fonteyn

[fonteyn]

The realm will not accept her. And to secure her claim, she'll have to put your children to the sword. She'll have no choice. You know it. You're no fool, and yet you choose not to see it. The time is coming, Alicent. Either you prepare Aegon to rule, or you cleave to Rhaenyra and pray for her mercy.

ALICENT HIGHTOWER — 1.05

[fonteyn]

MICHELLE PFEIFFER as TITANIA A Midsummer Night's Dream (1999)

[fonteyn]

NICHOLAS HOULT for Vogue photographed by Gabriel Perez Silva

[fonteyn]

I look up on google maps abt dermatologists in my area and a nutritionist with a specialty in hormonal issues and then what I get in return is being bombarded on ig for the past two weeks with diet culture, self blame, and pseudoscience. Hm. Thanks I guess.

[fonteyn]

FRIENDS 7.15 – "The One With Joey's New Brain"

[fonteyn]

Hey babe, number 4 with Dex perchance?

I want to live in your mind, your writing is so good <3

metronome

pairing: benjamin poindexter x reader prompt: legs intertwined under covers. (wc: 750) a/n: no smut haha, just reader talking in their sleep. thank u kenny for the rq!!!! :33

The sound pulls him out of the half-sleep he’s been pretending is enough. It’s not part of the usual symphony of night—not the lazy shifts of blanket against skin, nor the creak of the building settling under the recent cold—and so Dex notices it immediately. He’s a light sleeper on a good night, and tonight… well, you’re asleep in his bed. That’s already messing with his brain’s ability to fully shut down.

He blinks into the darkness, senses sharpening, and it’s just funny how his mind clicks into that state so fast. You’re warm against his side, a human heater he keeps forgetting is actually there. Breathing for yourself and not just a conjured weight his brain made up to make the sheets feel less empty. 

It wasn’t like it was ever careless with you. You’d touched him before: an absent hand settling over his knuckles mid-conversation, leaning in close to read something off his phone—but always with that invisible margin kept in place. Not for lack of want, but out of mutual wariness, as with alley cats sizing each other up. Wary of getting close too quickly, scaring each other off.

“...hello...?”

Was it ironic, then, that it’s become a shared habit for you to sleep together? Not in the euphemistic sense, just in the plain fact of occupying the same bed, night after night, limbs entangled. It had seemed only natural, the obvious solution for two people who couldn’t sleep worth a damn alone. The choice had been made without any real discussion, supplemented enough by the natural geometry of two bodies fitting perfectly in the same space. Anyone could see the alternative—a shared bout of insomnia—would be worse.

“...hmm…”

There it is again, the sound you’re making. At first it was simply a low, fragmented sigh; by the time he’s fully awake, it’s already approximating full words.

“...no, that’s my… breadstick…”

Dex’s brow furrows.

He turns his head slowly, eyes adjusting in the blue-green spill of night leaking in from the street. One arm’s slung haphazardly across his stomach, your cheek squished flat against the pillow. You look peaceful, even as you mutter something else entirely incoherent.

“...betrayal,” you add, after a long pause, “...no thank you.. olives..?”

He stares at you, bewildered.

“What are you dreaming about?” he asks, so quietly he’s sure he’s only said it in his head.

And softly, as if in response, you murmur:

“...Dex, you can’t fight the waiters…”

He can’t help it, his chest tightens with the effort not to laugh. Still, he stays silent, happy enough to watch you twitch faintly under the covers, your face occasionally wrinkling in dramatic disapproval. You twist again, cuddling closer to him automatically like your subconscious has no interest in respecting your own narrative. Your hand fists slightly in the fabric of his shirt. 

“...I love you,” you murmur.

The world goes quiet.

Dex freezes completely, struck by the certainty that any movement will scare the words back into the dark. 

I love you.

You shift, settling back into deeper sleep. He must not move. Moving was what got you noticed, he’d learned that as a kid, waiting for the voice down the hall to stop yelling. Stillness was what made you disappear. But your fingers twitch against him again, reminding him he hasn’t disappeared at all.

