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hisadoringkitten · 2 days

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It's been a little over a week...

I crashed hard today after the weekend. On Friday, you ran a practice set in preparation for this weekend's DJ gig on vacation. It was wonderful to sit and watch you. It's been a very long time since I've seen you DJ, and being able to watch adoringly without paying attention to anyone else seeing me staring at you with longing was wonderful. She and I sat and just gushed over you for at least an hour, fawning over your talent and how sexy you are when you get into it. She danced, I watched, the whole night was charged with great energy and when we finally climbed into bed, she cuddled up close and you encouraged me to play with you. She was so into it, watching at first, and once I moved to suck your cock, she began to play with me. She explored my pussy with her fingers, finding my spots and angles and shortly after I made you cum, she pushed me over the edge, hard and sustained. I really enjoyed it, but once again, you didn't touch me. I have to wonder what changed from

and

to now. Am I so much less desirable now that you have me here? Was it the thrill of the chase? the fantasy? that lead to those words? I'm so confused, and my confidence is shattered. I tried to push it away and look forward to Saturday.

You took us to Dallas, to the opening of an art gallery you say you hope will show my work someday. We went out after, stopping in several bars and an arcade along the way. I felt great in what I wore, my makeup, my look... I felt sexy but it felt like you didn't see me. I tried my best to stay behind you or to your right, tried to observe the glimmers of protocol we've discussed. I hoped you'd notice. The whole night you didn't seem to. When her focus became getting drunk, when her "Mr. Hyde" became the focus of the night I tried my best to calm her, to remind her we were there to have a good time, that you were getting her drinks but that you couldn't turn off your protective nature. It hurts to feel like I'm doing everything you asked of me while she was butting heads with you, and still, every look of admiration was hers. I don't want them instead of her, but I wish there were a few spared for me as well. There were pictures taken of her with you and her with me, but none of you and I. I longed to feel included in it. Even one of us all together, I brought it up, so did she, but no. When we went to the hotel full of Japanese art, I thought maybe we'd connect there... we're both artists, and we spoke excitedly about the art... I loved seeing it and talking about each piece with you, I thought maybe you'd be impressed with my knowledge... you've said more than a few times that my intelligence is a turn-on, but even there, passionately in my element, I felt invisible. I pushed through the considerable pain in my knee, determined to keep up and have a good time, but I felt rejected, especially as the pain grew and my energy diminished. We sat by the water while she drank her drinks, and I watched as your energy faded too. I knew there wouldn't be any left for me. It's selfish, maybe, but just once, I hoped you'd look at me with longing or praise me for keeping up, for helping with her headspace, for following protocol, for looking nice. I stifled tired tears in the car on the way home.

Sunday was rest, I stayed close to you, I was in considerable pain, and it felt awkward to have you get me things. I should have been catering to your needs. I helped you make dinner, I love cooking with you. For a moment, there felt like a closeness, an intimacy when you laid your head on my lap. It was late when we finally went to bed and I asked if I could please you before sleep. You allowed it. It was good, intense, and you said you wanted more after you fell asleep. I waited until you had been out for a bit, trying to stay awake to postpone it until close to when you'd wake up for work, to allow you the most sleep but began to nod off. Determined to obey, I began again, just as you instructed, with my hand, slowly. Your moans are the most delicious sound, and you soon told me to use my mouth. I genuinely love sucking your cock and quickly went back to it, you came for a second time but did not instruct me to stop. I stayed very still waiting for your heightened sensitivity to pass and went right back to it. You came a third time and pulled me close to cuddle until your alarm went off. I was so wet, pulling multiple orgasms from you is the biggest turn on. I told you as much, wanted you to feel for yourself but once again, you didn't touch me.

A little while later, on your way into work, when I told you I was going to try and get some sleep, you had me find and familiarize myself with your toys. I got so excited, still dripping wet, I obeyed in anxious anticipation. You told me to move them to your music room so they'd be more accessible. My hopes were high that I'd finally earned some modicum of reward for my diligence. I slept a bit and set to accomplishing as many chores as I could, watering the plants, running the dishwasher, and folding the laundry so you'd have little else to do when you got home. You hadn't talked to me hardly at all throughout the day and didn't tell me when you were headed home. I didn't know when to expect you, and you arrived while I was on the phone with my kids. That conversation was gutting. My son happily exclaimed that he didn't miss me. It felt like my heart being ripped from my chest. I felt so insignificant but tried to remind myself that he's little and probably didn't mean to hurt me. I tried not to let that pain show when I came in and saw you home, but you were in an unpleasant mood and seemed worn out. You talked about needing to accomplish a lot before our trip, and my heart sank. I had hoped that we'd play, that I'd relieve some of your stress and tension, and that you'd do the same for me. These are the last few days we'll have the privacy to play with your daughter out of town. You fell asleep, and I tried like hell to contain my disappointment.

After your wife went to work, you got up, caught a second wind, and my hope grew again. You started crossing things off your list, some stuff for work, we did more laundry, cleaned up around the house, packing for vacation... you handed me the contract of your ex-sub and spoke about us creating one of our own. I excitedly read through it, hoping we'd discuss it further, but you switched gears and showed me work projects. I enjoy discussing design with you but my head was spinning trying to keep up with your constantly shifting gears and my own disappointment, feeling like you were teasing me with what I've wanted most since I arrived, intimacy with you... the kind of heat and desire we had when talking about what it would be like once I was here. I knew it was getting late but was still jarred when you put on a show and instructed me to move so you could lay in my lap. I massaged your shoulder and cuddled close, but my heart sank as you drifted off and pushed me away. I tried to reposition myself to not inhibit your breathing, but every time you shifted, you pushed me further. I slid out from under you, moved to the other side of the couch, and tried to watch the show you put on for us. I couldn't help it, tears welled up, and I cried, quiet as I could, not wanting to disturb you but unwilling to put even more distance between us. I ached for your closeness. Your alarm went off at 3, I hadn't slept a wink. Again at 3:30, I still sat quietly weeping, wondering what I was doing wrong? What caused your lack of interest? What more could I do to rekindle it? Had I not accomplished every task you set forth? Had I not taken the initiative enough with regards to keeping house? Had I misstepped with your wife? Had my efforts to please you sexually at every opportunity not been sufficient? What more could I do? I sobbed so hard I thought my chest would cave in, and when your alarm rang again at 4, I was undone. You asked what was wrong, but where to start? My mind was reeling... how do I tell you that after everything you've done for me, I needed more? That I felt cast aside, neglected? I felt selfish and stupid and guilty for even thinking it. I was suddenly so self-concious and knew you were running late getting up and sleep deprived yourself. It wasn't the right time. You told me we could discuss it on your way in to work. You held me for a few moments. I wanted to break down there but didn't want to make you more late.

When I called and we began to discuss it, you seemed angry, and I regretted letting any of it show. We talked through a lot of it. You told me to write this. To explain so you could understand it clearly. I don't even understand it clearly. It's all so much. You asked me to define my expectations, but that feels like placing demands and makes me feel uncomfortable. I feel like you're looking at me like a brat, throwing a fit for not getting my way. That's not it. Not at all. I just can't understand where the passionate longing and desire went. My confidence is shattered, and I'm second-guessing my value to you. I'm feeling like I'll never be enough for you to want me... like no one ever wants me... I feel discarded by my friends, my ex, my kids, and you. I feel small and like I'll never be worthy of your dominance. Like I'll stay this broken thing you feel obligated to care for. Like everything we talked about, our goals and dreams and the things we want to do together will fall away, taking the precious few pieces of me I have left with them, until I'm nothing... to you or anyone else. I feel so empty, alone and scared. I keep trying to be excited about my apartment, hoping if I make it a wonderful, beautiful place you want to be, then maybe you'll want me there, maybe being in your home is too awkward, holds too many memories... but I'm so scared it'll be a place you just leave me, a place you can put me away when you don't want me... that you'll never want me... that I'll never be good enough.

You want to know the rewards I respond to... I don't know what they are with you. We talked so many times about the things we wanted. About the play, the sex, the control, the dominance, the protocol, going places where I can proudly and openly be yours. Yours... how long has it been since you called me "mine"? Never in person. I want that. I want you to crave me. I want you to want me. I want to feel like it's not one-sided, like there's not more distance between us now than when I was 6 hours away. I want intimacy, sex, play, but more than that, I want YOU to want it. You say it's been so long... but I feel like I'm insufficient to arouse your excitement. I want to feel like your pet, your sub, your confidant, your lover, and respite, not just your friend, your employee, your roommate. I want what we talked about... to help you build your empire and help you rule it from my place at your feet. I want the high-protocol, the headspace, for you to choose what I wear, how I look. I want to hear the pride in your voice when you call me a good girl. I want your guidance, your dominance, hell, I'll come right out and say it... I want your love. I want to feel valued and treasured and cherished. I'll earn it. I'll do anything for it. I don't want or expect it for nothing, but hasn't making all these changes, all this progress, hasn't going through all this pain and frustration earned me something beyond a place on your couch and in your bed?

I need reassurance. I need to not feel like a constant disappointment. I need to feel like you want me too. I thought that was what you wanted. What happened to me being your perfect match? The missing puzzle piece? The whole package? The gift from the universe when you needed it most? Now I'm here. I'm right here. I'm in your home, in your bed, and it feels like now that you have me, I no longer hold value. It hurts. It cuts me to my core. It scares me that this will be no different... like to so many people before you, I was a prize to be won, and now I'm being cast aside and forgotten.

I'm sorry... I'm sorry I'm not good enough.

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buriedchampagne · 1 month

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Buried Champagne, Chapter 19

“Brewster is office manager for an insurance company in Norfolk, Virginia. She was transferred from the office here to Dallas, then from Dallas to Norfolk with each move a promotion.”

Dr. Rex Gavin

“Brewster will most likely return to Gargantua some time and live alone, comfortable and happy.”

Dr. Rex Gavin

“My sister, Brewster, is coming home to look after her. You’ll meet her soon. Thank you again.”

Baxter Peters, nee’ Gavin

“I, Brewster Rachel Gavin, aged 18, do hereby resolve to rook the honorable Jacob Maurice Knopf into marriage before the year 1944 is over, by hook or crook, by fair means or foul, signed, Brewster Rachel Gavin, January 1st, 1944, Gargantua, Louisiana”

“Granddaddy knew what he wanted to do with the lot as soon as he saw it,” Help launched another of his family tales. “Leave the pecans and place the house so the back is beside that big, old cedar.” He knew it was a thirsty tree, and that his planned garden would do best where its roots pointed. He wanted the birds to have a home, too, and to draw butterflies while deterring mosquitoes from the bayou across the street. A very modern and scientific physician for his time, he remembered his country doctor father’s remedies, too, and knew the tree’s medical utility. He knew that, soaked or simmered, red cedar scrapings would make teas or syrups for respiratory problems, body aches and nervousness and that the berries, roots and twigs, left in alcohol in the sun until it became a reddish tea color and used externally, would treat skin problems. He was a modern and scientific physician for his time, and would not practice herbalism for patients, like the vinegar stew his own father prescribed for a smallpox patient before going home to die of smallpox himself in 1905, but he was not above recommending accessible, traditional Louisiana cures to poor patients to guide them in treating their own medical needs during a consultation or, to use the parlance of his time, “house call.”

“I didn’t know any of that at four, as I began to get acquainted with the world around me,” Help continued to reminisce. “My house was behind that of my grandparents, facing a side street. Beside their home and across the side street, on another part of the original lot, was where my aunt, uncle and eldest cousins lived. Generally, the whole demesne was a sort of family compound, with well-worn paths through the yards, and we were all at home on every inch of the property. ‘We’ meant my maternal grandparents, my aunt and uncle, my two cousins, my sister, myself, Einez, Penn, Judge, Dellah, Edwina, sometimes Brother, and Johnny. The first six named characters worked for us, sharing our meals and homes and teaming with us to create the homes and body of knowledge, love and care that made our lives good. Johnny was the adopted grandson of Einez, who worked for my grandparents, and my closest early childhood friend. I don’t know what salary arrangements the others had, but I know they and their households got free medical care from Granddaddy, and I know that when my mother got a raise, Edwina got the same percentage raise, because allowing her to do her job made it all possible and that was the right way to do it.

“Going out either my front, side or back door, I could see that cedar, year-round. Crawling down the onion row in Granddaddy’s garden with a hand broom, sweeping the dirt off the onion tops to make them grow flat and sweet, a memorable chore in Louisiana’s summer sun, what little shade I got came from that tree. When we sat in the back yard, sometimes as an even more extended tribe, joined by kin visitors, it marked the edge of our seating and play area. We shelled peas and pecans beneath it, listened to the hiss of traffic on the main road and for the afternoon paper thumping onto the front porch, a signal that it was time to begin preparing supper.

“Granddaddy and I would rest after working in the garden, he in his hammock and me restlessly moving from chair to chair or climbing a mimosa that shaded another part of the yard, and we would watch the purple martins that lived in milk-jug birdhouses strung from its branches hunt mosquitoes. Johnny told me his side of the family thought Granddaddy must be an angel or a saint or something, because they’d see him push that hand plow row after row or work in the greenhouse later in the morning than he ought to, and sweat like a whole gang over at Frierson Plantation, and never stink. Well, that was true, and Granddaddy was always careful with his diet, and full of those tribal witch doctor stories from the tropics. Bees never went after him, either, which he credited to bananas.

“Life had a simple, rational rhythm then from chores to Sunday visits from kin to the seasons. I deduced, at four, that breezes were produced by that cedar fanning the air for us. It swayed, and then we felt the air around us move and cool briefly. It’s still there.”

The tales Help told Edward over the years ranged from trying to make sense of the world to making little if any sense at all. The ones that tried to make sense of the world tended to take place in a Gavin-centric universe, revolving around his physician grandfather and the home where Edward had first met with Mrs. Gavin, Baxter Peters, Marionette Floyd and, later, others from that family. It was where he’d first met Help’s mother, Brewster Gavin Lathey, when she first moved back to Gargantua to care for her mother.

