#&8216;i

[101now]

'I wish I could come back'

A Virginia mother who was reported missing earlier this month amid allegations of child abuse told a local news reporter that she and her three children are doing well. A missing persons investigation began Sept. 13, after Lauren Cook failed to appear for a rescheduled court appearance in Franklin County Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court, authorities said. This was a rescheduled court…

[bronva]

Prince Albert of Monaco's wife, Princess Charlene, reflects on her lengthy medical saga: ‘I feel less pain’

Prince Albert of Monaco’s wife, Princess Charlene, reflects on her lengthy medical saga: ‘I feel less pain’

Princess Charlene of Monaco is opening up about her ongoing medical saga. On Wednesday, the South African-raised royal spoke to the local newspaper Monaco Matin, where she addressed the health concerns that kept her away from the principality for a year. “I would first like to say that I feel so much better today than I have in recent years,” the mother of two told the outlet. “I feel less pain…

[thewildsophia]

One Piece//Straw Hats x Winged!Reader

A/N: I haven't seen anything with the entire straw hat crew and a winged!reader so I made one myself. Can be read either as platonic or romantic.

CW: Strong language.

Word Count: 8216

"Read More Link” placed due to length.

Straw Hats w/Winged!Crewmate

Luffy

You met Luffy when you were flying before you were forcefully pulled down to the deck of the Thousand Sunny. Luffy had thought you were some large bird and was disappointed when he realized you weren’t edible.

You were dazed and disoriented when you looked up at Luffy and the other crewmembers who had flocked around the deck to gawk at you. After getting a good look at you, Luffy picked you up and without missing a beat asked you to join his crew. The rest of the crew all screamed at him which freaked you out and you tried to fly off. 

“Hey! Where you going?” You heard someone shout before being grabbed by your ankle and pulled back down to the deck. Your head was throbbing from that second pull and was being made worse by Nami screaming at Luffy to be nice to you.

Again, Luffy asked you to join his crew before Nami hit him on the head. Nami apologized to you and simply offered for you to stay on the ship while you orientate yourself.

During your “recovery” time though the crew manages to charm you enough to stay for a little while longer. After fighting by their side during one of their adventures on some random-ass island, you decide to officially join them.

The first few days you were on the ship, Luffy would come up behind you and just…grab them. After a few scoldings conversations about it, Luffy learned not just to grab them, but to at least make his presence known to you before doing so.

Sometimes if you’re on one side of the Sunny’s deck and he’s on the other, he’ll stretch his arm (or arms) out and tap your shoulder before stroking your wings. 

He really just can’t help himself tbh. They’re just so soft!

Once you become more comfortable with it, Luffy likes to just play with your wings. Stuff like opening and closing them or carding through the individual feathers with his fingers while you’re busy doing something else.

Luffy loves to just watch you move around sometimes since your wings have a life of their own. Like when you bend over to pick something up your wings stretch out just a little bit to help keep you balance. 

You eventually became comfortable enough to let Luffy pet your wings when the crew is enjoying some downtime. Ya’ll will be sitting somewhere near the Sunny’s railing and Luffy will be stroking your feathers with a surprising amount of delicacy. 

You quickly become one of Luffy’s favorite playmates without even trying. Whenever you're playing a game of tag your movements make you someone very hard to tag. 

Luffy likes to ask a lot of questions about your wings and what you are. His curiosity knows no bounds and that’s reflected in his well-intended but sometimes rude queries.

You are also one of the first people Luffy goes to when he wants to spar which is few and far in between. He finds that you are a very capable fighter and have a very unique style. When you move your body, your movements are smooth as silk and you are able to contort it in many different ways, similar to his in a way. He finds fighting against you to be a very unique challenge.

Whenever your wings are molting, you don’t let Luffy help you preen them, but you do give the nicer feathers from your wings to him, and my God does he love them. He tucked one of them in the ribbon of his straw hat and showed it off proudly to the rest of the crew and no you’re not crying-

BEGS you to take him flying with you. You say no every time for fear of dropping him in the ocean. You wouldn’t mind doing it if he just didn’t squIRM SO MUCH.

Luffy KNOWS that you can carry him in the air since you’ve grabbed him before in the middle of fights and placed him somewhere else so he pesters you every day about it. 

Knowing that you can carry him, he would purposely get into tight situations in battle so you would swoop down and fly him to safety.

Talking about combat as well, Luffy is mildly surprised at how fast you can move about the field, slipping and zooming between targets in an instant. He also took note of your strength and how much of a punch you pack despite your dainty stature. 

He once watched you kick a guy square in the face and he went flyyyyyying (no pun intended). The moment he saw that guy’s body sore through the air he thought to himself, “Yup, I picked out another great crewmember!”

Overall, he’s thrilled to have someone so unique on his crew and is obsessed with the way that you are just…you. Luffy has good taste in picking out his crew and you are no exception.

Zoro

Zoro had found you by complete accident. He had gotten lost on one of the many islands the straw hats visited in the Grand Line and accidentally ran into you.

At first, he thought you were someone who had fallen from Skypeia, but after noting just how large your wings are compared to those on Skypeia he thinks to ask, to which you explain you’re not from there.

He’s quick to ask for directions and you gladly help him all the while you two are chatting as you lead him back to his ship. The moment Luffy spots you with Zoro you immediately become an official crew member you don’t have a choice. 

Zoro never really asks where you’re from or what you are. He’s more interested in who you are and wants to know you personally. Considering he’s a part of a crew that has several devil fruit users, he starts to care less about others' abilities and looks and focuses more on their character.

Zoro is pretty indifferent about the whole wings thing tbh. He thinks they look nice and all, but it doesn’t really change his opinion of you either way. 

But don’t take it the wrong way like he’s disinterested; He’s that way with everyone.

He does enjoy laying against/on them when you two take naps together on the ship. They’re so soft and smell -- while not necessarily good -- nice; they smell like you, and he finds comfort in that. 

Zoro only ever asked you once to touch your wings. It was late at night and you had decided to join him in looking out since you couldn’t sleep. You’re sure he had been drinking. He was very quiet when he asked you, almost as if he didn’t want you to hear him.

The rough callouses on his hands ticked as they carded through your feathers and you stifled a small giggle at the sensation. He made only one comment about how soft they were. Slowly you found yourself drifting to sleep as his fingers methodically brushed your wings. 

The two of you ended up falling asleep together. Zoro’s head rested against your shoulder as you wrapped him in the warmth of your wing. When you woke up in the morning, Zoro was gone :(

Zoro doesn’t take care of his personal hygiene that well (this guy showers like, what, once every week? Stinky…) so he doesn’t really help you preen your wings when you’re molting. Or anytime really tbh. 

And if you’re being honest, he wouldn’t really be that good at it either. He would pull on the wrong ones and be rough when pushing feathers out of the way to pluck others. He wouldn’t mean to hurt you, he’s just not good at delicate work like that.

He doesn’t really collect your feathers like some of the others, but he does keep one of the really long-flight feathers that you gave him. He has it stashed in the Crow’s Nest (he thought it funny to keep your feather in the “Crows Nest” since a crow is a bird and birds have feathers…Just don’t bring it up to him bc he WILL get embarrassed).

Never asks you to take him flying with you, which you’re grateful for. He’s so dense with muscle that you don’t think you could actually fly with him. Plus, Luffy’s begging is enough lmao.

In battle, he expected you to be fast and light, but wasn’t expecting you to be such a hard hitter, you know? He thought you’d have a lighter punch given the whole “angelic” thing you have going on but no, his eyes widened when he watched you absolutely deck this buff-ass dude into the dirt.

Like this man’s whole head was stuck in the dirt and he struggled to pull it out. Zoro was honestly shocked you hadn’t busted his skull open from the impact of such a hit.

If you ever decide to take up swordsmanship, Zoro is glad -- and even a little excited -- to teach you. Just know that he doesn’t take it lightly and, while firm, is a reasonable instructor. He would also encourage you to try out different techniques that are unique to you and that may match your fighting style and mobility better. 

Maybe using your flight would help with sweeping attacks? Zoro doesn’t know, he leaves that up to you to figure out.

There was one time when he was knocked tf out in a long fight and you were the first thing he woke up to -- face pinched in worry and wings disheveled and dirty -- and he honestly thought he had died and gone to heaven, but you will NEVER hear him tell you about that.

Overall, Zoro is not that impressed by the fact you have wings but is instead impressed at how you use them to your and the crew’s benefit. He thinks of you as a very strong and reliable crew member and someone who is genuinely very kind to others.

Nami

The Straw Hats met you pretty early on in their journey at the Baratie. When Nami first saw you, a horrible thought ran through her head, that being she could possibly sell you as some kind of “exotic” item/person to pay off the debt to Arlong. However, she quickly pushed that thought out of her head and is somewhat disturbed at the fact that she ever had that thought. 

After Nami had stolen the Going Merry and returned to Cocoyasi Village, she was shocked to see you with the crew when they came to pick her up. She witnessed firsthand that day just how freakishly strong you are, having been able to beat the shit out of a Fishman by yourself. 

You were the first person to greet her after she got her tattoo reworked. You expressed how relieved you were that she was okay, that you understood why she did what she did, and that you wouldn’t (couldn’t) hold it against her. It was during that conversation that she decided she belonged with the Straw Hats.

You two quickly become friends once ya’ll officially join the crew. 

Whenever the crew docks on a new island, Nami LOVES to go shopping for items for you that would complement your wings. Clothes, jewelry, whatever, she loves to doll you up with or without your approval lol. 

Along with clothes and jewelry, Nami also looks for good soaps and other hygiene products that are gentle on your feathers and skin, but keep them looking and smelling nice.

Nami often asks you for fashion advice. You don’t change your outfits nearly as often as she does, but you slay every single one you wear and she aspires to look as good as you.

Tbh, you don’t know what to say to her since she too also slays and you just throw things together without any particular process.

Nami was the first person on the crew to buy you a pair of padded gloves to protect your hands while fighting as she noticed the copious amount of bruises and cuts to your knuckles.

Depending on how much you already know and understand, Nami shows you how to budget money if you’re ever unsure how to do so.

Something Nami does for you is offer to hold your wings. Considering how large of a bust she had, she understands the most out of the whole crew how sore your back and shoulders become when carrying something heavy like that all day. Nami has you lean into her chest and relax your wings while she holds them at the base where they connect to your back. You are always grateful whenever she does this because holy shit your back feels so light.

She’ll also help you stretch them out whenever you need to. For example, she’ll grab the tip of your wings and pull them out, stretching them to their full span. Keeping them folded all day can lead to some crazy cramps. 

Nami is always willing to help you preen your wings in the spots you can’t quite reach. Every time she helps you, she tells you how soft they are the whole time.

Nami collects the long, straight feathers that fall off and uses them to write with. It started when you gifted one of your long feathers to her and she kept it in the cup on her desk with all her other writing utensils. One day the quill she was using broke and, not wanting to buy another one, she improvised by using the one you gave her. She was shocked at how well it held up and how crisp the lines were and began asking you for more. 

Much like other members of the crew, Nami WILL fall asleep cuddled into your wings if given the chance. But just like the other members of the crew, you never mind when she does :)

Nami never really asks for you to carry her while flying, mainly because she has a slight fear of heights, but you have flown with her on occasion. Whether it be recreationally or to move her out of harm's way, you try to stay as low as safely possible whenever you carry Nami. 

Overall, Nami is not only mystified by your beauty and uniqueness but is also glad to have another strong fighter among the crew. She feels safe whenever you're near.

Usopp

So Usopp shot you out of the sky while the crew was sailing in the Grandline. He didn’t realize you were a person, he thought you were a large bird that Sanji could cook up for dinner! Imagine his surprise when you fell onto the deck and BOOM, a whole fucking person is lying there and, oh God are you dead?

Chopper was quick to tend to your wounds. Since Usopp had used a flame star on you, some of your feathers were singed on your left wing, which made it impossible for you to fly even if you wanted to until they grew back. Usopp stayed in the office while Chopper tended to you and waited for you to wake up. The moment you woke up in Chopper’s office you panicked; You screamed and threw anything you could get a hold of at the reindeer and Usopp before bolting for the door. You got out, but when you tried to take flight, you found that you were unable to. After falling to the deck a couple of times in a futile attempt to leave, you eventually accepted that you weren’t going anywhere.

Luffy offered you a spot as a part of the crew that day, but you were unsure. You eventually compromised on letting you stay on the ship until you dock on the next island, to which you could either leave or stay with the crew. Later on, you decided you would stay with them.

When given the chance, Usopp apologized PROFUSELY for shooting you. Like, he was on the ground crying, begging for forgiveness. Before anyone realized it, you had balled your hand up and punched Usopp in the stomach, sending him flying against the guardrail on the other side of their ship. Dazed, Usopp looked up at you as you approached him. Leaning down to face him, you said to him, “I forgive you,” and from then on out it was mostly smooth sailing between the two of you.

Usopp LOVES to draw up ideas on new items and weapons for you to use, either things that attach to your wings or that can be used by you while in flight. 

Speaking of drawing, Usopp also loves to draw, just…you. You’re such a unique subject, possessing a silhouette unmatched by any other (with maybe the exception of the Skypia citizens, but even then their wings were not as large as yours). Usopp just thinks you’re pretty and he likes to draw pretty things :)

Usopp also taught you how to shoot with a slingshot. He figured that while you’re in the air you’d have a pretty clear shot of the battlefield, so you could offer aerial support for the Straw Hats.

