Chuu/Lai

clementine

synopsis: this time of the year isn't the easiest for you, but nikolai is here to take care of everything when you lose sight of the sweetness in life...

content: fem!reader, comfort, fluff

Nikolai knows you haven't been sleeping well.

So when he saw you bundled up on the couch, wrapped up in a blanket akin to a caterpillar in its cocoon, he couldn't control himself or help the way his heart rate picked up.

He's already kneeling to your level while you’re still sleeping on the sofa to push back some of the hair falling over your face with one hand, the other swimming through the sea of softness to search and take hold of your hand in his. He didn’t mind you were taking a nap in the afternoon—getting to see your peaceful face and knowing that you’re finally able to get some rest after days of difficulty was enough for him to stay content.

He’s patient, not rushing you to wake up like how he would do sometimes in the mornings. You’re not feeling well, so he keeps all his antics stored and locked away for a time not so dull. He tries his hardest to control the urge to coddle you because he knows you need your space, but his heart aches for you anyway, and it is almost unbearable.

You just look so adorable.

He does have to admit, that he feels a bit bad thinking these kinds of thoughts while you're like this, but he can't help it.

A huff of air leaves you when you feel someone plop down next to you, their weight making you sink into the couch further, their hands trailing down your arms, finding their abode on your waist. You'd regained consciousness a few minutes ago, and heard him while he was walking around the living room, but couldn't bring yourself to open your eyelids yet when they still felt so heavy.

But he seems to catch on anyway when he curls up closer to you, his fluffy hair tickling you and his thumb running across the soft skin of your cheek when he becomes aware that you're awake.

This small couch was barely big enough to fit the both of you. He thinks he'll go furniture shopping with you soon, only if you feel like going out, of course.

He notices how you struggle. The way your energy levels dip, and the way your usual sparkle fades as the days grow shorter and darker.

That's why he'll gently suggest going for a walk in the crisp autumn air at times, hoping that exposure to natural light can help alleviate some worries off your mind and lift your mood. He'll offer to wrap you up in layers of warmth and accompany you on a stroll through the colorful foliage, providing his unwavering company as a source of solace and strength. And he'll wipe your tears away when you cry to him, telling him that you can't bring yourself to. He'll reassure you and tell you that everything is okay, pulling you into his comforting embrace, determined to hold your hand and walk by your side through the darkness while holding onto the belief that you can weather this storm.

Nikolai thinks you're too hard on yourself.

He thinks you don't treat yourself as nicely as he does to you and it makes him deeply upset—breaks his heart, so to speak. But he knows how difficult it can be. So, he feels the least he could do was be here for you when you're at your lowest, just like you always are when he's at his.

“Nikolai,” you call out to him, keeping your eyes still shut, aware of his presence close to you.

"Dove," he responds, his eyes glistening when he hears your voice. "How about we go out today? You need some sunshine," he suggests to you in a gentle voice accompanied by a signature dorky smile spread on his face.

Your eyelashes flutter as you open your eyes to find him leaning over you, one look at his face being enough to dispel some fatigue, always bringing you back down to earth when you’re floating.

"But you're right here," you say, your hands finding themselves in his hair to play with the braid that falls over his shoulder.

Nikolai is and has always been caring towards you, and moments like these serve as a reminder of who you're truly in a relationship with. His tough exterior was something you’ve always been aware of but never been afraid of. Not after he's shown you that beneath that exterior was hiding something soft, buried underneath layers and layers of faux fortitude.

Nikolai himself wasn't able to conceal his bashfulness. No matter how resilient he pretended to be and tried to appear, you always managed to shatter him with the right words laced with such potent fervor that never failed to permeate his mind.

He pulls away from you momentarily and rises to his feet to slowly draw back the curtains, making sure to do so with deliberate care in his actions so the light doesn't hurt your eyes. As he steps back, he nearly loses his footing as he slips on something but manages to steady himself in time before sparing a glance at the ground to see what the culprit is. The playing cards are still scattered across the floor, remnants from the impromptu dramatic performance he put on in the living room yesterday, all in an attempt to see your precious smile that he hasn't gotten the opportunity to catch a glimpse of as of late. A part of him wishes he had tumbled, for the chance he would get to hear your laughter again.

When he returns to you, he helps you sit up and drapes the blanket around you and over your shoulders. Although the sunlight streaming through the window gives you an ethereal glow, he finds the paleness of your skin as a result of insufficient sunlight and nutrients hard to ignore.

Nikolai knows you haven't been taking care of yourself as much as you should be.

He waits for you to notice it—the fresh bowl of fruit he prepared and placed on the table just for you. The clementines he'd bought from his grocery run this morning because they were finally in season and he knew you'd been wanting to have some.

