see the shadow of it under his mess of hair. 

“You don’t need to tell me if you don’t feel like it,” you simply say. 

You look out the windows, eyes tracking the swirling the flickering lights of lightning bugs outside. Gaze low as you stew in silence. Your fingers tap idly at the table. You feel calmer, sleepier. That persistent buzzing under your skin dissipating into the boneless way you sit. 

There will be more sticky summer nights like these, you’re sure. Maybe he’ll share what’s on his mind then but right now, you’re quite content with the silence. It cradles you like a refreshingly cool gust of air, tapering the heated expanse of your skin. 

“Maybe next time,” Sam murmurs, staring into the steaming cup. “When I come over again.”

A smile unfurls on your lips when he raises his head to look at you. “When you come over again.”

everyone adores you (at least i do)

pairing: sam x reader

wc: 1.1k

tags: CHEEEEESY cheesy cheesy puppy love, mutual pining, sam is PATHETICALLY down bad, pre-relationship, abigail and sebastian mentioned, friends to lovers

synopsis: if it were up to sam, he'd spend every second of everyday at your side.

a/n: in all of my other sam fics, its reader embarrassingly in love with him...he gets a taste of his own medicine here lol!

With vanilla ice cream melting and dripping down your fingertips, coarse sand underneath you and the salty ocean waves lapping at your feet; you are a child again, sitting with your grandpa at the docks, watching as he reeled in a ‘big one’. Filling his bucket with loads and loads of fish.

Those days are far gone now, but the memory remains, as clear as the day you remember it. The feeling is nostalgic, sleepy in the way your senses are dulled by syrupy thick contentment. Beaches at sunset have that effect on you, you suppose. 

“This is fun,” Sam says, tone lacking its boisterous loudness, you almost don’t hear it over the sound of crashing waves. “I had a lot of fun today, farmer.”

Your eyes flicker to him, his green gaze dead-set on the peachy golden sky, the taste of sea salt mingling with sweet ice cream heavy in your tongue. The sea breeze is cold, whipping against your face and running through your hair.

“I did too,” you agree. “Y’know, I don’t get a lot of off time with the farm and stuff. This is a nice change of pace.”

He smiles, that sunshine smile you’ve come to associate with Sam. “I caught you at just the right time then, huh?” 

You shrug, your own smile mirroring his. “Auspicious.” He did.

The sun is setting, the day is coming to a close yet Sam wishes it wouldn’t, silently pleading with any higher being to somehow stretch time. He is barely a religious person, but the weight of his want is enough to transcend his own beliefs. Every second with you barely feels like enough; like sand slipping through his fingers.

One thing’s for certain, Sam isn’t going to just let it end here.

“We should hang out like this again,” Sam says, a little hurriedly, captured all in one breath. Shy and tentative, like a bashful child with a school crush. “Uh, I mean, do you? Wanna? Hang out with me?”

You can barely suppress a delighted chuckle from slipping past your lips, your chest warming with fond affection. “I’d be more than happy to. Yoba knows I need a break or two or I’ll actually explode,” you huff while Sam hums in agreement. “We can even invite Abigail and Sebastian… so can demo that new song for me, I see you all working very hard when I visit sometimes.”

He should be happy to hear that; that you’d be more than happy to spend your precious off time with him out of all people. You and him, him and you, Sam and the farmer. Your name connected to his with ‘and’, it makes him giddy, causes his cheeks pinken and pinken. 

Just the two of you, though. Sure, he loves his friends, Abby and Seb have been with him since day one. But it feels out of place—

(Sam, Sebastian, Abigail and the farmer doesn’t have that ring to it…)

“Yeah, I—I dunno, it’s just…”

The unfiltered truth is stupid, at least to him. Vincent is far too young for some of the things Sam longs to say. There’s a reason Abby and Seb hang out under his nose, he won’t blame them, they have their own secrets he isn’t privy to—too serious, too dull for him.

(And now with you, he thinks you might just be the one he can share his own secrets with. Because even he has his own serious, dull thoughts. Thoughts that he doesn’t want brushed away with a snarky remark or a sarcastic laugh.)

“I kinda like that it’s just the two of us?” 

His voice sounds unsteady, squeaky. Trailing off at the end, lost in the sound of water crashing at your feet. Phrasing his statement into a question that you could deny, that you could easily brush off—because if you did, he would too. 

(It would be a bummer if you did though, but Sam is cool with that, chill with any decision you make. Really, he totally is.)

You grin, bumping your shoulder against his, your ice cream is dripping down, down, down your knuckles. Once your skin meets his, you don’t pull away, you press closer and closer to his side. Leaning your head against his sunburnt shoulder—but he barely registers the sting—and your arm against his own. It’s a pleasant weight, having you against him—grounding and tethering him to you.

“I do too. Like it, I mean. I think I get to see so many other sides to you, Sam. Without the others and all that.”

Sam feels his breath hitch, his cheeks flush even pinker even with the sunburns. “Woah, phew, I mean—awesome… When, when do you think we can meet next?”

You tilt your head, running calculations through your mind. You’re very busy on that farm, he knows; but Sam can’t help but keep his hopes up, you’re fun company. Maybe the best he’s had yet.

“I know I won’t have enough time until my melons are ready for harvesting—and don’t you dare try making a joke about that,” you smile, wide and cheeky. Right as Sam readies an innuendo at the tip of his tongue; it makes his blood pump faster and his breathing stutters at the thought of you knowing him so well. 

“So how about this?” you propose slowly. “We spend one day every month doing all the stuff we wanna do, together. just you and me—fun right? I’ll even sleep a little earlier the night before.”

Sam bites into his ice cream—chocolate and your treat, at your insistence—though he isn’t quite sure if the immediate smile on his lips is due to its sweetness, or yours.

He leans closer into you, resting his head on top of yours, strands of your hair tickling his lips. Lowering his voice into a whisper so only you can hear.

(The secret is that you make Sam want. Want, want, want like he’ll never get sick of it. He hoards these stolen moments with you so greedily yet wants more.)

“…two days, two days each month.”

He feels your body shake with the strength of your laughter, warmth swirls all throughout his body, tingling wherever your body brushes against his own. Sam finds that he likes the feeling, the buzz of it—it’s addicting.

“Yeah, alright then,” you reply, mirth dripping from each and every word. “two days. We have a deal. Better?”

“Yeah,” he turns back to face the water, the ocean spray misting his face. “Yeah, a lot better. That does sound fun.”

Anything sounds fun when it involves you.

SAM

fics

sweet like (fluff; 1.7k words)

8:05 (fluff; 3.2k words)

homecoming (hurt/comfort; 3.2k)

everyone adores you, at least i do (fluff, pining; 1.1k)

homecoming | sam x reader

word count: 3.2k

tags: hurt/comfort , family struggles , reader and sam are married , set somewhere in year 2 (kent is back) , oneshot , intimacy

synopsis: Sleep evades you on nights like these, without Sam by your side.

a/n: i love sam but the allure of angst is too hard to resist!!! sorry babe i still love you 😔

Sleep evades you on nights like these, without Sam by your side.

Your feet are bare as you linger at the entrance of your room. The dimmed light of the living room washes away the darkness of the hour. It's late, the air is cool and damp smelling of night dew—you take a deep inhale. It feels thick as you breathe it in, like smoke is clouding around the room, restricting your breaths.

Sleepless nights were not unusual in your household. Before you married Sam, you hardly slept—the satisfying ache of collapsing into your sheets after a day at the mines was an addiction you couldn’t get enough of. 

Now, you earn enough to afford coming home before sunset. No longer having to worry about how you’d afford the next day. And if you are being completely honest, evenings spent with Sam are far more addicting than the sting of a day’s work. 

The ache is still there. It comes with the profession. Though not anymore the dull humming ache in the muscles and joints of your arms and legs, but a bone deep ache settled deeply curling around your chest. 

Somehow, it stings even more.

It is as if it drags over your heart, catching on every ridge and edge of your bones. Daring to fill your lungs with ichor—hardening like stone around your ribs. No amount of stardrop you swallow can ever relieve the stinging soreness. 

The cushions of the old second-hand couch groan and squeak as you twist and turn atop of them. Perhaps as restless as you are. The light flickers—on, off, on. 

It doesn’t scare you, but it makes you uneasy. You’re long over the notion the farmhouse was haunted, but nights like these make that conviction waver. The nape of your neck prickles—like a person is staring from behind. Sam isn’t here to tease you about ghosts nor curl his arms around you in mock protection. 

He hasn’t been here in hours, hasn’t been present in so long. It feels wrong. It feels like an omen. Your fingers find the back of your neck, brushing over the vulnerable skin. 

You hold a tassel cushion tightly to your chest. Your knuckles whitening with the strength of your grip on it. The strength of your heartbeat is so loud you’re convinced it would be heard without the pillow to muffle the sound. 

Little Vincent is sound asleep, snoring softly away in his dreamland. He looks like the epitome of innocence under the quilted blankets of your bed. It's soft, worn and covered in stitched cartoon-y lions and tigers. A temporary parting gift bundled up in his dinosaur backpack from jodi. Before he came to live with you and his older brother. 

The separation was painful. there were tears—for both him and for his mother. 

(Sam stood next to you then, gripping at your hand so hard you felt it prickling with numbness. You didn’t dare look up to see the tears you know are there, the crystalline tears dripping down his lash line. 

It would’ve made the teardrops in yours fall over too. You’d stay strong for the both of you.)

The entrance door to the farmhouse creaks open and you immediately know it’s him. Relief floods your whole body—to your fingertips to your toes. He's safe, and home at last. You stand up and hurry to him, throwing the pillow to the ground, before the door creaks shut.

The air goes still, calm before the storm. The anticipation before potential terrible news.

(You expect there will be. You can tell by the way Sam slumps, like the weight is physically bearing down on his shoulders.)

Sam is still at the doorway, slumping over you when you wrap your arms around him. He smells of sweat and the cloying scent of rubbing alcohol—something must’ve happened, you think. It smells like the clinic.

The paper bag in his hand loses from his grip, it falls unceremoniously to the ground with a dull thump. You pay it no heed, mentally accounting to pick it up later. Though you note that it lands right over your ‘home sweet home’ doormat. Fitting.  

“Sammy.” you greet him with a chaste peck on the cheek. He barely has the energy to hug back, more so stay steadily upright on his feet. you both sway slightly, suspended in the tranquility of the moment.

You try again, slowing the movement of your lips. “Welcome home, my love. you there?”

His lips move against the skin of your neck, a whisper of a greeting. It is enough for you.

Sam retracts his face from your jaw. There are blue-purple eye bags under his eyes, like bruises. The trademark twinkle in his brilliant green irises have dulled to nothingness. He looks so unlike himself like this, older than his years and so unbearably tired.

And you wish, with all your heart, to take his aches away. To wash them away like ink in water. 

You pull him into the living room with you, the skin of his wrist enclosed in the firm guiding grip of your fingers. He's fragile like this, this sunshine of a man reduced to a shell of his usual demeanor. 

He trails slowly behind you, silent. You say nothing, either; choosing to focus on the rhythmic sounds of your footsteps padding against the floor. In the living room, you dim the lights to a mere whisper of light. 

These days, when he comes home, you’ve built some sort of routine.

You drag him down to you, spread lying down on the length of the couch. Your thighs frame his hips as he melts into the warmth of body. He lays on top of you, his cheekbone against your chest. You watch as his eyes flutter shut, as he presses his ear to the epicenter of your chest—the sound of your heartbeat quieting the swirl of thoughts in his mind. 

You gently remove the woolen beanie nestled on his head—revealing the stringy oily mess of hair under. A sign of how little care he has been sparing himself after his father’s homecoming. You feel your lips downturn into a frown. He hasn’t even been using that hair gel you like to tease and groan about. 

(You lied when you’d say you hated it. You don’t, never did. 

You miss it. You miss the things that make him, him.)

You don’t hesitate in running your hands through the softness of his hair. Your fingers scratch gently on his scalp, eliciting a soft sigh from your weary husband. Eyes watch raptly as his shoulders unwind and ripple. The tension in them melts away with the deft caress of your hands.

Your heart squeezes painfully in your chest. Like a knife twisting. You love him, you love him.

Moments pass, the silence is almost comfortable when you ask, speaking it to the silence of the room. There’s a wavering lilt in your voice reassuring him. You aren’t going to push him for an answer. He doesn’t need to respond. Him being safe, home and warm in your arms is all you ever want. All you’ll ever need.

“How are they?” 

(The first night, you and Sam stayed the night in his family home. squeezed in his twin bed with Vincent curled up by his ribs. The little boy couldn’t bear sleeping alone that night, not with the anxiety of his father being back making him pace a mile a minute.

The air in the household had shifted that day.

In the dead of the night, the fire alarm went off—a blaring loud beeping sound from the kitchen. Totally harmless, a malfunction. A disturbance to sleep more than anything.

Except it was not.

You still remember the blood-curdling scream that came from Jodi and Kent's room. The panicked sobs of Jodi as she tried to calm her terror stricken husband. 

You remember the way Vincent clung onto you, like a koala to a tree. You cupped your hands tightly over his ears—he didn’t need to suffer the consequence of it.

Sam removed the fire alarm and Vincent from the house the next morning.)

His voice is hushed when he speaks. A pin could drop and be more clearly heard. “Mom's… getting better.” 

Not getting worse than she already is.

You plant a kiss on the crown of his head, lips soft and adoring on his skin. You ache to take his burden, to take his share of suffering. 

It hurts sometimes, to be right beside him but feel so faraway. Yet like this, feeling every curve and edge of his body—you can convince yourself that it doesn’t.  

“Is Vince asleep?”

“Yes,” you reply, tucking a blond curl behind his ear. His head unconsciously tilts to the room where his younger brother rests. Ever so protective of him even like this. 

Continuing you say, “He was looking for you,” you thread your fingers through the short blond strands at his neck. Sam untenses slightly in your arms, his arms going limp at your sides. “He's been fidgety lately. Restless.”

“He usually is.” his feeble attempt at a joke. Though the rasp in his voice only makes it sound resigned. You purse your lips, eyes tracking back to the cedar wood of your bedroom door on the other side of the room—and the sleeping child behind it.

You stroke Sam's hair, thinking. “More so than usual.”

(You know why. He knows too. Kent wasn’t the same when he returned from the war. He was vulnerable, not the fragile type but vulnerable in the way a ignited bomb threatened an explosion.

Vincent wasn’t either—grown much more from that thumb suckling toddler when he left.

