Chapter Text
“Grim, did you move my potted plant?” You say, gaze flicking around your bedroom in search of your disappearing friend. Did he… no, not my sweet plant…!
Casper looks up from his self appointed task of rearranging your desk for the fifth time at the sound of your voice. The pen he's gripping glides between his fingers in a droning ease, ruby orbs dancing to meet yours. “It’s on the ledge here. I thought plants needed sunlight, so I moved it.”
The worry leaves your frame, and you brighten at the admission. When the ex-Reaper had first arrived in your humble abode, he’d only ever made snide comments towards the plant in apparent disdain. But over these past few weeks as you’ve come to know the loveable dork, you’ve realised his dislike for the harmless plant was simply because of how much you cared for it... while not a Reaper anymore, Casper can still sense your aura and parts of your soul in whatever you will better.
…and, well. You’ve been trying to work on that. But it’s not like you can stop caring about all the things that matter to you at the tip of a hat, right?
“Aw, coming around to my plant?” You tease, slinking up behind the white-haired male. He’s stationed at your desk, legs folded on the comfy chair, pen twirling between his long, gloved fingers. Your attention lingers as you take a moment to watch; you’ve had daydreams about biting his gloves off… “That’s cute of you. Say, would you like to become a co-parent to our lovely child?”
Casper’s leg bobs up and down. You can’t quite make out his expression, but you’re certain he’s got that flustered confusement plastered across his face that you oh-so adore. “I… why would we adopt a plant? Plants are not sentient… but considering how much you talk to this plant, I suppose it might as well be…” He trails off with a lint of exasperation at your antics, rising from the chair to pace off into the other room, like putting any distance between you, him, and your plant is going to account for anything.
Really, has he learnt anything about you these last few weeks? You follow at his heels, giggling into your palm as you go. “Hey! Don’t be shy, you’ll be a great dad to our new son! Heyyy! You can’t leave while I’m talking to you, darling. Are you not a gentlemen? Or is etiquette different down in the spooky underworld or whatever?”
He twirls around quickly, hair sliding off his shoulder. “I — what, that’s not—!“ He flounders for words, the dust of pink rising quickly to his face. Usually, you’d think Casper would be able to rebut your quips faster, but he’s been much more timid around you ever since abandoning his protocol. “Ugh. Shut up. What do you want for dinner? You mortals need to eat a lot, don't you?”
Oh, wow, he’s really walking into this one. You try and battle the smirk off your lips. “You?”
“…!!” His expression flashes, and his face ripples from top to bottom as you trail your fingertips along his smooth, bare shoulder. You should ask about his skincare routine again. Casper exhales a rough breath, and you recall a few days prior that he’d told you he doesn’t need to breathe, being a Reaper and all. Useful stuff to know. “You think yourself humorous, little human. Think again. In the meantime, you will have to settle for my dashing good looks as you eat.”
In the meantime? That implies it’s on the table. You snicker. “Yes, yes. Come on,” A laugh bubbles out of you, and your fingers become a palm, rubbing his shoulder as Casper’s frame tenses, taut like a rubber band. “You can’t even lie about it if I asked. I’m funny sometimes. You think I’m funny.”
He doesn’t reply, so you chuckle once again. There’s a small rustle of fabric as his gloved fists clench, a wisp of a tremor working down his figure, and you feel it from where you're touching him. You’d ask, but you think you already know.
His newly-skittish behaviour isn’t lost to you. Ever since he’d ended that call, with a nervous I’ll see you soon, Sunshine and slipped his way through your window and into your heart, he’s been stumbling over his words and flushing up to his ears if you so even smile in his general direction. Touching him is another thing entirely — his spine straightens and his eyes pop open wide, and he stares at the place of contact like he’s trying to figure out it’s purpose of placement. He schools his lips into a thin line of practiced indifference, pretending to be all cool about it, like you can't tell the effect you're having on him.
The thought makes you want to wrap him up in a big fluffy blanket and squeeze, but you’re sure that’d do more harm than good. He’s like a stray cat, you muse. The affection is foreign, but not unwanted. He’s experiencing many things for the first time… hell, he’s entire life, his entire purpose has been spun on his head from a whim choice he’d made for you, so you’d be damned if you weren’t going to try your bestest to support him as well as you can.
He needs to figure out who he is. Who he wants to be now, if not a Reaper in hunt for souls. Despite stating he holds no interest in revealing himself to any other mortal souls, you wonder if it’d be a good idea to trial taking him out more, getting him to talk to people. Staying cramped up in your apartment can’t be good for him, and it might help ease his nerves.
So, you ask. And you’re damned glad you did.
Under the blue sky and setting sunlight, Casper is a sight to behold. His hair shines and glistens whenever he moves, light trills of fluorescent notes cascading off his pale frame, and for a dumb moment, he really does remind you of a certain sparkling vampire, but all the more captivating.
“What?” He says sharply, stopping whatever ramble he’d been buzzing about as he catches you staring at him, and for once, you find yourself lost for words.
You shake your head. Tempted to say nothing, but even that feels like an insult in this very moment. It’s not nothing. He’s fucking gorgeous, and he knows it, if the small pleased little smile he’s donning is anything to go by. Slyly, he tucks a rouge strand of white hair behind his ear as the pair of you continue your walk, and the tiny smile never leaves his lips.
