#“they're both adults” no. that's not how child-parent relationships work

[wardenparker]

Who Took the Merry Out of Christmas

Frankie Morales x female reader Co-written with @absurdthirst

Rating: Explicit for family dysfunction. This blog is always 18+ Word Count: 10.7k Warnings: Post partum depression, marriage trouble, mentions of addiction, demanding family, abusive parents, verbal abuse, emotional abuse, dysfunctional family, a very sweet baby who has done nothing wrong ever, parents abusing their adult children in front of others. (There is a happy-ish ending, I promise.) Summary: It's only been a few months since Frankie came home from South America, and both of your families are bearing down on you for the holidays. A rocky marriage and even rockier relationships with your parents are bound to make for a very tense Christmas. Notes: Sorry it's not light and fluffy this year, gang. It just hasn't been a light and fluffy time. Considering how dramatic this holiday season has been, this little slice of family trauma seemed pretty appropriate.

Christmas. The time of year that is supposed to merry and bright. Well, the bright is accurate, especially in south Florida. Not a dusting of snow to be had, the palm trees in the front yard decorated with lights and the temperatures still letting everyone wear shorts and t-shirts if they wanted. It’s definitely not the white Christmas you had grown up with, but Frankie prefers this over freezing his ass off while shoveling snow off the driveway just to go to the store to get diapers.

The magic rubs off over the years. From childhood we outgrow the sparkle of the Christmas season as we stop thinking of it as magical, and now it's just another set of expectations that inevitably seems impossible to meet.

Both sides of your family had expected you and Frankie to host this year. Because of the baby, they said. Because now that you had a real family, it was time for you to take on the responsibility of holiday hosting. It's frustrating enough to be a first time mother of an eight month old. It's sleepless and difficult and Frankie has only barely gone back to work so money has been tighter than tight.

“Why don’t we just tell them that we can’t?” Frankie leans back from the sink where he’s finally shaving to look at you perched in the bed. You are tired and he knows that despite what you’ve said, hosting Christmas is the last fucking thing you need. “We have the baby. It’s a lot.”

"Because Christmas is next week, Francisco," you remind him. The baby monitor is on your nightstand, and you fiddle with it, but it's mostly a nervous habit. Mirabel wasn't a good sleeper for the first few months and you're constantly worried that she'll start having trouble again. "And they're coming here because of her. It was a miracle they didn't all fly down to cram into the delivery room when she was born, it seems mean to say they can't see her at Christmas."

“One— I wouldn’t have let them in the delivery room.” That memory was for him alone, he has absolutely loved being the first to hold his daughter. To be there to help and watch as you pushed his child into the world. “Two, shouldn’t that mean that they want to save you the stress of hosting?” He asks, leaning back in and putting the razor back to his cheek. “Hell, I say we order Chinese and be done with it.”

"I would agree." Stretching out in bed helps a lot. You've been dealing with a little hip pain lately that gets exasperated by carrying Mirabel around and you make sure to do stretches every morning and night – at least for a few minutes. "But we're in it now. Flights are booked. Meals have to be planned."

“I’ve got to mow the grass tomorrow.” He knows you will remind him of it so he goes ahead and checks it off your mental list. “And you need more mushrooms, right?” He makes a face in the mirror, hating mushrooms but you don’t seem to have picked up on that.

"Beef Wellington on Christmas is a family tradition." Your mother made it ever year from the recipe that her mother-in-law taught her, and now you make it every year for you and Frankie and however many of your friends you end up having over to dinner on the holiday. Usually it's the Miller brothers, this year might include Pope as well.

It’s good that he’s in a different room than you are so you don’t see the face that he makes. He hates the Beef Wellington, he’s just never been able to admit that. When you were dating, you could have served him a boiled shoe and he would have praised it. It was better than an MRE or the shit they served in the chow hall most days on base. And Frankie’s idea of cooking was either firing up a grill or going out to eat, so home cooked whatever was good to him. Especially when he knew he was getting laid after dinner. Now he’s stuck eating mushrooms every damn Christmas and it sucks. “I know.” He sighs, turning on the water to rinse the hair out of his razor. “I changed the sheets in the guest rooms.” He tells you. “And made sure your mom has the ‘good pillows’.” He rolls his eyes, again, happy you can’t see him because you would definitely scold him for that.

“Thank you, honey.” You know damn well he thinks it’s ridiculous and probably had a running monologue going why he made the guest beds about how picky your families are, but his parents are just as bad as yours in different ways. That’s why this holiday is going to be so fucking stressful. Part of why you work so hard to make family visits perfect is because his mother has never approved of you. “We’ll make sure everything is perfect. It will all be fine.”

Frankie hums as he finishes shaving and wipes his jaw dry. It’s a little jarring to see the smooth skin, he’s sported a patchy beard since getting out, but he’d decided that one thing he needed to do was look better after getting his pilot’s license back. He steps out of the bathroom and grins at you. “Hey baby.”

“Hey.” You say it before you look up, and when you lift your eyes you do a double take. “Clean shaven, huh? It’s been a while.”

He shrugs slightly, reaching up and rubbing his cheek lightly. “Figured your mom would complain less if I was clean shaven.” He had even gotten a haircut, not nearly as short as when he was active duty, but trimmed from the longer curls he had recently been sporting.

“Mira’s going to spend half of tomorrow poking at your face,” you predict, smiling softly. It will be the first time your daughter has ever seen him clean shaven.

He snorts. “As long as she doesn’t cry.” He slides his eyes along your body, not caring that you are in a comfy t-shirt and short, you look sexy to him. “So what are my chances of getting lucky tonight?” He asks, lifting a brow.

“Are you suddenly into somnophilia?” It proves your point that you can barely stifle a yawn. Getting up multiple times a night to pee or see what Mirabel needs takes its toll on your rest, and god knows you never ever get to sleep in anymore. Sure, you knew being a mother was going to be exhausting, but this is above and beyond that.

His playful grin slips and he shakes his head. “No baby, not if you’re too tired to enjoy yourself.” He doesn’t sigh, but he does miss the intimacy, the closeness of sex. Instead of complaining, he reaches back into the bathroom to flip off the light and starts walking towards the bedroom door. He will check the doors and downstairs windows one last time before setting the alarm, a habit of his. “You need some water or something downstairs?”

"No, I'm okay." It's not that you don't want him. He's still the same gorgeous man you married and conceived your daughter with. It isn't a matter of want. It's a matter of being so exhausted and feeling so disgusting from never having time to thoroughly shower and always ending up sweaty and sticky somehow. You don't feel like yourself, and you haven't since your second trimester.

But unloading all of that on Frankie doesn't seem fair when he's finally getting back on his feet with work and therapy and kicking his drug habit. The man doesn't even drink anymore, because he doesn't want to slip up again. So you keep your mouth shut and don't bitch about your own discomfort.

He sighs softly as he goes downstairs. Another night where he’s turned down, but he understands. You’ve been dealing with some postpartum issues and he doesn’t want to push. He just wants to make love to his wife more than once a month. It’s another reason why he had thought hosting Christmas would be a bad idea. You are already worn down and frazzled, despite Frankie sharing the load of the house and baby with you as much as he possibly could. This is just going to add more stress to your already loaded down shoulders and he doesn’t like it at all.

You turn over and slip under the covers when he goes downstairs to check the alarms. Being overwhelmed and depressed has you feeling like you're out drowning in the middle of the ocean and have suddenly forgotten how to swim. The best thing you can do right now is try to sleep.

Frankie comes back upstairs, slipping into the bed and curling around you. He hates that instead of curling against him, you huddle against your side of the bed. Wondering if you are secretly still pissed at him for the entire Coke thing. “I love you.” He whispers before he closes his eyes.

You love him, too. You do. And you have this whole time. It's just so hard to pull yourself out of the bottom of the ocean of your depression and uncertainty that you just pretend to be asleep and hope that you both knock out quickly.

Maybe tomorrow will be better. Probably not, but maybe. After all, it can't be worse.

******

“It’s okaaaaaaay.” Frankie bounces his very upset little girl on his hip and shoves a finger in her mouth. She’s teething and of course woke up in a horrible mood. She hiccups and he grabs the teething ring to throw it back in the freezer for a little bit. “It’s okay, baby girl. I know it hurts. Believe me, it doesn’t get better when you have a cavity either.”

"But she'll have good dental hygiene and never have a cavity in her whole life." You call from the kitchen, working your ass off to make sure that each and every bit of Christmas dinner is accounted for perfectly. Frankie isn't the world's best cook by any means, but this family tradition is ingrained in your bones -- beef Wellington, scalloped potatoes, green beans with almonds, and a demi-glace gravy to make everything even richer and fancier. It's a far cry from what you normally eat but that is sort of the point. It's the holidays. This is the time to be fancy.

He snorts. “Not if she gets her teeth from my side.” He calls back. “I’m ninety percent fillings at this point.” That makes her giggle and he grins at her. “Was daddy funny?” He walks her back into the kitchen to find you frantically stirring something. “I’ve got the living room vacuumed and the egg nog is in the garage fridge.”

"Have you heard from your parents yet?" Your in-laws are always early, which is not exactly a sin but it is inconvenient. If they say they'll be somewhere at 7 then they are always there by 6:30, wondering where on earth you've been for the last half hour.

“Not yet.” He loves his mom, he really does, but he’s not blind to her persnickety nature. He’s talked to her about it but it seems like she doesn’t bother you. A wonderful thing considering she’s run off more than one girlfriend of his over the years. “You know her, she’s gonna show up when she wants to. At the most inconvenient damn time.”

“I just want to have dinner in the oven when they get here.” The Christmas after Frankie proposed, your own parents had hosted everyone and Vanessa Morales had been less than impressed when your mother was still getting things into the oven when they arrived. It apparently didn’t matter in the least that they were early.

“Roger.” He kind of treats the parents visiting like a mission, a hostile one.

“Where did the Millers end up this year?” You can’t tell if it’s better or worse to not have his friends here as a conversational buffer. Part of you is grateful for fewer people in the house and half wishes you had friends here to lean on.

“I think Will and Teresa are going to get back together.” Frankie admits. “He said him and Benny were going to have Christmas with her and her brothers.” Frankie had always liked Will’s ex-fiancée and he knew you did as well.

“Good.” That’s a relief, showcased with how easily your shoulders drop with just a touch of tension dropped. “Good. That’s…That will be really good for them. I know they’ve missed each other.”

“They have.” Frankie pauses for a second . “Ben said he was going to swing by and check on Molly and the girls.” He murmurs quietly, regret lacing his tone.

“Where is Pope spending Christmas?” It’s not necessary to express more regret over Redfly’s death. Every single one of you have shed your tears over it and you make sure to check in with Molly at least once a week just like you always have. Family that you choose means you choose each other over and over again.

“He’s still in Australia.” Frankie sighs softly. Yovanna has covered her tracks well and he’s still looking for the woman he had fallen in love with.

"Shit..." All you can really do is shake your head at that. Even if Santiago Garcia is on your shit list for inducing the entire team away to South America for weeks, what happened there wasn't really his fault. It sounds like everything that could go wrong did, and the best that you can do is be grateful that Frankie came home to you in one peace.

“Yeah.” He shuffles slightly, rocking the baby as she continues to gnaw on her first and drool all over his shirt. He knows you aren’t happy with what happened, and he’s never been able to tell you all the details.

The tentative expression on his face makes you shake your head, and you turn back to the pan you have on the stove with a sigh. "You'll tell me when you're ready." It's been months and he's still keeping the whole story from you, but you have always been patient. You have always let Frankie come to you. "Let's just not do it on Christmas Eve. Our families are almost here."

“Okay.” He knows you are upset that he won’t talk to you, but he steps closer and leans down to kiss your shoulder. “Thank you for understanding.”

He'll come to you when he's ready. And you're doing your damnedest to be patient. But it's fucking hard when you feel like you're weathering a private storm on the edge of an ocean hell bent on drowning you.

For better or for worse, that is the moment that the doorbell rings.

“It’s showtime.” Frankie mutters, trying to plaster a happy smile on his face and just managing to look constipated.

"Shit, shit." You shove two trays into the oven right away, barely able to check to make sure that everything is assembled correctly but just dying to have it all in the oven. "Okay. That's got to be your parents." Frankie has walked away with the baby, leaving you to quickly wipe down the kitchen and pray you're not smelly from the sweat you worked up preparing dinner.

Frankie opens the door, smiling when he sees his mother and stepfather standing on the porch. “You made it.” He greets them. “Made good time getting here.”

“Of course we did.” Vanessa Morales moved into the house with determination, but the first thing she does is reach for her granddaughter. “Ay, hola Gordita! Eres mucho más bonita que tus fotos.”

Suddenly feeling shy, she pulls back and buries her face in Frankie’s neck. “Está bien, es tu abuela.” He soothes, rubbing her little back. “She’s cutting another tooth.” He explains.

“Pobrecita.” Vanessa coos, not taking the baby’s cue at all. “Come give your abuela a kiss, Gordita. Dame un beso.”

Mira doesn’t like it when someone crowds her face that she’s not familiar with and she immediately starts to cry, clinging to Frankie and trying to get away from her. “Mama.” He huffs, holding her tighter and cooing softly. “Give her a few minutes to warm up to you.”

Vanessa frowns, but relents when her husband agrees with Frankie. Instead, all she says as she’s lead into the house is, “Your sister’s bebes didn’t need time to warm up.”

“Gabriella lives in the same town as you, mama.” He reminds her, rolling his eyes at her miffed reaction. “Mira has seen you twice since she was born.”

“Even so.” His mother huffs, as though it were a personal affront.

“Feliz Navidad, Vanessa.” You come out of the kitchen a second later with your face freshly washed just to give yourself a boost and offer your in-laws a smile. “Hi, Javier. It’s nice to see you both.”

“There’s my favorite daughter-in-law.” Javier might just be a step-parent, but he has always thought that Francisco had chosen the best woman for him, despite what his wife might say. Vanessa is prickly, and while he might find that attractive since he’s a self-confessed asshole, he tries to make you feel accepted when he’s around. He steps around Vanessa to pull you in for a hug.

“Feliz Navidad, Javi.” The extra moment of consideration from your husband’s stepfather is dearly appreciated, and you accept the hug whole-heartedly. “How’s things?”

“Same.” He doesn’t mind slightly offending Frankie, so he kisses your y forehead and leans back to wink at you. He was a ladies man back in the day and still a silver fox, so it’s always fun to raise the hackles of the man he loves like his own son. Just for shits and giggles. “Better now that I’m around three beautiful ladies.” He turns that charming smile on Mira and leans in. “This one most of all.”

He earns a full belly laugh from his granddaughter and you feel yourself breathe just a little easier. Javier in a good mood bodes well for the night. “Can I offer you both something to drink? Vanessa?”

“I don’t suppose you have wine,” Vanessa manages to make it sound vile, to not have wine in the house. “Actually, mom, she picked up a bottle of your favorite sangria.” Frankie pipes up.

“Let me get you a glass.” The atmosphere is already frigid but that’s just how it’s always been between the two of you. Thank God she doesn’t know about the coke or she’d surely find a way to blame you for Frankie’s addiction issues, too. Just like she’s blamed you for everything else she deems wrong with her only son’s life.

“Javi?” Frankie lifts a brow towards his stepfather. “You want a whiskey? I’ve got a bottle in the den.”

“Good man.” Javi commends, and clasps his stepson on the back as they disappear into the other room together.

Vanessa turns towards you expectantly and pulls a tight smile. “When will dinner be ready?” She asks. “Assuming you’ve started cooking, of course.”

It’s too much for how exhausted you are, and even being prepared doesn’t make it okay. Without a buffer, Vanessa aims all of her venom at you endlessly. “It will be ready in an hour. No need to worry.” And the sooner your own parents get here the better — not that they’re perfect by any means.

“You look tired.” It’s not an observation born out of concern, but criticism. “You should really put a bit of effort in.” She hums. “Fransisco deserves that, doesn’t he?”

Yes. He does. But your husband of six years is also well aware of how much work raising a newborn is. Which is why you just smile and bite back how much his mother's constant nitpicking bothers you. "Your son prefers a natural look," you inform her as politely as you can without snapping. "No make up. So that I always look like myself."

She can’t possibly argue with that, because it would mean insulting her precious baby boy. Instead she just looks around like she’s never seen the place and starts to wander off towards the kitchen.

You’re debating whether or not you need to follow her when the doorbell rings. It’s still a touch too early for your parents to arrive — they shared their location with you so you could track their driving route on your phone from the airport. It should be ten more minutes until they arrive.

“I’ll get it!” You call, wondering if Frankie heard the doorbell in the den, and head back to the front.

“That must be her parents.” Frankie sighs and looks longingly at the bottle of whiskey but he knows he can’t have any. It wouldn’t be fair to you or to Mira.

“Save it for later.” Javi advises. “When your mama’s gone to bed and the baby is down, and you can relax with your wife.” It seems like Frankie is struggling more than he has let on, but there isn’t time to talk about that now. “Go say hi to your in-laws. I can take Mira if she’s okay with it.”

Surprisingly, it doesn’t take much convincing on either man’s part for Mira to go to her abuelo. Immediately little fingers dig into the hair covering his upper lip and Frankie chuckles. “She doesn’t understand why I don’t have facial hair today.” He explains.

“She can play all she wants.” Javi laughs, bouncing the little girl in his arms. “I got her, Frankie. Go on.”

It’s almost jarring to the aloof and broody man he had spent his teenage years around laughing and chortling at a baby, but Frankie smiles at the sight before turning to see about mitigating the next disastrous arrival.

You’re already at the door, half-smiling and half-bewildered as your parents hand off a bag full of wrapped presents to you like a butler and chatter away as they enter.

“It’s good to see you dear.” Your mother hums, “our trip here seemed to take forever.” She opens her mouth to once again suggest that you move back home and Frankie comes in to greet them.