It would be the easier thing to wake you, to test how fast he could say the wrong thing and watch you pull those words back into your chest—words he wants to hear again and again and again. But your legs are still tangled with his, your easy breathing a metronome for his thoughts, and he’s not looking to bleed for the answer tonight. So he lets you sleep, and tries it out in his head instead. Tasting the shape of what it would be like to say it back. Now would be the perfect time—with you dead to the world, unable to take it back if you changed your mind upon hearing it from him.

I love you too.

Instead, he shifts just enough to ease your head into a more comfortable angle against him. His hand hovers, then lowers to rest above your shoulder with such infinitesimal pressure it feels like his fingers have turned to stone. 

There are roles to fill, things to do. As for Dex, he must lie there, looking at the place where the wall meets the ceiling until it blurs into nothing. It will have to do for now.

[fonteyn]

US CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY & GLOBAL TERRORISM

US Use of Weapons of Mass Destruction The indiscriminate use of bombs by the US, usually outside a declared war situation, for wanton destruction, for no military objectives, whose targets and victims are civilian populations, or what we now call “collateral damage.”

Japan (1945) 

China (1945-46) 

Korea & China (1950-53) 

Guatemala (1954, 1960, 1967-69) 

Indonesia (1958) 

Cuba (1959-61) 

Congo (1964) 

Peru (1965) 

Laos (1964-70) 

Vietnam (1961-1973) 

Cambodia (1969-70) 

Grenada (1983) 

Lebanon (1983-84) 

Libya (1986) 

El Salvador (1980s) 

Nicaragua (1980s) 

Iran (1987) 

Panama (1989) 

Iraq (1991-2000) 

Kuwait (1991) 

Somalia (1993) 

Bosnia (1994-95) 

Sudan (1998) 

Afghanistan (1998) 

Pakistan (1998) 

Yugoslavia (1999) 

Bulgaria (1999) 

Macedonia (1999)

US Use of Chemical & Biological Weapons The US has refused to sign Conventions against the development and use of chemical and biological weapons, and has either used or tested (without informing the civilian populations) these weapons in the following locations abroad:

Bahamas (late 1940s-mid-1950s) 

Canada (1953) 

China and Korea (1950-53) 

Korea (1967-69) 

Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia (1961-1970) 

Panama (1940s-1990s) 

Cuba (1962, 69, 70, 71, 81, 96)

And the US has tested such weapons on US civilian populations, without their knowledge, in the following locations:

Watertown, NY and US Virgin Islands (1950) 

SF Bay Area (1950, 1957-67) 

Minneapolis (1953) 

St. Louis (1953) 

Washington, DC Area (1953, 1967) 

Florida (1955) 

Savannah GA/Avon Park, FL (1956-58) 

New York City (1956, 1966) 

Chicago (1960)

And the US has encouraged the use of such weapons, and provided the technology to develop such weapons in various nations abroad, including:

Egypt 

South Africa 

Iraq

US Political and Military Interventions since 1945 The US has launched a series of military and political interventions since 1945, often to install puppet regimes, or alternatively to engage in political actions such as smear campaigns, sponsoring or targeting opposition political groups (depending on how they served US interests), undermining political parties, sabotage and terror campaigns, and so forth. It has done so in nations such as

China (1945-51) 

South Africa (1960s-1980s)

France (1947) 

Bolivia (1964-75)

Marshall Islands (1946-58) 

Australia (1972-75)

Italy (1947-1975) 

Iraq (1972-75)

Greece (1947-49) 

Portugal (1974-76)

Philippines (1945-53) 

East Timor (1975-99)

Korea (1945-53) 

Ecuador (1975)

Albania (1949-53) 

Argentina (1976)

Eastern Europe (1948-56) 

Pakistan (1977)

Germany (1950s) 

Angola (1975-1980s)

Iran (1953) 

Jamaica (1976)

Guatemala (1953-1990s) 

Honduras (1980s)

Costa Rica (mid-1950s, 1970-71) 

Nicaragua (1980s)

Middle East (1956-58) 

Philippines (1970s-90s)

Indonesia (1957-58) 

