#(Now are there pictures where it's bluer? Yes. Do I care? No.

[redrydersrequiem]

Reunited chapter 2

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This is again for my own entertainment. I like to write even if im not the best at it. I like to use pictures and gifs in my stories it makes it more theatrical in my mind. I redo sentences and add stuff all the time cause I continuously reread my stuff and try to fix things. I hope everyone enjoys and i hope all of you have a good day. ❤️

Miles pov

Light blind my foggy eyes everything coming slowly into view when something big and blue takes up the most of my view

“Colonel, can you hear me?”. A blue savage is starring down at me and my first reaction is to punch the hell out of them.

Everything is jumbled as i dont know where i am or whats going on just that i have a hostile near me and i need to get the hell up out of here. More hostile show up all i can do is take swings at them as they try to grab me and hold me down. The first one from before is now infront of me again. While the others all hold me back.

“Hold him! Calm down colonel! Come on its me corporal wainfleet!

I finaly take a breath and focus on the face in front of me. Wait did that thing said he was corporal wainfleet. What. Squinting at the Navi in front i see it actually does look like Lyle but blue

“Lyle? Is it you?”

“Yes and Z-dog and Fig.” Lyle says gesturing to the two navis respectfully holding me.

I take a moment and collect myself

“Just let me go. I'm completely calm.” I can see they all slightly hesitate but do so anyway, still keeping their hand up just in case I start swinging again. But i don't care about them right now i'm looking down and finally notice my own two fists are no longer the tan skin I'm used to, instead they are blue. No it can’t be. I push Wainfleet aside and go toward the giant glass window in front of me. One of those savages stares back at me from the mirror. Hands moving the same as mine eyes blinking the same everything.

“Well ain’t this a bitch.” I say now realizing what has become of me.

After being checked out by the scientist I'm reunited with wainfleet and ordered to watch some video from my past or some shit like that.

“Attention two minutes until we hit the surface.”

I just ignore the soldier barking orders at me floating around trying to watch the video I've been told I have to. Once it starts my previous self shows up on the screen. All tan skin and gray hair. Tough guy military stance through and through

“ In case you were in doubt you are Colonel MIles Quaritch, just younger, taller, bluer and less pretty.”

I just huff at my former selfs gusto.

“In six hours I will attack the Navi fortress. It was thought advisable that I make this backup. Parker what the hell else do i need to say to this.”

“Just remind him how it works anything else you need him to know yada yada”

“ Freaking useless” I hear the former human say under his breath.

“Your memories and your personality are going to be sent back to earth where you are being cultivated just like the other lucky sobs of our team. You are a recombinant soul with my memories and my charm. You wont be able to remember my death because it won't happen.”

A chuckle occurs from over the humans shoulder, a female chuckle

“Miles are you guys just now doing your daily video logs cause if you are i'm gonna have to write you up.”

A woman appears behind miles, everyone else in the background looking sheepish until she fully enters the frame. She is gorgeous. Her smile breathtaking, making my heart pulse loudly a low pur coming from my blue chest.

“Hello there darlin. How’s the baby.?”

Baby? What baby? Is all i can think, attention directly on the video playing as my tail flags anxiously behind me. Stupid thing.

“Jr is fine he’s at his check up asleep waiting for the nurses to finish all the scans i thought i would check in on yall, what are you all doing all secretly up in here hmm”

“Nothing darlin, Parker just making us all catch up on our chores right guys. I hear yes and aye aye from the background”

“Well if you guys would just do what you're supposed to you wouldn’t get in trouble.”

“Your right darlin. Why are you in here though aren’t you tired.”

“I am but just because I had a baby doesn’t mean I can’t help out. The lab people are running around and I'm just making sure everyone is where they are supposed to be.”

“Well why don't you go back to our room and sleep darlin i'll make sure your job is all done ok and i'll pick up jr.”

“Miles, if I didn’t know any better I would say you're trying to get rid of me. Not at all mamas, I just want you and the little one to be all rested.

“Sure. Fine ill let you get back to your little video.”

The woman moves off my predecessor's lap but not before bending down to cup his face, planting a quick kiss on his lips. I notice a ring around her finger. So she wasn’t just a baby momma she actually meant something to him, to me. As she slips away the original faces back at the camera and measures it with a tight look

“That right there is something very important. She means the world remember that soldier with out her you ain’t got nothin. Now she doesn’t know whats about to go down. Or maybe she does i dont know, shes quicker than she looks. But remember she is to be protected. Whatever happens you as a clone have two objectives, the most important: take care of that beautiful thing you just saw. And secondly get revenge on the man who almost took her away Jake Sully. Remember that a marine can never be defeated. You can kill us but well just regroup in hell. Semper fi.”

“Ohrah” I hear Lyle say floating in front of me.

“Lyle, who was that?”

“Who was who, Colonel, the girl?

“Yeah”

“Oh that was y/n”.

“y/n” memories start flooding my mind I can hear her voice. Smell her scent. Feel her hands caress my face.

“She was important to me huh?”

“Yeah she was your fiancé. She was part of our team remember

“Yeah i think but i don't remember everything”

“It’s cool colonel give it a bit they said we'll get all our memories back in time”

“Wait you said she was part of our team right.”

“Yeah colonel she was a great field medic but also a great soldier”

“What happened to her?”

“I, I, actually don't know, I don't remember!, hey geeks were missing someone.” Lyle yells over to the scientist but before they can answer we hear the landing protocol go into effect. I guess we'll deal with this when we get to the ground.

After we get to the ground i half pay attention to what ever they yell at us. More focused on seeing my team and finding out what happened to y/n. I drop the subject for the Moment as i go over to the rest of my team to start our briefing

“Well lady’s we are definitely not in Kansas anymore. We’re on our way to pandora. I know you're all asking yourselves the same question: why so blue?”

Chuckles go around as the twelve sets of eyes focus on me.

“The sins of the past have made us reborn in the form of our enemies. We have their size, their strength and their speed, added to our training its a powerful cocktail”.

“We got a mission?”. Lopez asks from his set in the back

“We do. Our mission is to find and kill the leader of the Navi rebel army. They call him Toruk makto. We called him Jake sully.”

“But before we get to hunting I know you’ve all noticed we're missing a body here”.

“Yeah where is y/l/n.”

“I dont know yet zdarnski but trust me i'm going to find out so till then you all go about your business while i figure out mine.”

Lyle is at my six as we stalk through the base looking for the head a General Ardmore.

“Colonel there they are”, Lyle points over to a middle aged woman head bitch energy radiating from her. Emphasis on the bitch

“General Ardmore” i say standing at the ready in front of the small woman

“Nice to meet you, Colonel. I hear good things. But a lot has changed since you were last here. Come”

“She gestures walking through the bridehead”

“The new command center here has just been commissioned. The crowd fitters can erect a building in six days. We’ve done more here in one year than in the previous 30 years. No longer is our mission her to mine. It’s to tame. We are here to make pandora the new home of humanity. But before we can do that we have to pacify the savages, Sullys whims have become bolder and more frequent. His attacks are well executed. Good coordination between the troops. We only know that they are probably hiding out between the hallelujah mountains and we are still unable to flush them out. That is where your team will come in.”

“That’s all and well but I do have a pressing matter to deal with first.

“And what is that colonel?

“I seem to be missing an important member of my team.

“Ahh yes come with me”

She leads Lyle and i around to a lab looking sector. The ceilings were thankfully high enough we didn't have to crouch. It was just getting through doors that sucked. Taking sips of the co in my mask we come to a giant window, probably looking into a lab. The general presses a few buttons and the once dark glass now becomes clear. A Navi women who looked very much like y/n

“No.”

“Sorry general i know you had relations with this women when you where human is that correct”

“To my knowledge yes but none of the files said she had died.”

“Yes, well with what we found we were able to determine she died of blood loss during the battle of hometree. She and another soldier were both gunned down by the natives.”

My hands just clenched into fists as I continued to stare at the young women behind the glass.

“Since she was part of your unit and a capable soldier she was also made part of project phoenix. Although due to her health problems her backup was from a much earlier date then the rest of you. Like you all she went back to her twenty year old self with her memories being uploaded from the video logs she did before the battle. Like you all as well she doesn’t remember or know of her death. Unlike you though We had to take more liberties with some of her memories since she was very personable with the traitors during you time which is why i have a hard job for you colonel”

“And what would that be”

“I want you and your unit to keep a very close eye on Corporal y/l/n here to make sure she stays on mission. Got it”

“Understood general.”

“Good she should be woken up soon and the scientist think it would help for you to be there. They’ll contact you when they are ready till then im sure you both have other people to notify.

Your pov

Everything hurts. My body feels like I’ve never moved but over worked every muscle at the same time. My ears are ringing and my eyes sting. What is going on? Did I get sick overnight or something? Damn. I hear clapping and a few snaps next to my ears startling me, probably one of the others messing with me but I can’t bring myself to swat at the sound.

“Corporal can you hear us”

“Huh”

“Corporal i need you to open your eyes if you can

Wait am I in medical right now what happened?

“I slowly open my eyes, a bright light flowing into them

“Responses look good. Ok corporal y/l/n can you look at us please”

I finally turn my head and see a nurse. A tiny nurse. What the hell?I try to swing up quick but everyone goes on to try and calm me down, everyone is tiny looking and starting to freak me out. But suddenly blue flashes in my peripheral

“Darlin, I need you to calm down.”

Wait, that voice that's Miles, miles will help me. I quickly turn to look at the voice of the man I love when a male navi stares back at me. My jerk reaction is to push him away. Some unknown man staring at me while I feel like I've been drugged yeah that's a no go situation but the male grabs on hard to my arms. It’s not until I go to push again that I notice my arms aren't my arms

“Darlin, I need you to calm down and take a breath real quick, ok.”

I'm just frozen in shock

“ Quartich?”

“Yeah l/n it’s me”

I then turn and see the other avatar that tried to grab me looked familiar as well

“Wainfleet?”

“Hey sweet cheeks.”

Miles just growls out at Lyle and that when I know for sure it’s my miles that’s standing in front of me. The boys get me to calm down as the doctors now look me over. I myself am too busy staring in the Mirror at my new body to pay attention to anything they say. Wainfleet had taken up a spot along the wall in my view to give me some reassurance. While miles had gone off to speak with someone I just continued to stare. It was me that looked in the mirror but it wasn’t me that looked back.

After getting my bill of health, some fresh clothes and a run down on the co2 mask and where i have to use them. Miles and Lyle escort me to our new quarters. Entering everything is gigantic. It would probably be comical if any normal humans saw it.

“L/N” I hear called out loudly as a body comes crashing with mine.

It’s Z-dog with lopez and mansks not far behind her behind all the others also standing to come greet me

“Wow zdinarsk it you i'm so glad to see you again.”

I grab and hug z much to her jargon.(she’s not really a hugger) Lopez and Mansks also come over and pull me into a quick hug, everyone else nodding at me with a smile on their face.

“Look At you all. It’s kinda weird everyone being blue.”

“Don’t you know it” Hear ja call out from the back of the group

Everyone just laughing as miles and Lyle rejoin everyone now that i've been reintegrated

“Well would you look at that, the whole squad together again.” Lyle says tucking me and z in each arm squeezing us into his side. We both just exchange a glance before brushing him off onto the floor, everyone else laughing.

“That's enough ladies. I hear miles shout into the room”

“You all know you rooms we'll meet back here tomorrow morning o700 hours”

Roger colonel. Everyone just salutes and goes back to goofing around or going to their designated quarters. I kind of just stand there like a deer in headlights watching it all. Taking in everyone’s new faces and body’s. My family is back together again and right now that's all I can find it in me to care about.

The next couple of days are very tiring. Training to get back into shape and familiar with our new body’s strength and size. Miles is a constant by my side, us practically going right back to where we left off. But it feels like i'm forgetting something, something important, it's on the tip of my tongue but it wont come out.

I see Miles get particularly more on guard whenever the general comes around to visit, always throwing quick glances at me. I have to admit the woman rubs me the wrong way but I'm grateful to her and the rda for bringing me and my family back together again. But thats where my loyalties end. The others all go back into their roles in the group, no one really focusing on the past or what happened to them more inclined to stay in the present and think of the future. We’re finally given the go ahead to search the area, while i don't agree with trying to capture anyone i have no choice but to follow our orders to find a person called toruk makto.

We get into the Forrest everything is beautiful. I always thought pandora was beautiful but being able to experience it with out a mask is crazy. Walking under gigantic leafs i just take my hand up and spin under it filling its soft texture. Lyle laughs at my childishness but I can’t tell he thinks its cool out here judging by the look on his face when a bunch of helicopter lizards Kenten if i remember correctly start flying around us.

Miles stops and gives the order to fan out in the clearing. I see its an old shack. But why is it out here and why is it so familiar?.Before i can think more miles tells me to survey the surrounding area.While he and two others go survey the field I do as he says not wanting to question things in a possibly hostaile invironment

Miles pov

We make it the last known location of Jake sully. Not wanting to compromise y/n i have her survey the surrounding area as myself Lyle and zdog approach the old shack. Z and Lopez scope the shack as Lyle and i survey the ruins of an old amp suit.

Scrapping the moss off the side i see it was my old amp suit. There’s no body inside just the remnants of broken glass and a old arrow sticking through the seat.

“Lyle see what you can pull of this thing.”

I stand up taking a breath my eyes finding y/n looking at some plant growing on a tree. A smile wide on her face. It calms me to watch her be at peace.

“Here you go sir.” Lyle hands me a screen to watch the amp final moments

On the screen i see jake in his avatar form all dressed up for war.

But then i see y/n. Human y/n stumbling into the clearing and standing between us.

What the fuck are you doing there darlin. I say to my self my eyes still glued to the screen.

She’s trying to talk us both down. And i can tell by my former selfs body posture falling that whatever shes saying is working. That is until i hear her scream at something behind me. The angle turning quickly to be meet with the female savage jake had found. And a very familiar arrow coming straight toward me

The screen changes once more to y/n above me tears in her eyes and thats where it all stops

That bastard killed me. But wait y/n was there I thought the general said she was with another soldier when she was gunned down. I have so many questions im unable to process as a crunching noise comes from the brush off in the distance

Your pov

The old battle ground makes me unsteady like an impending dread that fills my heart

Miles and the others have all made sure I’m not really part of whatever they are doing I’m just perimeter surveillance I know miles is having the same issues I am but he’s pushing through

I see something white float through the sky. It's an Atokirina, it's beautiful almost like the seeds of a dandelion, It floats peacefully towards me. I hold out my palms as it grows closer and closer gently landing in my outstretched hands. Just as the seed setteles in my hand i hear yelling form the group behind me. I run back to the group gun ready to some face to face with Navi children being manhandled by the others

Hey wait they’re just kids. I try to get out but the others ignore me. I try again but the words stop when i see a human boy as well. Covered in blue strips with a mask on his face.

Miles pov

Three Navi children and a human are all captured in a second. I look over them all seeing they look somewhat like us. The young male has eyebrows and a very familiar looking face. Lyle points out that he thinks we have half breeds on our hands holding up the older girls hand to show five fingers. Now that got my attention

“Show me you hands kid” The kid just flips me off. Now i know there’s no doubt why the kid looks familiar. He looks like his father

“Your his”

I can hear y/n calling out to us to calm down and that they where just kids but I force myself to ignore her. It’s not till I go towards the youngest one that I see the human that was with them closely.

His hair is matted into dreads and he has blue stripes painted on him

He also looks familiar

“What’s your name kid?”

“Spider, spider l/n

“Miles?”

No one calls me that.”

Before I can say anything else I hear a sharp gasp from behind me. Y/n pushing through us to go towards the boy.

Your pov

“Wait your name is miles.” I say staring at the young boy. The longer I look the more the pain in my head and heart grow, I can feel myself starting to hyperventilate. The longer I stare into the child’s blue eyes. Eyes that reminded me oh so much of the man I love.

“But that's impossible the rda wouldn’t have left you here. They were supposed to take care of you” I can’t even make a complete thought as my hands gently try to reach out to the boy ghosting over his arms and face

The tears are blurring as the child just stares at me in shock

“Mom?”

“My baby” is all I can choke out before the ringing in my head turns up to a thousand

Spiders pov

The female is looking at me with tears in her eyes as she crouches down to be height level with me. It’s starting to freak me out but I can’t look away from her. Like there’s a string pulling my to go to her and giver her a hug but that’s stupid she obviously just another soldier just like quartich. But…..Wait it can’t be. The more I look at her the more familiar she becomes. She looks just like the photo I have. The slope of her nose and cheeks. The shape of her face and as she smiles at me is when it hits me

“Mom?”

Miles pov

I can tell she’s shocked seeing the kid. I know I should pull her back before something bad happens but my body won’t move my mind not wanting to take this from her. It’s not until she yells out that I finally move

“Y/n.” I just charge over to her grabbing and pulling her away from everything back into the opening field.

“Y/n,Y/n look at me what’s wrong “

“My head miles I.”

“Shh it’s ok just breath lyle come here”

Lyle bounds over and takes my silent command to look after y/n while I go and speak with spider

The sully kids pov

Why is that lady on the ground and what’s going on?, are all the kids can think as they continue to struggle against the people holding them. It’s not until they hear the words “my baby come”from her is that they realize the avatar in front of them was none other than the y/n l/n spider's mother. Come back from the grave just like quartich. It is impossible, wait till dad sees this. A broken yell breaks them out of their silent conversation as they see y/n no longer in front of spider but now on the ground clutching her head, Quartich and the bald one next to her. All of the others look at them and her with worry evident on their faces. She obviously means something to all of them

Miles pov

Taking in the surroundings I go and radio to the bridge head our location and how I need a pickup when getting a confirmation i walk back over to the sully boy.

“Ok kids here’s what’s going to happen you All are going to deliver a little message to you dad for me.” I slap a com link in the boys hand and stare him down

“Your daddy needs to give himself up while I’m still being nice. And if he doesn’t there’s going to be an all out manhunt for him and your family got it.

The kid just hisses at me.

“And to make sure you all deliver my message spider here is coming with us”

“What no let us go the older female screams”

All of the kids are struggling to protect their friend. I have to admit I was glad he had such loyal friends.Shaking my head a squashing those feelings down

“Let the kids go”

“What but sir “

“Just do it we need to leave”

The others toss the kids away from them guns raising to make sure none of the little shits attacked us while our backs were turned

Taking spider in hand I shove him towards Lyle. Exchanging the struggling teen for the hurt women. Holding y/n close as the chopper starts to come into view. The rain has started casting the clearing into darkness. My team continues to watch my back protecting me and y/n from the sully kids and the danger that may lurk behind them. It’s not till I hear a clear yipping sound call through the air and see the children all react to it. That I know he’s out there. Him and that she demon he married. The sound comes again and the children book it out of the clearing back into the safety of the trees. Ordering the team to load up and placing y/n in Mansks arms I decide to turn back surveying the trees. That’s when a shadow in one of the large trees catches my attention. It moves slightly as another one comes into view just below it.

“Jake!!!” I yell out. “I know you're out there sully. I hope with this I’ve gotten your attention. Tell you boy there to relay my message. I’ll be seeing you again real soon.” I hop into the chopper and we quickly make our ascent back towards the bridgehead.

Back at the bridgehead spider is taken to a holding room per the general's orders now while I don't agree I had more pressing matters on my hand.

Y/n looked exhausted, her eyes sunken and ears and tail twitching everywhere.

“Darlin how you feel?”.

“My head is killing me.”

“The science pukes said it would pass. Everything will be ok

“No, everything will not be miles. I'm so confused about what is going on. Why are we after Jake? I thought Jake was our friend

“Well that’s a long story. Here what's the last thing you remember.

“From when I was human.?”

I just nod tail flicking behind him worriedly

“I remember you proposing and I remember being assigned to help Jake and the science group, I remember having our son and being so happy. but after that nothing…. Now you tell me what am I missing.

“A lot happened darlin. While Jake was on our side he and the others decided to turn their backs on humanity. They…

“What do you mean turn their back on humanity Miles, you i both know the rda didn’t and still doesn’t care about the Navi. What every they did they were probably in the right.

“How does killing everyone we love as a family make them right.

“They were protecting themselves and their homes just like we would do if the roles were reversed. This is all once again the RDAs fault.

“Darlin you and I both know we owe everything to the rda. Now I'm sorry this situation is not what you want it to be hell i don't want it to be but we have to do what we're told ok. Just focus on yourself for once in your life i beg of you

“Miles that's not how life works

“Well i'm gonna need it to cause i don't need you giving the general any ideas”

“The general, what does she have to do with this?”

“She knew you were close to the traitors in the past. They didn’t want that becoming a detriment to their current mission. Our current mission may remind you. So they have me watching you. And if you slip up im supposed to hand you over.”

“Understanding comes to my face as I see now why miles was always so closed off to me recently.”

“So for my own sanity and your survival i need you to continue with the mission do you understand”

“Miles im not going to”

“Y/n i'm not asking i need you to do this until we can figure something else out please.

“God this situation is so fucked” All i can do is pace around while miles sits on the edge of the bed.

“Fine I’ll pretend if it keeps you and the others safe I’ll pretend but I refuse to hurt anyone miles. You have to realize this isn't the same as then, now we are the navi and I know without a doubt the rda does not care about any of our blue ass’s.”

“Your right darlin, we all know it but”

“But, we have to come up with a plan. I don't want to lose everyone again and I refuse to lose my son again. Ok.”

“Ok”

“Now speaking of we have a very alive problem staying in this room right now that we need to take care of first please i want to see him”

“Darlin I can’t let you do that.. i see he's staring at me but his cute little ears are drawn back and his eyes hold guilt”

“Miles where’s our son”

“Darlin hes not your son”

“Where is he miles” I yell out at the marine now blocking my way

“The general has him darlin’

“WHAT!”

“Wait! Goddamit!” She storms past me despite my best attempt to block her into our room. She always was quick and make it seem all to easy getting passed me to make her way to the interrogation wing. Running after her I stop quickly grabbing z dog and Lyle who just stood watching me storm past them. They follow after me quickly. I’m already trying to come up with what to say for damage control

Shit!”

Your pov

I get to the room and my blood boils. There he is ,little miles or spider as he kept calling him self earlier. Hes standing strapped to some sort of machine as the general yells out where’s Jake sully?" I can’t even begin to think straight taking in the scene in front of me. All I know is that my son is screaming with blood now slowly falling from his nose. Oh hell no. I immediately rush over stopping the machine before Ardmore can stop me and just as miles,Lyle and z-dog all come into the room.

“And what the hell do you think you're doing?”she screams, stomping over to me but Miles quickly grabs me by the back of the neck and pushes me towards z and wainfleet.

“Colonel is there a problem here?” she asks eyeing my struggling form

“No ma’am.” Miles say signaling to the others to fully haul me out of the way

Miles pov

“Colonel I thought you said l/n wasn’t acting out “

“She’s fine we’ve been able to sidetrack and subdue her from thinking of the past to long

“Good now explain what the hell that was just now”

“Simple general we just found our in”

“Excuse me”

“You know how they say never get between a mama lion and her cub. That’s what just happened l/n’s outburst just proved to the kid he can trust her and with that well be able to get him to trust us and give up sullys operation. “

“He’s not your son colonel this is not the time to play happy family is that understood “

“Yes sir”

“Good I will warn you once again do not let l/n compromise this mission or she will be put down is that understood “

“Understood general . I salute to the smug women in front of me though it takes all my will power and walk out to find y/n and spider”

[phoenixthemenace]

Till Death

Day 17. Running away-

"Johnny." Dr. Early said softly, his eyes dark and serious. "I've been where you are before. I had someone I loved dearly, and there was a hurt between us. I walked away and lost them. Please. Don't make the same mistake."

"Doc. I-" Johnny didn't know what to say.

"I know Johnny." Joe said, understanding everything he wanted to say. "Thank you. And yes, it's okay. It will be difficult for you two, but it's okay."

Johnny gave the doctor a small smile.

"I'll swing by in the morning and check out your yard."

Joe smiled and patted Johnny’s shoulder.

"Sounds like a plan. But I'm serious Johnny. Going out with a different girl every weekend is fun, but it's not…" Joe trailed off with a sad look in his eye.

Johnny returned the affectionate pat.

"Maybe after I spruce up your lawn you can help me come up with a plan to…you know…"

"Seduce someone?" Joe said loudly, a wicked twinkle in his eye.

Johnny turned scarlet at the giggles that burst out around them and bolted for the door. Joe laughed.

"Now girls, you shouldn't be scaring nice young firemen like that."

More laughter rang through the ER.

Roy breathed a sigh of relief when Johnny arrived at station 51 for his first day. He was quiet and reserved, focused on his new role.

It was during a quiet late night drive back to the station that he finally spoke.

"Hey Roy?"

"Yeah?"

"Do ya wanna come over and watch the game tomorrow?"

Roy didn't have to think about it.

"Sure. What time?"

"Six?" Johnny answered, trying to stifle a grin.

Roy was blown away when Johnny opened the door. Aside from the mouth watering smell of dinner, Johnny looked incredible. He was wearing a dark red shirt and blue jeans so tight Roy's imagination didn't have to work too hard.

Johnny thought Roy looked incredible too. A blue shirt that made his eyes bluer and pants that made his legs look like they went on forever. The combined picture presented made Johnny simultaneously drool and his mouth go dry. He hastily looked away before he did something stupid, and led Roy further into the apartment.

The apartment was dim and a delicious looking dinner waited on the tiny candle lit kitchen table. Roy just stood and stared, with open mouthed surprise.

"I… I j-just after what- what you said," Johnny stuttered, instantly nervous. "I w-wanted… I mean, if you don't want-"

Roy leaned over and kissed his cheek.