“It isn’t exactly a short flight.” You can acknowledge that, and it’s why your parents don’t visit more often. Your dad isn’t up to that much traveling anymore. “I’m glad we’re able to spend Christmas with you.”

“So are we.” The problem in Frankie’s eyes about his in-laws spending Christmas with you is that they treat the house like a hotel and you like staff for the visit. They don’t Think they should lift a finger for themselves. “Hey, glad you made it.” He gives them a polite smile and nods at your father before holding out his hand to shake it.

“Francisco.” Even after a decade together, your father still refuses to call your husband by his nickname. He shakes Frankie’s hand with unnecessary force, like usual, and grunts with approval. “How’s things?”

“Going well, sir.” Despite the difficulties raising a child, he knows voicing that to your parents would do neither of you any good. “And you?”

“Retirement is boring.” Your father gripes good-naturedly. “Thinking about finding something part tune just to get out of the house and avoid the nagging at home.”

Frankie snorts. “Yeah I could see how that would be a little overwhelming for you.”

"Never stop working, if you can help it." The older man claps Frankie on the shoulder like he's doling out the sagest advice in the world. "She'll be fine with the baby. But the second you're home for more than twenty minutes an extra day? You'll have a Honey Do list longer than your arm."

Frankie doesn’t mind spending time with his daughter and cleaning up around the house that is also his responsibility but he just hums. “That’s some advice.” He makes it sound like he agrees just to keep the peace. You need help with things and his father-in-law’s outlook is a little old fashioned for him.

“You’ll thank me for it,” your father advises, and gives Frankie another friendly-if-condescending pat on the arm before walking away in search of whatever it is he wants but hasn’t asked for yet. Presumably to find his wife, but that’s an assumption.

“Jesus.” Frankie sighs and turns to start taking jackets and bags from you. “I’ll get their bags to their room.” He grins. “Do I get a tip?”

“Does a kiss count?” Just because you’re both exhausted and you haven’t been in the mood for sex doesn’t mean you don’t love your husband or appreciate the things he does to help you.

“The best kind of tip.” He vows, leaning in and stealing a quick kiss before pulling away. You seem to shy away from physical displays when your parents are around. “I’ll be right back.”

“Thank you, honey.” Having him jump on board to help means everything, but you frown a second later. “Where’s the baby? I thought I put her playpen away.”

“She’s with Javier.” He smirks slightly. “Old man apparently still has it with the ladies.”

"Well, that's something, at least." Something that his mother is going to hate – that the baby hid from her and went straight to her abuelo instead. "I'm going to pour drinks for people and get the shrimp cocktail out of the fridge so everybody can focus on food instead of bickering."

“I’ll be there as quickly as I can dump these in their room.” He promises, you having already determined which room your parents are staying in.

But as fast as Frankie can move in spite of his bad back, it isn’t fast enough. By the time you walk into the kitchen you find all four of your collective parents staring at each other like it’s a stand off at the O.K. Corral.

“How about a little appetizer?” You ask, after a few seconds of trying to read the room and finding the stony silence completely impenetrable. The only thing you care about is keeping them reasonably civil and having your little girl back in your arms. “Thanks for hanging on to her, Javier.” You offer him a smile when you take her back.

“Oh that’s no problem at all.” Mira giggles at him and leans in to cuddle against his chest, making him smile proudly. “Nothing I wouldn’t do for this little beauty.”

“You wanna stay with abuelo, sweetheart? You go right ahead.” It leaves your hands free, and you’re grateful to have that for a few more moments. So instead of extracting your baby girl from her grandparent, you kiss her curls and cross to the refrigerator to retrieve the tray of shrimp cocktail you put together this morning. “Can I get anyone a drink? Or a refill?”

“Since we are already starting with the alcohol, I would like some wine.” Your mother eyes the glass of whatever is in Vanessa’s hand and tuts slightly. “White of course, red wines are too heavy for me.”

This is what holidays are. What family gatherings are. What they always are and why you dread them so much. Conversation can never seem to be civil, no one ever offers to help. Frankie is always putting out proverbial fires with all four parents while you work to be the perfect hostess but it’s never even enough to keep the peace. Everyone leaves feeling worse than when they came and yet they still insist on seeing the two of you. It’s enough to make you want to flee the scene, but you would never give your mother-in-law the satisfaction of seeing you run scared. It would only cement her low opinion of you.

So you pour drinks and serve appetizers, plastering the smile on your face and eventually taking Mirabel back from Javier just for utter relief of having your daughter back in your arms. By the time Frankie comes back downstairs, the doorbell rings again. Oh god, is all you can think, because you’re not expecting anyone else. What fresh hell is this?

Frankie frowns slightly, exchanging a confused look with you. “I’ll get it.” He promises, slightly caught off guard and wary by the unexpected arrival of someone else. Not that a fucking drug cartel would ring the doorbell. A firebomb through the window would be more their style.

The impatient chimes ring twice more before Frankie makes it across the house, not because it takes long but because of the insistent person on the other side. If your mother wasn’t already inside you would have guessed it was her without hesitation.

“Coming!” The friendly tone that Frankie adopts does stop him from reaching into the entry way dresser and pulling out the snub nosed .38 he keeps in there for just this occasion. He tucks it into the back of his pants before opening the door to find that it’s not necessary. “Benny!”

“Hey man.” Benny is grinning from ear to ear when he leans in the doorway to embrace his friend, slapping Frankie on the back in the process. “Sorry to drop in, but did you get Pope’s text?”

“Haven’t had time to look at my phone.” He hugs Ben Miller back just as hard as the bastard tries to squeeze him after the back slapping. “Everything okay?” He asks that quietly, since you have company and you don’t know about what happened in South America.

“Yeah.” Benny nods like a bobble head, immediately ready to reassure his friend. His brother. “He’s back. Brought Yovanna with him. He was texting around for a ride and a place to crash.”

“Holy shit, he found her.” He had his private doubts about tracking the lover he had sent to Australia down, but he’s happy for Pope. “And you decided to play Uber.”

Benny grins, wide and unapologetic, before standing aside with a flourish. “Special delivery!”

The shorter man grins but he doesn’t rush to embrace Frankie. A little unsure of how he will be greeted, but Frankie bursts out laughing “Cabron!” He huffs, lunging forward and wrapping his arms around his brother in arms.

“Feo.” Pope returns the hug easily, not caring that he holds his best friend a moment longer these days than he might have before. Shit’s changed, after all. “You remember Yovanna?” He knows that everything about that trip is burned into Frankie’s brain just like the other guys, but it seems the polite way to go about reintroducing them.

She seems nervous, hesitant. He knows that Pope had to have told her what happened to Tom. "Sure." He nods and flashes her a smile before he moves out of the doorway. "Come in. Please."

"Lotta cars here..." Pope observes, though 'a lot' is only two besides the cars that are supposed to be here.

"We'll see you guys tomorrow." Benny waves as he jogs back to his truck. Everybody is with family today and that includes him, because Will is the only member of this damn group that can cook worth a damn somewhere other than a grill.

“Thanks Ben!” He knows that Mira can sleep in the bassinet in your bedroom and he can pull down the Murphy Bed you both had decided to keep in there for those late, rough nights with the baby. “Take your shit up to the bedroom next to mine.” He tells him with a smirk. “I’ll let my mother know you are here.”

"Nessa's here?" Pope brightens measurably as he whisks Yovanna into the house. "Christmas with the fam, man. I'm telling you. This is going to be great."

He snorts as he closes the door. Hopefully this won’t make you feel even more overwhelmed than you already have been.

"Frankie!" You call from the kitchen, and he can hear shuffling chairs and footsteps. "Who is it, honey?"

“Well, uh—”

“Hoooooooney, I’m hooooome.” In typical, dramatic fashion, Pope swoops into the room with a broad grin, although he’s not directing it at you since you might actually hit him for that shit earlier this year. Instead, he aims that charm at Vanessa. “I heard the most beautiful lady this side of the border was here and I had to come.”

"Aye, Santiago mijo!" After a lifetime of being best friends with her only son, Vanessa looked at Santiago Garcia as being the baby boy she never had. She disregards everything else in the room to go and hug him, but for a single moment you're actually grateful for that. It gives you the time you need to catch your breath after your heart stops at the sight of your husband's best friend. The one who supposedly was still in Australia.

“There she is!” Pope shoots you a quick glance and an even quicker wink before he is folding Frankie’s mom into a tight hug. He knows that you and your mother-in-law don’t get along, and hopefully you won’t kick him out on his ass in exchange for distracting her from harassing you.

Immediately, Vanessa is fawning over Santi instead of picking on the fact that you haven’t dressed your baby girl specifically in pink. It’s so much of a relief to see him alive and well in your kitchen that you barely register anything else — and it takes you a second before you register the gorgeous woman standing anxiously in the doorway. Mira tucks her little face against your shoulder at the sight of a stranger, but you just at your daughter’s back and gently step closer. “You must be Yovanna?”

"Sí, I mean, yes." She knows that you and Frankie speak Spanish, but she also knows that she's in the United States, so practicing speaking English is necessary. Her eyes flicker between you and Frankie before she nods. "You must be the wife that is the best thing that ever happened to Francisco." After Pope had found her again, he had started telling her everything that he couldn't before. The flight from Australia filled with stories and names. "You're not Molly, right?" She asks, embarrassed that your name isn't quite coming to her. "That was the rude one's wife."

You tell her your name and disregard the comment about Tom because it’s accurate. You and Redfly never got along but you do try to respect the dead, so you won’t badmouth him now. “We’ll introduce you to Molly tomorrow, if you and Santi are going to be around. We always do a post-holiday thing with the team.”

"I think we are going to find a house?" She admits, shrugging slightly because she doesn't really mind where she is. As long as her brother is safe and she gets to be with Santiago. "That is what he was talking about."

“I’m glad to hear it.” To have him nearby and settled will do wonders for Frankie. He’s missed Pope and missed having his lifelong best friend close at hand. As much as you love each other and as much as you will always work to keep each other supported and happy, there is a part of him that isn’t quite full or right without Pope around. It’s the same way you feel about your own best friend. “Well, um…” Taking a second to grin at your bashful daughter, you turn slightly so the baby can see Yovanna over your shoulder. “This is Mirabel. She’s princess of the palace, and just…welcome. Merry Christmas. Dinner is in the oven and there’s plenty to drink.”

"I am sorry for intruding." She offers, smiling at the baby. "I hope it is not too much?"

“The team is family.” And sometimes family can be exhausting. Sometimes family can be troublesome. But family means doing the work. Which is exactly why you didn’t tell your parents to get stuffed over hosting this Christmas even though you’re exhausted and overwhelmed. “At the holidays, family is always welcome,” you tell her with certainty.

"He did not know how you would accept him." She admits softly, happy that he had been wrong about you being put off by him bringing your husband into the mess he had. "But it is good you have not had any problems since Lorea was killed."

“We haven’t,” you assure her quietly. “It’s the secret that we keep to make sure the boys are safe, and thankfully we have been safe.” For Santi? You can only shake your head and shrug while you bounce Mira in your arms. “I’ve over being upset with him, though it did take a while. Now? I’m just glad you’re both safe. That my husband came home to me. And that he won’t be doing anything like that ever again.”

“I understand.” She agrees. “It was stupid for them, for me. But at least they are home safe now.”

“Our families don’t know anything about it,” you tell her, not admitting for the moment that all you know is the name Lorea and that people had died. Two facts which Frankie had only told you so you could gauge your own safety if you were ever approached by someone who claimed to know him or know about what happened on that mission. You hadn’t asked more and he hadn’t offered, and since you had still been upset with him for going at all, it had never been brought up again.

Yovanna tilts her head in curiosity but she doesn’t comment on it. It’s very obvious that you don’t know the details and she doesn’t think that it’s her place to tell you about it. “Is there anything I can do to help?” She asks. “Since we are showing up unannounced.”

“Get settled and help yourself to a drink or an appetizer,” you offer, motioning to the small table on the other side of the kitchen counter. It’s where you and Frankie usually eat, especially with it being easy for placing Mira’s high chair, but tonight dinner will be served in the formal dining room. Which makes the little kitchen table a perfect apps-and-drinks table. “Welcome.” There will be plenty to talk about. More than plenty. But right now you refocus your attention. It’s time to give Mira a bottle and set her down for a nap, which will hopefully mean that she sleeps through the setting of the table and even the eating of dinner.

Everyone has been chatting, or at least Santiago has been distracting his mother while your father and Javi chat amiably. Your mother is fusing with something, one of the sides you had already prepared. Tasting it and adding something to it. He wants to stop her, but then he will just be told he doesn’t know what he’s doing in the kitchen, so he decides to not fight that battle today.

"I'm going to feed Mira," you tell Frankie as you slip past him in the kitchen. It will be a much-needed moment of relative quiet and you aren't going to pass it up. "I'll just go upstairs so I can feed her and put her down without fussing with a bottle. Is that okay?"

“You do that, babe.” He reaches out and squeezes your shoulder supportively. “I’ll try to keep everyone from killing each other.” It’s a large task, but hopefully he will be able to do it.

"Santi can help." It's not a suggestion that will take much pressing. Your quiet, introspective husband's best friend is a magnet for attention even without trying. "I'll be back down in a little bit. If you need me sooner, I have my phone on me. Just send an SOS text."

"I won't need it." He promises foolishly, unaware that the mothers will start in on him individually just as soon as he walks back into the kitchen.

"Good luck," you hum under your breath, before whisking your daughter off up the stairs.

"Francisco, be a dear and run this upstairs." Your mother's purse, one that she had earlier insisted that she needed to keep on her, now needs to be put in her room. She waggles the bag at him impatiently when he doesn't immediately jump to take it.

"She can do that, can't she?" Vanessa looks around, not even using your name to refer to you, and frowns after a moment. "Where did she go, Frankie? She should be taking care of her guests."

"She's feeding Mira, mama." He explains. "You remember what it's like to have a hungry, tired baby." He frowns slightly at her and takes the purse. "I'll take it upstairs, it's not a problem."

"So she took her away to feed her?" Vanessa clutches the pearls she isn't wearing. "One of us could have easily given her a bottle! She's teaching our granddaughter to hate us right away. Pobrecita Mirabel."

"She's breastfeeding." He huffs out. "Plus, she's putting her to bed."

"We're mothers too." To Frankie's surprise, your own mother chimes in, in support of Vanessa's viewpoint. "We can give a bottle just as easily as anyone else."

The look that your father shoots Frankie is apologetic at best but he says nothing, only drinks from his glass and turns to say something to Santiago, whom he vaguely remembers from your wedding. It's just about the least helpful atmosphere in the world but at least he isn't adding to the fire.

He shakes his head and doesn’t point out the glaringly obvious fact that if you are sticking your boob in his daughter’s mouth, then they couldn’t just as easily fed her, but it’s not worth the argument. Instead he turns around and hustles upstairs to deposit the bag at the foot of their guest bedroom.

It isn't exactly an ideal day. For anyone, it seems. But the only way out is through so he heads right back downstairs again once that is taken care of. When he comes back to the kitchen it's your father at the stove that catches his eye this time, but again Frankie doesn't say anything on that point. There's no use rocking the boat. Not now that his stepfather has most of the room entertained with a work story and no one is complaining at the moment.

"Oh damn." Your mother huffs, waggling the bottle. " We are out of wine." She raises her eyebrows at Frankie. "Will you be a dear and get another?"

"Is there another?" His mother asks, as if it was necessary to make the request any more irritating.

"Of course, mama." The implication that you didn't prepare well for today doesn't sit well with him, and Frankie heads straight out to the garage to get more of the wine that had been specifically bought for today.

You had bought an entire case. The sight of it makes Frankie smirk with pride. "That's my girl." He hums as he grabs another bottle. Hopefully this means that both mothers will get drunk enough that they won't be able to nitpick you.

It's a hope, as in vain as it might be, and when Frankie goes back into the house he finds things much as he left them. He refills both mothers' wine glasses and then ends up fetching the scotch from the den again for the fathers. It's constant back and forth, not able to sit and talk to Pope or to Yovanna, or even remember where he puts his own drink while he makes sure everyone else is settled.

"Goddamn." He mutters to himself. It's almost as if it's coordinated. Like a family who keeps a server running for their table by requesting something new every time they come back.

And it stays that way until the second you come back downstairs, baby monitor in hand, and sniff the air with a growing look of horror and panic on your face. "Shit. Shit!" You race to the oven with tears already stinging your eyes to find smoke and the smell of burning food coming from your finnicky, ill-behaved oven.

“What?” Frankie rushes back from den where he had been sent to dig out the bottle of bitters after Javi offered to make his father-in-law the best old fashioned he had ever drank. The bottle had been pushed to very back of the cabinet where the liquor was locked up and he had been half convinced it had been thrown out. “What’s wrong?”

"This!" When you drop the oven door open, a cartoonish cloud of smoke billows out. The once gorgeous-looking beef Wellington that you took such tender care to assemble is blackened beyong recognition when you pull the pan out and let it drop onto the stove top like a brick.

It's ruined. Completely and entirely. And you can feel your mother-in-law watching you while she picks out her preferred insult.

“Shit.” Frankie knows how much you have been anticipating this dinner. You hadn’t specifically said to look in on the damn thing but he feels guilty. “Babe, I’m so sorry.”

"I don't know how—" With your shoulders hunched and tears making your voice wobble, you pull the other pan out of the oven to find that the potatoes are scorched as well. Half of dinner is completely ruined. "I've made this a dozen times before!" Sure your oven isn't the best, but replacing it is expensive and you have just learned to live with how it cooks. But nothing like this has ever happened before. "How? How did this happen?"

“Well, you had the oven set to low.” Your mother offers and Vanessa nods. “You cannot possibly cook your little beef thing when it is set so low.” Your mother-in-law adds most helpfully. “I noticed it and asked your mother, so we turned it up for you. I’m sure that you are just too overwhelmed with things to have noticed.”