But when you don't move, he picks up a slice of the citrus himself and holds it up to your lips. With tired eyes looking up at him, you part your lips, letting him feed you the fruit. The sweet juice bursts on your tongue, and you press a kiss on the pad of his thumb, relishing in the way it lingers for a moment before he pulls it away. For some odd reason, you feel like it tastes sweeter when he feeds it to you.

As if you weren't already feeling warm from his affection, he sets your cheeks ablaze with a flustered heat when he cradles your face with both of his hands while you chew the fruit. He waits for you to finish before playfully squeezing your cheeks in his hands to make your lips pouty, placing the most gentle of kisses upon them, only then releasing when he feels warmth slowly crawl up from your ears to your face.

Your eyes close to savor his adoration, absent of the knowledge of unimaginable tenderness swimming in the pair of eyes staring at you right now. Your fingers loosely wrap around the wrists connected to hands that are caressing your face so softly, careful touches on your skin followed by lips ghosting over the crown of your head before coming to a stop.

Oh—right. He wasn't supposed to be doing this, not now. He shouldn't be bothering you in this way, not until you feel better, at least.

Taking this into consideration, Nikolai reluctantly lets go of you and moves intending to rest against the pillow next to your lap—where he originally would've placed his head. However, on second thought, he decides not to after a thought pervades his mind of how you might not want his weight on you when you're already carrying so much burden.

It wasn't until he felt fingers trailing up his own, seeking his touch again, that the thought quickly diminished and made him halt his movements. Raising his head to see you looking down at him with that gleam in your eyes that he missed oh so much confirmed it for him, that look that always revealed the want to have him closer to you.

So he fulfills that wish for you, moving over to your lap and shifting to a position with heedfulness where the both of you could feel comfortable, but mainly just for you.

Nikolai never wants to be a nuisance. He just wants to make you feel better, no matter how long that takes.

Because in the end, he always knew that sweetness would follow up the bitterness.

Your presence in his own life was living proof of that.

ɪᴛ'ꜱ ᴀ ᴘʀᴏᴍɪꜱᴇ · ɴɪᴋᴏʟᴀɪ ɢᴏɢᴏʟ ༉‧₊˚

content. f!reader. fluff-ish, (hilarious) threats of physical violence, flower metaphors, love at first philosophical debate, flower shops, nikolai treats reader like a puppy. might turn into a second oneshot. not proofread.

author's note. i'm back .ᐟ and surprisingly with a little nikolai. i've been working through some extreme writer's block, but i actually really like how this turned out. it's my first time tackling nikolai's character like this, so hopefully it's good .ᐟ

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He never knew where he would end up whenever he had free time. A mall, a park, a zoo—didn’t matter too much to him. Nikolai bounded in-and-out of these places, delighted by the varied expressions of his unsuspecting victims, whether they were the tail-end of a harmless prank or something far worse.

An unlocatable humming accompanied the orchestra of fans that kept the space cool, and the bountiful stock almost made his jaw drop. The store was filled to the brim with luscious flowers that put the market stalls he had seen earlier to shame—sad that someone’s hard work was about to be wasted.

He pretended to be the average customer, humming the harmony to that distant voice as he perused the aisles, tearing leaves and plucking petals whenever he felt like it. It was a tranquil prologue to the sick pranks that formed in his mind.

He stopped at a cluster of daisies, which blossomed in various bright colors, allowing them to stand out between the exotic plants that flanked them. So, as predicted, he ripped a couple at the stem, chuckling to himself as they clumped onto the dirty store floor.

“Get the hell away from my daisies!”

Nikolai thrived in the unforeseen—though he certainly did not expect to be met with a trowel pressed dangerously close to his jugular, nor did he expect the cute Chihuahua-like woman attached to his handle. If this was his demise, he couldn’t say he’d mind. 

“What the hell is wrong with you?” She snatched the flowers from his reach, cradling the pot like an infant as her voice sweetened. “I’m sorry the mean man hurt you.”

“You’re like a little puppy! How adorable!” Her snarl did not help her case. “I’ve heard about people talking to plants, but you take it to a whole nother level, lady.”

“You didn’t answer my question. Why did you do that?”

“That wasn’t your question, though.” The glint in her eyes could melt icebergs, so he decided to cut his losses before she committed second-degree murder and mashed him into fertilizer. “But I’ll answer both, don’t worry! For the first, there’s nothing wrong with me. I’m completely sane!”

“Sane people don’t have to say they’re sane,” she retorted as she hooked the tool onto her belt.

“That’s where you’re wrong.” He turned to a patch of lovely black irises, their ribboning petals outstretched under sunshine that threatened to shrivel them, but they remained firm. His thumb brushed against their surfaces, careful not to tear one off while under a similarly threatening gaze.