"Oh, I want." He said low and slow into Johnny’s ear. Johnny swallowed and a slow mischievous grin spread across his face, his confidence restored. Johnny took him by the hand and led him to his seat, his thumb tracing soft circles across Roy's knuckles.

Oh yes. He wanted.

Johnny turned out to be a decent cook after taking care of his aunt for so long, and Roy gladly had a second helping of everything, earning himself a radiant smile.

The pair didn't talk much as they ate, but exchanged glances that slowly morphed into long searching looks. Their legs at first accidentally bumping at the knees were soon pressed together. An indefinable energy built between the two that was as pleasant as it was terrifying.

Their minds were whirling with trepidation and possibilities. Johnny’s in particular was screaming for him to bolt, that this was only going to end in pain. But he told himself he was being silly and he should have his way with Roy right there on the kitchen table. He blushed furiously at the thought.

Roy caught the blush and gave Johnny a head to toe look that made his mouth go dry. Roy's thoughts were as jumbled as Johnny’s, but he wasn't afraid, so certain was he that this was the right course for them.

When they were finished cleaning up after dinner, the couple settled down to watch the game. It lasted all of five minutes before Johnny, who'd been constantly fidgeting, stood, turned off the TV and taking Roy's hand in a sure, firm grip, pulled him from the couch.

"I'm sick of running away from this. From us."

Heart pounding, he led the way to his bedroom. Not that Roy was reluctant, as soon as they crossed the threshold his lips found Johnny’s with a searing kiss that left them breathless.

When Roy spread Johnny’s shirt open and slipped it off his shoulders revealing beautifully tanned skin, he was delighted to find that it felt as smooth and amazing as he'd imagined. Roy's touch and the look in his eyes almost pushed Johnny over the edge. Then he found his hands buried in Roy's hairy chest and laughed with delight.

"Shut up." Roy grumbled while his hands worked Johnny belt buckle, unfastened his jeans and unzipped his fly. Still laughing, Johnny gasped, moaned and clutched Roy's arms when his hands slipped inside.

Roy paused.

"How the hell do you get these off?"

Johnny laughed again, stripped Roy of his pants and boxers before sending his own flying off to some corner of the room. He paused to admire the view before backing Roy into the bed and pouncing on him when he sprawled across it.

Johnny's hand was caressing Roy's face while he was nipping his way along his collarbone. Roy covered the hand on his cheek with his own and kissed the palm before drawing his pointer finger into his mouth, caressing it with his tongue.

Moaning Johnny pulled his hand from Roy's face, roughly seized the hand covering his and pinned it above his head. Kneeling with one leg between Roy's he ran his length along his partners with a slow grind of his hips. Roy held on to them with his free hand, the grip drawing another gasp of pleasure from Johnny. He leaned in and kissed Roy hot and deep, his tongue syncing nicely with his hips.

Their foreheads eventually rested together as they watched themselves glide against the other in a gradually increasing tempo, enjoying the sight of toned muscles moving beneath flushed skin. Their bodies danced with electricity as they panted, swore, moaned and thrust their way towards their release.

It was beyond words, one of the best and most powerful that either man could remember.

When he could move, Johnny flopped over onto his back, still gasping for air.

"Johnny." Roy whispered when he found his voice. "Johnny."

It was soft and reverent, like a prayer, and Johnny was humbled by it.

"Love you too." Johnny said quietly, twining their fingers together and smiling that beautiful, soft dimpled smile.

Wordless, Roy pulled Johnny to him and held him as tight as he could. Johnny laughed and returned the embrace.

They were home at last.

[daeyeol4you]

Chay has so much confidence and self-worth. Can you imagine? You go to an open house and meet your favorite artist. You rant about the details of said artist’s videos. The artist grants you one thing because of said rant, and instead of asking for an autograph or asking a question about upcoming music, YOU ASK THEM TO TUTOR YOU SO THAT YOU CAN GET INTO THEIR FACULTY! Chay is a bad bitch, and I don’t think enough people realize that. But he’s also so respectful when he sees Kim’s expression change. He immediately backs away and apologizes.

Kim why is your first response let me sign this teenager’s chest? Why are you marking him as yours? KimChay is Freaks for Freaks indeed.

THE LITTLE NOISE PORCHAY MAKES WHEN HE LOOKS AT HIS FRIEND

Kim’s smile as he watches Porchay walk away. I see you, Kim.

That got long I’m sorry, I was excited.

Time: 33:30 – 35:44 - Balcony Man Reveal

Kim’s back in his birdcage.

Kim’s outfit: The blue leather jacket and the black pants are a great color switch for this scene. Every scene in Kim’s apartment has a darker, bluer tone to it, and playing into the tone with Kim’s clothes help separate Kim and Wik.

This scene finally ends the amazingly drawn-out introduction to Kim the third son, and I love it. Blurring out Kim’s face whenever he’s tangentially in shot by focusing on Big, the guitar, and the folder before the slow pan up to reveal the previously introduced Wik.

I think I saw somewhere that the directors split up the scenes where one takes care of the light-hearted, romance scenes, one takes the action scenes, etc. My point is that while yes I think the light change and such are just two different directors, I like it. As disjointed as the multiple director fiasco got to be, I think this is one of the few times it works for them rather than against them.

“If you’re done, why are you still here?” – again Kim is so bitchy I love him. He tries so hard to be a lone wolf.

Kim seems genuinely upset when he learns that Porchay is Porsche’s brother. Now he’s questioning if anything from the open house was real. Is Porchay actually a fan? Or was that all an act to ingratiate himself to Kim, the one brother Porsche can’t reach while working in the family compound?

The Kimspiracy Board makes its debut! Also not me analyzing all of Kim’s little trinkets in front of the board.

I desperately want to know what’s in that little glass box.

The Kimspiracy Board is deadass half a foot from the wall. Bro anyone could see behind that!

They chose a really cute picture for Chay’s Kimspiracy Board photo. How was Kim not supposed to fall in love when he’s just staring at a cute Chay pic every day?

Kim also has so little on his Kimspiracy board. Kimlock Holmes get to work!

Overall Chay Rating: I’m gonna say B+

Its great to see Chay back on screen. This was the longest Chay scene so far! And its a treasure trove when you want to analyze his character progression. Seeing how he acts away from Porsche adds so much depth to his character because now we get to see how he asks beyond his role of baby brother. I do think the Wik fan quiz went a bit long and definitely didn’t match the tone of the other scenes. Only reason I’m not grading this episode a bit higher is while it was a long scene, Chay only physically appears in one scene. He’s talked about and shown in pictures, but those scenes are about Porsche and Kim, not Chay. The Chay Outfit was not giving this episode either though I do like the tricks the costumers played to make him stand out. I am so thankful that the Chay drought has ended, and we get to analyze Chay and watch Kim fall for him!

The Chay Rewatch Ep. 4

As part of my KP Rewatch, I’m going to be commenting on each episode and analyzing the different Chay scenes. He’s my favorite character, and I thought I’d put down my thoughts (as well as timestamps for his scenes) as a fun way to express that.

Ep 1 & 2, Ep 3

This one is gonna be two-parter because Tumblr has character limits

Episode 4 - The Chay Drought ends, KimChay begins

Gang we are finally back to seeing Chay outside of the previously on segment

Y’all when I tell you I was so excited for this episode

I’m so intrigued by what Porsche says in the sauna. Nampueng why the hell did you say that to baby Porsche? It does develop her character beyond the silent attic wife trapped by Korn though. Clearly, growing up as an adopted child in the mafia world hardened her enough that she felt okay saying this to a child.

Also her saying this about Chay is very telling. Porsche is the heir, the one trapped by parental expectations in a world he doesn’t like (like Kinn???). He has the responsibility to bear whatever he has to in order for Chay to be free. Chay was always meant to be outside of the mafia narrative and escape in a way Nampueng knew her first born never could. Or maybe she wanted to raise a fighter and a strategist, who knows.

Time: 26:00 – 31:19 – Return of the Best Boi

Our longest Chay scene yet, this scene is so long and I kept pausing it to write down every thought in my head.

Chay, I thought we’d never see you again

Sidenote, what’s the name of the friend Chay is with? I think the fandom named him Ohm? Because I’ve seen that name used in fanfics

 “We’ve got a kind graduate that will share his experience with us.” – I know this may be a translation thing, but isn’t Kim still a student at this university? We see him on campus later on in the series getting ragged on for not going to classes, so did the MC actually mean senior? Or maybe he graduated and then is doing his master’s at the same school?

Also, very glad we somewhat got an age on Kim since if he’s a graduate or a senior that puts him in the 21-24 age range, and since Chay is looking at schools to apply to, he’s probably 18/19 age range (yes I know Barcode was younger than that at the time of filming, but Jeff is definitely older than 21-24 so I’m not going to go by actor age). Not the worst age difference, but definitely one that exists.

Chay’s Outfit: Chay immediately stands out in the crowd with his baby blue school uniform and khaki pants. Almost every other student is wearing a very, very pale pink or blue shirt with dark shorts or skirts. The viewer is immediately capable of picking out Chay among the crowd and keeping an eye on him, a hard thing for costuming to achieve when the scene is meant to be a bunch of students all dressed nearly the same. Also, Chay’s school crest says BOC International and he doesn’t have his name sewn onto his shirt like the rest of the students (I’m assuming those are names, if I’m wrong please correct me)

“Who’s that?” “It’s Wik. How could you not know?” – Chay babes, please don’t attack your bestie like that.

Chay’s friend not knowing who Wik is when Chay literally has a whole obsessive fanboy thing going on, very interesting. I understand this is to tell the audience who Wik is, but it also says a lot about Chay’s relationship with his friends. Chay is really good at hiding things when he wants to, we see that throughout the series. The only person he doesn’t really hide anything from is Kim, and that’s honestly partially because Chay has the self-confidence of a god and Kim likes ferreting out secrets.

“I want to study here because of him.” – Oh Chay, you cute little delulu stalker. I know this gets ignored because there are so many other, bigger red flags in this story, but Chay deadass stalks Kim. And no joke, Kim falls for him because of it and later stalks him back. Soulmate behavior I guess. Chay’s red flag is a high school story red flag instead of a mafia storyline red flag so it gets buried. And Chay’s friend 100% sees that. Bro nods his head while internally going damn the delulu runs deep in this one.

Kim’s Wik Outfit: The brown leather jacket with the red lining and silver studs, the insane amount of silver jewelry, the white pants! This is such an outfit. The tendrils of hair artfully hanging in his face. Good shit. Did I stare at Jeff’s hands to see if he was wearing his family ring? Yes, and I won’t be taking questions about it.

“I’ve realized that you’re my good memory. The empty calendar is now full of your name.” “Your laughter that makes me feel like it’s Friday.” - Now I want to dissect this song because this song foreshadows the KimChay relationship so hard, and you don’t really pay much attention to it during your initial viewing because obviously the viewer first time round has no idea what kind of angst KimChay is headed for. Why Don’t You Stay gets all of the praise (obviously she’s the work horse of this drama) while this song gets crumbs. Kim singing this song in front of the person he’s going to fall in love with, who turns into the one good thing in his life, who’s ‘tutoring sessions’ (i.e. the two spy missions and medley of dates afterward) take over his calendar, and who’s laughter makes his heart warm (and 100% haunts him after he makes Chay cry)

I’m really interested in how big of a star Wik is. Chay’s friend doesn’t know him, but he’s obviously popular enough that his university (probably in exchange for some extra credit since Kim skips so much) has him as a headliner for their open house. He even draws a good-sized crowd who seem very knowledgeable about his work not just randoms who are touring the school like Chay’s friend.

I’m sorry bowl cut, drumstick boy has the best reactions throughout this scene. During Wik’s performance, dude is rocking out, and his exuberant thumbs up to what Wik says kills me. He may not be as wild as Chay, but bro is a big Wik fan so I support him. In comparison, Chay is very calm and quiet while watching his idol. He only shows his emotions when he can’t answer the questions and rants about Wik’s MVs.

Kim comes off so cold throughout this scene. The look on his face after he finishes his bit and the MC comes back on stage is dead inside. He is done. He does not want to be here. He wants to go write some songs and add pictures to his conspiracy board. I’m not saying that Kim dislikes performing and being Wik, no. I just think Kim likes the music more than he likes the performance. The public persona of Wik definitely helps him stay away from Korn’s machinations, but I think if Kim could have his music without the people aspect of being a musician he would in a heartbeat. But he puts up with it to stay away from his father.

Chay knowing all of the answers and correcting people. The looks he give the people who answer instead of him is as close to murderous as he gets in this series. If not for the laws of this land and the fact that Porsche doesn’t let him have a knife, he would have stabbed a bitch.

Anyways, there’s my obsessive fan boy! I am not joking when I say Kim fell for him because of his obsessive stalker tendencies. And his friend hyping him up, saying he’ll get the next question, and even trying to get the MC to pick Chay when literally less than an hour ago he had no idea who Wik was or the scale of Chay’s obsession. Need me a friend like that.

Speaking of, the absolute change in Kim’s expression when Chay goes on his little tangent. Bro deadass finally had some life in his eyes. He is shook and falling in love all at the same time. MC has to nudge Kim to get him out of his heart eyes moment.

I maintain that if Kim hadn’t gone all Kimlock Holmes about Porchay being Porsche’s brother he still would have obsessed over the cute boy who has the same obsessive red flag as him. KimChay are freaks who love a bit of stalking.

Bowl Cut’s “Even I didn’t know that. Who the hell are you?” – bro does Wik only have obsessive fans? Also yes, fear Chay’s power Bowl Cut Boy.

I am not gonna lie Barcode towering over people around him is so funny to me. He is baby, but that baby is six feet tall.

Chay is so happy when Kim offers to give him something else!!

[demethinkstoomuch]

I’ve been thinking about the Eighth, for “My brain really wants to do something fanficcy with Silas Octakiseron backing himself into a fatal contradiction” reasons, and so I got to thinking about the planetary set-up, and the general conclusion that it’s probably on or around Uranus. And, well, I’d never really looked at a picture of Uranus, you know? Not a photograph. I’d seen illustrations, and models, and so on, but I’d never really looked at a photo of it. And now I have, and I’ve got just one question:

Why do you have such a baby planet, one the color of mayonnaise?

[nitannichionne]

Leading Lady, Chapter 5: Cab Ride (A Henry Cavill Cast Fic)

CHapter 5 Cab Ride (Kitara POV)

I stood still. Shane Zachary Sheridan looked at me and said my name, and I was rooted to the spot like I was under a spell. His eyes looked bluer than any picture I'd seen. "I..." I searched for words. I wasn't ready for this. I wanted to run, to hide, truthfully get out of the state so Laura's lie would be true. That was the plan I had just browbeaten her into before he came because I had gotten cold feet. I averted my eyes. "You have the wrong--"

"Don't do this." He gently grasped me by my upper arms so I couldn't turn away. "When we started texting years ago, you promised me something." He took a deep breath, and tilted my chin up so my gaze couldn't escape his. "Are you really going to try to break your word-something you said was extremely important to you?"

I swallowed hard. I promised I'd never lie to him. Why? Because I knew I couldn't. I wasn't a good liar, I didn't practice enough to be a good one, and I knew if he locked eyes with me like he did now, I'd be lost. I averted my gaze. "I don't want to."

"Then don't." I glanced up at him as he shook his head slowly. "I don't know why you would." His hands slid down to mine and then he let one of them go, getting a better hold on the other. "We'll talk to you tomorrow."

WHAT? My head snapped up, my eyes pleading with Laura for help.

"What?" Laura's hazel eyes widened, reflecting my alarm on Shane. Thanks, La, I could have done that.

"I think we need to have a talk, that's all," he shrugged, giving Laura a sheepish smile. "and it may be too late for us to come back if you keep regular office hours." He paused. "You do keep regular hours--"

"Yes!" she answered. "yes, I do." She looked at me, and unfortunately this was one of those times I couldn't decipher her expression. "Tomorrow then."

"Cheers," he nodded thankfully, and he led me out the door.

I know what my look said, what my lips mouthed. Help.

Laura, my so-called bestie, just smiled. On your own.

There was no sense in this. None! I had hoped to see him at a cast party after the film wrapped or something, or be there when he was on set and leave before he finished working. Oh, God--we're at the elevator.

"I'm withholding my questions here."

I looked at him. Did he look angry?

"But you know, I've got to get off just one."

I stared at him. He was staring straight ahead, but his expression told it all. He was upset.

"What's going on here?" he asked. "Why didn't you return my texts after I found out about the part? Why didn't you want me to see you?"

I averted my gaze as I saw his head turn with my peripheral vision. I looked at my shoes. "That's three."

I saw his frown deepen, his jaw tighten. He escorted me onto the elevator.

I like our relationship, I wanted to tell him. I like our lols, our shared memes, memories, conversations-I like texting you. I know I don't have a chance with you but as long as we never saw each other, I could enjoy it for what it was. Now, you're close, and I may want more, and I can't take being friend-zoned, at least not at the moment. Let me go, Shane...let me regroup...

Not a good look. I swallowed hard, mortified as my throat tightened. I can't cry-not now! That would be awful! Come on, Kit-

"Don't," he said softly and then heavily sighed. "Don't."

I nodded, taking a deep breath. It was then I realized that there were others in the elevator. There may have been others by the doors. I just didn't notice them. I was that out of it, and cursed myself for it. I am better than this but terrible when broadsided. My hand was squeezed, and I looked up at him. It was just then I noticed he had never let it go since the office.

We caught a cab. Just when the car began to move into traffic, he spoke again.

"I'd like some answers please."

"Shane-"

"Oh, you know my name," Shane muttered sarcastically. "What's with the secrecy of your own?"

"I just..." I looked at the cabbie in the reflection. He was listening. "I didn't want to be found."

"Good job!" he said. "The only reason I was able to find you was because you contacted me after Murder on the--"

"Murder on the Moors!" the cabbie exclaimed, his British accent clear as a bell. "Blimey! You aced that one!"

He turned and managed a smile. "Thanks."

I managed a smile. "I thought he was really good, too--"

"Kit!" Shane said warningly, and I knew he wasn't falling for the distraction.

"Sorry, sir," the cabbie apologized. "Get on with your spat, then."

Spat? As in lovers' spat? Oh, wait...

"Thanks," Shane nodded thankfully to the cabbie. Men conspire-like everywhere you go! His attention was on me now, and I was mentally scrambling. "Did you ever think I wouldn't come after you?"

"Well, no, I didn't," I breathed.  "I'm sorry, I didn't. I just thought--"

"I wouldn't care enough," he finished, disappointment on his features. Great.

"Shane, I didn't think I--I merited--"

"Merited?" He repeated incredulously. "Merited? So what we had wasn't enough?"

My eyes widened at him, but in my peripheral vision I saw the cabbie's eyes widen too. Oh, God. "I was afraid, okay?"

"Of what?" he asked. "I crossed the pond for you. I--" It was then that he noticed the cabbie, hanging on our every word. "Wait till we get back to the hotel."

"Hotel?" I repeated. I saw the cabbie give a small smile. He probably thought we were going to-- "Why?"

He leaned into my ear, and whispered, "You know bloody well why!" He turned and faced ahead. "We're working this out my way. Everything has been on your terms for far too long."

I decided to stay silent. This cabbie was probably ready to pay for this little play, he looked absolutely giddy. I exhaled heavily.  I looked at Shane. He seemed truly upset and guilt gnawed at my insides making my stomach clench. "Would you rather go to my place?" I whispered.

"Not at the moment," he murmured. "Maybe later." That comment was sarcastic.

Finally, we reached a skyscraper where I knew there were luxury rentals and sublets. He let go of my hand to pay for the cab, and then reclaimed it to pull me out with him. Luckily I managed to dry my hand on my pants, but now he had me by my wrist. Was he ever going to let go? Did he want to? Did I want him to? He grasped my hand and walked into the hotel.

He led me past the front desk and to the elevator. I kept up with him, but it was clear he was the boss of things, like I was some captive. People saw us go by and took note, some even staring. We got in the elevator, and I stood there, staring straight ahead.

Not a word.

I felt panic begin to rise. What was he going to do? Tell me to never text him again? Yell at me till I cried? Go all Shades of Gray? What?

@mistress-of-ward​ @summersong69​ @kebabgirl67​ @griscka75​

[t-o-m-hollands]

A/N: Cointens violence and mentions of injuries, war and blood. Also swearing and drinking. Smut in future parts, nothing in this. 

“It seemed like a nice neighbourhood to have bad habits in.”  

― Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep  

When Tom’s grandfather passes away, he inherits an office in the middle of a buzzling London. He has no idea what to do with it.

The year is 1947 and Tom is restless after the war. After a chance meeting with his old comrade Harrison and a drunken lunch at the local pub they decide to open up a detective agency. After finding you huddled up in a library while chasing an unwilling witness Tom decides to hire you as the agency’s secretary. You, reluctantly, take up the offer from the charming stranger.

Together the three of you face some of London’s most hard-boiled criminals and lethal femme fatales.  

You have to navigate your way through adulthood, life after war and your growing feelings for your boss.

***

The pub was unusually crammed with people, workers meeting up with each other for a pint before heading home to their families. He could see them through the muted windows, cheering and laughing, pints of beer clutched in their hands. Now, it certainly wasn’t the nicest pub in London, a thick cover of mud covered the floor, the walls were so dirty that it was hard to tell what the original wallpaper had looked like. But then again, it was the Bugle, a pub well hidden in the Shafto Mews in London. It was not a pub you just happened to stroll in to, looking for a place to eat or a friendly place to catch up with a long-lost comrade in. It was a seedy and dirty place, where the beers came cheap and the brawls started easy.

The barman, a Mr. Eric Brew, was a brusque and quick-tempered elderly man with a beer belly so large it made it hard for him to steer his way through the many bottles and glasses behind the bar. Luckily for him it was unusual for anyone to ordered anything other than a pint or perhaps a glass of cheap and watered-down whiskey.

Tom loved this place, because no one ever bothered him here. This was not a place to talk to strangers in.  

On this particular autumn afternoon the air outside was crisp and full of the smell of pavement after rain, it smelled of London. Currently though the sky was bluer than it had been all summer and the leaves on the trees had just started to change their colours. There was a distinct chill in the air. Tom shivered in his dress shirt, thinking to himself that this was sure to be the last time that year he’d get away with not wearing a jacket.

As he stepped inside, he exchanged the almost impossible fresh autumn air for a cigarette smoke fog. It was unusually busy for a Tuesday afternoon, and the sound of loud voices and clinking glasses filled the air. Tom gathered it must be payday. It was long ago that he stopped to bother about the days of the week or when pay was due. Not because of an abundance of money but for the lack of a steady job.

Walking up the bar he told Eric to pour the usual and handed him a coin. Eric grunted and started to pour into a glass that looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in months.

“Busy today, mate” Tom stated. Eric grunted again and handed him his drink.  

As Tom sat down in the far, and well hidden, corner of the pub he thought to himself that his so-called conversation with the barman had been his longest conversation in days. After the war had ended, he’d stayed out in France, despite his mother’s letters begging him to come home he hadn’t. It wasn’t that he didn’t miss his family, on the contrary, being apart from them felt more torturous than anything he’d lived through during the war.

Still, he thought as he gulped down on his drink, he had been through war, and that does change a person. He wasn’t the same care-free boy who’d so gladly enlisted, desperate for some preconceived idea that the war would satisfy his deep-rooted need for adventure, to please his longing for glory. He’d happily waved his younger brothers and his parents goodbye on the platform, surrounded by sad looking boys saying farewells to their loved ones.

The war had not given him what he wanted. There had been no glory or sense of adventure.  And even though the worst injury he’d suffer was a broken nose that had more to do with his own stupidity than actual fighting he had still seen the suffering of others. Walked through villages so bombed there was nothing, no human nor animal left. Nothing but ruin and corpses left to rot. He’d seen the torn apart remains of what had once been children on the street. He had had to breath trough the smell of decaying flesh as they walked by. He had lost friends and comrades.  

The war had changed him, and he still wasn’t sure if it was for better or worse. All he knew was that he couldn’t face his father, or his mother. Not yet. He thought of his little brothers, how much five years must have changed them. He quietly wondered if he’d recognise them if he passed them on the streets today. He tried to convince himself that he would, and only after half a bottle of whiskey did he feel brave enough to admit it to himself that he probably wouldn’t. Too long had passed.  

The only reason he had come back to England at all was for a surprise visit from a solicitor, who had tracked him down somewhere outside of Cannes, informing him of the passing of his grandfather. Tom had few memories of said grandfather What he could recall was a fearsome and stern figure, Victorian in his manner. Tom could remember looking up to the damn near giant as he looked down at Tom with disapproval written all over his face as Tom stood in front of a broken vase, he’d accidentally shattered while chasing the cat. It certainly had not been a man fond of children. Tom had always kept his distance from the man whenever they had visited, scared of the scolding the older man was more than capable of.

Therefore, it had been, to say the least, a great surprise when said grandfather had left his entire inheritance to his oldest grandson.

Sure, there hadn’t been a lot of actual money, not after all the death-duties and inheritance taxes had gone through, but he’d gotten his office and the apartment above it, placed bang on one of the busiest streets of London. What his grandfather had used the office for he had no idea, and the solicitors refused to tell him anything about is grandfathers’ dealings, but judging by the state of the place it must have been an awfully long time since anyone sat their foot in the place, probably not since before the war, the first one. The entire place was, like this very pub, filled with dirt and dust and long abandoned forgotten things. Most of which was nothing more than trash, a chair that surely would break as soon as anyone sat down on it, a desk with one broken leg and a filing cabinet full of mouldy documents.