“My dad is coming home soon,” Sam confides in you on that day on that day on the beach. Him standing a few feet away from the shore line, and you; next to him.

“This isn’t how I wanted him to grow up,” his voice cracks with vulnerability. “I—I want him to have a better childhood than I did.”

“He will, Sam. He will.” I know you’ll make sure of it.

His eyes are red-rimmed and raw when he looks at you. All you wanted was to wipe that anguished expression off his face.)

He is silent. All is silent. Tranquility is like a honey thick syrup poured over your chest, smeared all over the expanse of your body. The soft sounds of your synchronized breathing is the only sound you can bear to hear. It makes your eyes droop, the lethargic feeling dulling your senses.

Your hand reaches for his, intertwining your palm with his long-fingered one. You relish in the familiar feeling of his calloused fingertips, earned from afternoons spent with his guitar. His skin is warm, warmer than yours. You give his hand a tentative squeeze, he squeezes back.

“Mom told me to say hi to you both for her,” he tells you, his breathing slow and deep. “She misses him, and you. She’s coming to visit as soon as she can.”

“Vince misses her too,” you sigh, craning your head forward to peek at the top of his head. “It's affecting him, I can tell. Penny's getting worried. She tells me he hasn’t been himself at school.”

All that Sam can manage is a deep intake of breath, then a softer resigned exhale. There isn’t much nor enough for him to say. Your free hand goes to smooth down his back. The muscles there are tough—bunched up and tense.

He shifts between your thighs, baring down heavier on your pelvis. Even as tired as he is, Sam is restless. Always has been, whether it be on his skateboard or with his guitar. You ignore the growing ache in your lower back—it is not your moment, but his. The warmth of his weight on top of you overpower any discomfort you have.

Twirling the stray curl at his neck, you finally ask. Fingers featherlight against his shoulder.  “How… is he?”

Sam stiffens above you, the lean line of his body rigid. He’s clearly distressed with talking about his father. You suck a breath through your teeth, knocking your leg gently against his, giving your silent push for him to continue.

“I can't even lie,” he squeezes his eyes shut and turns his face away. “It isn't good, Doc Harvey says dad’s got PTSD from the war. It's triggered by loud sounds. Remember the time he woke up because of the fire alarm?”

You nod, curling your fingers around his. You try to provide him any semblance of comfort—to reassure him. You love him, always. 

It's painful to see, to watch what he’s going through only by the sidelines. 

Sam looks up at you from your chest, eyes blurry with exhaustion. His jaw tensing ever so slightly, you see the patchy blonde stubble starting at the jut of his jaw. The wrinkle in his brow growing more prominent at the mention of his father. It's a fresh type of wound, raw and open. You dance around the topic, like poking a sleeping lion that threatens to attack at any given moment.

“We’ve transferred him to stay in my old room. He’s been holed up there most of the time. The nightmares are keeping mom up. He wakes up screaming most nights." Sam rasps, squeezing your fingers. He speaks lowly against the thin fabric of your sleep shirt, the heat of his body bleeding through it and into you. 

His voice dissolves into a pained crack when he speaks. “It sucks.”

“It will get better, we can get through it,” you sit up slightly, elbows bent behind you. Sam's been out the whole day. You assume he must be starving and tired. “Do you need anything?”

Sam doesn’t let you up, though. He tugs you back down under him with the gentle pull of his arm. You still in his arms, looking down at him.

“No,” he pleads. “just… stay with me, okay? Let's stay like this, please.”

You swallow, nodding. “Yes, of course.”

You wish you could ease his worries. You wish you could tell him that it’ll be alright and he would believe it.

You love him, more than life itself. Like you are a planet that orbits around him, the sun. You show him so everyday—and will continue to do so with everyday that will come. 

You just wish he’d be more selfish with you.

If he falls, you’ll piece him back together. Glue his bones together with your hands, relying on the familiarity of his being. Anything, you’d do anything.

The matching mermaid pendants resting over his and your collarbone symbolizes that.

“I want to help you, sam. You take all this burden up on your own. please?”

He sits up, back hunched over you. A dim shadow of him filtered over you. You follow him, like you can’t bear to be apart from him. 

“You are, you always have,” Sam softens, gazing at you so reverently you could sob. He looks at you as one gazes at master paintings, like he is in wordless awe of you. 

The room is dark with night. If you strain your ears hard enough, the cooing of the owls filter through the cracks of your windows. The moonlight is scarce, you can barely see the expressions painting his face. Though, you’re sure your expression is as lovesick as his. Practical hearts in your eyes as you stare.

“Looking after Vince is more than I could ever ask for, honey.” he whispers, pinching the hem of your sleep shirt between his thumb and pointer finger. 

“No Sam,” you murmur, taking his face into your hands. your hands frame his face, warming the cool skin of his cheeks. Desperation fills every movement in a plea for him to understand. “I meant you.”

You inhale, relishing the smell of sweat, mint and rubbing alcohol on his skin. The scent smells so comforting, and so familiar. 

You hope he finds that same solace in you as you do with him.

“I want to take care of you,” you say more firmly, stroking him on the skin of his brow bone. “Won’t you let me?”

He stares at you, enveloping your hands with warmer ones. You sigh contentedly at the feeling. They sear into your skin, warming you with the righteous heat of his devotion. 

To you, he is the sun and you have the sun right in the palm of your hands. You know he won’t ever burn you, nor leave your skin red and raw from his intensity. His rays are gentle, a featherlight whisper of a kiss on the expanse of your body.

But the sun never stops shining. It is steadfast in its duty to provide. You worry, will he explode in a grand supernova or crumple into a black hole? 

Either way, you will never allow it. You’d rather douse the sun in the water of the ocean to hold him in your arms. Maybe then, he can finally rest soundly. 

You feel his thumb rub back and forth on the back of your palm, silent and considering. The brush of it melting you against him like a contented cat. A smile graces your lips, you can wait.

Though you do not need to. Sam turns his head and kisses your wrist. His nose bumping into the crease of your thumb. You feel honeyed warmth drip down your heart, collecting in the cavern of your chest.

That's all the confirmation you need.

(There are some days his words fail him. The days his mind is bursting with ideas, so much so it’s difficult for him to convey a singular thought.

That's alright. Perfect, even. Sam has always been better at expressing himself through actions.)

“I love you,” you kiss his forehead, then over each of his eyelids. You want to kiss every inch of his skin until there is nothing left to cover. “so, so much.”

You press your lips to the corner of his. Opting to speak your promise against his skin, to tattoo your undying love into the smooth expanse of it. 

Sam tilts his head, causing his lips to brush completely against yours. He presses them firmer against yours, the taste of spearmint gum heavy on his tongue. You lick the seam of his lips—let me in, let me in. 

“I love you too. more than you know,” he gasps, tearing his lips away. His breath puffing warmly against the skin of your cheek. He declares it as if he’s running out of breath, and it is his final words. A willing sailor drowning in the deep ocean that is you. “More than anything, more than life itself.”

You press your forehead against his. Your eyes meet the depthless green of his. The twinkle is there; flickering and faint but present.

Love is what brought him to you. It’s what keeps bringing him home to you every night. You want to be his refuge, his comfort, his partner for life. 

Your eyes shut, eyelashes fluttering against your cheekbones. “Share the burden with me, Sammy. I can take it.”

At the end of the day, he is all you want. All that you need. If it takes him time, you won’t mind. even if it takes centuries.

Sam captures your lips again. Murmuring his agreement greedily against you. You love him, you love him and he loves you. 

You are the one he comes back to, his spouse. The greatest love of his life. Home isn’t the farmhouse you’ve built a life in—

It’s you, always has been you.

homecoming | sam x reader

word count: 3.2k

tags: hurt/comfort , family struggles , reader and sam are married , set somewhere in year 2 (kent is back) , oneshot , intimacy

synopsis: Sleep evades you on nights like these, without Sam by your side.

a/n: i love sam but the allure of angst is too hard to resist!!! sorry babe i still love you 😔

Sleep evades you on nights like these, without Sam by your side.

Your feet are bare as you linger at the entrance of your room. The dimmed light of the living room washes away the darkness of the hour. It's late, the air is cool and damp smelling of night dew—you take a deep inhale. It feels thick as you breathe it in, like smoke is clouding around the room, restricting your breaths.

Sleepless nights were not unusual in your household. Before you married Sam, you hardly slept—the satisfying ache of collapsing into your sheets after a day at the mines was an addiction you couldn’t get enough of. 

Now, you earn enough to afford coming home before sunset. No longer having to worry about how you’d afford the next day. And if you are being completely honest, evenings spent with Sam are far more addicting than the sting of a day’s work. 

The ache is still there. It comes with the profession. Though not anymore the dull humming ache in the muscles and joints of your arms and legs, but a bone deep ache settled deeply curling around your chest. 

Somehow, it stings even more.

It is as if it drags over your heart, catching on every ridge and edge of your bones. Daring to fill your lungs with ichor—hardening like stone around your ribs. No amount of stardrop you swallow can ever relieve the stinging soreness. 

The cushions of the old second-hand couch groan and squeak as you twist and turn atop of them. Perhaps as restless as you are. The light flickers—on, off, on. 

It doesn’t scare you, but it makes you uneasy. You’re long over the notion the farmhouse was haunted, but nights like these make that conviction waver. The nape of your neck prickles—like a person is staring from behind. Sam isn’t here to tease you about ghosts nor curl his arms around you in mock protection. 

He hasn’t been here in hours, hasn’t been present in so long. It feels wrong. It feels like an omen. Your fingers find the back of your neck, brushing over the vulnerable skin. 

You hold a tassel cushion tightly to your chest. Your knuckles whitening with the strength of your grip on it. The strength of your heartbeat is so loud you’re convinced it would be heard without the pillow to muffle the sound. 

Little Vincent is sound asleep, snoring softly away in his dreamland. He looks like the epitome of innocence under the quilted blankets of your bed. It's soft, worn and covered in stitched cartoon-y lions and tigers. A temporary parting gift bundled up in his dinosaur backpack from jodi. Before he came to live with you and his older brother. 

The separation was painful. there were tears—for both him and for his mother. 

(Sam stood next to you then, gripping at your hand so hard you felt it prickling with numbness. You didn’t dare look up to see the tears you know are there, the crystalline tears dripping down his lash line. 

It would’ve made the teardrops in yours fall over too. You’d stay strong for the both of you.)

The entrance door to the farmhouse creaks open and you immediately know it’s him. Relief floods your whole body—to your fingertips to your toes. He's safe, and home at last. You stand up and hurry to him, throwing the pillow to the ground, before the door creaks shut.

The air goes still, calm before the storm. The anticipation before potential terrible news.

(You expect there will be. You can tell by the way Sam slumps, like the weight is physically bearing down on his shoulders.)

Sam is still at the doorway, slumping over you when you wrap your arms around him. He smells of sweat and the cloying scent of rubbing alcohol—something must’ve happened, you think. It smells like the clinic.

The paper bag in his hand loses from his grip, it falls unceremoniously to the ground with a dull thump. You pay it no heed, mentally accounting to pick it up later. Though you note that it lands right over your ‘home sweet home’ doormat. Fitting.  

“Sammy.” you greet him with a chaste peck on the cheek. He barely has the energy to hug back, more so stay steadily upright on his feet. you both sway slightly, suspended in the tranquility of the moment.

You try again, slowing the movement of your lips. “Welcome home, my love. you there?”

His lips move against the skin of your neck, a whisper of a greeting. It is enough for you.

Sam retracts his face from your jaw. There are blue-purple eye bags under his eyes, like bruises. The trademark twinkle in his brilliant green irises have dulled to nothingness. He looks so unlike himself like this, older than his years and so unbearably tired.

And you wish, with all your heart, to take his aches away. To wash them away like ink in water. 

You pull him into the living room with you, the skin of his wrist enclosed in the firm guiding grip of your fingers. He's fragile like this, this sunshine of a man reduced to a shell of his usual demeanor. 

He trails slowly behind you, silent. You say nothing, either; choosing to focus on the rhythmic sounds of your footsteps padding against the floor. In the living room, you dim the lights to a mere whisper of light. 

These days, when he comes home, you’ve built some sort of routine.

You drag him down to you, spread lying down on the length of the couch. Your thighs frame his hips as he melts into the warmth of body. He lays on top of you, his cheekbone against your chest. You watch as his eyes flutter shut, as he presses his ear to the epicenter of your chest—the sound of your heartbeat quieting the swirl of thoughts in his mind. 

You gently remove the woolen beanie nestled on his head—revealing the stringy oily mess of hair under. A sign of how little care he has been sparing himself after his father’s homecoming. You feel your lips downturn into a frown. He hasn’t even been using that hair gel you like to tease and groan about. 

(You lied when you’d say you hated it. You don’t, never did. 

You miss it. You miss the things that make him, him.)

You don’t hesitate in running your hands through the softness of his hair. Your fingers scratch gently on his scalp, eliciting a soft sigh from your weary husband. Eyes watch raptly as his shoulders unwind and ripple. The tension in them melts away with the deft caress of your hands.

Your heart squeezes painfully in your chest. Like a knife twisting. You love him, you love him.

Moments pass, the silence is almost comfortable when you ask, speaking it to the silence of the room. There’s a wavering lilt in your voice reassuring him. You aren’t going to push him for an answer. He doesn’t need to respond. Him being safe, home and warm in your arms is all you ever want. All you’ll ever need.

“How are they?” 

(The first night, you and Sam stayed the night in his family home. squeezed in his twin bed with Vincent curled up by his ribs. The little boy couldn’t bear sleeping alone that night, not with the anxiety of his father being back making him pace a mile a minute.

The air in the household had shifted that day.

In the dead of the night, the fire alarm went off—a blaring loud beeping sound from the kitchen. Totally harmless, a malfunction. A disturbance to sleep more than anything.

Except it was not.

You still remember the blood-curdling scream that came from Jodi and Kent's room. The panicked sobs of Jodi as she tried to calm her terror stricken husband. 

You remember the way Vincent clung onto you, like a koala to a tree. You cupped your hands tightly over his ears—he didn’t need to suffer the consequence of it.

Sam removed the fire alarm and Vincent from the house the next morning.)

His voice is hushed when he speaks. A pin could drop and be more clearly heard. “Mom's… getting better.” 

Not getting worse than she already is.

You plant a kiss on the crown of his head, lips soft and adoring on his skin. You ache to take his burden, to take his share of suffering. 

It hurts sometimes, to be right beside him but feel so faraway. Yet like this, feeling every curve and edge of his body—you can convince yourself that it doesn’t.  