“Rationality dies at the hands of complacency, like those so-called witches in Europe.” She eyed his hand when he removed his glove, contemplative as he cradled the flowers with a care she hadn’t seen. “We’re gifted with knowledge of the past—those accusers had to be fanatical or greedy. Possibly both! And because everyone else was so comfortable being complacent, rationality died, and those who opposed them were sent to the gallows.”

“In the end, those considered sane are no better than anyone else.” His one unconcealed eye struck her, overflowing with complexity veiled behind a villainous facade. She took to his words with a familiar hum, allowing Nikolai to look closer at her. He had to assume she owned this quaint little store; if her protective nature didn’t clue him in, the several layers of dirt stains on her overalls did. His eye trailed upward, lingering on her lips, which were pursued in contemplation. It made his heart leap—it would be so exciting to have such a reactive test subject.

“You’re right,” she sighed, then hit him with a pointed look, telling him she had noticed him eyeing her. “But what does that have to do with destroying my flowers?”

“Ah, yes!” He exclaimed. “Your second question. The answer to that one is simple. I did it because I can!”

She stared at him, bewildered, as he switched from the tone of a prankster to a monster, like a predator who bared its claws at unsuspecting, idiotic prey. But instead of running tail, she took a deep breath—she was obviously about to scream. That was okay with him, though he was admittedly disappointed at the idea of such a predictable reaction.

“I would usually say just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should, but I have a feeling you already know that.” So she wasn’t screaming. She was more composed than ever, not angry or upset—her eyes were so focused, and he felt himself drawn in. “But I’m confused. Why are you doing something bad simply because you can?”

He raised a brow. The answer was obvious, but a part of his mind felt that her question was only surface level. “What do you mean?”

“You’ve appointed yourself as someone who stands against society, correct?” she prodded, her fingers absentmindedly circling the rim of a pot to push the dirt inside. 

He assisted her, albeit poorly, as he overfilled some pots. “Correct! It’s what I do.”

She paused. “If you’re going against society, then doesn’t that mean you’re adapting your behavior around society?”

He stopped, frowning.

“You’ve claimed that you're above society, but what you’re actually doing is acting parallel to it. You’re not doing things because you can. You’re doing them because someone told you not to.”

Nikolai swallowed hard, trying to focus on her hand as she took it out of her glove to brush back her hair. “Society needs someone to play the monster. You’re right—the complacent are no better just because they fall in line—but that doesn’t mean your actions are effective. You’ve just fallen into the opposing line of thinking.”

He couldn’t find the will to look at her anymore. This strange Chihuahua-like woman, in only a couple of sentences, unraveled his entire purpose. His connection with Fyodor no longer felt personal—had he always been that easy to read? A part of him wanted to pretend he had never heard her words, to walk out the door and pretend she never existed. Nothing was stopping him, so why didn’t he? When he met her eyes, he remained speechless.

“I-I majored in philosophy in college,” she stammered, her hands returning to her plants as she sunk under the conversation’s sudden weight.

“...I underestimated you.”

His every action had been to spite society, but was that any better than conforming to it? He was no closer to freedom; his strings remained intact due to ignorance. Was that why Fyodor only acknowledged him for a moment before filing him away as another “fantastic” person he had met on his journeys? He slipped from his glove, prickling his finger on a leaf. He thought that someone understanding him was enough.

But no. He wanted, no—he needed someone to oppose him. Transformation requires a catalyst. He thought he could bring about change by himself, but someone equal and opposite to him—they would be his catalyst.

“You’re easier to read than you think,” she said, breaking through his thoughts. “It’s just that most people would rather stick with their shallow, first perception than dig any deeper. It’s how the world keeps spinning.”

Before he could find the words to implore her to speak, to tell him about anything and everything, the sound of a bell cut through the air. 

“Good afternoon, (Name)!” an older woman exclaimed, eyeing Nikolai before she glanced at the aforementioned—at (Name).

“Good afternoon, Yamaguchi-san. I’ll be with you in just a moment.”

His hands fiddled with his overcoat. “Your name is (Name)?”

“It is.” He stifled his smile at her unamused expression, almost a pout. “What’s yours?”

“Hmm, not telling!” He poked her nose. “You’ll have to earn that when we meet again. Toodle-loo!”

But she caught him by the hand before he could exit in a grand spin. Her hand was warm, with a warmth that threatened to thaw at his frozen heart. “Hey! You’ll have to promise you won’t mess with any more of my plants. Got that?”

He should’ve said no; he should’ve said no and left. It had to be how she held out her pinkie or the twitch of her brow. He intertwined their fingers without a second thought, bringing the tip of hers to his lips as he delighted in her yelp. Another connection. Another string to tie him down. 

But this one would be okay.

“It’s a promise.”

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I don’t think he’s handling it well guys…

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