The only distinctive feature was a rather well-made painting. Not only was the portrait of the young lady striking, but the gold frame surrounding it was solid gold. Something that had chocked Tom greatly. For he had never seen anything look quite so out of place than that gold framed picture of a young, beautiful women with seemingly shining eyes –

“Surely it can’t be – Tom Holland, OI! Tom!”

Tom instinctively looked up, only to meet the eyes of a dearly beloved friend.

“Mate! As I live and breathe!”

“Where have you been, buddy?” Harrison happily exclaimed, pulling out the chair opposite of Tom and before pretty much falling down on it, a pint of beer in hand and a massive grin on his face.

“I haven’t seen you since Monte Cassino– ” he silenced himself. Maybe because of the look in Tom’s eyes, maybe because of memories of his own.

(I haven’t seen you since the war, I haven’t seen you since we were crying in the bunkers, thinking we would die. Hoping that we would. Hoping that we wouldn’t.)

“Yeah” is all Tom can manage to get out, lungs suddenly feeling too tight.

They both take large gulps from their glasses, avoiding the others eye.

“So how you’ve been, mate?” Harrison asks, sounding more mellow now, less cheerful.

“It’s been good, bud” Tom says, trying to sound happy, trying to raise the mood a little. He can see the dark clouds of the war in Harrisons eyes, can see it clear as day even in this smoke-filled, god forsaken pub. It’s still haunting him. And he doesn’t quite know what else to say, doesn’t know how to voice the fact that he himself is hardly sleeping anymore, that he spent two years in France living as a wanderer and picking up odd jobs wherever he could find them, not even trying to pick up the pieces from the past. Not knowing where to begin

(At home, the part of him that’s braver than the rest seem to always whisper. Start at home and build from there.)

“Yeah?” There’s a note of hope in Harrison’s voice and as he looks at him the clouds in his eyes seem to clear, if only a little, and Tom’s heart breaks for his old friend. He knows that desperation, saw it all over France in the soldier's eyes. A desperate longing for proof that there was something good in the world, even after everything that had been done.  

“Yes, mate! It’s been grand. I came into an inheritance and all!” And upon seeing the look of pure surprise in Harrisons now cloud-free face Tom bursts into genuine laughter, not caring to think about how long ago it had been since he had made a whole-hearted, genuine laughter.

“Alright, let’s order some food and then let’s catch up, yeah?”

And they did. The food at The Bugle was awful. Tom knew this, since coming back to London he’d drink away his consciousness in this pub and once or twice he had given in and ordered what The Bugle’s chef referred to as food. He knew this but did not care, for the company was excellent.

It turned out Harrison had come home immediately after the war. Had tried to pick up the pieces from before. He met up with his old friends (the ones that’d survived), he dated a different girl every week, unable to settle and now lived in his parent’s townhouse in Belgravia while they spent most of their time on the family estate out in Norfolk. He too was currently out of a job, however the difference was that Harrison had no need for work, the allowance his parents gave him and his own grandparents inheritance (which, although Tom never asked, but presumed) far exceeded his own.

Tom sensed that Harrison, just like himself, felt a deeply-rooted restlessness since coming home. It was in the way his left leg wouldn’t stop tapping, his regular glances around the room, in the way he just shovelled the food around his plate, not eating much.

Tom in return told him, although with far less detail than his friend had given, of staying out in France, of a surprise visit by the solicitors. He told him of the abandoned office and apartment he now was the owner of. He even told him of the portrait hanging above the broken desk.

They talked about old times, of old friends and past lovers, and every time the name of one of those comrades that didn’t make it to the end of the war was mentioned an awkward silence spread between them before the other one quickly started a new story.

(Harrison noticed that Tom never mentioned his parents, or his brothers. Not once. But he doesn’t say anything. He think they’ll get to that eventually.)

A loud crashing breaks their conversation and both Harrison and Tom are on their feet before either one of them has even registered where the sound came from.

“YOU FUCKING SWINE, I’LL GIVE YOU NOTHING!” The screeching, and surprisingly high-pitched voice, comes from Eric the barman, who’s standing arms raised above his head behind the bar. A young man, not even wearing anything to mask his face, is holding a revolver and pointing it right at Eric’s chest.

Before he’s even fully comprehended what he’s doing he’s halfway across the pub, people scattering out of his way, and out of the robbers aim. He can sense Harrison’s presence right behind him and then they’ve both tackled the young man to the ground. All Tom can think about is to get his hands on the man’s revolver, so that he can secure it. He sees how Harrison tries to get a hold of the young robbers’ arms as he’s waving them around, trying to fight them both at once. Unfortunately, he gets in a lucky swing that hits Tom right over his nose, a nose that’s already been broken once, and blood gushes out. The man looks surprised by this, partly because of the sudden stream of blood falling over him and partly because he actually just hit someone. Tom quickly uses this for his advantage and dives down for the revolver as Harrison secures the burglar’s arms behind his back.  

They manage to hold him down until the police comes. They give them a quick rundown of what happened. Eric, furious and face alarmingly red, fills in when he manages to find words, shaking from fury. One of the policemen offer to drive Tom to the hospital to have his nose looked at but he refuses. Then they ask if he’d like to press charges. Tom takes one quick look at the young man now sitting in a police car and shakes his head. The boy, for on closer inspection he’s nothing more than a boy, looks terrified, and honestly, he’s already in enough trouble with the law. During the past few years crime in London has been on the rise. Young and restless men all coming home from the war, looking for jobs where there are none and haunted from memories from the battlefields. It’s no wonder there’s desperation in the air.

So, Tom and Haz walks away, leaving the two police cars and its officers, a furious pub owner with an unexpectedly high-pitched voice, and an entire pub of people with their noses pressed up against its foggy windows.

As they walk, without discussing where they’re going, Tom suddenly bursts out in laughter. He doesn’t know why, but the restlessness that’s done nothing short but haunted him for years now has suddenly vanished. There’s a pause and then Harrison joins in and Tom knows, knows that he feels the same. That this sudden rush of adrenalin was just what he needed too.

They practically double over with laughter, leaning on the other to keep upright and when they finally stop a comfortable silence fill the quiet as they walk on.

Before long, and before having reflected on where his feet are leading him, they’re standing outside of 15 Sloane street.

“Is this it?” Harrison asks, voice filled with curiosity as he looks up at the red-bricked building.

“Yeah” is all Tom manage to get out as an answer. Because suddenly he feels almost shy, like he’s showing Harrison some long kept secret. And for a moment they just stand and admire the building. “Can I look inside?” Haz asks, curiosity colouring his every word. So, Tom unlocks the door and they step inside.

Inside the air feels heavy, not like in the pub where it had been full of smoke, but instead it feels old, and if it hadn’t been so damn cold outside Tom would have opened up the windows.

The ground is as covered in mud and dust and dirt as the pubs floor. The walls look dull too. But the space is good, a large foyer to receive visitors, a guest bathroom, an office, a kitchen and a staff bathroom too.  

“So” Harrison finally says, having taken in the place in silence. “What are you going to do with it?”

And Tom doesn’t know what to say because honestly – is that not just the question that’s frequently been on his mind since he first got here. “Dunno” ha answers lamely. “I suppose,” he starts but stops himself, feeling too embarrassed at his childish idea.

“What?” Haz encourages.

“Well” Tom begins, and then before he loses his gut he rambles out “It would be cool to be a detective though, wouldn’t it?” He doesn’t look at his old friend as he says this. He should though, because he misses out on the massive grin spreading across Harrison’s face.

“Oh totally!” He all but yells. “Like Sherlock Holmes, or Phillip Marlowe?”

“Phillip Marlowe, surely!” Tom responds, finally looking at his old comrade. He feels light as air, having finally put words on a wish that’s long been on his mind.

But now Haz looks awkwardly down, down on his well-polished, hand-made shoes and the muddy ground. “What?” Tom asks, worry threatening to blow his happy bubble.

“Look, you don’t have to, it’s just, like if you don’t want it or you find me lacking you could just sack me bu–“

“Of course, you’ll join me” Tom interrupts Harrisons awkward attempt at asking to work with him. “Really?” He asks, eyes gleaming with happiness. “You, ‘course mate, wouldn’t wanna do it without you”.

***

And so, it begins.

They start with trying to make the place habitable. After all, the office space needs to be a presentable enough environment for clients to feel comfortable to share their troubles with them and preferably the apartment above needs to be clean enough for Tom to live in without contracting a disease. It’s hard work, and Harrison loudly complains and gruntles and questions why they can’t hire someone to do it. Tom just laughs and tells him to shut his over-privileged mouth and keep mopping.

The truth is they could easily get someone in to do the cleaning for them, it’s just that Tom doesn’t want to, feels like they really ought to do this by hand, by themselves. To build the business from the ground up. And quite frankly, some real, good hard work is just what he needs. For the first time in ages he’s so physically exhausted by the time he goes to bed that he falls asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow. He still has nightmares, but he gets in a couple more hours sleep every night and that makes it worth it.

Even though Harrison loudly grumbles about the rough labour he is a hard worker. Tom teases him a lot about it. Telling him he didn’t expect to end up doing this when he was sent to that posh public school as a child. Telling him that this is what good honest works feels like. Informing him that the pain he had in his knees from scrubbing the floors is what heavy labour feels like. It’s all jokes thought, for even they grew up worlds apart on the social scale they still fought on the same battlefield and as children they fought the same imaginary dragons.

In the end aid comes in the form of Lady Lauren Osterfield herself.

Tall and lean and dressed from top to toe in fine silk and fur in soft colours and with hair, the same shade as her son, in soft waves. She sways into the office one day, unannounced, as Tom’s trying to scrub the dirt from the walls and Harrison’s sprawled out on the floor, fighting a particularly stubborn piece of dirt. A hard a look of deepest disapproval is written all over her face as she takes in the scene.

“Darling” she drags out the word and make the endearment sound like a loving, but stern warning. “You simply cannot do this on your own”

“But mommy we-” Harrison begin but she stops him with a raised hand. “I will hear none of it, sweetie. If there is one thing I know it’s potential, and this place has got spades of it. However, I will not see my darling boys like this” she huffs, then adds “also, the rate you two are going at you’ll be in your 50’s before you even had your first client.”

She walks over to where Tom stands, now leaning against the broken desk, hands in pockets and covered in dust and sweat. “Sweetheart, it is wonderful to see you again” And she strokes his cheek with a satin gloved hand and Tom can’t help but to lean into the touch.

He had spent many a school holiday at the Osterfield house. Although, house wasn’t the right word. Technically it was a manor house – Osterfield manor was in fact its name. It had been built by Lord Ashley Osterfield in the early 1600th and had stood proudly on its green fields ever since. Tom had lived in the village, in a small cottage with his mother, father, three brothers and a half-blind cook/nanny named Cully. Harrison, since it was the family tradition, had been sent away to Eton whereas Tom had gone to the village school.  But whenever summer holiday rolled around, they’d play on the grounds to the manor and in the forest surrounding it. They had played thief’s and robbers, Robin Hood and Peter Pan. Life had been blissful and full of light. He can still remember how the last month before summer break had seemed endless, how he’d counted down the days until his best friend would return, staring out of the window during class, not listening to whatever Ms Frank was going on about. They sent each other letters of course. About what was going on at home, what tricks each had played on their friends, or on their teachers, how awful school was or about the latest mystery novel they’d read.

His memories of the Osterfield family were many and fond. Lady Osterfield, with her loving but stern ways, never looking anything less than perfection, bringing them meringues and freshly made lemonade to the treehouse where they sat people-watching, spying on the garden parties going on below. Memories of Lord Osterfield, reading his newspaper outside in the warm summer sun, dressed in linen suits and with a great moustache covering his upper lip, teaching Tom tennis and playing croquet with them. And then little Charlotte Osterfield, Harrisons little sister. With her long, blonde hair neatly combed and braided, always carrying around a teddy bear, following them wherever they went. Harrison would get rather annoyed with her for that, but Tom had always said that she could join them if she wanted to.

He remembers Christmas eve at their house. A ginormous three in the hall, neatly decorated by Lady Osterfield herself. Countless of cousins and great-aunts and uncles coming over. The staff running around cleaning every corner. The chef, Mary her name had been, yelling orders and shouting herself blue in the face. The end result had been incredible though, and as snow covered the entire manor and its grounds there was a fire lit in every room, the smell of ham and turkey in the air, glitter and light and mistletoe and presents in overload. He remembers still, being sent home in the horse driven carriage on Christmas eve, belly full of delicious food and sweets, and presents from Lord and Lady Osterfield to every member of his family, including one to Cully, surrounding him as he watched the snow fall over the pretty little village outside the carriage window.

“Hello, Lady Osterfield, it’s been a while” he manages to get out. Because this is, has always been, his second mother. And it hurts even more to see her now, despite the fact that war doesn’t seem to have aged her a day. But seeing her reminds him so much of his own mommy, and his stomach seems to revolt.

“That” she says, and he thinks her eyes are wet with unshed tears “it certainly has been”. She doesn’t ask how his war had been, why he hadn’t return sooner, or sent them letters. Probably understands that he cannot give her those answers. Not yet at least. She lowers her hand and take a step back.

“So” she announces and there’s a level of authority to her voice that makes both Harrison and Tom stand up straighter. “I will send Georgina over, hopefully she can start tomorrow already, because this really is urgent”. She looks around her surrounding, the broken furniture, the floors and ceiling that refuse to give up the dirt they’ve been holding onto for years, despite Tom and Harrisons desperate scrubbing.

“Sorry? Mommy, who.... who on earth is Georgina?”  

Tom smiles, for he can almost hear the curse word Harrison so nearly lets out.

“Oh darling, it’s Georgina Brewster, she is simply marvellous and really the only one who can save this place. I shall call on her immediately, she will work wonders, just you see”.

*

Georgina Brewster, as it turns out, would have put fear of the devil into any and every one of the generals Tom had met during the war. She practically comes in as a steamroller into the office the very next day and before either Tom or Harrison know what’s going on they’ve been thrown out of their office with strict orders to “keep out of the way, for gods sake, and don’t come back until next Friday at least!”

And because neither Tom nor Harrison dare to contradict her, even though Tom’s apartment is above the office and he now has nowhere to sleep, they listen and keep out of her way, spending their time at Harrisons, or rather Harrisons parents, place in Belgravia.

There they plan out and strategize, trying to agree on what exactly their business should be and how they should conduct it.

Their first hurdle is the name of the agency.  

“So”

They’re at ‘The Bugle’ again and Tom is swirling the liquid in his glass back and forth, holding a lit cigarette in his other hand. Around them the air is filled with smoke and conversations. Tom had, rather cheekily, asked the barman if they shouldn’t get their drinks for free, seeing as they did save his ass just the other night. The barman had done his usual ritual of mumbles and grumbles before pouring them some watered down Irish whiskey.

“So?” he asks, implying that Harrison should continue his unfinished statement.

“What should we name it, mate?” Harrison is leaning back against the wall, his long legs sprawled out. He looks as exhausted as Tom feels.

“Name what?” Tom dumbly inquires, only half his mind on the conversation, the other on the gorgeous woman at the bar. She looks strangely out of place, wearing a respectably coat, dark hair neatly organised in curls and a soft smile on face as she’s conversation with the infamously grumpy barman, who – and Tom can hardly believe his eyes – is smiling back at her.

Harrison snorts and with a voice practically dripping in sarcasm he answers “Oh the golden retriever puppy we’re adopting! The fuck you think, mate? The detective agency of course!”

Tom gives his friend a kick on his sprawled-out legs.

“Holland Detective Services” he then states.

Harrison goes quiet for a second, rubbing the aching spot on his leg where Tom managed to get in a perfect hit, the bastard had always been good and noting soft spots. “Not Holland & Osterfield?” he asks, only half joking.

“Nah, too posh mate, we’ll sound like some solicitors’ firm, you know, like ‘Bundle & Alfredson & Alfredson & Bundle”, too ridiculous. Plus, no one trusts solicitors with their secrets, they’re too posh and proper. We need people to feel like they can come to us with things they can’t go to the police with.”

He looks over to the bar again, but the beatiful lady is nowhere to be seen.

*

And so, Harrison Detective Service is founded. The office (the apartment miss Brewster luckily left him handle himself) is revealed to them.

It’s perfect. There’s no other word for it. It’s looks professional but not over styled. The two large desks made from oak, the bar table with its whiskey decanter, the filing cabinets strategely placed in the little backroom, the lamps giving the office an almost golden and mysterious lightning, and on the wall hanging above his own desk, the painting of the woman that his grandfather left him. The only thing remaining from the original office.

*

It doesn’t take long until their first client arrives. He’s a perhaps not the ideal client, Tom notes. The man is in his late 50’s, wearing an ill fitted suit and smelling distinctly of B.O. He is however willing to pay.

Thus, this is how Tom ends up chasing a, to say the least, unwilling witness all down Euston Road. The man he’s chasing is fast, and Tom’s side is hurting and he feels out of form. He really should have had something other than whiskey for lunch. The man does a quick turn left, right over the road and Tom’s right at his heel.

A car horn blows and there’s a blinding light and for a moment Tom’s back on the battlefield in France, he throws up his arms, trying to shield himself for whatever is coming at him. His entire body tenses up and he waits for the inventible crash. But it doesn’t come, and there’s shouting but he can’t hear what they’re saying, the blood rushing through his head too loud for anything else to sound real. His lungs feel too tight and his breaths are shallow.  

Slowly he regains control of himself, as he tries to take the world around him in.

The shouting is coming from a very angry driver, half hanging out of his window telling Tom to get out of the way, waving his arms in fuming gestures. People on the pavement have stopped what they’re doing, some mid conversation or mid walk, all just staring at him. He jumps into action again, desperately trying to push down the part of his brain that’s still in France. He can’t see his witness, but there’s only one place he really can have gone.

He runs up the marble stairs, ignoring the glaring stares around him.

The foyer is impressive to say the least. It’s a large circular room, marble from floor to ceiling. Right in front of him, but all across the room, is a reception and an elderly woman sitting behind it.

“Excuse me sir, we close in twenty minutes,” she calls after him, but it’s all she manages to get out before he’s gone, having made his way all across the hall and into the large oak doors with a sign simply stating ‘Main Library’.

The doors slam behind him and the sound eco in the silence. At first he’s taken aback, for this is nothing like the marble mausoleum he’s left behind, and if he thought the reception area had been large then this room is massive. It’s nothing short of a labyrinth of oak bookshelves, reaching from top to ceiling and filled with large volumes of books that look as if they must be older than queen Victoria.

He can only assume that this is where his witness is hiding, somewhere in this maze he has taken cover, wrongly assuming that Tom will just give up and leave. His witness is in no such luck. Tom does however remember noting the lineament of a revolver inside the other man’s jacket, and by now he’s had more than enough time to take it out, perhaps just waiting for Tom to be close enough not to miss.

The library looks empty and surely it must be this late. On slow but quiet feet he makes his way to the left side of the room, deciding to start there. Careful not to make a sound he removes his own revolver from its holster. Slowly he starts to make his way down the aisles, every time he turns a corner he knows it’s about whoever is the quickest with their trigger that will win.

By the time he’s made it down aisle three he can feel his heart beat so hard in his chest he finds himself wondering if it’s going to leave a bruise on his skin with its violent beating. Adrenaline has been running in his veins since the near contact with the automobile outside.

And then he hears it, a sound, what might be the noise of shuffling, and he starts to move with even higher awareness of the danger of the situation. Any second now he could stare down the barrel of a gun.

Before he can be a coward about it, he jumps around the corner of the shelf, gun in hand and pointing it straight at the witness.

Except it’s not him.

It most certainly is not him.

A pair of enormous and breathtakingly beautiful - but also terrified - eyes stare at him and for a second the whole world seems to stop, or crash, and Tom can’t help but feel like he’s a planet that completely unexpectedly has gotten knocked of its axis. He goes still, not just his body but his mind too. Everything just seems to stop, and Tom can not remember anytime that has ever happened to him before. All he sees is a pair of hauntingly beautiful, and vert familiar, eyes.

“I’m sorry sir, but weapons are not allowed inside the library.” Her voice is soft and even, but Tom can hear the slight tremble behind them, he can tell she’s playing braver than she feels. He knows that trick all too well. So, he lowers his revolver, but doesn’t unload it, still ready for his hostile witness to pop up, and if he does Tom will be ready for him.

“I beg your pardon, miss” he says and looks her up and down, trying to take in the rest of the woman in front of him. He’s pretty sure she is the same woman he saw at the Bugle the other night. She’s only a few centimetres shorter than he is, but then she’s wearing a pair of kitten heels. Her black pencil skirt and white blouse practically scream out respectability and woman. Around her neck hangs a thin, golden necklace with a little golden heart attached to it. A fleeting question of who has given her this pass his brain. And then there’s her hair, brown and styled in and fashionable curls.

“Sir” she says, and she sounds sterner now, a little wrinkle between her eyebrows “could you please pu-“ but before she can finish the sentence, before she can even finish her though Tom’s pushed her down on the ground, trying to cover her with his body as bullets fly around him. He swears under his breath, and he feels the librarians still body under him and he can practically feel her heartbeat. He tries very hard not to react to how close their bodies are to each other. His hyper focused mind hears her hitched breathing even above the sound of a firing gun and he sends a silence prayer to whatever god might be listening that she’ll get out of this unharmed.

The witness is far away from them, all across the hall and if it wasn’t for the fact that he didn’t want to leave this woman unprotected he would just hope for the best and rush against him, firing as many bullets as he had and if he survived this, and if Harrison found out he would just have to take his scolding later. Still trying to cover the women underneath him he raises his gun and fires. He knows the chances of him aiming right are damn near zero from here, but he wants to make it clear to the other man that he sure is not going to give in without a fight.

Still keeping his eyes on the bookshelf the witness has hidden behind he whispers to the librarian, “when I move off you, go hide behind the bookshelf, do not run for the main entrance whatever you do, but if there’s another way out, and you get a chance to leave, I suggest you fucking take it miss”. He hears a hiss of breath and then, a quiet “alright” and that is all he needs.

Springing to his feet he rushes seven meters ahead and then throws himself down behind another bookshelf. Daring to cast a look behind him he just about manages to see the secretary hide behind another bookshelf. Good, he thinks to himself, at least he doesn’t have to worry about her. And so he sprints out from the bookshelf and runs for all his might straight against the bookshelf the witness is hiding behind. It doesn’t fall, but he can hear countless of books falling, hopefully all over the man with the gun. He hears a shout of surprise and despite the situation he can’t help but smiling, the all too familiar rush of adrenalin runs through him and he jumps around the corner. However, before he can even raise his weapon something hard hits his temple and the world goes white for a moment as he stumbles over.

The other man is above him, throwing punches, hitting different places of Tom’s face with every hit. Tom tries kicking and luckily enough the stupid idiot above him has mounted him at chest level and haven’t taken his legs in consideration. One of Tom’s kicks hits the shelf and as he grabs the man's arms with his, stopping the flow of punches he sees a thick book (Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, he notices with glee) fall down and hit the man straight on the head. This time it’s his turn to stumble and Tom shake him off him with ease, but the other man quickly recovers, and lunches over him again, arms stretched out to grasp around his throat. Before he can even try to fight the bigger man off him, the loud sound of the shot of a gun echoes against the walls of the library and he stills. Then he feels it. A bright burning in his side and then, another shot.

He manages to turn around trying to make sense of the situation. On the floor lays the hostile witness, clutching his leg, where he’s clearly just been shot, and above him stands the librarian. Arms shaking as she’s clasping the gun in her hands.

For a moment Tom forgets about everything else. The mess they’ve made. The fact the police must be on their way. The bleeding man beside him. The fact that he’s bleeding too. All he sees is he terrified but impossibly brave woman in front of him.

Slowly, trying to ignore the pain in the side of his stomach, he gets up and walks over to her, arms stretched up in a gesture to show that he means her no harm, for she looks terrified to the point where she’s trembling all over. Her eyes are still fixed on the man on the ground, who’s shouting in agony.  

“Look at me” he says, and his voice is firm and calm “Hey, miss, look at me”. She does, and something in his stomach churns. Once in the woods he and Harrison had all but stumbled over an injured deer, it had had the same look upon its face then as the woman had upon hers now. But he doesn’t flinch, don’t want her to lose focus but keep it on him and not the bleeding bastard on the floor.

When he finally reaches her, he takes the gun from her still clasped hands, unloads it, and put it in its folder by his chest.

“You’ll be alright, yeah? I promise you’ll be alright” he tries to reassure her but she keeps looking at him with that utterly terrified look on her face.

“Just hang on for a second, alright?” He doesn’t want take his eyes off of her, but he knows he has to, so he turns away from her and walks over to the injured man. Leaning down over him he whispers in his ear “mate, the police and probably the ambulance are on their way. They will be here any moment. Now, listen up, alright, ‘cause I’m only saying this once. You will be a fucking gentleman about this and when the police ask what happened here you’ll tell them it was some randy bugger trying to nick your stuff, yeah? You defended yourself, ‘cause you’re a lad and all that bullocks. They won’t believe you, but they can’t prove anything else.” His voice is low and threatening and he knows he has the witness full attention. “And in return” he continues “in return, I’ll stop hunting you over this Faulcon business, yeah? I’ll go after someone else, and when I finally have enough to turn that bastard over to the police, your name won’t be mentioned anywhere, yeah?” The man looks up at him with bloodshot eyes and nods.

Moving away from him he swiftly walks over to where the other mans’ revolver got lost in the fight and he takes it, places it in the inside pocket of his jacket. Then he walks over to the librarian, who, apart from her shaking hands has not moved a muscle. She’s staring at him, but not at his face this time, but eyes fixed on the wound at his right side. It’s pretty much only graced him. It still hurts though, and a bloodstain is growing ever larger and larger, staining his white button ups to the point where he doubts he’ll ever get the red out.