“Is Vince asleep?”

“Yes,” you reply, tucking a blond curl behind his ear. His head unconsciously tilts to the room where his younger brother rests. Ever so protective of him even like this. 

Continuing you say, “He was looking for you,” you thread your fingers through the short blond strands at his neck. Sam untenses slightly in your arms, his arms going limp at your sides. “He's been fidgety lately. Restless.”

“He usually is.” his feeble attempt at a joke. Though the rasp in his voice only makes it sound resigned. You purse your lips, eyes tracking back to the cedar wood of your bedroom door on the other side of the room—and the sleeping child behind it.

You stroke Sam's hair, thinking. “More so than usual.”

(You know why. He knows too. Kent wasn’t the same when he returned from the war. He was vulnerable, not the fragile type but vulnerable in the way a ignited bomb threatened an explosion.

Vincent wasn’t either—grown much more from that thumb suckling toddler when he left.

“My dad is coming home soon,” Sam confides in you on that day on that day on the beach. Him standing a few feet away from the shore line, and you; next to him.

“This isn’t how I wanted him to grow up,” his voice cracks with vulnerability. “I—I want him to have a better childhood than I did.”

“He will, Sam. He will.” I know you’ll make sure of it.

His eyes are red-rimmed and raw when he looks at you. All you wanted was to wipe that anguished expression off his face.)

He is silent. All is silent. Tranquility is like a honey thick syrup poured over your chest, smeared all over the expanse of your body. The soft sounds of your synchronized breathing is the only sound you can bear to hear. It makes your eyes droop, the lethargic feeling dulling your senses.

Your hand reaches for his, intertwining your palm with his long-fingered one. You relish in the familiar feeling of his calloused fingertips, earned from afternoons spent with his guitar. His skin is warm, warmer than yours. You give his hand a tentative squeeze, he squeezes back.

“Mom told me to say hi to you both for her,” he tells you, his breathing slow and deep. “She misses him, and you. She’s coming to visit as soon as she can.”

“Vince misses her too,” you sigh, craning your head forward to peek at the top of his head. “It's affecting him, I can tell. Penny's getting worried. She tells me he hasn’t been himself at school.”

All that Sam can manage is a deep intake of breath, then a softer resigned exhale. There isn’t much nor enough for him to say. Your free hand goes to smooth down his back. The muscles there are tough—bunched up and tense.

He shifts between your thighs, baring down heavier on your pelvis. Even as tired as he is, Sam is restless. Always has been, whether it be on his skateboard or with his guitar. You ignore the growing ache in your lower back—it is not your moment, but his. The warmth of his weight on top of you overpower any discomfort you have.

Twirling the stray curl at his neck, you finally ask. Fingers featherlight against his shoulder.  “How… is he?”

Sam stiffens above you, the lean line of his body rigid. He’s clearly distressed with talking about his father. You suck a breath through your teeth, knocking your leg gently against his, giving your silent push for him to continue.

“I can't even lie,” he squeezes his eyes shut and turns his face away. “It isn't good, Doc Harvey says dad’s got PTSD from the war. It's triggered by loud sounds. Remember the time he woke up because of the fire alarm?”

You nod, curling your fingers around his. You try to provide him any semblance of comfort—to reassure him. You love him, always. 

It's painful to see, to watch what he’s going through only by the sidelines. 

Sam looks up at you from your chest, eyes blurry with exhaustion. His jaw tensing ever so slightly, you see the patchy blonde stubble starting at the jut of his jaw. The wrinkle in his brow growing more prominent at the mention of his father. It's a fresh type of wound, raw and open. You dance around the topic, like poking a sleeping lion that threatens to attack at any given moment.

“We’ve transferred him to stay in my old room. He’s been holed up there most of the time. The nightmares are keeping mom up. He wakes up screaming most nights." Sam rasps, squeezing your fingers. He speaks lowly against the thin fabric of your sleep shirt, the heat of his body bleeding through it and into you. 

His voice dissolves into a pained crack when he speaks. “It sucks.”

“It will get better, we can get through it,” you sit up slightly, elbows bent behind you. Sam's been out the whole day. You assume he must be starving and tired. “Do you need anything?”

Sam doesn’t let you up, though. He tugs you back down under him with the gentle pull of his arm. You still in his arms, looking down at him.

“No,” he pleads. “just… stay with me, okay? Let's stay like this, please.”

You swallow, nodding. “Yes, of course.”

You wish you could ease his worries. You wish you could tell him that it’ll be alright and he would believe it.

You love him, more than life itself. Like you are a planet that orbits around him, the sun. You show him so everyday—and will continue to do so with everyday that will come. 

You just wish he’d be more selfish with you.

If he falls, you’ll piece him back together. Glue his bones together with your hands, relying on the familiarity of his being. Anything, you’d do anything.

The matching mermaid pendants resting over his and your collarbone symbolizes that.

“I want to help you, sam. You take all this burden up on your own. please?”

He sits up, back hunched over you. A dim shadow of him filtered over you. You follow him, like you can’t bear to be apart from him. 

“You are, you always have,” Sam softens, gazing at you so reverently you could sob. He looks at you as one gazes at master paintings, like he is in wordless awe of you. 

The room is dark with night. If you strain your ears hard enough, the cooing of the owls filter through the cracks of your windows. The moonlight is scarce, you can barely see the expressions painting his face. Though, you’re sure your expression is as lovesick as his. Practical hearts in your eyes as you stare.

“Looking after Vince is more than I could ever ask for, honey.” he whispers, pinching the hem of your sleep shirt between his thumb and pointer finger. 

“No Sam,” you murmur, taking his face into your hands. your hands frame his face, warming the cool skin of his cheeks. Desperation fills every movement in a plea for him to understand. “I meant you.”

You inhale, relishing the smell of sweat, mint and rubbing alcohol on his skin. The scent smells so comforting, and so familiar. 

You hope he finds that same solace in you as you do with him.

“I want to take care of you,” you say more firmly, stroking him on the skin of his brow bone. “Won’t you let me?”

He stares at you, enveloping your hands with warmer ones. You sigh contentedly at the feeling. They sear into your skin, warming you with the righteous heat of his devotion. 

To you, he is the sun and you have the sun right in the palm of your hands. You know he won’t ever burn you, nor leave your skin red and raw from his intensity. His rays are gentle, a featherlight whisper of a kiss on the expanse of your body.

But the sun never stops shining. It is steadfast in its duty to provide. You worry, will he explode in a grand supernova or crumple into a black hole? 

Either way, you will never allow it. You’d rather douse the sun in the water of the ocean to hold him in your arms. Maybe then, he can finally rest soundly. 

You feel his thumb rub back and forth on the back of your palm, silent and considering. The brush of it melting you against him like a contented cat. A smile graces your lips, you can wait.

Though you do not need to. Sam turns his head and kisses your wrist. His nose bumping into the crease of your thumb. You feel honeyed warmth drip down your heart, collecting in the cavern of your chest.

That's all the confirmation you need.

(There are some days his words fail him. The days his mind is bursting with ideas, so much so it’s difficult for him to convey a singular thought.

That's alright. Perfect, even. Sam has always been better at expressing himself through actions.)

“I love you,” you kiss his forehead, then over each of his eyelids. You want to kiss every inch of his skin until there is nothing left to cover. “so, so much.”

You press your lips to the corner of his. Opting to speak your promise against his skin, to tattoo your undying love into the smooth expanse of it. 

Sam tilts his head, causing his lips to brush completely against yours. He presses them firmer against yours, the taste of spearmint gum heavy on his tongue. You lick the seam of his lips—let me in, let me in. 

“I love you too. more than you know,” he gasps, tearing his lips away. His breath puffing warmly against the skin of your cheek. He declares it as if he’s running out of breath, and it is his final words. A willing sailor drowning in the deep ocean that is you. “More than anything, more than life itself.”

You press your forehead against his. Your eyes meet the depthless green of his. The twinkle is there; flickering and faint but present.

Love is what brought him to you. It’s what keeps bringing him home to you every night. You want to be his refuge, his comfort, his partner for life. 

Your eyes shut, eyelashes fluttering against your cheekbones. “Share the burden with me, Sammy. I can take it.”

At the end of the day, he is all you want. All that you need. If it takes him time, you won’t mind. even if it takes centuries.

Sam captures your lips again. Murmuring his agreement greedily against you. You love him, you love him and he loves you. 

You are the one he comes back to, his spouse. The greatest love of his life. Home isn’t the farmhouse you’ve built a life in—

It’s you, always has been you.

homecoming | sam x reader

word count: 3.2k

tags: hurt/comfort , family struggles , reader and sam are married , set somewhere in year 2 (kent is back) , oneshot , intimacy

synopsis: Sleep evades you on nights like these, without Sam by your side.

a/n: i love sam but the allure of angst is too hard to resist!!! sorry babe i still love you 😔

Sleep evades you on nights like these, without Sam by your side.

Your feet are bare as you linger at the entrance of your room. The dimmed light of the living room washes away the darkness of the hour. It's late, the air is cool and damp smelling of night dew—you take a deep inhale. It feels thick as you breathe it in, like smoke is clouding around the room, restricting your breaths.

Sleepless nights were not unusual in your household. Before you married Sam, you hardly slept—the satisfying ache of collapsing into your sheets after a day at the mines was an addiction you couldn’t get enough of. 

Now, you earn enough to afford coming home before sunset. No longer having to worry about how you’d afford the next day. And if you are being completely honest, evenings spent with Sam are far more addicting than the sting of a day’s work. 

The ache is still there. It comes with the profession. Though not anymore the dull humming ache in the muscles and joints of your arms and legs, but a bone deep ache settled deeply curling around your chest. 

Somehow, it stings even more.

It is as if it drags over your heart, catching on every ridge and edge of your bones. Daring to fill your lungs with ichor—hardening like stone around your ribs. No amount of stardrop you swallow can ever relieve the stinging soreness. 

The cushions of the old second-hand couch groan and squeak as you twist and turn atop of them. Perhaps as restless as you are. The light flickers—on, off, on. 

It doesn’t scare you, but it makes you uneasy. You’re long over the notion the farmhouse was haunted, but nights like these make that conviction waver. The nape of your neck prickles—like a person is staring from behind. Sam isn’t here to tease you about ghosts nor curl his arms around you in mock protection. 

He hasn’t been here in hours, hasn’t been present in so long. It feels wrong. It feels like an omen. Your fingers find the back of your neck, brushing over the vulnerable skin. 

You hold a tassel cushion tightly to your chest. Your knuckles whitening with the strength of your grip on it. The strength of your heartbeat is so loud you’re convinced it would be heard without the pillow to muffle the sound. 

Little Vincent is sound asleep, snoring softly away in his dreamland. He looks like the epitome of innocence under the quilted blankets of your bed. It's soft, worn and covered in stitched cartoon-y lions and tigers. A temporary parting gift bundled up in his dinosaur backpack from jodi. Before he came to live with you and his older brother. 

The separation was painful. there were tears—for both him and for his mother. 

(Sam stood next to you then, gripping at your hand so hard you felt it prickling with numbness. You didn’t dare look up to see the tears you know are there, the crystalline tears dripping down his lash line. 

It would’ve made the teardrops in yours fall over too. You’d stay strong for the both of you.)

The entrance door to the farmhouse creaks open and you immediately know it’s him. Relief floods your whole body—to your fingertips to your toes. He's safe, and home at last. You stand up and hurry to him, throwing the pillow to the ground, before the door creaks shut.

The air goes still, calm before the storm. The anticipation before potential terrible news.

(You expect there will be. You can tell by the way Sam slumps, like the weight is physically bearing down on his shoulders.)

Sam is still at the doorway, slumping over you when you wrap your arms around him. He smells of sweat and the cloying scent of rubbing alcohol—something must’ve happened, you think. It smells like the clinic.

The paper bag in his hand loses from his grip, it falls unceremoniously to the ground with a dull thump. You pay it no heed, mentally accounting to pick it up later. Though you note that it lands right over your ‘home sweet home’ doormat. Fitting.  

“Sammy.” you greet him with a chaste peck on the cheek. He barely has the energy to hug back, more so stay steadily upright on his feet. you both sway slightly, suspended in the tranquility of the moment.

You try again, slowing the movement of your lips. “Welcome home, my love. you there?”

His lips move against the skin of your neck, a whisper of a greeting. It is enough for you.

Sam retracts his face from your jaw. There are blue-purple eye bags under his eyes, like bruises. The trademark twinkle in his brilliant green irises have dulled to nothingness. He looks so unlike himself like this, older than his years and so unbearably tired.

And you wish, with all your heart, to take his aches away. To wash them away like ink in water. 

You pull him into the living room with you, the skin of his wrist enclosed in the firm guiding grip of your fingers. He's fragile like this, this sunshine of a man reduced to a shell of his usual demeanor. 

He trails slowly behind you, silent. You say nothing, either; choosing to focus on the rhythmic sounds of your footsteps padding against the floor. In the living room, you dim the lights to a mere whisper of light. 

These days, when he comes home, you’ve built some sort of routine.

You drag him down to you, spread lying down on the length of the couch. Your thighs frame his hips as he melts into the warmth of body. He lays on top of you, his cheekbone against your chest. You watch as his eyes flutter shut, as he presses his ear to the epicenter of your chest—the sound of your heartbeat quieting the swirl of thoughts in his mind. 

You gently remove the woolen beanie nestled on his head—revealing the stringy oily mess of hair under. A sign of how little care he has been sparing himself after his father’s homecoming. You feel your lips downturn into a frown. He hasn’t even been using that hair gel you like to tease and groan about. 

(You lied when you’d say you hated it. You don’t, never did. 

You miss it. You miss the things that make him, him.)

You don’t hesitate in running your hands through the softness of his hair. Your fingers scratch gently on his scalp, eliciting a soft sigh from your weary husband. Eyes watch raptly as his shoulders unwind and ripple. The tension in them melts away with the deft caress of your hands.

Your heart squeezes painfully in your chest. Like a knife twisting. You love him, you love him.

Moments pass, the silence is almost comfortable when you ask, speaking it to the silence of the room. There’s a wavering lilt in your voice reassuring him. You aren’t going to push him for an answer. He doesn’t need to respond. Him being safe, home and warm in your arms is all you ever want. All you’ll ever need.

“How are they?” 

(The first night, you and Sam stayed the night in his family home. squeezed in his twin bed with Vincent curled up by his ribs. The little boy couldn’t bear sleeping alone that night, not with the anxiety of his father being back making him pace a mile a minute.