He also looked into different fabrics and materials he could make new clothes for you out of; Something that was light and wouldn’t affect your flying, but something that was flame and puncture-resistant. With the help of Franky and Nami, he was able to sew something that provided you with a little more protection in combat than what you typically wear.  

When you first asked Usopp to help preen your wings in the springtime, he refused immediately. It wasn’t because he didn’t want to help you, he just didn’t think he could do a good job at it. You assured him and told him you’d instruct him while he did it. 

It took a while for him to figure out which feathers were ready to come out and which ones were still healthy and alive (He pulled out quite a few good flight feathers…ouch), but by the end of it, all your wings were healthy and shiny. 

You told Usopp he could do whatever he wanted with the feathers and at first, he just kept them in a box in his workshop, not sure what to do with them but unable to just throw them out because, hello, they’re your feathers.

He tries to come up with inventions that could utilize them, but he has yet to design and sketch one up. 

Usopp found out the hard way just how hard your punches hit. He also got to bear witness to it when the crew was fighting off another random pirate crew that thought they could cash in their bounty. Usopp was  s h o o k  when he watched you grab this pretty beefy pirate and just drag him to the fucking floor before beating the absolute shit out of him with your bare hands. Rest assured, he never doubted your capability in a fight after that. 

Overall, Usopp is impressed, and somewhat scared, of your strength and just the general uniqueness that is you. He has just never met anyone like you before (until Skypia that is, but they’re not even as cool as you) and is always in awe of you.

Sanji

Oh, where to begin with this guy lmao…

You met Sanji allllll the way back at the Baratie. You had barely managed to escape the capture of a pirate crew that wanted to sell you and found yourself flying aimlessly over the sea, with no idea where you were or where you were going and starving. You stumbled across the Baratie by complete accident and once you realized that it was a restaurant, you practically ran through the doors.

You pleaded with the staff to give you anything to eat -- offering to clean dishes, dispose of trash, or be a bodyguard for the restaurant (that last one got a few laughs out of some of the staff) -- but without any money, you were quickly kicked out.

Before long, a pair of black dress shoes stood in front of where you lay on the ground and a plate of fried rice was placed in front of you. You gasped as you sat up and looked at the person who gave you the food. “No one deserves to starve. Especially someone as lovely as yourself,” He said to you. 

From that day on, Sanji kept a close eye on you. Sanji let you stay and work with him -- with the approval of Zeff ofc -- so when he left to join the Straw Hat crew, you joined alongside him; Thankfully, Luffy didn’t have a problem with it.

Sanji makes special meals for you considering that you have a different diet from the other Straw Hats. If you ever tell him he doesn’t have to do that for you, he insists on making your meals with certain ingredients since he does the same for Chopper (considering he, as a reindeer, has a vegan diet and all). 

You’re also the main person Sanji asks for help in the kitchen the very few times he ever asks for help. He has a lot of trust in your kitchen skill considering you worked with him for a short time. 

Regardless of your gender or sex, Sanji is ALWAYS fawning over you. Are you hot? Here’s a cold, refreshing drink for you. Are you hungry for a snack? Sanji has already cut up a nice gala apple for you! Seriously, this man is just obsessed with you (in a good way, that is).

Like Nami, Sanji loves to go out and buy outfits for you. Dresses and skirts or suits and ties, whatever you want, Sanji will buy it for you.

Sanji is very curious about your life before he met you and how exactly you came to be the way you are. He assumed you got your wings from a devil fruit and was shocked when you told him you were born with them. That was the moment he became more invested in your origin and what exactly you are. 

He never pressures you to tell him anything if you’re uncomfortable with it, but if you are, he’ll fix you both a cup of tea and sit with you in the kitchen, listening intently to whatever you have to say. 

Sanji is also the most likely one to spend time with you at odd hours of the night. He doesn’t have the soundest sleep schedule and is a fairly light sleeper -- at least the lightest out of all the men -- so there’s a good chance he’ll be awake whenever you can’t sleep. Again, he’ll fix you something light to eat or drink that will hopefully help you sleep. 

Sanji never expected you to ask him to help you care for your wings, but bro did not hesitate to say yes. He has you sit in the kitchen’s dining area while he helps preen your wings, handing you the feathers as he goes. When you offered him to keep them he didn’t waste a second more and stuffed them (gently) into his coat pockets with the longer ones poking out of his pocket lol.

He doesn’t keep them in the kitchen (for sanitary reasons), but he does keep them in a small keepsake box where he puts all his valuables in his sleeping area. Sometimes when he’s changing up his outfit, he’ll place one of your short feathers into the suit pocket alongside a handkerchief. It’s so adorable and you smiled so hard when you first saw it.

Sanji would never ask you to take him flying, but if you offered he first declined before quickly agreeing if you insist. He won’t admit it, but the moment he met you he wished you’d sweep him off his feet and bring him into the air with you.

Sanji didn’t think you could fight that well. To him, you looked like a delicate teenager/young adult needing protection. He did everything he could to protect you from the pirates that attacked the Baratie, but it wasn’t until he was pinned down and forced to watch you get jumped by a group of the other pirates that he actually saw just how strong you were. 

Granted, it took you a hot second and you got hit by them a few times, but you still managed to beat the absolute shit out of them (and these were decently built people as well). 

Sanji never doubted your ability to defend yourself from then on, but he still does try to protect you whenever he can. It’s just ingrained in him to protect other people. 

Overall, Sanij was immediately won over by your beauty, but as he got to know you and your personality became more understood by him, a deep respect for your character grew within him. While lovely, Sanji often looks past your wings and sees you for who you truly are.

Chopper

Chopper met you along with all the other Straw Hats on Drum Island. You assisted Luffy in bringing Nami to the only doctor on the island, acting as another bodyguard for him along with Sanji. Eventually, Sanji was knocked out and you carried him while Luffy had Nami. 

It took a while for you two to reach the top of the Rockies where the doctor was supposed to be and it was draining on the both of you. You saw a pair of feet approach you and passed out to the sound of Luffy shouting, “They’re my Nakama!” 

Doctorine allowed Chopper to treat you since, out of the four, your injuries were the least severe. At first, the two assumed you were a regular human and laid you on your back while they treated the others. It wasn’t until after Luffy was bandaged up that the two got to you. Removing your coat, Chopper was taken aback at the sight of feathers all inside your coat pressed up against your body. He quickly called Doctorine over and quickly decided to treat you instead and pushed Sanji over to Chopper for care.

Chopper made quick work of Sanji in order to watch Doctorine treat you. He watched intently as she was careful of your wings and placed you to rest on your side instead of your back. You were the last to wake up of the four and Chopper couldn’t hold back his questions about you. Doctorine swiftly dismissed him to allow you to recover as you had developed a small cold on top of your other injuries.

After recovering some and being faced with Drum Island’s “King” Wapol, Chopper was incredibly impressed by how well you fight along with the other Straw Hats. Not only were you wearing somewhat restricting clothing (those coats kept you warm but were hard to move in at times), but you were also still injured and yet you still managed to pack these guys up lmao. He was also very grateful when you covered him from an incoming attack, but also felt guilty that you had to sustain another injury.

After Chopper joined the crew, you were the first one he truly befriended. While he had no problem with the others in the crew, he felt most comfortable with you. He thinks it’s because of your gentle appearance and kind voice, but you think it’s because of your wings and somewhere in this subconscious he connects them to an animal and therefore connects you to an animal, which brings him comfort.

Chopper has many, and I mean many, questions about your anatomy and physiology. You explain everything you know about your body to him, including that you have hollow bones, there are air sacs in your lower abdomen, there are some foods that you just can’t eat, and that your hearing is very sensitive (sorry to my HoH and deaf baddies ilyyy). 

Chopper loves to sleep with you. Whether it’s taking naps together or actually falling asleep at night, he feels very safe within your arms and wrapped in your wings. 

As a doctor, Chopper knows how one’s back hurts when carrying a large weight on their shoulders for an extended period of time, so he’s quick to ask about any back pain you have. If you are ever having any discomfort, Chopper will massage your shoulders and back near where your wings connect to your skin to ease the soreness. He’ll also look into any medicine that helps with back pain like yours.

Chopper gets really nervous whenever you sustain any injury to your wings. While he has been taught how to treat many different injuries and illnesses on a person, your wings are a whole new thing to him and often time he needs your guidance to treat you. He’s very nervous about hurting you more than you already are :( 

Chopper was very excited the first time you asked him to preen your wings. He’d seen some of the birds on Drum Island do the same thing sometimes during the warmer months, but he never quite understood what they were doing at the time. He’s very gentle and always asks before fully pulling off a feather all the way like he does a little tug and asks if it’s ready to go. 

If you ever break one of your blood feathers, Chopper is quick to treat you with the least amount of pain possible.

Chopper uses some of your shorter, stiff feathers as pens to write with similar to Nami. He keeps them in a cup with all his other pens and pencils. The rest of your feathers he throws out since he doesn’t have a use for them and wants to keep his office clean and clear.

Chopper frequently asks you to take him flying and isn’t above begging you to do so.

He’s the only Straw Hat that you take flying somewhat regularly. His small stature and light weight make it possible for you to fly for long periods of time without straining yourself too much. The first few times you carried him with you, you flew close to the deck/ground so as not to frighten him. Once he felt confident you wouldn’t drop him, he began to beg you to fly higher, which you happily complied with. 

Whenever you guys are attacked, you are the first person Chopper runs to for cover (assuming you’re close enough). He’s seen just how strong you are and feels safe with you.

Overall, Chopper first views you as a very unique patient; Someone who he can learn something new from. He then started to see just how genuinely kind you are and began to look up to you as an inspiration for what he wants to be.

Robin

You were already a part of the Straw Hat crew when you met Robin while she was still working for Crocodile. Similar to Chopper, the large, baggy clothing you were wearing gave you the appearance of being a normal human. It’s not until she goes to use her devil fruit and restrain you that she feels something unusual on you; Something soft.

It’s not until you all depart from Alabasta and she makes her presence known on the ship that she actually sees them. With your protective clothes gone, your large, soft wings are on full display and Robin’s interest is immediately piqued. 

Using her devil fruit, she grows an arm out of your back and you freak out at the feeling of her touching your wing from so far away. She’s normally much more polite about such things, but she just couldn’t contain herself at that moment. She promptly apologized to you before joining the crew, much to everyone’s surprise.

Robin is very curious about you after you inform her your wings aren’t the product of some devil fruit. She thinks back on any race -- either modern or ancient -- that had wings like yours, but she could think of none. Not even the people from Skypia had wings as majestic as yours, so she quickly ruled that out.

Robin will often ask you to join her while she sits out on the deck reading. It doesn’t matter what you were doing before, if it’s something that can be done outside then she’ll beckon you over. 

She asks about your origins during one of these times in a non-probing way and very politely. If you tell her you don’t know much about your origin or that you haven’t eaten a devil fruit, she’ll start looking into it while doing her other research. 

The title/nickname she calls you by is “The Avian” or just “Avian.”

Whenever the crew docks at an island and goes shopping, Robin likes to buy little bird-related nicknacks -- stuff like ceramic parakeets and glass canaries. She gifts them to you saying that they reminded her of you. 

You have a shelf in your room that, along with your books, holds all the little birds (Robin smiled so hard when she saw it for the first time and, if I dare say, even blushed a little 0_0). They’re all secured with a little bit of adhesive on the bottom to prevent them from flying when the ship is forced to make crazy maneuvers. 

In the least creepy way possible, Robin likes to watch you sleep. She doesn’t actively try to watch you sleep but if you end up falling asleep next to her while lounging on the deck together, she’ll close the book she’s reading and just…watch you. Not long, just a few minutes max.

She’s very grateful to be alive and that gratitude spreads to her friends and crewmates. She’s happy that you are alive and seeing you breathe and your heart pump brings her comfort knowing that you are alive. 

Robin acts very much like a mother towards you, especially if you’re one of the younger members of the crew. She keeps an eye on you as you soar through the sky and perform cool tricks that impress the others and is always ready to catch you if something goes wrong.

Robin based her one devil fruit move where she grows “wings” of a sort after you.

Robin loves very much to help groom and preen your wings. She’s like Luffy in wanting to touch your wings frequently, but she’s much more discrete about it than he is. 

She’s very gentle when pulling your feathers and removing dead ones. She always asks for confirmation before actually pulling one off. Her fingers are gentle as they card through your feathers and she scratched them in all the right ways. 

She’ll also make sure to reorganize the feathers so that they lay correctly and comfortably when she’s done helping you groom them.

Robin never asks you to take her flying and she’ll turn down any offers you may give her. She may seem aloof and not interested but in reality, she very much wants you to carry her during flight. She’s a little embarrassed about it but mostly feels that you have better things to do than take her for a joy ride.

Whenever you grab her and fly her over to somewhere safe during a fight, she has a little fun while in the air with you.

Robin isn’t all that impressed at your inhuman strength. When you’re as well-traveled as she is you come across so many unique and bizarre people that you eventually become unfazed by it. 