Seychelles (1979-81)

Haiti (1959) 

South Yemen (1979-84)

Western Europe (1950s-1960s) 

South Korea (1980)

Guyana (1953-64) 

Chad (1981-82)

Iraq (1958-63) 

Grenada (1979-83)

Vietnam (1945-53) 

Suriname (1982-84)

Cambodia (1955-73) 

Libya (1981-89)

Laos (1957-73) 

Fiji (1987)

Thailand (1965-73) 

Panama (1989)

Ecuador (1960-63) 

Afghanistan (1979-92)

Congo (1960-65, 1977-78) 

El Salvador (1980-92)

Algeria (1960s) 

Haiti (1987-94)

Brazil (1961-64) 

Bulgaria (1990-91)

Peru (1965) 

Albania (1991-92)

Dominican Republic (1963-65) 

Somalia (1993)

Cuba (1959-present) 

Iraq (1990s)

Indonesia (1965) 

Peru (1990-present)

Ghana (1966) 

Mexico (1990-present)

Uruguay (1969-72) 

Colombia (1990-present)

Chile (1964-73) 

Yugoslavia (1995-99)

Greece (1967-74)

US Perversions of Foreign Elections The US has specifically intervened to rig or distort the outcome of foreign elections, and sometimes engineered sham “demonstration” elections to ward off accusations of government repression in allied nations in the US sphere of influence. These sham elections have often installed or maintained in power repressive dictators who have victimized their populations. Such practices have occurred in nations such as:

Philippines (1950s) 

Italy (1948-1970s) 

Lebanon (1950s) 

Indonesia (1955) 

Vietnam (1955) 

Guyana (1953-64) 

Japan (1958-1970s) 

Nepal (1959) 

Laos (1960) 

Brazil (1962) 

Dominican Republic (1962) 

Guatemala (1963) 

Bolivia (1966) 

Chile (1964-70) 

Portugal (1974-75) 

Australia (1974-75) 

Jamaica (1976) 

El Salvador (1984) 

Panama (1984, 89) 

Nicaragua (1984, 90) 

Haiti (1987, 88) 

Bulgaria (1990-91) 

Albania (1991-92) 

Russia (1996) 

Mongolia (1996) 

Bosnia (1998)

US Versus World at the United Nations The US has repeatedly acted to undermine peace and human rights initiatives at the United Nations, routinely voting against hundreds of UN resolutions and treaties. The US easily has the worst record of any nation on not supporting UN treaties. In almost all of its hundreds of “no” votes, the US was the “sole” nation to vote no (among the 100-130 nations that usually vote), and among only 1 or 2 other nations voting no the rest of the time. Here’s a representative sample of US votes from 1978-1987:

US Is the Sole “No” Vote on Resolutions or Treaties

For aid to underdeveloped nations 

For the promotion of developing nation exports 

For UN promotion of human rights

For protecting developing nations in trade agreements

For New International Economic Order for underdeveloped nations

For development as a human right

Versus multinational corporate operations in South Africa

For cooperative models in developing nations

For right of nations to economic system of their choice

Versus chemical and biological weapons (at least 3 times)

Versus Namibian apartheid

For economic/standard of living rights as human rights

Versus apartheid South African aggression vs. neighboring states (2 times)

Versus foreign investments in apartheid South Africa

For world charter to protect ecology

For anti-apartheid convention

For anti-apartheid convention in international sports

For nuclear test ban treaty (at least 2 times)

For prevention of arms race in outer space

For UNESCO-sponsored new world information order (at least 2 times)

For international law to protect economic rights

For Transport & Communications Decade in Africa

Versus manufacture of new types of weapons of mass destruction 

Versus naval arms race 

For Independent Commission on Disarmament & Security Issues 

For UN response mechanism for natural disasters 

For the Right to Food 

For Report of Committee on Elimination of Racial Discrimination 

For UN study on military development 

For Commemoration of 25th anniversary of Independence for Colonial Countries 

For Industrial Development Decade in Africa 

For interdependence of economic and political rights 

For improved UN response to human rights abuses 

For protection of rights of migrant workers 

For protection against products harmful to health and the environment 

For a Convention on the Rights of the Child 

For training journalists in the developing world 

For international cooperation on third world debt 

For a UN Conference on Trade & Development

US Is 1 of Only 2 “No” Votes on Resolutions or Treaties 

For Palestinian living conditions/rights (at least 8 times) 