The air in the household had shifted that day.

In the dead of the night, the fire alarm went off—a blaring loud beeping sound from the kitchen. Totally harmless, a malfunction. A disturbance to sleep more than anything.

Except it was not.

You still remember the blood-curdling scream that came from Jodi and Kent's room. The panicked sobs of Jodi as she tried to calm her terror stricken husband. 

You remember the way Vincent clung onto you, like a koala to a tree. You cupped your hands tightly over his ears—he didn’t need to suffer the consequence of it.

Sam removed the fire alarm and Vincent from the house the next morning.)

His voice is hushed when he speaks. A pin could drop and be more clearly heard. “Mom's… getting better.” 

Not getting worse than she already is.

You plant a kiss on the crown of his head, lips soft and adoring on his skin. You ache to take his burden, to take his share of suffering. 

It hurts sometimes, to be right beside him but feel so faraway. Yet like this, feeling every curve and edge of his body—you can convince yourself that it doesn’t.  

“Is Vince asleep?”

“Yes,” you reply, tucking a blond curl behind his ear. His head unconsciously tilts to the room where his younger brother rests. Ever so protective of him even like this. 

Continuing you say, “He was looking for you,” you thread your fingers through the short blond strands at his neck. Sam untenses slightly in your arms, his arms going limp at your sides. “He's been fidgety lately. Restless.”

“He usually is.” his feeble attempt at a joke. Though the rasp in his voice only makes it sound resigned. You purse your lips, eyes tracking back to the cedar wood of your bedroom door on the other side of the room—and the sleeping child behind it.

You stroke Sam's hair, thinking. “More so than usual.”

(You know why. He knows too. Kent wasn’t the same when he returned from the war. He was vulnerable, not the fragile type but vulnerable in the way a ignited bomb threatened an explosion.

Vincent wasn’t either—grown much more from that thumb suckling toddler when he left.

“My dad is coming home soon,” Sam confides in you on that day on that day on the beach. Him standing a few feet away from the shore line, and you; next to him.

“This isn’t how I wanted him to grow up,” his voice cracks with vulnerability. “I—I want him to have a better childhood than I did.”

“He will, Sam. He will.” I know you’ll make sure of it.

His eyes are red-rimmed and raw when he looks at you. All you wanted was to wipe that anguished expression off his face.)

He is silent. All is silent. Tranquility is like a honey thick syrup poured over your chest, smeared all over the expanse of your body. The soft sounds of your synchronized breathing is the only sound you can bear to hear. It makes your eyes droop, the lethargic feeling dulling your senses.

Your hand reaches for his, intertwining your palm with his long-fingered one. You relish in the familiar feeling of his calloused fingertips, earned from afternoons spent with his guitar. His skin is warm, warmer than yours. You give his hand a tentative squeeze, he squeezes back.

“Mom told me to say hi to you both for her,” he tells you, his breathing slow and deep. “She misses him, and you. She’s coming to visit as soon as she can.”

“Vince misses her too,” you sigh, craning your head forward to peek at the top of his head. “It's affecting him, I can tell. Penny's getting worried. She tells me he hasn’t been himself at school.”

All that Sam can manage is a deep intake of breath, then a softer resigned exhale. There isn’t much nor enough for him to say. Your free hand goes to smooth down his back. The muscles there are tough—bunched up and tense.

He shifts between your thighs, baring down heavier on your pelvis. Even as tired as he is, Sam is restless. Always has been, whether it be on his skateboard or with his guitar. You ignore the growing ache in your lower back—it is not your moment, but his. The warmth of his weight on top of you overpower any discomfort you have.

Twirling the stray curl at his neck, you finally ask. Fingers featherlight against his shoulder.  “How… is he?”

Sam stiffens above you, the lean line of his body rigid. He’s clearly distressed with talking about his father. You suck a breath through your teeth, knocking your leg gently against his, giving your silent push for him to continue.

“I can't even lie,” he squeezes his eyes shut and turns his face away. “It isn't good, Doc Harvey says dad’s got PTSD from the war. It's triggered by loud sounds. Remember the time he woke up because of the fire alarm?”

You nod, curling your fingers around his. You try to provide him any semblance of comfort—to reassure him. You love him, always. 

It's painful to see, to watch what he’s going through only by the sidelines. 

Sam looks up at you from your chest, eyes blurry with exhaustion. His jaw tensing ever so slightly, you see the patchy blonde stubble starting at the jut of his jaw. The wrinkle in his brow growing more prominent at the mention of his father. It's a fresh type of wound, raw and open. You dance around the topic, like poking a sleeping lion that threatens to attack at any given moment.

“We’ve transferred him to stay in my old room. He’s been holed up there most of the time. The nightmares are keeping mom up. He wakes up screaming most nights." Sam rasps, squeezing your fingers. He speaks lowly against the thin fabric of your sleep shirt, the heat of his body bleeding through it and into you. 

His voice dissolves into a pained crack when he speaks. “It sucks.”

“It will get better, we can get through it,” you sit up slightly, elbows bent behind you. Sam's been out the whole day. You assume he must be starving and tired. “Do you need anything?”

Sam doesn’t let you up, though. He tugs you back down under him with the gentle pull of his arm. You still in his arms, looking down at him.

“No,” he pleads. “just… stay with me, okay? Let's stay like this, please.”

You swallow, nodding. “Yes, of course.”

You wish you could ease his worries. You wish you could tell him that it’ll be alright and he would believe it.

You love him, more than life itself. Like you are a planet that orbits around him, the sun. You show him so everyday—and will continue to do so with everyday that will come. 

You just wish he’d be more selfish with you.

If he falls, you’ll piece him back together. Glue his bones together with your hands, relying on the familiarity of his being. Anything, you’d do anything.

The matching mermaid pendants resting over his and your collarbone symbolizes that.

“I want to help you, sam. You take all this burden up on your own. please?”

He sits up, back hunched over you. A dim shadow of him filtered over you. You follow him, like you can’t bear to be apart from him. 

“You are, you always have,” Sam softens, gazing at you so reverently you could sob. He looks at you as one gazes at master paintings, like he is in wordless awe of you. 

The room is dark with night. If you strain your ears hard enough, the cooing of the owls filter through the cracks of your windows. The moonlight is scarce, you can barely see the expressions painting his face. Though, you’re sure your expression is as lovesick as his. Practical hearts in your eyes as you stare.

“Looking after Vince is more than I could ever ask for, honey.” he whispers, pinching the hem of your sleep shirt between his thumb and pointer finger. 

“No Sam,” you murmur, taking his face into your hands. your hands frame his face, warming the cool skin of his cheeks. Desperation fills every movement in a plea for him to understand. “I meant you.”

You inhale, relishing the smell of sweat, mint and rubbing alcohol on his skin. The scent smells so comforting, and so familiar. 

You hope he finds that same solace in you as you do with him.

“I want to take care of you,” you say more firmly, stroking him on the skin of his brow bone. “Won’t you let me?”

He stares at you, enveloping your hands with warmer ones. You sigh contentedly at the feeling. They sear into your skin, warming you with the righteous heat of his devotion. 

To you, he is the sun and you have the sun right in the palm of your hands. You know he won’t ever burn you, nor leave your skin red and raw from his intensity. His rays are gentle, a featherlight whisper of a kiss on the expanse of your body.

But the sun never stops shining. It is steadfast in its duty to provide. You worry, will he explode in a grand supernova or crumple into a black hole? 

Either way, you will never allow it. You’d rather douse the sun in the water of the ocean to hold him in your arms. Maybe then, he can finally rest soundly. 

You feel his thumb rub back and forth on the back of your palm, silent and considering. The brush of it melting you against him like a contented cat. A smile graces your lips, you can wait.

Though you do not need to. Sam turns his head and kisses your wrist. His nose bumping into the crease of your thumb. You feel honeyed warmth drip down your heart, collecting in the cavern of your chest.

That's all the confirmation you need.

(There are some days his words fail him. The days his mind is bursting with ideas, so much so it’s difficult for him to convey a singular thought.

That's alright. Perfect, even. Sam has always been better at expressing himself through actions.)

“I love you,” you kiss his forehead, then over each of his eyelids. You want to kiss every inch of his skin until there is nothing left to cover. “so, so much.”

You press your lips to the corner of his. Opting to speak your promise against his skin, to tattoo your undying love into the smooth expanse of it. 

Sam tilts his head, causing his lips to brush completely against yours. He presses them firmer against yours, the taste of spearmint gum heavy on his tongue. You lick the seam of his lips—let me in, let me in. 

“I love you too. more than you know,” he gasps, tearing his lips away. His breath puffing warmly against the skin of your cheek. He declares it as if he’s running out of breath, and it is his final words. A willing sailor drowning in the deep ocean that is you. “More than anything, more than life itself.”

You press your forehead against his. Your eyes meet the depthless green of his. The twinkle is there; flickering and faint but present.

Love is what brought him to you. It’s what keeps bringing him home to you every night. You want to be his refuge, his comfort, his partner for life. 

Your eyes shut, eyelashes fluttering against your cheekbones. “Share the burden with me, Sammy. I can take it.”

At the end of the day, he is all you want. All that you need. If it takes him time, you won’t mind. even if it takes centuries.

Sam captures your lips again. Murmuring his agreement greedily against you. You love him, you love him and he loves you. 

You are the one he comes back to, his spouse. The greatest love of his life. Home isn’t the farmhouse you’ve built a life in—

It’s you, always has been you.

long time, no see…. i’m in the final stretch of school now and am up to my NECK with schoolwork 😔

sam fic coming out soon tho! careful with this one, its angsty!!

done with Sam! enjoy this golden retriever :)

8:05 | SAM

word count: 3.2k

summary: sam’s ten heart event with a twist.

tags: winter, developing relationships, fluff, swearing, cuddling, hiding from his mother in his bed lol

a/n: this spiralled out of my control and into 3k words… enjoy!

it’s cold.

the fleece coat you’ve bundled yourself in cannot protect goosebumps from forming from the biting chill of the valley’s winter nights. your breaths come out in cloudy puffs of air, the heat slowly draining out of every exhale. it’s dark out, poorly spaced lampposts providing the bare minimum amount of light to navigate.

you got sam’s letter earlier, a clumsily written note that was stuffed haphazardly into your farm’s mailbox—the yellow lined paper he used, all crumpled and ripped.

meet me in front of my house! at 8 pm, i’ll be waiting. there’s something i want to tell you.

the ending sentence is somehow even more sloppily written compared to the ones before it. as if he was debating whether or not to add it in, but ultimately decided for it—it’s funny to imagine him hunched over his desk, stressing over what to write to you.

well, you won’t deny feeling excitement over the possibility of whatever sam has to say. if the subtle skip in your step is anything to go by.

you walk through the silent night of the town, it seems like everything’s frozen in place during the colder times of the year—everyone’s safe at home, toasty under their covers and you’d imagine thoroughly enjoying going to bed at 7 pm.

you do too, sometimes. there’s less to do when the ground is too frozen to plant any crop.

there’s a lot more free time out of the farm during the winter. you’ve really started integrating yourself with the townspeople—helping haley find her bracelet, befriending sam’s prickly coworker shane, and even discovering a shadowperson named Krobus in the town sewers. it really is starting to feel like home.

walking, you cut the corner passing by emily and haley’s house—and there he is.

he looks devastatingly handsome all dressed in winter clothing. his regular denim jacket switched out for a dark woolen coat, his pants are unripped and, surprisingly, not smeared with dirt.

though what you like most about his winter attire is his hair. those wild golden locks are laid flat under a woolen beanie—a stark difference from the spiked updo he usually does (though you like that one too). the tips of his hair are slightly curled upwards, revealing that family trait of curly hair.

you creep closer, just watching him wait for you—the way he folds his arms in an attempt to warm up, and the little shuffle he does on his feet. you laugh softly, he must’ve been waiting a while—just like you have for him.

sam turns at the sound of your laugh, his body unconsciously tilting towards you, like a magnet’s uncontrollable attracting to metal. “you made it,” he breathes, his nose, ears and cheeks pinkened by the cold.

you nod, unable to stop a bashful smile from forming on your lips. “i made it.”

a big grin splits his face, mimicking yours. underneath the lone lamplight he looks jaw-droppingly handsome. you feel yourself become warm just in proximity to him.

“i wanted to talk to you in private,” he says. sam’s buzzing with energy, surveying the dark streets before meeting your gaze with his. “it’s kinda cold out here though… i, um—i can sneak you into my room…”

your heart skips a beat, like you’ve skipped a step on a staircase. “what?” you croak.

your eyes catch onto him wringing his fingers, a nervous habit you can’t help but always notice (not because his hands are nice and interesting to look at, not at all).

“you don’t wanna?”

“no!” you inhale, trying to alleviate the twisting sensation in your gut. “i do wanna, ahem, lead the way.”

sam smiles at you, dimples and all. he leads you towards the tiny bedroom window in front of his house. the window is already open—you assume that’s where he jumped out of to meet you.

he climbs through the window with minimal effort, landing on the flooring with a dull thump!

you raise a brow. “have you done this before?”

sam stretches his hand out to you, waiting. his smile turnt sheepish. “i mean, i think we were all rebellious teenagers once.”

you resist the urge to snort—sam’s nervous, you can tell. he doesn’t have his quips and jokes tonight. and he’s shy, but eager. like a puppy, excited and curious about the world.

“o-kay,” you say, one hand in his hand the other set firmly on the windowsill. “make sure i don’t fall please.”

sam nods, eagerly. the curled ends of his hair shake along with the motion as he does.

how endearing.

you tighten your grip on his hand, hauling yourself through the small window, trying your damn best to not make any sudden noise. which is successful for the most part, only a tiny huff of exertion escapes you.

annoying, yes. but the chill of winter burns through any energy you have faster than other seasons.

your feet connect with the wood of his floor, hand still clasped in his and the chill merely at your back. it’s warm inside, with him.

his room is the same as it’s always been when you’d visit before—shelves, band equipment, posters—but the ambiance is different. a little more charged with tension so thick you could cut through it with a knife.

sam does not bother turning on his light, you don’t mind it all that much. but it takes some effort to avoid tumbling over stray objects that clutter his bedroom floor.

“look, I know I’ve been about nothing but the band for a while now…” he starts. “but I don’t want you to think that’s all i’m interested in.”

you chuckle, clasping your fingers behind your back. “it certainly takes up a big chunk of your interests.”

he pouts, literally pouts. it must be the love bug you caught because you think it’s just plain adorable. “i’m really trying over here!”