That house was a Depression product, built by workers desperate for work for buyers without huge savings accounts. Originally a two-story rectangular cube on a large lot with portions on both sides of a one-block blacktop road near that time’s edge of town, it had become the Gavins’ home for $10,000.00 in 1937. A few nights after the family had moved in, young Webster had gone downstairs for a snack and found one of the workmen in the kitchen. It was, after all, the Depression, and the man had had no place to go and no place to work once the house was built, so he’d hidden under a pile of tarps in a deep closet under the stairs, sneaking out in the night to raid the refrigerator. Surprised by young Webster, he’d run off into the night. Later examination turned up some chicken bones and a rusty peach can in the sloping back of the closet beneath the staris. “Aunt Webster loved to tell that story to me and my cousins when we were kids and she came home from New York to visit,” Help told Edward.

In 1941, upstairs and downstairs screen porches, a music room adjoining the living room, and an expansion of one of the bedrooms had been grafted on for another $10,000.00 acquired from the sale of a piece of the property across the street from the house and on Edgarson. In 1949, for another $10,000.00 brought in by sale of the rest of the property across the street to Baxter’s husband, prospering as a large-animal veterinarian there in cattle country, Dr. and Mrs. Gavin added a large garage and adjoining pantry the same size and the front porch with its obligatory Southern mansion columns. From the street, one could barely tell they were square rather than round.

“That place … The Klan burned a cross in the front yard once, upset that Granddaddy took black patients. He went outside with a 12-gauge in his right hand and a .38 in his left, Ma’ams trailing behind him with his doctor bag, and put a solid slug into the head of one of their damn horses. The Klansman flew over the horse’s head into the yard, and all his buddies left him there. Granddaddy put down his shotgun, took his doctor bag from Ma’ams, walked across the yard and set the Klansman’s broken arm, and yanked his hood off to identify him. The next day, he sent the son of a bitch a bill for medical services and dead horse removal. The man paid the bill and the Klan never bothered Granddaddy again. Have a drink.”

Edward held his snifter out for more brandy, as on so many nights over so many years, and Help continued guiding him through Gavinville. “Ma’ams was always worried about her appearance, and would fall for any beauty treatment that arrived in “Ladies Home Journal” or “The Farmer’s Almanac.” It was probably the Almanac that led her to ask Granddaddy to bring Myrtle home from Shackville, which was Granddaddy’s farm up near Mooringsport where he hunted and had some livestock under the care of “Shack,” who was a sharecropper. They say Shack ate armadillos before starving to death after he sold half of Granddaddy’s cows and got fired and put off the place, but that was later. Hell, I remember Shack and Shackville, myself, and going out there as a kid when they changed the fields.

“You see, they used the fallow system, using two out of three fields for crops while letting cattle crap all over the third one, and then they’d rotate use. There was always a tool shed where the two crop fields met, and in Spring, we’d burn the shed down, my cousins and I would make a game out of sifting through the ashes to get the nails and hinges, and the grownups would use them to build another shed for the next year. It was a thing left over from Granddaddy’s own childhood farm days when the Mississippi railroads hadn’t been repaired from the Civil War yet and the hardware store was twenty miles up a dirt road.

“Anyway, Myrtle was Ma’ams’ favorite cow, and she’d dance and cross her legs and come when she was called, and wore a straw hat with a bow on it, and Granddaddy brought her to the house in town from the farm, because that damn article in the Almanac had assured Ma’ams that if she milked a cow every day, it would make her hands soft.

“Well, the neighbor leaned over the fence one morning and informed Ma’ams that they were in the suburbs, not the country, and that cows were inappropriate. She told him she’d discuss it with her husband when he came home for lunch, it being Granddaddy’s habit to leave his office and come home for the first half of every weekday afternoon to eat and nap with his wife. She told Granddaddy what the neighbor had said as soon as he pulled up, and he said he’d be right back, got his doctor bag and a crowbar out of the car, went next door and knocked on the door. When the neighbor answered, he yanked him out by the lapels, hung him up on the fence, broke his arm with the crowbar, set it, and later sent him a bill for medical services. The man never objected to Myrtle the cow dancing in her straw hat in the yard again.”

Replenishing his own snifter, then taking a significant sip, Help wound that part of his story up with, “Yes, that broken arm thing was a recurring theme in Granddaddy stories.”

Edward had asked Help, early in their friendship, why his mother had resorted to the name of her first husband, Abelard Lathey, rather than keep Help’s father’s “Roulet” or drop both and just use Gavin. The answer was, “She didn’t want my father’s credit rating.” She’d left Abelard when Help’s sister, Aloysia, was four because he bored her, a reason her lawyer had informed her did not constitute grounds for divorce in Louisiana, so that and her later estrangement from Perce Roulet, Junior when Help was three were both formalized under “incompatibility.”

With Baxter Peters right across the street and Webster being the youngest and favorite child, it was strange that Brewster should be the daughter who became her mother’s caregiver. They’d argued incessantly, according to Help, during his childhood in the house behind his grandparents’ pseudo-neo-Grecian facing the bayou. At “Shackville,” the weekend farm, Dr. Gavin had chosen the trees from which the smaller house was constructed, personally ringing them with a large utility knife he’d made from a file during his own childhood on a farm in Mississippi so they’d die and season slowly before becoming the joists, double floors, wall studs and ceiling beams at 108 Edgarson. This level of equity in the structure made Greta feel perfectly justified in entering her twice-divorced daughter’s home at any time of day or night while she was renting it to inventory the refrigerator and open the mail. Daughter Brewster liked her privacy and her late-sleeping weekend mornings and never hesitated to remind her mother of those preferences, but Greta never stopped doing exactly as she pleased, not only in that house, but at the home Baxter’s husband designed and had built on that piece of the original lot across Edgarson where he, Baxter, the two oldest grandchildren, innumerable cats, cocker spaniels before that breed went idiot and chihuahuas after it had, tried unsuccessfully to reside in peace.

It was Brewster, though, as an adult and neighbor, that got most of the attention from her mother. “She was a twice-divorced woman, oh the shame,” Help narrated melodramatically.

She had two children who, though in reality were better off than almost any imaginable peers, what with Edwina to take care of them between their getting home from school and Brewster getting home from work, a retired doctor and nurse next door and an uncle and aunt with a swimming pool across the street, but their grandmother would quiz them about when their mother had gotten home from her most recent date and how long said date had stayed when dropping her off. “When my sister, Aloysia, became of age to date, her swains could count on seeing the flashlight coming across the yard toward their car in five minutes or less from the time they pulled into our driveway. Where’s that bottle?”

Eddie passed it over, then went to his small kitchen to put dishes away while the story continued. The two old friends were happy with their pattern and their topic.

“Why my mother ended up doing it,” Help conjectured, “Well, there are several stories, likely all true. Uncle Colquitt, Baxter’s husband, said Webster had gotten her drunk up in New York and poured her, drunk and maudlin, onto a plane. He told me she was barely able to walk when she got here. Webster said it just made sense, given the relative incomes and retirement plans. My mother said she’d made a promise to her father. Marionette said she missed being in the South where she belonged. I think there was probably a man she wanted to leave up in New York.”

To make sure Eddie was listening, Help added, “Of course, she might have come down to be closer to her children and grandchildren.” A cup fell to the floor in the kitchen. It didn’t break, but it rolled around a bit. “Always leave ‘em laughing,” said Help, bidding his friend good night and heading out the door, still chuckling to himself over the notion of his mother being swayed by maternal instinct.

Eddie had met and spent considerable time with Brewster Gavin Lathey. When she utilized his visits with her mother to go to the casino and came home a winner, she tried to tip him for almost a year before accepting that the parish would frown on lagniappe. When she stayed in the house while he was with her mother, she sometimes asked him to judge disagreements they had, as if Mrs. Gavin had any clue as to why she had done or said whatever their spat was about. Mainly, though, she told him stories.

Help had told Edward about his mother and her younger sister smoking pot two years before he, himself had, experimenting while on vacation trips to Mexico and the Caribbean. He’d recounted his embarrassment when she foraged around various silver and teak cigarette boxes in the living room, pulled out sandwich bags of herbiage, and asked his high school friends to roll up some “sticks,” then gone on “munch trips. “She never did get the slang right,” Help said, with some perturbation. Brewster, herself, told Edward about baking pot brownies and keeping them in the freezer for days when her mother got particularly agitated, and how worried she was when her brother, Rex. Jr., dropped by one day and innocently helped himself to a brownie he would have strongly disapproved of for anyone’s use, especially that of his mother in the shape she was in, from the counter.

She told him, too, about the love of her life, an Army Air Corps captain from Delaware that she met at a tea dance up at Barksdale. “I only dated officers, of course,” she interrrupted herself to assure Edward, not wanting him to get the wrong impression. “He took me to nice places, sophisticated places, the Zephyr Room, Broccato’s, Sansone’s, where my crowd first met the Captain, that piano player who played at all our parties, and I fell for him. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten over Maurice,” she reminisced with a sign.

“I remember the night before he left for England. I was staying overnight with my best friend, Ann, and she and her beau double-dated with Maurice and me. I think they took us to a movie and then dropped us back at her house, and then they snuck back awhile later. Ann had two windows in her bedroom, and she talked and held hands with … Carl, I think his name was, through one window, and I talked and held hands with Maurice through the other. Finally, they had to get back to the base, and we kissed goodnight through the windows. In the morning, I gathered up the cigarette butts Maurice had dropped outside the window and put them in a satin bag I’d saved from earrings Daddy had given me for Christmas. We were romantic in that sort of silly way then. For the rest of the war, every time I saw a newspaper article or saw a news reel about our planes being shot down over Europe or the Channel, my heart jumped into my throat and I prayed, “Oh God, please don’t let that be Maurice. We wrote, but with wartime censorship, I couldn’t tell much about where he was doing what. He came to visit me once right after the war to tell me in person that his parents had chosen a wife for him and that there was no way out of it. He did it as gently as he could, but I was devastated. Mother was relieved, because Maurice was Jewish and almost a Yankee, but her effort to console me with that was completely unhelpful. I lost 15 pounds, threw away Maurice’s cigarette butts, and locked up the journal in which I’d vowed to make him marry me.”

After Mrs. Gavin passed away, Brewster became a part-time caregiver, herself, after she gave up nine-to-five work, ending her career life as Vice President of a small life insurance company. She occasionally ran into Eddie at her charges’ homes and sometimes called him for advice. She never followed his advice, but she did continue to work and make her charges happy, mainly by bringing them excitement and activities to look forward to when those elements had largely faded from their lives prior to her having come into them.

Help said she did it because she liked the attention, herself, because of the magic she’d always had; her ownership of every room she walked into made her a sort of “Mary Poppins of old people,” as she aged herself, and because of a strong work ethic she would never admit to, a strong work ethic being decidedly unladylike. “When my sister and I were kids, she used to stop in the doorway every morning on her way to work, turn around, and recite a little chant, ‘I’m going to work to make the money to buy the tickets to ride the rides.’

“Outside of all that, for which I adore her, she’s become irritating as hell with age. She’s always enjoyed talking about the radio shows everyone listened to in her youth. I took a tablet over and asked her which one she’d like me to find online for her. She asked for The Whistling Shadow. Well, I knew The Whistler and The Shadow were both ‘30s vintage radio shows, so asked her which one she meant. She was damned if she’d admit she’d had a brief moment of confusion, I argued that there would be no point in being The Shadow, able to hide from the bad guys, if one was going to at the same time announce one’s presence to every criminal on the block by whistling, and that such a stupid son of a bitch would annoy the crooks and be murdered just to shut him up in the first episode and, though I restrained myself from asking her if the character she had in mind was related to The Humming Shadow, whether he did bird calls or took requests, and whether, if he did take requests, anyone had ever called into the program to ask him to whistle Me And My Shadow, the visit didn’t end well. I’m not like you, Eddie, my boy, I haven’t the patience.

“Also, I guess I’ve never forgiven her for sending me to see a psychiatrist when I was seven. She picked me up from school one day, which she’d never done before, since she worked and the two and a half block walk home was just something we did then. She’d taken off work early to take me to a government building not far from your office, Eddie,” Help recounted with a certain wryness and a sip of brandy, “one of the old-style ones, with cream-painted cinder block walls and the smell of an animal hospital throughout. Through open office doors, I remember seeing nothing but gray metal desks and file cabinets and metal office chairs with green leather padded seats.

“On the way there, she told me we were going to see a man who’d heard about my reading so much and even refusing to play with the neighborhood kids to stay in and read instead. She said he really wanted to meet me. It seemed pretty shady to me, even at seven, before I’d met Cousin Father Elias, who’d gone Greek Orthodox because he liked the robes but been booted from a post at an orphanage in Alaska for reasons I couldn’t quite figure out from my usual listening post under Mom’s bridge table, but I held her hand as we walked down the shiny linoleum floor to a room where a pudgy man with red cheeks and hair heavily oiled to keep the dandruff flakes in place and smiled at me like a mall Santa, except that we didn’t have a mall in Gargantua back then, and introductions were made. My mother left the room, and he began to ask me questions about what I liked to read.

“He kept pulling children’s adventure stories heavy on the illustrations off of his shelves, pronouncing each to be one of his favorites, and asking me if I’d read them. I read Gone With The Wind between first and second grade, by the way, getting the idea from that book that babies came from kissing, and skipped Suzie and Pete At The Circus, The Pretty New Teacher, and Grandma Loses Her Purse Again. I didn’t tell him I’d read Gone With The Wind, because I’d decided there was something wrong with him and didn’t want to embarrass him or make him mad, what with him being a grownup. Having failed at icebreaking over sham shared literary interests, he suggested a game.

“Now Eddie, we’ve never talked about it, but I think something we have in common that makes us ready friends is that neither of us plays games. We compete against ourselves, and that’s enough,” Help said, looking Eddie straight in the eye while doing so, “so when this man I felt sorry for but wanted to get away from as soon as possible went to a locker, gray, of course, and pulled an ‘Uncle Wiggly’ board game from a whole stack of similar games I’d seen in stores and on classroom shelves for rainy day recess periods, the whole project became clear to me.