“Miss, look at me, yeah?” He tried to get eye-contact with her again, because even if she’s been incredible brave so far, she looks as if she’s about to pass out “Just focus on me, I’ve got to get us out of here thought, do you know any other way then the main entrance? Some back door?”

As he’s talking he buttons up the suit jacket, effectively hiding the wound. He sees her eyes flicker down for a brief second as he does so. Then, as if she suddenly wakes up she takes a breath so deep he can’t help but to wonder if her lungs had been empty. “Yes” she then says, and he feels the immense relief over the fact that her voice sounds clear and controlled again. “It leads straight out into a back alley and then out on Gordon Street.”

He stares at her, taking her in again. Her dark hair still in perfect curls framing her, perhaps somewhat paler, face. Her back is straight, her hands still somewhat shaking. He notices her red fingertips, and no gold ring to be seen. At least he doesn’t have to deal with some unknown husband, who probably wouldn’t be too happy with him if he’d heard what Tom dragged her into.

“What’s your name?” he asks, because he has to know.

“Laura” she breath out.  

Just a first name then.  

“Well Laura” he says “let’s leave”.

He takes one of her shaking hands in his, and she leads the way out of the chaotic scene, leaving behind them a massive hall and a labyrinth of bookshelves and in that labyrinth an injured man slowly losing consciousness.

***

A/N -  Harrisons family is of course entirely fictionalised. As is everyone in this story.  

Also, my sort of face claim for Laura in this story is Gene Tierney, but imagine it as whoever you like.

[atths--twice]

Daily Dose of Sunshine

An AU, in which Mulder watches Scully from afar. Or is she watching him?

So today is @linlo-eggshellheart​‘s birthday and I was not aware until this morning. Recently on Twitter a picture was making the rounds where people “filled the jars” for the types of tropes they enjoyed. Well, Lin had every jar filled but one. Now, how am I supposed to resist writing something to match what she enjoyed? 

I am not a huge AU reader or writer, generally sticking to canon compliant, BUT a Flower/Coffee shop AU is just too fluffy to pass up. I hope you all enjoy this sweet little story. 😊

He watched her from across the street, her long red hair in a loose braid laying over her shoulder. The apron she wore today was a periwinkle blue and he knew, without being closer, that it would make her eyes even bluer, which seemed an impossible feat.

A customer approached her and as she turned toward her with a smile, his heart raced and he had to catch his breath. He could not hear what they were saying, but her laugh… it rang out like a sweet melody, echoing against the buildings.

He watched her help the customer, once again admiring the care she took in helping someone pick out a bouquet of flowers. She laughed again and nodded, looking his way and his breath caught again. He stood quickly to his feet, his body and mind seemingly unconnected, as he took a step forward before she ushered the customer inside to pay.

Idiot, he thought, shaking his head and sitting down, with a loud sigh. As if she was looking over here. He shook his head again and closed his eyes briefly, the sounds of the city waking up loud in his ears.

The squeak of brakes caused him to open his eyes. The bus he was waiting for was pulling up and he sighed as he stood up and grabbed his bag. Stepping onto the bus, he sat by the window, hoping to see her one last time before the bus drove away.

Fate was on his side as a disabled person was in need of assistance to get onto the bus, halting its departure. He kept an eye on both the flower shop and on his fellow passenger, his breath fogging up the window as he breathed out his hope of seeing her.

The door opened and she and the customer walked out, smiling and chatting about what he did not know. The bouquet of flowers was beautiful, but was nothing compared to her beauty. She laughed again and it was muffled inside of the bus.

He wiped at the window, wanting a better view of her. The customer walked away, waving goodbye and she did the same, crossing her arms with a smile. Just before she walked back to the work she was doing earlier, she looked his way, staring directly at him and holding his gaze.

His mouth fell open and he forgot to breathe. She raised an eyebrow at him and turned around, heading back to the numerous containers of flowers she was arranging and preparing for the day.

He stood up just as the bus began to move and he fell back into his seat, his bag hitting him hard on his leg. Wincing, he craned his neck, no longer able to see her, but trying desperately to do so.

“Holy shit,” he mumbled, rubbing at his leg. “Holy shit.” He shook his head and grinned with a laugh and then inhaled a breath, his face hot with embarrassment.

He swallowed, thinking of her face and dissecting every movement it had made. Was she angry? Telling him with that eyebrow lift that she knew he was watching her and to stop? Was she encouraging him to do more than stare? Letting him know she would welcome… something?

He debated about it for the rest of the day, going from one decision to the other. He would let it be, not wanting to make a fool of himself as he undoubtedly would. No, he would walk into that flower shop and ask her out to the coffee shop a few doors down. Or out to dinner.

Or to marry him.

No, he thought almost angrily as he rode the bus home. Better to do nothing. She’ll think I’m some kind of creep. Hell, maybe she already does.

He shook his head as the bus slowed down at his stop. He helped an elderly woman, holding her bag of groceries and offering his hand as she stepped down. She smiled as he handed them back to her and she patted his hand.

“Thank you, young man. The world needs more men like you,” she said kindly and he shook his head, looking down at the ground.

“You’re welcome. Thank you,” he said, looking back up at her and then past her as he saw the lights to the flower shop were still on, something he had never seen at this hour.

The woman walked away saying thank you again, but he did not respond. He was staring at the shop, debating on whether to cross the street and investigate or to head home. The flowers that normally sat outside in the mornings, were not there and the sidewalk was empty and wet.

What if she’s hurt? he thought, taking a step forward, and pressing the crosswalk button. That probably was not the case, but if it was, he would never forgive himself.

The walk signal lit up and with every step, his heart pounded harder against his chest. He had only been in the shop once and it had been enough to fall head over heels for her, even though they had not even spoken.

She was beautiful, which was obvious to anyone who saw her, but it was so much more than that. She was kind, her smile was like a balm, and her laugh… Christ…

She was rather short, needing to stand on something to reach things as she arranged the flowers and helped customers. He had found it to be adorable as he had watched her, even though he knew she most likely hated her short stature.

What had pushed him over the edge, however, was her eyes. They were the bluest eyes he had ever seen and for the brief moment they had held his own, he felt as though they were having a conversation. Something no one heard, but he had felt to his soul. Lifetimes of conversations seemed to take place and it had both intrigued and terrified him.

Another customer had gotten her attention and she had looked at them, the connection between her and him breaking. After he was able to breathe, he had quickly and quietly walked out of the shop and had never gone back. Instead, for the past two months, he had watched her from the safety of the bus stop across the street.

He shook his head as he stood in front of the shop now, the beautiful green lettering on the door bearing its name: Little Bit of Sunshine. He exhaled as he shook his head again. How aptly it was named. She was the sunshine to his morning and yet he did not even know her name.

Hand on the silver handle, he took a breath and pulled the door open. A bell jingled a cheery greeting and the scent of the flowers filled his nose. Inhaling deeply, he smiled as he looked around. She was nowhere to be seen, so he stepped in further.

“Be right out,” she called and he paused by the register, his heart pounding and his mouth dry. He tugged at the bag across his body, and smoothed his hair.

“I’m actually closed now, but I…” she said, walking through the light purple curtains to his right and stopping as she saw him. “Oh… it’s you.” She clasped her hands together and then let them go, pushing her braid back and some stray strands behind her ears.

“Umm… your light was on and I… I’d never seen your light on this late. I just… I wanted to see that you were okay.”

“Oh. I see,” she said, her brow furrowing. “Well… I’m okay.” She smiled and he nodded, grabbing onto the strap across his chest.

“Well… I’ll uh… I’ll let you close up then. Glad to see you’re okay.” He knocked his knuckles on the counter and stepped back, smiling with a nod, and taking another step.

“Really? You’re leaving?” she asked, crossing her arms and raising that one eyebrow again.

“You said you were closing…”

“You said I never have my light on this late.” He paused and stared at her, trying to decipher her words.

“I… I did say that, yes,” he stumbled over the words, still trying to work out what she meant.

“And you know this because…?” she asked with a small smile.

“Because… I…”

“Mmm-hmm?” she nodded, her smile growing.

“This is my stop. I… uh… don’t live far from here and I…”

“Is Jack’s open? What about Thoughtful Treasures?”

“I… I don’t know.”

“Well, isn’t this your stop? Wouldn’t you notice if their lights were on?” She tilted her head slightly to the side, her eyes shining.

“Umm,” he said, his heart racing and his palms sweaty. “I uh…”

“You hadn’t noticed,” she stated, not a question, as she stepped toward him. “You just noticed that mine was still on.” He nodded dumbly, swallowing hard.

“Perhaps those places are not too interesting to you. You’re not a guy who’s looking for a porcelain curio to place on a shelf or craving a meal that may leave you feeling bloated and sluggish,” she said with a shrug and a smile.

Reaching behind the counter, she picked up her purse, took off her apron and hung it on a yellow daisy hook. She smoothed down the black t-shirt she wore, and tucked her hair behind her ears again as she placed her purse across her body; their bags mirroring each other.

“Perhaps you’re more of a guy who notices flower shops because it’s directly in your eyesight as you wait for the bus in the morning.” She stared at him and he nodded again, once more feeling his heart pounding erratically. This was it, she was going to call him out, tell him to stop.

Or alert a police officer.

“Hmm… I see,” she said, stepping closer and turning out the lights of the shop, plunging them into near darkness, the only light coming in from the street outside.

“I’m sorry. I… uh… I shouldn’t have…” he spluttered and she stared at him.

“Waited so long to cross the street? I agree.” She gestured with her chin for him to move back and head to the door.

“No, that’s not what I meant,” he said, stepping back and shaking his head, his eyes on her as he accidentally bumped into a table and she reached out to steady the shaking vase.

“Careful. Don’t want you getting spooked again. It might take another two months for you to venture over here,” she murmured and his mouth dropped open.

He stared into her eyes and again, he felt conversations that were not being spoken out loud. She had to have felt it too because she nodded, looking down as she pushed her hair behind her ears again. He swallowed and stepped back, his back hitting the door.

Pushing it open, he stepped outside and took a few steps as he took a deep breath. The city smelled horrible compared to the sweet fragrance he had been breathing in just seconds before.

Turning around, he watched her lock the door and step back, her eyes finding his. He opened his mouth to apologize and tell her he would stop staring at her. Find a different bus stop if that was what it took.

“So…” she said, before he was able to formulate the words he was not sure how to say. “If you’ve only noticed the lights in my shop, you probably didn’t notice the ones that are on 24/7 in the coffee shop two doors down?”

“No, I know those are always on,” he answered, feeling brave. “I notice them every time yours aren’t on, wishing I’d had the nerve to ask you to meet me there when I come home from work.” He licked his dry lips as she smiled, a dimple showing in her cheek.

“So, it worked then. Leaving my lights on this late, I mean.” She raised that eyebrow again and his heart raced, falling in love with her even further.

“I guess it did,” he agreed with a grin.

“Indeed,” she said, smirking and looking towards the coffee shop. Looking back at him, he nodded and gestured for her to go first. She nodded and took a couple of steps.

“Oh,” she said, turning to him and halting in her steps. “My name is Dana, by the way. Dana Scully.” She stuck out her hand and he held it, memorizing the softness of it as he shook it.

“Mulder. Fox Mulder.” She grinned and squeezed his hand.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you, Fox.”

“And you, Dana.”

He dropped her hand and they stared at one another, both of them grinning. She laughed and shook her head, continuing to walk towards the coffee shop.

He nodded with happiness as he followed beside her, the previous little bit of sunshine in his life growing large enough to light up the darkening evening sky.

[josiebeale]

That’s Christmas To Me

Pairing: Josie Saltzman x Hope Mikaelson

A/N: Since we didn’t get the Hosie mistletoe kiss in ep8 I thought I’d fix that problem. Fluff. 

Inspired by the song called “That’s Christmas To Me” by Pentatonix. 

___________

The fireplace is burning bright filling up the common room with warmth. The lights are dimmed and the stars are glowing high on the sky as Josie watches the millions of snowflakes falling outside and covering the ground in thick snow. Everything is white and peaceful and Josie doesn’t think she’s ever seen anything more beautiful.

The whole school is decorated in red and green, the Christmas Tree standing tall in the corner with several presents underneath. Josie looks around and smiles, seeing the students hanging around cuddling on the couches, couples sneaking underneath the mistletoe to share a kiss.

She longs to have somebody she can do that with, to be cheesy and totally in love especially around the holidays. It’s hard to be alone.

She sighs and tightens her fingers around her cup of hot chocolate, leaning against the windowsill and watches as Pedro and the other kids play outside in the snow. 

Hope swallows, watching her across from the room with a soft smile on her face. Josie looks so beautiful but whenever Hope thinks about going over to her she breaks out in nerves.

“Take a picture. It’ll last longer.” Lizzie’s deadpan voice makes Hope roll her eyes as the blonde siphoner comes to stand beside her with her arms crossed over her chest, looking at her sister. “On second thought... That’s even creepier. Don’t do that.”

“Ha ha. Very funny.” Hope says sarcastically. 

“Why are you watching my sister, again, Mikaelson?” Lizzie asks with her eyebrows raised. “Aren’t you with a certain garden gnome?”

Hope’s lips curls into a grimace. “Landon and I are not together. He choose neither of us, remember? I don’t know where he is.” 

Lizzie’s head tilts to the side as she looks at Hope, seeing that the tribrid only has eyes for Josie. Lizzie lets herself smile for a second before she sets her lips into the signature none interested frown.

“And you clearly don’t care to find out.” She states and Hope doesn’t argue. “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t care either especially now that I know you have feelings for my sister. I’m just glad you are not under his weird nerd charm that he seemed to get you and Josie to actually like him - “

“Wait, what?” Hope’s head snaps away from Josie and looks at Lizzie with wide eyes. “I don’t have feelings for Josie!”

Lizzie couldn’t roll her eyes harder. “Sure and my sister doesn’t like fire spells.” 

Hope opens and closes her mouth before she puffs in annoyance. 

“So, what’s the plan?” 

“What plan?”

“Do I have to explain everything to you?” Lizzie groans. “Your plan to get my sister to notice you. What is it?”

Hope takes in a deep breath and looks at Josie again, seeing her wave outside the window before laughing softly and Hope’s heart skips a beat. 

“I don’t know.” Hope admits it lowly and Lizzie shakes her head.

“It looks like I have to do everything.” 

Suddenly the front door busts open, the cold air blowing into Hope’s face as the kids run inside covered in snow. The tribrid smiles sweetly as Pedro pulls off his hat and shakes his head like a dog, water dropping everywhere. 

“Jo!” Pedro yells out and drops his coat on the couch and runs to the brunette siphoner. Josie turns around and a beautiful smile lights up her face as she leans forward bracing her hands on her knees to be eye level with Pedro. 

“Hey, buddy. Did you have fun outside?” She asks.

Pedro nods with enthusiasm and reaches for Josie’s hand dragging her to the fireplace where the rest of his friends are all settled down on the couches or on the carpet, their eyes sparkling with joy.

“Sing something!” Pedro says excitedly at Josie and Hope watches as the brunette blushes at the sudden attention. 

“I - I don’t know...” She stutters but Lizzie’s lips stretches into a smirk as she pushes herself forward and leans her hands on the back of the sofa. 

“Come on, Jo. Bring us some Holiday cheer.” Lizzie encourages, her head tilting to the side when Josie still hesitates. “For the kids.” 

Hope frowns in confusion as Lizzie ruffles one of the boy’s hair and glances at her over her shoulder. What is she planning? 

“After all she has a beautiful voice, isn’t she, Hope?” 

Everybody’s eyes are suddenly on Hope - including Josie - as the tribrid forgets how to speak for a moment. Her mouth opens and closes like a fish out of water as Josie’s eyes stare into her soul.

“Um, yeah, yes! She - it’s beautiful, Josie.” She wants to deadpan but Josie starts to smile sweetly at her and the world stops for a second. Neither of them notice Lizzie’s smirk deepen.

Josie nervously tucks a stray lock of hair behind her ears and looks around the room. Everybody seemed to stop what they were doing and just watching her waiting for her to perform. 

Suddenly soft piano music fills the room as Hope snaps her head to the instrument in the corner but nobody is playing, the keys dance around on its own. She frowns as she looks at Lizzie, seeing her hand glowing red as she grips Pedro’s shoulder and with a quick flick of her wrist enchants the piano.

Hope takes in a deep breath and sets her eyes on Josie as the brunette bits her bottom lip and starts singing. 

Have yourself a merry little Christmas Let your heart be light From now on your troubles will be out of sight

Hope’s heart fills with warmth as her eyes softens, unable to look at anything but Josie. Her voice is soft and her eyelids flatters shut, giving herself over to the music. The flames flashes behind her as the snow falls outside and everything is magical. The kind of magic that only Christmas can bring. 

Have yourself a merry little Christmas Make the Yuletide gay From now on your troubles will be miles away

The smallest of smiles appears on her face, so happy and sweet and Hope thinks she’s falling in love with her all over again. Everybody is watching her but Josie opens her eyes and looks at Hope.

Through the years we all will be together If the fates allow Hang a shining star upon the highest place

Hope’s heart skips a nervous beat at the intensity of chocolate brown eyes but she refuses to look away. Josie makes her feel alive and safe like she’s invincible as long as she’s by her side. She would do anything to keep Josie safe and she has a feeling Josie would do the same.

The last note of the song rings out softly as the piano stops and it’s quiet for a moment before applause erupts from the students. Josie blushes bright red but she stands tall with a large smile on her face and Hope couldn’t clap louder.

Josie’s eyes lingers on Hope before she steps away from being center stage and goes back to the window, sitting down on the window sill seat. Lizzie turns around quickly and grabs Hope’s arm.

“Go! Now!” 

Hope doesn’t have time to think about what could happen before Lizzie pushes her to Josie. Her heart is hammering in her chest as she approaches the girl. As she stands before her, Josie’s head turns up and her eyes softens when she sees Hope.

“Is - Is this seat taken?” Hope says gently, pointing to the open space across from Josie and the brunette nods. The tribrid sits down, fidgeting with her fingers in her lap as her eyes slowly connects with Josie’s.

“That was beautiful.” Hope breaths out and Josie gives her a shy smile, tucking her head. 

“Thank you. I wasn’t expecting to give a concert today.” She chuckles slightly and Hope longs to hear her do that again. She wants to be the one who makes her laugh. 

Comfortable silence fall over them for a second as Josie glances out the window, the snow still steadily falling from the sky and Hope watches her. She hasn’t talked to her since that night in her dorm room but she would never forget that conversation. It made her realize what has been in front of her the whole time but she couldn’t see it. 

“How are you feeling?” Hope asks softly and Josie’s smile vanishes slightly before she plasters on a fake one but Hope can see it in her eyes that she’s hurt. 

“I’m fine.” She says but then she breathes out deeply. “I’m just...lonely.” Her shoulders shrug like she’s tired of pretending and Hope’s eyebrows frown a little.

“I’m here.” The words flow out of her before she could catch them but when Josie’s eyes snaps to hers and something changes Hope wants to scream them louder. To make her understand that Hope is going to be there forever. 

Tentative fingers touch hers as Josie takes her hand, just like she did that night and the air changes around them. Josie’s eyes bounce all over her face and Hope’s breath gets caught in her throat.

“You know,” Hope whispers, “I’ve been thinking about what you said.” Josie breaths in deeply, her thumb gently sweeping across Hope’s knuckles. “About making our own choices. I thought I only wanted to come back to school cause I missed being home. But that’s not true.”

The corner of her lips stretches into a small smile as Hope’s eyes sparkle bluer than Josie’s ever seen them before. Her heart pounds in her chest as Hope slowly intertwines their fingers.

“I wanted to come back for you.” Her voice breaks as Josie bits her bottom lip. “Because I love you.” 

There it was. The words she has been waiting to hear since she got back her memories. When the feelings she had came rushing back and overwhelming her as she looked deep into Hope’s eyes, finally recognizing why they were so familiar. Josie knew something was missing, that something was off but she didn’t know what, until that night.

Hope squeezed her fingers tightly as her heart pounded in her chest so loud that she was afraid Josie’s going to hear it. Her eyes desperately searched Josie’s for something, anything but suddenly Lizzie comes into her vision standing behind Josie’s shoulder on the top of the stairs.

Hope’s frowns as Lizzie points her fingers up and mouth ‘look up’. 

A slowly growing mistletoe hangs above their heads and Hope doesn’t know if she wants to laugh or cry. Josie giggles as she looks up before her smile disappears and a serious expression crosses her face. 

Hope’s breathing catches in her throat. “We don’t ha - “

Josie’s soft lips cuts her off, pressed lightly against hers in a sweet kiss. The brunette sighs contently as her hand slides into Hope’s hair, grasping the back of her neck to pull her closer. Hope kisses her back and cups her cheek, trying to savor every taste in case this turns out to be a dream. 

“I love you too, Hope Mikaelson.” Josie whispers against her lips as she pulls away slightly, resting her forehead on Hope’s. The tribrid laughs in relief and pulls her back into another kiss, longer than the first.

Neither of them see Lizzie roll her eyes with a smile on her face before saying. 

“You’re welcome.”

The End. 

[royallyprincesslilly]

Title: Love, Maybe? {18}

Chris Evans X Reader OFC Vixen Giovanni

Warning: Cursing, Angst

Word Count: 3.2K

Summary: After a night of drunkenness you wake up next to warm, hot as hell body, a migraine and no memory of the night before. When you come to realize that the hot body belongs to none other than Hollywood’s golden boy Chris Evans you freak out. As events unfold you become even more panicked to find out you got married in your drunken haze. What else is there to do but get it annulled, right? Before walking away, you share one more night of molten kisses and passion. 3 years later you are still living with the repercussions of your brash decisions, but the surprises don’t stop there. The past has a way of coming back and have you questioning is this fate that you’ve been running from, hell could it have been love, maybe?

Note: Italic texts is an inner Vixen thought. Bold Italic texts is an inner Chris thought.

**Slightly Edited/Proofread**

Thank you guys for reading!!!! If you enjoyed this please LIKE, COMMENT, REBLOG. 😊 ❤️  ❤️ ❤️

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter 18: First Steps

  -Vixen-

   “How long has it been?”

   “About a week,” you responded as you spooned another overflowing spoon of vanilla ice cream into your mouth, then another soon followed.

   “Okay, a week isn’t bad. I mean I’d expect a little adjustment period. The man just found out he has an almost-three-year-old daughter. I think a week is an acceptable amount of time to take,” Nexus calmly rationalized.

   You weren’t as calm or seeing things the same. You were the complete opposite. Where she was calm, you were an anxious mess. You’d spent the last week in a hyperactive bubble of chaos. Your mind ran miles a minute, thinking what he was thinking, doing, how he was feeling. You worried more than anything. Part of you worried he’d decided he wanted to be involved, that he wanted to be her father and be completely hands-on, and another part of you worried he’d decided to cut and run, worried he didn’t want to know her, didn’t want to be a father. You worried about a lot more than that, to be honest, but touching on it was not something you were ready for. Instead, you stuffed your face with even more ice cream.

  “You’ve been eating a lot of ice cream lately. You wanna talk about it?”

“I like ice cream,” you defended.

   “Yeah, but you normally eat a lot of ice cream when you’re stressed and anxious.”

   “Okay, yes, I’m stressed. This is an insane situation. A situation I created, but it's still a stressful situation.”

  “I get it. You’re the mother of Chris Evans’ child. That is insane to think about, and even more insane to say it. The only way for us to get used to it is to keep saying it so say it.” You looked around the semi-crowded dessert shop. She was crazy if she thought you’d go shouting out your business. You looked back at her, and she gave you an expectant look as if she had no time to waste.

  “Nex, you’re insane if you think I’m going to shout out my business—especially here.”

   “I never said shout it. Whisper it if you have to, the point is you have to speak the words.”

   Closing your eyes, you took a deep breath; it wasn’t a full one. You hadn’t been able to take a full one for weeks, not since San Fran. It always felt like something was sitting heavy on your chest. You still hadn’t said the words. In three damn years, it was the one thing you had refused to say.

   “Vix, come on.”

   You sighed loudly and kissed your teeth. You looked over to Ella playing in the child area across the shop and smiled, watching her innocence. She was innocent in all this. She deserved everything good in the world.

   “I am the mother of Chris Evans’ daughter. Chris Evans is my baby daddy.”

   Nex snorted and shook her head. “Nice touch.” You sighed again and plopped a hefty spoonful of ice cream in your mouth. “I don’t feel any better you false prophet.” Nexus laughed this time, drawing Ella’s attention. She laughed too making you smile.

   “What if he’s decided to hell with her and the whole father shit? What if he hates me so much he doesn’t even want to bother?” the silence stretched between you and Nex and the two of you just stared at Ella. “Let’s say that is the case, how would that make you feel?”

   “Feel? She had to be kidding. I’ve worked overtime for years to put a kaput on anything related to feelings. I made an effort to not even go near any content that could evoke any feelings.”

   “Okay, something easier then. Would you be okay if that were his decision?” You rubbed your scalp; you were already regretting the intricate updo you’d put your hair in this morning. Reaching back, you took the pins out and sighed once you were free. “I’ve been living with just her and me for her whole life. It was without a thought of having someone involved. I never once thought hey what if he were, it was just not where I was. If he decided to just continue on his life knowing he has a child out there and chose not to be involved, I think I’d be okay.” You looked at Nexus who had a “bitch please” look on her face. Who were you kidding, you probably wouldn’t be okay with it. You’d probably be pissed though you had no right to be.

   “Do you want him involved? I honestly think you’re more worried about him choosing to opt-out over anything else.” You took another attempt at a deep breath and was still unsuccessful. “If he opted out it would be like him not choosing me again, and even worse not choosing her. She’s a part of him Nex.”