She does admire that, while you’re strong, it does take you some time to deal with a group of enemies. Some of the other crewmates are able to take out a lot of people in a crazy short amount of time so seeing you take a minute to beat up a group reminds her that you’re -- and the rest of the group as well -- still human and very real. You’re not some machine created to kill.

It was still a little jarring for her to see your petite frame bust some large guy’s ass and throw him across the battlefield. It took her a couple of battles to get used to it tbh.

Overall, Robin is very interested in you, both in who you are as a person and what you are as a being. To her, you are the definition of “looks can be deceiving” as you manage to surprise her time and time again.

Franky

When Usopp had come back to the ship bloody and bruised and without the money, you went out with the rest of the group that went to pay his attackers a visit. 

When Franky first saw you approaching with the group he thought you were an angel (bc he’s corny like that). He laughed to himself a little bit thinking about how out of place you looked side by side with the rest of him. He stopped laughing, however, when you socked him in the jaw and sent him flying into a wall that was a few feet away. 

Chaos ensued and the last glimpse he got of you was of your wings swaying as you walked away from the rubble of the Franky House with the rest of your crew.

Time passes and the events of Water 7/CP9 take place and before you know it Franky is now a part of the crew (much to your surprise).

Tbh, it takes you a hot minute to really warm up to him as a crewmate considering what he did to Usopp, but in the end, you decide to follow Usopp’s lead, and if he was willing to forgive Franky then you were too.

Franky’s corny ass asks you if you’re an angel or something similar and you have to tell him no, much to his disappointment. Like he visually deflates when you tell him you aren’t some Godsend.

He does like to place you on his shoulder and say some stupid shit like, “Look! I’ve got an angel on my shoulder!” It’s a little embarrassing when he does that on a new island and locals look at you like you’re insane.

He only once asked about what you were and after you told him you didn’t know he never brought it up again. Bro really just doesn’t care lmao. 

Franky likes to just watch you move about sometimes. Your wings move in a way that is uniquely and completely you. When you lean forward your wings spread back to balance yourself. If you ever trip your wings flutter to right yourself. They’re just really fun to look at for him.

Franky will look at some of the schematics that Usopp made for items related to your wings and will actually make them (with modifications he sees fit). He also creates some of his own inventions for you to try out and if one particular item doesn’t do it for you Franky’s not offended at all and scrapes/revises it.

The first time Franky touched your wings was when he was making an item for you and needed your wings’ specific measurements. He noted just how soft they were and couldn’t help but press his face into them, causing you to laugh lightly.

You kept some of them, but most of his inventions for you were just too heavy/bulky for them to be practical in battle :/

He’ll ask you to try out some of his inventions from time to time similar to Usopp, specifically ones that are better executed from higher places. 

Franky is not the person to ask for help to preen your wings. It’s not that he’s rough like Zoro -- quite the opposite in fact -- but because his hands are just so big. He has difficulty trying to grab individual feathers and often pulls three or four out at a time. 

He is about just stroking your wings though. He uses very light pressure on them as his fingers ghost over your feathers and it almost feels like a gentle breeze instead of someone touching them. 

Franky loves it when you give him your feathers! He often asks you to just give all the dead ones to him and he’ll personally go through them and pick out the ones he wants to keep. 

He uses them for decorating his inventions and other things, as well as writing and just sitting pretty somewhere in his workshop. He even keeps one of them in his shirt pocket claiming that it’s “lucky.”

After the two of you became better acquainted, Franky asked you a few times to pick him up and fly with him. You tried, you really did, but you just couldn’t. You can pick him up relatively okay, but you just couldn’t take flight with him. He chalked it up to being mostly metal and didn’t bother you about trying again. 

Franky learned his lesson the hard way not to fuck with you. His jaw was sore for days after you punched him in the face. He never saw you fight during the CP9 battle, so the first time he actually saw you fight as an ally was after the crew docked at the next island and were harassed by some other pirates. 

Franky watched you throw a guy at least three times your size over your head and a solid twenty-five feet away from you. He then proceeded to witness you break someone’s nose with a headbutt and he was glad you hadn’t done that to him (although his nose is made of metal). 

He then considered getting or making you a pair of brass knuckles to see just how much damage you could do in a single punch.

Overall, Franky is always looking for new inventions to make and your body provides a very unique canvas he can design his inventions for. In his eyes, you’re not only a unique individual but also someone who is forgiving and kind-hearted.

Brook

You met Brook with the rest of the crew near Thriller Bark. Immediately charmed by your beauty, Brook politely asked to see your underwear (regardless of your gender bc bffr he don’t care). Nami is quick to hit him for it.

Since he wasn’t present for most of Thriller Bark he kind of slipped your mind, since you had been dealing with zombies, until you ran into him by accident and he told you how to actually defeat them. Grateful, you do as he says.

After the stressful events of Thriller Bark and +1 more crewmate, you’re all off onto Fishman Island (until you take a detour to Sabaody Archipelago that is).

Brook assumes that your wings come from a devil fruit and is shocked one night when you casually mention you don’t have devil fruit powers. He then asks about it and you tell him that you just don’t know, so he doesn’t ask any further.

Expect this absolute dipshit to ask to see your underwear at least once a week if not more. Brook has a preference for pretty women, but really he likes anyone that’s pretty so you check the box in that aspect at least.

Brook likes to talk about Laboon with you. He feels that out of everyone on the ship, you’d understand his attachment to Laboon the most, even if you hadn’t met him in the East Blue. 

Perhaps it’s because you resemble a bird? Brook isn’t even sure why he feels that way about you.

Brook would teach you how to whistle and mimic other bird calls/tweeting. He thought it fitting and thinks it amusing whenever he finds you somewhere on the deck delivering bird noises to yourself in the early morning. 

It’s especially amusing when an actual bird or two respond to your call and sit with you on the deck.

Brook loves to hug you even if he can’t feel you (small headcanon: Brook is unable to feel since he lacks the nerve endings necessary to do so). He’s not a creep in the sense that he wants to touch you, he just loves the idea that he’s hugging someone since, hello, that man was alone for fifty years so he’s a little fucked in the head from that. 

Tbh, he just likes to be around and in physical contact with you. Again, this stems from his time alone and he feels more safe when he’s with someone, especially you. Maybe, subconsciously, he views you as some kind of angel that’s there to guide him after his death so he feels the most at ease with you, but you’ll never hear him admit that.

Brook would be very good at preening your wings -- probably one of the best if you’re being honest. Since his fingers are nothing but bone they’re very precise in which feather they grab. Although, the lack of friction does mean that your feathers frequently slip through his bones, but two or three yanks later and the dead feather is gone!

Brook started collecting your feathers the first time you let him preen your wings. You know the boa he wears post-time skip? It’s made out of your feathers. 

While Brook can’t actually feel your feathers, he just believes the others when they say they’re soft and will fight anyone who argues otherwise.

Brook is the easiest to fly with out of all the Straw Hats hands down. He genuinely feels like nothing when you carry him and you’ve actually dropped him once due to this. 

Brook seems like the kind of guy to have a fear of heights, so he doesn’t ask you to carry him a lot when flying. He doesn’t mind though, however, when you bail him out of a tight spot in the middle of a fight. 

He’ll actually be screaming and crying and thanking you as you set him down somewhere safe before continuing your own fight with whomever.

Speaking of fighting, Brook is terrified when he first sees you throw a punch. He was expecting some regular, non-devil fruit-type punch that would maybe disorientate someone. What he wasn’t expecting was for you to send someone twice, thrice your size across the room and skit to a halt on the hard, concrete floor. 

He determined then that he would never make you mad and is very glad you’re on his side lmao. 

Overall, Brook adores you, for your beauty/handsomeness, your kindheart, and your immense strength. You are someone he feels comfortable with and that he can form a deep bond with in a way he can’t with the other crewmembers; You are unique to him in that way.

Straw Hats

Usopp, Luffy, and Chopper all cuddle you when taking a nap lmao. Sometimes others will join you four, but they’re the core group :)

Nami and Sanji are the main people who like to dress you up (you have a whole collection of clothes that the two of them have bought for you), but you’ll often find Robin, Franky, and Brook in attendance at the small “fashion shows” Nami and Sanji “host” for you after they have gone shopping. 

Franky will sometimes find little bird items that remind him of you, but instead of giving them to you himself, he hands them off to Robin to gift to you instead (embarrassed much, Franky?).

You, Robin, and Nami go to spas frequently whenever you get the chance. Nami always makes sure you get a deep tissue back massage there. 

Considering your unique physique, there are many people who gawk at you whenever you enter new islands and towns. It’s mostly limited to stares and whispers amongst others, but occasionally someone will speak up and talk to you. 

Zoro and Sanji are especially defensive of you when this happens. It’s not that they think you can’t handle yourself, it’s just that they want to make sure you have the appropriate backup necessary in case someone does get nasty with you.

There have been occasions when someone grabs your wings without your knowledge/consent, both random pedestrians and enemies.

If it’s a pedestrian then someone from the crew will probably leave them with a minor injury, such as a slap to the face or a punch to the gut.

If it’s an enemy then the crew is on that person in an instant. 

There is one time you can vividly remember an enemy grabbing your wings. You were trying to move Luffy away from someone when you were suddenly grabbed by the ankle and dragged back to the ground, causing you to drop Luffy some feet away. A foot was set on your lower back with a lot of pressure and that’s when your wings were grabbed close to the base and pulled.

The scream that ripped through your throat was haunting as you tried to contort your back away from your assailant in vain. You felt warm blood drip onto your shoulders when suddenly all the pressure on you was gone and you saw the guy lying still on the ground several meters away from you.

Chopper tended to you first that night and noted the mostly minor tearing around the top base of your wings. It took a week to heal completely, yet the scars from it still remain on your back, a lighter color than the rest of the tissue there. 

Overall, the crew loves you to bits and you love them too.

A/N: I was NOT intending this to be so long. I only wanted each character to be like 6-7 points each, but I got carried away as usual. Either way, I hope you enjoyed it!

[formula1bby]

Fortune Favors the Brave Ch. 1

Carlos Sainz x driver!fem!oc

wc: 8216

SLOW BURN MULTIPART STORY, begins in 2019 but we will be jumping around slightly just bc I will not survive writing out every season until the current one XD Later on in the story there will be references to an oc for a different story that I will also be releasing a teaser for within the next couple of weeks but as of right now she is not relevant to Aaliyah's story.

Warnings: descriptions of a panic/anxiety attack, obnoxious reporters, lots of swearing XD

A/N: welp, it's finally here! After almost a year of me talking about this I actually finished editing chapter 1! Let me know what you guys think and if you want to be included in the tag list for this!

Formula One is a dream for many drivers, yet so few of them actually get to achieve that dream. It’s such a cruel fate that these drivers face but for those that are able to turn their dreams into reality, it’s everything. One such lucky driver was 18 year old Aaliyah Thompson. She had the fortunate opportunity to be a full time driver for Toro Rosso in 2017, straight out of winning the Formula Renault 2.0 Litre championship in 2016. She quickly showed her merit and earned eight points at her first Grand Prix (in a less than adequate car), proving those that doubted her wrong. Although, some say that Aaliyah making it into Formula One was just as cruel a fate as never achieving that dream. Being the first female driver to actually start a grand prix since Lella Lombardi in 1976 as well as the youngest driver to have ever entered a grand prix, being only 16 years old in her first season, meant people held her to a very different set of standards. Any mistake meant that her seat would be questioned immediately and the media, who were always breathing down her neck like wolves, would get that misstep they’d been waiting for and pounce.

Aaliyah would be lying if she ever said she regretted her decision to sign with Toro Rosso. Sure, it was hard and the competition she faced in F1 was much more difficult than Formula Renault, but this was her dream and she’d be damned if she let anyone or anything dampen that for her.

Walking through the parking lot, Aaliyah groaned at the horde of media surrounding the entrance to the paddock. Maggie, her PR manager and best friend, lightly smacked Aaliyah’s arm to remind her cameras were everywhere, including the Netflix camera that was going to be following them for the whole weekend.

“Play nice, please,” Maggie said. “You don’t have to answer any questions yet since your first media appearance isn’t until noon, but at least look like you’re happy to see people.”

“I know, I know,” Aaliyah agreed, grabbing her backpack and slinging it over her shoulder. “I’m just not ready for everyone to ask about it.”

Maggie looked sympathetically at the 18 year old as they walked into the paddock for the first race of the 2019 season. They scanned their badges and, as expected, people immediately started asking Aaliyah about her crash and shoving microphones in her face.

“Are you nervous to drive in another grand prix after your crash in Mexico last year?” one reporter tried to ask Aaliyah.

“She’s not answering any questions right now,” Maggie explained, pushing the reporter away. “She has a scheduled media appearance at noon, you can talk to her then.”

Aaliyah could feel her throat tightening as people still tried to shout questions at her and blocked their path to the AlphaTauri hospitality. Maggie tried to explain loudly to them that they weren’t taking any questions right now, but the reporters either didn’t hear her or didn’t care. Aaliyah felt her breathing shorten as she began to hyperventilate. She looked calm to the cameras but anyone that knew her could tell she was anything but. Aaliyah tapped Maggie’s bicep three times, a signal the two had come up with that would let Maggie know they needed to get out of whatever situation asap. Maggie noticed it and immediately grabbed Aaliyah’s arm and pulled her through the swarm of reporters, no regard for who she bumped into.

