#Blue MIrror Aviator Sunglasses

[gaymindcontrol]

The Traffic Stop

David was driving home after a long day in the office. He was still dressed in his work tee and jeans, driving with the windows down and the music on full volume. He was trying to shake off the stress from the day and take in the brisk autumn air.

He exited the freeway that he was traveling on and noticed a Police car following him. He knew that he had been speeding.

“Shit.” he quickly muffled to himself.

In a flash, the car’s lights and sirens were engaged and David knew he needed to find a place to pull over.

Shortly ahead, there was an abandoned Gas Station that had plenty of room for both David’s truck and the pursuing Police Officer’s vehicle. Once David pulled over, he waited about 5 minutes before the Officer exited his vehicle. He was about 6’ tall with a slender yet muscular build. His hair was brown and short, perfectly styled. He was wearing a pair of Aviator sunglasses and… dangling a lit cigarette from his mouth?

“People still smoke cigarettes in 2023?” David asked himself.

David’s Father was a smoker when David was young, but he quit years ago. David only knew because his Father is seen smoking in some of his own baby pictures. None of David’s buddies were smokers, and they all frowned upon the habit pretty heavily.

As the Officer approached David’s truck, he removed his sunglasses. David began to roll down the window. The office spoke in a deep, commanding voice.

“Do you know why I pulled you over today, boy?” asked the Officer, rather firmly.

“Well, I do believe… I’m sorry, did you just call me boy?” David responded, shocked.

The Officer took a long drag on his cigarette and took it from his mouth, simultaneously flicking the ash to the ground and blowing a thick cloud of smoke into the surrounding air. “Yes, I did. I’m approaching my mid-40s and you’re what… no older than 25-30 years old? To me, you’re a boy.” answered the officer.

David was unsure how to respond, as he has always respected the Police, but this entire situation just seemed odd to him. “I understand, Officer. My apologies for questioning you. I believe you pulled me over because I was speeding.” he said, hoping that coming clean would keep him from paying a fine.

The officer immediately responded, “That would be correct, boy. Now I’m going to need to see your license and registration.”

David handed over his documentation and remained in the vehicle. The officer went back to his patrol car and got inside. David looked in his rear view mirror and noticed that the lights on the patrol car that were previously flashing red and blue appeared to be flashing an odd green and purple.

“No, that can’t be right…” David said as he shook his head, thinking he may be seeing things. He looked in his rear view mirror again and now the lights appeared to be red and blue again, but there was still something off about them. Almost like a little extra light with every flash.

“These are actually kind of nice to watch” David thought to himself. He continued to watch them until, well… David wasn’t sure. Everything went black and he felt so incredibly relaxed. He felt like he could stay in this place, wherever it may be, forever.

Suddenly, David got a strong whiff of cigarette smoke. “I’m back with your documents, boy. Put them back and step out of the vehicle.” the officer commanded.

“Yes, sir.” David responded without thought. As David opened his eyes to put his documents back, he thought, “why did I call him sir?”

“Everything alright, boy?” the Officer asked, a little firmer than before, and David felt his mind relaxing again. Any thoughts of this situation being unusual left his mind instantly.

“Yes, sir.” David responded again, without thought. Instinctively, David performed his next command and stepped out of the vehicle. He shut his door and stood in front of the officer waiting for his next order.

It didn’t come immediately. David continued to stand in place staring into the Officer’s face as he dangled his cigarette from his mouth and took continuous drags. The smoke was blowing directly into David’s face, but he didn’t mind in his current state.

David never considered himself to be gay, but everything about this Officer simply captivated him. His hair, his face, his voice, his body, and his uniform. His boots. The way he dangled a cigarette between his lips and blew thick clouds of smoke from his mouth and nose.

“Do you smoke, boy?” the Officer asked David.

“No, I don’t smoke, Sir.” David replied coldly.

“Have you ever been a smoker?” followed up the Officer.

“No, I have never been a smoker, sir. I have always found smoking quite repulsing.” David replied as he continued to stare into the Officer’s face.

The Officer paused and stared back at David. He appeared to be thinking about how to handle David, and what to do next.

“Do you find it repulsing when I smoke, boy?” the Officer questioned David.

“No, Sir. You do not repulse me, Sir.” David replied, blankly.

“Good. I think there’s some hope for you then.” the Officer smirked.

David didn’t understand the command. “Sir?” he hopefully asked.

The Officer chuckled. “See this here in my uniform pocket? These are my smokes. Marlboro. Marlboro Reds. The first time I smoked a red, I knew there was no turning back. The way that it made my lungs feel. Stronger. Full. It made my cock hard, instantly. I was only 17, but it made me a man. Boys don’t smoke, men do. Do you understand?”

After listening to the Officer’s relaxing, yet commanding voice, David was struggling to keep his eyes open let alone speak. “Y… Ye… Yes… Sir… Boys don’t smoke… Men do…” he managed to stumble out.

“Good, boy.” the Officer responded. He then blew a thick cloud of smoke into David’s face. David’s body immediately tensed up. David could taste and smell every ounce of smoke in the air. He felt it infiltrating his nose, his mouth, his lungs. His cock even become fully erect. Even harder than usual, it seemed.

As the Office continued to stand in front of David, smoking away, David felt a desire growing inside of him. It was so strong that it felt like it could rip him apart from the inside out, if he didn’t satisfy it. David couldn’t quite determine what the desire was. He just knew that it had to do with the Officer. His new master.