  “Not choosing you,” Nexus repeated. You didn’t even realize you’d said that out loud.

   “Shit!”

   Ella rushed over to you as quick as her little legs could manage and pulled on your pant leg. Sliding off the seat to sink to the floor getting on her level, she threw her arms around your neck burying her face into your chest. “What’s the matter, sweetie?” You lifted her and gently rocked her from side to side in an effort to soothe her. She didn’t answer, and you looked at Nexus communicating that it was time to go. Without missing a beat, Nex got up, gathered your trash and walked to the door where she discarded of the items in the bin. “What’s wrong Ella?” She didn’t respond to Nex’s question either. You assumed she was tired and decided it was time to head home. It had been a busy day.

   By the time you made it back to the house and got Ella taken care of with a bath and a small snack the sun had set, and you were more than ready to call it a night. As you waited for the pizza to arrive, you scrolled through your social media and sipped a glass of wine. Curiosity got the better of you, and you typed in his name. As the results populated, you saw a bunch of images of him throughout the years, most from movies. You looked over the pictures and admired how his look had changed over the years.

   When you’d met he wasn’t an ugly guy, you doubted he had ever been ugly it was universally impossible. He looked as if he was still in that stage of life where he didn’t’ want any ties, and he preferred things to be complication-free, it showed it in his small goatee. Now that goatee had filled out in a jaw-dropping way; his eyes had intensified with how blue they were. The night in the diner you couldn’t not look in his eyes. You didn’t know if it was the fact that his hair had gotten redder and it worked to bring out the blue more or if they had in fact gotten bluer. His eyes were Ella’s eyes. You loved spending hours just looking into her eyes through the years. It dawned on you the night at the diner why.

   You were thankful when the doorbell rang to find it was the pizza. After Ella gobbled down two slices, she sauntered off to the playroom with Nexus’ finger tightly in her small hand, and there they remained for at least an hour. You didn’t even notice when Nex sat beside you on the back deck. She held out another bottle of wine which you smiled at. As she filled your empty glass your thoughts drifted yet again.

   “So, not choosing you.”

   You sighed because you knew she hadn’t let it go. You knew she’d bring it back up; you knew it would be one of those things that you’d have to face head-on. “Tell me about what that meant.” Gulping down the glass of wine, you refilled it and rubbed the smooth glass against your full bottom lip. “There are two possible nights Ella was conceived. Either it was the night we got married in Vegas or, the last night at his house here in LA after we’d signed the divorce papers. It’s impossible to tell really. They were days apart. Anyway, the night at his house after we’d—everything was good, it was amazing. it was always amazing Nex.” You sighed again taking a much-needed pause, the memories from that night were beginning to play in front of you like a movie and were bringing all the feelings with them.

   “I mean, he carries himself with pure big dick energy, and it’s not a small amount it’s an overwhelming amount. I don’t understand how because he’s a white boy, but he has it.” You snorted unable to contain your amusement. She was right, you’d noticed it years ago. It was overpowering hence how you got married and then how Ella happened. “So, you’re saying Chris Evans lays good pipe. Wow,” Nex said as she stared into the backyard with an amazed look on her face.

   “Good is an understatement. It’s not just the pipe that’s pure perfection.” Nexus gasped and looked to you like you’d just dropped the biggest bomb in the world. You gave her the eye and knew she got it. She giggled to herself while you immersed yourself in the memories again. “We’d spent the day together, had lunch, talked—a lot he comes off so relatable, so down to earth, you can tell he’s cut from a different cloth. I messed up and thought amazing dick and strong strokes meant more and could mean more, and he set me straight,” you summed up.

  “What the hell does that mean? What did he do?” You stared into the glass you held and finally said the words out loud and allowed the emotions you felt then to float front and center for the first time since it happened. “What!? Oh, hell no he didn’t.” You nodded and finished the glass then poured the last of the bottle into your glass.  Yeah, you’d finished the whole bottle by yourself.

   “Wow, I’m speechless. He said that? Wow.” You nodded again and bit your bottom lip and rubbed your temples, feeling the throbbing start. “What’d you say?”

   You’d wanted to cuss his ass out but if you’d done that it would have shown you cared more and that was the last thing in hell you would have done. “Nothing. He went to the bathroom. I got dressed and left. There was nothing to say. He made his position clear.” You both sat there in silence. You lost in the memories from that night and the things you could have said. You wondered if you would have said something showed that you cared if things could have been different. Would he have admitted he felt something too? Would the two of you have been able to get it together perhaps date, then raise Ella together this entire time? Would you have stayed married? Groaning you put the glass down. These were dangerous thoughts, thoughts that could ruin things more than they already were.

   “He was the one that hurt you. He’s the reason you shut down, the reason no one ever had a chance all these years. The reason why Zack will never make it out the friend zone. He broke you.” It was then you remembered Zack. You hadn’t talked since that day at the restaurant. The day you’d seen Chris. He’d stayed away, and you knew you would have to be the one to reach out to make things right. You just didn’t care to.

   “Shit, maybe I am broken.” You stood, gathered your glass and two of the four empty bottles around you and walked inside. Nex followed you into the kitchen with the remaining items.

   “I don’t think he’s decided to opt-out. After everything I’ve come to see over the last few years or interviews, he wants kids, a family. Plus, he doesn’t look like the kind of man who’d opt-out knowing he had a baby in the world. He needs time; he needs some space; it’s a lot you dropped on him. It took you nine months to come to terms with your situation. It wasn’t until they put Ella on your chest that it all really clicked for you. It’s been about two weeks.” She was right; you knew it. This wasn’t the kind of thing one just absorbs in hours. It was a lot, a lifetime worth of responsibility.

   “Do you want him involved?”

   “This again.”

   You closed your eyes again and tried to separate your feelings from what was right and wrong. Carefully and quickly you went through the endless possibilities and outcomes, and though you tried to keep your feelings out of it, they crept in. After a while, you groaned. The ringing of Nexus’ phone broke the silence and saved you from saying the words. Nexus hurried to her bag and rifled through it until she took out the phone. It was almost midnight, and neither of you knew who could be calling.

   “Hello?” Her eyes slowly widened, and you felt a sinking feeling in the pit of your belly. Deep down, you knew who it was.

   “Shit.”

   Nexus walked to you. “Hang on.” She held the phone out to you. You didn’t move; just looked at the phone then to her. She nodded as if to urge you to make a move, but you were frozen. Nexus reached out took your hand and placed the phone in it. You stood there trying to find your voice and your courage. Slowly you raised the device to your ear and released a slow breath.

   “Hello?” There was silence for a good minute then you heard him take a deep breath on the other end.

   “I want to be involved. I want to be a part of her life.” Tears filled your eyes, and they rolled down your cheeks freely as you nodded as if he could see you. “Are you there?” Clearing your throat and wiping away the tears you nodded again.

   “Yeah, I’m here. Okay.” More silence stretched between you. You had no idea what to say; the decision was made. He’d stepped up, opting out was not an option. You felt fear but also a strange mix of relief and happiness.

   “So, how do we do this?” You scoffed and laughed. No matter how you tried to stop yourself, you couldn’t manage it, so there you stood leaning against the kitchen island laughing like an idiot. “I have no idea,” you responded. It was his turn to laugh. So that was how a good two minutes were spent, the two of you laughing at the situation and the fact neither of you knew what to do now, or how to do it. slowly your laughter died down, and the silence returned.

   “I know you said you don’t know me or some things about my lifestyle and this might be the wrong first move but--.” More silence stretched with his hesitation. Your anxiety rose higher, as did your heart rate. “Can I meet her?” Your heart pounded and melted at the same time. His voice was so small, so unsure and so damn gripping, you wanted to reach out into the phone and place it against his cheek. You groaned and put your head on the island and allowed the cold marble to center you. “It was a stupid idea. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be so presumptuous; of course, it’s too soon.”

   “No, no, that’s not it. No, you’re not, it’s fine. I’m sorry I just—I’m having a hard time with words or thoughts right now. I’ve been attacked with memories for the last few hours, and it’s taking a toll. I’m sorry. Yeah,” you rushed out without thinking.

   “What kind of memories?” With the question you imagined his hands on your body and then his head between your legs. You groaned and shook your head. “Oh, you know, normal stuff.” Somehow you knew he was smiling; you could feel it, and it made you smile as well. “Yeah, I know about normal stuff. It’s hard,” he responded.

   “Hard? Does he mean what I think he means? What’s hard? Is he hard? Does he think about what I think about? Does he have dreams like I do? Oh my god!”

   Clearing your throat, you tried your best to shake away the thoughts and the butterflies taking flight in the pit of your belly. “So yeah, you uh—you can meet her. I don’t think it’s too soon. It may be long overdue.”

   “Really? Are you sure? I don’t want to overstep or--.” You interrupted his ramble with a smile on your face. “This is new for the both of us, I don’t have a manual or a guide, and I have literally been living the last three years based on what feels right. If it feels right I do it. This—it feels right. It feels like the right move,” you filled in. He was quiet again. You wondered what he was thinking, wondered what he would say if he’d say anything at all.

   “Is tomorrow good?

   “Jesus he’s really in.”

   “Yeah, sure. Tomorrow is fine,” you confirmed while even more butterflies took flight. You tried to keep your thoughts straight, tried to keep everything else at bay. “Um, maybe the restaurant off of Wilshire?”

   “Might not be a good idea doing this in public. There’s already been more than enough run-ins with the paps. She’s still freaked from that day,” you explained. “Right, of course. I’m sorry about that by the way,” Chris interjected.

   “It’s fine. I’m sure you can’t control it.” He sighed into the phone and you pictured his breath smelling like oranges and mint like it did that last night. You took a deep breath as if you could really smell it—smell him. You couldn’t. This was just a phone conversation, and you were already feeling foolish. “What about my place?” Your stomach knotted, and you softly gasped as you placed your hand over your belly. You wondered if he still lived at the same place. “Do you still live at the same place in the hills?”

   “You remember. Yeah, same place.” Your core clenched and you groaned. “Not a good idea. Um, why not here. It’s somewhere she’s comfortable, private away from the press, safe.” Another stretch of silence filled the time. “Safe for her or you?”  He saw through you. A disconcerting feeling filled you. It was definitely safe for you. You knew if you went back to his house, you’d be incapacitated with memories and emotions and this wasn’t about you. It was about Ella, him and Ella. “Safe all around. Does that work?” He agreed, and the two of you released a breath in unison then let the silence return. You could hear his breathing, and it was a soothing sound, a sound you liked. You confirmed an adequate time and gave him your address then rushed off the phone and dropped into the couch. Nex tried her best to calm your nerves, but it wasn’t enough. You knew you wouldn’t sleep that night. You felt there was a lot on the line and you had to make sure you were under control by tomorrow.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

***If you want to be tagged please SEND AN ASK SO IT WILL BE EASIER FOR ME TO KEEP TRACK OF. Thank you for reading!!! 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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[kidhawks]

hOLY SHIT- yes yes yesss!!!! EMSJXKSKD THATS SO FLIPPIN COOL!!! What the heck, I LOVE that. You don't understand, I don't care how biased I am, but fuck. That's some good content right there, I go feral for the crippled or scarred mentor trope who's still able to utilize their very terrifying skillset, but hmm a living legend vanishing, a rumor in the underground, still every bit as dangerous as he once was. Yesss gimme that. Live fast, die young they say.

(Cont.) Love the image of the world having passed him by, while above ground they're constantly churning out heroes, with so much potential, many new faces to heroics with all eyes on them. I had a post-war scenario for Class 1A, but it fits better with Hawks. Picture this, society is upheavaled, a new generation of kids born into a dystopian society. They heard the stories, of a hero class and heroes from bygone days that once attempted to fight back against the evil, but lost and scattered.

(+) The rumors lead them underground, where Takami lurks. Are the stories true? Back when there were heroes in the country, instead of roaming villains or vigilantes. Just imagine Hawks living in a sanctuary left over from the war, a hideout they once used when these kids stumble their way in and they're bright-eyed, a bit fearful, but they have some kind of spark, the kind he once saw in those kids, in Tokoyami. And they ask him to train them. What does he do?

(+) And Hawks refuses, because they tried once before and they lost. But the boy has messy green hair, a bit more blue than Deku, and even bluer eyes, they remind him of Touya. The look Touya had back when they dreamed together. When he used to talk about something brighter. And the girl, it feels like an old memory stabbing into older wounds, she has wings. And eyes red and determined to not fall behind, so much like Tokoyami. And Hawks can't go through this, not again.

(+) Maybe eventually those kids could get Hawks to cave, and he'll tell them stories of the war. The day the lights went out, when a pillar fell, exposing the darkness, a society basked in the glow of fragile flames turned to dust. A tale drowned by fire and ice, thunder and lightning. And all the complications of hero and villain. Something new is blooming so, just maybe, they could try again.

1) so sorry i took a while to reply and 2) AAAHHHHH THIS IS SO COOL ANON!!! u took my idea and RAN with it omg

honestly, society becoming dystopian is a fan theory i see often, but usually all the pros are dead. it’s interesting imo to have someone like hawks who now works from the shadows and has lost sight of the hope he had as a kid. grizzled older hawks is a bit of guilty pleasure because when I first saw his design I thought he’d be more like 30-ish? and aaaah, the idea of him who didn’t want to train the next generation (because he didn’t want heroes to be needed anymore) now having to be this tough mentor because he’s like, one of the only ones left? GIMME

[all-or-nothing-baby]

My Personal Journey to The Land of Pan (But not Neverland. Or wherever that Greek God of The Wild lives.)

I'm Lucy and I used to think I was a Lesbian.

My first kiss was at seven years old, with a girl. When we were alone, we'd kiss and be affectionate and hold hands. After a while, I asked her, "Why do we only do these things when nobody else is around?" and also, "Do you want to be my girlfriend?" She answered "No, don't be stupid. It's wrong and we shouldn't be doing it anyway. And I don't want to do it anymore."

I was gutted and didn't understand.

The next four people I kissed were girls. Each of them eventually said similar things.

I still didn't understand.

What was even more confusing to me was I knew I liked boys too. The first person I'd wanted to kiss was a boy with dark hair that hung in his bluer-than-blue eyes. I was at nursery school (kindergarten). Age, it seemed really wasn't a thing. I could like boys and girls my own age but also felt attraction to much older people.

So, I thought, what does all this make me? Different? Yes. A freak? Maybe. Except I didn't really feel like a freak (not for these reasons, at least.) The only thing that actually worried me was my family. I was brought up pretty strict Catholic. I never believed in God but was scared of the things said in the bible - even if I knew it was horseshit - because they believed it. I feared my parents would think I was broken or something. So, I kept schtum.

It was in my teens when I stopped worrying or caring.

Thank (fuck) the UK'S Channel 4 was, from its birth in 1982, a controversial and progressive station. This boon, plus having the advantage of older peers which meant borrowed VHS tapes, alongside my canny ninja abilities (creeping downstairs at the various kids homes I ended up living in), gave me the priceless gift of watching late night movies, such as:

Dog Day Afternoon (1975), My Beautiful Launderette (1985), My Own Private Idaho (1991), Bound (1996), and Sunday, Bloody Sunday (1971).

Even though these films were awesome as somebody who'd experienced same-sex attraction, they still didn't solve the mystery of Me.

I liked both females and males.

Then, in a magazine, I read about 'bisexuality'.

FINALLY I had an explanation for why I was the way I was. And not only that, I wasn't the only one.

So, for the longest time, I thought I was bisexual.

Some of the people I fell for identified with a different gender to the one they were (supposedly, according to everyone else) born with, which I wondered about. To be honest though, by this point, I didn't really care about semantics. I just knew I was sexually and romantically attracted to anyone who made me feel things.

I told my family as and when it came up. I didn't 'come out' as to me, I didn't see why I had to. I'd just tell them when I found someone attractive, whatever their sex. Thankfully, they weren't at all bothered. I'll be eternally grateful to them for that, seeing as I know some people who've been completely ostracised by their own just for who they love.

I'm now thirty-eight. I only heard the term pansexual about five years ago. When I researched it, it was so cool to find out that what I am is a thing.

It was like my whole life I'd been drawing in the sand with a stick. At first, I had no idea what I was drawing. Then, I knew what the image was, but I couldn't quite finish it; I couldn't see it all at once--it was too big. The term pansexual was my helicopter. It flew me up above the beach and, for the first time, I could see the whole picture.

I'm attracted to people. I fall for people. That's it.

This post is a also a thank you. It's for all the people who came before me; and those who came (and will continue to come) after me, who fought and fight for queer rights. They allowed and allow all of us the privileges we have today. Things are still not where they should be, but they are on their way there. One day, I hope, nobody will have to feel confused. Nobody will be cut out, laughed at or beaten. Nobody will have to come out.

I'm Lucy and I'm pansexual.

(Aaaaaand to those of you who have reached this point, wow. And thank you for coming to my Ted Talk! To show my appreciation of you taking the time to read my queer lifestory [the short version!], here's an incomplete selection of stars I had the hots for growing up. All the love, from me to you… June 12th 2019.)

[ P R I D E 2 0 1 9 ]

[milomeepit]

Diamond In The Rough: Chapter Nineteen

Roman has always wanted better. Has always believed that there’s a better life, a better world, just out of reach. Just beyond the veil of shitty teachers who don’t care, angry classmates that scream insults and slurs at each other all day, and drug-hazed parents who are more concerned with their next hit than looking after their ten year old son.

When he runs away after a particularly bad night at home and finds a quiet little cafe/bookstore tucked away in a back alley of the city, the sweet couple who run the joint (an odd pair; a quiet, gloomy man with a wry sense of humour and a cynical gleam in his eye, and a bouncy man who smiles like sunshine and laughs like a storybook king) help show him that maybe- just maybe- he really can have the life he always dreamed of.

Masterpost (to be added soon!)

Word Count: 3314

Chapter Warnings: nightmares, blood, snakes, confusion, stabbing, panic, anxiety, crying, happy crying, food

“Roman. It’s time to get up, Roman, come on.”

A hand shook his shoulder gently. Roman raised his head from the pillow, blinking at the bright sunlight that streamed in through the window. He looked towards the disturbance to see Logan’s face, hovering above him. A concerned frown creased the man’s eyebrows.

“Are you alright?” He asked softly.

“‘M... tired,” Roman yawned as he shook his head. “S’fine.”

“I made pancakes for brunch. Would you like some?” Logan sat on the bed next to him. The mattress dipped under his weight, and Roman had a brief flash of the sensation of falling.

“I, uh... sure. Thanks,” He flopped back down onto the pillow, facing towards the window.

Logan leaned down to the floor and picked Arwen off the ground. He brushed her off before offering her to Roman. “I’ve also got hot chocolate warming on the stove, if you would like some.”

Roman took Arwen. “Yes, please.” He forced a smile onto his face. His head ached, and his limbs felt heavy as lead, but he didn’t want to worry Logan.

Logan squeezed his shoulder gently. “I’ll see you downstairs in a few minutes, then.” He smiled before getting up and leaving the room.

Roman lay in bed for another minute, staring out the window. Crisp white snow covered the ground, glittering in the morning sunlight. Part of him ached to go out and play, but he knew it would just be him and Cody. Logan had mentioned he wasn’t much of a fan of the colder weather, so it seemed unlikely he would join in a snowball fight. He sighed and got up, swapping his cozy pyjamas for sweatpants, a long sleeved shirt, and his red hoodie.

Breakfast passed, painfully slowly. Logan did his best to keep up a conversation, but Roman felt sapped of energy, like lead weights were tied to his wrists and dragging him down. He felt bad for the one-word, disinterested answers he gave Logan, but he just couldn’t bring himself to pull up his usual pep and bounce.

By the time Logan disappeared into his office, Roman was practically ready to crawl back into bed. Everything ached, and he wanted to hide away for a little while. Though, he could practically already hear Patton rambling about sleep schedules and making the most of the day, so he instead settled for curling up with a blanket on the couch in the rec room and watching a movie.

The familiar crescendo of the Walt Disney sequence was comforting, as was the sepia-toned rainy opening scene of the film. His eyes were glued to the screen as Lewis fiddled with his PB’n’J dispensing hat, half wondering if it would work the same with pop tarts.

If he was Lewis, the one being adopted, then he decided that Patton would definitely be Lucille. Virgil could pass for Bud when he was in a silly mood. Virgil had mentioned he had siblings, so the two of them could probably be Fritz and Joe. And Roman wouldn’t mind marrying someone like Franny. She was funny and passionate and strong and loved her family more than anything, all the best things he liked in a person.

He cuddled Arwen tightly, only half paying attention to the movie as his mind wandered. It would be amazing to have a time machine like the Robinsons did. He could go anywhere, any time, he wanted. Just fly through the sky and pop to wherever he liked.

Though, he thought, it would be cooler to ride on a dragon. Feel warm scales beneath his hands, the wind rushing through his hair, the powerful wings pushing them up, up, up through the clouds. Dragons were cool. He’d always wanted a pet, something friendly and scaley that climbed up his arm. A snake could be cool.

He could picture it now; shining eyes and shimmering golden scales, smooth to touch. Dropping down into his lap from the sky, a gift from the heavens above, like a fallen star. It would curl around him, wrapping him in a serpentine hug before slithering away.

Roman got to his feet, slowly following it. The golden scales drew him forward like a magnet, almost hypnotizing. When he finally broke his gaze away and looked around, they were in a forest. Green and blue and red and purple plants surrounded them, and the snake nimbly weaved between them. Roman trotted along behind it, looking around at the scenery. It rather reminded him of the valley from his last daydream.

He looked down at the snake again, watching it curl around a tree and onto rocky ground. He blinked, looking around to see a cave. Stalactites clung to the ceiling, water drip-drop-dripping from them in a soft rhythm. Piles of treasure littered the space, almost glowing in the shadows where the light didn’t quite reach. He heard voices, distantly, faraway conversations he couldn’t quite catch.

Fear tugged at his chest, and he instead returned his attention to the snake. It wound back around and out of the mouth of the cave, and when Roman looked up again, he was walking through a garden. A picnic blanket was spread carefully across the grass, and a box of cookies sat half-eaten on top of the basket. Bottles of water sat unopened on the checked blanket, and Roman felt the distinct urge to go sit.

He blinked, glanced back to the snake, and then they were in a ballroom filled with people that spun gracefully past him. They seemed undisturbed by the snake that stretched across the shining floor. Faces flashed past him, too quickly to get a proper look at, but achingly familiar. A young man with a moustache and a mischievous grin, with a tall young woman with a shy smile and fluffy brown hair that fell down her back in waves. A girl with eyes bluer than he’d ever seen and a flowing white dress winked at him. Another woman, older, with dark ginger hair and a sharp smile swept past. He knew them. He couldn’t know them, and yet he did.

It made him dizzy. He looked down again, silently begging the snake to take him somewhere else. Somewhere quieter. It seemed to respond to his discomfort, hooking to the right and away from the crowd. Before Roman knew it, they were outside. It was night, but not dark. A full moon cast a silvery light over the scene, a grassy hill dotted with small flowers that waved in the breeze. Stars sparkled overhead, glitter spread across the dark, dark blue that covered the sky.

Roman let out a soft gasp at the bone-deep longing that spiked through him. It was beautiful, more so than anything he could think of. He felt that same pull to sit, to just soak in the scene and stay there forever, but the snake didn’t pause. As it was, he broke into a jog to catch up with it. He studied it as he walked. It, too, seemed somehow familiar. Something seemed to be trying to click in his head, like an engine having trouble starting.

The scene changed again. Stone walls appeared around them rough and imposing, and when Roman looked back down, the snake had vanished. A cold sense of horror rose up, and he broke into a sprint, trying to find it.

The night became darker. The glittering stars faded from the sky. He shivered as he searched the maze for his guide. There seemed to be no escape from the cold, no matter how hard he tried to will himself to another place. The walls began to form cracks, stone splintering off and falling to the ground. He had to step around chunks of rubble as he ran further into the labyrinth.

Carvings appeared on the ruined walls. Images that seemed to dance before his eyes, hard to focus on. A terrible monster, huge and angry and merciless, destroying towns and villages, swallowing people whole. Figures bowed down before the giant creature, a snake with those same golden scales he recognized. Roman skidded to a halt in front of a depiction of the snake staring straight at the viewer. Its eyes drilled into him, sending a chill right through his body.

“... What are you?” He murmured, reaching up to touch the wall.

As his fingertips brushed against the stone, a loud crash rang through the night. He spun around, blinking rapidly. “H-hello?” He called. “Who’s there?”

“You don’t understand, he’s gone completely rogue!”

He jumped at the noise. A girl’s voice, both familiar and not. He was getting pretty sick of that feeling.

“Look, I know you two used to be really close, but... he’s.... changed. Badly.”

A boy, this time. A little nasal and whiny, and something inside him ached at the shaky words.

“Hello?” He started walking towards the voices, yelling out to them.

“He’s a monster! Nothing we can do would change that!” The girl snapped.

The walls around him shifted again. Banners appeared, large enough to hang down to the floor, with careful embroidery and bright colours.

“I know. I know you want him back, but...” The boy trailed off.

At some point the rough ground had changed to smooth stone. Windows dotted the walls between tapestries. Torches on the wall threw dancing shadows as he sprinted past them. A castle?

“Gods, why can’t you just trust me on this?” The girl’s voice was filled with anger and hurt and desperation.

Roman wondered who they were talking to. It certainly seemed like pieces of the conversation were missing.

He hurtled around a corner and skidded to a stop. A dead end. He looked over the hall, noticing the spears that lay abandoned on the floor, some snapped and broken. Blood was splashed across the castle stone, violent red smears that made his stomach roll. He peeled his eyes away from the floor and up to the tapestry hanging on the wall.