“This had to be something Ma’ams had volunteered me for at church, one of those things like the time she signed up to host missionaries and then forgot about it, but that’s another story. I figured out that this poor son of a bitch was retarded and lonely, and that kids were sent to keep him company while his guardian was at work, probably someplace else in this horrible building. That was the only explanation I could think of. My mother must have lost an argument with Ma’ams, and this was the penalty. I wished she’d included me in the decision, or the argument, or something, because this was not the way I wanted to spend any part of my Tuesday afternoons for the indefinite future.

“What was really going on was that my extremely socially conscious mother was very disturbed when the doorbell rang and I asked her to tell the neighborhood kids, if it was them, that I was reading, or sick, or asleep, or anything so I could stay with my books. You know that law firm down the street, Calhoun and Cowan?”

Eddie said he passed it every day on his way to the office, and Help explained, “Calhoun and Cowan were among my neighbors, and they first bonded over throwing dirt clods at stray dogs and tricking their younger sisters into eating bugs. That’s how it works, and my mother wanted me to build those same dog clodding, bug eating trick-based friendships early, then join the Dogga Clodda Bug fraternity in college to expand my circle of such connections and go to church with them, marry one of their sisters and block out the memory of her eating bugs while getting her pregnant to spawn another generation that would act the same way, and so on so that we could all sell cars and insurance and houses and stocks and bonds to one another happily ever after.

“That’s her idea of a good time. Well fuck that,” Help said, draining his snifter. “Apparently, after a couple of visits, the child psychiatrist asked my mother for more details about my reading, and she mentioned comic books. He asked me the next time I saw him which comic book superhero I wanted to be. I said none, and he asked again. There was a third round; well, retarded people lack comprehension skills, so this didn’t surprise me, and he pulled out the ‘Uncle Wiggly’ game after a few minutes.

“Between that Tuesday and the next, though, I figured out that he wanted me to answer his questions in a certain way for some reason, and that I might get out of these excrutiating visits if I complied. It seemed like just the sort of thing a grownup ‘Uncle Wiggly’ enthusiast would consider a win, and then he’d get bored with me and some other churchy grandmother would have to draft some other unlucky grandkid to babysit the greasy-haired retarded guy.

“So I told him, when he asked about my superhero fantasies again, that I wanted to be Spiderman. He looked pretty happy with that, and sure enough, that was my last Tuesday babysitting assignment. He told my mother that I thought I was a superhero, and that she needed to get me involved in normal group activities soon or else I might become violent. So she signed me up for martial arts lessons at the Y and stopped lying for me when kids knocked on the door wanting me to come out and play.

“Calhoun & Cowan and the rest of my alleged peers dug a hole in the vacant lot down the street and built walls and a roof over it with the bamboo that bordered the lot. They were excited to have this playhouse headquarters and begged me to bring my comic books over to make the place complete. I did so, and they took them all down to the barbershop next door to our elementary school and sold them to the barber for two cents apiece. It gave purpose to the judo lessons, and I began shoplifting comic books to rebuild my collection, and thus did my early learning years proceed.

“I did recently forgive her for another childhood wound, though, and I’m glad I brought it up to her. She went to Europe when I was five and had the measles. I held a grudge against her for abandoning me like that for all those years. When I finally mentioned it to her over the last holidays, she just scoffed and said, ‘Hell, I left you with your grandparents, a doctor and nurse who loved you. You couldn’t have been in better hands. Hell.’

“Sometimes, you have to be glad to lose an argument. That’s the moral to that story,” Help concluded. “I wish she felt the same way about things and could forgive and forget. You know my paternal grandparents loved to travel. They were away at Christmas time, 1955, leaving my father at 209 Promise. His brother was a block away and he still had friends at that time. He was a fullgrown man, but he portrayed himself as a castoff latchkey child and used pity, mistletoe, and scotch to seduce my mother over those holidays. She became pregnant. Other women got abortions in Gargantua from understanding doctors in those days, but all the understanding doctors knew that Dr. Gavin would not be understanding if he found out that anyone had performed such a service for his daughter and, as I’ve told you, broken arms figure prominently in Granddaddy stories, so she had to go to Dallas instead, accompanied by Marionette Floyd.

“Marionette was from Mississippi, and more than somewhat superstitious, with the whole ‘If your right hand itches, money is headed your way and if you put scissors under your pillow, it will cut the pain of a toothache in half” way, and between her input and my mother’s guilt, they decided that the soul of the fetus my mother had had removed would come back in the body of the next child she had and seek vengeance. I was that child, born in 1957, conceived after my parents wed, and every time my mother and I argue, she tells me I’m only disagreeing with her to get back at her for aborting me in 1955.”

Eddie didn’t have a ready response to that tale, so Help filled in the silence with a cheerier anecdote. “You know that IPad my sister and I gave her for her 89thth birthday? I found Jeopardy shows on Youtube and made a playlist out of twenty shows for her. She loves Jeopardy. Every time I see her, she assures me her mind is still sound, because she usually gets the answers before the contestants do. She doesn’t realize she’s seen those same shows dozens of times. It’s good for her morale.”

Eventually and inevitably, Eddie found himself preparing to deliver Brewster Gavin Lathey’s eulogy. Help was in town, of course, staying with his sister in the house where she’d been their mother’s primary caregiver for the last several years of Brewster’s life. It was a difficult thing to prepare. It came from guilt and would be delivered to guilt. Meaning every word, Brewster had told her loved ones and close friends for years to look into assisted suicide on her account if she found herself either unable to put on her own lipstick or willing to live with either of her children. Eddie had never looked into it for her.

His mind kept distracting him the night before the service, telling him she’d worked all that time, entertaining people and looking after them as well as she could for as long as she could and was now handing that last ticket to ride that last ride over to the Old Giant Invisible Bearded Conductor Up In The Clouds.

Help confirmed that she’dd asked him to put a pillow over her head and smother her every time he visited her from St. Louis after Aloysia had moved her into her house. That would probably have been more traumatic had she not threatened suicide on every birthday ending in “0” or “5” since “50,” and not done the “alien thing.”

Eddie had, of course, been hooked by that “alien thing” mention and asked Help to elaborate. He complied, “There was a certain drinking gear she’d get into back on Edgarson, when she’d call me and Aloysia into her room after guests had left and tell us she was leaving with the aliens at midnight.” There was a tone to Help’s delivery of this story that was in no other, like he wanted some suggestion as to why she would do that to her children, but didn’t want it to reflect badly on her, but knew it had to, but just plain ‘why?’

“She’d show us her suitcase under the bed, tell us she was going to live forever, see the universe, and learn all there was to know. We’d cry and beg her not to go, and she’d cuss us for being so selfish as to no want her to have that life she’d described. Outside of that, she was usually just amusing on steroids. She smoked pot with my high school friends before I did, pulling bags from trips to the Caribbean and Mexico from antique silver cigarette boxes and asking them to roll up some ‘sticks,’ then going on ‘munch trips.’ She never did get the slang quite right, but you know they loved her. She read their palms. She turned a blind eye to high school amours, so my friends brought their girl friends to my home and lost their virginity there. She and I argued over her letting them use my bed, in fact. Well, goddamnit.

“Another of her stoner things when I was in high school was to put on Granddaddy’s old hunting cap and wander around the place singing the wrong words to Rolling Stones songs she osmosed from my eight-track player in the den. I didn’t think Granddaddy would have approved. Not so sure now … I know he tried some of those shamanic herbs and brews when he was in the jungle, and he loved to make songs up to annoy Ma’ams.”

Help demonstrated with a half melody, “’They were ragged, they were torn, something, something, something, something, they were bagging at the knees and the crotch was full of cheese, oh, Maggie, and her old, dirty drawers,’” and then Ma’ams would say, “‘Oh, Dr. Gavin,’” and he’d laugh and go on with his gardening. So she came by it honestly.

“Anyway, back to her parenting, she was always willing to make liquor store runs for me and my friends when we were too young to legally drink, and then to help nurse us back to sobriety when we erred while teaching ourselves to drink. You know, it was a big problem for my generation that we were close enough to our parents to want to drink as they did but were too removed from them by our ‘Never trust anyone over 30 except Grace Slick’ ideals and their divorces to actually get pointers from them. She always advised my friends, when they started to spin, to drink a glass of orange juice and then lay down, usually across my bed, with their heads lower than their bodies. Few tried that cure more than once.”

Helping Aloysia and her daughters move her mother into her house, Edward had a chance to look into her closet. Though she was in a rented apartment, her closet was cedar lined and organized with one wall of white clothing, one of red, and one of black. She was a beautiful woman and worked to maximize that as long as she could, too. He came upon her old diaries that day, too, and found her entry from January 1st, 1944, “I, Brewster Ruth Gavin, aged 18, do hereby resolve to rope the honorable Maurice Knopf into marriage, before this year of 1944 is over, by hook or by crook, by fair means or foul,” followed by her strong signature. He smiled at this reminder of the woman’s passionate, romantic nature.

Her memorial was held in the Baptist Church she’d grown up in, and Eddie’s affection for her swelled as he stepped to the pulpit to fulfill his responsibility to this colorful woman who had become his friend over many years. The organist faded Sinatra’s My Way, which Brewster had insisted be played at her service, and Eddie began the eulogy. As he believed and often told people in need of comfort many times over the years, Eddie told his audience that in several sub-Saharan cultures, death has three distinct phases. The first is equivalent to our “flatlining. The second takes place when everyone who directly knew the deceased joins him or her in the Great Beyond. The third is reached only when the person’s influence wholly passes from the Earth. “In this concept,” he informed the few dozen people in front of him, “one can see immortality. As long as the loved one remains in some minds of some of the living, that loved one remains, in a way, alive. Let’s keep Brewster Gavin Lathey, who so enjoyed entertaining us with stories, with us by way of a story.

“In another chapel in this very church, many years ago, a very fervent minister concluded a very fire and brimstone sermon by asking his congregants if anyone had anything to add to the day’s message. A pretty little girl escaped her aisle seat beside her assembled family, marched up to the pulpit steps, put her hands behind her back, and, in the hush of an audience that had no idea what to expect, began to sing a popular song of the day, ‘Tiptoe through the window, by the window, that’s where I’ll be, come tiptoe through the tulips with me.’

“Her mother was mortified. Let’s forgive her and miss her and love her. That’s our Brewster Gavin Lathey.”

Knowing that Brewster and Eddie had become close, and because he was indisputably family by this time, Aloysia offered him an antique secretary, a family piece that had been in Brewster’s room during her final years. It had been emptied of her clothes, papers, and books before Eddie and Help wrestled it from Aloysia’s house to Villa Park, but when Eddie opened it to begin using it for his own home office needs, he noticed that one small drawer didn’t close all the way. When he removed it to find the obstacle, a partially used red lipstick tube rolled out.

#southern fiction #louisiana #original writing #prose

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niyaaas-world · 9 months

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Butterflies • PJS

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The Kim family consisting of daughter Maleigha, father Doyoung, and Mother Alicia. The family had Previously resided in Dallas TX but had to make a move to Washington for Doyoung job. Although the mother and daughter pair were not happy about the move, they had no choice as they didn't want to be separated from their husband and father.

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Doyoung and Alicia met when Doyoung traveled to America as a foreign exchange student During his high school years , he had took a tennis elective and the two met there in gym Class and were inseperable. Although coming from completely different racial backgrounds they have their similarities and it caused them to bond. The pair dated entirely throughout high school and carried on into their college years even when Doyoung Return to Korea to attend university. After they both graduated, they settled down in America and got married the two had always wanted a family and tried for a child and they were blessed with the beautiful baby girl, Maleigha.

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Maleigha woke up bright and early yesterday was the first day of the second grade at a new school, being the new kid caused the utmost feeling of anxiety for her, but she tried to remember that only good could come from this situation. She had been the new kid at school before once in kindergarten so mentally she was prepared but it's always nerve racking to be in a completely new environment with new people who have no idea who you are as a person even at the small age of 6 she was very intellectual and emotionally intelligent.

After getting dressed in her uniform and eating the breakfast her mother prepared for her she booked it towards the car and fastened her seat belt legs continuously moving anxiously as her mother and father drove her to her new school. All heads turned when the curly-head girl walked through the door and then many eyes on her made a feeling in her stomach arise.

She was told to sit by a little boy named Jay he was awkward looking, had chubby cheeks and pretty short brown baby curls. She thought the boy was cute though and turned to him and asked for his name introducing herself in the process. She felt butterflies hearing the boy speak his cheeks were red and flushed as were hers. After their brief introduction they sat in silence waiting for the teacher to give instructions for their daily assignments by the time resets hit the pair wars comfortable as kids who've known each other for years what didn't take long as the kids talked the day away.

At the end of the day Maleigha couldn't wait to ask her mother if the following Friday she could go to Jay's house after school and have a play date and reluctantly Alicia agreed worried about who this boy and his family were but overjoyed at how her little girl made a friend so easily. When Friday came the families met and clicked instantly. A play date for the kids turned into a play date for the entire family. For the next three years every weekend the families would have a big dinner together being so close they would even go to each other's family reunions. Doyoung and Jays father even when to the same University in Korea and had no clue.

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The pair, Jay and Maleigha, were going into the fifth grade and were still attached at the hip, sleepovers nearly every day and weekend. Best friends who could not be separated until the two worlds fell apart. Jay's Family had to back to Korea for his dad's business and it was inevitable that he had to go with him. No matter how much the pair best friends begged and pleaded they knew at the end of the day they would be separated and not just by a couple of hours but on two completely different sides of the globe. The day of the separation the two cried until their eyes were red and swollen damn-near shut.

The goodbye was sorrowful and not only for the children. The two families had bonded and to let go of each other was hard they knew that they would visit and see each other but there's nothing like being down the road from your best friends. Maleigha and jay swore to keep in touch and at first it was easy Maleigha Would visit in the summer and they would face time and video chat 24/7 until one day, they didn't. Jay began training to become an idol and it became his number one priority. He didn't mean to get so caught up in training to where he lost focus at his friendships, but it just happened naturally. Maleigha tried not to take it to heart but no matter what she felt betrayed. She was busy with things too like dancing and modeling, but she never let that be above her friendship.