Versus foreign intervention into other nations 

For a UN Conference on Women 

Versus nuclear test explosions (at least 2 times) 

For the non-use of nuclear weapons vs. non-nuclear states 

For a Middle East nuclear free zone 

Versus Israeli nuclear weapons (at least 2 times) 

For a new world international economic order 

For a trade union conference on sanctions vs. South Africa 

For the Law of the Sea Treaty 

For economic assistance to Palestinians 

For UN measures against fascist activities and groups 

For international cooperation on money/finance/debt/trade/development 

For a Zone of Peace in the South Atlantic 

For compliance with Intl Court of Justice decision for Nicaragua vs. US. 

**For a conference and measures to prevent international terrorism (including its underlying causes) 

For ending the trade embargo vs. Nicaragua

US Is 1 of Only 3 “No” Votes on Resolutions and Treaties 

Versus Israeli human rights abuses (at least 6 times) 

Versus South African apartheid (at least 4 times) 

Versus return of refugees to Israel 

For ending nuclear arms race (at least 2 times) 

For an embargo on apartheid South Africa 

For South African liberation from apartheid (at least 3 times) 

For the independence of colonial nations 

For the UN Decade for Women 

Versus harmful foreign economic practices in colonial territories 

For a Middle East Peace Conference 

For ending the embargo of Cuba (at least 10 times)

In addition, the US has: 

Repeatedly withheld its dues from the UN 

Twice left UNESCO because of its human rights initiatives 

Twice left the International Labor Organization for its workers rights initiatives 

Refused to renew the Antiballistic Missile Treaty 

Refused to sign the Kyoto Treaty on global warming 

Refused to back the World Health Organization’s ban on infant formula abuses 

Refused to sign the Anti-Biological Weapons Convention 

Refused to sign the Convention against the use of land mines 

Refused to participate in the UN Conference Against Racism in Durban 

Been one of the last nations in the world to sign the UN Covenant on 

Political & Civil Rights (30 years after its creation) 

Refused to sign the UN Covenant on Economic & Social Rights 

Opposed the emerging new UN Covenant on the Rights to Peace, Development & Environmental Protection

Sampling of Deaths >From US Military Interventions & Propping Up Corrupt Dictators (using the most conservative estimates)

Nicaragua – 30,000 dead

Brazil  – 100,000 dead

Korea – 4 million dead

Guatemala – 200,000 dead

Honduras – 20,000 dead

El Salvador – 63,000 dead

Argentina – 40,000 dead

Bolivia – 10,000 dead

Uruguay – 10,000 dead

Ecuador – 10,000 dead

Peru – 10,000 dead

Iraq – 1.3 million dead

Iran – 30,000 dead

Sudan – 8-10,000 dead

Colombia – 50,000 dead

Panama – 5,000 dead

Japan – 140,000 dead

Afghanistan – 10,000 dead

Somalia – 5000 dead

Philippines – 150,000 dead

Haiti – 100,000 dead

Dominican Republic – 10,000 dead

Libya – 500 dead

Macedonia – 1000 dead

South Africa – 10,000 dead

Pakistan – 10,000 dead

Palestine – 40,000 dead

Indonesia – 1 million dead

East Timor – 1/3-½ of total population

Greece – 10,000 dead

Laos – 600,000 dead

Cambodia – 1 million dead

Angola – 300,000 dead

Grenada – 500 dead

Congo  – 2 million dead

Egypt – 10,000 dead

Vietnam – 1.5 million dead

Chile – 50,000 dead

Other Lethal US Interventions CIA Terror Training Manuals Development and distribution of training manuals for foreign military personnel or foreign nationals, including instructions on assassination, subversion, sabotage, population control, torture, repression, psychological torture, death squads, etc.