That same golden snake. It felt like it was taunting him, it’s cold eyes mocking his confusion and distress. Poor little prince, lost and alone, it seemed to say. Nobody to save you. Nobody to chase away the shadows and monsters. Nobody to protect you.

Roman’s head felt like it was going to split open. What was this? He didn’t want this. He didn’t want any of this. The dizziness, the nausea, the darkness and panic and violence and cold. He didn’t understand. He didn’t want to understand, he just wanted out.

Footsteps clacked on the stones behind him. He turned to see a tall man, his features hard to make out in the dim, flickering torchlight. The only thing Roman could see clearly was his eyes- shining gold.

Just like the snake.

It took a moment for him to register the knife in the man’s hand. A dagger, shining in the firelight, with a sharp, thin blade. It took another few seconds for Roman to realise it was pointed squarely in his direction.

His heart leapt into his throat. What was happening?

“You need to wake up, Roman.” The man’s voice was smooth, like liquid gold. Roman shivered at the strong pang of some unfamiliar emotion that shot through him. The man threw a glance over his shoulder as running footsteps drew closer to them, clattering down the hall. Someone shouted out at the man, and he stiffened, stepping around the corner and much closer to Roman. “You don’t belong here, little one.”

Roman stumbled backwards. He hit fabric, his back up against the snake tapestry hanging on the wall. Something was wrong about this. Wrong and bad and much too real. “W-who are you?” He choked out.

The man froze for a moment. His eyes swept up and down Roman, and he opened his mouth.

“Get away from him!” The boy’s voice boomed down the hallway, and the man glanced over his shoulder again.

His mouth twisted into a snarl, and Roman was distracted for a moment by the sharpsharpmuchtoosharp teeth. His eyes glowed with something Roman couldn’t identify. Not quite hatred, but something close. “Your murderer.”

Roman’s eyes snapped open. He gasped as he bolted upright on the couch and clutched at his chest. Pictures danced in his vision, too fast to focus on. Constellations that sparkled overhead, their shapes utterly foreign. Smooth scales under his hands, warm and soft. Fires that blazed, higher than he could see and hotter than he could bear. Soft smiles, barely visible out of the corner of their mouth. A knife, plunging into soft flesh that parted beneath its blade.

His chest ached. A familiar feeling, one he knew as well as the freckles that dotted his arms, but it seemed to burn. He curled into himself, clapping both hands over his mouth in an attempt to muffle the sobs that burst from his throat.

“Roman?” Logan appeared in the doorway. He crouched down next to the couch and reached out to touch Roman’s shoulder. “What’s wrong?” He asked gently.

Roman flung his arms around Logan’s middle and clung to him. “Bad dream,” He mumbled against the fabric of Logan’s shirt.

Logan sat on the floor and rubbed Roman’s back. “I’m sorry to hear that. Are you okay?”

Roman shrugged. “I... I dunno,” He admitted. “M’scared.”

“What are you scared of?”

“I... what if I don’t...” The words died in his throat, bitter and uncooperative.

Logan hummed in understanding. “It will be alright. I can’t see any reason that things wouldn’t work out.”

Roman pulled back a little and scrubbed at his face with his sleeve. “... But what if they don’t anyway?” He whined.

Logan frowned sympathetically. “Well... whatever happens, I’ll be here for you. I promise.”

Roman sighed. He sagged against Logan’s chest and turned his head to look at the TV screen. It was black, the timer device having turned it off after a period of inactivity. He wondered how long he’d been asleep. His stomach growled, as if to say ‘Long enough we need food, dingus!’

He peered up at the clock on the wall and his stomach sank. It was 4.30pm. Only half an hour left before his fate was revealed.

“Would you like to do a puzzle? I still have an unopened one in the hall closet.” Logan suggested. “I think it’s a fantasy scene, a lake with mermaids.”

“Yes, please.” Roman nodded. He slid off of Logan’s lap and shuffled on his knees over to the coffee table.

They spent the next half hour chatting about mermaids and mythology as they fit together the glossy puzzle pieces. Roman worked on the trees and plants while Logan worked on the water, and it quickly took shape under their hands.

Roman had never realised quite how much he enjoyed doing puzzles with people. It was pleasant to work together on something so casual, especially if you could talk while you worked. The pretty artwork and brightly coloured scenes were a big plus, too.

“As legends go, the first known mermaid stories appeared in Assyria, around 1000 BC. The goddess Atargatis, mother of Assyrian queen Semiramis, loved a mortal, and unintentionally killed him,” Logan explained. “She jumped into a lake and took the form of a fish, but the waters didn’t hide her divine beauty. After that, she took the form of a mermaid- although the earliest representations of Atargatis showed her as a fish with a human head and arm, similar to the Babylonian god Ea.”

“Cool!” Roman exclaimed. “Who was Ea?”

“Well, that’s actually quite interesting! Enki is the Sumerian god of water, knowledge, mischief, crafts, and creation. He was later known as Ea in Akkadian and Babylonian mytho-” Logan was interrupted by a knock on the door.

Roman froze and looked up at Logan. “It’s not 5pm yet, is it?” He mumbled. “Can’t be.”

Logan ruffled his hair lightly. “It’s alright, Roman,” He reassured. “Come, let’s go see.”

Roman slowly got to his feet and dragged himself after Logan. It felt like he was marching to the gallows, or pulled along in an ice cold river that intended to toss him over a jagged waterfall. He wrapped his arms around himself and hovered in the doorway of the rec room. He stared at the front door. From here, he wouldn't be able to see who was there, but they wouldn’t be able to see him, either, so it suited him just fine.

“It’ll be okay,” Logan glanced over his shoulder and smiled again before returning his attention to the door as the visitor knocked again.

Roman’s heart thudded in his chest as Logan turned the handle and opened the door. A gust of wind swept into the entryway, and he shivered. It was obviously still freezing outside. At least he might be able to play in the snow at some point, he thought. That would make things a bit better.

He couldn’t quite see Logan’s face from here, either. He was speaking quietly with whoever was at the door. Roman couldn’t make out the conversation, and his anxiety ratcheted up another notch as he strained to hear the other person’s voice.

A few tense seconds passed before Logan moved out of the doorway. Roman held his breath, his eyes wide.

Please.

He almost screamed as vibrant green and purple eyes met his around the door. Virgil broke into a wide grin and dropped to one knee as Roman threw himself forward into his arms, already bursting into tears again.

“Oh, sweetheart, honey, it’s okay, we got you, it’s okay, darling.” Patton’s arms joined Virgil’s, and Roman felt like he was going to burst into pieces like a firework.

“Hey, hey,” Virgil murmured. He dotted kisses on the top of Roman’s head. “We got you, buddy.”

“I-I...!” Roman wheezed, flailing a hand wordlessly. What words were there, when his heart was so full of love and relief and hope and joy? What could possibly encapsulate how happy he was to see them?

Patton took his hand and squeezed it. “I know, honey,” He beamed, and Roman saw the shiny film of tears swimming in his eyes. “Me, too.”

“I can stay?” Roman asked as he relaxed into their grasp, feeling safer than he had in quite a while.

Virgil nodded. “You sure can, Ro,” He whispered. His voice was soft and raw, and Roman realised that he’d probably already been crying.

He could stay. Forever. Cookies and hugs, movies and blankets, spaghetti and kisses, storybooks and warmth, and love. So much love. His heart felt like it was going to burst open. His hands shook as he clung to Patton and Virgil, and he never wanted to let go. He would never have to.

Logan cleared his throat, and the three of them looked up to where he stood, awkwardly holding the door open. “We’re letting all the heat out,” He pointed out.

Virgil laughed. “Sorry, Specs. Got a little distracted.” He kissed Roman’s forehead again, and Roman swore that he felt sparks zap right through him. “C’mon, guys.”

Some undignified scrambling later, they were all on their feet once again. Patton hung off of Virgil’s arm, cooing over Roman and chatting away about all the ideas he had for decorating Roman’s room and making it his. Roman liked that idea.

As Roman sat in the rec room, a blanket wrapped around his shoulders, sandwiched between his new fathers, and his hands wrapped around a steaming mug of sweet hot chocolate, he sighed contentedly.

Sometimes, he thought, just sometimes, life really did come equipped with all the parts of a fairy tale. A down-on-their-luck hero, villains to make your blood curdle, and, most importantly, a loving family.

As Patton leaned across to peck Virgil on the cheek, his arm looped lovingly around Roman’s waist, Roman thought to himself that he liked that part best of all.

[coeurdastronaute]

Essays in Existentialism: Plus One

“I’m not going. This is stupid,” Lexa lamented as she sipped her coffee. She slumped back in her chair and stared at her fingers picking at the holder anxiously.

“You have to go.”

“I don’t, and I’m not. It was a courtesy invitation, and that’s all.”

“Which is exactly why you have to go,” Anya explained, already annoyed at her sister's antics and moping. “You have to show her that you moved on and it didn’t take forever for you to get over her. Costia needs to see that you got someone nicer and better and smarter and hotter.”

“I’m fine. I’m over her. I don’t have to go to prove anything. And,” she twisted up her face at the realization, “I haven’t found anyone all of those things. I haven’t even tried.”

The café filled with people grabbing some sustenance while the two sat at their normal table. For the better part of the conversation, Lexa regretted mentioning that she’d gotten her ex’s wedding invitation. She also hated that now she would have to listen to her sister’s opinions on the matter.

“That’s my point! You haven’t even looked! Costia cheated on you, broke your heart, stole four years of your life, and then asked to be friends after it was all over,” she recited. “Now she invites you to her wedding and you’re supposed to go and be happy? No way.”

“We’re friends. It was the nice thing to do, but I probably won’t go.”

“You have to go and show her what’s what.”

“What does that even mean?” Lexa shook her head and sipped her coffee as she let her gaze wander to the window and the city outside.

The coffee shop was bustling, filled with people reading and writing and talking and laughing, but it did nothing to make Lexa feel any better about the invitation. She refused to look at her sister because she knew exactly the look she was getting.

“You find yourself a hot date and make her see that you weren’t even bothered at all.”

“That’s stupid.”

“It’s brilliant.”

“It’s petty.”

“Think about it,” Anya said excitedly. “You go to the wedding, you take a smoking hot lady, and you end it, once and for all. You prove that you aren’t even  thinking about Costia.”

“It’s over. It’s been over for years.”

“All you do is work.”

“I run my own business,” Lexa sighed, shaking her head. “I want to be successful. And I am over her. I’ve dated.”

All that Anya could do was shake her head and give a heavy groan of complaint. She was never a fan of Costia, and she was certainly more than happy to see it over, though never happy to see how gutted it made her sister.

There wasn’t a doubt that Lexa loved Costia. She’d been her first real love. There’d been girlfriends before, but something always came up, always ended it before six months. Something about Costia was different, and for the life of her Anya never knew why, and her sister could never explain it.

And while it was true that Lexa was busy, her sister never believed much else. She didn’t buy the other girls and going out and being over Costia. Someone over their ex wouldn’t look so glum about a wedding invitation.

“You have to show her. Just think about it.”

“I never would have imagined you’d be advocating me going to Costia’s wedding.”

“I’m advocating you getting laid and rubbing it in her face.”

“Okay, are you done?” Lexa laughed and hoped all at once.

From the table, she looked back over the café while her workers went about their jobs, not really needing her to do their jobs. She didn’t care, she still liked to work normal hours. Unfortunately she hired competent people and so she wasn’t needed and couldn’t be saved from her sister.

“Think about it.”

Lexa shook her head and sighed, hoping it was enough.

The problem was that Lexa did think about it.

She thought about it all night as she locked up the doors in her café. She let it bother her when she met a few friends out for drinks. She even let it follow her as she told them about her sister’s plan, to which they eagerly agreed, much to her own disappointment and shaming.

The problem was that Lexa thought about it all night.

She thought about it after a few glasses of beer. She thought about it as her brain got a little dizzy and her fingers moved on her keyboard.

Wanted: Beautiful, intelligent, kind, caring, smart, funny woman to show off to my ex at her wedding. Trip to wine country included... Honestly, the other stuff doesn’t matter, just be super hot.

With a grin, she emailed it to her sister, asking if she should post it somewhere.

Still, the thought nagged at her until she opened her ex’s profile. The pictures didn’t hurt her, didn’t bother her. It was like looking at a memory. In reality, she didn’t know Costia anymore, and that was alright. In the years apart, Lexa had grown her little place into a business, and she survived and mended. She just wasn’t sure she was ready for anything with someone else. She got good at being alone and wounded.

With a half drunk revelation about her place in life that she hoped she would forget, Lexa fell asleep and vowed to never think about Costia’s wedding again.

Lexa was mildly successful. After about a week, her sister didn’t bring it up, and she forgot to return the RSVP. It faded away to nothing, and she continued her normal life just as she had since Costia got kicked out and left for good.

“I’ve found her,” Anya sprinted into the coffee shop, nearly panting and half skidding past the counter.

From the booth in the back where she worked on the books, Lexa adjusted her glasses as she looked up and watched her sister frantically look around the counter for her. She perked up when she met Lexa’s eyes and continued to weave back through the tables, shedding a scarf and bag in the process.

“I’ve found your date!”

“I don’t need a date,” Lexa furrowed, forgetting about the stupid wedding. “I have three employees on vacation next week. I’m fine. I’ve told you--”

“Shh. Hush. Shh-shh-shhut your face,” she shook her head and tried to catch her breath still. “I ran the whole way here. I haven’t ran anywhere, ever.”

“You could have texted--”

“Shhh!”

With a roll of her eyes, Lexa waited patiently for her sister. She had bills to pay and she had stuff to get done for the day. After their mom left, Anya grew up almost overnight. The tender age of twelve and suddenly making sure Lexa was okay. It was a hard habit to break. Even fifteen years later.

“We don’t have much time, but through a series of events, I may have forwarded your email to most of my company, meaning all of my company,” she explained, holding up her hand as her sister moved to interrupt and complain. “But I did find you a date.”

“You… You…” Lexa squinted and stared at her sister incredulously. Her mouth wanted to move, but she was too mortified. “You WHAT?”

It came out louder that Lexa normally sounded, which surprised her sister slightly. A few people mingling in the coffee shop looked over, though she didn’t notice. Instead, she just stared at Anya and waited to find the proper words. They’d never come though. She knew it. Her brain was too frazzled.

“Just be calm. Sit up straight. Fix your hair. Be charming,” her sister insisted.

“Anya, I can’t possibly--”

The words stalled as she trailed off slowly when she saw a beautiful girl appear in her coffee shop. But as much as she was distracted, she found her senses again and shook away the thought before giving her sister another glare.

“I’m not doing this,” she hissed, ignoring Anya’s self-satisfied grin.

“Yes you are. You need this.”

“You’re not pimping me out to a strang--”

“Yes I am.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Too late.”

“Am I interrupting?” the girl in question appeared, all too close for Lexa’s comfort.

“No!” Anya said, much too loudly. “No, no, not at all.” With a pointed look, she found her smile to put the stranger at ease. “Clarke, I’d like you to meet my sister, Lexa.”

“Hi,” the blonde smiled

Lexa gaped for a second, pursing her lips shut as she gulped. It was more of a problem than she’d expected. How a girl like that answered a stupid email, as lost on Lexa. But her sister nudged her shoulder and she came back around.

“Hello,” she managed stiffly, earning another nudge. “I-- Um. Could I get you a coffee?”

“Sit, sit,” Anya interrupted. “I’ll go get them for you both. Take your time. Get to know each other. Work it out. I know where everything is. Lexa owns this place. Pretty good coffee. What can I get you, Clarke?”

“What do you recommend?” she asked, turning to the owner with a natural smile on her face. Lexa could make out the hint of a dimple on the blonde’s cheek and that was trouble.

“Matcha cappuccino,” Lexa decided. “We just got some new leaves in from one of my friends in Kyoto.”

“Two of those, coming right up,” her sister clapped her hands. “You two sit and get acquainted.”

In a second, she was gone, weaving through the tables toward the counter, leaving the two strangers standing there, awkwardly looking back and forth at each other until Lexa held out her hand and motioned for Clarke to take the chair her sister already offered. Awkwardly, she gave a weary smile and tried to figure out where to start.

From the get go, Lexa could see that Clarke was essentially the opposite of her ex. Where Costia was tall and slender, Clarke was shorter and curvy. Where there was dark, curly hair, no was blonde waves. Gone were brown eyes and in their place was blue ones; bluer than any blue had a right to be. And the smile. Clarke had a constant smile, always right there and eager and warm.

Lexa blushed when she realized she’d met Clarke’s eyes again after staring at her lips, her cheeks growing pink with the blush of being found out.

“I’m really sorry my sister’s pulling you into this mess,” Lexa finally began, all the words bubbling up from her chest and spilling out of her mouth. “I’m severely embarrassed that it got forwarded. It was just a joke, and I don’t even want to go, but I also don’t think it’s fair to ask someone to preten--”

“Easy there, tiger,” Clarke chuckled as Lexa spun out. “No one dragged me into it. I volunteered.”

“But… why?”

“I’d had a few glasses of wine when I responded, to be honest,” she shrugged. “And then Anya seemed so grateful and relieved. I’m also kind of excited for an adventure. If I wrote a bucket list, I’d like to think crashing an ex’s wedding just to spite them would be on it.”

“Let me just get this straight. You’d willingly go and pretend to be my girlfriend to make my ex mad, just for fun?”

“Makes me sound a bit psychotic when you put it like that,” she frowned before perking back up. “But yeah. Why not? Should be some good karma in there somewhere.”

Lexa stared at the stranger, torn between amazement at the good intentions on display and the absolute absurdity of it all. She couldn’t just go with someone she just met to Costia’s fancy, Napa wedding. That would be bad. And wrong. Wrong and bad. That would be crazy. And yet, it was suddenly an option.

“You’re really sure about this, aren’t you?” Lexa finally asked.

“I’m a fairly good fake date. If you’d like references, you can ask my high school boyfriend. I was his beard for two years for family functions.”  

“Ah, so you’re a professional fake girlfriend?”

“I think that’s an escort-in-training, to be precise,” Clarke decided before seeing Lexa’s face fall slightly. “I’m kidding, obviously. That was a joke.”

“Thank goodness.”

Before either could say anything else, two cups appeared with frothy green and white foam were slid on the table, right on top of Lexa’s work and papers and notebook. She looked between the two of them and smiled expectantly.

“You two seem like you’re talking. Going well?” Anya hoped.

The hope in her tone was evident from the get go, and Lexa didn't really know what to say, so she just shrugged and looked at Clarke who did much the same thing.

“It’s alright,” Lexa finally tried, earning a nod from the blonde across the table.

“Good, good,” she smiled. “I’m just going to head back to work and let you two crazy kids iron out the details. I’m sure this is going to be great.”

Once more, Anya gave her sister a pointed look and communicated a few things to her through her face before giving Clarke a smile, resuming the happy front. To her credit, Lexa didn’t completely die of embarrassment just yet.

“So, you run this place?” Clarke asked, blowing on her drink before taking a sip.

“Own it.”

“Wow. No wonder you look so stressed. I can’t imagine the pressure.”

“I get by alright.”

For a moment, she didn’t have much else to say, but Lexa felt like she should. There was this weird feeling of wanting to say things to put the girl across her at ease, and she really wasn’t sure how.

“This is good.”

“Thank you,” Lexa smiled weakly as she quickly processed the information that came from the amiable stranger. “So you’re serious about this, aren’t you?”

From across the table, Clarke carefully put down the mug of delicious coffee with care and from beneath her lashes, in an absolutely stunning kind of look that was enough to make Lexa’s mouth go instantly dry, she met her eyes and she let her lip quirk up on the corner slowly and just enough.

“Lexa, there are moments when you just have to be someone’s fake girlfriend. It’s a service to the world.”

“To the world, huh?”

“I had a pretty gnarly break up a few months ago. My friends say I need to get out. This seems like a low-pressure introduction, and for some reason, hiding behind an act of charity makes it easier for me to put myself out there.”

With a sigh and another sip of her cup, Lexa looked around the coffee shop and mulled. She was someone who mulled. She took time to decide things. Never one to be rash or impetuous, unless apparently a lot of wine was involved, Lexa tried to turn it around from all sides.

Clarke just sipped and smiled, careful to wipe the foam that got caught on her lips.

“We don’t have to touch or be super personal. I won’t ask you do to something you aren’t comfortable with. This is strictly pretend, or even it’s like friends, hanging out.”

“Well, you’re a sweet fake girlfriend,” Clarke beamed.

“I’m not doing this to get my ex back or to sleep with you or anything like that. Anya thinks that showing up with a beautiful girl would just be a nice way to turn the page.”

“I kind of agree. Your sister wants you to show your ex that you’ve moved on and she missed out. I think that’s fair.”

“I’m over her. I am. I think that’s why this feels weird.”

“You don’t want to seem like you’re trying too hard when you’re actually okay,” Clarke nodded, understanding perfectly. “But you also are still kind of hurt and don’t want to go alone because that would seem weird.”

“Super weird, right?”

Clarke just chuckled and nodded.

“It’s kind of weird being this honest with a complete stranger.”

“Yeah, or with anyone,” Lexa mumbled slightly to herself.

“If you want, you can think it over. You don’t have to decide. I think it’s just nice to know that you have the option to have someone to hang out with and make it less weird at your ex’s wedding.”

The nice girl nodded politely and finished her coffee. There was a kind of pink in her cheeks that made her eyes seem clearer.

“You’re really serious?”

“I am,” Clarke nodded. “You seem relatively normal minus this whole thing.”

In a move, Clarke reached across the table and picked up a pen before snagging a napkin. She jotted down her number and slid it across the table.

“I still can’t believe you’re serious,” Lexa shook her head despite seeing the number.

“Me neither. Just let me know. I should head back to work,” she offered, standing up from the table finally. “It was nice to meet you.”

“It was nice to meet you.”

Lexa stood as well, though the moment she did, she regret it and was unsure why. Instead, she just remained and somehow stuck her hand out to shake as if it were an interview. Nice enough, Clarke smiled and shook her hand before heading back toward the entrance and tossing a wave over her shoulder.

It wasn’t until Clarke was gone that Lexa sat back down and picked up the napkin tenderly. She smiled slightly at the whirlwind that just happened. She wasn’t ever that honest, and she was never that vulnerable, but two minutes with a pretty girl and she was confessing it all.

“Where did she go? What did you do?” Anya worried, sitting quickly.

“I didn’t do anything. I can’t believe you did this though. She was nice and seemed normal and you--”

“I found you a wedding date, if you didn’t scare her off.”

“I have to think about it.”

“What is there to think about? I hand-delivered a hot blonde who is just weird enough to accept your drunken offer for a date to your ex’s wedding.”

“I am still not sure I’m going,” Lexa shook her head.

Carefully, she folded the napkin and slid it in the pocket of her shirt.

Her sister  rolled her eyes and groaned.

“You’re impossible.”

For the entirety of the evening, well after the coffee shop was closed and Lexa was back in her own place, the weight of the napkin tucked into her shirt pocket weighed heavily upon her chest. She refused to look at it to confirm the numbers and the slopes and curves of Clarke’s name just above it.

But like a little thought worm that burrowed deep into her brain, she couldn’t reach it to evict it. The notion existed within her and she couldn’t escape it.

Once again, Lexa opened up her ex’s website and perused the pictures. There was a distinct lack of connection there anymore, and yet the book wasn’t shut. Clarke was right-- Lexa needed to go there and make sure. She had to feel the disconnect in person. She had to free herself of this nagging need to feel something. And Clarke had the qualifications for it. She was pretty and funny and sympathetic to a weirdo’s weird request.

After another lap of pacing through her house, Lexa stood still as a statue in her living room before tugging the napkin out and dialing the number.

“Hello?” Clarke greeted on the sixth right, right before Lexa was prepared to chalk it up to a loss.

“Clarke? It’s Lexa. Lexa Woods. Anya’s sister. We met earlier at my coffee shop. About the, er-- the um-- wedding?”

It all came out so quick that her brain was even catching up quick enough to be embarrassed for the incoherence.

“Ah, yes. I remember.”

There was some amusement in her voice and that did not make it any easier.

“Would you go with me to my ex’s wedding?” Lexa blurted. “I think my sister might be right.”

“Don’t tell her that.”

“I was going to ask you the same thing.”

“So you’re asking for a smokeshow and arm candy to show off and help with closure?”

“Yeah, but I’m kind of okay with you hanging out with me. You have a pretty good grip on what I’m feeling.”

“I would love to be your fake girlfriend, but I have one condition.”

“Oh God,” Lexa goraned, flopping down on her couch as the embarrassment caught up with her and she knew enough to be nervous.

“I get to make up our origin story.”

“Sold!” she barked. “I don’t want to think about anything.”

“Perfect. Should we go over the details?”

“I’ll email you the reservations, and of course I’ll book your plane ticket.”

“How chivalrous of you, darling,” Clarke teased.

There was a moment of quiet before Lexa took a deep breath.

“Thank you for doing this. It means a lot to me, a complete stranger.”

“I get a paid-for vacation and I love dancing at weddings. This works out for both of us.”

“Whatever you say, Clarke.”

NEXT

[tenpin-boleyn]

I procrastinated and this mess happened

It’s horrificly bad but it’s inspired by this doodle I did when I was, you guessed it, procrastinating :))

So enjoy this pile of Millie’s cat sick :)

“I’m glad I found Chocolate Milk now because if I found it before I wouldn’t be able to drink it.” Anne stated, her face the perfect picture of nonchalance. “Why? Are you lactose intolerant?” You replied back, blissfully unaware of the past Anne hid. “I was beheaded? Duh” she laughed.