“It was set low on purpose.” You turn again, this time look at the temperature setting on the oven, and feel yourself deflate when the digital read out says 425F. “Our oven runs hot,” you explain to them, so upset that you’re physically shaking while tears stain your cheeks. They push in and they treat you like shit and then they ruin things and yet they’re still acting like you’re the one who is incompetent. “If you had just asked, I would have told you why it was set low. You’ve essentially set my oven to over 500 degrees and burnt half of dinner because you didn’t think i knew what I was doing.”

“How was I supposed to know?” Your mother gives you a bewildered hurt expression and covers her heart like you are attacking her. Frankie moves over to you and sighs softly as he sees the burnt remnants of the meal you had worked so hard on. “Why have you bought a new oven?” She demands. “Your husband is a pilot. He should be taking care of these things.”

“You should have asked, Mom.” But of course she didn’t. Your mother is the queen of that ‘Mother Knows Best’ attitude and has never admired to being wrong in your whole life. “Being a pilot doesn’t make him a millionaire, and we’ve got the baby. Life is expensive right now. We’ve been saving up like reasonable people.”

Vanessa bristles at the implication that there is something lacking in her baby boy but Santiago sees that as well and quickly steps in to distract her. “It’s being taken care of.” He assures your mother but she huffs and shakes her head. Which makes Vanessa snap her head to the side. “Don’t you dare think ill about Francisco.” She hisses. “He works all the time to make sure your daughter stays home. He’s working himself to death.” Frankie rolls his eyes. “Mama. Stop.” He ordered, feeling like this is getting out of hand. “It’s true. You don’t think I know you called Javi to borrow money?” She demands.

"I work from home, Vanessa. I don't sit around on my ass all day doing nothing!" True that you took your maximum maternity leave, but you had damn well needed it. Postpartum healing took its toll and the depression that went with it had hit you hard. And after Frankie had come back with so many secrets? Well, it's not as if your home life is all sunshine and roses right now.

"Then why does—"

"It doesn't matter why, Mom. It's only our business." None of them need to know about what happened with Frankie's license or anything else. It's not as though they have ever offered to help or support you before so you're not about to share your troubles with them now.

“But—”

“ENOUGH!” Frankie nearly bellows the order, making your mother jump and snap her mouth shut, eyes wide in near fear. Your father looks down at his glass guiltily and even his own mother gasps as she presses a hand to her chest. Only Javi looks somewhat amused by the entire thing, a small smirk of approval twisting his lips. “I don’t give a damn that you drove for hours or flew here to see us for Christmas.” He seethes. “This is our house and I am not going to put up with you mistreating my wife.” His eyes narrow as he turns towards his mother and then towards his mother-in-law. “Either one of you. You don’t like it? Leave.” His tone is stony and flat, leaving no room for argument.

Pope and Yovanna are dead silent in the corner, not willing to meddle in family drama when they've only just arrived, and three of the four parents exchange appalled looks.

"We didn't raise you to be so disrespectful." Your mother snaps, standing from her chair with steam practically pouring out of her ears. "Or to be a terrible cook. Go get our things. We're going to a hotel until you come to your senses."

“Go get them your goddamn self.” Frankie snaps back. “And you aren’t welcomed back until you apologize to her.” That’s one set of parents he’s pissed of completely, so he turns to his mom. “Mama? You gonna be nice or is it gonna be more passive aggressive bullshit comments? Because if it is, you can get the fuck out too.”

"I have never made a passive aggressive comment about--" she begins, but Javier actually laughs at her pious pearl clutching.

"Nessa, that's all you've said to your poor daughter-in-law for years." He tells her bluntly. "Come on. I'll get our stuff." Vanessa looks absolutely appalled, but Javier just shrugs. "Prove me wrong," he insists. "Apologize."

Frankie waits, brows raised and he actually hopes for a moment that his mother will apologize. Her mouth opens and she starts talking, making his heart sink.

“She should—”

“Nope.” He cuts her off, a disappointed look on his face. “I should have put my foot down years ago. That’s my fault. Until you apologize to her, and mean it, you aren’t welcomed in our lives.” He tells her, even though it breaks his heart. “You’re my mother and I love you. But this is my wife. The woman I vowed to spend the rest of my life with. The woman I love. You would have never put up with the kind of shit you give her out of Javi’s dad.” He reminds her. “And I’m done having her cry when you leave.” He nods towards the door. “Merry Christmas. Now I’d like you to leave.”

The stone-silent kitchen is a staring contest for long moments while Frankie’s mother realizes that her son is actually giving her an ultimatum. With a dramatic huff, she pushes out of her seat and storms to the door, shouting something about how his sister would never treat her like this. She shouts so loud that the sound of the baby crying bleeds through the baby monitor and cuts down the stairwell, but when you let out your own wretched, exhausted sob, Frankie stops you.

“I’ve got her.” He promises, reaching out and holding onto your shoulders. “I want you to pour yourself a big glass of wine and go upstairs and get into a bath.” He knows how much you love to soak in the tub, but you haven’t had much of a chance to do that since Mirabel was born. “I’ll take care of everything.”

"I have to figure out what the hell to make for dinner," you insist, intermittently glancing back between Pope and Yovanna, and toward the stairs where your baby girl is screaming.

“I’ll handle it.” Frankie implores, lifting his brows. “Trust me, baby. Go upstairs. I’ve got this.”

"I'm so sorry." The entire day has collapsed and it feels like it's your fault. Despite the fact that you were actively sabotaged and abused for the last hour – only an hour! – it still feels like you failed.

“It’s not your fault.” This comes from Javier, sighing softly as he glances at the two of you. Your mother and father are still upstairs, rummaging around after leaving the kitchen quietly in the face of Frankie’s ultimatum. “Don’t be sorry. Let your husband take care of you.” He looks at his step-son. “I’ll read her the riot act.” He promises.

"You're the only one I wish could stay," you admit to your father-in-law with a deflated shrug, but lean into your husband's side for a moment and just breathe Frankie in. "Okay. I'm going to have a wine bath. Whatever else we end up doing for dinner, there's a huge salad in the refrigerator and a tray of Christmas cookies in the pantry."

“Okay.” He kisses the top of your head before he pulls away to grab the monitor. “Big glass of wine.” He reminds you before he looks over at Pope and Yovanna. “You two good?”

"We're good." Pope nods, but he's already out of his chair and moving to wash his hands. Even after being gone for a few years, he still knows this house and these people as well as anything else in the world. "Go take care of your baby girl. We'll be ready to help when you get back."

“Thanks man.” He nods towards Javi and then rushes out of the room. “Daddy’s coming, Mira.” He calls out. “It’s okay.”

"It's...not usually like this." It's the best you can do to reassure Yovanna when you come out of the pantry again with a bottle of your preferred white wine and a large glass. That bottled sangria that Vanessa likes is garbage, no matter what she pretends.

“It is okay.” She promises. “Family can be difficult.” She smiles, knowing how often her brother puts her in hard situations.

"I'll...be back in a little bit." The idea of a glass of wine in a bath is basically unheard of in your life now and it's something you used to do at least once a week. The chance to relax and feel like you get to start the day over again is incredibly welcome.

"Take your time, hermana." Pope insists. "Take the bottle with you, if you want. We've got this."

With Mira, Frankie has her up on his shoulder, rocking her soothingly. “It’s okay. Shhhhhhh shhhhhhh.” He shushes softly, angry at his mother for not caring about waking his daughter up. She hiccups and starts to quiet down, not needing a bottle or a diaper, just some comfort. “It’s gonna be alright.” He promises, to both her and himself.

He can hear you in the hallway, light steps on the way to the master bathroom so that you don’t make more noise and disturb Mirabel any more than she already is.

It doesn’t take long for her to fall back asleep, although he spends precious minutes carefully laying her back down and making sure she stays asleep. Smiling softly when she shoves her thumb in her mouth as she sleeps. He creeps out of the room and back downstairs as he hears the water start to run from the master en-suite.

“Okay.” Pope is standing in the kitchen with a tied off trash bag sitting near the garage door and the two pans formerly full of burned food now scraped out and refilled with steaming, soapy water. “What’s the plan?” He asks, nodding to Yovanna beside him. “What can we do to help?”

“I’ve got some steaks in the freezer.” It’ll only take twenty minutes to thaw them. “If you want to go fire up the grill, I’ll pull them out.”

"Heard that." Thankfully the stunning Florida weather guarantees a warm Christmas with perfect grilling weather, and Pope heads outside immediately. He can have that grilled fired up and ready in no time.

"I can help, too." Yovanna insists. She would feel awful to not help out under any circumstances, but especially now. "Anything, Francisco. I'm happy to."

“There’s salad, but I know there’s also a carton of mushrooms.” Frankie explains. “Will you slice them and an onion to sauté?” He asks. “She loves onions and mushrooms on her steak.”

"Absolutely." A relatively small task that will make all the difference to someone who is having a hard day? She is more than happy to do what he asks. The three of them set to work immediately and within half an hour the smell of burnt pastry and potatoes is replaced with grill smoke and sauteed aromatics.

You come downstairs in clean, comfortable clothes with a glass of wine in your system, smelling like a bath bomb and looking like you're just starting a brand new day. When Yovanna is in the kitchen with a sautee pan instead of Frankie or Pope, you have to sit with your embarrassment for a moment.

"I'm sorry for...before. That wasn't the first impression that I wanted to make."

“The men are outside.” She tells you with a smile. “The salad looks gorgeous but Francisco said you like onions and mushrooms on your steak.” She explains. “And do not worry. I am just happy that you look more relaxed now.”

"Much." You huff out a laugh, feeling sheepish about the whole thing. "Families at the holidays..."

"Are always pretending to get along?" She laughs. "It is the same everywhere."

"Well...thank you, again." If you knew her better you might go so far as to give her the giant hug of gratitude that you would like to, but that will keep for later in the day. For now the two of you exchange knowing smiles about how ridiculous families can be and you go out the sliding door to the patio where Frankie and Santi are standing at the grill inspecting the image of your sleeping daughter on the baby monitor.

“I’m telling you man, she’s gonna be a problem when she gets older.” Pope huffs. “We need to start scaring away the boys now.”

"What if she grows up to like girls?" Of course they're already in protective mode. That doesn't surprise you in the least. "Or maybe she won't want romance at all. Anything is possible."

“Yeah but the boys can get her pregnant.” He points out, lifting a brow at Frankie’s immediate frown. “Well that’s not happening since she’s going to stay a virgin.” The overly protective father scoffs.

"She's going to be educated on her body and consent, and she's going to have the unwavering support of her parents," you correct them both. But there is still a soft smile on your face when you tuck yourself under Frankie's arm. "And if all else fails, she has Uncle Pope, Uncle Ironhead, and Uncle Benny to scare off anyone who doesn't respect her."

“What about me?” Frankie huffs as he settles his arm at your waist and hauls you closer. You look relaxed, and he’s glad. “How are you feeling, baby?” He asks.

"A little better. Pretty stupid, but better." When you lean into his chest he presses a kiss to your hair and you sigh. "Think our mothers are ever actually going to apologize?"

“If they don’t, we will have peace.” His eyes slip closed and he smiles slightly. “The dream.” He jokes before he opens his eye and looks at you seriously. “They will eventually. When they realize we are serious.”

"No contact with all of our parents except Javier." Another huffed laugh from you ends in a sigh. "Merry Christmas, I guess. Is it bad that I feel relieved?"

“We are having Christmas ribeye’s, with that salad you made, you can have your onions and mushrooms, and I know you have those rolls in there.” He grins. “Washed down with your wine and Christmas cookies.”

"Well...Mira is having a bottle the rest of the day anyway. No reason not to enjoy." With your arms around his waist, you tug Frankie tighter and practically shudder with that sigh of relief that rocks out of you. "Thank you, baby. I know neither of us ever wanted it to come to that with our parents, but thank you for stepping in. And for taking care of things afterward."

“Of course.” He knows that your trust and faith in him has been shaken by the drug charges and then disappearing to South America, but he wants to rebuild it. “Anytime, baby. I love you.”

“I love you too.” That, thankfully, was never in doubt.

******

A year passes with so much incident that it is a task of its own to decide where to start when someone asks you 'what's been going on?'. Planning the next Christmas is easier simply because of logistics. Hosting doesn't feel daunting when the people who are coming to the house are supportive, helpful, and kind.

Dinner is a potluck this year, with all the boys from Frankie's unit bringing their partners. Even Benny has a girlfriend – one who promises she's capable of bringing more to a potluck than jarred salsa and bagged chips – and Frankie is once again going to grill ribeyes. New traditions are falling into place, but the fact is that you're actually looking forward to things this year instead of dreading them.

“Babe.” Frankie ducks into the kitchen to admire the new oven that he had delivered six months ago. “Do you want to do that mashed potato casserole you were talking about or do you want to do baked potatoes this year?”

"Why don't we do baked potatoes and we can put out a bar of toppings and stuff? I can throw some bacon in a pan and chop some scallions." Things are better. You're talking more. You're listening to each other and asking questions instead of assuming. Frankie even comes home early from work once every other week to look after Mira while you have therapy. It's helped your postpartum depression immensely.

“That sounds good.” He agrees, grinning at you. “Pope and Yovanna are going to bring the salad this time. She loves that dressing recipe you gave her.”

"It's a good one." Yovanna has fast become a close friend, joining the sisterhood you have with Teresa, and now with Benny's girlfriend Roseanne. "Everybody should be here pretty soon. I figured there was no use in pretending this is formal. We're all perfectly happy to sit around together and hang out."

“Have you heard anything?” He asks softly, aware that you might have some feelings about everything that went down last year.

"Only from Javier." Frankie's stepfather was the only one who had been in contact, and even that was respectfully sparse. "I've sent him some photos of Mira and he texted this morning to say Merry Christmas and that he hoped the package he sent got here in time."

Even though you have been remarkable about the silence, Frankie steps closer and folds you into his arms for a reassuring hug. “It’ll all work out, baby.” He promises. “I just love seeing you excited for Christmas.”

“It’s easier to be excited when I’m not dreading the arguments and insults.” You lean into him a little tighter and sigh. It’s shit that things had to blow up the way they did last year, but things are better now. You’re both happier. The boys are all back together and Pope had proposed to Yovanna at Thanksgiving. Will and Teresa are ecstatic about expecting their first kid together. Things are good. “I love you, baby. So much.”

“I love you too.” He murmurs softly, kissing your forehead. He had told you everything that had happened and while you were unhappy about it, you hadn’t held it against him. That’s the best gift he could have ever asked for. “Merry Christmas, baby.”

------ Master Tags: @pixiedurango @chattychell @winter-fox-queen @lady-himbo @artsymaddie @princess76179 @paintballkid711 @missminkylove @pedrosbrat @ew-erin @sarahjkl82-blog @sharkbait77 @justanotherblonde23 @lv7867 @recklesswit @mylittlesenaar @f0rever15elf @gallowsjoker @steeevienicks @athalien @sherala007 @skvatnavle @thatpinkshirt @jaime1110 @girlimjusttryingtoreadfanfics @goodgriefitsawildworld @greeneyedblondie44 @littlemousedroid @harriedandharassed @churchill356 @ajathegreats-blog @haylzcyon   @beardsanddetectives @kirsteng42 @ladykatakuri @adancedivasmom @madiebear @tanzthompson @emilianamason @bigsdinger @xocalliexo @pedr0swh0r3 @avaleineandafryingpan @charlyrmv @avidreader73 @iceclaw101 @loveslide @elegantduckturtle @becsworld @julesonrecord @its-nebuleuse @itsrubberbisquit @mikeyswifie @guelyury @lizzie-cakes @for-a-longlongtime @vabeachazn @purplerain04 @weho2kcmo @madnessofadaydreamer

[brucewaynehater101]

The number of times I've seen people argue that Bruce is a decent father and that he is not abusive absolutely blows my absolute mind.

Yes, you can hc whatever version of Bruce you want. You can even blame it all on bad writers or reject canon. You can claim comic!Bruce isn't your Bruce and main a different version of him. Those are all valid.

However, you can NOT say that he has ever been justified for hitting his kids. There is no excuse for him willingly laying his hands on his kids. It doesn't matter if the person is drunk, drowning in grief, lost in emotions, whatever. Hitting kids is not okay.

Continually, the physical abuse is a very obvious sign of Bruce being a shit dad in the comics. On top of that, there is so much emotional abuse and manipulation as well. He's shitty as fuck to his kids and there's no reason this is okay. He may love those kids, but that doesn't excuse his behaviors.

Anyways, reject canon Bruce all you want. There's certain aspects of other characters I reject, and DC stands for Disregard Canon. Feel free to have whatever version of Bruce you desire.

What is NOT okay is excusing or accepting canon Bruce's actions/behaviors as acceptable.

[compressingsins]

|| At My Worse

Bakugo x chubby f!reader

Warnings : Established relationship, past bullying, body worship, loving Bakugo (a bit OOC but it’s just to fit the story), reader and Bakugo are virgins, future au both are adults, nsfw, creampie, car sex; Minors do not interact, please.

Hiiii! So I’ve been seeing way too many TikTok’s of Bakugo’s death and even though he’s not dead! I’m getting tired of seeing them, so I decided to write just a cute little story for our angry baby. Hope you guys enjoy! 🫶🏾

Please do not copy or rewrite my works without my permission. 🫥

"You're such a pig! Stop picking up food off the ground and stuffing it in your mouth, that's nasty!"

You sat in the sandbox with your head down, your eyes trained on the ground as you tried to zone out the mean comments. But it wasn't easy, being only five years old and getting bullied by other kids brung tears to your eyes. It wasn't fully processed in your mind as to why you're always getting bullied. Daily, you get picked on about your weight and your parents never happen to see it. And as a kid, you don't understand why your small body was much bigger than other kids. Though, it never became an real issue to you until you started coming to the public playground and park to just play.