Specific Torture Campaigns Creation and launching of direct US campaigns to support torture as an instrument of terror and social control for governments in Greece, Iran, Vietnam, Bolivia, Uruguay, Brazil, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Panama

Supporting and Harboring Terrorists The promotion, protection, arming or equipping of terrorists such as:

Klaus Barbie and other German Nazis, and Italian and Japanese fascists, after WW II

Manual Noriega (Panama), Saddam Hussein (Iraq), Rafael Trujillo (Dominican Republic), Osama bin Laden (Afghanistan), and others whose terrorism has come back to haunt us

Running the Higher War College (Brazil) and first School of the Americas (Panama), which gave US training to repressors, death squad members, and torturers (the second School of the Americas is still running at Ft. Benning GA)

Providing asylum for Cuban, Salvadoran, Guatemalan, Haitian, Chilean, Argentinian, Iranian, South Vietnamese and other terrorists, dictators, and torturers

Assassinating World Leaders Using assassination as a tool of foreign policy, wherein the CIA has initiated assassination attempts against at least 40 foreign heads of state (some several times) in the last 50 years, a number of which have been successful, such as: Patrice Lumumba (Congo), Rafael Trujillo (Dominican Republic), Ngo Dihn Diem (Vietnam) Salvador Allende (Chile)

Arms Trade & US Military Presence

The US is the world’s largest seller of weapons abroad, arming dictators, militaries, and terrorists that repress or victimize their populations, and fueling scores of violent conflicts around the globe

The US is the world’s largest provider of live land mines which, even in peacetime, kill or injure at least several people around the world each day

The US has military bases in at least 50 nations around the world, which have led to frequent victimization of local populations.

The US military has been bombing one Middle Eastern or Muslim nation or another almost continuously since 1983, including Lebanon, Libya, Syria, Iran, the Sudan, Afghanistan, and Iraq (almost daily bombings since 1991)

This, then, is a sampling of American foreign policies over the last 50 years. The FBI uses the following definition for Terrorism: “The unlawful use of force or violence committed by a group or individual, who has some connection to a foreign power or whose activities transcend national boundaries, against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.” This sounds like the terrorism we just experienced. It also sounds a lot like the US policies and actions since 1945 that I’ve just described.

This is a version of an an original page atributed to Robert Elias, a US Professor of Political Science , a list which, like so many others,  has otherwise ‘disappered’

via https://web.archive.org/web/20161125052245/http://www.the-philosopher.co.uk/whocares/popups/warcrimes.htm

[fonteyn]

Bullying is crazy... I spent 13 years of my life forced to be at a certain location for 6+ hours almost every day, and at this location multiple of my peers would verbally harass or insult me, physically assault me, sexually harass me, socially ostracize me, every single day, for factors entirely outside of my control. And every adult who was ostensibly supposed to prevent this from happening either willfully ignored it or actively contributed to the bullying. And like, I'm supposed to just brush it off as "just bullying" and something that everyone goes through? Like I was literally in psychological torment camp every day for nearly my entire childhood and now I'm supposed to just function like a human being. Anyways what did you want on your sub. Ham and cheese. No lettuce or mayo..got it okay

[fonteyn]

I'm fully convinced ppl are just coming up with stupid things to make weddings even more expensive cause wdym it's now common to deliver a single tissue to each individual guests in a plastic envelope in case they feel like crying?????

[fonteyn]

ads targeted to women: omg you are thirtyyyy. kill yourself

[fonteyn]

favorite first watches of 2025 — ★★★★★ SINNERS (2025)

[fonteyn]

[fonteyn]

[fonteyn]

[fonteyn]

slammer

pairing: benjamin poindexter x reader

summary: in the middle of summer, you find dex's old box of pogs. : ) (fluff, gn!reader)

a/n: inspired by the prop notes from kid dex's therapy sessions (here!!) that mentioned he had great aim with the slammers and pogs which i found so cute 🥺 these are advanced reparations for the absolute hell i'm bout to put him through in the next fic : )

You weren’t even looking for them on purpose. It’s the other fan you were trying to find: the city’s caught in one of those off-peak cold snaps in the middle of summer, where the air can’t commit to heat or chill, stuck in a muggy, bone-deep limbo that leaves sweat and goosebumps living side by side. So you’re crouched in Dex’s bedroom, cursing under your breath, one arm elbow-deep beneath the bedframe with your fingertips skating over dust and loose receipts—when they land on something decidedly not a fan.