“sorry!” you grin, “okay, continue.”

“well, um… shoot, this is kinda hard, huh?” he forces an awkward chuckle. “and nerve-wrecking… but what i’m trying to say is…”

“i’m really happy that we’ve grown this close, and well…” sam looks at you, he’s stupidly red—the color spreading all over his face. “i—i’m just wondering, do you think of me as… just a friend?”

your breath stutters, and you feel yourself blushing before you can do anything to stop it. you stare at him as he does with you. the two of you locking eyes for a second, it feels like it’s just you and him in the world.

you feel your shy admittance at the tip of your tongue. no, you’d say, you’re more than that for me, if you want to be.

sam smiles at you, shy but so, so overwhelmingly bright—it’s blinding. your head is running a mile a minute when you finally get the courage—

“sam!” you hear jodi’s groggy voice from outside the door. your stomach drops with dread. “somebody’s at the door! go and check please?”

you lock eyes once again, this time for entirely different reasons, and with entirely different feelings.

“oh my god, sam,” you whisper hurriedly, panic gripping you. “your mom doesn’t know i’m here—what do we do—”

“hold on—” he replies, with the same sense of urgency as you. “okay, okay—i have a plan, just trust me, ‘kay?”

you think you might break out into a cold sweat. you look at him quizzically, “what?”

sam gives you an apologetic smile with that stupid beautiful face of his, he moves forward, grabbing you by your wrists, and moving you with him—towards his bed.

“sam!” you hiss, alarms are blaring in every corner of your mind as sam all but drags you under the toasty covers of his bed. he lifts the blanket and stations you by the edge, covering you in the blanket—which is now a lumpy mess.

this is his childhood bed you’re in, where his mother and brother are just by the door.

and his mother is calling him.

“i’ll get this over with quick,” he says to you, already heading towards the door of his room. “hang on tight, ‘kay?”

you breathe a sound of agreement, way too jittery to formulate any proper response as you quieten under the covers.

though the sheets do feel nice, and smells overwhelmingly of that specific cologne he uses (stolen from joja inventory, he told you once). you will yourself not to relax and melt into the sheets so fast. instead, you listen for each and every sound that may give hint to whatever the hell is happening.

there’s a commotion that you can hear happening, the door swings open, the hinges creaking along with it—this whole surreal experience feels a little like the confrontation part of a horror movie, the helpless victim hiding and the heavy footfalls of the killer.

though in your case, it’s not one set of footsteps, but two.

“what are you two doing here?”

“you’re the one who called us over, remember?” you can recognize the band’s shut-in pianist’s voice from anywhere. “you were all like, stop skipping practice, seb.”

sam’s voice is oddly pitchy when he responds. “…well, tonight’s no good!”

you hear the other person huff, you strain your ears harder to listen. the huffing person clearly fed up with the strange behavior sam’s putting out right now.

“my mom and vincent are asleep,” he adds hurriedly. “they’d wake up—”

you resist the urge to groan, stifling your mouth under a sweaty palm. jodie was just speaking to him minutes ago, there’s no way they’d buy that. he cannot be a more obvious liar.

thankfully they gloss over the fact. “sam, why are you acting so damn weird?” sebastian asks, straightforward as ever.

“yeah,” the other voice adds. feminine but strong. which you now identify as abigail’s, you hear a pinch of impatience in her voice. “and why are you red? did you sit outside in the snow or something—”

sam chokes, which he tries to conceal as an odd sounding cough. abigail pauses mid-sentence. the shift in the atmosphere is palpable. you screw your eyes shut, hearing the rapid rate of your heartbeat. it’s so loud you’re almost convinced the trio can hear the thumping from your hiding spot under the sheets. this is it, they’re going to discover you.

“oh, oh i see,” abigail grins. “on second thought, i wouldn't risk catching all those germs. i’m feeling starved, let’s hit the saloon, seb.”

the aforementioned man grumbles, seemingly puzzled by the sudden switch in abigail’s attitude. “huh… why?” abigail must have whispered something to him—you can barely hear over the muffle of sam’s blanket comforters. “ugh, alright. fine. you owe us one, sam.”

“oh, of course! mhm, yup,” you cringe at the immense awkwardness of sam’s response, feeling the overwhelming urge to pull out your own hair. “i’ll see you guys tomorrow, yeah? now shoo! wouldn’t wanna get you both sick or somethin’…”

“huh?” sebastian replies, rightfully puzzled as they’re forcefully pushed out of the room. “why would we see you tomorrow if you’re sick—”

“well seb,” abigail says smugly. “let’s just say sammy here is taking care of some important business—”

“okay, bye!” you hear the door click shut. to your utter bewilderment, sam shut the door in their faces.

the room is deathly quiet, the air is stagnant and stuffy. once you feel it safe enough, you crane your neck out of the blankets to check over him. to trace any lingering feeling the sudden visit might’ve given him. sam’s got his back rested against the wood of his door, his back slumped.

“i—i wasn’t expecting that,” you say quietly from your hiding spot on his bed. peeking the top half of your face, watching the door carefully. “kinda nerve-wracking.”

and embarrassing.

“i know—i’m sorry,” he sighs, rubbing his temples. “i didn’t expect them coming over.”

“sebastian said you invited them for practice, though.” you point out.

“maybe i did,” he admits, creeping closer to you on the bed, even if he’s guilty and embarrassed. “i totally forgot—i mean, i was really nervous! my mind blanks when i get nervous…”

sam stops right by the side of the bed, as if he’s waiting for your permission to get in with you—in his own bed. and to be perfectly honest, you really want him to.

“kinda ruined the atmosphere too,” he looks away from you, eyes downcast and melancholy. “i had this whole thing planned too, and i, just… ugh…”

your eyes soften. “sam, it’s really fine. okay, maybe a little shocking but you know it’s not enough to scare me away.”

he looks down at you, worried. his eyebrows are ever so slightly pinched—you wish you could run your fingers over it, and smooth it out yourself.

“plus,” you murmur, reaching over the small amount of space between the two of you to clasp his wrist. “i’m not just gonna leave… just tell me what you were going to say—before the… interruption.”

that gives you the final push to gather your courage to tug him into bed with you. sam follows, flopping onto the empty bedding next to you without a fight. for a moment, it’s just the two of you, side by side, slowly huddling closer and closer for warmth.

and sam is warm. he’s practically radiating comfy heat you wish to burrow into—or wrap yourself around. the perfect bed-partner for winter nights like these.

you find yourself becoming addicted to the feeling.

sam angles his body towards you. you on your back and him on his side, it feels intimate and special. and for some reason, it feels familiar—like you’ve always belonged by his side.

“i think you know already,” he tells you, his eyes are not clear in the dim light but you know, there are practically hearts in them. “that i like you.”

you giggle softly. “and i think you know the same about me.”

sam tentatively grasps your hand, the freezing fingertips thawing under his careful touch. the caress of his hand on yours sends tingling electricity down your spine, your whole body feels alert—alive.

he speaks again, but this time his tone is a whisper of what it usually is. “stay awhile?”

“yeah,” you swallow, squeezing his hand in your grip. a small smile on your lips. “yes, i want to.”

“good,” he smiles, his eyes crinkle at the edges so softly and the dimples on his cheeks deepen. there really is no one else who can compare for you. “hey, you’re really cold… let me warm you up?”

you turn to your side, facing him. at this angle, your faces are mere inches apart. you can trace every dip, line and curve of his face, and he yours. your hand tingles with the overwhelming urge to reach for him and squeeze.

“it is cold,” you agree. “i’d very much like that.”

“phew,” he softly sighs. sam drags his fingers up your arm, stopping at your elbow. wherever he touches, a whisper of him lingers on your skin—a bone deep imprint you yearn for him to spread all across your skin.

you roll into him with little to no effort at all. sam drags you to his chest, your ear perched right above his heart, you can hear the steady thump! of his heartbeat from underneath. sam winds his arms around you, intensifying the heat you feel by tenfold—it’s not uncomfortable at all, though. you like it.

your bodies fit perfectly together, just like puzzle pieces. a mess of limbs tangling together. the warmth of him making you shudder in honey-like delight. it feels syrupy and soft and warm wrapped in his arms.

his hand at your back travels downwards, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake you feel even through the thickness of the fabric separating the skin of your back and his fingertips. his hands feel rough and calloused at the small of your back—from playing guitar and his skateboarding incidents—but you enjoy the feeling.

you trail your fingers under the thick fabric of his jacket and shirt, feeling the smooth skin underneath—the action has no deeper meaning than you wanting to feel.

sam’s uncharacteristically quiet. his breaths are slow and long, like he’s on the verge of sleep. yet his arms are wound tight around you—like he never wants to let go of you. your nerves make you feel like a slow simmering soup. warm and slowly cooking over the fire.

you two stay entangled for a while, in comfortable silence. sometime during the night you’ve matched your breathing to his, and he pulled you somehow even closer to his body.

but, a thump comes from his window, a light tapping sound. soft but persistent. the two of you opt to ignore it, in favor of snuggling closer to each other. yet the taps continue, and become louder and faster.

disrupted by the noise, sam mournfully throws the covers from over him to check, untangling himself from your grip. leaving a very him-shaped indent on the bed left in his wake. you groan, sticking your bottom lip out, you miss the warmth of him already.

“oh shit.”

the expletive makes you sit up in his bed, the comforter draping off your middle. you can make out the shape of him even with the dimness of the light—sam’s back is towards you, and if your eyes dare deceive you, he looks like he’s shrinking into himself a tiny bit.

“what is it?” you whisper-shout to him.

he slowly turns to you, wide eyed, his shoulders stiff. sort of resembling a kicked-dog. sam bows down his head—with what you think is shame, for what reason, you can’t tell. rubbing your eyes of sleep, you furrow your brow, craning your neck to look out the window behind him.

abigail and sebastian are there, waving wildly at you. your eyes widen. abigail and sebastian are waving at you with smug smiles plastered on their faces.

your stomach drops for the umpteenth time that night. you honestly feel too horrified to speak.

you bury yourself under the sheets, a feeble attempt to conceal your mortification. so that’s why abigail was playing along with sam’s urgent ramblings—she knew (not that sam was any good at keeping a cool facade, he is totally incapable of lying smoothly). you groan, you feel like a rebellious teenager again, only the part where you get caught and utterly humiliated.

outside, you can hear the loud roaring laughter of the duo through the glass, alongside the awkward, embarrassed chatter of your newly-minted boyfriend. (not technically official, but the title succeeds to relieve your horror by the tiniest bit)

still, you stay put. through the mortification and embarrassment you still stick yourself to sam’s side, or more literally, on his bed—because you know, there’s no other place you’d rather be.

you spare another glance out of the covers at the trio—to your surprise, sam’s beat you to it. looking at you with heart eyes and the most lovesick expression (you’re pretty sure yours looks the same).

you know there’s going to be a lot more explaining to do in the morning. but it doesn’t matter to you, not right now when you’re in sam’s bed on the verge of sleep.

not when you feel so warm.

a/n: shoutout to the ass trio for making an appearance in the fic! i love you abby and seb.

first post :)

Sebastian likes frogs. Emphasis on the word likes.

He appreciates them, they do good for the environment. They eat up all the nasty flies that buzz around the mountain lake, too. He doesn’t have to worry about mosquitos snaking on his blood while he smokes. It’s just a plus that he finds them cool and interesting.

Which most people find weird. Sebastian thinks it’s weird that they find it weird. Frogs aren’t going out of their way to bother people.

Yes, he likes them. They’re his favorite animal, certainly.

But favorite is not enough for him to want to smooch a frog.

“Sam, I’m not gonna fucking kiss a frog.”

“C’mon! It’ll be like the movie!” Sam teases, insistently shoving Sebastian to the frog innocently sitting on a park bench. “Who knows, maybe it’ll be your very own froggy princess—”

“Didn’t the girl turn into a frog when she kissed it,” he shoots back, elbowing Sam backwards in the gut. The blond lets out an overdramatic hiss of pain, bent over and clutching his stomach. “Abby, back me up here.”

“I never watched that stuff,” Abigail shrugs, watching with amusement. She makes no move to help at all, comfortably resting against the wide wooden posts of a fence. “Watched a lotta cartoons though. Phineas and Ferb is my jam.”

“Not about the movie,” Sebastian grits exasperatedly. His brows knitting together in frustration “The frog.”

“Mhm, go on,” a cheshire-like grin on her face. “Kiss it, Seb. A big smooch right on its slimy mouth.”

Sam eggs him on, the pain of being elbowed magically disappearing. “Do it! Do it!”

Sebastian presses his lips tightly together. There’s no use resisting once Abby and Sam band together. They’re a force to be reckoned with like this—demanding and overbearing. Sebastian exasperatedly wipes a hand over his face, shooting the poor frog a sorry look.

Sam pushes him one more time, he gives him a stony glare in return. “Fuck—alright! Stop being so damn loud, you’ll scare it away.”

The frog in question croaks slightly, like it senses the trio talking about it. He gives it a wary glance.

As he slowly approaches, Sebastian can hear Abby and Sam’s satisfied sniggering behind him. They roped him into doing another stupidly outrageous thing for the umpteenth time.

He sighs, he really needs better friends.

Mustering up all his courage, he bends down, almost eye level with the frog, resting a hand on the wooden grain bench on where it’s perched upon.

He screws his eyes shut and goes for it.

Sebastian’s lips connect with the frog’s slimy, almost rough skin. So fast and featherlight that it can barely be considered a kiss. Cold against his lips. He pulls back immediately after, wiping any residue off his lips with the back of his hand.

The frog jumps, croaking with,what he assumes is, alarm.

“See?” Abby laughs, ruffling his hair good-naturedly. “No princess in sight. You didn’t turn into a frog either!”

“Man,” Sam snickers, patting him roughly on the back. Sebastian groans with every smack. “It would’ve been cool though, if you turned into a frog. We’d have a frog drummer in our band!”

Sebastian shoves his unruly friends off. “Yeah, whatever. Let’s get going. The frog is probably traumatized.”

“You can check that off your bucket list,” Abby teases, a smirk playing on her lips. “Kiss a frog before I die. We’ll tell the story for generations.”

Sam howls with laughter, Sebastian feels absolutely mortified.

Before the trio could make any move out of the park, a cloud of green smoke curtains the frog, so thick and so unusual. Sebastian unconsciously backs away from it.

“What—woah,” Sam says, more mezmerised than shocked at the green smoke pouring out of the frog Sebastian kissed. “What is that?”