Three kids, like you, stood around your tear stained frame and locked you in to pick on you. They kicked sand at your back, and sometimes they took your toys. But what made your tears stream more was when they all decided to knock down your sandcastle that you've been working on for so long.

"This isn't even a sandcastle! It's more like a pin full of pigs, where you belong!"

"Yeah, I bet you're the queen of all pigs!"

You couldn't understand why kids were so mean and they're just as young as you. It's always bright and sunny but they've always made it dark and gloomy, somehow. There's things other kids tell you that a child shouldn't know and when you tell your parents, they just automatically think that you're overreacting. You're a child, there's no way you can make up some of the things you tell them. But they just always shut you down with some stupid excuse that you're sick of hearing. You just wish that you had at least one friend who cared because before all the bullying, you didn't really even care for having friends.

Now, you just need someone to help you and have your back. Because not even your parents have that, they believe what they want while you sit there and get bullied. You can't really understand anything, as only a mere child, and with other kids telling you that you belong in an orphanage or that you were adopted, it's painful. Funny thing is, you actually know what all that heartbreaking stuff means. Even as a child. But your sobbing was only to their amusement.

"Gosh, you're such a crybaby! Do you want some food to calm yourself?!"

Your child mind didn't know how else to react, only to cry at the utterly mean comments of these other kids. You know personally that you don't deserve any of this, not as an innocent child who just wants to see the world and enjoy it as much as she can. That's just something you couldn't do. Because apparently, there are other people in this world who'd rather see your misery than your happiness.

"Hey!"

A loud voice shouted in the distance in front of you three, your eyes slowly looking up along with the other kids. There was another kid who was running towards you, with spiky ashy blonde hair and fuming red eyes. You weren't afraid but you were thinking that he was just coming to pick on you too, which brought a nervous throb to your heart. He didn't seem nice. Not even in the slightest...

"What do you want?" One of the kids questioned while holding your toy in her hand.

"Leave her alone, idiots! She didn't do anything to you!"

What? This kid was... defending you? Your gaze averted back to his face and softened from how defensive he became. It's like he was trying to protect you and you felt a sense of relief and happiness flow through you.

"What's it to you? She doesn't even have any friends defending her, so why do you care?"

"Because I'm gonna be just like All-Might, someday! Which means..." He stated before reaching out and grabbing your arm to pull you out of the middle of the kids, "...it's my duty to protect everyone who's helpless agaisnt a villain! Do you wanna fight, come on!" The blonde haired kid was the first person to ever defend you, and it made you feel so... respected now that you had that. This kid doesn't even know you and that warmed everything. You no longer felt like you were alone with him grasping onto your arm and protecting you.

Even with his slightly light voice, the kids didn't seem like they wanted anything to do with you anymore. "Whatever, she doesn't have any friends anyway so screw you losers!" One little girl said as her friends followed behind her, with you and the blonde haired kid watching them. His hold on your arm had ceased to be released as you grasped at his hand but he wasn't paying attention, "Well, she has a friend now and that's me!" And his words stopped your actions on trying to release the tight hold he had on your arm, no one had ever referred to you as their friend.

He growled as they got more and more into the distance, but turned to you once they were completely gone. He still had a hold on your arm, keeping you close to him so you couldn't go anywhere but his hold was a little too tight.

"You're holding my arm too tight!"

He frantically let your arm go before apologizing, "Oh, my bad!"

You rubbed the spot on your arm that he was holding before looking back at his face, that was smiling at you which made you softly smile.

"Those kids didn't hurt you, did they?"

"No. Just took my toys and... destroyed my sandcastle."

His eyes were sealed on your face as he gasped from hearing your story. Your eyes landed on the ground in front of you, a glimpse of his feet in your sight.

"Your sandcastle, that's so cool! We can share my toys and build another sandcastle, if you want to. But I only have hero toys, oh, maybe we can make a hero sandcastle!" You didn't know what to say or do but you wanted to. You really wanted to build a new sandcastle with him, even if you just met him. A nod and a smile was sent from you to him before you replied.

"Well, yeah! I'd love to build a new sandcastle with you!" You both ran away to another clear spot where no one was as you both sat on your bottoms in front of each other to build the sandcastle, "I'm ____. What's your name?"

The little boy looked at you before smiling and replying with closed eyes, "I'm Katsuki Bakugo! And someday, I'll become the hero that'll always keep you safe!" A twinkle was in your eyes, staring at the boy's face that you never want to forget.

Katsuki Bakugo... your hero.

…

…

…

"Why don't you smile during your interviews on tv, Bakugo?" You questioned your bestfriend as you walked down a dirt road with him as the sun was setting, "You need to stop being so stubborn and actually try to look like a hero. It doesn't hurt to smile, you know." You sighed and continued talking. Bakugo usually took days off just to hang with you and relax, or so he calls it. You've never complained about him always wanting to hang with you and take the day off, just because you enjoy his company. The both of you have been friends ever since you were five and now you're in your twenties.

You have other friends, but they're not as special as the grumpy Bakugo. And you've never really understood why he became so grumpy because as a child, he was so sweet and always smiling. But now if you want him to smile, it's basically like you have a better chance at winning the lottery than doing that. But none of that mattered, he's still special to you in each and every way. "I'll smile, when I get the reason to." His response was short like always, so you didn't really mind it at all.

"Geez, Bakugo! How come you just became so damn grumpy, once we hit middle school? What happened?" He didn't answer you as you both continued walking down this trail. The only sound was the birds chirping and the wind blowing through the leaves in the trees, but the silence was expected to you. Everytime you asked this question, he always got silent for a while, for some reason. You don't know why.

Even if he's your bestfriend, there's things that he doesn't tell you. But you don't mind it because obviously, as a person, there's things that'll be kept private. You know there's private things that you keep secret and don't tell anyone, not even Bakugo. It was just some things you were uncomfortable with. But your trail journeying this dirt road was nearly over, considering you were on your way to your apartment that was on this road. It's a country apartment complex and you decided to live in it because you didn't want to be in the big dangerous city. Not that there aren't heroes there, you just enjoy the country.

Your apartment building was right there which you pointed out, "I'm home... finally!" You quietly cheered, since you both have been walking a long time. The male alongside you grumbled as he continued trailing beside you with his hands in his pockets, his eyes sealed on your building with slight distaste. He didn't like you living all the way out here because he confessed that he couldn't protect you. It was a real shock but you tease him about that all the time.

But you appreciated the fact that he always walked you home, no matter how far it is from where he lives. Though, you always let the male know that you were okay and could protect yourself out here, if something was to happen. Even if it did, you live in an apartment with others so you had back up.

"Thanks again, Bakugo. You're always welcome to stay and rest up, so you can head out tomorrow, you know."

"Duh, I know that. I don't wanna freeload off of you, for a day."

"A half of day, idiot. Practically a quarter and you won't be freeloading, especially since I want your company! Come on, Bakugo, you never wanna spend the night at my apartment."

"I have legs, I can fucking walk all the way back home..." He grumbled which made your eyes roll in slight irritation and annoyance, "...besides, I'm a hero and usually use my walk home as a time to make sure everyone's safe."

That actually wasn't a stupid idea and you know he can keep anyone safe. When you were younger, you didn't know Bakugo would become this strong and a real Pro Hero. The only problem that you personally have is that he does things more differently than normal heroes. Like, cursing out a civilian to move to a safe area. You guess it works but it's still unacceptable, when it comes to saving someone's life. He is the great Katsuki Bakugo everyone knew from UA High school, so you knew there are some people who knows how he acts. Maybe it was okay when civilians rather investigate situations than run, so that's one reason he could do that.

But still, he can just use a stronger and more disciplined tone to get them to move, not make them be afraid of him since he is a hero. But you said nothing else as you were now walking up the staircase to your apartment, which always nerved you when you're with Bakugo because for some reason, he always walked extremely close behind you. You've never brought it up just because you figure it's just another sense of security, from the male.

He waited patiently for you to pull out your keys and unlock the door, along with you walking in your apartment like a guard dog. You were so thankful of how protective he is over you, even if he is always so damn grumpy. You've accepted that grumpy side of him so long ago, just because he accepted you for you back then. Your hand slipped into the jacket pocket you were wearing, jingling it first to make sure your keys were in it which they were. You pulled them out and found the right key before inserting it into the door of your apartment, turning it in silence as you could only hear the soft breathing from Bakugo. He always waited until you locked the door.

You pulled your key out before stepping inside and turning to face Bakugo who was still standing there with his usual angered expression. He never ask for them, but you felt it was appropriate to give him a goodbye hug that he always slowly accepted. Sometimes, he'd hug you longer than what felt necessary but you never mind it.

"Thanks again, Bakugo. Make sure you—"

"I know that. You better make sure your damn door is locked and—“

"My alarm is on, if someone tries to break in. Gosh, I know! Stop worrying so much about me, it really doesn't suit your character."

He only clicked his tongue before letting you go and you did the same, before taking a step back to reenter your apartment. His hands were back in his pockets as he stared you down from the other side of your door. You honestly hate when he has to leave, just because he's the main important person you've had in your life. But you knew he didn't want you to waste time, as he says, and hold your door open so people wouldn't know you're home. He's so protective over you that somebody would possibly mistake him for your dad, just by his security around you. You adorn his security and welcome it because you don't have a quirk to defend yourself.

He even accepted that you're quirkless, and that's another thing you loved so much about him. No one really said anything about you being quirkless, it just made you feel alone along sometimes. However, the friends you've gained at UA high was more than you could handle. None of them judged you for anything, you even had two perverts complimenting you. It was just class 1-B that always said something to you. But their mean words were shut down, when Bakugo decided to nearly commit murder. But not just him, if he wasn't around, your entire class did their absolute best to protect you and did a damn good job at it. Yeah, you got bullied in school but you miss the experience you got to share with your friends.

"By the way, Bakugo, I've been meaning to ask you are you free Saturday night? There's a new cafe I wanted to try out!"

His eyes just stared into yours, a glare being sent from him that was making you think he didn't want to. You frantically waved your hands in your face, trying to just brush off what you just asked.

"Uh... you don't have to, Bakugo! I just wanted-"

"I'll be there, dumbass. You're not taking no one else but me but if you're not there by five, then I won't be there."

He turned his back before you could reply but you heard him loud and clear, "I'll be there!" You shouted, watching him walk away until he turned a corner to proceed down the stairs. It didn't take him long to leave your view, which you decided to close the door behind you.

...

...

...

Bakugo just felt as if you just asked him on a date. You've asked him to places before but he felt as if asking him to a cafe was a date. If he was being honest with himself, he has been wanting to go on an official date with you before. But his attitude and pride was getting in the way of that confession. He felt as if he'd be seen as soft for confessing something like that. The thought alone brought a bright tint of pink to his cheeks, his hand covering the embarrassment.

Now all that was in his head was you, and what he wanted with you. He couldn't stand how he was, when it came to you. He's a hero but he wants to be the only hero for you, in each and every way. But he has never confessed to a girl before, so if he was to be rejected by you he didn't know what he'd do. That thought was bringing a headache to him, which was irritating in a way. His fingers pinched the bridge of his nose, a sigh escaping him to pacify that irritation.

"Ngh-! Fucking stupid..."

...

...

...

"Where is he? He told me to be here before five and he's not even here!" You whisper shouted to yourself and swirled your spoon in the cup of coffee a servant gave you. You poured sugar in the cup and watched the substance dance around in the liquid, grazing the sides of the cup and sticking to it occasionally. It was ten minutes after five, which meant he was late even if you knew you could wait. But still, he wanted you to be on time when he's not even here on time.

The cafe was nice, though, quiet and not with many people. It was just the kind of place you could relax and not worry about anything. Besides that fact, all the servants that came over to you were nice. None of them said a thing, only delivering a smile to you that made you comfortable. But your concentration broke once a voice sounded out and entered your ears. "I'm right here, dumbass..." The voice said, obviously being your bestfriend who still looked angry once you turned to him, "...so you can stop stirring that damn coffee like an idiot."

You never cared about how disrespectful he was, just jumping up to hug him as he shamelessly returned the hold. But he didn't want to hold it longer than thirty seconds, though you didn't complain. He took his seat and you did the same and sat across from him, staring blankly at him. He wasn't annoyed, more like irritated already with being around others. Bakugo knew how people were, even if you were never expecting it, he was expecting everything that assholes had to say. His eyes were already scanning the room, trying to see if anyone looked like the asshole type.

Quite frankly, everyone was attending their own thing and staring at whoever was across from them and talking. He felt a sense of relief wash over him. He didn't have to murder someone today. He never wanted to admit it most of the time, but he always loved hanging with you and only you.

"Why the hell did you want to come to this place? Doesn't seem like anything special to me."

"Stop being so grumpy, can't I hang with my bestfriend?"

He groaned in annoyance but you were right, he didn't mind hanging with you. However, clapping came from behind you and Bakugo along with hysterical laughing. The laughing sounded like it was getting closer to the both of you, which made you both turn around to the source. You couldn't help but think how familiar that laugh sounded. Like all life from your body just escaped, as you turned your head to be met with the main person who picked on you in high school. Monoma, who instantly made you turn away, even though he clearly saw you.

"Ah, your bestfriend? Who would wanna be bestfriends with this loser? I'm guessing you're still a loser too, ____, so you're perfect for each other!"

"What the hell do you want, you damn extra?"

You could hear Bakugo growling practically, eyeing Monoma down as if he wanted to murder him. He, however, knows how much he hates beating up people in front of you. But, you knew Monoma only came over for trouble and to pick on you, as if you're not full grown adults, now.

"I can't come over and greet the two losers I've known from high school!?"

"You're fucking with us because..?"

"Because of you, ____!" Monoma called you out with a point which made you turn to him with wide eyes, "I missed the days when I could roast your ass, without your stupid boyfriend coming to your rescue!"

You knew he was referring to Bakugo, but you could see how Bakugo was holding himself back from killing this asshole. This isn't how you wanted your hangout session with Bakugo to go, not knowing that Monoma was coming. If you were being honest with yourself, you didn't even know that he was in town. You knew he was a hero as well, but you didn't know if he was a pro since you've only seen him a few times on tv. Not like you're friends or anything, so you didn't really care about his appearances on tv. But you didn't want to deal with this, so you grabbed Bakugo by his wrist.

"Uh, this isn't necessary can we leave now, Bakugo? We can just continue this at my—"

"Still the same ole ____, huh?" Monoma interrupted, which made Bakugo tear his wrist out of your grasp.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Oh, you know what I'm talking about! The same weak ass ____ that always hid behind everyone in her class! Your quirkless ass shouldn't have even attended UA high!"

Hearing those words only replayed your bad experiences in high school, overpowering the good experiences that you only wanted to remember. You know you're quirkless and that's why you hated hearing someone just speak it like it wasn't obvious to you, already. "And why the fuck is that a reason for her not to have attended UA high? You don't need a damn quirk to be a hero. Your weak ass shouldn't even be a pro."

The blonde haired male only laughed, basically brushing off Bakugo's insult that should hurt any hero. You just took a hold of Bakugo's wrist again and tugged on it, trying to get him to just come with you and leave. This wasn't worth your time and you didn't want to deal with Monoma, anymore. "At least I have a quirk that can save someone! And what the hell can she do, hm?! Run away and cry what a loser!" He had a point but you know that you weren't really interested in being a hero, when you found out you wouldn't develop a quirk or ever have one. It was a bummer for a while but with Monoma constantly bringing up, it's bringing up all those terrible feelings you've had knowing you wouldn't get a quirk.

"You better shut your fucking mouth before I shut it for you..." You knew he would defend you but seeing the death glare he sent to Monoma warmed your heart. However, you didn't want this to go farther than it has to.

"Oh yeah, what're you gonna do?! Attacking another hero will get your ass suspended from being a pro yourself, so you can't do anything! This is hilarious, you're such a klutz!"

He was such an asshole it hurt. You didn't understand why he was so damn unnecessarily rude, especially when you've done absolutley nothing to him.

"Bakugo, can we please just leave! This isn't worth it, please stop getting mad—!"

"You've always had a knack for running away, ____! Hm, I always wondered where you'd go. Maybe someplace where a buffet is being served!"

"Shut your damn mouth, you fucking extra! I don't mind getting suspended from being a damn hero, if that means assholes like you won't bother anyone again! Just because you have a quirk doesn't make your scrawny ass a hero! If you can't shut your damn mouth and protect the weak, then you're just as bad as the villains!"

"Bakugo..."

He was practically fuming, but the fact that he was standing up for you brought such warmth to your heart. He has stood up for you before but this for some reason took the cake. Your hands tugged on his wrist as you pulled him away from the laughing male, that only continued to talk while Bakugo growled at him but followed behind you.

"Yeah, you should probably leave, you know! In case you don't wanna worsen your already bad reputation as a person. You know—where you're such an asshole to everyone!"

That would've been the last straw for Bakugo, if you didn't stop him and wrapped your arms around his strong arm.

"Come on, Bakugo, he's not worth you losing your position as a hero! Don't let him anger you, okay?! Please, for me!"

That stopped all his yelling, his body physically losing all tension as he let you drag him away from the male and outside the cafe. However, once you were outside and away from the cafe, Bakugo snatched his arm out of your grasp. You should've saw that coming but you followed after him. He was so upset and storming down the sidewalk, looking like he wasn't going anywhere in particular. His taller form caused him to take bigger and longer strides away from you, making you have to jog and run after him and shout his name before he just ran off somewhere without trace.

"Bakugo, wait—please!" You called out, which made him stop and turn to you with a glare, his body still as tense as it was when you two were in the cafe arguing with Monoma.

"Aren't you tired of shitheads pushing you around?!"

"Yeah... but I can't do anything about it."