Once they were out of the swarm, Maggie fell back in step beside Aaliyah so she could check on her.

“Are you okay?” she asked softly. Aaliyah shook her head in response, trying to hold back tears until they got to hospitality. “Do you want to stop walking?” Another head shake. “Alright, let’s get you to hospitality then.”

Aaliyah nodded and the two sped walked to hospitality and were greeted by cool air conditioning as they finally got away from all of the prying cameras, telling the Netflix camera to give them space. Some of the AlphaTauri workers tried to greet Aaliyah but were instantly silenced by the look Maggie gave them. She pulled Aaliyah into her driver’s room and set her down on the couch.

Aaliyah’s face was blank as she tried to focus on her breathing. Hot tears were falling down her face when she couldn’t calm down. She could faintly hear someone talking to her but couldn’t make out any of the words. Her vision was blurring and she started grabbing at her head and pulling at her hair, wanting this panic attack to stop. She felt her hands being gently pulled away from her head and soothing circles being rubbed into her palms. One of her hands was placed on the person’s, Aaliyah supposed it was Maggie’s, chest so that she could feel her breathing and replicate it. Aaliyah did her best to take slow, deep breaths and found herself calming down.

“Liyah?” she heard Maggie say. “If you can hear me, know that you’re safe. We’re in your driver room and there are no cameras and no media in here. It’s just me and you.”

Aaliyah nodded, letting Maggie know that she could hear her. Closing her eyes, Aaliyah continued to focus on her breathing and Maggie’s soothing voice. It felt like an eternity before Aaliyah opened her eyes and saw Maggie, crouched in front of her, holding her hands to ground her.

“Thank you,” Aaliyah shakily said. “I d-d-don’t kn-know what ha-hap-happened.”

There was that damn stutter again. Aaliyah didn’t miss it but knew that she got like this when she was shaken up. Just another unseen side effect of her concussion from last season.

“It’s alright, Liyah,” Maggie assured, sitting down next to the girl and rubbing circles on her back. “I should have gotten you out of there sooner, that one is on me.”

“You couldn’t have stopped it,” she said, taking time to think about what she was saying to stop her stutter. “Unfortunately the media just fucking sucks.”

Maggie laughed as Aaliyah continued to calm down from her panic attack. The two friends talked about anything not related to racing or the media until Noah, Aaliyah’s trainer, knocked on the door lightly. Maggie got up and opened the door to let the British man into the room, the Netflix cameras following him.

“How’s my favorite driver doing?” he asked as he set his bag on the massage table.

“Had a panic attack already so I’m doing peachy,” she said with a laugh and a cheeky smile.

Noah looked over to Maggie to see her response to this and Maggie just smiled and shrugged her shoulders, just glad to see Aaliyah back to herself. Maggie bid Noah and Aaliyah goodbye after reminding the two to not let Aaliyah be late to the media conference with both of them telling her they would be there on time.

“Alright,” Noah said, pulling a resistance band out of his bag for Aaliyah to use. “Why don’t you go ahead and put your hair up however you’re gonna have it for the track walk later before we get started.”

Aaliyah nodded and started putting her hair in braids while chatting with Noah.

“Shit,” Aaliyah said as she got to the end of the first braid. “I don’t have any hair ties.”

Noah was immediately handing her one he kept on his wrist at all times for her. It was something he learned very quickly after becoming her trainer, that she always lost hair ties and never found them again so he had to always have one or two on him. Aaliyah and Noah talked some more about the schedule for the day as Aaliyah finished her other braid, accepting the other hair tie from Noah.

“How are you feeling?” he asked.

“I’m ready,” Aaliyah responded. “I’m still nervous but if I don’t get back to it now and start strong, I might never be back to normal.”

“Makes sense,” Noah said, handing Aaliyah the resistance band. “I’m proud of you, though.”

Aaliyah smiled at Noah, who was more of a friend than just a trainer to her. She started doing exercises with the resistance band as she talked some more with Noah. He told her about how his fiancee, Bridget, was doing and showed her pictures of their son. Aaliyah checked her phone to see that her boyfriend had texted her. Smiling, she opened the message app and responded to his good luck message, ending it with an “I love you”.

“That Jake you’re messaging?” Noah asked the teen.

“Yeah,” she said, putting her phone away. “He couldn’t come to this weekend’s race. Said he had a shoot he and his team were doing and couldn’t change the date.”

Noah nodded, understanding that since Jake was a content creator he also had an incredibly busy schedule. That being said, he was a little annoyed because he knew Jake had promised Aaliyah he would be there for her first race of the season. Noah always looked out for Aaliyah, seeing her as his kid sister since he was almost 10 years older than her. When she had started dating Jake right after Abu Dhabi the previous year, he was hesitant to accept him but quickly realized how happy he made Aaliyah. That made him okay in Noah’s book.

“Do you want to go say hi to the other drivers?” Noah asked as he packed his bag back up.

“Yeah, that sounds fun,” Aaliyah agreed, putting her hat and sunglasses on.

The two left the driver room and walked around the paddock, a Netflix camera following them the whole time. Aaliyah saw Daniel from a mile away, walking with Kevin, and ran up to him, jumping onto his back. He stumbled a bit before holding onto her legs to keep her from falling off, both of them laughing wildly.

“Hey, kiddo!” he greeted. “How you going?”

“Doing alright,” she responded, sliding off of Daniel’s back and giving him a proper hug. “Bit of a rough morning but I’m sure it’ll get better.”

“Media pestering you?”

“Yeah.”

“Do I need to fight anyone?”

“Not yet.”

Aaliyah greeted Kevin with a hug as well, always having a soft spot for the older man. The three chatted as they walked to the media area. They were grouped together for the press conference, which Aaliyah was very excited about. Checo completed the group for the press conference and they chatted as they waited for their cue to go sit down. Checo noticed that Aaliyah’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes but told himself he would talk to her later so that he didn’t take her focus away from the task at hand. He was glad that he was in her group for the press conference, feeling like he had a duty to help protect her from the media.

“Checo?” Aaliyah asked, speaking Spanish. “You alright?”

“Just a bit nervous for the first race of the season, mija,” he said, not wanting her to know he was worried about her. “You know how it is: the media is gonna throw a lot at us today.”

Aaliyah’s face screwed up in disgust, knowing all too well the types of questions she’d be asked today. Maggie had prepped her as best as she could but everyone knew that it would still be rough on her.

“Yeah, fuck them.”

Checo let out a loud laugh, drawing Daniel and Kevin out of their conversation to look at the two with confusion and amusement. Their PR managers quickly shushed them, knowing that if they were too loud everyone inside the press room could hear them. A few minutes later, the previous group cleared out of the press room and the group of four entered. They took their seats, Aaliyah sitting between Checo and Kevin, and put their mics on, giggling to each other about a snarky comment Aaliyah had made directly before they all walked in.

“Welcome,” a reporter said after they’d all settled down. “How are you guys?” A mix of ‘good’ and ‘excited’ were said in response. “I have a question for all of you: how are you feeling going into this race, it being the first one of the season?”

“I’ll start,” Daniel said with a laugh. “I’m excited. You know, we have a good car this year and I’m looking forward to making some pretty epic moments with the team.”

“Yeah,” Kevin agreed, going down the line. “I think it’ll be a good season. The car felt good during testing and I’m sure there will be a learning curve for it, but I’m optimistic this year.”

“I’m excited,” Aaliyah said with a grin. “It’s gonna be a great season and I’m super stoked to be teamed up with Alex this year. He seems like a great driver and I’m counting on a lot of fun battles on track.”

“It will be a very interesting season,” Checo said. “I’m looking forward to this race and I hope to earn some good points this weekend.”

The next five minutes were filled with questions for the four drivers. Aaliyah was both relieved and surprised that there had been no questions about her Mexico crash. Her relief was short-lived, however, when a particularly invasive reporter asked a question.

“I have a question for Aaliyah,” he started. “How are you feeling starting a new season so soon after your crash in Mexico? Don’t you think it’s too early for your mental state to handle the stress? Have you questioned your place and ability in this sport since your crash and the comments that everyone made about you?”

Checo was about to speak up to defend Aaliyah when she lightly touched his leg with a finger under the table, telling him it was okay.

“I don’t know, because that was definitely more than one question,” Aaliyah started, pointing out his lack of press conference etiquette. “How do you feel about trying to make someone relive trauma for your story?”

“So you’re not gonna give me an answer?” the reporter asked.

“Hell no,” Aaliyah responded with an incredulous chuckle. “If you can’t be respectful when you interview someone that recently went through something incredibly traumatic then you don’t deserve answers to your questions.”

“I’m just trying to get answers to questions we’re all wondering.”

“Stay wondering then.”

Checo gave Aaliyah a look, silently asking if she was okay. She subtly nodded back, taking a deep breath as the next reporter asked a question. Kevin kept looking over at Aaliyah throughout the rest of the media conference, making sure she was fine.

“We have time for one last question,” the facilitator told everyone.

“My question is for Aaliyah,” a female reporter spoke up. “I understand if you don’t want to talk about your crash and how you’re feeling, it was obviously traumatic for you, but I was just wondering if you would be willing to tell us a bit about how you got back on your feet afterwards. It was truly inspirational seeing you come back to the track as soon as possible last season and I would love for you to share with us what motivated you in your quick recovery.”

Aaliyah smiled softly at the woman. Finally, someone that treats me like a person. She thought.

“I appreciate you asking that in such a respectful way,” Aaliyah started, giving a pointed glare to the reporter that had been so rude to her before. “Yeah, honestly it has been a super long healing process for me. Physically, I was completely healed before Abu Dhabi. Mentally,” a pause. “Mentally I’m still healing. Like I’ve said, and been very open about, it was incredibly traumatic. Thankfully I’ve had an awesome support system with my friends, family, my team, and my boyfriend. It’s really because of them that I was able to get back in the car so soon after my crash. Plus, I’ve always said that part of the reason I’m here is to show girls that they can do whatever they want and that nothing can keep them down for long. So long answer short: I had lots of support from friends and family and wanted to make sure I’m a good role model for other girls and women.”

“Thank you,” the reporter responded. “I wish you all the best as you continue to recover.”

Aaliyah nodded in thanks as the facilitator ended the press conference. The four drivers took their mics off and walked out of the room, meeting their PR managers outside. Maggie gave Aaliyah a hug, sorry she couldn’t stop the first reporter from asking about her crash.

“Liyah,” Kevin started, getting the young driver’s attention. “You okay?”

“Honestly,” Aaliyah said, side-hugging Maggie. “Not really. But I’ll get over it. It’s not too different from any other season where reporters don’t respect me.”

“That’s not something you should get used to,” Kevin noted.

“I know,” she said, resting her head against Maggie’s shoulder. The blonde wrapped an arm around her friend for comfort. “But if I don’t get used to it, I’ll continue to be affected by it. And I’m sick of crying after every press conference and interview.”

The three drivers looked at her with a tinge of pity. Even though they knew that media duties were always rough for the 18 year old, they were unaware of the extent of the toll it took on her. Maggie glanced at her watch and pulled Aaliyah away from the uncomfortable situation by saying that she had to do her track walk soon and needed to meet up with her team. Aaliyah gave them all a hug in parting and said she’d talk to them later that evening.

“I’m gonna get that reporter fired,” Maggie said, referring to the rude reporter. Aaliyah laughed as Maggie continued her incredibly unprofessional rant. “Seriously! Who does he think he is? Talking to you like that. I’ll shave my head before I let anyone disrespect you like that.”

Aaliyah laughed loudly as the two friends walked back to the AlphaTauri hospitality. The two made it back and Alex was sitting in the lounge area, eating some of the snacks available to them. Aaliyah smiled as she parted ways with Maggie, who was likely off to plan something for Aaliyah to do, to sit down across from her rookie teammate.

“Hey, Alex!” she greeted as she sat down. “How are you?”

“Oh hey, Liyah!” he said around a mouthful of crisps. “I’m doing alright, less nervous today than I thought I would be, but I’m sure I’ll make up for it tomorrow.”

Aaliyah laughed a bit at his response. It was odd, she was the younger one on the team but was the more experienced driver. Alex looked up to her to follow her lead. Not literally of course, Aaliyah was much too short for that to be a possibility.

“It’s honestly not that bad once you’re in the car,” Aaliyah assured, sitting back on the couch and crossing her legs. “Yes, the cars are different from other Formula series’ but it’s racing just like you’ve done your whole life. You’ll do grand, I’m sure.”

“I appreciate that, thank you,” Alex said honestly. “How was your press conference, by the way?”

“Long answer or short answer?” Aaliyah asked, rolling her eyes.

“We’ve got time.”

Aaliyah laughed at Alex’s response before telling him about the press conference, going into great detail (per his request) about the rude reporter she had called out. Alex was just as appalled as Maggie and was ready to get up and punch the reporter for his treatment of Aaliyah.

“He really said that to you?” he asked incredulously.

“Yeah,” she responded. “I was kind of expecting questions about it, but definitely nothing like that. It kind of shook me up a bit.”

“Understandable.” A pause. “I’m gonna fight him.”