You had known Anne for over a year now, but not once has she mentioned being beheaded in a past life. You had seen Anne in Six obviously but you’d just assumed that was a character she had taken on. Like that time you played the Virgin Mary at age 4, probably not the best decision eh Mrs Keeping but there we go.

Anne suddenly looked as white as a ghost. She had forgotten that you didn’t know. For what it was worth Anne was a great actor. Onstage she was competition to a gremlin, but to a select few she was Anne. Just Anne. Anne with no tragic backstory. Just a girl who liked milkshakes. “I’m so sorry Anne. I didn’t know” you said lovingly, placing a hand onto Anne’s. It was a small gesture but it made you feel better that you could bring a bit of colour back to her rosy cheeks again. “Shall we go to yours? I want to show you something that will open your eyes forever.” Anne nodded to this, happy that you hadn’t dragged out the topic anymore.

You had hoped Anne wouldn’t already know what you were about to show her. It might be common knowledge to most but she had a tickling feeling that Anne wasn’t part of that percentage. You took her hand and ran down the street, passing the Queens house, which made Anne raise an eyebrow. Jane liked everyone home by 9, and it was already half 7, so she couldn’t go on a wild adventure to oxford on a random bus. “Look Y/N-“

“Tah dah.” You stopped and raised your hands at the sign above you.

“Tesco? You brought me to Tesco?”

You smiled at the green minx, “ah my child this isn’t any normal trip to Tesco. This is a life changing trip”

You managed to pry Anne away from the chocolate bars- you had a feeling that the sugar from the milkshakes was already getting to her head- and led her down the dairy isle. While Anne was distracted with a carton of purple milk you grabbed the carton you were searching for. “What do you think goes into purple milk? Cow blood mixed with a taste of WKD? ANNE MILLICENT BOLEYN DONT YOU DARE THINK ABOUT TOUCHING MY ALCOHOL CABINET. Well now I don’t have to” She laughed.

“Anne what I have in my hands will change your entire life.”

You presented her with a carton of chocolate milk and you smiled to yourself as you watched her eyes widen and start to twinkle.

“You. Can. Buy. Chocolate. Milk?”

When you finally went back to the Queens place, you couldn’t help but worry. You had literally bought Tesco out of Chocolate milk. You knew Jane was a strict mum so perhaps introducing Anne, loud, insane Anne, to a new sugary invention wasn’t the best idea. Especially when you are carrying 27 cartons. 26, Anne just drank one. “Shall we take these up to my room?” Anne was obviously thinking about not having to share, rather than what Jane would think. “You do realise you need to keep milk in the fridge right?”

“But I thought- cause its chocolate-“

She looked downtrodden. “Do you want to sleep round? It’s getting late anyway and I just changed my sheets after months so it’s not a biohazard anymore!” You giggled to yourself, Anne truly was special. “I’d love to. Will the others mind?”

“No they love you!” And with that Anne unlocked the door.

“I’m telling you they’re dating!”

“No, id have read about it by now.”

“Huh?”

“Am I the only one who reads her dia- hello. Welcome to the very normal and casual conversation we are definitely having.” Cleves exclaimed from where she was sat, having realised that both girls were standing in the hallway.

“I’ve missed you guys! How have you been?”

“Great, I’ve finished my book on why men are absolutely pointless and serve no use on this planet!”

“And I made cookies for the first time! Who would have known that chocolate cookies aren’t just overcooked cookies?”

Anna noticed the bags we were carrying. “Do you two care to explain why we now own a farms worth of chocolate milk?”

“To cure my lacking toes intolerance”

“To help feed children in Africa!”

You both panicked. Anne, because she didn’t want to share, and you, because you didn’t want to get Anne into trouble for spending an absurd amount on flavoured milk. “Put them Into the garage fridge before Jane sees them! Lord knows what she’ll do with 40 cartons of confiscated milk.”

You glanced at Anne and giggled, you had noticed that her eyes were just a bit more bluer today, a trait you learnt meant that she was happy, and a darker blue meant she was going through a rough patch. “Before Jane sees what?” A blonde figure asked.

Before either of you could panic out another excuse, Cleves piped up again. “ I was just asking the girls to take my deliveries upstairs into my fridge” Anne winked at you both “because my back hurts awfully”

Jane smiled sympathetically at Cleves, unaware of the truth she was hiding. “Alright hurry up you two, and it’s lovely to see you Y/N!”

“You too Mrs Seymour!”

“Call me Jane.” You smiled. Although you called her Jane to Anne, it was only because that’s what Anne used, Jane had never formally told you to call her Jane, so you didn’t think it was proper. It felt nice to know that someone liked you, even a tiny bit.

“I’m telling you it’s not going to fit.” You declared as Anne tried to stuff 25 cartons of milk into the tiny mini fridge Anna had in her room. Yes Anne had drank another carton and was nearly bouncing off the walls. To your surprise 23 of the cartons fit inside of the fridge. “Looks like we’ll have to drink these then” Anne smiled mischievously.

The pair of you had been sat in Anne’s bed for about half an hour, just enjoying each other’s company whilst sipping the chocolate milk when you couldn’t stop yourself. “Why didn’t you tell me you got beheaded?” You had to admit, Anne’s slip up earlier stung. Didn’t she trust you with that information? But she trusted a room full of strangers?

Anne couldn’t look you in the eye, she was quite engaged by the edible glitter she had poured into her milk. You didn’t think she heard you so you started to ask her again.

“Why didn-“

“I’m sorry. I’m really fucking sorry. It’s just, I’m so happy when I’m around you, and I don’t want to waste a second of it talking about my last life- it was hell, yes, but I’m over it. I’d rather talk about scrunchies than kerplunkies” and with that she motioned a quick beheading with her fingers and tongue.

To be fair, you hadn’t expected that reply. You hadn’t expected a decent reply end of. You’d put it down to the fact that Anne was coming down from a 22 hour long sugar rush and was too tired to think about what she was saying. “I- I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you. I’m sorry that you feel that you need to keep things from me just to have a good time. I mean we could do 95% fun and 5% family trauma because god knows I’ve got tons. But I like hanging out with you to Boleyn.”

Neither of you knew what to say next. Not much had been said but it was enough to build a bridge that wasn’t previously there. Out of nowhere Anne gets a text from Kitty. It contained an emoji and a word. Typical kitty. “💋 her”

Anne was shocked, 1. Where was Katherine and how did she spot the silence and sexual tension, and 2. How the fuck did she know that she was gay. Sure the queens were open and accepting of being gay, but it wasn’t something that Anne spoke about. But despite all of the racing questions, Anne plucked up the balls she stole from Henry and leant in and cupped Y/N’s face. You were shocked at this movement. How did a discussion about beheadings lead to this? But you weren’t complaining. You had realised you loved Anne the day she fell off of her bike. She had never rode a bike before so you had been teaching her, at first she seemed promising, but she fell over and scraped her knee, causing a war amount of blood to pour. To your amazement, she started crying and asking for Millie. You panicked, who was Millie?? You thought it could be a pet name for one of the queens but you couldn’t be sure which. So you ran inside to fetch Kitty. “Who’s Millie??”

Without even speaking Kat ran upstairs and returned holding a ragged old dog teddy. Just the thought of Anne being so vulnerable, clutching the years old toy made your heart wrench- more than when your favourite TV show got cancelled and definitely more than when Ben and Jerry’s decided to stop selling Cookie Dough at the cinema.

You leant in to annes hands, and placed your lips upon hers in a frenzy of sparks and fireworks. You had dreamt of this moment, but you could never have imagined it would come true. Just the thought made you smile, making Anne laugh whilst kissing you. You suddenly pull away, realising that you hadn’t been honestly with Anne either. “ I was murdered. By my father.”

“Where the actual fuck did that come from”

From outside the door the pair heard giggles and a muffled shout of “language Anne!”

Of course the other queens would be spying on the pair of you. You weren’t blind,or deaf. You’d heard the comments kitty and Cleves make when they think you can’t hear, and you’ve seen the silent arguments between kitty and Jane.

It did feel nice to have people who cared. Even if they were looking out for Anne. They felt like family. It felt like home.

“ANNE MILLICENT BOLEYN I SWEAR TO GOD IF YOU TOUCH MY BIBLE EVER AGAIN-“ Catherine of Aragon burst into the room, past the other queens listening intently outside the door and you suddenly realised that you were still locked in an embrace with Anne. You quickly pulled away before whispering

“That impression was spot on.”

[niallismymuse]

Chapter 2

Stepping off the jet fifteen hours later, Niall is smacked in the face with heat and humidity. It’s so bright here in Honolulu, Hawaii, compared to London. He loves it, and he’s already prepared for the weather difference – he had changed on the plane into shorts and a tank top. Ellie’s adorned in a similar outfit.

She smiles at him, hair tucked into a neat bun on the top of her head. Their luggage is being loaded into the hotel limousine that’s been provided. Apparently, it comes with the room. It’s a nice surprise; Niall hasn’t looked into the trip too much, deciding to wait and see.

“Ready?” Ellie asks, and he takes her hand. They descend from the plane and are ushered into the cool air of the limo. They sit, and Niall turns to look out the window. The trees are a lush green, and, off in the distance, a jewel-toned ocean awaits. He’s been here before, so he knows that everything is gorgeous here, which is part of the fun. There isn’t an ugly part of Hawaii. Even the volcanoes have an edged, dangerous beauty to them.

The driver takes off once their luggage is loaded, and Niall leans back into his seat. The ride is about twenty-five minutes, and then the limo stops in front of the Halekulani Hotel, right beside Waikiki Beach. It’s breathtaking here, so much so that when he gets out of the limo, he nearly comes to a standstill. Only Ellie’s hand on his arm keeps him moving forward.

Niall has seen a lot throughout his over-a-decade-long career. He’s seen a lot of beautiful things, and a lot of the ugliness that permeates the world. It’s taught him some valuable lessons: what he does and gets to see is a privilege few get, something he works to acknowledge often. He has opportunities many wish for. And, lastly, there is beauty and grace in everything, and it’s necessary to not only see it, but appreciate it as well. This is the time and place for such appreciation.

Ellie leads him inside while the porters take care of their suitcases. They check in at the front desk, where Niall learns they’re staying in the Orchid Suite. An attendant shows them where it’s located, and all he can think when he walks in is that this might be the most beautiful hotel he’s ever stayed at.

True to its name, the Orchid Suite is filled with pots of orchids, ranging from white to purple and everything in between. The whites have a purple core, and some of the purples are speckled and striped with yellow. Each and every one of them is beautiful. There’s an intimate living room directly past the entranceway that they’re standing in, and beyond that is a lanai. A blue sky melds with an even bluer ocean just past the gardens decorating the ground outside of the lanai.

Niall is only half-aware of the porter dropping off their suitcases. Ellie tips him, and it’s that action that snaps him out of the daze he’s in.

“I’ll race you to the bedroom,” he grins, and then takes off, running as fast as he’s able. He swings a right after a glance to the left shows a dining area and a doorway that has more couches past it. He guesses correctly, but Ellie speeds past him and into the master bedroom, before throwing herself on top of the king-sized bed in the middle.

There’s still plenty of space with her spread-eagled on top of it, so Niall lays down beside her, groaning as his muscles sink into the plush comforter and the mattress beneath it.

“You’re such an old man,” she grins at him and reaches over to poke him. He chuckles at the jab, and then snatches her wrists and rolls on top of her, grinning wildly down at her. Ellie’s smile softens until she’s looking tenderly up at him, despite the fact that he has her completely pinned down beneath him. “I love you.”

Niall leans down and pecks her lips, before purposefully bumping her nose with his, making her giggle. “I love you too, dork.”

Ellie laughs, and then pushes her body up against his, wiggling to try and shove him off. “Get off, you ass!”

They’re both giggling and red in the face when the tussle ends a few minutes later, eyeing each other in a playful way, just in case one decides to start it up again. When nothing happens, Niall let’s his shoulders slump and he sighs. “So…what should we do now?”

He likes that phrase. It sounds like they’re on an adventure, which they most definitely are, but an interesting one compared to the old ‘life is an adventure’ saying people like to tout when they’re bored.

Ellie rubs at her tummy and then glances down at his, eyes narrowed. On cue, his stomach grumbles, and Niall realizes that he’s starving. “I suppose that answers your question,” she laughs and stands up from the bed. “Want to get some lunch and then go to the beach?”

Niall nods and gets up from the bed, searching throughout the suite for their suitcases. They’re right next to the front door, and he takes the handles and pulls them both in. Ellie pushes hers down and starts going through it there on the floor, searching for a swimsuit and a to wear coverup at the restaurant. He sets his on the bed and opens it there, grabbing a pair of swim trunks and a white t-shirt to wear over it.

They change, him into those swim trunks and the t-shirt, and Ellie into a dark red bikini with a sheer white coverup on top, and a floppy hat.

“You look like a tourist,” he snorts and flicks the side of it. It wobbles on top of her head.

She sticks her tongue out at him. “I am one.”

They head off to lunch, hand-in-hand, with a bag full of towels and sunscreen slung on Ellie’s shoulder. After wandering around, slightly lost and amazed and unwilling to admit the former but definitely the latter, they decide on eating at a restaurant on the premises called Orchids. It’s fitting, given their suite.

Orchids is serving lunch, which is a two-course meal they get to select. Niall is immediately overwhelmed and excited, because this is the kind of food he occasionally dreams about. He’s not a bad cook himself, but he knows this is going to be delicious no matter what he orders. After long minutes of contemplation, Niall orders Maccheroni Bolognese and a spinach salad, and Ellie decides on the Tagliolini Alle Vongole.

And life is good. They eat their lunches with the sound of waves crashing on the beach providing a melody, and maybe they drink a little wine even though it’s only two in the afternoon, and they enjoy themselves.

Because that’s what Ellie and Niall do best. They live, and they love, and they enjoy all of the in between.

“Your face looks so blurry,” Ellie murmurs, and Niall smiles, tries to readjust his phone so maybe the picture isn’t so bad. She’s sleepy, her eyes half-lidded with exhaustion, but he’s wide awake. He treasures these moments, uses them to get through his day – okay, he doesn’t have to get through his day, because he loves almost every minute of being on tour, but these videocalls are something to look forward to.

“Sorry,” he apologizes, squinting at the bright light of his screen in the near-dark of his room. “Is that better?”

“Yes,” she answers softly, and then she adjusts herself on her bed, pulling her blankets closer. They cover a majority of her face, and he chuckles at the sight of her. “How was the show?”

His chest swells with pride. They had concludedtheir first of two shows in Dublin, Ireland, only an hour and a half ago, and it had been incredible. Being in his country, singing with his mates, and watching hispeople show up and give their all…it was incredible. “I’ve never been prouder to be Irish,” he laughs, the sound echoing in the large space of his hotel room.

“Good,” she replies, the vowels softened by the sleep in her voice. Despite his assurances that she didn’t need to, Ellie had set an alarm for the middle of the night to give him a call. So here they are, talking to no one but each other in their own solitary darkness. It makes his heart pound in his chest like it did earlier on stage.

Niall is falling in love with her, and god, he knows it, recognizes it with every breath his lungs take.

He doesn’t think she knows, though.

“How was your class today?” Niall asks, straining to remember what day of the week it is and if she had class at all. On tour, it gets like that. He’s constantly traveling and hustling and singing, in so many different places, that Mondays and Tuesdays fade to the back of his mind. It’s like a long break from school, but he’s working and playing.

Ellie smiles like she knows something he doesn’t. “It was good. I have a project due next week…it still feels so surreal to me. That I’m here, in England, instead of back home.” Her lips part, and she hesitates. “I…I wish you were here with me.”

There’s something so raw and vulnerable about that statement, combined with the tiredness hanging on her face, that makes him pause. Niall’s glad that it’s dark, because he can feel the blush on his cheek, and in the daylight, it would be ten times more prominent. “I wish I was too.” He replies gently, and it’s true. He would give almost anything for her to be here. He’s lucky she’s even in England, and not back in America. Thatwas rough for him, rough in a way that told him how important she was to him already. It had confirmed for him fully the extent of his unrequited feelings.

Ellie smiles a real smile then, not tainted by exhaustion. “And you will be, soon.”

It’s not exactly true: they don’t get a break until June, and it’s a short one, barely a week. It’s the beginning of March now. But it’s little white lies like this that make the ache in his chest fade into the background.

“Soon,” Niall promises, and remembers the times they had when she had moved to Harlaxton College over the winter. The laughter, the drinking, the good times. How full his soul had felt. “Soon.”

Niall is already sunburnt, and they haven’t even been in Hawaii for twenty-four hours yet. He groans, lying face down on the bed, as Ellie snickers and rubs Aloe Vera into his back.

“You’re an idiot,” she says, and not for the first time. There’s a certain smugness to her tone that makes him want to do naughty things to make her pay for it, but her hands on his back are so soothing that he can’t muster the energy to flip her over. “I told you to put more sunscreen on. I even offered to get out of the water with you, so I could spray your back.”

Niall lifts his hand up and flips her off.

He’s also slightly tipsy – there was a bar near the beach, and what’s a man to do when there’s alcohol a-plenty?

She lets out a startled laugh. “Oooh, you do realize you are incredibly vulnerable right now, right? I could smack your back and you would be on fire.”

Niall’s quiet, conceding to her point. Ellie clicks her tongue, then leans down and presses a tiny kiss to the bare, unburnt skin of the left side of his shoulder. “I would never do that to my husband, though. The vows I made to you prevent it.”

“So lucky I married you,” he grumbles, “just so I could know that you won’t beat me up.”

She laughs, and then he feels her hands leave his back, only to be replaced by a gush of cool air. She’s fanning him. Niall almost tears up.

“What did I do to deserve you?” he asks, ridiculously emotional about the fact that his wife, after coating him in a layer of Aloe Vera, is now fanning him.

“You loved me.” Ellie answers simply, and he turns his head to look at her and smile. “You loved me, and you supported me, through almost the entirety of us knowing each other. That’s why you deserve me. Because you are kind, and good, and so fucking incredible, Niall.”

Now it seems like Ellie is tearing up. Niall pushes himself up, hissing at how his skin crinkles with the movement, but looks back at her in concern. “Babe, are you okay?”

Her lip trembles slightly, but she nods her head and leans into kiss him. He closes his eyes as the softness of her lips meet his and reaches up to cup her cheek. Ellie leans into his touch, smiling into the kiss, and then breaks away. “I’ve got to get this swimsuit and salt off,” she says softly, giving him a ‘what can you do?’ sort of shrug and an easy smile.

Niall smiles and relaxes back on the bed, listening as she climbs off of the bed and pads into the bathroom. Only moments later, he hears the pitter-patter of water hitting the tile, and how the pattern changes when she steps inside a few seconds later. He dozes to the sound, mind drifting, the sting of his sunburn a background sensation only.

When the water stops, however, his eyes fly open. Letting out a quiet groan, he turns and sits up to look at the bathroom. Ellie comes out a few minutes later, hair wet but towel-dried, and utterly naked.

Niall likes to appreciate beauty everywhere he goes. It never gets old. And, he knows as he looks at her, that he will never be tired of appreciating her, either. It’s a thought he has every time something like this happens. He could just sit here and look at her forever, but he wants more, too. He wants to run his fingers down the soft flesh of her tummy and sides, feel the swells of her breasts. He wants to kiss every inch of her, over and over again.

Ellie smiles. There is no insecurity, no shyness. Because this is them, and they’ve been together for years now, over a decade. He knows every inch of her like the back of his hand, and she knows him just the same.

This is them.

“So…” she pauses, reaching her leg out and playfully kicking it towards him, then fluttering her eyelashes. “Do you think, with your current skin condition, we can still fuck?”

The blunt question sends chills down his spine and blood straight on down. Niall swallows, because his mouth is so dry so suddenly it almost hurts, and then nods. “I think we can figure something out.”

They do.

Afterwards, Ellie has to reapply the Aloe Vera and then rinse off in the shower again because it somehow got all over her, but it was totally worth it.

They eat the leftover Tagliolini she had sent back to their room from their lunch today, sharing it at the dining room table. He’s wearing a crappy t-shirt that he doesn’t mind getting sticky, and she’s sitting on his lap. They’re eating out of the same takeout container, and Niall notices how little she ate at lunch. And how little she’s eating now.

“Are you feeling okay?” He asks, pausing to watch her. She takes a bite of her tiny forkful of food and swallows it daintily before gazing at him with wide, innocent eyes.

“But of course. Whatever could be wrong?” Ellie asks in a faux accent, and he nearly rolls his eyes at her dramatics.

“You’re not eating like you used to.”

Ellie pauses, staring down at him in the oddest way. She bites down on her lip and tilts her head to the side, eyes darting with his. “Well,” she starts, and then stops again. “I’m just not hungry like I used to be.”

Niall nods his head, pressing his lips together. Her nostrils didn’t flare, and her voice didn’t waver. So why does he still get the feeling that she’s not telling him the full story?

They finish eating their leftovers in silence, though Ellie stops a good few minutes before the container is empty. She gets up off of him and strolls towards the doors that open to the lanai and pushes them open. She’s stepping outside, in her plaid pajama shorts and tank top, before he can say anything.

Niall tosses the container in the garbage and follows her outside into the lanai. Beyond it is the gardens they have access to. They’re beautiful in the sunlight, but here, under the moon…incandescent is the only word he can use to describe it. And Ellie, standing there under the moonlight, too…

Her back is towards him, like she’s examining a distant area, and nothing can distract her from it. The closer he gets, the more he notices: the upwards tilt to her head, the open, unguarded way she’s standing. Ellie is looking up at the moon, and from the way she’s shining as she looks up at it, it’s almost like the moon is shining back, a reaction to her.

The stars blanket the surrounding darkness like fireflies, though theirs is a constant shine. It’s not something they can see in London – the smog has covered up the night sky for years now, and in order to see it, they have to travel miles away from the city. Here, it’s open and waiting, and Niall has the strangest urge to reach up and see if he can pluck a star from the sky above. They look so close.

Instead, he stops by Ellie and wraps his arm around her waist, tilting his head up to look where she’s looking, trying to see what has her so mesmerized. She leans into him, an encouragement. But Niall can see nothing but the shining night sky, surrounding them so completely.

Maybe that’s all it is, anyway.

“You haven’t talked to me in a week.”

Ellie is angry. Her fists are clenched, and they keep twitching where they lay next to her pockets. Niall’s eyes are drawn to them constantly, even as the time stretches on. He sighs then, and steps aside to let her inside his apartment.

Even how she walks inside expresses her anger towards him. Her steps are sharp and short, staccato. Her shoes smack down on the wooden floor, creating a slapping sound. She pauses just inside his apartment and stares balefully at him, not blinking.

He deserves this, he knows. He deserves her anger, and if she were to slap him right now, well, he wouldn’t complain.

Because it’s true. He hasn’t talked to her in a week, longer than that really. Ever since Niall returned here to London after the end of the Take Me Home tour, in early November, he’s been avoiding her. Because One Direction has just released Midnight Memories, their third studio album, barely a year after releasing their second. Because their next tour, Where We Are, is scheduled to commence in April of 2014. Because now he’s embroiled in press gigs, over and over again.

Because he’s madly in love with her, and he’s gone from home so often that he practically doesn’t have one. This apartment in London…he’s only in it a few months out of the year, and that would make a relationship difficult, and if there’s one thing Niall knows for sure, it’s that she deserves better.

Because he’s being both selfish and selfless – he can’t give up on One Direction, not when the fans are so dedicated, and his mates put their all into the band. Yet he can’t imagine asking her to make the sacrifices being with him would require.

But how can he possibly put that into words?

Ellie crosses her arms over her chest as the silence stretches on to be so thin Niall can hear it reaching a breaking point. Finally, she shakes her head, and looks at him in such a hurt way that he feels it like a punch to the throat. “Y’know, I moved here partially because of you. Because I really liked you, and I thought…I thought maybe you liked me too.” Niall’s lips part, but she holds up a finger, stopping him dead in his tracks. “Save it. I want to be perfectly clear here that I did not move here on the whim of someday being in a relationship with you. I moved here because I fucking love London, and England as a whole. You are – were, at this point, I guess – a major bonus.”

She takes a deep breath. Niall envies her the movement, because he doesn’t think he can breathe. Ellie…liked him? Even in the past tense, it makes his brain explode. He had never dreamed, in all of the dreams he’s had since meeting her, that she would like him back. Ellie has always seemed on another level than him. She’s smart, and funny, and beautiful, and what universe would allow it?

“Okay. I’ve said what I wanted to say. I am going to leave now.” She pivots on her feet and turns back to the door, striding towards it without a backwards glance. In the back of his mind, Niall can’t help but note that, in times of pressure, she is stone-cold. It makes him oddly proud.

“Ellie-“ he falters when she turns and glares fiercely at him from the use of the nickname, “Elise. Stop. Just one moment. Please.”

She freezes, one foot out the door. Ellie stands completely still, balanced halfway in his life and halfway out of it for good. It’s up to Niall to pull her back in, but only if she’s willing, of course.

Niall takes a deep breath. This is the rest of his life on the scales here. “Elise Williams, I am in love with you. I have been in love with you since I helped you move into your dorm at Harlaxton, and every moment since. And I never thought you would ever, in any alternate universe, feel the same.”

Elise, if anything, looks angrier, but she doesn’t stop him from continuing, so he does.

“I’ve been touring so much this entire year, and we just released another album-“ he can see that she’s about to take this the wrong way, like he’s been ghosting her because of work, which isn’t entirely accurate, so he speeds on, “And I’m going back on tour in April. Okay? Even right now, I’m hardly home because I’m running around doing all of this promotion. How…how in the world could I do this to you, bring you into this insane life where you see me for all of five minutes and then I’m gone for eight months?”

He’s panting at the end, because all of his anger and frustration at the situation has poured out into this speech. Months’ worth.