He continued to approach you until you eventually hit your back agaisnt something, making the blonde male pin you agaisnt the object with his body extremely close to yours. Like really close, his body flushed agaisnt yours and his eyes beaming holes into your skull. "You can. You just let those fuckers take away your confidence to make you think you have to bow down to their asses. Geez, you need to know you have friends." You knew that, but it just didn't seem like it anymore, since everyone was doing their own thing as pro hero's. You couldn't really rely on anyone like that, only Bakugo who always tried to be there for you. But being a hero, you know that he doesn't really have time to always relax and kickback with you.

"Yeah, but nobody's there for me at my worse..."

"You really are a dumbass aren't you? I haven't stuck around and kicked your bullies asses for nothing, ____!" It sounded like... he was pouring his heart out to you, but you couldn't tell since he's always angry. So maybe he was just making it clear that he wouldn't allow anyone to mess with you.

"Wha—what are you saying..?"

He couldn't help the pink that dusted his cheeks as he looked down at your face that looked concerned. But he knew he couldn't hold back anymore, it's been so long and he has been holding this in for years. "I'm fucking in love with you, dumbass! Why can't you just see that, damnit?!" He pushed himself off your body as his shocking words reached your ears, your eyes widening from the unexpected confession. Bakugo... is in love with you? You wouldn't have never expected him to be in love with you, him of all people. Just because you didn't think you were his type and that he preferred being only your friend.

"Wha—why didn't you ever tell me, Bakugo?"

"How the hell could I?" He questioned you with his back turned, "I mean... in middle school, you were with some idiot that didn't deserve you. I got so damn mad at you, just because it felt like you fucking neglected me. Like you were stringing me along. I hated you for some time damnit!"

"Is... that why you stopped smiling?"

"That and some other stuff. The only reason I stuck around after you got a boyfriend was because I've never been in love before. But I valued your happiness more than my wants and just stayed your fucking friend." It was silent after he said that because honestly, you didn't know how to feel. You were in love... but not with the guy you dated in middle school. You were a child but you still felt things. Though, you only dated him for one reason.

"Bakugo, please look at me..." You could hear the growl emitting from him before he turned to you, "...I only dated him to fill the empty void that someone else didn't seem interested in filling. I've been in love with you too Katsuki Bakugo, ever since you helped me on that playground when we were kids. But I've never told you because I didn't think you were into me!" His head jerked back at your confession as a gasp escaped his lips, but his shock only made you continue pouring out everything you felt about him.

"Yeah, you became an asshole but still... I'm fucking in love with you, Katsuki! I've never been in love with anyone as much as I am with you. You're practically the only one that cares about my existence, and that's why I'm in love with you! You see past my looks and forget about societies standards! Not once have you commented negatively about my weight, and I love you so much for that! I don't wanna see you with anyone else... I need you. So damn much, it hurts..."

Your voice quieted as you neared the end of your words, but he heard you and couldn't stop his actions of crashing his lips agaisnt yours. Your eyes were wide, taking in the soft texture of his lips that instantly brought a warmth to your entire body. You didn't think you could be even more in love with Bakugo than you already are...

...

It came as a surprise as you found yourself in the backseat of your car, your back agaisnt the seat with Bakugo pressed firmly between your thighs. His lips were attacking any part of your flesh he could see, the sensation sending toe shaking chills throughout your body. Your nails dug into his jacket on his shoulders, slightly pushing it down which made the male help you rip it off his body. He was left in a orange loose t-shirt that you took a hold of, once he exposed the vibrant color to your eyes. But he wasn't hesitant in finishing his meal, sinking his teeth back into your collarbone he showcased for his teeth to nibble on. His tongue grazed some of your skin before pulling it in between his top lip and tongue, before letting his teeth take over and deeply mark that spot.

Your body has never experienced this feeling before, a tickling sensation that sparked a flame in your body that your brain couldn't compensate. The only form of communication that you transferred was your nails digging into his shoulders, driving into his shirt that only encouraged his actions. The man above you wanted to devour you whole in which he was. You needed to stop though, because it was overbearing at the moment. Your hands tapped his shoulders, since your mouth couldn't produce the words to get him to stop. He made sure to suckle hard on the spot of your throat that he was attacking, before coming to a stop and pulling off your throat with a pop. He sat up and looked in your eyes with slight irritation.

"What's the problem?"

"Bakugo, are we really about to do this?"

"Why not? We feel the same way about each other, don't we?" He questioned with a sign of annoyance laced in his voice.

"Yeah, but I haven't... you know."

He knew what you were getting at, but that didn't phase him at all. He's in your exact same boat, that's why he wasn't really feeling anything after you said that to him.

"I haven't done it before, neither, so what's the damn problem?"

"You... haven't?"

"No! How could I when my heart has been stuck on you all my damn life! I honestly don't even find anyone else that attractive..." He turned away from your face as he said that, kind of like he was embarrassed which you found cute and leaned up to place a kiss on his cheek. He jolted out of surprise, his eyes wide as he stared down at your giggling form with the apples of his cheeks tinting red.

"You're so cute, Bakugo, I can't really handle it."

"I'm not tryna be cute!" He shouted which only made him even cuter, "And stop calling me Bakugo, damnit! Call me by my first name!" You only continued laughing at the male above you, which made him soften again and stare at your beautiful form underneath him. He couldn't deny how much he was waiting for this, his face even softening and losing the usual angered expression it held.

"Well, Katsuki, thank you for being real with me. I love you..." You couldn't believe how bold you were being but you couldn't help it, you've loved him for years. And personally, his heart couldn't handle how you showcased your affection for him. No one has ever showed him this kind of affection before, and it's practically magical as he's seeing it from you. He never wanted to be with anyone else but you, so that's why his soft side that is extremely rare is coming out.

"..."

His words were mumbled so softly that you didn't even register what he said. Your hands grasped his face to make him lock eyes with you, but he did everything to to avoid your gaze.

"What did you say?"

"I said I love you, ____!" He yelled but it was still heartwarming to hear from him. "Stop tryna make me be a whimp, you know I fucking love you. Now let me love you and show you that I'm not shitting you."

You could already see how serious he was, but you wanted him to make love to you too. Even if you haven't done this before, knowing he hasn't done it neither made this all the more special. No matter that it's happening in the backseat of your car. You were nervous but you were ready, no matter if you're not experienced, he's not neither and that's all the more reason for you to be ready. You've both loved each other for years, so just getting him to finally return that love made some nervousness fly away.

"Then, let's not waste anymore time, Katsuki~."

He was surprised by your words, but his shit eating smirk returned as he didn't even bother taking off his shirt, and pulled it apart from his body. Your eyes widen from slight surprise, seeing how forceful and ready he was. As his toned body came into your view, his muscles flexed and tensed from the cold air that ghosted his skin. Bakugo was even more fit than you thought, his arms containing thick veins that made his body even more attractive. It just made him look stronger than he is. You didn't even know the sight of his veins would be a weakness for you.

"I didn't realize you'd be this needy for me, but I don't hate that."

His words were followed by him sitting on the other end of your carseat, his back against part of the door and seat while he sat back. You were confused as you sat your body up and looked at him, confusion spreading across your face from his actions. It's like he could read your mind and answered your question.

"I wanted to take my time with you but you seem like you really want me to fuck you. So, come on and take what you want~."

That embarrassed you and halted your body also of wanting him so badly. You did want him but when he put it like that, you couldn't stop how embarrassed you were.

"It's embarrassing when you put it like that, Katsuki!"

He chuckled and eyed you from his corner, his gaze only heightening your embarrassment. "Just strip, ____." He could see how you visibly tensed up from that, and he already knew what that was about. He smacked his teeth before continuing to talk, "Stop letting your past thoughts get in the way. There's nothing wrong with your body, I fucking love it. Don't even ask how I've already seen you naked, before.” You really wanted to know the answer to that. But it wasn't as important as this moment. You were just slowly pulling off your clothes, Bakugo watching you as he undid his belt. He pulled it from around his hips and dropped it upon the floor, his eyes boaring holes into you as you stripped.

"Okay, it was an accident. You invited me over to your place and I was looking for you. Shit, you know how quiet your shower is and when I went into your bathroom, you were stepping out of your shower and I saw everything. So before you ask, no I'm not a fucking creep." You chuckled, he looked so embarrassed that that had happened but you didn't mind. He was so cute. He saw how you stopped at just your shirt and underwear, but he didn't mind that. He knows how you feel about your body and wants you to be comfortable, so he had absolutely no problem with what you were doing. He snatched your body up and guided you to his lap, your body straddling him that embarrassed you.

"Look at me..." He spoke and you did as told and as you did, your heart melted from the soft smile that was plastered across his face, "...all of this..." He gestured to your stomach before placing a soft kiss agaisnt your belly, "...belongs to me. Don't be embarrassed, we're doing this together, not with anyone else." You didn't know Bakugo could go completely out of character because of you. He stared into your eyes the entire time he unbuttoned his pants, his arm wrapping around your body so he could lift you up as he lifted his hips to lower his pants enough to display his underwear that had a bulging tent in the front of them.

He... was so damn attractive to you, that you couldn't help how your body squirmed on top of him. His hands went to his crotch, letting your body lean against the carseat behind you while he fished himself from his boxers. You gulped from hearing it slap agaisnt his abdomen, but you couldn't bring yourself to look. "Come on, ____, look down. Unless you want it to be a surprise?" You didn't respond to that which enlightened a chuckle from him. He leaned forward to your ear and whispered into it, "I'm taking that as a yes~."

You could feel his hard length poke into your stomach from the position, poking into it and smearing the liquid of pre-cum against your abdomen that made you quiver. You were nervous as he lifted you up and pulled you agaisnt his chest, securely holding you with one arm as he gripped the base of his cock with the other and angled it to your anticipating hole. His hold on you tightened, once he began lowering you onto his throbbing cock, the tension in the air thickening as the thick tip seeked entrance on your virgin tight hole.

Bakugo wrapped his free arm around you while lowering you more, onto him, his breath catching from the feeling of your walls trying to swallow only his tip that could barely enter you correctly. You were so unready, that your walls didn't quite brace themselves for the thick tip protruding into your entrance, only to stop as a thick barrier kept the blonde haired male out of your body. The lump in your throat was harshly swallowed, once the male forcibly began prying open your insides that necessarily needed that force, if you both wanted this to genuinely happen.

But pain shot to your brain as he hit a thin barrier, the tightness worsening it which made you clamp your arms around the males neck, only for Bakugo to pull you against his chest and hold you to help you pacify the pain. "It hurts, huh..?" He questioned, knowing that he wanted to just plunge his entire throbbing length inside you, "Just try to calm down, ____. We're both taking part in this, so just relax and focus on me and not the pain." His voice always soothed you and took all the pain away, so it wasn't really hard to focus on only him even if you could still feel the pain that merely felt like a sting from a needle or a bee.

Even so, you still weren't naturally opening up to him which caused the male to softly start rutting his cock into one of your barriers, your teeth clamping down on his shoulder the more he moved. He was nearly losing his mind already, the squishy and gummy texture of your warm walls sucking a thick load of pre-cum from his trembling tip that made Bakugo practically moan out your name. He was so blinded by your gummy walls that he didn't realize your teeth punctured his skin, though, he couldn't control himself as he grasped your hips and began fucking himself up into you.

The pain wasn't as bad as before, slowly fading the more he drove himself into your sopping heat. You still couldn't speak, your grip on his shoulder only tightening the more he hammered into you. "Fuuuck, ____~!" His voice called out, which only made you clamp down tighter on the thick organ that was leaving and reentering your body for a desirable feeling that your body drooled over. He could literally feel your insides shaping to remember his thick cock, only his and that he will make sure of. You only belong to him and no one else and he wanted you, most importantly to know that.

His hands pushed your body against the front seat behind you, one of his hands going to hold your stomach down while his other traveled to your throat to apply pressure that caused an electrical nerve to shock every part of your body. Your eyes were closed shut, the dominance of him fucking desperately into you getting to your mind that nearly took over it. His eyes stared at your fucked out face with twin patches of pink painting his cheeks, your eyes sealed shut as your lips were parted.

You looked so erratic, riding his hard cock only for him to dominate you in the process. His face held the same expression as yours, pleasured and nearly taken out, only though his eyes were opened and focused on your body. The image of the woman he fell in love with caused his cock to already twitch, his veins pulsing along the skin of his cock which you could feel that transmitted a vibration through your walls and signaled for your cervix to clamp down on his cock. That partly stopped his movements, the males eyes closing as he sucked in a breathe before letting his hips move, once again. You've never felt anything as amazing as this, to be connected with the man of your dreams in such an intimate way.

"Katsuki..! I feel like- ngh~! I'm gonna explode!" You confessed, only getting a harsh snap of his hips in the process.

The blonde's hold on your throat tightened, only for him to pull your face closer to his where he licked the side of your cheek, "Then I'm gonna make you explode like dynamite!" His hand forced your head back into the seat, the pounding of his throbbing length increasing only for that pleasure to be added with an even greater sensation of his thick fingers rubbing harshly at your drooling pearl. He could feel how you tightened which made him squeeze harder on your throat, your hands going to his wrist as you felt your core throbbing and quickly trembling around his thick cock.

Your juices sloshed out, making Bakugo's eyes trail to your heat that swelled with every harsh thrust of his hips. The sensation was nearly too much, only pressuring your walls to release and your cervix nearly choke on his cock. "Damnit, I'm gonna fucking cum!" He sounded so angry about it, like he didn't want the experience to end which you could understand and agree with. You loved this feeling you were feeling with him, even though your body could hardly handle it.

"Katsuki, please~! I'm cumming!" You screamed, making the male wrap his arms securely around your body and practically fuse your bodies from how tight his hold was. Your cervix burst harshly agaisnt his cock, making Bakugo's eyes shut tightly and plant his face in your shoulder while you did the same from his harshly fucking cock.

"Damnit, ____!" The male shouted as his cock twitched inside you before shooting thick jets of cum into your womb, the sensation causing his and your toes to curl. "Fuck, I'm so fucking in love with you!"

His words were almost muffled but you heard him, "I... I love you too, Katsuki." You breathlessly moaned agaisnt his hard chest. And he wasn't lying, he was going to stay true to his word that he'd be the only hero to only protect and love you for however long you live. His hold on you loosened as he let your back fall agaisnt the front seat, again. Your bodies were drenched in sweat, his hold staying on your hips as he stayed buried inside of you. His eyes opened to meet your face, taking in your still fucked out expression.

"Wanna do this again, at your place?" Your eyes snapped open to look at his smirking... no, smiling face that stared into your eyes. "This time, we can go as many times as we want. And I fucking wanna go until morning."

Well, you were fucked quite literally . It would be an understatement to say that he was very good sexually, so you knew that in bed it would be a different story...

...

...

…

This work was originally written by @compressingsins , if you see anything similar, please report it to me. 🫶🏾

[6okuto]

Hi dear I have and idea for touch starved ais and vere.

WHAT IF- what if the reader (MC) is like a single parent?????

Mc's like a mild or dilf or something like that?!

AIS AND VERE WITH A SINGLE PARENT

gn!mc | meow. this (doing old reqs) is my parting gift(?)..

VERE

his ear flicks up when mc mentions their kid for the first time. where are they? why are you here? who's the other parent?

not a guy who spends time around kids. probably not a guy who should spend time around kids /hj what swear words and scary stories will he share...

^ tbf he also gives some solid life advice, even if it's a bit blunt, or something the kid doesn't understand just yet

if mc's kid is witty / snarky he finds them amusing (especially if it's at mc) and easier to be around! whether that's good for mc or not is not up to mc Lmao

it varies depending on mc's relationship with their kid but if mc's kid is grown up, vere is more of his usual self. swearing, analyzing them, taunting them, etc.

vere never thought of himself as a possible father-figure. or even like, a fun uncle. but he likes mc, and despite his complaints or denial, has grown a little fond of their child.

^ possible angst if vere's like, do you really want to be with me? am i the role model you want them to have in their life? i'm chained up for god's sake etc

gets soft/quiet when mc talks to him about their kid. he sees the fondness in their expression, and even if he can't really relate, he can still sympathize

would make a couple pilf...? jokes. sorry. it isn't necessary though. he does enough flirting and innuendos that the pilf(?) thing doesn't come up that often

brings up their kid when mc is about to do something dangerous or stupid, when they succeed at said dangerous or stupid thing, or when their kid also tries doing something dangerous and or stupid. "well it's no surprise who you got your confidence from."

vere questioning mc's parenting tactics LOL. mc is like And what do you know about parenting and vere's like. enough to judge yours. they find common ground eventually

AIS

really doubles down on his warnings about the seaspring when he finds out they're a parent. he doesn't have to know how old, what their relationship is like, etc—he's already asking how much they're willing to risk and telling them to think about their kid

otherwise he doesn't really treat mc differently—they're a grown and capable adult, and being a parent doesn't change or weaken that

ais would pick his pets over hanging out with a kid, but he doesn't give himself enough credit with how well he can get along with one

if mc's kid is old enough that he can play pranks on mc with them. well. he will. mc looks at the both of them and they both shrug like What? it wasn't us? (the kid is grinning and giggling but ais keeps it together for the both of them.)

if there's an opportunity to introduce them to princess / whoever else, he will! like look at this sweet girl, you don't have to be scared. you wanna try getting her to sit and roll around?

babysits if needed, takes them out for the day (if only to keep them away from the seaspring). they get some food and he comes up with exaggerated stories for each shop the kid points out

mc's kid who's old enough for ais to teach them some self defense after they walk in on him taking care of injuries from a bar fight. mc who walks in on them and goes ?!?!?!

mc vents about their parenting troubles, and ais isn't sure if his leadership advice/experience is totally applicable to taking care of a child, but surely some of it is? he tries to help anyway

i can see their kid opening up to ais about things that worry them tbh. he's got that vibe. depending on what it is, ais might suggest to mc something they should do, or try to help himself

similar to vere, he likes mc and their child but he wants them to think about what's best for them—if that includes him in the picture. like yes he'll do his best, but he can't blame them if things don't work out. honestly he might try to cut things off firstdjdjshd

[multifandom-nerds-blog]

I'm rewatching Trollhunters in the background right now, and the disfunctional mother son relationship between Jim and his mom is making me crazy.