From strangers to friends, to strangers again, all in the blink of an eye.

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first Chapter I hope you all enjoy, more coming soon! don't forget to vote, and comment.

#enhypen #kpop #enha x reader #enhypenxblackreader #enha #jay enhypen #enhypenxpoc #poc reader #enhypen jay #park jongseong

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deputygonebye · 1 year

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@laebyrinths asked: "Should I stop talking?"

50 Prompts (Fluff + Angst) || Fluff || Jillian Caldwell

Purple stained on the corners of everyone's lips, crust crumbs dabbed along the lines, Maggie's blueberry pie was an instant hit to the survivors who sat around the Greene family dinner table. Where she found the fruit, none dared to ask, rather stuffed their faces further with the sweet treat that she had prepared for them all. Shane was thankful to have something as simple as pie to fill his belly. Not nearly as good as what Grandma Jean used to make, her recipes the very best in the entire nation, but Maggie's a very close second. Forkful after forkful shoved into his hungry mouth; from across the table did he catch the sight of Jillian eating her own slice. Voice not silenced just because she was feasting on food, over the course of having known her, the ex-deputy could say with confidence that he had grown to like her. Appreciated her for what she brought to the group, was grateful to have her around when the Walkers got tough. Maybe her immunity exploited somewhat, Jillian had saved not just Shane's but everyone else's life countless times. Sacrificed herself and put herself into harms way, it was a noble thing to do.

Noble and honorable, even when the others had left to find sleep that night, Shane found himself still sat in his seat. Plate gone of pie but attention paid to Jillian still, brown eyes locked onto her own blue, truly fascinated by what she had to say.

"No. No, please, keep goin'. I like what you were talkin' about." Shane replied, leaning forward a bit more on the table, elbows pressed onto the wood. "You're a hell of a better storyteller than poor Glenn, that's for sure. I swear, if I have to hear another hour long lecture about the origins of Batman or Superman or any other kind of man, I'm stealin' the RV and heading to Dallas. He's a good kid, but damn. Boy can really get goin' with all that stuff. Hey, you want another piece? T-Dog said he left this one for you. Said you deserved it, and to be honest with you, Jill, I agree with him. You done good today. That little thing you did with Carl, bein' there for him, I thought that was real kind."

#laebyrinths #Muse || Jillian Caldwell #Jude and Executioner || Post Apocalypse Era #Location || Greene Family Farm

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masterclasspace · 2 years

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You don’t need to memorize a lot of odd or challenging vocabulary words to succeed on the SAT. Instead, the terms you’ll be asked about are words that show up commonly in college-level literature and in professional life. When taking the SAT, you won't have to provide a definition for a word out of nowhere.

#Best SAT preparation in Dallas #Best SAT Classes in Los Angeles #Best SAT Classes in San Francisco #Best SAT Classes in New Jersey

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socheckitout-mikey · 3 years

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Can I request a Johnny x soc reader where they hide their relationship and suddenly realize they really dont want to so now they have to adjust

heya birdie! i only really write hc’s so that’s the format they’re in. also, i kinda focused it more heavily on the reader meeting the gang, bc johnny would be pretty set on her meeting them since they’re pretty much his family. i hope you enjoy what i came up with! - mae

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Johnny Dating a Soc Reader and Hiding their Relationship Hc’s:

° None of the gang seemed to pick up on the fact that Johnnycake is dating you, and honestly, Johnny is pretty happy about that. Boii get’s teased enough as it is whenever he does open his mouth, he doesn’t need to be flooded with an onslaught of attention in regards to you.

° It’s just not Johnny’s style to be propped on top of a roof of a building, yowling about how he’s together with you. That’s more of Two-bit’s style. It’s not born out of embarrassment of dating you, someone who’s in a different social class altogether, it’s more over the fact that attention tends to overwhelm Johnny since he’s a raging introvert.

° In fact, Johnny is incredibly ecstatic to have you as his s/o despite the ample amount of insecurities he has about himself and his social status. He considers himself a lucky guy to have bagged someone as amazing and understanding as you. You balance a lot of his anxieties and insecurities out with patience and reassurance: Two things that we all know Johnny desperately lacks outside of the gang.

° Johnny tends to get effortlessly embarrassed whenever the spotlight is scorching on his form. So when you had told him you wanted to keep your relationship a secret, a part of him was incredibly relieved, but not before his mind started racing madly over the negative avenues for your reasoning.

° That other part of him felt ashamed of himself, especially because he primarily thought you were doing this out of the fact you were embarrassed of what others would think of you if they discovered the pair of you were dating.

° Yet you swiftly shutdown those ridiculous avenues of thought, ensuring him that you cared for him deeply and that societies prim and proper nose wouldn’t make you change who you loved, - even if it was upturned -. Similarly to Johnnycake, you relinquished from attention, the sheer thought of all these eyes being on you both made your skin crawl grotesquely.

° And thus began the comfortable pinnacle of your relationship with Johnny Cade. There was never much pressure, the pair of you free in the lack of obligation of speaking about your relationship to anyone else. It was beautiful while it lasted.

° You see, the gang weren’t blind. Soon they began to notice a spring in Johnny’s step, how he spoke a little more, how he disappeared frequently. The amount of times he’d led the gang on wild goose chases across town to lose them somewhere along the way to yours drove him insane!

° Teasing became an ample part of his life, the gang eventually guessing that he was dating someone. And although his crimson cheeks probably gave him away, his mouth never did. But Dally was hot onto the younger boy with a knowing smirk because Johnny may’ve slipped it loose once or twice whilst the guy was drunk: Sometimes, miraculously, Dally remembered his drunk endeavors.

° And your friends... fickle they were! Figured it out two weeks into your relationship with Johnny. Though fortunately for you they were trustworthy folk, they never pushed the topic, ready for whenever you were ready to tell them on your own terms.

° It was incredibly comical when you and Johnny met one night, both wild eyed and slightly breathless. The pair of you were sat in your car, the soft drawl of the radio humming whimsically in the background as Johnny sucked the life out of his tenth cancer stick of the night.

° “We gotta talk-” the paid of you mumbled out desperately in unison, the anxiety shivering in your tones made the pair of you spooked. Now that you look back on it, you laugh.

° “You first-” a unison it was once more and Johnny couldn’t help but crack a wry toothy grin before throwing his cigarette butt out the window.

° “Okay, you shoot first, Y/N.” Johnny stated in a shaky tone, his stammering long gone. You were one of the only people he felt real comfortable talking with.

° “I-I think we should tell our friends, because my friends are figurin’ it out.”

° And that night the pair of you stayed up till the early hours devising a plan on how best to break this to your friends.

° Johnny decided he’d need to pull up his bootstraps and meet your pals first, considering they were the nicest of the bunch. After all, the gang were notorious for being nasty to people they didn’t know, though laid off once they did get to know people. It was precautionary.

° And him meeting your friends went spectacularly! They loved Johnny so much and had nothing but great things to say about him. It was a bit of an ego boost for the kid, albeit incredibly overwhelming. He was still grinning in the vacant lot that night when Dally sat with the kid, fully sober for once.

° “Dal,” Johnny had hummed through the night air, shaking softly as nerves wracked his guts, “I gotta come clean about somethin’.” Did he have to say it so corny?

° “Shoot, Johnny-kid, what’s up?” Dally stated, seriousness taking him by the reins.

° And out it all came...

° Dally was ecstatic to say the least, taunting came out in boisterous fits and soon enough he’d wrestled Johnny into the Curtis house, gloating about how Johnny had snatched himself someone fancy.

° No one believed him initially, but then Johnny told them your name and when I tell you Soda’s jaw slammed onto the floor, it really did. They were so happy for him! And with happiness came the wild teasing of six boisterous boys, all eager to meet the person who’d won Johnny’s attention.

° Johnny was on edge about you meeting the gang, considering that you’d seen some of their antics in person from afar. He assured you that after awhile, they’d lay off; but for now, you’d be like that new attraction at the zoo. You hated that analogy but it made you laugh.

° You’d pretty much prepared yourself for the absolute worst, and although you were scared stiff, you sure didn’t show it. It made Johnny admire you more because you took everything the boys gave you in stride: I mean, it wasn’t like you weren’t a stranger to how teenage boys acted, after all, you did go to school with a whole bunch of em’.

° Darry was the most intimidating besides Dallas, due to his stature and height, but also because of that notorious icy look in his eye. He’d firmly shook your hand, muttering a brief “Hi, I’m Darry,” before slinking back into the kitchen to finish cooking dinner. Darry was a tough nut to crack, something Johnny had told you not to take personally: In fact, Darry really liked you from the moment you walked through the door because you were precisely what Johnny needed in a partner. You were also a good kid, something he hoped eventually would rub off on the other boys, but he wasn’t exactly expecting miracles.

° Sodapop was wild eyed and dreamy as ever, albeit just as dirty as the other boys. He flirted with you every chance he could get, eliciting Johnny to wise off to him; something that made the gang both gawk and simper like wolves.

° “What? You’ve never heard him speak before?” You’d quipped back wittily. You were also weary on how witty you were, seeing as you were typically seen as someone out of their leagues, you didn’t wanna come off as preppy, like you looked down on them. The truth was, you didn’t look down on them. After all, they were important people to Johnny, so they deserved as much respect as anyone else.

° Steve was cocky and smart mouthed, something you had witnessed all too often at school: In fact, you were pretty sure you’d been on the receiving end of his callous words more than once. You took everything he said with a grain of salt. He was also a little intense to begin with, joining in on Soda, Two and Dally flirting with you, but only in the sense to get you to be severely embarrassed.

° And Johnny was almost defensive of you, swatting away the gang and wising off to them to cut it out and leave you alone. He should’ve known better than to rise to their bait, because after all, that’s what they were really looking for; to get him going all red in the face.

° “You guys are nasty! I swear, ain’t nobody was this bad when Evie came round...”

° The minute you’d walked through the front door, Two-bit was hot on your heels, with Dally in tow, attempting to make you laugh up a storm. Well, he did, because it’s Two-bit after all: Who couldn’t that guy make laugh? His flirting would’ve been smooth if not for him having hiccupped halfway through his sentence.

° “Hey, sweet cheeks, why don’t you ditch Johnny for a real good lookin’ man like me, huh sugar?”

° “If the mirrors the one who told you that, then it’s lying.” You quipped back skillfully, more than comfortable taking on someone as wise-cracking as Two. The insult seemed to break the ice somewhat because Two didn’t take anything personally. In fact, all the boys thought it was pretty funny.

° Dally was the one that genuinely terrified you. The lines between a hood and a greaser weren’t present in him after all: Dallas Winston was as bad as they got, like Tim Shepard, and if it weren’t for him being Johnny’s buddy, you’d have avoided him at all costs. You weren’t sold short on his little show at the beginning, flirting with you, pulling on your hair like you were his kid sister or something... Dally found every way to irritate the hell out of you.

° “C’mon now, Dal! Cut that shit out!” Johnny snapped particularly at one point, but he meant business: Johnny never really wised off to anyone, so it took some guts for him to go out for Dally like that. Dally just grinned at him silly before ruffling the kids hair. “Alright, alright! Who knew you dug this one so much, eh?”

° Ponyboy, although quiet, was probably your most favorite of the gang. You really weren’t a stranger to him at school, often having some classes together with him. So it was somewhat refreshing to see someone you knew a little well in class. Every so often you’d catch the kid looking at you apologetically from the dining room whenever Steve or Two would say something that would’ve made anyone else run for the hills.

° “You know, if you keep goin’ like that, Johnny-cakes’ heads gonna burst into flames.”

° Whenever the boys got too rambunctious, Darry would pipe up from the doorway, reminding the boys that they needed to tone it down. After all, they’d promised Johnny they’d be on their best behavior, which in fact, that whole promise had been thrown out the window long ago. You’d just accepted it at this point.

° Eventually nighttime curled over Tulsa Oklahoma, and it was time for you to head on home. As soon as you and Johnny got down to the lot, he was intent on apologizing for their awful behavior, absolutely certain that you wouldn’t wanna be with a bum like him that hung out with trash like that.

° “What’re you apologizin’ for? I like em’. I mean, they’re awful, but...” You grinned at your boyfriend, linking fingers with him.

° “Did Two sneak you some booze?!” Johnny was animated, his voice cracking as it reached an octave that it hadn’t before.

° It did take awhile for the gang to accept you as Johnny’s girlfriend, but that didn’t matter to you as the cat was out of the bag: Outing your relationship to both of your friend groups was probably the best avenue to have gone down, since it was never in either of your guys’s nature to have just shown up to school one day holding hands and all that mushy galore!

° Everyone at school made a huge deal out of you guys dating for about a week until the next ‘crazy’ rumor swept their attention. Although you were still subject to some odd looks and some remarks, the pair of you just ignored them.

° The most the pair of you would do in public was hold hands or Johnny’s arm was around your shoulders. Subtle things. He got a whole ear full from the gang about how whipped he was. Johnny just didn’t dig the whole possessive thing that Dally was into. He didn’t need the whole world watching him make out with you!

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

please like, reblog and follow for more!

requests: open!

#johnnycade #johnny cade #johnny cade imagines #johnny cade headcanons #johnny cade x reader #the outsiders #the outsiders imagines #the outsiders headcanons #the outsiders johnny cade #the outsiders johnny cade headcanons #the outsiders johnny cade imagines #the outsiders johnny cade x reader #hope you enjoyed them!#mae

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let-me-luve-you · 3 years

Text

Winter Storm

Jared Padalecki x Reader

Summary: You play Cordell Walker’s daughter on the new show Walker. Jared takes you under his wing. What happens when a winter storm hits all of Texas.

Warnings: Mentions of a rough upbringing, Texas winter storm, power outage, water problems, some angst, scary weather, fluff, protective Jared, maybe a cuss word somewhere

A/N: As a Texan, this past week has been scary. I have been extremely blessed to not have the problems that a lot are. I was lucky and did not lose power and did not have any pipes burst. This idea came to me after seeing that Jared and Gen were helping others while dealing with their own problems at their house.