“I think you’ll have to get in line,” Aaliyah joked. “Checo, Dan, and Maggie have first dibs. Maggie said something about getting him fired and shaving her head before she let someone talk to me like that.” Alex laughed at this, easily seeing the fiery blonde saying that. “It was all very unprofessional but sweet nonetheless so I’m not gonna snitch on her.”

Maggie, of course, chose that moment to walk back into the lounge area. Aaliyah laughed at the timing as her PR manager raised an eyebrow at her and went to stand behind Aaliyah on the couch. She rested her hands on her shoulders, gripping them lightly, before speaking.

“What’s this I hear about you snitching on me?” she asked.

“No, I said I wasn’t snitching on you,” Aaliyah clarified with a chuckle.

Maggie released Aaliyah from her grasp before immediately jumping back to business. Alex laughed at the interaction between the two, clearly seeing how close they were. Maggie finished telling Aaliyah her schedule for the rest of the day and stayed to chat for a few minutes longer.

“How long have you guys known each other?” Alex asked.

“I think we met my second to last year of karting?” Aaliyah asked Maggie to clarify.

“Yeah,” Maggie agreed. “It was one of the races where you beat my brother. He was not happy about it but I remember thinking I wanted to be friends with you.”

“And now she won’t leave me alone,” she joked to Alex.

Maggie smacked Aaliyah on the back of the head, rolling her eyes. Aaliyah let out an undignified noise at the contact and rubbed the back of her head where it had been hit, protesting that she recently had a concussion. Alex let out a loud laugh at the two’s interaction. Maggie gave Aaliyah a light tap on top of her head and said goodbye, saying she was leaving to get lunch for her and Aaliyah.

“Were you nervous before your first race weekend in F1?” Alex quietly asked the younger girl once Maggie had left.

Aaliyah smiled at Alex softly. She knew the nerves and the media were likely getting to him much more than he had been letting on.

“I was terrified,” Aaliyah said with a chuckle. “I was paired up with a more experienced and older driver, I was driving for the junior team of a team that had recently been champions for four consecutive years, and I was gonna be surrounded by a bunch of guys I didn’t know. Obviously my experience is different from yours, but if I ended up doing well, you’ll do just fine. You’re more experienced than I was when I joined.”

“Thanks, Liyah,” he said sincerely.

“Of course, Alex,” she responded.

“Is Jake going to be here at all this weekend?” Alex asked as he shoved more crisps into his mouth.

“No,” Aaliyah said, tired smile on her face. “He said he had a shoot he was doing for a big video and they couldn’t change the shoot date so close to it.”

“Didn’t you say he promised he’d be here for your first race of the season?”

“I did say that, yes. Apparently money is more important than supporting me and attending our first race weekend as a couple.”

“That’s messed up.”

Aaliyah nodded, clearly annoyed by her boyfriend’s decisions. As Alex looked at her, his eyebrows scrunched together in annoyance. He had met Jake a few times during pre-season events and each time made him wonder what on earth Aaliyah saw in him. She was so much more mature, successful, and overall pleasant to be around than the guy she chose to date. They seemed happy, so Alex didn’t say anything. He really wanted to though. Aaliyah already felt like his sister and even though he knew she didn’t need him to protect her, he felt like he had an obligation to look out for her.

At that moment, Aaliyah’s phone rang. She looked at the caller ID and saw that Max was calling her. Sighing, she put the phone to her ear.

“What do you need?” she asked.

“How come you think I need something every time I call you? Can’t I just want to talk to my best friend?” the Dutch man asked.

“You can but you never do,” Aaliyah responded with a laugh.

“I’m coming over and we’re talking about it.”

The smile fell off of Aaliyah’s face after hearing that. She knew Max knew her better than almost everyone, besides her family and Lance, and he knew how much she was really affected by the media that day.

“Okay.”

“Okay. See you soon.”

Aaliyah sighed and ended the call. Alex looked at her, worried.

“What was that about?” he asked.

“Max being an annoyingly good best friend,” she responded.

That was an unexpected twist for Alex, but he decided to leave whatever the two friends were going to talk about between them. Aaliyah and Alex made small talk in the lounge area until Max barged into the AlphaTauri hospitality and made eye contact with Aaliyah. Alex laughed as Aaliyah hung her head and followed Max to her driver’s room as he scolded her for not telling him what happened in the press conference and how he had to find out from Daniel. He closed the door to her room and crossed his arms as he looked at her. She took her hat off and set it down as she turned to look at Max, more accurately to avoid his gaze by looking anywhere but him.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.

“I was going to tell you,” Aaliyah started. “I just hadn’t gotten around to it yet.”

“Aaliyah,” he sighed.

“I know! Okay?! I know!” she snapped. “You told me to tell you if something like this happened and you told me to not be snarky. But I couldn’t help it! He was being an ass!”

Max waited for Aaliyah to calm down from her outburst, knowing she needed it and wouldn’t do this in front of anyone else aside from Lance, Checo, and maybe Pierre. Aaliyah looked at him and Max saw how vulnerable she really felt. He said her name softly and pulled her into a tight hug. She let her tears fall, completely overwhelmed by the day already. Max held his friend until he knew she was okay and she started pulling away. He watched as she wiped her face free of tears and turned to look in the mirror in her driver room to wipe away any mascara that had smudged.

“You feel better now?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she replied, grabbing her water bottle and taking a sip. “Thanks for always being there for me.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Max said, giving the younger girl another hug. “You’re stuck with me.”

“There’s worse people to be stuck with,” she joked. “Can you even imagine if I was stuck with Robert?”

Max laughed out loud at this. It’s not that either of them disliked Kubica, but he definitely would not be at the top of Aaliyah’s list of people she’d go to when she needed someone. The two friends waited in Aaliyah’s driver room until she was completely composed and no longer looked like she had just been crying. Aaliyah led Max to the front door of the hospitality and gave him a hug before sending him on his merry way. Turning back around, Alex was scrolling on social media on the couch and gave Aaliyah a smile as she walked back over to the sitting area. She followed his lead and pulled out her phone to scroll through various media feeds, eventually settling on watching videos on YouTube.

At some point Maggie and Alex’s PR manager brought food back for lunch and the four of them ate together in the lounge area. When they were done, they cleaned up and Aaliyah went to her driver room to grab her hat and came back out to see her team ready to go to the track for their track walk. Aaliyah put her hat on and grabbed a water bottle from Maggie’s hand. Putting on her sunglasses, Aaliyah told her team she was ready and they all bid their goodbyes to those present in the hospitality and made their way to the track.

Walking through the paddock was rough. Aaliyah was the hot topic of the season start despite the season’s three rookies, the dramatic end of her Mexico Grand Prix the prior season not losing any of its headlining ability yet, causing reporters to flock to her in the hopes they could glean a bit of that popularity for themselves. Aaliyah did her best to ignore the media as her team formed a sort of barricade around her to protect her from prying eyes and loud, invasive questions. When they finally got to the track, her team allowed Aaliyah to walk onto it first to escape the reporters. They quickly followed her lead and began their track walk.

Aaliyah couldn’t help but let her mind wander a bit on the track. She always ended up making her team do multiple laps on track so that she could get a good feel for it, something that the media had lovingly dubbed “fortune telling” (the term going hand-in-hand with the nickname “Miss Fortune” that they had also given her) since she almost always had a more accurate reading of the track than her competitors.

“What do you think, Liyah?” Jacques asked his driver, his British accent a familiar voice to her ears.

Aaliyah was snapped out of her thoughts and looked up at her race engineer with wide eyes. She smiled sheepishly and Jacques laughed, knowing she didn’t have a clue what they had been talking about.

“Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t quite catch that.”

“It’s alright,” Jacques said with a smile. “I was asking what you thought about this turn and how you think you’ll be able to go with it?”

Aaliyah stood still and examined the entrance, apex, and exit of the turn with careful eyes. It was a sight to see, the girl becoming incredibly serious very quickly, a sight that her team tried to never take for granted. They enjoyed watching her process, especially because she always gave them great insight about the practicalities of the track and how she could realistically drive it. Crouching down, Aaliyah placed a hand on the track lightly. She wasn’t a superstitious person, but she was a little stitious. She didn’t think the track could literally talk to her, but she could almost feel how the track felt on those days. It didn’t make sense to any of the other drivers or the engineers, some of them regularly teasing her for it, but ultimately they accepted that her readings were pretty accurate more often than not. Aaliyah studied the track with scrutiny, hoping to glean any information that she could from it.

“How does it feel?” Jacques asked the girl.

“Not sure yet,” Aaliyah responded. “Not bad, not good, just… nothing right now. May need to do a few more laps before I can really tell.”

Jacques nodded, accepting her answer. She would always tell him what the track felt like to her so that he could change strategies accordingly. Her strategists also made sure to take her readings into account, knowing all too well what could happen if they didn’t. On good weekends, Aaliyah described the track as warm, not like warm weather, more like the fuzzy feeling you get when surrounded by the people you love. An inviting feeling, for sure. Those were the weekends that everyone could expect her to do extraordinarily well and she normally delivered the expected or better results. Naturally, those were Aaliyah’s favorites. Some weekends, the track didn’t feel warm, but it also didn’t feel like the cold that filled her when the track felt bad. Those weekends were a toss-up about what would happen. When the track felt bad, it was a cold that washed over Aaliyah as if she was in primary school and about to give a speech. It made her nervous, but she wasn’t filled with dread. Those races, more often than not, she didn’t deliver the results that were expected of her.

The worst of the feelings, Aaliyah had only experienced a handful of times in her entire racing career, but it was an unforgettable feeling. It was the cold dread that didn’t just wash over her, it poured down on her continually the entire weekend. Imagine standing on the edge of an unstable cliff with no safety gear ensuring your safe return home and certain doom if you were to fall. That was the worst feeling Aaliyah had ever experienced. She felt it at Mexico the year prior and back in Formula Renault once or twice. Every time, she had a bad crash and didn’t finish the race.

Aaliyah was jumpscared out of her reverie by Daniel Ricciardo biking past her with a loud “Whooop!” Placing a hand on her chest to calm down, Aaliyah flipped Daniel off as he sped away. He glanced back at the girl and his grin somehow got bigger as he laughed loudly at her reaction.

“I hope you fall!” Aaliyah yelled after him, not really meaning it. “Aussies, am I right?”

Her team laughed with the British girl before getting on with the rest of the track walk. They walked around the track twice so that they could get better bearings on the track conditions. Deciding they got all the information they needed, Aaliyah’s team told her they were going to head back to the garage to come up with a plan for practice and to let them know when she got a better read on the track herself. Noah stayed behind with her to chat as the rest of their team left.

“You get a good reading yet?” Noah asked his friend.

“It’s weird,” Aaliyah started, looking at Noah. “For a second there I thought it felt pretty good but now? Now I just feel nothing. Not good or bad.”

“We’ll let the strategy guys know then,” he said with a smile. “I’m always amazed by your readings, have I ever told you that?”

“You’ve mentioned it once or twice,” she responded with a chuckle. “I could stand to hear it more often. Too many people say it’s weird.”

“Fuck them, then,” Noah grimaced. “It’s incredible because you’re almost always more accurate than the others.”

“You’re too good to me, Noah,” Aaliyah said with a smile.

“Nah,” he disagreed, pulling the girl into his side in a hug. “I’m not good enough to you. Even if you’re a dumbass sometimes.”

“There it is,” she laughed, knowing he could never be sentimental for too long.

The two laughed as they made their way off the track and into the garage to greet the engineers. Aaliyah said hello to both sides of the AlphaTauri garage before heading back to the hospitality to do some of the social media duties Maggie had told her about prior to the track walk. She waved to some fans and took pictures with some people that were in the paddock before finally reaching the refuge that was the hospitality.

Noah let her walk in first to escape the mass of people and cameras that were trying to follow her. Alex was no longer in the sitting area of the hospitality but Maggie was there to greet Aaliyah and Noah. The three went to Aaliyah’s driver room to get Aaliyah ready for the social media videos. Aaliyah sat down on the couch and took off her hat and sunglasses, setting them on a small table next to her.

“Drink water,” Maggie told Aaliyah, handing her a water bottle. “You look pale.”

“Thanks, mum,” Aaliyah said with a light smirk.

She didn’t actually argue with Maggie and drank the water given to her. Noah and Aaliyah chatted as Maggie finalized a few things on her phone and let in one of the team photographers to take some natural pictures to start off the weekend. Maggie finally finished whatever it was she had been doing and turned to Aaliyah.

“Okay, Liyah,” she started. “You have one more social media video to make showing off your helmet for the year and then you’ll be free for the rest of the day.”

“Free as in I get to leave or free as in I have to stay in case something comes up?” she asked with a cheeky smile.

“Free as in you get to leave, brat,” Maggie said, lightly smacking Aaliyah’s head with her folder. “Your helmet is in the bag on the table. Also make sure you bring a new sharpie tomorrow, you’ll have to sign some things before and after practice.”

Aaliyah nodded as she got up and grabbed her helmet for the 2019 season. It was her favorite helmet that she’d had so far, with swirling reds and yellows adorning the majority of the surface area. Her six-year-old brother, Leo, had helped her design it with input from their ten-year-old brother, Hunter. She sat back down on the couch and held the helmet in her hands to show it off to the camera that was about to be recording her. Maggie gave her a thumbs up, telling her it had started and Aaliyah began talking.