Like, he's taking care of the household and his mother for years as a teenager and before probably. She is sometimes giving half hearted comments about him not having to do so much, but very obviously she's not gonna make him stop do all the cooking and cleaning. Y'know. Both because they've been living like this for years, and because it's obviously also very comfortable to have someone do all the house work.

Then Strickler comes into the picture, and if we ignore the whole Troll and changeling side of the story, Barabara gets very offended cause Jim doesn't want her to meet him privately. Again, ignoring the whole magic and trolls stuff, STRICKLER IS JIMS TEACHER. If Jim hadn't figured out that Strickler was a changeling he probably wouldn't have a problem with it, but the fact that he does, no matter the reason, should be enough for Barbara to put a stop to the relationship. Her child is clearly uncomfortable with her seeing/dating that guy, for whatever reason, and even clearly vocalized it. But she doesn't care about, or rather, she tells Jim that she "wouldn't expect something like that" from him. Obviously not, cause she may see him like her child/teenager he is, BUT DOESN'T TREAT HIM LIKE ONE.

And then Jim, unknowingly to Barbara, becomes the Trollhunter, and his behavior changes. He's suddenly doing reckless stuff, sneaking out, getting bruises, landing in detention and even at the police station, barely avoiding a police report. What does she do? Asking him what's going on? If everything's alright at school? If he has any other problems? Maybe trying to lower his workload around the house, which again, he's doing most of that as a teenager and longer probably.

Nah. She doesn't do anything until he lands in the hospital. Except for again, dismissing him rather negatively at the one topic he's openly expressing any negative opinions about (Strickler). And after he lands in the hospital she now starts not asking questions, but demanding answers. Demanding answers from a teenager in a difficult situation who is also now acting much more like a teenager than he ever did before, from her point of view at least. Except she obviously doesn't know how to deal with a teenager, cause she has never had to raise or live with a teenager. She instead lived with a child pretending to be an adult for years, that was partly much more of an adult than she was, who did way to much work even before Jim became the Trollhunter. So she throws punishments at him and grounds him, but does he listen?

No. Cause why should he? Not only is he dealing with things much more important than being grounded, yknow, saving the world, he's trying to protect her from the sheer knowledge of the supernatural and physically protecting her from getting harmed. And again, for the majority of the time since his dad left he pretended to be an adult. He was and is the main adult in the household, dealing with important things she doesn't even know about.

The only one's treating Jim like a teenager are teachers, other children and Blinky and Aaargh sort of when they're not in the middle of Troll business. Strickler, in the first episodes where Jim doesn't know about his true identity, is much more of a parental figure to Jim (also after his redemption later on tbh) than his mother.

In summary: Barbara is treating her son like an adult, almost like a partner, instead of a child/teenager. And when that isn't possible anymore she doesn't know how to properly treat him. She also doesn't really care that her son is uncomfortable with her being around Strickler, or Strickler in general. And it takes Blinky telling her (when Jim is 16) that Jim might be affected by his father leaving when he was five years old.

Jim meanwhile is treating his mother more like a child/teenager instead of the adult and MOTHER that she is. Seeing her as his responsibility. Cooking for her. Cleaning for her. Telling her to rest and take breaks.

They obviously love each other other. And their relationship might not be toxic, but it's very much disfunctional. In a way that is mostly negative for Jim.

[grison-in-space]

You know, I've been reading things written by people on the internet for my whole life, or at least my whole life after I was about ten. I'm thirty three now. That means there are people whose words I read on the internet twenty years ago who are presumably still around and occupying the internet—sometimes using names I can recognize from back then, too. (hat tip to my fellow "changing usernames is unnatural actually" brethren; I've only changed one myself twice in the whole world since I was about fourteen or fifteen.)

Sometimes I think about a person I see around occasionally on the internet. That person wrote a story about a character in a rather silly fandom we shared, and I read it as a child just beginning to conceptualize being someone whose opinions might matter. And I remember reading that story at some point, because at that age I had a hyperfixation on that character in that fandom at that time and I read pretty much everything in the genre. I never really got to talk to anyone but the inside of my head about it. My friends didn't read fanfiction, and my parents viewed my reading fanfiction as some kind of depraved, shameful secret. Anyway, I read that story and I remember having some kind of deep realization about how adult humans work while I was reading it.

I learned something about the world from that story. (It was one of those insights that are now so molten alongside my core that it's difficult for me to disentangle them from myself, like "people outside you have their own perspective on your behaviors, but that doesn't mean they have to be right.") And I remember that they know it, because they taught it to me, without meaning to. One of the anonymous impacts on readers that writers never see unless they're extraordinarily lucky.

And I smile, because it's lovely to see them again, and they showed me a skill I still use today. We don't have a relationship of any kind—it would be very difficult to recognize me, I think—but they did me a favor a long time ago. And I remember. Now I get to be reminded that this person still exists, and is still a pretty cool human to be around today, at least for the specific circumstance of internet neighbor. Well, and our modern level of concern about once beloved elders from the distant past going terrifyingly cult-addled and bigoted on short notice.

That has not happened in the slightest. They're just still a pretty nice fandom person who is a bit older than me, who is recognizably the same person they have always been, but more intensely and thoughtfully—like a distilled brandy, not a sour vinegar left out on a countertop too long.

Weirdly, that's a thing I find comforting: this tiny, one way, invisible affection. Every so often I feel this intense affection for a person I've never spoken to or about, because I see them and I love them intensely for a moment and then we both go about our days.

Think about how many interactions you have with people as you go about your day. Wouldn't it be nice to imagine that other people feel like that about you?

I think I'm going to imagine that there's one person that read something I said and thinks that about me. I don't need to ever actually know if it's true: I can just imagine someone who happened to be at a formative moment when they learned something against the background of my words. We'll never know each other as our screennames are lost along the years and we move in and out of touch with parts of ourselves, but we still have that little fond impact on one another, those fingerprints in one another's clay.

It's a nicer world to imagine than the one where no one is paying attention to me, or the only people paying attention to me are mean. And there's really no way to ever know for sure, so why not inhabit the pleasant end of the imaginatory pool if you can?

[adventuringblind]

Solace

Max Verstappen x Reader

Genre: angsty AF but happy end don't worry

Request: No, but they're open! I love seeing your ideas so please send them! I promise I don't bite... most the time ;)

Summary: you and Max get to grow together. Neither of your dads being the best parenting model. When Max sees what your dad has don’t to you, he knows something has to be done.

Warnings: Jos Verstappen, depictions of most forms of abuse, descriptions of injuries

Notes: written in second person. I’ve noticed a theme with my writing… we’re just going to ignore it and I will continue to heal my trauma this way :)

Masterlist

Everyone expected great things from you. Expectations you wanted so badly to meet. Yet you always felt like you were falling short.

Your father is a Redbull mechanic. A good one at that. He's incredibly smart and respected within the paddock. One of Max's top engineers.

Your mother had left during your childhood. This means you got to spend your time traveling everywhere with your father. Him even being your teacher until you started online school and graduated.

Christian offered you a job that involved being on the pitwall. One you took happily. It meant you didn't have to spend the race in the garage with your dad.

From the outside, you looked happy. But you weren't up to standard with what your father wanted. You weren't perfect.

Behind closed doors, things were much different. You were blamed for your mothers disappearance. Blamed for your fathers woes. Used as a physical and verbal punching bag to help him feel better.

All the while, you convinced yourself it was for his benefit. That you deserved this for not being what your father wanted. He provided for you all these years, why couldn't you do this for him.

When Max started at redbull, both of you were still young. Regardless, the friendship was meant to be. No matter how much wither of your fathers hated it.

It led to secret rendezvous and stolen moments of escape with each other. You understood him and he understood you.

Max failed to realize how you understood. His dad was open with his behaviors. Jos had yet to back down from a session of publicly shaming his child. Your dad didn't do anything close to that. So how on earth could you know exactly what he needed during those hard nights.

He'd asked Christian about it a few times. Why you were so shy and timid around adults. It was difficult to understand.

Christian had told him not to worry about it and to focus on his racing. He was watching out for you.

It was true. Christian had been your Guardian angel on multiple occasions. Even staying with his family over long breaks why home was too difficult. He made sure you were fed and had clothes that fit. Everything you lacked in your own house.

The one thing that stopped him from getting him away from you is that you never explicitly told him or showed any signs of it. He was working on assumptions and possible hints.

He'd tried to catch anything that would give him a leg up, but he'd yet to het anything.

Your relationship with Max grew over the years. The two of you melded. You knew how to tame the Mad Max that fought to escape, and he knew how to soothe your tears.

You found solice in each other. Stability in your friendship. A love you both were willing to fight for.

Which happened a lot.

Neither of you knew how to communicate properly. Resulting in hard arguments and yelling matches. One of you is always shutting down before any real reconciliation can happen.

Christian got to be a father to both of you in this way. Coaching you two on how to express your feelings healthily. He was routing for you two. Knowing both your fathers weren't the best, you and Max needed to learn and love with someone safe. He was glad to take you both under his wing.

Then you were able to flourish. You started smiling more. Your eyes lost the bags from underneath them.

Max started opening up more. Standing up to his father slowly became easier. His smile and silly attitude got to be more prominent.

You started showing affection to each other in public. Openly spending time with the other. Not caring what either of your fathers thought.

After all, you were both adults. Right?

You thought everything was going to be over when you moved in with Max. You were nervous about it, mainly because you were self-conscious about your body. Nevertheless, you knew it would be a good change.

~

It was a soft moment between you two. Your giggles as Max left chaft kisses all over your face made him smile.

He felt bad for looking. He knew you were struggling with insecurities, and he wanted to respect your privacy.

But as your shirt inches up your body, he catches sight of the dark marks along your hips and torso.

He immediately stopped everything. His breathe hitched in his throat.

You looked where his eyes had landed. The secret finally out. One part of you wanted to be relieved, but right now you were panicking. Your brain reeling with every possible outcome.

You did the first thing that came to mind. You apologized. You begged him not to tell anyone. Tried to convince him that it was your own fault. Your breath becoming more uneven with every word.

Max was taken off guard. He knew it had been bad, but he’d never seen it and you’d never shown him. His emotions were bubbling to the surface rapidly. But you didn’t need him to be angry with your father right now.

He removes his hands from your body to give you space. He didn’t want to scare you anymore then he already had. “Don’t apologize, none of that is your fault, okay.” It felt like he was trying to soothe a wild animal. “Can I hold you?”

You nodded your head yes. Eyes moving rapidly to every sound. Your senses hyper aware of everything happening.

He reached out for you slowly, making sure to stay within eye view. Something that helped him when he’d come to you. Slowly you made your way into his arms. Basking in the way he felt like safety.

“We don’t have to talk about it now, but when you’re ready I’m going to spend hours kissing all your bruises better.”

~

The next morning, Max took it slow. You both were needed at the track but he wasn’t in a rush. He wanted to give you time. You��d fallen asleep in his arms. Him soothing every tear that ran down your cheeks.

When you two arrived together, he made his way through the back entry with you in tow. Attempting to avoid cameras and your father. He needed to make sure you got somewhere safe first before he even attempted talking to his lead engineer.

He immediately went to Christian. His face when he saw you two approach made Max want to turn around.

“I can see on your face that you want to punch someone.” Christian sighs in exasperation.

Max looks between his team principal and you. Words now refusing to form in his mouth. How was he supposed to explain this? “Can Y/N stay with you while I run around doing things.”

Christian hesitates, confusion evident. “Only if you tell me what’s going on.” He could see you were in pain. You looked like you’d been crying.

Max leaned into whisper. Worried about cameras and the nearing possibility of your father spotting you two. “It’s worse then we thought.”

Christian rubbed his temples. Motioning for Max and you to follow him into his office. The door closing the a soft click behind them. Neither sat down, the anxiety too much for either of them.

Christian was trying to get a read off of you. You, however, had yet to even look at him. Your body language had reverted back to when you were small. When he let you pretend to work on the cars. It hurt him.

He was about to say something when a knock sounded at the door. A rough knock. A familiar knock. You flinched away from the door. Your survival instincts kicking in.

Christian motioned for you two to sit down. Max gently gripping your wrist to get you to follow him. You flicked unintentionally but he just looked at you knowingly. You needed to move and he was just trying to help.

You sit down across from Christian. Max’s leg was bouncing up and down so fast you thought he might put a hole in the floor.

“Come in.”

You don’t turn around when the door closes. You can hear his breathing. Aware of his every move without even seeing him. Fighting every urge to run away.

“Oh- I was looking for Y/N. We need to go over some data.” He picked up on your fear. You knew it as he walked directly behind you. His hand gripping your shoulder.

You flinched and turned away from his hand. The tension in the room was to thick for you to breath. Max was already out of his chair and ready to connect his fist with anything.

Christian put his hands in between the two men. Aware of the still open door and people peaking inside.

You were trying to cower away from the aggression. Away from the onlookers. Into the safety of Max.

“I think Y/N was busy going over some things with Max, but I’d be happy to look at it.” Christian gave his best attempt at a neutral smile.

Your father was growing angrier. It’s the first time he’d openly tried anything. The grip he had on your shoulder already bruising.

“Busy doing what? Trying to ruin her future even more?”

Max saw red. He was already angry, but now he’d crossed a line. He knew he shouldn’t have done it. However, the feeling of his fist connecting with the jaw of your fathers was to satisfying for him to care.

Your father reeled backwards. His hands clutching his face.

You jump from the chair. Finding refuge behind Max's body.

Max was ready to go for another swing. Before he could lunge, Christian grabbed his shoulder.

"Why don't you Teo cool off in Max's driver room. I'll come find you later."

Max didn't move. His chest heaving. The two men willing eachother to make a move.

You take Max's wrist. Gently trying to lead him through the door.

You, however, didn't get far. Your father knew something was wrong the second he saw you come into the garage. He’d been around Max long enough to know that he’s a protector. He knew that if you wanted, you could ruin his entire life.

So, he lunged for you. Grabbed hold of your hair and pulled. You were in his grip again before Max could even register what was happening.

“Max, go get security.”

“But-“

“Your going to be faster then me.”

Reluctant, Max sprints out of the garage. Making his way swiftly to the nearest security checkpoint. He was grateful it was only Thursday. The amount of fans in the paddock significantly less and he didn’t have to drive with his adrenaline already so high.

You were silently pleading that Christian is able to talk some sense into your father. His previously free hand now covering your mouth.

You’d been here before. Breath. Hold. Exhale. Repeat. The mantra you’re mind recited through your entire childhood.

You could see Christian saying words but couldn’t hear them. He was trying to get closer but the hold on you became stronger with each step he took.

Your mind goes blank for a moment. Your body present but your mind dissociated. You can see the interactions take place, but you don’t feel present, or even real.

He is shaking you now. Your body jostling. Then the floor. More footsteps.

Max.

He’s leaning over you. Checking to see if your okay. You can see the panic in his eyes. A soft blue that you will your mind to latch onto.

You can hear him now. He’s whispering to you. “Your safe now” falling like a prayer from his lips.

Max cradles you in his arms. Holding you close as the noises of your father struggling slowly get quieter.

Christian also appeared at eye level. Crouching down beside the two of you. “I’m so sorry that I didn’t see it.”

“I didn’t want to cause my trouble.”

“You never cause trouble.” A smile ghosts across Christian’s face for a moment. “Your dad will not be allowed back into the paddock. And you already know, but if you ever need a place you’re welcome at our home.”

~

Unfortunately, the events that transpired were within view of people and cameras. Christian deemed it a ‘family emergency’ and let you two go back to the hotel. Leaving the media Max needed to do for tomorrow and Checo to replace Max at the press conference.

Now you and Max lay facing each other on the bed. Neither has said very much. Only trying to process the events.

Then you remember something Max said last night. “Can you kiss it better please?”

Max smiled softly and inched himself closer to you. “Stop me if it becomes to much.” You nod at him.

He lifts up your Redbull polo uniform just above your waistline. Placing gently kisses to every place on your body that your father had marked in some way.

He pulled you into him after he finished. The two of you just staying their. Embracing the new possibility of peace you’d both wanted for so long.

[yrrtyrrtwhenihrrthrrt]

Yanno something I don't think is explored nearly enough? Ambrosius's relationship with the Director, and I'm referring to both versions here because they're both interesting in both similar and different ways

For the movie version (I will talk about the comic version on this post too, don't you worry) first of all my pal @walrus150915 wrote an incredible fic exploring this for the NBB please go read it right fucking now, but moving on from that, Ambrosius arguably saw the Director as his mom, or at least a stand-in for his mom.

She was (or seemed to be) a nurturing but authoritative adult who guided him in the role he was supposed to fill. A lot of people like to write her as an overtly nasty bitch in pre-canon fics, and while I completely get that, let's not forget that Ballister, at the beginning of the movie, found it potentially believable that he was her favorite student. He was dumbfounded and devastated to see she had been the one to frame him, he couldn't believe it and never suspected her for a second. I'll talk more about Ballister's relationship with her in another post, but the point is this is an Oscar-winning actress, people!

Ambrosius had every reason to look up to her and believe she cared about him. And she went from (in his perspective) treating him with patience, kindness, sympathy and respect, to trying to MURDER HIM.