Ellie presses her lips together in a thin line. “Don’t you think…that it’s my choice to enter into this? That I should have a say in whether or not I get involved?”

Niall pauses. “I never even dreamed that you liked me, Ellie. You are so good, so strong and beautiful and pure, out of my league- “

She cuts him off. “Yeah, yeah, I know. Carry on.” A smile twitches on her lips, and, repressed as it is, it still gives him hope. He can still salvage this.

“I can’t stand the thought of…making you sacrifice so much just for me, and then, maybe someday, it falls apart. And…it was all for nothing. Loving each other, fighting for each other, and then poof. Gone. Over.”

Ellie shakes her head. “I’m a little disappointed, Niall.” She hesitates, her eyes meeting his. “How many relationships have you been in? Real ones.” When he doesn’t answer, she goes on. “I’ve been in two. And my exes and I are broken up for real reasons, because we were young and stupid, and because we grew and changed. But we grew and changed partly because we were together in the first place. Don’t you see? Even if we break up and it doesn’t work out, it’s worth it, because we become hopefully better people by the end of it.” She shakes her head, looking frustrated, like she doesn’t expect him to get it.

Niall’s heart begins to thunder in his chest. “I understand.”

She nods once. “I hope you do. This is my choice, too. It’s 50/50 on this one, and you can’t decide what you think is best for me.”

Niall nods his head. “I’m sorry,” he says genuinely, because he is. Regret is starting to build up in his mind. He almost – and still might have – ruined the best thing that’s ever happened to him just because a preconceived notion that was all in his head. “Can…we try again?”

Ellie tilts her head to the side, considering. Niall drinks her in, how strands of her hair flow down into the royal blue of the pea coat she’s wearing. Her eyes are such a beautiful shade of brown, like mahogany. And her lips, even when pursed in contemplation, are the most kissable he’s ever seen.

For the first time in a long while, Niall prays. He doesn’t pray to anyone or anything in particular; he simply prays for another chance, one that he won’t fuck up.

“Yes.” Ellie answers slowly, the syllable leaving her mouth hesitantly. Seeing his excitement, she points at him. “Don’t fucking do that again.”

Before the words are even fully out of her mouth, Niall’s swinging her around his apartment, and she laughs, letting out a shriek of delight as she wraps her arms around his neck. He sets her down, and their eyes meet and lock. This. This is the moment he’s been waiting for. Slowly, giving her plenty of time to back away, Niall leans down and presses his lips softly to hers in a gentle kiss.

She’s so still for a moment that he begins to think that he’s overstepped, but before he can back away, her fingers wrap into the hair on the nape of his neck and her lips move against his. They’re kissing. Neurons are firing spastically, and Niall can feel every inch of her pressed against every inch of him.

Kissing Ellie, Niall decides, is like the world ending and then being reborn. That’s how he feels. The person he was before he kissed her, and the person he is now after. It is fireworks and sparks and flames and every other synonym for desire and passion; all that and a million times more than anything he has ever experienced.

Ellie pulls back to look up at him, her lips slightly swollen from the kissing. She smiles. “I love you too, you absolute nut.”

And love.

Niall laughs and kisses her again, and kisses and kisses and kisses until he’s dizzy with it. Panting, he steps away, because if he gets too close too soon, he might spontaneously combust. But no contact is unacceptable, so Niall takes her hand too.

“So…are we young and stupid?” He asks, smiling widely, with the hope of a man changed for the better.

Ellie giggles, looking down at their joined hands before glancing back up at him. “Of the utmost sort.” She leans up and gently places a soft kiss on his cheek. “By the way, you realize Panic! released an album a month ago, right? I’ll be able to survive off of that high for at least a year. I’ll hardly miss you while you tour.”

Niall looks at her only a little despairingly. “How am I in love you?”

“Are you sure we have to get up so early to do this?” Niall whines as he reclines in bed, watching as Ellie brushes her hair in the bathroom. She merely hums in response, murmurs a quick, “we need to do this before it gets too hot out,” and turns her music up slightly louder, and he pouts.

Ellie had set them up to go hiking at Diamond Head State Monument, early in the morning. He’s still feeling crispy and he’s exhausted – they spent a lot of time in the sunshine yesterday, and couple that with international travel and time changes, he’s not sure how his wife is so peppy.

Niall closes his eyes, trying to rest, but then the beat to a certain song starts and his lips quirk up despite himself. Ellie loves this song.

Sure enough, by the time the chorus has hit, she’s using the hair brush as a microphone and pointing at him, jumping up and down on the tile as she sings along: “So I say damn your kiss and the awful things you doooooooo…you’re worse than nicotine! Nicotinnneeee, yeah you’re worse than nicotine!”

He’s laughing as she swings her hips around, singing dramatically loud.

Ellie is…not a good singer. At best, she can stay on pitch. At worst, when she’s practically screaming the words and just having a good time, she’s hopelessly out of tune and an absolute trainwreck. But he loves it. He loves her enthusiasm, how little she cares about how bad she is, and he can’t help but hop out of bed and sing with her too.

They share the brush throughout the rest of the song, passing it back and forth and then sharing it through the last round of the chorus. By the end of it, Niall is laughing so hard he can barely breathe, and Ellie is in stitches next to him.

“See,” she gasps, placing a hand on his shoulder, “you love Brendon.”

Niall rolls his eyes playfully and chooses not to comment. Instead, he pats her bum and reaches for the Aloe Vera, to apply another coat to the burned skin on his back.

Once they’re both dressed, they eat a quick breakfast delivered by room service, and head out to the car waiting for them. Ellie is clad in navy shorts, a white tank top, tennis shoes, and her favorite pair of Ray Bans is perched on the top of her head. Once they’re both seated, she pulls sunblock out of her string backpack and hands it to him, throwing a weighted look at his already-red shoulders, and then lifts a brow. Begrudgingly, Niall begins to rub the sunblock onto his skin.

As soon as they’re both properly sun-blocked, she puts the tube back in her backpack. “I’ve got a few water bottles in here as well,” she tells him as she pulls it closed, setting it on her knees. “The hike should be about an hour and a half to two hours round trip. But it’s beautiful at the top, from what I’ve heard. It’s so good that the United States Military actually used it as a post to watch for attack. It should be worth it.”

Niall smiles at the fun fact, leaning in to press a kiss to her head. “It will be.” She’s such a nerd.

He enjoys the exercise, the chance to get outside and notice things. The fresh air, the invigorating walk, the sights…he’s actually quite excited, despite the early hour.

Once they get to the State Park, they pay the fee necessary to get in. They take their bags and make their way to the trail head, Ellie pausing to double and triple check that she has everything. “It looks like it gets a little strenuous,” Niall points out, reading the sign placed by the starting point. “Obviously the way up is mostly an ascent, and there are 99 steep steps to get to the top.”

Ellie pokes his side. “Well, I feel like we’re both in pretty good shape, so we should be fine.”

He chuckles and nods in agreement, and she looks briefly dazed, like she’s experienced some sort of shock. “What kind of look is that?”

She smiles and shakes her head. “I just love your laugh, that’s all,” she murmurs softly, and before he can say anything about it, she takes off down the trail. Niall has no choice but to jog after her.

It’s gorgeous, every inch of it. Diamond Head is shaped like a ring, sort of like an atoll but on land, or at least that’s how Ellie explains in. First, they have to make their way towards that ring from inside of it, and then eventually up it. The trail cuts through what he likes to call a golden field of long grass. Over the sound of the wind rustling through it, Niall can hear the sound of the Pacific crashing against the shore.

Everything is great, to start with. He walks next to Ellie, fingers occasionally brushing, and they help each other over some of the rocks in the pathway. Slowly, as the trail gets more difficult, he notices a couple small things. Ellie’s breathing is growing more and more labored as time goes on. She starts to walk a little more slowly, too.

By the time they’ve made it to the foot of the staircase up to the top, she’s dragging. “Babe, are you okay?” Niall asks, genuinely concerned. Ellie isn’t normally so tired out by physical activities like this – at the very least, she can tough anything out, especially a hike. “Do you want to turn back? We can go back now.”

Her eyelids flutter, and she swallows. She looks pale. “I’m…good. No, I want to make it to the top. The sight is supposed to be unbeatable.” Before Niall can argue with her and suggest they just go back to the hotel, Ellie takes a deep breath and starts up the stairs. He follows just behind her.

She barely makes it. At the top, she has to lean against him. Her breathing is ragged, and if he listens hard, he thinks he can detect some wheezing. “Jesus, love, don’t kill yourself,” he grumbles as he wraps his arm around her waist. “The view isn’t that worth it.” Niall’s joking, because his unease has spiked over the past fifteen minutes – fifteen minutes, all to walk up 99 stairs. Which he’s not judging exactly, but he feels like it shouldn’t have taken so long – but Ellie breathes out a laugh.

The view is incredible, though.

The Pacific Ocean lays before them, turquoise and sparkling. Behind, and to their right and left, is Honolulu. They’re high up enough that they can see the city fairly well, though Niall’s interest is mostly on the ocean.

Ellie is staring at the water like it’s her salvation. Her eyes are huge, and she’s gripping the black railing in front of her like a lifeline. He wonders, briefly, if she’s about to leap over the edge and go rolling down to meet the water’s edge.

She leans further into him and he takes her weight, intensely disliking how hard her breathing is still. “Something is wrong with you,” Niall says quietly, and waits for her to either confirm or deny. Instead she remains quiet, letting the wind answer for her. It howls in his ears, and he doesn’t like that sound either – like a mournful soul, wailing for them to join it in the ocean depths below.

Ellie remains quiet as they stand there for long minutes, simply taking in the view. She doesn’t move away from him though, and he doesn’t bring it up again.

The walk back to the center of the ring is significantly easier. Ellie’s breathing settles, and she manages to move around fluidly. But Niall can see how tired she is, and so instead of hanging around, he loads them both up into the car as quickly as he can. She leans back into the seat and closes her eyes after draining a water bottle completely empty.

Niall glances over at her and then begins to Google things, a dangerous path.

When they get back to the hotel, Ellie hops out of the car with more than her usual pep, and Niall scrambles to follow her. She doesn’t wait for him, nearly breaking into a flat-out run back to their room. For someone who could hardly breathe earlier, she sure can move quickly.

Ellie races into their bathroom and immediately falls to her knees in front of her toilet. And then she begins to hurl her guts up.

“Fuck,” Niall swears, and slides to his knees behind her, pulling her hair back from her face, keeping it trapped there in his fist. He rubs her back soothingly as she wretches, wincing sympathetically.

When it’s over, she rests her head against the toilet bowl and sniffles. Niall reaches around her and flushes the toilet, and she sighs in what he takes as relief. “You alright, love?”

She nods slowly. “Must have overexerted myself. I guess I was too tired from traveling.” Slowly, Ellie extracts her limbs one at a time, testing each one out for stability, before slowly standing up. She stumbles towards the sink and starts to carefully brush her teeth, while Niall remains on the floor, staring at her. Anxiety builds in his stomach, but it’s the good kind, because…

Well.

“Babe,” Niall draws out the syllables, trying not to spook her off. “Are you sure it’s not because of something else? This puking and exhaustion…are you sure you’re not pregnant?”

Ellie freezes. Even her toothbrush stills, sticking haphazardly out of her mouth.

Niall continues on. “I know that most women say they get really hungry, but some do lose their appetite, and it does make sense with how tired you’ve been. I really think – “

“I’m not pregnant,” Ellie snaps, then rinses her mouth out in the sink. She looks horrified for an entire second. “God, Niall, if I was pregnant right now, wouldn’t that mean I cheated on you? You’ve been back for four weeks, and it takes around two for conception.”

Niall almost brings up how she had visited him in the States four weeks before that, but this odd tightening feeling in his chest stops him. It’s a feeling he almost doesn’t recognize, but there it is – hurt.

It hits him like a blow to the chest, and he stands up quickly, backing a step away from her. It’s been a long time since she’s used that tone with him, or he with her, and it stings. Not to mention her expression. Especially because he still hasn’t managed to bring up the topic of starting a family with her; and this is how she responds to the mere suggestion of a baby. Their baby.

She sees the hurt on his face and has the grace to look ashamed. “I’m sorry…I’m sorry, babe, I didn’t mean to snap at you. It’s just…I’m tired, and pregnancy is scary, and I…I’m sorry.” She sounds regretful, so Niall sighs and reaches for her. She falls into his arms, pressing her face into his shoulder and murmuring “I’m sorry” over and over again.

“It’s alright,” he replies after a moment, stroking her back, still shocked. “I didn’t mean to spring that on you.”

Ellie places a kiss on his shoulder. “I shouldn’t have overreacted.”

Niall remains quiet for a minute. Then he dares it. “Do you…want to start a family with me?”

It’s something they brought up before marriage, because it’s a smart talk to have with any potential spouse. Niall needed to know if they were compatible in that sense – he wanted kids. He still does. And Ellie, at the time, had said she had also wanted kids. Did that change?

Ellie hums softly and pulls back to look him in the eyes. “Of course, I do.” She whispers, and for some reason, her eyes are watery. It’s been an emotional few minutes. “Baby, of course. I want everything with you. The sun, the stars, the universe. I want it all with you.” Her words make him smile, and he leans down to tenderly kiss the tip of her nose.

“I love you.”

Niall leans down to peck her lips, and feels her lips form the words back.

“I love you too.”

“Hey love, Louis commented on that video I uploaded!” Niall calls from the living room, chuckling to himself. He had uploaded a video of Ellie pretending to sing along to their single ‘Steal My Girl’, specifically Louis’ part, to Instagram. She had danced around while practically shouting the words. It was hilarious.

“Oh yeah?” She yells back from the kitchen, where she’s pouring herself some cereal. Ellie knows exactly where everything is, down to every obscure cooking instrument he owns, and has for years now, but seeing how at home she is in theirapartment is a good feeling. “What did he say?”

Niall grins. “He said that if he ever can’t make a show, you’re taking his spot.” Ellie laughs with him, and pads into the living room, wearing shamrock-studded pajama pants and a grey tank top.

“I expect to be paid for it,” she answers as she plops down on the couch, hissing when she nearly spills her cereal.

Niall leans over and kisses her cheek. “Overtime.”

Ellie smiles and checks through her own notifications, snickering when she catches sight of all of the notifications that she got from her own retaliation video – a snippet of the video where he ran out of the recording studio in his underwear, and proudly declared, “I recorded like this!” to the lads. They had then broken into singing ‘Steal My Girl’.  She had captioned it, ‘don’t fight a war you can’t win, Horan.’

It was a well-placed shot, but at least it had already made its rounds on the Internet.

They sit in a comfortable silence, Niall watching a game on TV while Ellie works on her cereal and scrolls through her phone. It’s a good silence, but one that gives him time to think, which isn’t always a good thing.

“Do you want kids?” he asks into the silence, looking out of the corner of his eye to gauge her reaction.

Ellie doesn’t so much as bat an eye. “Of course I do.” She sets her phone down on the coffee table and turns to face him. “I want a few. What about you?” Her attention is completely on him, so he turns to face her as well, pausing the game.

“I want a couple of ‘em too.” He says after thinking for a moment. “I dunno how many, though. When our family feels full, I guess.” This isn’t the first time he’s thought about it, and they’ve lightly discussed this before, but not a full-on conversation like this.

She smiles. “That’s a nice way of thinking about it. When our family feels full.” She stretches slowly, tilting her head to the side. “I’m an only child, and you know, there are some perks to that, but I was also lonely a lot of the time too. I only had my parents for a while, because they worked so much. I don’t want our kids to ever feel lonely.”

Niall reaches for her, and she clambers over into his lap. “Our kids will be spoiled rotten,” he tells her, and she giggles.

“Uh-uh. They will be raised with dignity and strong morals.” She pauses, eyes dancing. “But they’ll know how to have fun.”

Niall shrugs, leaning in to peck her cheek. “Anything, baby.” He collapses back onto the couch, pulling her with him, and she shrieks at the sudden movement. Their lips are mere centimeters apart, and he notes that, stores the information away for usage later. “We’ll have a wonderful family.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

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[mentalcurls]

6.5 Effettivamente

I’ve been waiting for this clip ever since 3.4 Argentina (which took place a month ago today btw), but in my soul I’ve actually been waiting for this coming out since forever.

my 💔 poor 💔 heart 💔 broke 💔 seeing Martino watch his friends interact from afar

they’re relaxed and comfortable with each other, their relationship is as close as ever while Marti’s relationship with them is in tatters, he barely speaks to Gio and that’s it

this is even worse than the picture Gio posted on IG on Tuesday, when Martino was supposed to go to Elia’s to prep for the exam and didn’t go

my 💔 poor 💔 heart 💔 breaking 💔 again because, despite Giovanni’s reassurances on Monday, Martino doesn’t believe Elia has forgiven him so he chooses to stay away from him... and let’s not forget Elia sits next to Marti during classes

Elia leaves, Martino finally approaches Giovanni, but he looks like he’s going to his death, look at his face, my poor baby

has he ever been bluer?

deep breaths baby, deep breaths

HE DOESN’T SAY ANYTHING? LEAVING THE FIRST MOVE TO GIO (who doesn’t disappoint thank God)? SO HE COULD HYPOTHETICALLY IGNORE HIM?

JEsus, the awkwardness between them kills me

the seconds of silence between the greeting and Marti asking the first question, Martino licking his lips and swallowing like he’s gathering the courage to say something monumental despite it being a silly, innocent question

THE STILTED CONVERSATION oh God why, I’m hurting

“Ma non penso che ti interessi, no?” (But I don’t think you’re interested, right?) is Martino twisting a knife into his own wound because he’s saying: you don’t want to go out with the radio guys, you don’t want to get involved into something I’m doing (and I like, because we’ve seen he’s putting more effort into it with the Virginia Woolf thing on Wednesday - though it might also be something to keep his mind occupied on something that is not his crumbling relationships), you don’t want to spend time with me

I mean, Marti obviously knows, intellectually, that Gio doesn’t want to go to radio things because of Eva and because it’s just not his thing, but deep inside it’s just another refusal, one which Martino preemptively steels himself for

That “se… se ti va puoi… puoi venire da me” (If you’d like you can come to mine) is said in the same tone Martino has when he tells Filippo he’s seeing a boy in 5.5 Pride and when he asks Sana about homosexuality and religion in 4.3 Evoluzione

“Pizza, mortazza e City-Real” ICONIC

Marti asks Gio to hang out with a half smile (!!!) but Gio remains impassible and Martino’s smile falls

when Giovanni asks about their score, it’s as good as a YES FINALLY, it’s the rebuilding of the bridge between them and Martino smiles fully possibly for the first time in weeks because that’s their game, their ritual, their friendship going back to normal

WHEN THEY LEAVE THEY’RE BOTH SMILING AND TEASING EACH OTHER my heart sings with joy

Marti and Gio who are still laughing and making fun of one another while playing FIFA

(FIFA is a big bonding ritual for the boysquad, it’s the way they settle bets, it’s one of the topics they tease each other about, they play tournaments when they don’t know what to do, they keep long term score of who’s best and it’s something they all love, it’s a place of comfort for them)

(FIFA is a football/soccer game, which is imho significant as the setting Marti picks for his coming out, he’s trying to reinforce the idea that he’s still a guy who loves “boy things” like sports and videogames, despite his sexuality - as well as trying to reinforce that he’s still the same guy who played the previous 47+56 games he and Gio kept score of)

(the fact that Gio hesitates before starting to play FIFA again after Martino tells him he likes boys probably ups the level of panic in Marti’s head, because what if he’s gonna be excluded from something as important for their group and as “masculine” as FIFA now??)

(when Gio starts to play again AND ASKS MARTINO ABOUT NICO AT THE SAME TIME it’s such an important thing for Marti because he finds out can have it all)

I would like to thank not only God but also Jesus and LudoBesse for the closeups of Ludovico Tersigni’s face when he smiles 🙏

Their knees touching just gets to me, for no real reason, and I kinda wish we were able to see if they kept touching for the whole time or if Marti retracted after coming out

EFFFFFFettttttivaaamenteeeeee (make it last longer c’mon, Marti, I know you can)

is it me or does Marti look a tad disappointed when Gio asks him if the person he likes is Emma? maybe it’s just nerves

Marti who keeps stealing glances at Giovanni, checking in constantly

Gio senses Martino is uncomfortable, especially after the “ma non l’hai capito?” “no non si capisce un cazzo” (“don’t you know?” “no, I can’t understand you for shit”) exchange, and cracks the Sana joke to make him relax a bit, you can see he’s trying to keep a straight face long enough to speak without giving himself away (he should learn to deliver jokes from Nico, I mean, he kept a straight face for the whole Maddalena and hypertrichosis thing)

“Non *swallows* non è una ragazza” (It’s not *swallows* it’s not a girl) POOR BABY DEER HE CAN’T EVEN SPEAK  his throat must be so dry, he must be trying to keep breathing normally so hard, he’s probably shaking and THEN HE CLENCHES HIS JAW

once again Marti is steeling himself for the worst

and Gio just goes... slack, is the best way I can think to describe it, for a second. I don’t think it’s surprise? At least not for the gay thing, maybe for the fact that Marti actually confirmed it for him. It may also be relief

it’s just a second, then Gio gathers himself and thinks, looks at Marti who can’t meet his eyes

“Sono io?” (mind, non-Italian fans, it’s not a “Is it me?”, it’s more of a “It’s me?”)

I LIVE FOR MARTINO OVERCOMPENSATING WHEN HE DENIES IT to hide the fact that he did, indeed, crush on Gio for a long time 😘

the smiles. their smiles. Marti is slowly relaxing, Gio is finally understanding what’s going on with him and they feel like THEY��RE FINALLY FRIENDS AGAIN✨

Marti thinks it’s over, the three most important things he can see Gio wanting to know about (why’s Martino hurting, that Marti is gay and that he’s not in love with him) are out there and cleared between them now, and Gio smiled! And had nothing bad to say! Except he won’t play. Uh-oh.

HA, Giovanni Garau, patron saint of best friends, does it again! He’s put together all the little pieces, all the scraps of interaction, all the tiny moments when something he couldn’t quite pinpoint happened and BAM! He gets it, he knows.

Martino’s wry smile and nod

Gio mirroring him and nodding as well, halfway between “Okay, I can see it” and “Dude, well done, I’m actually kind of impressed”

and then Gio comes in like a wrecking ball against toxic masculinity and compliments Marti on his choice of man

Marti who acts like he’s never even noticed whether Nico is attractive or not

Marti looks so embarrassed, he should have been blushing (FE_CESARI UR GOOD BUT WHERE ARE MY BLUSHES ARE YOU A REDHEAD OR NOT????)

I wonder how closely Gio is mirroring the comments Martino usually makes when Gio himself tells him he’s attracted to a girl, maybe even when he told him about Eva? He tries his best to be supportive even though he doesn’t really understand, the exact same way Marti has always been supportive of him despite not understanding girls’ appeal

“Che fate, state insieme, uscite, COME STAI?” (What’s happening there, are you togethere, are you dating, how are you?) COME STAI GUYS most supportive best friend ever

“È un po’ strano lui” (He’s kind of weird) is such a weird way to put it? I mean, sure, you could say Nico acted weird, but not for the reasons Martino gives Gio, imo; he’s “weird” for changing schools in his last year, for his granddad’s puppets, for asking Marti to ditch a party he himself had asked him to and for dragging him to an abandoned pool of all places; Marti instead describes his as weird for appearing undecided, for seemingly stringing him along

is that a hint of disgust, almost, I detect in Martino’s voice while he quotes Niccolò’s text? Is he that fed up?

Gio makes a sound at that, that I can’t decide if it’s just an encouragement for Marti to go on, or if it’s an “okay, got it” while he plans Niccolò’s demise for daring to string Martino along

still, Giovanni sides with Martino but doesn’t tell his best friend he’s better off without Nico or make any threats of retribution or promises to fight for Marti’s honour or smth, because he’s a supportive pal who will trashtalk Marti’s s.o. when he acts like a dick but will still support Marti’s feelings for him and believes in Martio’s ability to take care of himself

I have Questions about Luchino’s voice message, specifically: who was this message sent to?

not Gio directly, because Luca asks “Voi c’avete”, second person plural

did he send it to the group with all four guys? but Marti’s phone didn’t ring, so either he’s got the group conversation muted (💔) or Luca sent it somewhere else

is there a group with only Gio, Elia and Luca in it to whom the latter could have sent the voice message? again, my 💔 heart 💔 breaks 💔

anyways, Marti is the best bro because despite not talking to Luca for two weeks he still offers up his notes

Gio taking advantage of Martino leaving without pausing the game to score on him lol

Gio asks Martino what he’s found while Marti is looking at the flipbook thingy... how much do you want to bet that by the time Marti answers nothing with that big smile on his face, Gio has seen the thing, what Marti was doing with it and the way he was smiling and he’s put everything together without Marti saying anything? that’s why he doesn’t press, as much as in recognition of the fact that Marti already opened up to him so much today

I 100% love the way both Marti and Gio start their sentences when they’re saying something important with “Comunque” (Anyways) as if it’s just a continuation from one long conversation between them, or as if they’re just stating for the record something that is obvious

Marti was definitely not expecting at all Gio to actively tell him he’s better than whoever Niccolò’s girlfriend is on principle, which in my experience is a very common best friend thing to say, and that hurts

Gio grabbing Marti by the neck and ruffling his hair is such a friend/brother thing to do, it’s a fond and exasperated thing in the way only siblings’ touches can be, halfway between an attempt to strangle you and a caress

This clip was so beautiful, the friendship between Giovanni and Martino is so beautiful, their ship is so beautiful! I’m so happy and so thankful for LudoBesse 🙏