HERE ARE SOME LINKS TO HELP OUT IF YOU ARE ABLE TO.

KICK THE COLD - AUSTIN MUTUAL AID

GENESIS WOMEN’S SHELTER & SUPPORT

FEEDING TEXAS

LIST OF ORGANIZATIONS SEEKING DONATIONS IN DALLAS AREA

THE WAY HOME

You do not have to donate to any of these organizations, but if you feel the need to help, here are a few links. ^^^^ There are plenty more out there if you don’t want to donate to these links.

MASTERLIST BUY ME A COFFEE

Winter weather will be hitting Texas this weekend. You can expect lots of snow and ice. It is best to prepare for possible power outages and water being turned off. That is worst case scenario, but be prepared as Sunday will be a cold one.

You panicked. Growing up in North Texas you never had to deal with severe winter weather. You were used to dealing with tornados. But the way they were talking on the news, this weekend was going to be bad.

Thankfully you had the day off and were able to go to the store. You grabbed a case of water and food that you could prepare and food that didn’t have to be cooked to eat. You were still getting used to the adult life as an 18 year old, but since you had been taking care of yourself the last few years, you learned a thing or two in the kitchen. You made sure to grab some snacks as well since they didn’t have to be cooked or stored in the fridge either.

As you pulled up to your apartment building, you got a call from the lead and producer of the show you were on. You still weren’t sure how you managed to land the role of Stella in the new show Walker, but you were grateful. You put the car in park and grabbed your phone.

“Hey Jare.” You said. Jared was the older brother you always wanted, even though he plays your dad and he has moments where he acts like your dad. You didn’t have a great life growing up and to have a male figure in your life to help you in anyway, made you happy. Same thing with Gen.

“Hey Y/N/N. How’re you doing?” He asked.

“I’m doing good. Just got back from the store. Am I needed on set?” You asked in a panic thinking you missed something.

“No, no you’re not needed. Just wanted to call and tell you we are not filming Monday or Tuesday next week. And depending on the weather and roads, we may cancel Wednesday as well.” He informed you.

“Oh. Is it because of the storm?” You asked.

“Yeah. We aren’t sure how bad it’ll be, but we are hoping we are just being over cautious.” He said. “You said you went to the store?”

“Yeah. I just wanted to get something’s so I won’t have to get out. And I got some stuff. I won’t need to cook in case we lose power. Also filled up with gas in case I lose heat and need to warm up some.” You told him.

“Come stay with us. We have plenty of room and we have a fireplace. We just restocked our firewood supply. I don’t want to be worrying about you all weekend.” He said.

“I’ll be okay. Really. Thank you for the offer though.” You said nicely. You really did mean it. You were used to taking care of yourself that when people did want to help you, you appreciated them.

“Well. I have my truck if I need to come get you. If you change your mind, come over. The kids would love to see you.” He said. You heard Gen agree with him in the background. “And Gen would too.”

“Well after the storm, I’ll come over for dinner to see everyone. And I’ll even come another night to babysit so you and Gen can go on a date.” You said with a laugh once you heard Gen immediately laugh.

“Gen says you don’t have to, but I will take you up on both offers.” Jared told you. “Okay. Well stay in touch. They say it’ll start sometime tomorrow night.”

“Y’all stay safe and stay in touch too.” You said. “Bye Jare.”

“Bye Y/N/N.” He said before hanging up. You put your phone back into your pocket before lugging all of the groceries into your apartment. You put everything away before going to change out of your winter clothes.

After changing into some PJs to be comfortable. You decided to meal prep some so you wouldn’t have to worry about it later. And if the weather isn’t as bad as they think it’ll be, you can just eat them throughout the week.

Sunday morning, you woke up and looked outside. All you could see was white fluffiness. You smiled as the world looked at peace. You loved snow. You always thought it brought beauty to the world.

When you walked back to your phone where it laid on its charger, you saw a couple of texts from Jared and Gen. Both had sent you photos of Tom, Shep, and Odette playing the in the snow. Then you saw Jared’s text about possible rolling power outages.

You picked up the phone and called Jared and before he could even say hello, you asked, “What does that mean? Your text... I don’t understand it.”

“It means they’ll shut the power off for an hour to three hours to preserve energy.” Jared said.

“Oh.” You said.

“Yeah, so if the power goes out, don’t worry, it should come back on.” He reassured you.

“Okay. Thank you for letting me know.” You replied.

“Of course. How are you doing anyways?” He asked.

“Good. Just woke up. Felt good to sleep in. I’m probably about to start warming up my lunch.” You informed him. “How are y’all handling it over there? I saw the pics you and Gen sent. The kids look like they’re having a blast.”

“We’re doing good. The kids are definitely loving the snow. I did have to help Gen gather the chickens this morning which wasn’t fun.” He said with a laugh.

“Oh gosh. Yeah chasing chickens isn’t fun. Are they okay? I didn’t even think about y’all’s animals?”

“They’re all in the barn with heat lamps. Thankfully the barn is powered by solar so we don’t have to worry too much if the power goes out since we have a lot of energy stored up.” He said.

“Good that’s good. Well I’ll let you get back to doing whatever you were doing. Thanks again for letting me know.”

“Anytime. If you need something, holler. Okay?” He asked.

“I will. Bye.” You said. You heard his farewell as you went to hang up the phone. After preheating the oven, you took the lasagna and boxed garlic bread out of the freezer. You figured, while the power was still on, you could cook the one meal you prepped that couldn’t be eaten cold until you cooked it and it was leftovers.

An hour later, you sat at the counter charging your phone and iPad while you ate. When you went to take another bite, the power cut off.

“Great.” You whispered. You knew it was only going to be for a few hours, but you were a little aggravated by the inconvenience. You stood up and went and put on thicker sweatpants and your socks. When you made it back to your phone to text Jared that your power went out, you saw you barely had any service. That concerned you in case you needed to make a call for an emergency.

Power just went out. Hopefully y’all didn’t lose power. I’ll let you know when it’s back on. Sent 1:23 pm

You continued to eat as you awaited a response. Shrugging when you finished your meal and put the dirty dish in the sink, you moved to the living room to read a book you started the night before.

Hours later, you still had no power and you still hadn’t heard from Jared or Gen. You had checked social media, but neither had posted anything. You decided to scroll through Twitter and saw the horrors of people’s pipes bursting and roofs caving in flooding their homes.

Seeing people in Austin posting that, you decided to grab a tote to store your valuables in. Sadly, it wasn’t a lot, but the idea of losing what little you had that meant something to you scared you.

You needed to go to your car to charge your phone and warm up some, so you decided to store your valuables in the trunk. Thankfully you had a covered parking space that was right in front of your apartment. When you put the tote in the trunk, you checked to make sure the tail pipe was clear of snow before you started the car.

After spending an hour in the car, you decided it was time for bed. Grabbing every piece of blankets you had, you cuddled up in Jared’s hoody that you stole from him when you filmed episode 2 of Walker and all the blankets. You even had on two pairs of socks on since you got cold earlier.

The next morning, you checked to see your phone still had more than half its battery life left. But what shocked you was still no response from Jared. You got on Instagram and saw that Gen had posted a boomerang of him with his socks on as gloves, but neither had checked in with you.

You were kind of upset by this. You knew they didn’t owe you anything, but it still hurt. Going to the kitchen, you saw it was flooded.

“Oh no. Oh no. Nonononono.” You panicked. You ran to the bathroom and grabbed all the towels you owned and rushed back to the kitchen. You threw them down to try and absorb as much water as possible. You opened the cabinet and saw the pipe that had burst. You grabbed your phone and called the landlord.

“Hey Craig. I had a pipe burst this morning.” You said when he answered.

“Can’t do much with the weather like this.” He said not really caring.

“Can you turn the water off or something? Or tell me where it is and I’ll do it.” You said getting angry.

“Can’t do that either. If I do that, your neighbors lose their water too.” He said.

“Well what am I supposed to do. Just sit in water all day?” You asked with an annoyed tone.

“City’s running out of water anyway so they may shut it off. So won’t be long before it stops.” He said. You got so mad that you hung up. He was useless.

After 3 hours, all of your towels were soaked and you started using some of your clothes to help absorb what the towels couldn’t. You had tried calling Jared to see if he knew what to do but it went straight to voicemail. Same with Gen.

After using most of your clothes to stop the water, you decided to pack a bag in case you had to leave. Plus it would let you know what you could use to absorb the water that still remains. Thankfully your landlord had turned the water off after multiple people called about pipes bursting. All you had to do was finish cleaning up the mess.

Two days later, you were sitting in your car, about to go back into your apartment when you got a call from Gen.

“Y/N. Oh my gosh it’s so good to hear from you. We haven’t had service, plus we lost power and had a few pipes burst. Are you okay?” She asked worriedly.

“I’m okay. Sitting in my car right now so I could charge my phone and warm up a bit.” You told her.

“You don’t have power still?” She asked.

“Nope. And I also had a pipe burst. But I cleaned it up and nothing was damaged. Did you have any damage done? Is everyone okay?” You asked concerned.

“Yeah. We are fine. And just minimal floor damage.” She told you. “Jared is cleaning that mess up while I’m going to the store. Do you need anything? We have some of our neighbors over trying to stay warm and I’m grabbing them stuff too. So I don’t mind getting you anything.”

“I’m okay. I have plenty.” You said. You wanted heat. You wanted to sleep without having to wear five layers, but you refused to ask.

“Well if you do need something, text or call. Hopefully we get service back.” She said.

“I will. Thanks Gen.” you said as you hung up. Ten minutes later you got a call from Jared.

“Pack a bag and bring some blankets.” He said before you could even greet him.

“What?” You asked genuinely confused.

“I said, pack a bag and bring some blankets. Also if you want to bring any food you don’t want to go to waste or if you have water, bring that too. I’ll come in and help you carry.” He said.

“Wh-wait.. what is happening?” You asked.

“I’m coming to get you and you are going to stay with us for a couple of days. I just got off the phone with Gen and she said you had a pipe burst and you don’t have heat. So you are going to come stay with us until your power is back on and the pipe is fixed.” He said. “I’m pulling up. I’ll be inside in a second.” He hung up before you could say anything.

You went and unlocked the door before moving to your room. You grabbed your big suitcase and packed what few pair of pants you had, a weeks worth of underwear, two weeks worth of socks since you hated having cold feet, and the remaining three sweaters and seven shirts you had. It barely filled your suitcase so you decided to throw in a couple of hoodies as well.

“That all your packing?” Jared asked concerned. No one knew how long this was going to last.

“It’s all I got clean.” You answered honestly.

“No way.” He said in disbelief. You shrugged and told him to follow you as you walked into the kitchen. He saw the pile of clothes and towels on the ground. “Oh Y/N. I’m sorry this happened to you.”

“Happened to you too.” You said before moving back to your room. You grabbed a blanket and started to fold it, starting a pile you were taking with you to the Padalecki’s. Once you finished that, you grabbed your pillow too.

“Want any books or anything? You have room in your suitcase.” Jared said as he pointed to it. You shrugged and grabbed a few books you had been wanting to read. After throwing them into the suitcase, you ran to the living room to grab your iPad and chargers.

“We can charge them in the cars if we need to.” Jared said when you thought about not putting them in your bag. You nodded before throwing them in and zipping it up. “This ready to go to the truck?” You nodded once again before he grabbed the suitcase handle and stack of blankets and your pillow with ease. “Go figure out food and I’ll come back to help.”

Once in the kitchen, you grabbed the full water case you had bought a few days before and the almost empty one that you had already opened. You then moved to the fridge to grab the few casserole dishes you had left to eat. You grabbed your travel food carrier and put the casseroles in first before the almost empty case of water in after it. You saw Jared walking back in and asked,

“Is there any food of mine you want? I’ve got everything packed that will definitely go bad before I get back. The rest has already gone bad.” You said while looking at Jared who was looking through your cabinets. He found your snack one and grabbed a few things and shoved them in your carrier.

“That’s all I want.” He smirked. “Ready to go? We can come back in a couple of days if we need to.”

“Ready.” You walked to his truck and he helped you load the water and carrier. As you got into the passenger seat and started to buckle, you said, “thanks for coming to get me and letting me stay with you.”

“Anything for family.” He said smiling at you before driving carefully back to his house.

“But we aren’t family?” You said more as a question.

“You’re my tv daughter, so technically we are.” He said with a laugh. “But in all seriousness, I do see you as family. Me and you have gotten close over these past few months. I can see you as a daughter and I can see you as a little sister.” You could hear the sincerity in his voice.

“Really?” You asked. He nodded his head. “It means a lot to hear you say that. I see you as a big brother.”

“Good.” You saw him smile. “That means you can ask me for anything or do anything and I’ll be there for you. Sorry I didn’t come get you sooner. I thought about it.”

“It’s okay. I tried calling but could never get through. It happens. I’m just glad nothing more serious happened. I’m glad we are all safe.” You said honestly.

“And we are about to get you warm. We have the fire going in the living room and in mine and Gen’s room. Kids have been sleeping with us or on the floor in our room. You’re welcome to make a pallet in front of the fire and crash there.” He said as he pulled into his driveway.

“Sleeping in front of a warm fire sounds lovely right now. Thank you.” You leaned over and gave him a big hug. “I love you Jare.” You said before pulling back to kiss his cheek.

“Love you too y/n/n.” He smiled at you. “Now let’s go take all this in and get you warmed up.”

Tags: @deadcoldhearts

#jared padalecki #jared x reader #jared padalecki x reader #jared padalecki rpf #jared padalecki one shot #jared padalecki imagines #jared padalecki fanfic #jared padalecki fanfiction #jared rpf #cordell walker #walker #walker rpf #walker fanfiction #walker fanfic

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imagines-r-s · 3 years

Text

sticking it

chapter 9

a/n: idk why this chapter took so long, but here it is. for reference - in gymnastics, US Championships are the last meet before Olympic Trials, they’re a two day competition. any feedback is welcome. i’m kinda upset that this series (or at least this part) is almost done, but there is more to come with this series i promise. also had to repost bc it wasn’t showing up in the tags

taglist: @butgilinsky @barbienoturbby @sunsetholland @lovenhlboys @sortagaysortahigh @hockey-racing-fubol @oopsiedoopsie23 @iwantahockeyhimbo @dreamsndior @itsurgirlgracie @heartshapedkissxs @lwstuff @handwrittenheroes

warnings: uh, i don’t think there’s anything, but if i miss something just let me know (the jamie mentioned is jamie oleksiak, not j b*nn)

sticking it masterlist

wc: 5.8

(not my gif)

“Are you sure that you have everything?” Joel asked for the twentieth time in the past hour, “we can run back to yours if you need anything else”

“I feel like you’re just trying to get me to stay with you longer,” you said, skeptically.