You don't just get over a parental figure doing something like that to you (then oh yeah, promptly fucking d y i n g). The pain, the loss of realizing someone you loved and trusted was never who you thought they were (after he'd been battling those same feelings about Ballister) and never really cared about you as a person, it would be devastatingly traumatic. Like poor guy what the fuck. He had to cope with that WHILST trying to repair his broken relationship Jesus Christ

And that's not even getting INTO the comic version, which I will be getting into now. There's a big difference between the two and I think that's in no small part due to the timeframe. C! Ambro has been under the Director's thumb a full 15 years longer than his counterpart. This gave her time to exert more control over him, and also gave him time to grow more aware of her behavior. M!Ambro and the Director have the relationship of a person and their (non-sexual) groomer, while C!Ambro's relationship with her is more overtly that of a person and their abuser.*

She's regularly seen threatening him, threatening to have his loved one (Ballister) killed if he doesn't obey her thereby forcing him to do things against his will (like murder a child), insulting him, and showing him absolutely zero sympathy or kindness, even when he's seriously harmed. I think Ambrosius would, by this point, know that the Director isn't a good person and that she doesn't love him, but she's had much more time to sink her claws into him.

He's not going to leave her. This life, being the Champion, working for her, it's all he knows, and it's all he has. Where is he going to go, back to Ballister? Ballister hates him (because the Director took measures to isolate Ambrosius from him) and he's worked for the Institution his whole life. He knows the Director is bad, but he still trusts her. This is the devil he knows, at least, so by the time the story takes place he at least feels confident that they have a mutual understanding.

I imagine it took time to get to this point. He saw her as a mentor and spent most of his life desperate for her approval. After the joust, I can only imagine this got worse. She was all he had, and he'd do anything to prove himself worthy of the championship title he knows deep down that he stole. He probably saw her as a real friend for a long time, no matter how obvious she made it that the feeling wasn't mutual, and that he'd have to try ever harder to earn her praise.

What I'm saying is this man spent fifteen years under the boot of his abuser, then after fifteen years of grooming and psychological abuse she threw him in the trash, stripped him of his title and everything he'd worked for, tried to have his lover executed, then fucking died. And NOBODY TALKS ABOUT IT??? HELLOO?????

*this is not to say that M! Ambro's relationship with the Director was not abusive, it was, or that C! Ambro wasn't groomed, he was. Simply that for him, the grooming had more time to develop into overt, recognizable abuse.

[king-mera]

what are your thoughts on frozen empire? What are its failures?

Oy Vey…

I've already ranted my thoughts both in posts and in private, so what can I say that hasn't already been said? I'll just try to summarize my main gripes.

The cast is bloated with too many characters and none of them have enough screentime to properly showcase or develop their personalities. It's honestly a shame too, because Afterlife set up Phoebe, Trevor, Lucky, and Podcast as the new main four Ghostbusters to parallel to the OGs, who could be their mentors. Instead we got the Spengler family, along with Nadim, and lars. It's not as tight and focus as it should be, in my opinion. I don't hate Lars, but his inclusion bothers me in particular because his role could easily be filled by other characters. I don't know why he's being pushed as "the new Egon" either when Phoebe was already shown to have so much in common with him.

Speaking of Phoebe, what the Hell were the writers trying to do with her? In her first appearance she was funny, clever, and brave. She had a temper sure, but only when she was pushed to her breaking point. She also knew how to be a team player, working with her friends and family to prevent the apocalypse. In just her second appearance, suddenly she's snapping at her parents, recklessly causing damage, arrogantly taking all credit for saving the world, and preferring the company of a ghostly stranger over people. Disturbingly enough, she develops a morbid fascination with becoming a ghost herself. Where did this come from? She behaves more like Rowan North from the 2016 film. What happened to the determined young girl who stood up to the god of destruction and refused to die? Now she's locking herself into a metal box and painfully electrocuting herself in a scene that resembles self-harm or suicide. All this to separate her soul from her body just to be closer to this girl she's hinted to have a crush on.

Phoebe never needed a love interest of any gender, explicit or implied. It doesn't serve her story when there were so many other interesting things about her that could've been explored instead. How does she live up to the legacy of her grandfather? Is she worried about repeating his mistakes? Does she struggle to be taken seriously as a child doing an adult's job? There were already two other romantic subplots that deserved focus anyway: Callie with Gary and Trevor with Lucky. Adding a third one at this point just comes out of nowhere. Not to mention all the other elements of Phoebe and Melody's relationship that make it weird, like the age gap between the actors or the fact that melody is DEAD. Even if you ignore the flirty undertones and interpret their interactions as platonic, it's still a toxic situation because Melody is only manipulating Phoebe to release the real villain Garakka.

Garakka fails to impress me, too. He has little in the way of personality or motive. His visual design has a striking silhouette at first glance, but it's rather plain compared to other ghosts in the series. There’s nothing about him that suggests the culture he’s from (what was a frost giant/lich doing in India?). I don't understand why they make such a big deal out of his horns either, they're the source of his power yet he's able to do things without them. The horns are also conveniently locked in the same room as his orb, so he's able to quickly retrieve them. They might as well have stayed stuck on his head the whole time! What's so scary about this guy anyway? He's cold, naked, and skinny. That's not scary, it's just me stepping out of the shower.

Well, I guess Garakka deserves some credit for killing that random store clerk. The only on-screen kill in GB film besides Shandor in the last movie, and it’s some poor innocent bystander. Normally I wouldn’t mind such a thing, but it sucks that Phoebe and Nadim are indirectly responsible for this dude’s death through their irresponsibility. All the characters seem incompetent here. The Firehouse and the new lab don’t have adequate safety measures, and apparently Egon never thought to plan ahead for if the containment unit got full. That last point is a non-issue that just wastes time since the lab has backup units and Garakka breaks the main one from the outside anyway.

There are several moments that come across as mean-spirited and cynical, from Podcast crushing the old lady’s watch (that belonged to her late husband) to Lucky and Trevor cracking sex jokes about Nadim’s dead Grandmother. I complain about Phoebe’s attitude, but it’s not like she has a good support network. Her parents are dismissive of her and Ray doesn’t ask her what’s wrong when she asks if he ever wondered what it’s like to be a ghost.

We get a happy ending when Garakka is trapped and Melody crosses over, but it rings hollow when nobody acted as they should. They only acted how the convoluted plot demanded them to.

Oh and those mini-pufts, how I despise them. They were fine in Afterlife but now they’ve overstayed their welcome and become the new minions.

This whole movie feels like a bad dream and as far as I'm concerned, it's not canon.

[ivysangel]

listen, i think smut is great. i read it, i write it, i think about way more than is probably considered healthy, but i don't think it should be as readily accessible in bookstores as it is right now, and especially without warnings.

i went to barnes & noble with my friend a few weeks ago and in the front of the store was this humongous romance section that had hundreds of those booktok romance books that was trending now. i wish i had a picture to show you guys just how big it was, because there were like six or so book cases and then this big table with some "romantic summer reads".

naturally, because it's what's trending right now, so many of the books had those really cute cartoon couple drawings. you know the one's where the two mc's are standing next to each other, or back to back, or hugging or smth (ykwim) and all of them were completely innocent looking and not marked as having adult content in any way. this isn't my first rodeo or anything, so i know that a really good chunk of these books have graphic sex written in them despite having no warnings or indicators of such content. and sure enough as me and my friend are flipping through them we're seeing all of the graphic depictictions of sex that if you were just reading the blurb on the back you would not know existed in the book.

the rationale i've seen from a lot of the authors and readers of the book are that they want something "inconspicuous" that doesn't draw attention to the fact that they're reading smut in public or whatever. and while i understand the sentiment, there's got to be some kind of regulation for this kind of thing. because some kid who's just looking for a cute romance book accidentally picking up smut is actually very bad and shouldn't be normalized in the slightest.

and i always see people saying, "well their parents should be checking the stuff they read anyway" or "i read smut when i was young so i don't see what the problem is" which pisses me off so bad because:

A) i know that when i was younger my mom didn't monitor what i read because the books i was reading were never misleading. both the covers, blurbs, and warnings (if there ever were any) were in line with the content of the books i read and there was no reason to be worried. i'm almost 100% sure that when most parents go to the bookstore with their kid and their child picks up a book with a cute cover, and the info about the plot on the back says nothing about it being anything other than a cute relationship, they don't think anything of it. maybe if it was one of those harlequin novels with the shirtless guys and the ladies with their boobs spilling out of tight dresses they'd tell them to put the book down but because the covers of new age smut books are designed to decieve, that's exactly what they do. decieve. and if it works on your friends and family and everyone around you, why in god's name wouldn't it work on someone's parent.

and B) it's no secret that kids have been reading smut well before they should for ages. i read smut as a kid, some of my friends read smut as kids, lots of people have and will continue to do so, the difference is that it wasn't as mainstream and easily accessible as it is now. not that you had to scour the internet for it, a quick search on wattpad would give you a million results, but it wasn't something that wasn't so publicly advertised, and sold. in my experience, it was the kind of thing that you heard about from a friend who heard about it from another friend not fucking tiktok. the biggest social media platform rn.

i'd also like to point out that if you read smut when you were younger and grew up to not understand how harmful it is, even going as far to encourage kids to read it, you're a huge fucking weirdo. i'm only 18, still very much a "child" by some people's standards, and i get chills when i remember how young i and some of my friends were when we created our first wattpad accounts. which is probably why i care so much about this topic, i don't think children should be exposed to that kind of stuff at all, and i don't like how now anyone of any age can walk into a bookstore and either knowingly or unknowingly pick up some freak nasty sex because a bunch or horny people on tiktok can't understand how harmful it is to have these books in so many places without any warnings whatsoever.

also: this had already gotten so long but i forgot to mention that there's a rising interest in "dark themes" and those books DEFINITELY need a warning. i wrote an essay once on how unregulated darker themed media has contributed to the idealization of toxic relationships in young people, and i'd like to say that right now i think booktok is one of the biggest contributors

[merakiui]

I am E A T I N G the accidental preganancy trope like good soup 👏 I’m so curious how that would be for more “hardass” characters who are hyper-focused/hyperfixated on their life and goals like:

-Azul, Jade to an extent, Rollo, Riddle, Vil

(Honorable mentions: Leona, Malleus, Jamil, Idia, and Deuce)

Like they could be doing SO well in their lives and are successful businessmen, mafia bosses, doctors, priests, etc etc lol (or are starting their young adult years!!!) and a baby is just SO OUT OF LEFT FIELD I LOVE IT lol

:o !!!! I think most of them on the list would take responsibility by marrying you or offering some form of assistance and support, whether monetary, emotional, physical (or all and more).

Rollo is a man of tradition, so naturally his first thought is to assume responsibility by marrying you. I think Riddle might think somewhere along the same lines because rules are so engrained into his being, and knowing how his mother is she likely views accidental pregnancies with such hateful scorn. Riddle thinks he's breaking a rule by not marrying you and he panics a little as he frets over how he'll tell his mother of this because it completely ruins her arranged marriage plans for him. But then it's almost a blessing in disguise because it gives Riddle the chance to make more choices for himself and have more autonomy over his personal life and relationships.

Malleus and Deuce are the characters who are the most thrilled with the news. They're both so in love with you, so an accidental pregnancy doesn't even feel like an accident to them because of how accepting of it they are! :D in Deuce's case, he looks so amazed as he asks to feel your belly (regardless of whether you're already showing or not) and he looks so excited. Does this mean he's going to be a dad now? It totally means that, right?! Omg he can't wait to tell his mama!!!!! And Malleus is so overjoyed. Very happy dragon hours. >w< he just radiates ebullience, but no one can truly tell because his expressions are often misread. But Lilia knows and he's very happy for you and Malleus.

Knowing Azul, he finds some way to work a child into his life. He's always making plans for the future, and while some aspects of these plans may be set in stone he can make changes when necessary. Maybe he's not entirely pleased because he's so worried and anxious, but then it hits him that he's going to be a father and ohhhh he's so soft. T^T I think Vil is much the same when it comes to his future. He's also highly determined and won't settle for less. For him a child is a surprise. He may not have planned to become a parent at this stage in his life, but he isn't complaining. Vil doesn't care what the media will say. He'll do his best to shield you from them so you can have a healthy, happy pregnancy and carry to term. He is so supportive!!!! Whatever you need or want, he'll get it for you.

Idia panics. T_T oh, he is so not ready. So unprepared. Filled to the brim with anxiety. What do you mean he's going to be a DAD????? That feels so impossible to fathom for him. He's just a gamer (and super intelligent tech genius who is renowned for his accomplishments, but that's besides the point). >_< you can't expect him to be S-tier at parenting when the only thing he's ever raised in his life are high-scores and virtual pets. ;;;; he's putty in your hands. You can do whatever you want; it's your body, so he won't force you to do something you don't want to do. If you do decide to keep the baby, he's poring over reputable sources online in an effort to understand how any of this works. He doesn't want to tell his parents because he knows how much they'll fawn and how eccentric they can be. Mama Shroud will share all sorts of stories from her time when she was pregnant; if you ever need anything, the Shrouds provide! You're set for life. And Ortho's excited to welcome another member into the family!!!

Leona has to warm up to the idea because kids have never been his priority. He takes responsibility; he's not going to be a scumbag or a deadbeat. Absolutely not. And he provides more than enough for you. If his brother's wife thought he was mistreating you, he'd never hear the end of it. But also Leona would never dream of mistreating you. Sure, the news is a bit of a shock at first and he's not too keen about raising a child with you, but that's just life. It's always going to be shocking when you least expect it. He may not be fond of it in the beginning, but when those feelings hit and he realizes he's a father and he's bonding more with you and feeling the baby kick and tumble around inside; it's genuinely so soft and sweet,,,, yeah, maybe this isn't so bad...

Jade........ he lives for surprises like this. To say he's pleased is an understatement. He is brimming with excitement and he wants to tell everyone and no one all at once. This is such a pleasant surprise! He cannot stop grinning because the two of you share such a wonderful secret now and he's going to keep it from everyone for as long as he can just so he can see them get shocked. You're probably in on it, too. >:) the two of you are so devious. I think he's the most relaxed with an accidental pregnancy, and his composed attitude definitely eases some of your initial fears. You're so relieved he's not upset, but then how could he ever be upset? You've created life together and he loves you. Oh, did you not know about that? :3c like news of your pregnancy, Jade's confession is just as sudden and shocking. (The two of you have lots of fun gaslighting Floyd when he visits and starts to take note of the subtle changes to you, which you both insist nothing has changed. It's all in good fun. Floyd's going to kick Jade's ass after the truth comes to light. How dare he not tell him he's having a baby with Shrimpy!!!!! That conceited asshole!!!)

[absolutefuckingfreak]

pearl + franmaya thoughts

Bridge To The Turnabout is one of absolute favorite ace attorney cases of all time, this isn't really surprising as from what I've seen, its generally considered one of (if not) the best cases. It gives us the best thing that has ever graced this world, assistant Franziska. But also Pearl and Franziska interaction, and this one interaction is basically the foundation for people's interpretations of Pearl's idea of Franziska and Maya being together. And I love it. Some of my favorite plots for Franmaya fics are the ones where Franziska NEEDS to win over the approval of this. Literal child. For the sake of her relationship. Whether it be through Franziska making Pearl think she is so super cool, bonding through hurt/comfort, or Pearl just coming to realize that Franziska makes Maya happy, I absolutely adore when people write and/or make art about it. In canon, Pearl literally just berated Franziska, a grown adult, for being mean to her cousin..and Franziska took that personally. The scene itself is amazing because Franziska would never take criticism like that from anyone. But this 9 year old absolutely tears her apart in a way no one could even DARE to try. But this isn't about that one scene from BTTT that everyone knows about. This is me being stupidly self indulgent over a ship I love. Franziska and Maya being gay for each other aside, I love the dynamic between Franziska and Pearl. In a way, they're just like each other, which leads me to believe that Franziska would truly see herself in Pearl, and want to protect her like she were her own kin. Both prodigies, both destined for something amazing, both having corrupt parents. I feel as though Franziska would look at Pearl and envision a tiny Franziska, wanting to be just like her Papa, incredibly intelligent for being such a young age, and not really knowing any better of the horrors of having to grow up so fast. I think as close as they would become, Pearl would tell Franziska about what her mom was like, to Franziska's horror. I mean, Pearl's autonomy was kind of stripped from her. Maybe that's a stretch but with the way Morgan acted and talked about Pearl, I've always compared them to Rapunzel and Mother Gothel from Tangled. A lot of people hate Manfred Von Karma and believe him to be an abusive father, but I feel like there's reason to believe from multiple sources that he actually loved his kids. But this isn't about him and there's people who have explained this point way better than I ever could. Something I see a lot less is talk about Morgan Fey. Who was willing to kill her own niece so Pearl could take her place. Like her own blood. Back to the Rapunzel and Mother Gothel comparison, Mother Gothel values Rapunzel for her hair and that hair's ability to keep her young. Morgan values Pearl for her absolutely insane psychic abilities, believing she could be the one to put the branch family back on top. She wants to basically live vicariously through her daughter and will absolutely stop at nothing to get her goal achieved. Sucks to suck for her because it doesn't work but it also makes you go what the fuck! Maybe one day I'll make another post after doing a bunch of research on how this could pyschologically fuck up a kid (though I already have some idea). Franziska would absolutely want to protect this kid's innocence. Pearl doesn't know any better, she's a kid. She doesn't fully understand all the adult stuff going on around her and this is touched upon in BTTT. Pearl shouldn't know about all the horrible stuff that goes on in her family. She should literally be playing with dolls and probably learning how to use a whip, this is Franziska after all. This is technically a franmaya post and yet it has mostly been about Franziska and Pearl's friendship because well, I think franmaya needs to be there for Franziska and Pearl to even interact, because it puts that feeling inside of Franziska to have Pearl approve of her like a dad would.