“Hello, everyone, Liyah here!” Aaliyah started with a grin. “I hope you’re all as excited as me for the start of the new season and I wanted to share with you guys my helmet for the 2019 season.” She lifted it up higher to better show the camera what it looked like. “It was actually designed by my two younger brothers and refined by my sister and myself. My youngest brother really clung to the Red Bull colors of yellow and red and did some sweeping waves for the beach town we grew up in in England and my other brother included a paw print of the family dog that he somehow coerced her to cooperate for.” She turned the helmet so the visor was facing her and pointed out the paw print with the dog’s name underneath to the camera. “This helmet doesn’t have some huge symbolism or anything, it’s mostly a testament to my family and how much they mean to me. It’s really a way for me to stay close to them while I’m on track, which is something I started last year after Mexico when I put a picture of them in my helmet.” She let the helmet go lower in frame as she finished the video off. “Anyways, thank you guys for your support and I can’t wait to see you all this season! Liyah out.”

She gave a two finger salute and Maggie ended the recording.

“Nicely done, Liyah,” she said, turning the camera off to put it away. “Alright, I want to head back to the hotel so that I can edit this and get it up right away on your channels and send it to Mike for the AlphaTauri channels. Once you’re packed up, we’ll head out, okay?”

Aaliyah nodded and got up to pack her stuff up. It was a quick process since most of it was still in her bag. Putting her helmet away and zipping up her bag, Aaliyah was ready and slung her backpack over her shoulder. Noah and Maggie both stood up and the three walked out together, saying goodbye to those that were in the common area of the hospitality. They walked out to the carpark, completely ignoring any reporters that were being obnoxious and yelling questions at Aaliyah. She did, however, stop for photos with some fans and signed some things when asked. They finally made it out to the carpark and Maggie and Aaliyah said goodbye to Noah, knowing they probably wouldn’t see him again before the next morning.

“You cool if I drive?” Aaliyah asked Maggie, knowing that sometimes Maggie couldn’t handle someone else driving her.

“I appreciate the concern,” Maggie said. “But I never mind you driving me. Noah on the other hand…”

Maggie trailed off and the two girls laughed as they put their bags in the boot of the car and got in. It was a relatively short drive back to the hotel and the music that Maggie played made it seem that much shorter. Once they got to the hotel and parked, they grabbed their bags out of the car and walked in together. Their rooms were on the same floor so they accompanied each other in the elevator and separated to go down the hallways that held their respective rooms.

“Thank god,” Aaliyah said quietly as she unlocked her hotel room and walked inside.

She immediately dumped her bag on the chair in the living room and went straight back to the bedroom so that she could get ready for either a bath or shower, she hadn’t decided which one she wanted yet. She had taken off her shoes and belt and was about to take off her shirt when there was a knock at her door. Quietly groaning, Aaliyah walked to her front door. Looking through the peephole, she saw Carlos standing at her door.

The two were pretty good friends, having been teammates during Aaliyah’s rookie season with Toro Rosso, and often checked up with each other at least once every race weekend. There were some exceptions of course, but generally they would make a point to see each other outside of the paddock every race weekend.

Aaliyah sighed a bit and opened the door to her friend.

“Do you do this often, Sainz?” she asked teasingly.

“What do you mean?” he asked, confused.

“Knock on women’s hotel doors immediately after they get back,” Aaliyah chuckled.

Carlos’ eyes widened a bit, worried he was intruding now, and he started to turn to leave while talking.

“Sorry,” he started. “I didn’t realize you had only just got back from the circuit. I can leave you for the night?”

Aaliyah laughed and grabbed his arm, stopping him from actually leaving.

“I’m kidding, Carlos,” she said in Spanish. “You are more than welcome to keep me company for a while tonight.”

Carlos smiled as Aaliyah gestured for him to go into her hotel room. He walked in and gawked at the size.

“Your room is this big?” he asked incredulously. “Mine looks like a closet compared.”

“It’s the Red Bull money,” Aaliyah laughed as the door closed behind her. “That and the brand new sponsor.”

Carlos let out a hum of agreement as Aaliyah went to her bedroom and grabbed clothes to change into, announcing to her friend that she would be out shortly. She closed the door of the bedroom and quickly changed into more comfortable clothes and tossed one of Jake’s hoodies over her shirt, the piece of clothing dwarfing her given the height difference between her and her boyfriend. Aaliyah pulled her hair out of the braids and into a ponytail before walking back out to Carlos.

“Is that Jake’s?” Carlos asked.

“Yeah,” Aaliyah said in Spanish. “He gave it to me before I left for Australia.”

“Didn’t he say at dinner last month that he would join you this weekend?” he asked, confused as to why she was alone for the race weekend.

“He did,” she responded, clearly upset by the fact that he wasn’t there as she plopped onto the couch and set her feet in his lap at the other end. “But he said that they had a video shoot that they couldn’t change the date for and apparently it’s a huge one.”

“But still,” Carlos started, his face screwing up in distaste for Jake’s actions. “That’s not right to cancel on you like that, especially since it would be your first race after announcing your relationship.” Aaliyah nodded with a tired smile but Carlos wasn’t done with his rant yet. “Not to mention all of the times that you didn’t go to parties and events because you were going to one of his video shoots. He needs to do the same for you.”

“You’re preaching to the choir right now, Carlos,” Aaliyah said with a dry laugh. “But there’s nothing I can do about it right now and I want to have that conversation when neither of us have some big event happening.”

Carlos hummed in agreement with Aaliyah’s plan and the two fell into a comfortable silence. They sat like that, Aaliyah’s feet still in Carlos’ lap and his arm resting on her calves, for a few minutes before Aaliyah started to reach for the remote to turn the tv on. As she grabbed it, Carlos began to speak again.

“If I’m being honest,” he started, making Aaliyah pause her action. “This wasn’t just a social call.” She looked at him, confused, as she set the remote back down. “I heard what happened today at your press conference. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

Aaliyah shook her head as she let it rest against the back of the couch.

“Is everyone talking about that or something?” she asked, switching back to English and clearly annoyed by the interaction being the gossip of the day. “Who did you even hear about it from?”

“Well,” Carlos started, hesitating to say how he heard of it. With a pointed look from Aaliyah his resolve crumbled and he spoke. “I heard it from Lando who said he heard it from George who said he heard it from Alex.”

“Of course it was the rookies,” Aaliyah said.

There was more silence before Carlos broke the silence. He knew that he shouldn’t have brought it up but he also knew that he needed to talk to Aaliyah about it.

“I just wanted to make sure you were okay, Liyah,” he said. “I know how that kind of stuff affects you. We were teammates after all.”

“I know, Carlos,” Aaliyah said, smiling softly at him. “I do appreciate it, despite what it sounds like.” There was a pause as Aaliyah thought about her response. “I’m doing as well as I can,” she settled on. “It sucks for sure, but I’m alright. I held it together and got through the rest of the conference, which is what matters.”

“What matters is you and your mental health,” Carlos interjected, upset that she was so nonchalant about it. “You say you’re fine, but you don’t even know how bad it’s affecting you. You accept it as an inevitable event that you’ll be disrespected and that shouldn’t be the case.”

Carlos was getting so heated about this that he switched back to Spanish to get his point across. At his comment, Aaliyah stood up and looked down at Carlos.

“Do you really think I wouldn’t stop it if I could?!” she exclaimed. “I would love it if I didn’t have to deal with this every single day of my fucking life. Unfortunately, I don’t have that kind of power because nobody fucking respects me! Of course I shouldn’t accept it as inevitable, but until others also stand up for me it will be! It will always be something I have to deal with just because of my gender and choice of profession. I know that, I accept that. You need to get over your self righteous self and accept it too if you’re not going to try to help make a change.” Aaliyah was out of breath at the end of the rant but she wasn’t done yet. “I understand that you don’t get it, but if you really want things to change, you have to actually be a part of it instead of just telling me how things should be.”

Carlos was left in a stunned silence. He hadn’t expected Aaliyah to react in that way when he brought it up and he wholly regretted asking her about it in that moment. He was about to say something when Aaliyah cut him off.

“I think you need to leave, Carlos,” she said, not in a cold way, just a frustrated one. “It’s been a long day for both of us. We should get some rest before practice tomorrow.”

Carlos got up and left in a flurry of hushed “I’m sorry”. Aaliyah sighed as the door clicked behind him and plopped back down on the couch. It didn’t help that she had already had to deal with Max about the press conference that day as well as the slight twinge of betrayal from finding out Alex was one of the ones that spread the gossip. It wasn’t like she expected for nobody to learn about it, it was televised after all. She had just hoped that it wouldn’t be the source of paddock gossip, she’d already been the center of that too many times.

Aaliyah got up, realizing she still hadn’t showered, and walked to the bathroom to clean off from the day. The Australian sun and heat didn’t do her many favors, leaving her a sweating mess after the day at the track. She showered off, finally being able to relax from the stressful day she had. Setting an alarm, Aaliyah got into bed, hoping to get some rest before getting into the car the following morning.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N: If you made it all the way down here, thank you for reading! I appreciate you! Let me know what you thought of this chapter and let me know if you would like to be put on the taglist! This is a story I have been thinking about and writing for a hot minute now so it seems kinda weird to be sharing this story with everyone else now XD Anywho, I hope you enjoyed <3 See you all later!

Cazza out (^▽^)

[alternative-ffa]

The first story I ever wrote... Absolutely Gorgeous. Those in the fetish long enough know this one. And I guess it gets rid of my anonymity....

It was August 23rd and Jiminy Leonhart was celebrating his 20th birthday with two of his brothers. Jim was seated on one of the couches in the living room surrounding a big ebony table, his rear filling up all three cushions; his dark brown hair complimented with a silver streak fell down over his round chubby face as his hazel eyes timidly explored his surroundings.

Magnus and Emmitt were Jiminy’s closest siblings and they were seated in other couches around the living room table. They sat in silence waiting for the cake to be brought in. When they heard the squeak of the door each one of them looked back at once with flushed cheeks and drooling mouths as the birthday cake was brought into the room.

Jiminy’s eyes especially, widened with a fire of passion as his taste buds tingled upon sight of it. The cake was placed on the table as close as possible to the birthday boy. By instinct, Jim’s hands immediately moved from resting at his sides to cradling his fat belly. His hands caressed his corpulence as he imagined the taste of the enormous three layer chocolate fudge cake in front of him. He was visibly excited to be able to take a gigantic bite of the sugar covered dessert, and he licked his swollen lips in anticipation.

His brother’s were equally as gluttonous as him, so they rushed through the happy birthday song aiming to taste it as soon as possible. Afterwards, Magnus helped Jiminy sit upright within his seven-hundred pound frame so he could reach the cake in order to blow out the twenty burning candles.

It was a very lonely gathering. It took place in a living room fit for royalty, but there were only two guests present. Because of Jiminy’s stoic personality and the fact that he was a recluse since the age of fifteen, Jiminy didn’t have the luxury of friends. And only two of his four brothers even attended the celebration. Emmitt weighed a massive eight-hundred and fifty pounds, so he sympathized with Jiminy’s misery. Magnus weighed nearly four-hundred pounds and he had accepted the inevitable fact that he was going down the same path as his brothers had. Phineas and Frederyck, the two absent brothers, hadn’t had the misfortune of extreme weight-gain yet in their lives, so they had no empathy for Jiminy or their other siblings. They never attended any family events.

Jiminy closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His stomach bulged out as his lungs filled with air, and the candles extinguished as he blew his wish at the flames. Magnus removed the wax from the cake, and then cut two large pieces and passed them out to Jim and Emmitt. By the time Magnus got cake on his plate, Jim had already finished his slice and was leaning over to help himself to another. His stomach bulged down between his thick thighs as he wiggled closer to the table to reach the cake.

Magnus stood up and went to help him before he fell over; for Jiminy had instances before of leaning too far to get food and landing on his stomach in pain. This time Magnus cut a half of one tier of the gigantic cake and placed it on a platter in front of Jim, “Now ya won’t need me to get more for ya.”

Emmitt chuckled and added, “But you might need to get me some &#8216;ore”, as he held out his plate and belched.

After an hour, and many more platters of cake for Jiminy, the dessert had disappeared. Jiminy leaned back on the couch with his eyes shut, and his stomach red with fresh stretch marks spidering out of the bottom of his shirt. He let out a weak groan and said quietly, “Happy birthday to me.”

Jim had stuffed himself so full that his breath was short and labored. With his eyes squinting behind his dark hair he struggled to get oxygen in his lungs with opposition from all the food in his stomach. Magnus stood slowly with a grip on his belly for he had stuffed himself as well, and he waddled over to the door to call the servants to come take the empty plates away. Magnus went over to the table and grabbed a box of tissues before he headed back towards Jiminy. Emmitt was almost equally as stuffed as Jim, but he was used to the feeling of his stomach being as tight as a drum; so he just sat there and waited the feeling out in gluttonous satisfaction.

Magnus proceeded to clean all the crumbs off of Jiminy’s cheeks, chins, and his gigantic bulge of a neck. Crumbs and fudge had also fallen all over Jim’s shirt. This meant Magnus had to get a new shirt for him from his bedroom. Magnus yanked Jiminy’s sweaty, stretched and stained shirt up over his head, and then he noticed the tears on Jiminy’s face. He could understand why; for here was his little brother, only twenty years old and already barley able to walk on his own. Jiminy had fudge and cake all over his chest as well for it fell down his shirt. So he took some tissues from Magnus and began to clean himself off, violently scratching them across his breasts. Magnus sat opposite to Jim and looked at him as he said, “It’s your birthday Jim, what’s tha matter?”