It rattles when you pull it out. A brown shoebox, beat to hell, corners taped and retaped into submission with black sharpie on the lid.

B. POINDEXTER / 199X-199X

A prickle rolls up your spine as you frown down at the thing. Guilt, curiosity, excitement—all swimming in the same warm, unsure current. Dex has let you in; he’s been more open with you lately, even generous—tiny pieces of his life given freely like coins pressed into your palm. You’ve been lucky to see what you’ve seen. And still—it only makes you greedier. The more he gives, the more you want. Want to turn him over in your hands, hold every year he’s tried to bury in your mouth and learn the taste of it. But it takes time. You know that.

On the other hand, you also know he doesn’t have to know.

You open the lid–

–and you can’t help but giggle.

Inside are pogs. Real, actual, unapologetic pogs: stacks and dozens of glossy cardboard discs packed edge to edge, their designs faded into a sunwashed pastel of 90’s absurdity—off-brand cartoon mascots, fireball fonts, metallic foils curling at the corners. There’s a pile of slammers too, metal and plastic, one of them shaped like a skull. You stare breathlessly, awash in a nostalgia so strong that you don’t even hear Dex behind you until he clears his throat.

“What are you doing?”

You jolt, then look over your shoulder. “These are yours?” 

His gaze cuts to the lid, then back to you. His throat works like he wants to swallow the question whole.

“Where’d you get that?”

“Bed,” you say, like the world’s most innocent thief, flipping a slammer between your fingers. “Man, I used to suck at these. You must’ve been crazy good, huh?”

Dex walks past you and reaches up, opening the closet and pulling down the fan—the one you’d been looking for—in two seconds flat.

“It was a phase.”

“Bullshit,” you say, your hands now sorting through the rest of the stacks. “You have, like, a thousand.”

“Okay, I was pretty good,” he finally admits, almost too quiet to hear. You can tell he’s trying not to smile, to puff up too much. For all intents and purposes, he’s failing. It’s already seeping through, so you just throw him the bone—besides, you’re already plotting something.

“Oh, I bet you were. You probably trained.”

“I did.”

You laugh, barked and disbelieving. “You trained for pogs?”

Dex shrugs. “Didn’t have much to do. You could win other kids’ stacks, I wanted all of ‘em.”

“Oh my God.” You’re grinning so hard you’re scared your face might crack. “Dex, I have an idea.”

Later that afternoon—windows open, someone two floors up smoking something acrid and sweet—you stand across him on the living room floor with a pile of mismatched pogs between you. There’s the Business Section of today’s paper underneath as the playing surface. Dex has sorted the pogs by sheen, weight, center-balance like he’s tuning an instrument. You just picked yours based on which ones have funny cats and dogs on them.

“You sure about that slammer?” he says, brows raised.

You glance down at your gaudy glitter-pink disk. It has a cartoon cat on it that reminds you vaguely of Dex, which was why you chose it in the first place.

“It speaks to me.”

Dex suppresses a sigh. “You’re gonna lose everything.”

“You’re the one who’s emotionally invested,” you say smugly. “Unfortunately for you, I’m the cool, collected underdog, and you’re–”

“Oh, you won’t be for long.”

You blink, thrown by the gleam in his eye. His mouth is pulled into something dangerously close to cocky in a way you like. It’s the first time you’ve seen him like this—light, boyish, kind of wicked with no trace of self-consciousness—and he looks ten years younger, like someone you would've thrown rocks at just to get his attention in middle school.

He takes his time stacking the pogs, five tall, shiny sides up, as if the whole thing is ceremonial. His fingers are steady and precise.

“You go first,” you offer.