Another thing I wanted to touch on because I cannot form a coherent train of thought even if I tried was the "homophobic Pearl" joke, which is just something I think is funny but also hope people don't actually take as a factual part of her character. Like ironically, yeah that's hilarious. Truly though, Pearl would not be homophobic, obviously?? Like someone could make the argument that Morgan instilled homophobia into her, but also she didn't let her leave the village so I kind of believe Morgan would think she wouldn't have to, if she wanted to even. If she doesn't leave the village how is she gonna learn about different kinds of love. Also Pearl is just, really into romance in general, she believes it to traditionally be between a man and a woman because that's what she's been taught, she's a kid. Also Maya is like, her idol, if she said she liked girls and boys (or just girls depending on how you hc her) then Pearl would gaze at her all starry eyed and go "YOU CAN DO THAT???" and probably think up a bunch of stories about princesses being together. Pearl being included in franmaya sillies is so important to me, Maya watching as two of her favorite people finally get along, Franziska feeling that protective instinct bubble up inside of her at the innocence of this little girl, Pearl coming to terms that Maya loves who she loves, and Franziska isn't as bad as she once was. They are so. Found Family. They matter SO much to me.

[chillinglikeashilling]

Michael and Kit: Making New Choices

This is a continuation of this post where I was talking about my thoughts about Kit and Jentry's dynamic in the show. (I finally finished the season) I need to re-watch the series again sometime soon because I'm so fascinated by the Episode 5.

The show sets up Michael and Kit as parallels from the start of the episode which is such a fun choice because they ended the episode before with this legitimately creepy scene of Kit pulling his skin back on. There was a chance for the tone of the show to really change there but the show immediately contextualizes how it wants us to view Kit by showing him in parallel with Michael.

Both of them are teenagers (or young at the very least) waking up to go to school, getting closer to Jentry but also trying to establish some sense of self identity and sufficiency. Michael is trying to balance meeting his parents expectations, against a desire to try something new and possibly divert from a path that he's been on for a long time. There's a sort of conservatism (not politically necessarily but in the way parents will often uphold traditional values and institutions) that we can see in some of the adult characters in the show like Michael's parents and Gugu, and it really pushes back on the teenage characters when they try to change.

Kit is somewhat different in that his deal with Mr. Cheng seems much more recent and his "parents" are just puppets for Mr. Cheng, but what is Mr. Cheng if not the oldest, most controlling adult on this show. A man so caught up in what he believes is good for his child that he attempted to kill a teenage girl several times just to drag his daughter kicking and screaming out of an afterlife she was at peace with.

It's so interesting to me that both Kit and Michael are struggling with asserting themselves and taking control of their decisions and basically all of the people in their lives except for Jentry are advising them to basically stick to what is easiest (i.e. the path that has been decided for them). It's a big part of Jentry's personal journey as well after all.

I mean, a lunch lady basically talks to both Kit and Michael about the importance of making their own choices and how other people will keep making choices for them if they don't. However that scene starts with the lunch lady explicitly refusing Michael's attempt to make a new choice.

There's a consistent pressure that we see pushing back on Michael when he attempts to change- his parents, Stella, the lunch lady. Everyone around him is so used to him following the script that it's genuinely baffling to them when he doesn't. Jentry, who is a person Michael has known a long time but who has been away long enough that they're still getting used to each other again, is the one relationship pushing him to change. In the episode its Jentry's text that tells us Michael was even considering trying out for band! Meanwhile for Kit there's a pressure there from Mr. Cheng but its actually easier for him to make the specific choice not to hurt Jentry. Mr. Cheng (or more specifically the Mogui) don't give up on having Kit do what they want but they only step back because they have enough knowledge about the systems in place to know that things will work out badly for Kit. Mr. Cheng knows that Kit and Jentry won't work because Kit has been lying to Jentry the entire time, and because Kit is making a decision not to hurt Jentry specifically (instead of say a choice to not hand over the powers) eventually Kit finds himself in a situation where giving the powers to Mr. Cheng feels like the easiest choice, the only choice.

[laugtherhyena]

I need to have ibis taken away from me so that i stop expanding Ayame's family tree-

Quite literally the most random thing ever, at one point earlier this week i remembered this throwaway from Asoot's puppetmaster arc at the scene where Akane goes to spend the night at Ayame's house;

This was, obviously, done because back then none of us had any ideas let alone designs and character traits for Ayame's family, hence the need for an excuse to why they're not present.

Cut to present year where i went and made characters for her parents and thought back to this line like "Hey i should make that", since i wrote Bashira as a single child that means this is an aunt from Ippei's side of the family; Mai Hatano!

And hey i was actually nice this time around so she's actually alive post-tragedy :] so here's some general info on her:

-She's 9 years younger than Ippei, the parents were going through a rocky part of their relationship and the mom thought maybe having another kid could save their marriage but it really only made everything worse and the husband left around the time Mai was turning 2 years old.

-The deal is that the father as some kind of businessman that was having an affair with a coworker and would excuse him coming up late or not even back home by saying he was piled up with work and blaming the wife or being “insensitive about his efforts”, but she knew he was bullshitting and could tell he had someone else. So again, she thought maybe if they had another kid that would fix things but it only led to somewhat constantly arguing for over an year until he left with his lover and cut contact with the rest of the family.

-This ties into why later in life Ippei choose financial stability over following his music career, the family struggled quite a bit over the years with just the mom and two kids, they had to move a few times and Ippei even got his job as a waiter during his mid to late teens to help out with money. I guess this also ties into why he and Bashira planned so much to have Ayame, i think his parents married pretty young and inexperienced so he wanted to avoid that and have a normal family.

-On Mai’s side she felt like she was at fault for “ruining her parent's marriage” for a good chunk of her childhood and early adolescence. She's over that as an adult, though it did lead to her avoiding serious relationships with anyone though most of her life. At most she's had some flings/one night stands, but never a proper boyfriend or anything official.

-On top of that Mai is generally pretty bad at dealing with emotions, both of other people and her own. She has no idea how to comfort anyone or help when they're in some emotional turmoil or need someone to vent to, so oftentimes she is kinda just changes the subject or gives a pretty standard response of like “Damn that sucks” before doing so and proceeds to ignore the issue as in sorta of a “forget about it” way. (As you can probably guess, she's not the one to show her hurt to others for a similar reason. When she received the news that her brother and his family had died she didn't express much of a reaction at all at the foundation and only cried when she was back home because she did genuinely care for them, though her odd reaction gave the impression to some coworkers that this wasn't the case.)

-She is a very stubborn person so she doesn't talk to people about this problem of hers, much less seek help when it comes to it because the fact that she can't truly help the people she cares for when they need emotional support really hurts her so she'd rather ignore and forget than deal with her lack of abilities in the area. 

-Stubbornness and ignorance are notably her most negative traits (“I was never taught and I will not learn” sorta thing). This extends to circumstances other than her loved ones emotional needs because a lot of the time she will be dismissive or ignorant about certain things solely because they don't affect her directly nor anyone she cares for.

-That being said, she is very outwardly nice and shows care to others. Very chatty and outgoing, pretty much the opposite of her brother and niece since she can talk to people very easily. She's on good terms with pretty much everyone from Tsurugi's division and talks quite frequently to other foundation workers as well. Though she is rather blunt and says whatever comes to her mind at any given moment.

-Before the tragedy she worked as a personal bodyguard in Towa city, this busy and sometimes dangerous lifestyle led to her distancing herself from her brother a lot as they grew older. It wasn't anything intentional, just life bringing them in separate ways so while she did love her brother and his family a lot they didn't see each other super often, it was mostly during holidays, funerals or events like some of Ayame’s competitions or similar situations. This became one of her biggest regrets late in life as she wishes she could have spent more time with them.

-She broke her arm pretty badly when a client was getting ambushed and was set to stay out of business until recovered. Once she was dispatched from the hospital Ippei and Bashira came to drive her home and help her settle back, alongside doing some catching-up. That was the last time they saw each other.

-When the tragedy broke out she became stranded in Towa city because of all the chaos and the Warriors of hope hunting down the adults. Her arm was still broken then, but Mai is a rather reckless person and went around fighting despairs and rescuing other citizens in spite of her injury, which led to her injured arm getting broken and slashed in many other places which then led her developing a nasty infection that she just kept fighting on her own for months until she and a group of adults managed to leave the city.

-She was brought to a hospital pretty much immediately after by the group's leader and by that point she pretty much couldn't feel or move her hand anymore and the whole area around her arm gave her immense pain. When she started getting treated the staff tried to contact any family member which led to them contacting the Kisaragi foundation and upon informing them that she was in their care Rei requested that Mai should be moved to the foundation’s hospital facility, which was where she stayed for the majority of her recovery.

-There wasn't much Hikaru or any of the medical scaff could do to save her injured arm so she had to have it amputated to avoid further spread of infection, but at this point Mai couldn't even think much about the fact and just told them to do whatever it takes to make the pain stop. On top of losing her arm, she also became prone to infections out of how bad hers was.

-It was when she was recovering from surgery that Tsurugi came to speak to her, he apologized for the foundation taking so long to rescue her, alongside informing her how the place functions and most importantly letting Mai know that her brother and his family had died. It was only after he left that the weight of this information and everything Mai had gone settled in and, for the first time ever since the tragedy started, she cried.

-The thing is that unlike her brother, an overthinker who thinks ahead and carefully plans everything in life, Mai tends to throw herself into things head on just hoping that it will all work out in the end and while she's going through things she doesn't stop to think much about the details until it's over. So it was only as she was recovering in the hospital that she thought about everything she had gone through, everything she had lost, and for once tried to think of what her next course of action should be while going through these feelings.

-That being said, she never fell into a depression or took the loss as hard as someone like Keisuke did because that's just not the kind of person Mai is. Somewhat similar to her ignorant demeanor, her way of dealing with grief is mainly by occupying her mind with other things, like going places she enjoys or focusing on training and work. The last one being the reason she joined Tsurugi's division pretty much immediately after being dispatched from the medbay.

-Mai’s an action woman! She has a lot of energy and loves getting into fights, especially if it is to protect others, so it's no surprise she joined his division and not Rei’s or Teruya's. But when it comes to Tsurugi's ideals Mai is by no means a follower, she thinks he's insane, way too radical, but so far his black and white mortality hasn't affected her or anyone she cares for directly so she turns a blind eye to it, this is the guy who pays her after all. (This does change post Sdra2, especially after Keisuke almost shoots Midori)

-She was assigned to be in charge of the new members basic physical combat and self defense training, especially for those like Ryutaro and Keisuke who had no experience in this line of work before. This is part of how she ended up becoming a close friend of theirs, though Mai tends to treat Ryutaro (and Midori by extension) more like younger siblings rather than coworkers.

-The foundation provides her a prosthetic for use only during missions (by Tsurugi's orders). Mai doesn't mind that since she doesn't actually like having the prosthetic on, it feels more like a trouble to put on and use than it's worth, she much prefers not having one at all.

-On a similar vein, Mai isn't a fan of the work uniform, she finds it way too stuffy and clunky so she only puts it on right before going on a mission, alongside the prosthetic arm. Tsurugi doesn't take that well, as he sees it as Mai not taking work as seriously as she should, but she is one of his best soldiers so he refrains from picking up on her.

-Onto some more miscellaneous information. Mai’s apartment is rather disorganized and messy, but for her it’s fine because she knows where everything is, even if it's not in the right place per say. Bashira used to jokingly pick up on her over it.

-She’s also a pretty bad cook, can only really pull off simple meals which is why she's a huge fan of takeout and fast food in general.

-Back in Ippei's late teens/early 20s she was the one to keep pushing him to take initiative and ask out Bashira, though that help absolutely came alongside teasing her brother for being so shy.

-They were really close then, Ippei would even pick her up from school everyday n all. This strong care stayed strong over the years even after they started seeing each other less and less after moving out of their childhood home, and even less after their mother passed away from old age sometime around the late 2000s.

-She never spent much time with Ayame but oftentimes when she would feel self conscious about her lack of femininity her parents would mention how she's just like her aunt on that aspect

-Mai has her brother's collection of music vinyls at her place, she's not the biggest fan of classical music, but listening to it reminds her of him.

[anarchy-and-piglins]

About the Victorian Au, I wonder where the Benchtrio would fit in? I'd like to think they'd get roped into the antique store somehow, maybe one of them breaks something and so they work there to pay it off, only for Phil and Techno to end up getting attached and then the trio just kinda deciding "this is our turf now, you mess with Phil you mess with us"

Plus, Tubbo is very good at fixing and building things so Phil is very glad they stuck around, makes some jobs a lot easier

Okay so I'm thinking clingyduo (Tommy and Tubbo) are kind of to Techno what Holmes' network of street urchins is in the Sherlock Holmes stories kekw. Like, they're two homeless kids who grew up orphaned or very poor, got into petty crime, in a way their background is very similar to Techno's own. He gives them food or money in exchange for doing little chores for him like standing lookout, retrieving stuff, gathering info, sneaking, or things that a child is more suited to than an adult. Techno claims he's totally not attached but he is, of course he is. The sentiment is returned, especially by Tommy who definitely looks up to Techno a lot.

Because it is my jam, I think it's a weirdly mutually protective relationship because like, Techno is looking out for these kids a bit like a pseudo big brother or weird uncle, and Techno isn't always well-liked by both the upper class or the lower class he interacts with so clingyduo will not hesitate to stab a bitch if they look at Techno funny (even though that's not really needed, growing up on the street just made them kinda antsy and Techno is one of their only trusted adults).

At least until Phil and Techno become besties, and then after a small acclimation period they start to like Phil a lot too. The end goal would be for Phil to employ them in the antique shop yes, so they can finally have a better life and not do unlawful things (or not as many unlawful things. What Phil doesn't see won't hurt him :3c)

Then for Ranboo, because I love giving him a very different entryway into the story than clingyduo (it reminds me of how in dsmp canon, Ranboo was kind of the odd duck out coming into the friendship late), he's a rich kid, upper class teenager, who maybe goes to Techno for help with something? I don't know what exactly, though it would be a little similar to Phil maybe in that he has issues with his posh overbearing parents? Or maybe Ranboo is just looking for a tutor and Techno takes a shining to him?

Whichever the case, this would allow for that mentor vibe from Techno because peerpressureduo my heart, PLUS he'd then meet clingyduo through Techno, and while the dynamic is a bit strained at first (very different backgrounds and such) they end up becoming besties :3

Also, this would mean that if Niki is somebody who comes to Techno for help, we can have syndicate 4/4. Maybe she's an aristocrat stuck in a betrothment she doesn't want, and she solicits Tehcno's help to find a way to get out of it somehow? That could be a fun side quest.

[mywifealhaitham]

may i request childhood bestfriends to lovers with goro akechi? for spice maybe they separate but reunite again when they're older

◟✶◝ childhood best friends with goro akechi

◟a/n◝ ok woah sorry this got so like angsty... I just kept yapping about everything but the lovers part 😞😞 sorry my brain will never write akechi happy

• you two originally met when his mother was alive, your parents were friends with her so you two naturally drifted towards eachother whenever the adults would hang out.

• you both got close over the years until his mother killed herself then you two got split apart. you both were so young and didn't fully understand the impact of everything, just that you went to her funeral with your parents and saw your dear friend akechi talking with some people in suits.

• you only saw him twice after that day. once was when he was walking with some adult on the street when you both were older. you wanted to rush over to him but your mind kept running, what if he forgot about you? or what if you'd remind him of the times were he had a mom? before you knew it he melted into the crowd of thousands. the second time was when you saw him on TV. by now you were a teenager and close to graduating and almost completely forgotten about him besides a few photos in a long forgotten about childhood photos book until you decided to eat your meal while watching TV that day.

• you nearly choked when his name appeared in a headline at the bottom of the TV screen, "young prince detective gives us a live interview here at...". you couldn't believe it. of course you knew that he grew up like you did but in your mind he was just a frozen picture of him as a child. as you fully abandon your food in favor of watching the TV you hope that fate will reunite you two again.

• and fate heard your call. about a week later when school was once again starting up you lazily zombie-walked to the train station. you stood by the platform in your unbuttoned shirt and undid tie when a stranger stood next to you. you glanced over at him when you two made eye contact. if you weren't awake by know then you surely were awake now because the stranger who stood next to you in this early morning was your old childhood best friend who was seemly frozen in your mind.

• you two politely smiled at eachother, both of your minds going into overdrive seemingly trying to process something that only really you understands. it's quiet for a few seconds before akechi tilts his head a bit before saying your name with a uncertain tone. you break out into a grin and come back to life with a gentle reply of his name.

• after that encounter in the train station and a seemingly long chat until the train came you two exchanged phone numbers to catch up. almost every night he wasn't busy you'd hang out with him and talk about everything that happened with you. he'd just smile and nod along to whatever you said. the only things he'd really tell you are stories about his job and how he came to be. you'd always notice a small glit in his eye when he talked about himself, almost like he wanted to say so much more.

• and there was so much more he wanted to spill. ever since he saw you at the train station he's been overjoyed. he'd never admit this thousands of decades but he's been thinking about you since forever. he could have easily tracked you down and reached out but the part of him that says he doesn't need human relationships kept him far away from you. now that your near him again he wants to tell you every feeling he's felt since you both got split apart.

• but he's the lovely young prince detective so he must stay composed in the presence of others, so he copies your energy towards him. if you continue to be ecstatic to see him again even though you both talked yesterday then he will match that energy. if you get more and more busy with other friends and can't hang out as much then suddenly he has more work that needs to be done. he will play any role as long as someone so dear to him doesn't leave.

• why does he do this for someone that half of his heart deems unless and unnecessary? it's because he loves you. it took him quite awhile to realize this and even longer to realize that it wasn't just a strong friendship but romantic love. and what makes it stronger is that you are his family, or the closest he has to it. you've see his dear mom and knew him before he locked all his past away and that's what makes him fall for you.

• whether you love him back or stay his closest friend is all up to you. akechi is a smart man so he has backup plans for everything. if your heart loves him back then he will do the best he can to keep you away from the phantom thieves and his schemes and show you only his good side, not letting any part slip. if you two just stay friends then he has no choice but to push you away slowly. it shatters his heart but he has duties that needs to be done and he can't keep letting his past haunt him.