You decide to eat out with him (he doesn’t eat, but comments on your dietary needs when you order a burger. You shush him, ravenous, and devour the whole thing in front of him as he watches with a nonplussed stare of undeniable disappointment) and walk back once you’re finished, chatting his ear off eagerly despite all the stares the pair of you receive for how loud you are unknowingly.
Nothing bad befalls you with him by your side, and later that night, as you convince him once again that, yes, it’s fine for him to share the bed with you, he's already been doing it for weeks and he’s not taking the couch, your hand itches to close the small space between you only separated by his plush Azrael (he cuddles it in his sleep… so cute…), but your woes on how he’d react fumble about in the recess of your mind, so your hand drawls back, tentative, hesitant, a swell of emotion rising within you.
The bridge floats into your mind. But no matter how much you now imagine that cute, little bridge, you can’t force Casper to walk across it.
Quite quickly you’d learnt he’s all talk no bite. Even as you’d pressed him down against your bedsheets, with his hair sprawled about ethereally, you couldn’t dare to ask him for more than just a kiss. Because once you’d pulled away, met his red splotched cheeks, heaving chest panting out desperate breaths he doesn’t even need, dazed eyes and shaking thighs spread wide to make room for your knee, you’d known for sure he really had never done all this before, the poor, lonely little man. But he certainly knows enough, if some of his comments are to be believed.
As you lay there contemplating sleep, your mind trails back to a particular comment you’d made, all those weeks ago. The specifics are lost to you, so you only remember how Casper had mentioned having you wrapped around his finger, so, with a wit only you posess, you’d spun it back on him without a second thought, but not without adding your own little twist.
Well, as long as that comes after me being wrapped around your… you’d paused, then, for lingering affect, as you’d watched through your laptop screen as Casper’s eyes had widened, his ruby red orbs blackening… finger. Your finger, that is.
He’d blushed so prettily then as he’d caught the innuendo, palm pressing against his lips as he mumbled something about watching what you say. You hadn’t been certain at the time, but you’d been pretty sure you caught him wetting his lips as he glanced to the side before cockily purring that you wouldn’t be able to last very long ‘wrapped’ around him to begin with. Sure the pair of you weren’t talking about souls anymore you’d been tempted to reply that it would be his own folly, not yours, and more a compliment if anything, but he’d brushed himself off and shifted back into careful nonchalance before you could manage the words, so you’d let the conversation go.
A shame, really. He’d look so good beneath you again, sweat sticking his hair to his forehead, moaning as your cock scraped and shaped his gummed insides to your shaft, sculpted to take what you're so eager to give.
Fuck. You twist uncomfortably, trying not to think about how red his face would be as you whispered sweet nothings against his earlobe, fingers sprawled against his soft chest, kneading lightly as he writhed and squirmed and panted with little shakes and whimpers as he loses his internal battle with himself you know he'd fight, surrendering to you, lulling down to melt into your bedsheets at the sensations your cock would be bringing him — ah, you can imagine it now, how his voice would pitch and punch out of him with each furious thrust — he’d take you so well, like he was made to be ruined by you.
Selfishly, you think of how unwell he feels if your aura isn’t there to heal him. He cannot stay in the mortal plane for long without your presence nearby, and you know he can’t return now that he’s broken protocol. His newfound freedom wouldn’t be possible without you. Bound to you from more than simple will.
Maybe he was made for you. Or you were made for him? Casper is careful on the specifics, but you know he’d been trying to claim your soul for a long time before inevitably reaching out to you with his shady app. With his darkness and your light… perhaps it was meant to be, that silly balance thing he'd blathered about. Since he won't be absorbing anymore souls, it's up to you to keep his balance in check...
You huff out a heated breath, head knocking to the side as you sneak a glance to your slumbering companion. His cheek is squashed against Azrael’s fluffed head, a serene elegance about him that his waking hours don't carry in the same sense. His features are usually so carefully conducted, so it’s sweet to see how comfortable he is now, to drop his guard around you like this. Utterly adorable, even if he won’t admit it.
Fighting down the heat in your abdomen, you toss to your side, staring at your door, wondering if your neighbors are about. Perhaps you should stop eavesdropping on them… you wonder when they'll be heading off to run away together. Perhaps you should tell Casper about them sometime. It's kind of important, right?
Casper’s frame stirs from behind you. Squinting through the darkness, you roll over to observe him — you hadn’t done anything to disturb him, you’d been sure — perhaps he’s having a bad dream? Your body pulls in closer as you query giving him a light shake internally — before your brain shutters off as a small sound escapes his parted lips, airy and full of something.
Desire? Is it? You wonder if you’re projecting. There’s a small nag at a corner of your conscious, a pull that feels a bit like Casper, a churning heat that hits you with such incessant force that you decide to slip out from underneath the rapidly heating covers, collecting yourself hastily, grubby palms sliding across your pajamas.
You take a page from Casper’s book. A cold shower. A very, very cold shower is needed. Instantly. Lest you do something incredibly stupid.
(But no matter how cold you turn the dial, it does little to fizz out the churning fire burning in your abdomen.)