“The fuck if we know, Sam!”

“Boys, boys, shut the fuck up. Look.”

Abigail points at the fog. It grows and grows, stopping and dissipating once the whole bench is covered with the green mist.

The frog is gone—disappeared into thin air. Instead, a not-so-frog shaped person sits. You blink up at Sebastian slowly.

Woah, woah.

He feels his heart accelerating—for all the wrong reasons. An unusual thumping sound that vibrates all throughout his body—his fingertips, his stomach, his toes. Where there should be fear and panic and definitely fear, Sebastian feels exhilaration.

You’re pretty.

It’s also pretty horrifying for him to think—and feel.

You blink slowly—a frog-like trait that cement his suspicions. You’re staring up at him as he stares back down at you, curious meets bewildered. “…”

His eyes are wide, scanning each and every part of your now not frog-like features. Sebastian feels cold sweat dripping down his forehead—a stark temperature difference to the heat in his cheeks. “Oh—oh shit.”

“Uhm… ribbit?”

-

Another thing he blames on Sam and Abby—his horrifying attraction you; the person, not the frog.

He checks that off his metaphorical bucket list, too.

moonlight jellies

22:00.

Standing on the dock, the light breeze of the summer's end ruffled my few loose hairs. I'd traded my straw hat and red t-shirt for my bucket hat and bomber jacket, the only nice pieces of clothing I owned. I want to believe I dressed up for myself or for the occasion, but it wasn't true. I wanted to look good for him, even as I refused to admit it.

The candles floated along the dock like the yellowed leaves that would soon make their appearance. It was a romantic setting. I almost blushed. I took the opportunity to greet everyone, hesitating a little when I reached their group. The three were always together and tonight they were joined by his younger brother, too. Of course I spoke to him last, I had to feel prepared. But I was beginning to realize that I would never really be prepared to talk to him.

"Do you think they're poisonous?" he mused. He didn't take notice of the outfit I'd curated for him that night, but I admired his curiosity. He held onto a childlike wonder, which was probably one of the many reasons he got along with Vincent so well. It was charming. I wouldn't want to test out that theory, I thought. There was never much I wanted to say in these interactions and I didn't want to trip over my words, so I rarely offered more than a hmm in return. Sam didn't seem bothered by this, which made me think we could make a good team. "Guess I shouldn't push Sebastian in the water, then," he laughed.

Soon it was time to light and release the boat. I quietly walked to the other end of the dock for a better view. I liked Sam, but I liked to experience these things alone, too. We all waited in anticipation as the Mayor released the lighted boat. For a moment nothing happened, and then, the first jellyfish floated close to me, so close that it almost touched my feet. I felt the light illuminating my face, and from across the dock I could see him facing me. Looking. Staring? I couldn't make eye contact, but it felt nice to be observed by him. When the other jellies surrounded the dock, I took a peek in his direction only to find him still eying me. Then, a green hue illuminated the spot a little to my left -- a rare green jellyfish. To say it was shocking was an understatement. The gentle contrast of colours had me mesmerised. I could see my reflection in it, and I looked awestruck. It seemed that no one else saw this rare jelly, which made me feel simultaneously special and sad.

The others began to set off for their homes after the last jellyfish had passed far beyond the dock. I stayed behind and stared at the ocean that had turned black with the lack of light. I looked at the reflection of the moon inside it, the contrast between its light and the darkness of the waves. There were few moments like this one in which I experienced peace. But the peace quickly faded when I felt a hand against my shoulder.

"Looks like the green one liked you!" he giggled, somewhat startling me. I chuckled in agreement. I was surprised that someone else had caught sight of that jellyfish, but it made me happy to know that he had.

"It's late. You going home, right?" I nodded at his question. I turned to leave in his direction only to find that he'd already run off to catch up with Abigail and Sebastian. Why did I think he planned to walk with me? But, was I wrong? Why else would he come and talk to me?

I guess we both behaved awkwardly at times.

8:05 | SAM

word count: 3.2k

summary: sam’s ten heart event with a twist.

tags: winter, developing relationships, fluff, swearing, cuddling, hiding from his mother in his bed lol

a/n: this spiralled out of my control and into 3k words… enjoy!

it’s cold.

the fleece coat you’ve bundled yourself in cannot protect goosebumps from forming from the biting chill of the valley’s winter nights. your breaths come out in cloudy puffs of air, the heat slowly draining out of every exhale. it’s dark out, poorly spaced lampposts providing the bare minimum amount of light to navigate.

you got sam’s letter earlier, a clumsily written note that was stuffed haphazardly into your farm’s mailbox—the yellow lined paper he used, all crumpled and ripped.

meet me in front of my house! at 8 pm, i’ll be waiting. there’s something i want to tell you.

the ending sentence is somehow even more sloppily written compared to the ones before it. as if he was debating whether or not to add it in, but ultimately decided for it—it’s funny to imagine him hunched over his desk, stressing over what to write to you.

well, you won’t deny feeling excitement over the possibility of whatever sam has to say. if the subtle skip in your step is anything to go by.

you walk through the silent night of the town, it seems like everything’s frozen in place during the colder times of the year—everyone’s safe at home, toasty under their covers and you’d imagine thoroughly enjoying going to bed at 7 pm.

you do too, sometimes. there’s less to do when the ground is too frozen to plant any crop.

there’s a lot more free time out of the farm during the winter. you’ve really started integrating yourself with the townspeople—helping haley find her bracelet, befriending sam’s prickly coworker shane, and even discovering a shadowperson named Krobus in the town sewers. it really is starting to feel like home.

walking, you cut the corner passing by emily and haley’s house—and there he is.

he looks devastatingly handsome all dressed in winter clothing. his regular denim jacket switched out for a dark woolen coat, his pants are unripped and, surprisingly, not smeared with dirt.

though what you like most about his winter attire is his hair. those wild golden locks are laid flat under a woolen beanie—a stark difference from the spiked updo he usually does (though you like that one too). the tips of his hair are slightly curled upwards, revealing that family trait of curly hair.

you creep closer, just watching him wait for you—the way he folds his arms in an attempt to warm up, and the little shuffle he does on his feet. you laugh softly, he must’ve been waiting a while—just like you have for him.

sam turns at the sound of your laugh, his body unconsciously tilting towards you, like a magnet’s uncontrollable attracting to metal. “you made it,” he breathes, his nose, ears and cheeks pinkened by the cold.

you nod, unable to stop a bashful smile from forming on your lips. “i made it.”

a big grin splits his face, mimicking yours. underneath the lone lamplight he looks jaw-droppingly handsome. you feel yourself become warm just in proximity to him.

“i wanted to talk to you in private,” he says. sam’s buzzing with energy, surveying the dark streets before meeting your gaze with his. “it’s kinda cold out here though… i, um—i can sneak you into my room…”

your heart skips a beat, like you’ve skipped a step on a staircase. “what?” you croak.

your eyes catch onto him wringing his fingers, a nervous habit you can’t help but always notice (not because his hands are nice and interesting to look at, not at all).

“you don’t wanna?”

“no!” you inhale, trying to alleviate the twisting sensation in your gut. “i do wanna, ahem, lead the way.”

sam smiles at you, dimples and all. he leads you towards the tiny bedroom window in front of his house. the window is already open—you assume that’s where he jumped out of to meet you.

he climbs through the window with minimal effort, landing on the flooring with a dull thump!

you raise a brow. “have you done this before?”

sam stretches his hand out to you, waiting. his smile turnt sheepish. “i mean, i think we were all rebellious teenagers once.”

you resist the urge to snort—sam’s nervous, you can tell. he doesn’t have his quips and jokes tonight. and he’s shy, but eager. like a puppy, excited and curious about the world.

“o-kay,” you say, one hand in his hand the other set firmly on the windowsill. “make sure i don’t fall please.”

sam nods, eagerly. the curled ends of his hair shake along with the motion as he does.

how endearing.

you tighten your grip on his hand, hauling yourself through the small window, trying your damn best to not make any sudden noise. which is successful for the most part, only a tiny huff of exertion escapes you.

annoying, yes. but the chill of winter burns through any energy you have faster than other seasons.

your feet connect with the wood of his floor, hand still clasped in his and the chill merely at your back. it’s warm inside, with him.

his room is the same as it’s always been when you’d visit before—shelves, band equipment, posters—but the ambiance is different. a little more charged with tension so thick you could cut through it with a knife.

sam does not bother turning on his light, you don’t mind it all that much. but it takes some effort to avoid tumbling over stray objects that clutter his bedroom floor.

“look, I know I’ve been about nothing but the band for a while now…” he starts. “but I don’t want you to think that’s all i’m interested in.”

you chuckle, clasping your fingers behind your back. “it certainly takes up a big chunk of your interests.”

he pouts, literally pouts. it must be the love bug you caught because you think it’s just plain adorable. “i’m really trying over here!”

“sorry!” you grin, “okay, continue.”

“well, um… shoot, this is kinda hard, huh?” he forces an awkward chuckle. “and nerve-wrecking… but what i’m trying to say is…”

“i’m really happy that we’ve grown this close, and well…” sam looks at you, he’s stupidly red—the color spreading all over his face. “i—i’m just wondering, do you think of me as… just a friend?”

your breath stutters, and you feel yourself blushing before you can do anything to stop it. you stare at him as he does with you. the two of you locking eyes for a second, it feels like it’s just you and him in the world.

you feel your shy admittance at the tip of your tongue. no, you’d say, you’re more than that for me, if you want to be.

sam smiles at you, shy but so, so overwhelmingly bright—it’s blinding. your head is running a mile a minute when you finally get the courage—

“sam!” you hear jodi’s groggy voice from outside the door. your stomach drops with dread. “somebody’s at the door! go and check please?”

you lock eyes once again, this time for entirely different reasons, and with entirely different feelings.

“oh my god, sam,” you whisper hurriedly, panic gripping you. “your mom doesn’t know i’m here—what do we do—”

“hold on—” he replies, with the same sense of urgency as you. “okay, okay—i have a plan, just trust me, ‘kay?”

you think you might break out into a cold sweat. you look at him quizzically, “what?”

sam gives you an apologetic smile with that stupid beautiful face of his, he moves forward, grabbing you by your wrists, and moving you with him—towards his bed.

“sam!” you hiss, alarms are blaring in every corner of your mind as sam all but drags you under the toasty covers of his bed. he lifts the blanket and stations you by the edge, covering you in the blanket—which is now a lumpy mess.

this is his childhood bed you’re in, where his mother and brother are just by the door.

and his mother is calling him.

“i’ll get this over with quick,” he says to you, already heading towards the door of his room. “hang on tight, ‘kay?”

you breathe a sound of agreement, way too jittery to formulate any proper response as you quieten under the covers.

though the sheets do feel nice, and smells overwhelmingly of that specific cologne he uses (stolen from joja inventory, he told you once). you will yourself not to relax and melt into the sheets so fast. instead, you listen for each and every sound that may give hint to whatever the hell is happening.

there’s a commotion that you can hear happening, the door swings open, the hinges creaking along with it—this whole surreal experience feels a little like the confrontation part of a horror movie, the helpless victim hiding and the heavy footfalls of the killer.

though in your case, it’s not one set of footsteps, but two.

“what are you two doing here?”

“you’re the one who called us over, remember?” you can recognize the band’s shut-in pianist’s voice from anywhere. “you were all like, stop skipping practice, seb.”

sam’s voice is oddly pitchy when he responds. “…well, tonight’s no good!”

you hear the other person huff, you strain your ears harder to listen. the huffing person clearly fed up with the strange behavior sam’s putting out right now.

“my mom and vincent are asleep,” he adds hurriedly. “they’d wake up—”

you resist the urge to groan, stifling your mouth under a sweaty palm. jodie was just speaking to him minutes ago, there’s no way they’d buy that. he cannot be a more obvious liar.

thankfully they gloss over the fact. “sam, why are you acting so damn weird?” sebastian asks, straightforward as ever.

“yeah,” the other voice adds. feminine but strong. which you now identify as abigail’s, you hear a pinch of impatience in her voice. “and why are you red? did you sit outside in the snow or something—”

sam chokes, which he tries to conceal as an odd sounding cough. abigail pauses mid-sentence. the shift in the atmosphere is palpable. you screw your eyes shut, hearing the rapid rate of your heartbeat. it’s so loud you’re almost convinced the trio can hear the thumping from your hiding spot under the sheets. this is it, they’re going to discover you.

“oh, oh i see,” abigail grins. “on second thought, i wouldn't risk catching all those germs. i’m feeling starved, let’s hit the saloon, seb.”

the aforementioned man grumbles, seemingly puzzled by the sudden switch in abigail’s attitude. “huh… why?” abigail must have whispered something to him—you can barely hear over the muffle of sam’s blanket comforters. “ugh, alright. fine. you owe us one, sam.”

“oh, of course! mhm, yup,” you cringe at the immense awkwardness of sam’s response, feeling the overwhelming urge to pull out your own hair. “i’ll see you guys tomorrow, yeah? now shoo! wouldn’t wanna get you both sick or somethin’…”

“huh?” sebastian replies, rightfully puzzled as they’re forcefully pushed out of the room. “why would we see you tomorrow if you’re sick—”

“well seb,” abigail says smugly. “let’s just say sammy here is taking care of some important business—”

“okay, bye!” you hear the door click shut. to your utter bewilderment, sam shut the door in their faces.

the room is deathly quiet, the air is stagnant and stuffy. once you feel it safe enough, you crane your neck out of the blankets to check over him. to trace any lingering feeling the sudden visit might’ve given him. sam’s got his back rested against the wood of his door, his back slumped.

“i—i wasn’t expecting that,” you say quietly from your hiding spot on his bed. peeking the top half of your face, watching the door carefully. “kinda nerve-wracking.”

and embarrassing.

“i know—i’m sorry,” he sighs, rubbing his temples. “i didn’t expect them coming over.”

“sebastian said you invited them for practice, though.” you point out.

“maybe i did,” he admits, creeping closer to you on the bed, even if he’s guilty and embarrassed. “i totally forgot—i mean, i was really nervous! my mind blanks when i get nervous…”

sam stops right by the side of the bed, as if he’s waiting for your permission to get in with you—in his own bed. and to be perfectly honest, you really want him to.

“kinda ruined the atmosphere too,” he looks away from you, eyes downcast and melancholy. “i had this whole thing planned too, and i, just… ugh…”

your eyes soften. “sam, it’s really fine. okay, maybe a little shocking but you know it’s not enough to scare me away.”

he looks down at you, worried. his eyebrows are ever so slightly pinched—you wish you could run your fingers over it, and smooth it out yourself.