Jiminy started to cry out loud and responded with puffy red eyes, “Look *sniff* at me.”

Magnus sighed, and put his hand on Jim’s hand. “Look Jim, come on, it’s your birthday, please try to be happy for once. You deserve happiness, especially now.” Magnus’s eyes twinkled upon the statement, as if he knew something Jiminy did not.

But Jim just looked over at Magnus unmoved and motioned for his help in putting his new clean shirt on.

Magnus leaned over to get Jim’s shirt on the table and then helped put it over his brother’s head. Emmitt still sat silently in the corner digesting his cake binge and passionately massaging his belly with his sausage-like fingers. Magnus buttoned up Jim’s shirt, and ran into some resistance at the bottom button. As he tugged on the shirt to get the button fastened, he told Jiminy about his birthday present. “Jim, ya remember Mary?”

Jim sniffed a little with curiosity and then nodded as his blubbery neck jiggled. Magnus continued, “Well, she’s agreed to meet you.”

Jiminy looked shocked, and he said, “No. No. You’re kidding. You know I’m not ready to meet her yet, I-I-I can't let her see me like this.”

Magnus said, “You’ve been in love with her for three years Jiminy and you haven’t talked to her once. Sitting on the balcony during parties and admiring her from afar isn’t getting yourself any closer to establishing a relationship with her.”

Jim responded, “I know, but she's the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. And even in all my fantasies of my first meeting with her, I was thin. There’s a reason for that, you know I cannot face her at this size. I don’t want to first time she sees me to be like this; she could never find me attractive—never mind actually dating me.”

Magnus argued, “Well, after talking to her, I’ve come to the conclusion that meeting her would improve you’re self esteem. Believe me Jiminy, it is time something good happened to you.”

Jim exclaimed, “What did you tell her? Does… does she know about me?”

“Yes Jim, but I'm not going to go into detail about what I told her; please believe me that this is going to make you happy.” Magnus pleaded.

Jim just asked, “How?”

Magnus smiled, “Well, what if I told you that she does find you attractive and I know it for a fact. I'm sure she’ll prove it to you; now go to your room, for she’s sitting on your bed waiting for you.”

Jiminy didn’t know how to react. He just muttered quietly, “She’s in my room?”

Magnus repeated himself for emphasis while assisting Jiminy’s girth off the couch.

Jim wiggled his body for the momentum to stand himself up and upon doing so, his shirt tightened around his incredibly stuffed stomach and he breathed heavily as he slowly waddled to his room. It took him awhile to get there for his belly hung down below his thighs as his breasts fell down towards his sides forcing his arms out causing them to occasionally collide with the walls. He had to walk tentatively for his stomach kept bouncing off of his legs, causing his distended belly discomfort. Near his room, his belly was feeling nauseous. He he had to caress it into peace with his hands, as well as occasionally having to pull down on his shirt to keep his belly button from coming into view.

He was too shocked to really speak to Magnus during the walk down. He was also so stuffed from the cake that walking and talking would have used up all his energy, and would have probably made him more nauseous. When they got to his bedroom, Magnus opened both doors for Jim as he waddled into the room. After he entered, the doors were shut behind him. On his bed, sat Mary. She was wearing a small tight red dress which fitted her like a glove and formed to her petite hourglass frame. Her bright brown eyes focused on him when he entered, and they glistened as her gaze met his.

Jiminy was unable to move. He stood there in horror and shock just staring at the small beautiful creature he knew so hauntingly well seated on his bed, her long black hair reflected the candle light which created waves of color across the walls of the bedchamber. Her ruby red lips curled into a white smile and she raised her eyebrows when she saw that he was frightened. A few uncomfortable seconds passed, and then Mary stood up off the bed and said, “Ya know, you could come ova here if ya want.”

Jiminy just stuttered dumbly, “Oh… al… alright.”

He moved slowly up toward his bed, desperately trying to disguise his waddle. He lowered his gigantic frame onto the bed as slowly as possible so as to not hear the usual groan the wood made when pressure was put upon it. But to his dismay, the bed did groan in pain. Mary sat herself near him, but not too close. He whimpered when he heard the bed groan, and she looked at him with concerned eyes and asked, “What’s tha matter? Are you alright Jim?”

He nodded quickly with his eyes closed, unable to even look at her. His fists were clenched with extreme effort, and he bit his lip to keep from crying. He was never more embarrassed before in his life. Neither had he ever been in this situation before, so he didn’t know how to act anyway; which didn’t make the situation any more comfortable for either of them.

Mary could tell what he was feeling, so she gently touched his shoulder as to assure him. But upon contact he jerked away as though touched by fire. She stood up and moved away from him, as she took a deep breath she turned around and walked back up towards him. Mary leaned down so she was adjacent to his face and she put her hands on his cheeks and moved his gaze up to hers. He couldn’t look her in the eyes without his face wrinkling up into a sob. He had dreamed about the day he’d meet her, and he never imagined himself in such a fat, pathetic state in his fantasies. When his eyes met hers, she expected him to show happiness, but all she got was him shutting his eyes quickly and biting his lip.

She accepted defeat, moved away from him, and said, “I think you should get into bed.”

He just nodded, and she waited for a moment, expecting him to say something. But all she received was silence. She was beginning to think that he didn’t like her, so she offered, “Let me help ya change Jim, so that my presence here tonight had at least one purpose.”

Jiminy then spoke up meekly with his eyes still facing the floor, “What was your purpose here?”

She walked back up to the bed, and then took a seat next to him as she said, “I wanted to maybe get to know ya Jim. I heard about you, and then I asked Magnus. After everything he told me, well, you sounded wonderful. And I wanted to surprise ya on your birthday and give you a night you’ll never forget, and maybe more.”

Jiminy looked at her incredulously for a second and then audibly mumbled, “Well, if I sounded wonderful, then I'm shocked that you haven’t changed your mind upon looking at me.”

Mary looked at him in sympathy and knowingly asked, “What do you mean? Do ya think Magnus could have left something out about your description?”

Jim sighed and said, “Well, I find it hard to believe that he mentioned how fat I am.”

And Jim took his chubby baby hands and grabbed the gut that fell across his lap in a violent gesture of disgust. “After all, how could I have sounded wonderful if he had mentioned that?”

Mary’s expression of sympathy deepened as she listened to him regard himself with so much hate, “He didn’t need to mention that, I already knew, cuz I heard Finny and Freddy talking about you. I asked Magnus about you because… well, I find men of your size attractive. And when he told me that you were a recluse and had no one but him and Emmitt, well I couldn’t just sit back and see a handsome man continue to be lonely. So, I wanted to meet ya and maybe be part of your life.”

Silence followed, for Jiminy could hardly speak, and then Mary said, “If you don’t believe that I'm attracted to you, then will you at least let me prove it?”

Jim sighed to himself, and his great chest heaved in an expression of disbelief as he said, “But how is that possible?”

“How is what possible?” Mary asked.

Jim finally looked up at her with teary eyes, and then glanced down at himself and his protruding belly, thick love handles, breasts, and thighs, and said, “How could anyone be attracted to this? It’s ultimate misery to be like this, so how could it ever attract a woman as beautiful as you?”

Mary smiled at him a little and said, “I wish I could explain it to ya Jim. But I can't, cuz I don’t even know why. All I do know is that you are absolutely gorgeous Jiminy. Just absolutely gorgeous.”

The floodgates opened upon hearing that. Jiminy buried his fat face in his hands, and his body shook with uncontrollable wails and sobs. Mary immediately put her arms around what she could of him, and she rubbed the layers of fat on his back. She slowly placed her small fragile head on his flabby and thick shoulder. She whispered in his ear as she held his shaking, weeping form, “Shhh Jim, there’s nothing to cry about. So Shhh.”

After Jiminy’s tears dissipated, they spent the next hour in his room, talking about Jiminy’s crush on Mary and her counter-attraction. Jim soon became less shy and he was willing to believe her sincerity, for after all she had held him in her arms, and he had never felt a woman’s touch before. It was after midnight before Mary finally left, and Jiminy was exhausted. He’d never felt so many emotions in one day.

After Mary left, Magnus came in to get him ready for bed. He was surprised because Jiminy was actually smiling, and his eyes were gleaming with happiness. Jiminy hadn’t been noticeably happy in a very long time. But sadly, the happiness was brief. Jiminy began to unbutton his shirt in preparation for bed, but Magnus had to finish unbuttoning him after the first three buttons. Jim’s fingers were too fat and his belly was too big for him to be able to finish taking off his shirt by himself. His pants were unzipped, and Magnus tugged at his pant legs to pull them off. The pants themselves weighed nearly twenty pounds, and they were getting a little tight for Jim’s 86-inch waist line.

After his clothes were finally off, Jiminy got out of bed and waddled into the bathroom. It was even harder for him to walk without clothes on because at least his clothes helped keep his stomach from swaying back and forth against his thighs. Upon entering the bathroom he went over to the sink and washed his face. When he turned around to wipe his face off on a towel, he saw his whole reflection up against the full-length mirror on the wall. He stood there feeling drained, just looking at himself, and analyzing his whole body.

After being with Mary, he felt beautiful for the first time in his life. But upon seeing every single fold of fat which wrapped itself around his frame and every single dark piercing stretch mark, he felt it consume his confidence until he was left completely empty of happiness. He was awakened from his nightmarish reverie by Magnus knocking on the door and asking, “Are ya alright in there Jim?”

He quickly answered while clearing his throat, “Yes, yes, I’ll be done in a minute.”

Jiminy couldn’t resist, after seeing his full girth in the mirror, he waddled up towards the industrial-size scale. He whispered to himself over and over again, “It looks worse than it is. It looks worse than it is.”

He placed a foot encased with the bruised fat of his ankle onto the scale, and then while grabbing onto the sink for support, he lowered the rest of his massive body on top of it. He could practically hear the scale groaning with pain from the pressure as he read its measurement: 749 lbs.

His chubby hands immediately came up to his mouth to stifle his sob of agony. He almost fell off the scale and he leaned his back up against the wall as he cried, again. His fingers dug deep into his belly as he grasped it with passionate hate, leaving scratches. His eyes were crinkled up and he bit his lower lip to keep Magnus from hearing and becoming worried. He breathed slowly and after a minute of wiping the tears from his face and composing himself, he waddled out of the bathroom and lay his body down onto his bed.

Jiminy couldn’t reach the blankets once he had lied down on his back, so Magnus tucked him in. After pulling the blankets up to his brother’s chest, Magnus noticed his tear stained face. So instead of leaving, he sat next to Jim and said, “I was under the impression that things went well between you and Mary.”

Jim nodded, “Yeah, they did. I just really feel like it was a dream, ya know? And like… it didn’t happen. I’ve been obsessing over her for three years knowing she could never find me attractive. So how could something this wonderful really happen to me?”

Magnus smiled and said, “Well, think about all the things you’ve been through in the past few years. Shouldn’t it be about time something good happens?”

Jiminy smirked a little bit and then returned to his stoic face as he said, “Yeah, I suppose so. I just cannot believe she's attracted to me.” He paused, then groaned with hate as he slowly looked down at his own girth and rubbed it with emphasis, “It’s just… … I'm so fat, Magnus.”

Magnus burrowed his eyebrows in concern, “You weighed yourself in there didn’t you?”

Jiminy nodded with his eyes shut tight, obviously holding back more tears.

Magnus inquired empathetically, “How much?”

Jiminy took a deep breath and said, “Seven-hundred and forty-nine pounds. …I mean, honestly Magnus, how am I supposed to believe she's attracted to me when I'm so gigantic…?”

Magnus thought for a minute and then confidently said, “Well she is attracted to you. So ya just remember that tonight Jim. And you’re gonna see her in the morning and I know she’ll prove it to you.”

Jiminy put up a fake smile and nodded. So Magnus stood up and said as he walked out the door, “Happy Birthday Jim.”

And with that, the door was shut, and Jiminy fell into a deep sleep riddled with images of Mary.

Jiminy awoke to a knock on his bedroom door. He opened his eyes then stretched a little as he said, “Come in.”

Mary walked into the room. She was wearing a long baby blue spring dress. And Jiminy was in shock over her angelic figure in the doorway. He was admiring how radiant she was, and then he noticed his blanket was only up to his belly button. He quickly turned red and pulled the blanket up to his thick puffy neck in order to cover his massive breasts from view. He shrunk down further into the bed, for he desperately wanted to disappear between the covers and hide from the world. But then Mary giggled and walked over to his bed. Jiminy’s eyes were wide with terror as she sat next to his bed and said, “Why are ya so scared?”

Jiminy just gulped and shook his head quickly, never taking his eyes off her face. Mary’s expression changed from amusement to slight concern. “Come on Jim, what’s the matter?”

He responded, “I'm not scared, I was just surprised seeing you come in.”

Mary nodded her head in acceptance of his response and said, “Well Magnus went out, so I offered to get you into the bath and dress you.”