He shrugs offhandedly, and so he does go first—with a flick of his wrist that’s so fast, so fluid, so obscene that the tower of pogs explodes like a paper city hit with artillery, discs skittering in every direction. He scoops his winnings with fast, neat fingers, already reassembling the stack with inhuman speed before you’ve even processed what just happened. 

“Dex!”

He glances up innocently. “Hm?”

“...What the hell was that?”

He shrugs. “S’all in the wrist.”

“You’re sick.” You shake your finger at him. “You’re a sick man.”

“It’s your idea. Besides, you picked the sparkle one.”

“You knew it was bad and you let me choose it!”

“There are no bad slammers,” Dex says with finality. He’s fucking smirking. “Just bad technique.”

Needless to say, you lose three rounds in a row.

Dex never misses. He adjusts between turns like he’s recalibrating for crosswind. You realize, horrified, that he’s calculating and measuring angles. He’s playing pogs like he’d play ballistics—and with that, you know you’re done for. Who uses geometry at a damn kids’ game?

By round four, he’s up 9 to 2.

“Stack ‘em again,” he says, “I’ll give you a handicap.”

You shoot him a glare, but your hands are already reaching. Outside, the city smells like heat and burned meat and tires; inside, Dex appraises the tower of decades-old collectibles like he’s holding court in his private kingdom, knees starting to ache and not caring in the slightest.

You throw again. You miss the stack entirely. The slammer glances off the base like a dead frog.

He’s never grinned so wide.

“This is bullshit!”

“You’re not flattening your wrist enough,” he says evenly, voice dropping as you reach across him to snatch your slammer back. “And you’re leaning too much. You gotta watch your shoulder.”

“Aww,” you say, mock-wounded. “You’re coaching me.”

He doesn’t flinch. “You’ll like it better when you win.”

You hope the flush in your cheeks can pass for heat from the muggy air, and not the sudden gentleness in his voice.

Neither of you speaks after that. You circle the stack in silence, studying it like it might give up secrets, pressing an auspicious kiss to your slammer. And then—crack—it hits clean: two discs flipping into the air with a satisfying snap, and Dex’s eyebrows visibly twitch.

“Oh?” you say. “Is someone coming for your throne?”

He’s already restacking. “Try it again.”

He lets you win the fourth round. You know he does: he fakes a poor angle and doesn’t even scoop up all the pogs he could’ve taken. Because you’re a self-preserving schmuck, you pretend not to notice. He pretends to lose with dignity. You both know the dance. 

The noon unspools as such. The fan humming, the wind warm and tired through the screen, the faint hum of distant traffic and city static. Someone lights another cigarette down the block. You lie flat on the hardwood, pogs scattered like bones between you. No one’s playing anymore.

Dex has his arm raised, examining the slammer balanced between his knuckles. A natural extension of his own body. He looks criminally pleased with himself, entirely at home in his own skin.

“You ever cheat?” you ask, flicking a bent pog at his chest. Your hands are sticky from soda, sticker gunk, the glue of summer.

He doesn’t look over. “Never.”

“Never ever?” 

“No point. If I lost, it meant I needed to get better.”

“Huh.” You’d always been of the opinion that cheating on games was half the fun, so you’re quiet for a second, considering it. “I guess that’s very you.”

Eventually, he turns his head. The sun is gentle on him, the yellow rays painting and mixing with his hair like fire, and his face is glowing where it meets the lines of his cheeks and the illuminated hazel of his eyes. 

“Just didn’t wanna disappoint anyone,” he says.

You don’t answer, reaching across the mess of pogs to press your fingers against the back of his hand. He lets you; he doesn’t pull away. He never does anymore.

“...Best of fifteen again?” you murmur, against the warm skin of his neck.

Dex sighs.

“Haven’t you had enough of me beating you?”

“Not even close.” You pull back to look at him, smiling like an idiot. Full and bright with it. He’d been beaming like a little kid right then, so how could you not be, too?

You could lose forever and still walk away full.

You press your elbow to his, shoulder to shoulder.

“Line ‘em up, then.”

[fonteyn]

Gues who saw the batman ( and come back from illness)

[fonteyn]

na na na na na na na batman