“Is it working?”

“No, Bee, I have to leave at some point,” you said, putting another bag of yours in his car,”I won’t be gone long.”

“Yeah, but you’ll be closer to the Stars and that has me worried,” he said, causing you to chuckle.

“You worried about Seggy? Or Roope? Or Big Rig? Or Mi-”

“Okay, I get it.”

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, I love you and only you, shawty. Besides, I can only tolerate Texas weather for so long,” you said, leaning up to kiss him on the cheek.

“I love you, too, shawty,” he paused,”Wait,- that was rude.”

After packing the last of your bags into the car, you made your way to the airport to meet Marcus and Michelle. Once you arrived at the airport, Joel parked the car before the two of you headed into the airport. The four of you caught up for a while before Marcus suggested giving you and Joel time to say goodbye.

“Is this how it feels when me and the guys leave for the road?” Joel asked, softly.

“Yeah,” you said, smiling sadly.

“Well, good thing I’m the one on the road all the time, I mean, I don’t like leaving you, but when I’m leaving it’s a different feeling, you know.”

“Well glad it makes you happy, buddy.”

“Did you just buddy me?” Joel asked, incredulously.

“Did I?” you asked, laughing as Joel gasped in shock.

“Wow, I see how it is. I’ll remember that.”

“Go ahead, babe. Remember it however you want,” you paused when you saw the sad look on his face, reaching to hold his face in your hands, “hey, I’m only a text away, I might not be right here, but I will answer as soon as I can and we’ll facetime as much as you want these next few days.”

Joel nodded before looking up and seeing Marcus and Michelle headed your way, “we hate to cut this short, but we have to get going pretty soon.”

“I know I asked, but do you really have to go?”

“Yeah, Bee, I really have to go.”

“You better kick ass out there or else you’re just leaving for nothing,” he said, jokingly, “but honestly, I wish you the best of luck - I know you don’t need it, but I’ll say it anyway. Make sure to tell Nicole I said good luck and please make sure to wipe that smug look off Kathryn's face. Okay?”

“Yeah, of course,” you said, wrapping your arms around him as he pressed kiss to the top of your head. “I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you, too, but if you don’t go, the only thing you’ll be missing is your flight.”

“Wow, Bee, you are so funny.”

“Well, one of us has to be the funny one in the relationship. Your mom jokes only get you so far far in life, babe,” he said, causing you to elbow him in the stomach.

“I’m leaving now. I love you and I will text you when I land,” you leaned up for a quick goodbye kiss before grabbing your carry-on bag and heading to your gate. You avoided looking back, knowing that if you did, both of you wouldn’t let the other leave.

“I think you chose a good one,” Marcus said once the three of you had sat down.

“What?” you asked, shocked.

“Joel. He seems like a good guy. He clearly cares about you and I can see that you care a lot about him, too. He clearly makes you happy,” Marcus added.

Heat rushed up your face, to which you simply looked out the window, “yeah, he’s a good guy.”

“A cute one, too,” Michelle interrupted.

“Yes, that too. But Michelle, you better lay off,” the three of you laughed as the flight attendants started to announce the safety procedures for your flight. The three of you did your own thing the rest of the flight: Marcus planning out how podium training would go, Michelle analyzing your routines, and you sleeping.

“Alright, so as soon as we land, we get luggage and go to our hotel. There is a small media event tomorrow morning before podium training, then podium training, then probably some more media. You will have the rest of the night to do whatever, I know you’ll probably go see your Dallas friends and that’s fine, just make it back in time. Then, Friday is the first day of competition, Saturday is the second day, then we have some free time Sunday,” Marcus read off to you, even with you half asleep.

“Sounds lovely,” you grumbled.

…..

“So, y/n, with your injury being a top priority, how different have practices been since you are still somewhat in recovery?” one of the journalists asked. You had stayed prepared for a multitude of questions having to do with your injury, so this question had an easy response.

“I would say, it’s definitely a totally new experience. I’ve had to tailor my focus to other aspects of this sport since the start of my recovery, whether that be drills, more conditioning, or changing up my routines. My team and I definitely have figured out what things work and what doesn’t and we continue to learn as I continue training,” you answered, swiftly.

“Now obviously, you were the highest scorer in most of your competitions, even before your injury, how has competition changed for you? And what has inspired you to train harder?” another journalist asked.

“I have to say, competition is slightly more nerve-wracking than before. I mean getting injured at a major competition definitely changes perspective for all aspects of it. I feel that I have to be more cautious when performing, whereas before I would just go with the motions. Something that’s inspired me has been that my competitors have continued training, I have a fair amount of competition - all of which are excellent athletes - which has helped motivate me a lot, but I also have an amazing support system back home who have made sure to give me that extra motivation when I need it,” you smiled.

“Now, having to deal with that support system at home, who and how have they influenced your decisions of your journey through recovery?” which was the first question that made you smile.

“Well first, a huge shoutout to my family, especially my cousin, Kevin. Without his support, I wouldn’t have ever tried to get back in the gym, he’s been there this whole time and I couldn’t be more grateful. Um, my coaches were so supportive of my comeback; my physical trainor, Adrian, who told me all the doctors were wrong and gave me the reality checks I needed; the whole Philadelphia Flyers roster and their families cheered me on the whole time, especially my boyfriend, Joel Farabee. My friends, my teammates, all of them pushed me where I needed to be,” you said, gratefully.

“Thank you for your time, y/n. We wish you the best of luck this weekend,” the main announcer said to you before you went off to podium training.

Marcus and Michelle had both told you only to warm up simplified versions of your routine, so that you could bring shock factor when you were actually performing. You had upgraded almost all of your tumbling back to where it was before injury, but no one needed to know that besides you and those in your gym. Podium training had gone very well, better than you had anticipated, so you were looking forward to how championships would go.

As you packed up your gym bag and grabbed your phone, you saw all the messages you had from the Flyers group chat you had somehow found your way to.

Bee: did you guys see that too?

Tiki Bar: if we are talking about the same thing, i think we did.

Patti Lapone: did she actually say nice things about us?

Kev: i really think the texas heat is getting to her already

G: she’s probably just feeling under the weather about competition, otherwise we might want to check if she is okay

Scotty: i think i misheard or i got hit in the head and didn’t realize it

Frosty: hell has frozen over

Bee: haha. frost. frozen. get it

Tiki Bar: beezer.

G: i’ll make you do laps if you make another frost joke

Laughing at the texts in the group chat in reaction to your interview, you simply typed up a simple response: this is what i get when i’m nice, now you know why i’m not like this all the time.

Luckily for you, you didn’t have to do any media after podium training, so you were able to leave whenever you wanted to. After checking with Marcus and Michelle, you made sure it was alright that you went off to go see Tyler and the rest of the guys. Assuming that they would be at practice, after changing out of your leo, you took the drive to the Stars practice facility.

Having come to Fort Worth so much for gymnastics and Dallas for a few hockey games, you had run into some of the Stars roster on multiple occasions. By the third time you had ran into them, and this time ran into was a very literal statement, you had exchanged social medias and most of the roster kept an eye out for any updates in your gymnastics career. During your recovery, the whole team constantly asked for updates about how you were and how gymnastics was going.

Once you parked, you quietly made your way inside - not wanting to interrupt the practice. There were a few officials walking around, but most either paid you no mind or recognized you from times before you had been here. Walking towards the rink, your eyes settled on the boys doing laps for the last part of practice. It wasn’t until most of the guys were only talking and about to get off the ice that they noticed you.

Tyler was the first to notice you, smiling and waving towards you, which caused most of the team to follow where he was looking and notice you. As the team headed to the locker room to change, you simply waited on one of the benches for them.

“I feel like you only came all this way to see my dogs,” Tyler said, making his way towards you.

“No, I would never do such a thing, I obviously came here to say hi to you,” you stood up to give him a hug.

“Mhm, whatever you say. Didn’t you have podium training today? How’d it go?”

“Well, it went pretty well actually. I did a few of my dismounts, but kept most of my landings safe just to be careful. But other than that everything went well.”

“As long as you kick ass tomorrow, I’m fine,” he said, honestly, “do you have anything else to do for the rest of the day or did you just come to say hi?”

“Well, I have no plans for the rest of the day, but I don’t want to intrude on any team plans.”

“You know you would never be intruding on anything with us, even if you are dating a Flyer,” Jamie O said from behind you.

“God, Jamie, what the fuck? Where’d you come from?”

“Your mom’s house,” he said, earning a fist bump from Tyler.

“I can’t even be upset, that was a good one,” you smiled as Jamie hugged you,”and don’t bring Joel into this.”

“My condolences.”

“Condolences? No one died?” you questioned.

“You are dating someone that plays for the Flyers,” Tyler said.

“Damn, that’s harsh,” you replied.

“Anyways, moving on. Me and a few other guys were coming over to mine for lunch and to hangout, if you want to come you are welcome to,” Tyler said to which you simply nodded.

“Is that who I think it is?” another familiar voice rang out, causing you to whip your head around to see Roope and Jake heading your way.

“Well, if you thought it was me, then you would be correct, my friend,” you retaliated.

“I’m surprised they let you in here, considering you are dating a Flyer,” Otter said, jokingly.

“Quit bringing the fact that I’m dating Bee into the conversation.”

“At least Nicole is in the safe zone,” Roope said, causing your eyes to widen, “y/n. What was that?”

“What was what?” you questioned as Roope simply narrowed his eyes.

“You did the thing.”

“What are you talking about, bestie?”

“Oh, you have a habit of your face changing when you know something that will ruin the whole perspective or something or if you know a secret that will change the entire story. Very entertaining and concerning that you didn’t know,” Tyler added.

“Um, well, didn’t expect to be psychoanalyzed by a bunch of hockey players today, but here we are.”

“Ok, I think we should head to mine and then, we can continue psychoanalyzing you,” Tyler suggested to which you all agreed. Roope, who had gotten a ride from Tyler in the morning, immediately hopped into your car as soon as you unlocked it.

“What’s up with Nicole?” he asked as soon as you started driving.

“What happened to hello? How are you?” you joked.

“Listen, I’m asking now because I don’t want to talk about this with the guys there. But what did you mean?” he said, causing you to take a deep breath. It wasn’t like Roope and Nicole were ever together, but it was always an unspoken fling of sorts, that they never made official.

“Look,-”

“Please, just tell me what’s happening,” he pleaded.

“Nicole and Nolan are sort of together,” you rushed out, causing a moment of silence to break out. You didn’t know what to expect as a reaction, considering they weren’t official and hadn’t really talked since the last time you and her were in Texas.

“Is she happy?”

“Yeah, she’s happy.”

“Okay, that’s all I care about,” he said simply, which made your heart almost break for one of your closest friends.

…..

Being able to spend time with some of your close friends that you hadn’t seen in a while was just what you needed to destress about championships. Maybe an intense game of uno with five of the most competitive people was exactly what some might call a destressor, but here you were.

Tyler threw down his cards as he stood up dramatically, “no, because there is no way that a.) she already has an uno and that b.) all of you used your draw two cards against me.”

“Don’t be upset, Ty, that’s just how the game of uno is sometimes,” you replied, hiding a laugh.

“Oh, shut up. I think you guys cheated,” Tyler accused.

“I think you just don’t know how to play uno,” Jamie mumbled.

“Oh, yeah, real funny. I think you all teamed up against me and Jake dealt that way on purpose.”

“And we all think, you just can’t accept a loss in uno,” Roope added.

“Fine, let’s settle this like men,” Tyler grabbed all the cards, attempting to shuffle them before accepting he couldn’t shuffle and handing them over to you to shuffle, “I’m watching you.”

“Oh, wow, so scared,” quickly shuffling them, doing a little bit more than usual to get Tyler off your case, you handed them back to him, “there you go.”

Another final round of uno, which ended up with you and Roope head to head as far as who would win, while Tyler had ended up with at least 15 cards to which Jamie was the first to speak up, “I think we should end here before someone gets hurt.”

“No, no, we’re fine. It’s fine. y/n, take your turn,” he said, eyes narrowing as he watched from beside you. Even if it was your last card, you dropped the draw 4, which made Tyler draw more cards.

“Damn, that sucks,” you said, hiding a laugh.

“What was that, y/n?” Tyler said.

“I said, damn, that sucks,” you repeated, watching Tyler closely as he stood up quickly once again, before practically chasing you. “Tyler, it’s just uno. Stop chasing me.”

“Oh, wow, ‘damn, that sucks’” Tyler mocked.

As the other three watched, Jamie just grabbed the bowl of popcorn as they watched their friends running around chasing each other. “I see why we don’t play uno much,” Jake said.

“Yep. Exactly. But no one listened when I advised against it,” Jamie said, taking a drink of his beer.

“Tyler, watch yourself,” you said, as he stood on the opposite side of the couch. He started running one way, as you ran the other to avoid him, but he quickly sidestepped and caught up to you. Practically throwing you over his shoulder, he made his way out to the pool, “Tyler, let’s not do anything crazy here.”

“Oh, you mean like hold a draw four card until the end of the game,” Tyler said, as he tossed you into the deep end of his pool.

“Children. Literal children,” Roope said, shaking his head, going to grab you a towel.

Rising up from the water and quickly moving the hair out of your face, you swam over to where Tyler was, “hey, can you help me out?”

“Nah, I’m not falling for that one,” he stated.