Jiminy’s eyes widened in disbelief, and he looked at her as though she was joking with him, “What did you say?”

Mary had stood up and was already going through Jiminy’s armoire, picking out his clothing as she answered his question, “I said that I would get you into the bath and help you dress afterward.”

And she looked at him with a smirk and a gleam of mischief in her eyes.

Jiminy lay in his bed still gripping the covers for dear life as he asked, “Well, at least you’ll leave the room while I'm bathing, right?”

Mary said, “If you want me to, of course I will. But um, do you need my help getting out of bed?”

Jiminy said defensively, “No…no, I’ll be fine.”

Mary nodded and placed his clothes on a table in his bedroom, and walked towards the door. Before she left and closed the door she said, “I’ll come back in an hour or so to see how you’re doing.”

Jiminy nodded, and she left the room.

Now, Jiminy had just gotten himself into an awkward situation. He was going to have a very hard time taking a bath on his own; after all he couldn’t even reach half of his body. But he was going to try; after all he wanted to avoid Mary seeing him naked at all costs. There existed a horrible image in his mind of her seeing him naked and vomiting in response. He shook it out of his head as he took a deep breath and heaved his body out of bed. He waddled into the bathroom and shut the door behind him.

Taking another deep breath he leaned towards the faucet and turned it on. Then he sat on the toilet seat cover to take a rest, as the water filled up in the bath tub. Jiminy knew that there was no way he was going to complete his bath and change in the time Mary returned. It was impossible, for he couldn’t even dress himself anyway. But he figured it would be easiest to hide himself under the bubbles in the bath, so he planned to at least be covered in them before she came in.

By now the water was up to the right height, so Jiminy poured bubbles in the bath and then slowly stepped his gigantic blubbery body in the warm water. Finally coming to a comfortable position, he lay there in the water thinking about Mary for the next half hour. He hadn’t had a chance to really enjoy the thought of her since he saw her the previous night.

He imagined every inch of her soft fragile body, and what it would be like to have his hands all over her. He imagined her smell and her lips up against his as her breath brushed across his neck. He was convulsing in pleasure at the thought and almost wet himself right there in the tub. But what brought him out of his reverie was the squeak of the bathroom door as Mary opened it.

He was still extremely turned on, which made her look even more appetizing to him. She stood in the doorway, wearing that blue dress, looking at Jiminy with a sultry smile. She walked towards him and then sat on the side of the tub as she asked teasingly, “So, how are you coming on your bath? You’ve been in there for an hour… and look! Your hair isn’t even wet yet!”

Jiminy looked down at his body to see how covered up he was. The water covered up most of his gigantic belly, but it left his nipples and breasts exposed. He was disappointed that it was the farthest he could hide himself beneath the water. So he shook the thought of his disgusting body out of his mind as he answered her, “I just got in the bath. I mean, it, well… it takes me a while to get things done.” And he moved his hands from his sides over to his belly.

Mary smiled at him and said, “Well that’s why I offered to help you earlier.” Then she added temptingly, “Do you want me to now?”

Normally Jiminy would decline her offer, and say he could do it himself. But he still thought about her beautiful body and how he wanted his hands all over her. His fantasy of the last half hour came into his mind and he felt that he would do anything to touch her; or at least have her touch him. He looked up at her with wide doe eyes and said, “I… I don’t know. I mean… I do need help, but are you sure you want to help me?”

Mary stood up and kneeled down to face him. She looked him in the eyes and said “Yes, I’d absolutely love to help you.”

Jiminy blushed at her answer, and she began to take scoops of water in her hand and pour it on his head. She laughed as the water ran down his fat face. She massaged his head with the shampoo, and then used the spray handle to clean it off. When she was finished she stroked his wet hair back away from his eyes and said, “Alright, sit up now Jim so I can dry your hair off.”

Jiminy looked up at her and hinted that he needed help by lifting his arms. She grabbed them and with great effort, and assistance from him, she pulled him up straight. She then said, “I don’t think I'm strong enough to pull you out of the tub.”

Jim smiled a little at her and said, “Oh of course not. I can get myself out, wait for me in the bedroom.”

Mary grinned at him and walked out of the room, and Jiminy finally felt relaxed again.

He grabbed the sides of the tub to pull himself up more and then reached for the handle above him, specifically installed to help him get in and out of the tub, and with much effort he pulled himself out. He sat down on the toilet seat cover and grabbed the nearest towel and began to dry his body off. It would take a while for him to be completely dry for he had to dry underneath all the layers of flesh around his body. Mary knocked on the door, and Jiminy quickly wrapped the little towel as much he could around himself. But when Mary opened the door, she immediately gasped, “Oh my god…” upon seeing him exposed like that.

Jim looked at her, very hurt. He could tell she gasped at how hideous he was. He looked down at the floor and his eyebrows turned down into a frown as he turned red with embarrassment. Mary saw that she made him upset, so she took a step towards him and tried to explain herself, “Oh Jim, I really didn’t mean anything by that.”

Jiminy didn’t even look at her, he just shook his head and said meekly, “Leave me alone.”

Mary tried to protest, but Jiminy just interrupted her and said, “Please, I can do everything myself.”

Mary just nodded and being respectful of his privacy, she walked out of his bedroom. Jiminy was left alone. And when he realized it, a wave of sadness came over him to replace the humiliation. He stood himself up, rubbed himself dry, and just got into bed.

He knew it was too good to be true, that Mary couldn’t really find him attractive. It was all just a charade, a lie: to give him false happiness on his birthday. No woman could ever be attracted to a man that fat; that kind of woman didn’t exist, and he felt foolish to have believed her. Then he was overcome by sleep.

For the rest of the day and afternoon he fell in and out of lucid dreams. And not once did Mary disturb him. It made him feel even worse. He hoped that maybe she would come in and apologize to him, and tell him she really did find him attractive. He dreamed about her coming in and confessing her love for him the whole day. But she didn’t come in until after dinner, and Jiminy was deep asleep by then.

She quietly tip-toed in and went over to the bed. She had a little to drink with Magnus and Finny, so she just came in and lifted up the sheets of his bed. She saw him lying there, naked; and moved her eyes up and down his body. She studied every feature: the folds of skin on his back, which rolled around to the front of him to make up his breasts, and his gigantic love handles which sprouted from the middle of his back and enlarged to create the massive stomach that took up half the bed. She looked at his thick legs, with his thighs covered in dark stretch marks.

His thighs were gorgeous; their thickness was what made him waddle so pleasingly to her eye. Just watching him waddle with difficulty towards her on the previous night, with his stomach bouncing in front of her, made her want him so bad.

Seeing him sitting on the toilet seat, almost naked in the exposing spotlight, shocked her. Not because he was disgusting like he believed, but because she didn’t realize how big he really was. He was enormous and also the sexiest man she had ever had the pleasure of viewing in her life. It was like waking up Christmas morning seeing 100 more presents than you expected, for he really was a lot better than she expected. She felt an overwhelming desire to be close to him, and the alcohol clouded her judgment, so she quietly crawled into his bed and nestled under the covers very close to him. Listening to his steady powerful breath and feeling the warmth of his body up against hers lulled her into a peaceful sleep.

[fxrmxla]

Toto Wolff doesn’t think that Max Verstappen’s clash with Lando Norris has any correlation with unpunished incidents from 2021.

“I don’t think you can take this conclusion. It’s been so long and from our side, we are in a different place today, and I think he is. It takes two to tango.”

“I haven’t seen Lando and Max’s race to be honest. I haven’t seen how all of that came about. I first need to watch it before I have an opinion but I wouldn’t see that as a big consequence of 2021 not having been managed well to what happened in 2024.”

“I don’t think they have a correlation.”

😶😶😶😶

[wandaluvstacos]

BLM putting out current wild horses up for adoption and I'm just salivating over this big dude here (8216, minute mark 6:53)

15.1 hands and 13 years old so definitely a PROJECT but damn the older ones always look so stunning. Kinda wish they'd just let him roam in the wild for the rest of his days; looking like this I think he deserves to procreate, lol. After 8 years I think their adoptability is much more limited. Hoping he goes to a good home though; he'd be gorgeous under saddle.

8218 isn't too bad either, but he's 17 years old. T__T Like just let him live out the rest of his life in the wild! let my big man be free!

look at deez big feets

Anyway, American mustangs are genuinely better looking than like 90% of American-bred horse breeds at this point, let's just pack it in.

[bighermie]

Dailywire Article

Obama&#8217;s Letter To Ex-GF Unredacted: &#8216;I Make Love To Men Daily, But In The Imagination&#8217;

https://www.dailywire.com/news/obamas-letter-to-ex-gf-unredacted-i-make-love-to-men-daily-but-in-the-imagination

Gee. Really? Well no shit. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. And Michelle is really Michael.

[stopandimagineloveforever]

Some of the celebrities featured in the commercial include Paul McCartney, Natalie Portman, Joaquin Phoenix, Ariana Grande, Jessica Chastain, Billie Eilish, and James Cromwell, all of whom have either given up meat or all animal products. It also shows animals in cages on factory farms, where research suggests 99 percent of all animal products in the US come from, before showing happier clips of pigs and cows playing in the grass.

“I have always been a fan of Arthur O’Shaughnessy’s ‘Ode’ poem and the ‘Pure Imagination’ song from the original Willy Wonka film,” Lockwood says. “The lyrics are especially poignant and relevant as they pertain to our treatment of the animals with whom we share this earth.”

[bronva]

Blake Shelton gets emotional about 'The Voice' exit, meeting wife Gwen Stefani: 'I won the ultimate prize'

Blake Shelton gets emotional about ‘The Voice’ exit, meeting wife Gwen Stefani: ‘I won the ultimate prize’

When Blake Shelton signed up to be a judge on NBC’s “The Voice,” he didn’t realize he’d leave with a nine-time champion title, a lifetime of memories and the greatest gift of all — his wife, singer-songwriter Gwen Stefani. “‘The Voice’ has changed my life in a million ways. Most importantly, I met Gwen Stefani as a coach on the show, and now she’s my wife,” Shelton told Fox News Digital after the…

[trukker94gurl]

Trump Would Consider Temporary Speakership: &#8216;I Will Do It if Necessary&#8217;

Trump Would Consider Temporary Speakership: ‘I Will Do It if Necessary’ https://link.theepochtimes.com/mkt_app/us/trump-would-consider-temporary-speakership-i-will-do-it-if-necessary-5504900?utm_source=andshare

[the-laridian]

Wordcount 19 August 2023

1960s editing: 3802

Legion ACG: 4414

Also today: got all the blocks for the new quilt sewn, and laid them out... and... I'm 2 blocks short. :/ So I have to make 2 more blocks. Guess that'll be tomorrow's project, figuring out enough scraps and bits to do this.

Total for today: 8216

Total for August: 160,151

Total for 2023: 2,199,628

[ao3feed-crimeboys]

Dear Reader

by phantom_star739

And Tommy— Tommy might be the cause of all this, but was also oblivious to all. “You brought me to life, Tommy,” Wilbur whispers. Tommy gave him anatomy to say or do whatever he wants.

Wilbur brushes Tommy’s hair aside. The boy smiles, sending fireworks to pop in his chest. “I just wanted you.”

Wilbur closes his eyes. He might not know much, but he knew himself. “And you have me.”

OR: wilbur's a book character and tommy is the boy that brought him to life

~a crimeboys/dadbur dear reader au~

Words: 8216, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Series: Part 16 of my unconnected (mostly) one-shots that will not have sequels no matter what you say

Fandoms: Minecraft (Video Game), Dream SMP

Rating: General Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: Gen

Characters: Wilbur Soot, Tommy (Minecraft Diaries), Technoblade (Video Blogging RPF), Phil Watson | Philza

Relationships: Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit, Wilbur Soot & Technoblade & TommyInnit & Phil Watson

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Books, Song: Dear Reader (Taylor Swift), Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Child Abuse, Physical Abuse, Fluff, Hugs, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Happy Ending, King Wilbur Soot, TommyInnit Needs a Hug (Video Blogging RPF), Sad TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Protective Wilbur Soot, Sad Wilbur Soot, Wilbur Soot-centric, Wilbur Soot and TommyInnit are Siblings, Wilbur Soot Loves TommyInnit, TommyInnit Loves Wilbur Soot, Temporary Character Death, Unreliable Narrator, sometimes, when the narrarator is tommy

[lordzannis]

https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza

https://www.972mag.com/jewish-chronicle-elon-perry-netanyahu-intelligence/

https://www.972mag.com/dehumanization-moral-abyss-israelis/

https://www.972mag.com/before-zionism-the-shared-life-of-jews-and-palestinians/

https://www.972mag.com/ir2/

https://www.972mag.com/iran-israel-hezbollah-ori-goldberg/

https://www.972mag.com/shatzi-weisberger-tribute-organizing/

https://www.972mag.com/palestinians-israeli-politics-elections/

The burden, and wall, of Zionism - +972 Magazine

https://www.972mag.com/jewish-communists-palestine-israel/

https://www.972mag.com/will-imagining-zionism-without-supremacy/

https://www.972mag.com/young-american-jews/

https://www.972mag.com/zionism-jewish-lives-herzl/

https://www.972mag.com/jnf-zionism-palestinians-dispossession/

[normalcyisfake]

James Ogilvy is a close confidant of William & Catherine.