“plus,” you murmur, reaching over the small amount of space between the two of you to clasp his wrist. “i’m not just gonna leave… just tell me what you were going to say—before the… interruption.”

that gives you the final push to gather your courage to tug him into bed with you. sam follows, flopping onto the empty bedding next to you without a fight. for a moment, it’s just the two of you, side by side, slowly huddling closer and closer for warmth.

and sam is warm. he’s practically radiating comfy heat you wish to burrow into—or wrap yourself around. the perfect bed-partner for winter nights like these.

you find yourself becoming addicted to the feeling.

sam angles his body towards you. you on your back and him on his side, it feels intimate and special. and for some reason, it feels familiar—like you’ve always belonged by his side.

“i think you know already,” he tells you, his eyes are not clear in the dim light but you know, there are practically hearts in them. “that i like you.”

you giggle softly. “and i think you know the same about me.”

sam tentatively grasps your hand, the freezing fingertips thawing under his careful touch. the caress of his hand on yours sends tingling electricity down your spine, your whole body feels alert—alive.

he speaks again, but this time his tone is a whisper of what it usually is. “stay awhile?”

“yeah,” you swallow, squeezing his hand in your grip. a small smile on your lips. “yes, i want to.”

“good,” he smiles, his eyes crinkle at the edges so softly and the dimples on his cheeks deepen. there really is no one else who can compare for you. “hey, you’re really cold… let me warm you up?”

you turn to your side, facing him. at this angle, your faces are mere inches apart. you can trace every dip, line and curve of his face, and he yours. your hand tingles with the overwhelming urge to reach for him and squeeze.

“it is cold,” you agree. “i’d very much like that.”

“phew,” he softly sighs. sam drags his fingers up your arm, stopping at your elbow. wherever he touches, a whisper of him lingers on your skin—a bone deep imprint you yearn for him to spread all across your skin.

you roll into him with little to no effort at all. sam drags you to his chest, your ear perched right above his heart, you can hear the steady thump! of his heartbeat from underneath. sam winds his arms around you, intensifying the heat you feel by tenfold—it’s not uncomfortable at all, though. you like it.

your bodies fit perfectly together, just like puzzle pieces. a mess of limbs tangling together. the warmth of him making you shudder in honey-like delight. it feels syrupy and soft and warm wrapped in his arms.

his hand at your back travels downwards, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake you feel even through the thickness of the fabric separating the skin of your back and his fingertips. his hands feel rough and calloused at the small of your back—from playing guitar and his skateboarding incidents—but you enjoy the feeling.

you trail your fingers under the thick fabric of his jacket and shirt, feeling the smooth skin underneath—the action has no deeper meaning than you wanting to feel.

sam’s uncharacteristically quiet. his breaths are slow and long, like he’s on the verge of sleep. yet his arms are wound tight around you—like he never wants to let go of you. your nerves make you feel like a slow simmering soup. warm and slowly cooking over the fire.

you two stay entangled for a while, in comfortable silence. sometime during the night you’ve matched your breathing to his, and he pulled you somehow even closer to his body.

but, a thump comes from his window, a light tapping sound. soft but persistent. the two of you opt to ignore it, in favor of snuggling closer to each other. yet the taps continue, and become louder and faster.

disrupted by the noise, sam mournfully throws the covers from over him to check, untangling himself from your grip. leaving a very him-shaped indent on the bed left in his wake. you groan, sticking your bottom lip out, you miss the warmth of him already.

“oh shit.”

the expletive makes you sit up in his bed, the comforter draping off your middle. you can make out the shape of him even with the dimness of the light—sam’s back is towards you, and if your eyes dare deceive you, he looks like he’s shrinking into himself a tiny bit.

“what is it?” you whisper-shout to him.

he slowly turns to you, wide eyed, his shoulders stiff. sort of resembling a kicked-dog. sam bows down his head—with what you think is shame, for what reason, you can’t tell. rubbing your eyes of sleep, you furrow your brow, craning your neck to look out the window behind him.

abigail and sebastian are there, waving wildly at you. your eyes widen. abigail and sebastian are waving at you with smug smiles plastered on their faces.

your stomach drops for the umpteenth time that night. you honestly feel too horrified to speak.

you bury yourself under the sheets, a feeble attempt to conceal your mortification. so that’s why abigail was playing along with sam’s urgent ramblings—she knew (not that sam was any good at keeping a cool facade, he is totally incapable of lying smoothly). you groan, you feel like a rebellious teenager again, only the part where you get caught and utterly humiliated.

outside, you can hear the loud roaring laughter of the duo through the glass, alongside the awkward, embarrassed chatter of your newly-minted boyfriend. (not technically official, but the title succeeds to relieve your horror by the tiniest bit)

still, you stay put. through the mortification and embarrassment you still stick yourself to sam’s side, or more literally, on his bed—because you know, there’s no other place you’d rather be.

you spare another glance out of the covers at the trio—to your surprise, sam’s beat you to it. looking at you with heart eyes and the most lovesick expression (you’re pretty sure yours looks the same).

you know there’s going to be a lot more explaining to do in the morning. but it doesn’t matter to you, not right now when you’re in sam’s bed on the verge of sleep.

not when you feel so warm.

a/n: shoutout to the ass trio for making an appearance in the fic! i love you abby and seb.

8:05 | SAM

word count: 3.2k

summary: sam’s ten heart event with a twist.

tags: winter, developing relationships, fluff, swearing, cuddling, hiding from his mother in his bed lol

a/n: this spiralled out of my control and into 3k words… enjoy!

it’s cold.

the fleece coat you’ve bundled yourself in cannot protect goosebumps from forming from the biting chill of the valley’s winter nights. your breaths come out in cloudy puffs of air, the heat slowly draining out of every exhale. it’s dark out, poorly spaced lampposts providing the bare minimum amount of light to navigate.

you got sam’s letter earlier, a clumsily written note that was stuffed haphazardly into your farm’s mailbox—the yellow lined paper he used, all crumpled and ripped.

meet me in front of my house! at 8 pm, i’ll be waiting. there’s something i want to tell you.

the ending sentence is somehow even more sloppily written compared to the ones before it. as if he was debating whether or not to add it in, but ultimately decided for it—it’s funny to imagine him hunched over his desk, stressing over what to write to you.

well, you won’t deny feeling excitement over the possibility of whatever sam has to say. if the subtle skip in your step is anything to go by.

you walk through the silent night of the town, it seems like everything’s frozen in place during the colder times of the year—everyone’s safe at home, toasty under their covers and you’d imagine thoroughly enjoying going to bed at 7 pm.

you do too, sometimes. there’s less to do when the ground is too frozen to plant any crop.

there’s a lot more free time out of the farm during the winter. you’ve really started integrating yourself with the townspeople—helping haley find her bracelet, befriending sam’s prickly coworker shane, and even discovering a shadowperson named Krobus in the town sewers. it really is starting to feel like home.

walking, you cut the corner passing by emily and haley’s house—and there he is.

he looks devastatingly handsome all dressed in winter clothing. his regular denim jacket switched out for a dark woolen coat, his pants are unripped and, surprisingly, not smeared with dirt.

though what you like most about his winter attire is his hair. those wild golden locks are laid flat under a woolen beanie—a stark difference from the spiked updo he usually does (though you like that one too). the tips of his hair are slightly curled upwards, revealing that family trait of curly hair.

you creep closer, just watching him wait for you—the way he folds his arms in an attempt to warm up, and the little shuffle he does on his feet. you laugh softly, he must’ve been waiting a while—just like you have for him.

sam turns at the sound of your laugh, his body unconsciously tilting towards you, like a magnet’s uncontrollable attracting to metal. “you made it,” he breathes, his nose, ears and cheeks pinkened by the cold.

you nod, unable to stop a bashful smile from forming on your lips. “i made it.”

a big grin splits his face, mimicking yours. underneath the lone lamplight he looks jaw-droppingly handsome. you feel yourself become warm just in proximity to him.

“i wanted to talk to you in private,” he says. sam’s buzzing with energy, surveying the dark streets before meeting your gaze with his. “it’s kinda cold out here though… i, um—i can sneak you into my room…”

your heart skips a beat, like you’ve skipped a step on a staircase. “what?” you croak.

your eyes catch onto him wringing his fingers, a nervous habit you can’t help but always notice (not because his hands are nice and interesting to look at, not at all).

“you don’t wanna?”

“no!” you inhale, trying to alleviate the twisting sensation in your gut. “i do wanna, ahem, lead the way.”

sam smiles at you, dimples and all. he leads you towards the tiny bedroom window in front of his house. the window is already open—you assume that’s where he jumped out of to meet you.

he climbs through the window with minimal effort, landing on the flooring with a dull thump!

you raise a brow. “have you done this before?”

sam stretches his hand out to you, waiting. his smile turnt sheepish. “i mean, i think we were all rebellious teenagers once.”

you resist the urge to snort—sam’s nervous, you can tell. he doesn’t have his quips and jokes tonight. and he’s shy, but eager. like a puppy, excited and curious about the world.

“o-kay,” you say, one hand in his hand the other set firmly on the windowsill. “make sure i don’t fall please.”

sam nods, eagerly. the curled ends of his hair shake along with the motion as he does.

how endearing.

you tighten your grip on his hand, hauling yourself through the small window, trying your damn best to not make any sudden noise. which is successful for the most part, only a tiny huff of exertion escapes you.

annoying, yes. but the chill of winter burns through any energy you have faster than other seasons.

your feet connect with the wood of his floor, hand still clasped in his and the chill merely at your back. it’s warm inside, with him.

his room is the same as it’s always been when you’d visit before—shelves, band equipment, posters—but the ambiance is different. a little more charged with tension so thick you could cut through it with a knife.

sam does not bother turning on his light, you don’t mind it all that much. but it takes some effort to avoid tumbling over stray objects that clutter his bedroom floor.

“look, I know I’ve been about nothing but the band for a while now…” he starts. “but I don’t want you to think that’s all i’m interested in.”

you chuckle, clasping your fingers behind your back. “it certainly takes up a big chunk of your interests.”

he pouts, literally pouts. it must be the love bug you caught because you think it’s just plain adorable. “i’m really trying over here!”

“sorry!” you grin, “okay, continue.”

“well, um… shoot, this is kinda hard, huh?” he forces an awkward chuckle. “and nerve-wrecking… but what i’m trying to say is…”

“i’m really happy that we’ve grown this close, and well…” sam looks at you, he’s stupidly red—the color spreading all over his face. “i—i’m just wondering, do you think of me as… just a friend?”

your breath stutters, and you feel yourself blushing before you can do anything to stop it. you stare at him as he does with you. the two of you locking eyes for a second, it feels like it’s just you and him in the world.

you feel your shy admittance at the tip of your tongue. no, you’d say, you’re more than that for me, if you want to be.

sam smiles at you, shy but so, so overwhelmingly bright—it’s blinding. your head is running a mile a minute when you finally get the courage—

“sam!” you hear jodi’s groggy voice from outside the door. your stomach drops with dread. “somebody’s at the door! go and check please?”

you lock eyes once again, this time for entirely different reasons, and with entirely different feelings.

“oh my god, sam,” you whisper hurriedly, panic gripping you. “your mom doesn’t know i’m here—what do we do—”

“hold on—” he replies, with the same sense of urgency as you. “okay, okay—i have a plan, just trust me, ‘kay?”

you think you might break out into a cold sweat. you look at him quizzically, “what?”

sam gives you an apologetic smile with that stupid beautiful face of his, he moves forward, grabbing you by your wrists, and moving you with him—towards his bed.

“sam!” you hiss, alarms are blaring in every corner of your mind as sam all but drags you under the toasty covers of his bed. he lifts the blanket and stations you by the edge, covering you in the blanket—which is now a lumpy mess.

this is his childhood bed you’re in, where his mother and brother are just by the door.

and his mother is calling him.

“i’ll get this over with quick,” he says to you, already heading towards the door of his room. “hang on tight, ‘kay?”

you breathe a sound of agreement, way too jittery to formulate any proper response as you quieten under the covers.

though the sheets do feel nice, and smells overwhelmingly of that specific cologne he uses (stolen from joja inventory, he told you once). you will yourself not to relax and melt into the sheets so fast. instead, you listen for each and every sound that may give hint to whatever the hell is happening.

there’s a commotion that you can hear happening, the door swings open, the hinges creaking along with it—this whole surreal experience feels a little like the confrontation part of a horror movie, the helpless victim hiding and the heavy footfalls of the killer.

though in your case, it’s not one set of footsteps, but two.

“what are you two doing here?”

“you’re the one who called us over, remember?” you can recognize the band’s shut-in pianist’s voice from anywhere. “you were all like, stop skipping practice, seb.”

sam’s voice is oddly pitchy when he responds. “…well, tonight’s no good!”

you hear the other person huff, you strain your ears harder to listen. the huffing person clearly fed up with the strange behavior sam’s putting out right now.

“my mom and vincent are asleep,” he adds hurriedly. “they’d wake up—”

you resist the urge to groan, stifling your mouth under a sweaty palm. jodie was just speaking to him minutes ago, there’s no way they’d buy that. he cannot be a more obvious liar.

thankfully they gloss over the fact. “sam, why are you acting so damn weird?” sebastian asks, straightforward as ever.

“yeah,” the other voice adds. feminine but strong. which you now identify as abigail’s, you hear a pinch of impatience in her voice. “and why are you red? did you sit outside in the snow or something—”

sam chokes, which he tries to conceal as an odd sounding cough. abigail pauses mid-sentence. the shift in the atmosphere is palpable. you screw your eyes shut, hearing the rapid rate of your heartbeat. it’s so loud you’re almost convinced the trio can hear the thumping from your hiding spot under the sheets. this is it, they’re going to discover you.

“oh, oh i see,” abigail grins. “on second thought, i wouldn't risk catching all those germs. i’m feeling starved, let’s hit the saloon, seb.”

the aforementioned man grumbles, seemingly puzzled by the sudden switch in abigail’s attitude. “huh… why?” abigail must have whispered something to him—you can barely hear over the muffle of sam’s blanket comforters. “ugh, alright. fine. you owe us one, sam.”