“Seriously, I won’t do anything right now, I promise,” you said, as you saw him reach his arm out to which you quickly grabbed and stood out of the pool. Walking towards Roope, who had grabbed you a towel, you turned back around to see Tyler still walking near the pool. Using this to your advantage, you ran and pushed Tyler into the pool. “Sorry, bestie,” you said, running to get the towel from Roope and running back in the house.

After getting changed into one of Tyler’s extra shirts he had lying around, you were just hanging out with the guys when a familiar contact flashed on the screen to FaceTime, Jake who was right next to you immediately noticed, “ooh, better go talk to your man, y/n.”

“Shut the literal fuck up,” you called back, standing up to go the kitchen for privacy. Answering, you noticed that Joel was at Nolan and Kevin’s apartment, “were you that lonely without me, babe?”

“No, well maybe, but I’m helping them set up for the watch party tomorrow,” Joel said, taking a seat at their kitchen island, “how’d podium training go?”

“It went really well actually, I didn’t work the 3.5 just so that way I have something over their heads, you know. But other than that, it was all good. How are things at home?”

“Well, I mean no one is dead, which is always good. Um, debated getting a dog, my mom called, I told her about you. Uh, already told you about the watch party. I don’t think anything else interesting happened,” he said, shrugging as if he hadn’t just mentioned bringing you up to his mom.

“Wait, you told your mom about me?”

“Well, she does follow me on Instagram, so after seeing the post she texted me asking and then she asked while we were on the phone. She wished you good luck, by the way. She’s also visiting here with my dad in a few weeks and I’d really love it if you would meet them,” he said, shyly.

“Uh, yeah, yeah, of course,” you rushed out, hoping you didn’t sound as nervous as you were.

“That sounded very unsure.”

“No, it’s fine. I just have never been at the spot in a relationship where I meet the parents, I’m just nervous. I don’t want to mess it up.”

“Babe, my mom already loves you, she was getting on my case about not telling her, but she already thinks very highly of you and I definitely hyped you up a little bit. You have nothing to worry about,” he reassured you, which made you smile.

“Hey, y/n/n,” Kevin yelled.

“Hey, Kev.”

“You were very nice in your interview today, it had all of us worried,” Kevin said, which caused you to roll your eyes in response.

“Hey, I can be nice sometimes.”

“On very rare occasions, yes,” Joel added.

“Whatever.” As you talked a little while longer with the guys, eventually Roope and Tyler had come in to say hi to everyone as well, which had you dying laughing as both of them gave the ‘you hurt her, we fly to Philly and hurt you’ talk that almost everyone had given him.

Telling Joel you would call him back whenever you made it back to your hotel, you stayed with the guys for another couple of hours before heading back to your hotel. Nicole had spent most of the day after podium training resting and had met you in the hotel lobby when you got back.

“So,- “ she didn’t even have to finish her sentence before you knew what she was saying.

“Roope is doing good, he said he hopes things are going well,” you said, watching as a small smile crept up her face.

“Well, good to know. Did you know KD is also staying at this hotel?”

“Well, considering this is the host hotel and most competitors are here, I am not all that shocked.”

“Yeah, but you probably didn’t know she’s legit a few rooms away from us, did ya?”

“No, guess not,” you said, “how’d you find that one out?”

“Well, let me set the scene for you. I go to get ice and then I hear her talking with, uh, whatever her name is, Callie or Carly, it starts with a C. Anyways, they were talking about you and me and how our skills have been less than recently and all this stuff about you not catching up to where you were - which I found so fucking funny because who has won gold at the past few meets? Not her. Anyways, all is fair in the sport of gymnastics, but I’m just excited to see her reaction to you doing the 3.5.”

“Damn, no pressure there, Nic.”

“Okay, but the thing is, you have the skill,” Nicole said, as you got into the elevator. “You have it down. It’s all up here, in your cranium,” she said, pointing to your head.

“Alright, let’s just go to bed now,” you said, slowly removing her hand and opening the door to your hotel room.

…..

“Hello everyone and welcome to Day One of the 2021 US Gymnastics Championships. We are very excited to see how today’s competition goes as this competition will decide who makes it onto the National Team and who will qualify for Olympic Trials,” Joel heard the announcer say as he made his way to sit with everyone in the living room.

“Did you talk to her this morning?” Claude asked from beside him.

“Yeah, usual pre-comp anxieties. Nolan talked to her and Nicole to give the usual pep talk and then we talked for a while on their way to the arena,” Joel answered, looking back to the TV to see you prepping for bars, “she said podium training went well, but Kathryn was talking shit, so all I know is she better kick her ass.”

“You know she will, it happens everytime. She gets in her head and still does amazing, just a casual Tuesday,” Scott added.

“It’s not Tuesday?” Travis questioned.

“Yes, I know,” Scott said, confusing everyone.

“Alright, moving on,” Joel reiterated.

“And starting on bars, we have y/n y/l/n. Now if you remember, less than a year ago, y/n was injured at another competition doing a beam dismount that she might be competing in today’s competition. She is definitely one to watch as she has a reputation of scoring high in these meets, before and after her return. Her teammate, Nicole Carter, will be following up.”

Joel watched as you stepped away from the chalk box to start your routine, he watched intently as you jumped from the springboard to reach the high bar. He watched intently as you went through your routine. Release skills. Giants. Pirouettes. More release skills. More giants. Dismount. Stuck landing.

“A great start to Day 1 for y/n, who seems pretty proud of how that routine went,” the announcer said, “rotation two will be beam, where we might see that 3.5 twist, which is currently in the process of being named by Kathryn Davis, who was the first to compete it at a major competition. Now the question everyone is wondering is will we see this skill from y/n today?”

“She’s doing it. Fucking dumbass,” Joel grumbled at the announcer.

“Damn, Beezer, tell them how you really feel,” Travis replied, as everyone else laughed at Joel’s behavior before watching Nicole compete. Nicole’s routine ended with a stuck landing, the camera following her as she made her way off the platform and hugged you before the two of you did your secret handshake.

Knowing the next event was beam, Joel waited as other competitors did their routines as you were warming up. He knew this moment would make or break how the rest of the meet went and with this only being your second event, it needed to go well.

Everyone watched anxiously as you saluted the judges, shaking your hands out before you reached to mount the beam. You took a deep breath before actually starting your routine. Starting the beginning choreography, you kept your movements sharp and clean. All the skills in your routine were sharp - doing this so if the dismount didn’t go well, it hopefully wouldn’t affect your score too much.

Joel had memorized your routines, knowing you were approaching your dismount, he saw your movements become slightly hesitant. Watching as you did a quick pivot on the beam to prep for the dismount, he watched you take a deep breath.

“C’mon, babe. You got it,” he said, and by whatever power was listening he watched your lips twitch up to a smile as you started your dismount. Going for the round-off and starting the twists, you did the three and a half twists, opening up to find your landing, and stuck your dismount. Joel’s smile grew even more when he saw how happy you were with your routine.

The rest of Day 1 of Championships went well for both you and Nicole; the two of you ending in the first and place spot in all around, with Kathryn following close behind. After the competition, both of you had your media conferences before you made your way back to the hotel. As both of you checked your phone, you saw the multiple notifications from various social medias.

“Dude, did you see what Ryanne posted?” Nicole asked, a look on her face that you couldn’t easily recognize.

“No, hold on,” you opened Instagram to see she had tagged you in multiple posts on her instagram story: starting off with a picture of all the guys wearing a jersey with your and Nicole’s name on it, a picture of all the guys watching warms ups intently, a video of Joel and Travis debating the name of a skill from Nicole’s routine (Travis was right), a video of Joel watching you do your beam routine and cheering you on right as you go for your dismount, and then a video of everyone cheering as you and Nicole as they announced the end of day 1.

…..

After falling asleep with Joel on FaceTime, you woke up to your 6am alarm to get ready for Day 2 of championship, Joel - who had told you he would wake up with you - was still sound asleep. Getting you and Nicole an apple from the lobby, you talked to a few of your competitors and a few fans before heading back to yours and Nicole’s room.

“Wake up, bitch, it’s Day 2 of Championships,” you said, jumping to lay next to Nicole on her bed.

“Leave me to die here, I don’t want to go. USAG can suck a homeless man’s dick,” she mumbled into the pillow.

“That’s truly something, wait til the media teams hear about that one,” you joked, only to get a glare sent your way.

“You know what? You can suck on one, too,” she responded, pulling the blanket over her head.

“Well at least, there's less competition,” to which she quickly peaked out of the blanket.

“Oh, you wish. We’re neck and neck this time, so we’ll see who gets bragging rights.”

“Well if you don’t get out of bed, then we’ll never know,” you said, to which she only sent a glare your way.

“Do we really have to get up and compete today? Do you think we could petition to reschedule?”

“I mean, I’m sure if we talked to people, we’d get a lot of signatures, but I don’t think it would go over well,” you said, grabbing your garment bag that held your leo for today, “I’m going to go get ready because I know if we end up talking to Joel and Nolan first, we won’t be ready in time.”

After you got ready, both you and Nicole got your pep talk from Nolan and Bee. On the way to the arena, both of you got a bunch of good luck messages - not just from your friends and family, but also from teammates and even some from most of the Stars roster. You had a feeling in your gut that today would be a good day.

…..

“Alright folks, Day 2 of Championships have been off to a great start and are about to come to a close. With Nicole Carter in first with a 57.605 All-Around score and Kathryn Davis in second with a 57.1, Cassie Riley in third with a 56.2, it comes down to the final rotations. y/n y/l/n is one of the last to go on floor today, who will need a score of at least a 13.5 to get first,” the announcer said.

“And compared to her average score, this will be easily attainable. If she scores at least a 14.5, she’ll be first overall for both days of competition. She already has a for sure spot at Trials, even when you don’t consider scores. As long as she is able to hit all elements of this routine, she’ll be fine,” another announcer said.

“Ok, you’re good, you just have to hit this routine and there’s no doubt you’ll make it to where you want to be. Deep breaths, Twinkle Toes,” Marcus said.

Walking up the platform to get up to the floor, you took your spot at the edge of the floor, ready to salute the judge, and get the last meet of championships out of the way. After anxiously waiting, the judge finally saluted. Entering the floor with a determined walk, you took your spot waiting for the familiar sound of your floor music to ring out.

That familiar feeling of doing the sport you loved, once again, rushed through your veins. Block everything out and complete the routine, that’s all you had to do. Going to your starting pose, the music started. Going through the familiar motions of your routine, you stuck your first tumbling pass. Then came the leaps and jump sequence and all that was in between, with the additional three tumbling passes.

You didn’t give yourself a chance to overthink about your routine, you knew that it wouldn’t benefit you in any way, but as you stepped off the floor you knew that you did what you could. As soon as you made it back to where Marcus and Nicole were sitting, you waited to see what your score was.

Joel and everyone watching at home watched as you sat down to see what your score was. He had this dopey grin gracing his features from the amount of pride he felt in that moment. He didn’t care what your score was, he knew you had put whatever you could out on the mat. He listened to Travis for a moment until the announcer started up again for scores and awards, “and y/n y/l/n pulled through with the score that she needed, a 14.9 on floor. She placed first in All-Around, Carter following right behind, and Davis in third. If all goes this well at trials, I’d say we have a lot of good representation for the Olympic Games.”

…..

After the meet and countless amount of interviews both you and Nicole were extremely worn out and had both passed out on the flight back. As you and Nicole stepped out of the terminal, you were met with the familiar faces of your friends and family. You smiled as you saw Bee for the first time in a few days and despite how tired you were, you couldn’t stop yourself from running to him.

He immediately caught you and did the cliche spin (the one you swore you would never do) before pulling you into a regular hug, “I’m so proud of you, babe. You have no idea.”

“Thank you. I surprisingly missed you,” you joked, laughing harder when Joel pulled you away slightly to catch a glimpse of your face.

“Wow, aren’t I glad I was blessed with such a nice girlfriend? It’s crazy.”

“Absolutely insane.”

“Preposterous.”

“Can the two of you shut the fuck up?” Kevin asked, coming over to give you a hug, “you did good out there, y/n/n. You also kept all your bones intact, I’m proud.”

“Shut the fuck up, Kev.”

“Okay, aside from you getting onto Kev and Bee, I missed you, too,” Karly said from beside Travis.

“I kinda did, too. You did amazing though, y/n/n. I’m proud,” Travis said.

“Thank you, thank you. All in a hard day's work,” you said, shrugging.

“Dude, you might want to go back to Beezer, he looks like a lost puppy watching you talk to us,” Travis pointed out, nodding in Joel’s direction who smiled when you caught his eye.

“Yeah, not a shocking development,” you said, before walking back in Joel’s direction, “hey, Bee.”

“Hey, honey,” he said, wrapping his arms around you again, “you ready to go home?”

“Yeah, of course,” you leaned up to kiss his cheek.

“Ew, guys. Get a room,” Kevin called out, fake gagging.

#joel farabee #joel farabee x reader #joel farabee imagines #joel farabee x gymnast!reader #nhl imagines #nhl imagine #hockey imagines

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ghstandpucks · 4 years

Text

Cutting Edge ~ Nathan MacKinnon Ch.10

Chapter 10!!! Oh wow, we’re here! I was excited about this chapter, as I am with the next one! I hope you all enjoy it and let me know what you think of the series this far! I only have a few chapters left in my head to write for it, so we are getting closer to the end!

I hope you are all healthy and safe, and Happy Holidays!!! Let me know if you would like to be tagged in the series! Enjoy!

Cutting Edge Master List

Returning to Denver after Christmas, you spent most of your time at the rink after practice working on polishing your own skating again. You had been informed that all skating coaches would be performing at the upcoming NHL All-Stars weekend, and every figure skater had been sent music to choreograph a routine to. Luckily for you, choreography was one of your strong points. You had always loved putting your own routines together, and this was no exception. You had been sent the song CHAMPION by Bishop Briggs and though you loved the song, you knew your routine had to be flawless to skate to it. You were the reigning Olympic champion after all. Nate would stay most of the time with you, trying his best to be helpful and give you his opinion when you asked for it. He admittedly did not know much about figure skating though and usually just told you everything looked great, even when you knew it probably wasn’t. You appreciated his support though none the less.