“oh, of course! mhm, yup,” you cringe at the immense awkwardness of sam’s response, feeling the overwhelming urge to pull out your own hair. “i’ll see you guys tomorrow, yeah? now shoo! wouldn’t wanna get you both sick or somethin’…”

“huh?” sebastian replies, rightfully puzzled as they’re forcefully pushed out of the room. “why would we see you tomorrow if you’re sick—”

“well seb,” abigail says smugly. “let’s just say sammy here is taking care of some important business—”

“okay, bye!” you hear the door click shut. to your utter bewilderment, sam shut the door in their faces.

the room is deathly quiet, the air is stagnant and stuffy. once you feel it safe enough, you crane your neck out of the blankets to check over him. to trace any lingering feeling the sudden visit might’ve given him. sam’s got his back rested against the wood of his door, his back slumped.

“i—i wasn’t expecting that,” you say quietly from your hiding spot on his bed. peeking the top half of your face, watching the door carefully. “kinda nerve-wracking.”

and embarrassing.

“i know—i’m sorry,” he sighs, rubbing his temples. “i didn’t expect them coming over.”

“sebastian said you invited them for practice, though.” you point out.

“maybe i did,” he admits, creeping closer to you on the bed, even if he’s guilty and embarrassed. “i totally forgot—i mean, i was really nervous! my mind blanks when i get nervous…”

sam stops right by the side of the bed, as if he’s waiting for your permission to get in with you—in his own bed. and to be perfectly honest, you really want him to.

“kinda ruined the atmosphere too,” he looks away from you, eyes downcast and melancholy. “i had this whole thing planned too, and i, just… ugh…”

your eyes soften. “sam, it’s really fine. okay, maybe a little shocking but you know it’s not enough to scare me away.”

he looks down at you, worried. his eyebrows are ever so slightly pinched—you wish you could run your fingers over it, and smooth it out yourself.

“plus,” you murmur, reaching over the small amount of space between the two of you to clasp his wrist. “i’m not just gonna leave… just tell me what you were going to say—before the… interruption.”

that gives you the final push to gather your courage to tug him into bed with you. sam follows, flopping onto the empty bedding next to you without a fight. for a moment, it’s just the two of you, side by side, slowly huddling closer and closer for warmth.

and sam is warm. he’s practically radiating comfy heat you wish to burrow into—or wrap yourself around. the perfect bed-partner for winter nights like these.

you find yourself becoming addicted to the feeling.

sam angles his body towards you. you on your back and him on his side, it feels intimate and special. and for some reason, it feels familiar—like you’ve always belonged by his side.

“i think you know already,” he tells you, his eyes are not clear in the dim light but you know, there are practically hearts in them. “that i like you.”

you giggle softly. “and i think you know the same about me.”

sam tentatively grasps your hand, the freezing fingertips thawing under his careful touch. the caress of his hand on yours sends tingling electricity down your spine, your whole body feels alert—alive.

he speaks again, but this time his tone is a whisper of what it usually is. “stay awhile?”

“yeah,” you swallow, squeezing his hand in your grip. a small smile on your lips. “yes, i want to.”

“good,” he smiles, his eyes crinkle at the edges so softly and the dimples on his cheeks deepen. there really is no one else who can compare for you. “hey, you’re really cold… let me warm you up?”

you turn to your side, facing him. at this angle, your faces are mere inches apart. you can trace every dip, line and curve of his face, and he yours. your hand tingles with the overwhelming urge to reach for him and squeeze.

“it is cold,” you agree. “i’d very much like that.”

“phew,” he softly sighs. sam drags his fingers up your arm, stopping at your elbow. wherever he touches, a whisper of him lingers on your skin—a bone deep imprint you yearn for him to spread all across your skin.

you roll into him with little to no effort at all. sam drags you to his chest, your ear perched right above his heart, you can hear the steady thump! of his heartbeat from underneath. sam winds his arms around you, intensifying the heat you feel by tenfold—it’s not uncomfortable at all, though. you like it.

your bodies fit perfectly together, just like puzzle pieces. a mess of limbs tangling together. the warmth of him making you shudder in honey-like delight. it feels syrupy and soft and warm wrapped in his arms.

his hand at your back travels downwards, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake you feel even through the thickness of the fabric separating the skin of your back and his fingertips. his hands feel rough and calloused at the small of your back—from playing guitar and his skateboarding incidents—but you enjoy the feeling.

you trail your fingers under the thick fabric of his jacket and shirt, feeling the smooth skin underneath—the action has no deeper meaning than you wanting to feel.

sam’s uncharacteristically quiet. his breaths are slow and long, like he’s on the verge of sleep. yet his arms are wound tight around you—like he never wants to let go of you. your nerves make you feel like a slow simmering soup. warm and slowly cooking over the fire.

you two stay entangled for a while, in comfortable silence. sometime during the night you’ve matched your breathing to his, and he pulled you somehow even closer to his body.

but, a thump comes from his window, a light tapping sound. soft but persistent. the two of you opt to ignore it, in favor of snuggling closer to each other. yet the taps continue, and become louder and faster.

disrupted by the noise, sam mournfully throws the covers from over him to check, untangling himself from your grip. leaving a very him-shaped indent on the bed left in his wake. you groan, sticking your bottom lip out, you miss the warmth of him already.

“oh shit.”

the expletive makes you sit up in his bed, the comforter draping off your middle. you can make out the shape of him even with the dimness of the light—sam’s back is towards you, and if your eyes dare deceive you, he looks like he’s shrinking into himself a tiny bit.

“what is it?” you whisper-shout to him.

he slowly turns to you, wide eyed, his shoulders stiff. sort of resembling a kicked-dog. sam bows down his head—with what you think is shame, for what reason, you can’t tell. rubbing your eyes of sleep, you furrow your brow, craning your neck to look out the window behind him.

abigail and sebastian are there, waving wildly at you. your eyes widen. abigail and sebastian are waving at you with smug smiles plastered on their faces.

your stomach drops for the umpteenth time that night. you honestly feel too horrified to speak.

you bury yourself under the sheets, a feeble attempt to conceal your mortification. so that’s why abigail was playing along with sam’s urgent ramblings—she knew (not that sam was any good at keeping a cool facade, he is totally incapable of lying smoothly). you groan, you feel like a rebellious teenager again, only the part where you get caught and utterly humiliated.

outside, you can hear the loud roaring laughter of the duo through the glass, alongside the awkward, embarrassed chatter of your newly-minted boyfriend. (not technically official, but the title succeeds to relieve your horror by the tiniest bit)

still, you stay put. through the mortification and embarrassment you still stick yourself to sam’s side, or more literally, on his bed—because you know, there’s no other place you’d rather be.

you spare another glance out of the covers at the trio—to your surprise, sam’s beat you to it. looking at you with heart eyes and the most lovesick expression (you’re pretty sure yours looks the same).

you know there’s going to be a lot more explaining to do in the morning. but it doesn’t matter to you, not right now when you’re in sam’s bed on the verge of sleep.

not when you feel so warm.

a/n: shoutout to the ass trio for making an appearance in the fic! i love you abby and seb.

I'll tell you a secret... my name 'Sam' is short for 'Samson'.

sweet like

word count: 1.5 k

synopsis: love confessions are not easy, having nosy neighbours isn’t either—but loving sam is different, it’s as easy as breathing.

a/n: samson my beloved, youre allergic to pollen but accepted my bouquet anyway. 😔❤️

edit: sweet like is now on ao3! here

today’s the day, you’re really going to do it. no ifs or buts.

you swear you will, but damn if it isn’t messing with your head. it’s definitely the nervousness or heat stroke symptoms causing the overly-conscious way you regard all other shoppers in pierre’s general store. you feel the uneven, erratic thrum of your pulse underneath your skin.

your hands are cold and clammy and disgustingly sweaty as a bright bouquet of tulips, poppies, sweet peas and fairy roses is unceremoniously slid across the store counter and bundled into your arms. the smell is dizzyingly perfumed. pierre doesn’t bat an eye though the knowing glint just tells you that he knows.

you and sam have been friends for as long as you started living in the valley. he’s a literal ball of sunshine compacted into a 5’10 body, and he’s sweet—maybe at times a little sloppy and forgetful but those quirks make him all the more lovable—to you.

and you admit yes, you did have a crush on him—and after watching his band’s performance in zuzu city, it got even worse. suddenly the ignition jump started the thrum of your heart—beating at race car speeds at the mere mention of his name. restless and anxious

so, here you are, buying a bouquet (one you could surely make yourself, but according to abigail buying this exact one is town tradition) at 10 am in the morning, in front of all your nosy neighbours.

you clutch the flowers tighter to your chest as caroline cranes her neck to take a peek. slowing down as she restocks the shelves. shameless, these people are sharks to blood when it comes to gossip.

you shoot her a wary glare, lips pursed together. pushing open the door to the shop, the little entrance bell rings with your exit.

after your realization, you see the world through rose-tinted glasses, the skies seem brighter and clearer, with soft fluffy clouds suspended in them. the breeze is soft and refreshing, while the sun is a comforting warmth at your back.

not even a few steps past the stardrop saloon do you feel any different.

adrenaline pumps through your veins as you see a flash of familiar spiked-up golden hair in your periphery. you feel your breath stutter as you reflexively stuff the delicate bouquet in your pack and snap it shut.

you turn your back, clutching a hand to your chest—you feel your heart racing underneath your fingertips as well as the heat rising up your skin. it’s fine, you reason, you’ll play it off as sunburn.

you slap at your cheeks, encouragingly.

the aforementioned man, skates towards you, calling your attention. turning, you nod your head in greeting, offering him a less than wobbly smile.

you wait until the skateboard skids to a stop, sam stops a few feet from you. his breaths slightly labored from the effort, he’s still as bright and cheery as ever

“sam,” you cringe as your voice cracks into an awkward pitch. he perks up at the mention of his name, giving you an enthusiastic wave. you swallow the lump forming in your throat.

“hey farmer,” he smiles, sam sets one of his feet down from on his skateboard. “it’s really bright out today. what’cha up to?”

“i was looking for you, actually.”

“and i’m here!” he replies before sheepishly adding. “that’s a coincidence. i was going to go visit you—well, before i forgot.”

“really,” your stomach traitorously flutters. “what for?”

“to give you something,” he says breezily, sam digs around in his pant pockets, seemingly looking for something. “i swear i have the thingy in here somewhere..”

you watch as he fumbles around looking for the thingy. Your mind drifts to the scrunched up bouquet sitting in your pack. you hadn’t expected running into him so soon—

maybe, you think. you aren’t as ready as you think.

“ahh, here it is!”

sam fishes out a rectangular shaped object from his back pocket, its slim and clear. you tilt your head in curiosity and he smiles wider.

“a cassette of the band’s song,” he tells you, grabbing your limp hand to stuff it into your palm. “listen to it! you have a cassette player on your farm, right?”

the momental brush of his hand against yours has you stumbling over your mess of thoughts and feelings. it is a little pathetic, to be acting like a lovesick teenager again—you groan to yourself. “yeah, i do.”

the cassette is light in your palm, the hard plastic case is covered in sharpied lightning bolts and smiley faces—along with the careful engraving of your name. the hand drawn designs are wonky and childlike (you suspect he asked vincent to draw them), but it’s yours.

he made this for you.

you feel the giddy warmth spread all throughout your body—concentrated in your chest and stomach which twists with some emotion you’re too confused to name.

“i couldn’t find you after the performance,” he confesses. you peek up from the cassette at his face—his cheeks are bright pink with bashfulness. “it was too crowded, i wanted to give you the first sample recording.”

standing on willow street in front of his family house with the sun beating down on you, sweat dripping down your temple, flowers haphazardly stuffed into your backpack. you’re literally buzzing with energy—the warmth, inside and out, is making your head spin.

you feel your mouth moving before you can even register what you’re saying, feverish words tumble out.

voice a tad strangled, you rasp. “sam.”

he looks down at his skateboard, his attention; short and slipping away. “yeah?”

“be my boyfriend.”

“sure!” he pauses, processing what you said, his eyes whip back up to stare into yours—wide and so, so blue. “waaait.. wuuh—”

“i was—uh, do you want to know why i wanted to visit you today?” you ramble on, tracing the cassette case edges with sweaty fingers. the beat of your heart is a resounding thumping sound in your eardrums. “actually, this is not how i planned things, but got nervous, you make me nervous.”

you shrug off your backpack, the heavy weight of it that once was grounding you groaned as it hit the ground. you open the flap and produce the now crumpled flowers—stems bent and broken, petals missing but the smell is still overwhelmingly sweet. you hold out the bouquet to him with shaky fingers, the cassette held in your other hand clasped behind your back.

“—i wanted to make this a little more special…” you sigh nervously, eyes squeezed shut while your bottom lip is chewed between worrying teeth. “it’s all crumpled, sorry…”

“i think this is plenty special already.”

you feel as he moves closer, plucking the flowers out of your hands. now, there’s barely any space between the both of you. your eyes snap open, mouth slightly gaping as he takes a long sniff full of flowers.

your heart sings for joy as he does—but the concerningly wet sneeze he lets out makes you furrow your brow in realization.

he’s goddamn allergic.

your eyes widen, reaching for the flowers. “sam, you’re allergic to pollen!”

your fingers barely brush the stems when he pull the flowers away from you. sam laughs, bright and pure—one that sounds like it came deep from his gut. you flush deeper in embarrassment, and a little in confusion.

“so? you gave me these. i like them!”

“i can’t believe it slipped my mind,” you cringe. “don’t keep them! the stems are all twisted and broken anyway.”

he sneezes again, shaking his head petulantly, his nose pinkened with irritation, a small sound of mortification exits your mouth. how can you be so forgetful?

digging through your backpack, you grab the small pack of tissues you usually use to dab off sweat easily. you take one out of the pack and stretch it out towards him.

instead of your offered tissue, sam grabs you by the wrist, tugging you to him. you follow with not much of a fight, a confusing mixture of nervous and giddy energy you’ve become. he holds you still against him, his arms coming behind you to wrap the both of you together tightly.

you go limp against him, head buried his shoulder. you think, you fit together perfectly.

“by the way, i like you too.” he murmurs into your hair. “a lot more than you think i do.”

“even if i forgot you were allergic to flowers?”

he snorts, leaving a chaste peck on your forehead, you feel your cheeks flush. “especially because you forgot, it was kinda funny.”

your head shoots up, nearly bumping his chin. “sam!”

he laughs and you can’t help but smile in return. your gaze returns to the sky, and suddenly you can’t quite recall what you were so worried about. really, life in stardew valley has never been so bright.

(and if you see some of your neighbors watching at the corner of your eye, you shut your eyes to ignore them.)

Save me Sam_Winter.png