Two weeks before the All-Star break was set, you found yourself traveling to Dallas as the boys had a game against the Stars. Along with the Stars came the one figure skater you could live without ever dealing with again, Ashley Wagner. Beside Nate, no one knew the animosity that was between the two of you, and you were hoping to keep it that way. You didn’t need to worry the team with a petty feud between two rival figure skaters.

You were staring out the window of the plane when you felt someone sit down next to you. Turning, you saw Nate settling into the seat as he gave you a questioning look. “You okay?” he asked. He knew you weren’t looking forward seeing Ashley, and was not sure what this new environment would bring out. You smiled and nodded, opening your book again to distract you.

Nate was worried about you. He had been watching you stress yourself out over putting together a perfect routine for the All-Stars, not to mention helping Jeremy put his together over multiple facetimes. Apparently, you were the one to come to with routine questions. He thought it was amazing, how you could take a song and within two days have a mostly completed routine laid out, he would never be that creative. But between coaching, working on your skating, and running to dress fittings at a shop you found in Denver, he had never seen you look so worn out. Nate was worried that if Ashley pushed a button correctly, you would snap. Your smile may be able to fool everyone else, but Nate had been paying attention over the two months you had been together and was starting to be able to read you like a book. Though it was comforting to you that he knew how you were feeling without even saying it; it also put you on edge. You were used to concealing your feelings behind a smile, and with Nate you couldn’t anymore.

The team landed in Dallas the evening before their game, and you enjoyed dinner with them before heading to your hotel room. You were just crawling into bed with the cooking channel on when there was a knock at your door. Opening it, Nate stepped in quickly and shut the door behind him. “What are you doing here?” you asked. When you traveled, the two of you didn’t spend time in each other’s rooms unless someone else was around to prevent any suspicion.

“No one saw me, we’re fine,” he said, placing a soft kiss on you lips. He grabbed your hand and pulled you over to the bed, getting in on his side as you did the same. “I won’t stay long,” he said gently as you rested your head on his chest. His arm that was around you started drawing absent minded figures on your waist underneath your shirt, as his other hand held yours. “I’ll leave early before anyone should be up,” he said into your hair as you both drifted off.

Around 5am, you heard Nate’s alarm go off and felt him get out of bed. He chuckled as you mumbled incoherently and deftly reached for him. “Go back to sleep,” he whispered, placing a kiss on your forehead. You sleepily watched him walk to the door and peak his head out, giggling at his large figure trying to be sneaky as he made his way out.

~ ~ ~

This was not happening. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Who does interviews before anything happens! You absentmindedly grabbed the figure skate charm on your necklace and bit your lip. You had just been told that you would be doing a pre-game interview. That wasn’t what was bothering you though. What was bothering you was that you would be doing the interview with Ashley. You knew someone had happened across your not so friendly history and planned this because you have never done an interview with any of the other skating coaches.

You were ushered to the area and sat down in front of a microphone when you were announced. Ashley walked in after, smiling brightly at you. You returned it, quickly snapping into performance mode. At first the questions were fine; how did you like being with your team, how were things going, did you miss skating yourself. Then the question came of how do you think your team will do in the game tonight. Ashley, being asked first, put on a brilliant smile that made you want to role your eyes. God she was so fake. “I think we’ll do great! I know how Y/N skates and I have prepared them for it. The Stars are a great team so we shouldn’t have a problem.” You kept your smile light, trying your best not to roll your eyes at her. The same question was then directed to you.

“I believe that the team is prepared. Similar to what Ashley said, I know how she skates and it should be a good game,” you answered. You heard Ashley snicker quietly and you had to bite your tongue. This was not the time or place to lose your temper on her. After a few more questions, you were asked to take a picture together. You had been fiddling with your necklace and didn’t pay any attention to it until you realized Ashley was looking at it.

“That’s new. Why is there a 29 on it?” she asked. You froze, but quickly recovered and turned the charm back around.

“It’s the maker of the charm,” you tried to shrug off. As you walked out of the room of the interview, Ashley followed.

“I’ve never heard of them. Where can I order one?” she pestered.

“It’s this little boutique in Denver. They don’t have a website,” you said off the top of your head.

“Well that’s too bad. Maybe you can take me to this 29 store the next time we’re in Denver?”

“Of course.” You both faked a smile at each other as you got to the hallway leading to the locker rooms. Unfortunately for you, Nate had stepped outside to see where you were. The team had seen the interview and you were taking a little long to get back. He volunteered to make sure you weren’t lost. Ashley didn’t miss him.

“What a coincidence, 29 looks like he’s looking for you,” she smirked, leaving for the Stars locker room. You walked over to Nate and started to push him back into the locker room. To say he was slightly confused was an understatement.

It was late in the third period, the score tied 1-1. The game had been highly physical, and you couldn’t help but be on edge. You were standing on the bench when the final buzzard went off, and the game was pushed into overtime. The game became even more physical if that was even possible, and you jumped as Perry checked Cale into the boards in front of you. A time out was called by the Stars, and you glanced briefly over to their bench. As you did, you saw Ashley say something to Jamie Benn, and he smirked looking your way. You saw him then eye Nate, and you had a bad feeling about it. Watching as Benn skated over to Nate, you could tell he was saying something. Nate tried his best to ignore the left winger, and you wish you could hear what was being said. The puck dropped, and as quickly as it hit the ice, gloves were also falling. You watched as Nate and Benn went at it, wanting to hide behind your hands but also not being able to look away. Without notice, you grabbed onto Tyson’s arm as he was the player you were standing behind. The bench was yelling, the crowd was cheering, and you didn’t know what to do. Watching hockey fights on tv or from the stands was one thing; but watching from the bench as the player you were dating was duking it out with another had you frozen in place.

To your relief, you saw Benn hit the ice with Nate on top and the refs scrambled to separate them. What you weren’t prepared for though was seeing Nate with a cut at his eyebrow, blood gushing from it. You unintentionally squeezed Tyson’s arm, and he turned back to you. “He’s fine Y/N,” he spoke lightly, patting your hand with his glove. Looking at him, you nodded and tried to compose yourself. Your first instinct was to run to Nate and see if he was alright, but you knew you couldn’t do that. All you could do was watch as he was escorted off the ice, his penalty longer than the amount of time left in the game. Benn had a bloody nose, and what looked like a busted lip, but that didn’t stop him from smirking over at you. You watched as Ashley tried to hide a laugh, and you were thankful that the game was about to resume or else you may have yelled something you shouldn’t. Unfortunately, a man down with Nate off the ice, the Stars scored first, effectively winning the game.

You were waiting outside the medical room wanting to see Nate as the Avs started to spill out of the locker room and head for the bus. You were in your own head, blaming yourself for the loss when you heard someone walk up to you. Looking up, you saw Tyson with a concerned look on his face. “You know he’s fine right? They probably just have to stitch up his eyebrow if anything,” he said, trying to judge your reaction.

“I feel like it’s my fault,” you whispered, tears starting to blur your vison.

“What do you mean? None of this is your fault Coach,” Tyson responded, confused as to why you were blaming yourself.

“I think he got in the fight because of me; because stupid Ashley can’t keep her mouth shut. And then we lost because we were a man down and it’s all my fault,” you swiped at a pesky tear that had fallen. Tyson wasn’t sure what to do, not entirely understanding why you were taking the loss so personally. They had lost a few times before and he didn’t think you had been this effected by it.

“You’re losing me. Why would Nate’s fight be your fault?” As Tyson finished his question, you grabbed the charm on your necklace and flipped it over to show him. You saw the moment his confusion turned into realization at what the ‘29’ was referring to. “Wait you and Mac?” he whispered, eyes wide and smile threatening to show. You nodded. “I knew it! Since when?”

“Since the home opener. But we’re keeping it quiet so you need to calm down right now!”

“Does anyone else know?” he asked, trying and failing to compose his face.

“Only Gabe and Andre on the team. Mel knows, and my best friend Jeremy knows, plus our parents but that’s it.” You said, then remembered why you were having this conversation to begin with. “But now I think Ashley knows, at least she guessed when she saw my necklace which is why this is all my fault. I shouldn’t have been playing with it which drew her attention to it and it landed on the wrong side.” You wiped angrily at another tear that fell, annoyed. You had always been a crier when you were mad though; it was how you dealt best with the emotion. Tyson went to comfort you as the door behind him opened. You looked around him and saw Nate, with the outlines of an apparent black eye and medical tape over fresh stitches over his right eye on his eyebrow ridge. You rushed around Tyson and wrapped your arms around Nate’s sternum, hugging him not caring that he hadn’t showered yet. He held you with one arm, his stuff in the other as he looked at Tyson who was smiling like an idiot.

“See you two lovebirds on the bus,” the younger man saluted and walked off. Nate stared after him confused for a second, but then seeing no one was around he bent down and planted a kiss on top of your head. You separated from him, looking up into his blue eyes.

“I’m so sorry if this is because of me,” you whispered, not bothering to stop another tear that had fallen.

“It’s fine baby. Does Josty know about us?” Nate asked, wiping a tear with the pad of his thumb. It was a risk, being this close in public. But he hadn’t seen you cry before, and he wanted to be near you after what Benn had said on the ice. You nodded and grabbed his hand, noticing he had also split one of his knuckles.

“I was freaking out because Ashley saw the 29 on my necklace and I think she figured it out and said something to Benn. I feel like it’s my fault we lost and I ended up telling Tyson.” You were looking down at your hands, then looked back up to him, your heart clenching at how concerned he looked when it should have been the other way around. “Why did you get in the fight?” you asked softly.

“It doesn’t matter. It’s not your fault though. We’re a team Y/N, all of us. I screwed up and let what Benn said get to me. If it is anyone’s fault we lost, it’s mine,” Nate shook his head as you opened your mouth to protest. He really did not want to tell you what Benn had said as it had all been in regards to you. He had been vulgar, and Nate snapped. Giving your hand a slight squeeze, he continued. “I’m going to go change. Why don’t you get to the bus and I’ll see you in a bit okay?” You nodded, and Nate watched as you walked away. Though he was upset with himself for getting in a fight and subsequently losing the game, he would do it again for you in a heartbeat. And as you walked away from him toward the bus, he realized for the first time that he would do anything for you, and you were taking his heart with you piece by piece.

An hour later found you sitting against your headboard, giggling at Andre’s reaction to the Hallmark movie you had playing. He had complained about it at first, but your room your rules. He had surprisingly gotten into the plot, and was yelling at the man who mistakenly thought the main character was with someone else when he wanted to confess his feelings for her. After Chip Gate (what you loving dubbed Tyson and Cale’s chip debate after the first game), your room had become the place the team drifted to. Whether it was to conceal junk food that they shouldn’t be eating, an ear to listen to girl problems, or a comforting environment in terms of a loss on the road, you became the team’s go to person. Not to mention you had motherly tendencies and didn’t mind being there and fussing over everyone. It made you feel even more accepted as part of the team. This is why at the moment Andre was sitting on the floor leaning against the bed, Tyson had taken his usual spot laying across the foot of the bed, and Cale was sitting in the desk chair.

Before you could tell Andre to be quiet so you could hear what was being said, there was a knock at your door. Tyson got up and answered, Nate walking into the room behind him. His eye was swollen and bruising, but he seemed more relaxed as he walked over to the side of the bed and sat next to you. He put his arm around you, pulling you into his side and placing a kiss on your head. “Did I miss something?” you heard Cale speak up and you looked at Nate with wide eyes and a slight giggle.

“Dammit,” Nate mumbled. He forgot Cale didn’t know. This was the first time he thought he could be open with you, forgetting the young defenseman was still in the dark about your relationship.

“Coach and Nate are dating. Now shut up so we can see the guy stop being an idiot.” Tyson responded. “Also Coach, I hate you for making me so interested in this movie,” he complained over his shoulder.

“You know you love it,” you teased, snuggling into Nate’s side. Cale kept going between staring at you and Nate, then the tv, unsure of when this happened and how others knew. Luckily for him, the movie ended 20 minutes later and he started asking questions. You told him how you got together and asked him not say anything because you were keeping it quiet.

“Of course, but why do they know?” he asked.

“I was on the phone with Burky and Y/N sneezed in the background, and Josty just found out today because…why again?” Nate asked you.

“I was freaking out about you getting into a fight,” you answered.

“Does anyone else on the team know?” Cale questioned.

“Gabe, but that’s it. So you are now sworn to secrecy,” you said looking over at him. Cale nodded, and then turned back to the tv. After another hour the three of them left for their own rooms, leaving you and Nate alone. You turned the tv off and turned off all the lights beside one on the bedside table. Nate took his shirt off and climbed under the covers with you, the both of you on your sides facing each other. You ran your fingers gently over his swollen eye. “Do you want me to get you some ice for this, or anything?” you asked. Nate shook his head.

“No, I just want to lay here with you,” Nate grabbed your hand in his and kissed your knuckles.

“I’m sorry,” you whispered, still feeling guilty over his fight, the team’s loss. Nate placed his arm over your waist and pulled you closer to him.

“You have nothing to be sorry for. You were right, Ashley probably did figure it out. But I would fight anyone for you,” Nate said honestly, moving strands of hair out of your face.

“What did he say?” you asked. Nate shook his head again.

“He was being inappropriate to you. That’s why I took care of it,” he stated, and you didn’t ask any further questions. Nate was glad because he did not want to repeat the vulgar things Benn had said to him. He wishes he would have hit him a few more times just thinking about it. Nate was brought out of his thought by a soft giggle.

“You defended my honor?” you teased him. Nate chuckled and rolled his eyes at you. “My hero,” you whispered, pressing your lips to his. Nate returned your kiss, maneuvering himself so your back was flat on the bed with him hovering over you. The kiss became heated as Nate slipped one of his hands under your shirt.

“Any day,” he whispered before kissing your neck. After what became a heated make out session, you were laying with your back pressed into Nate’s chest, holding his hand that was slipped under your head as his other rested on your stomach, holding you close to him. And though you never wanted to be someone’s damsel in distress, with how protected you felt in Nate’s arms, he could defend you anytime.

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