With a snap of the Officer’s fingers, David instinctively knew what the growing desire was. It was to smoke. It was to be a real man. Without thinking, his arm raised from his side and reached for the officer’s front pocket of his uniform. David removed the contents, a pack of Marlboro Red cigarettes and a silver Zippo lighter. Though David had never smoked a day in his life, he knew how to proceed. He removed a cigarette from the pack and placed it between his lips, willingly, even eagerly. He flipped the lid of the Zippo and struck the wheel. A flame emerged from the Zippo and David placed it in front of his cigarette, dragging deeply as it lit.

He exhaled and took a deep drag on the Marlboro Red, allowing the delicious smoke to enter and fill his lungs. Take over his body and his mind. Another drag, and another. David couldn’t get enough. His actions seemed to make the Officer very happy.

“Mmm. How does it feel boy? To be a real man? To smoke a red?” the Officer asked.

“It feels amazing, Sir. So much pleasure. So relaxed…” David replied, in between drags on his nearly finished cigarette.

“You’re a natural, David. Have another.” the Officer commanded.

“Yes, Sir. I need another red, Sir.” David begged.

Once again, he withdrew a cigarette and lit it. Sucking on it deep, filling his lungs with the rich smoke over and over again. It had gotten dark, and the Officer seemed to be interested in a little more fun with David, before moving on to his next stop.

“How about this, boy? I’ll let you go without a ticket today, but I’m going to need you to follow a few more commands. Do you think you can handle that?” the Officer questioned.

“Yes, Sir. Anything, Sir. Will obey, Sir.” David helplessly replied.

“Perfect. As I said, you’re a natural. Now get into the back of my squad car, and lay on your stomach.”

David stomped out his cigarette and complied. The Officer leaned in behind David and pulled David’s jeans down to his knees. David could hear the Officer unzip his own pants. David never imagined he would be in a situation like this, but he was so turned on. Even if he wasn’t, he’s not sure that he could resist the temptation of this handsome Officer.

He heard the sound of the Zippo lighter and sensed the now familiar taste and smell of a Marlboro. He began to relax again, knowing he would not be resisting any Officer today.

David felt something warm and wet on his asshole. Lube? Than the Officer’s rough hands, and fingers. “Ooooo…” David spluttered.

“This may be a new experience for you, boy, but I promise you’re going to love every second of it. As long as you relax and obey.” the Officer said.

“Relax. Obey. Relax. Obey.” David found himself repeating inside of his head.

Something began to penetrate David. He was so relaxed, but it was painful. “Please, Sir. It hurts, Sir.” David begged.

“Don’t worry, boy. That’s just my cock. It’s on the larger size, but you’ll get used to it if you just relax.” the Officer emphasized.

“Relax. Obey. Relax. Obey.” David found himself repeating again. He could feel the Officer’s cock penetrating him deeper, until the Officer was completely inside of David. David sporadically began thrashing his arms trying to find something, anything to dig his fingers into. It hurt so much.

Suddenly, David felt something touch his lips. He knew exactly what it was. The Officer had placed his own lit Marlboro into David’s hungry lips. David took a deep drag and felt his body relax again instantly. There was no pain. There were no worries. Just David, his Marlboro Red, and the Officer’s thick, sweet cock.

Seeing David smoking again seemed to excite the Officer, as he began to pump his cock in and out of David’s tight hole. David moaned loudly, but there was no one around to hear. As David continued to smoke, the Officer continued to pound harder. David’s head was even beginning to hit the inside of the opposing rear vehicle door.

“Now we’re getting somewhere, boy. Fuck. Fuck yeah. How does it feel?” the Officer asked.

A few minutes ago, David would have responded that it was painful and terrifying. Now, however… “So good, Sir. Must obey, Sir. Fuck me, Sir. Please, Sir.” David managed to moan out.

As the Officer continued to pound David, all of the sensations began to overwhelm him. His lungs were begging for more smoke. His ass was begging for more cock. His brain was begging him to relax and obey. David’s eyes began to roll into the back of his head. He was unable to process anything further. He was stuck in a state of pleasure and ecstasy.

David’s own cock began to throb so violently that it was actually shaking. David could feel the rest of his body begin to shake, too. He knew he was reaching the point of ejaculation.

The Officer lit another cigarette and continued to fuck David from behind. “I forgot to tell you, boy. You cannot cum until you hear the snap of my fingers. I’m going to take my time, and so will you.” the Officer ordered.

“Yeeeeesssss Siiiiirrrrrr….” David groaned. The Officer placed another Marlboro into David’s mouth and lit it. David again took a deep drag and felt his stress and worries flow away. Nothing else mattered to him in that moment.

The Officer pressed down on David’s neck as the thrusting became more and more intense. David’s head was turned to the side so he could continue to smoke while the Officer watched, as he freely fucked David.

David heard the sound of a snap, and the next thing he knew his body began to shake once again. He continued to suck down his Marlboro as he felt the Officer’s cock draining deep inside of him. David’s own cock had never felt more pleasure in his entire life. It was pouring cum onto the backseat of the Patrol Car. David felt incredibly sweaty and sticky, but more satisfied than he had felt in his entire life.

The Officer put away his serviced cock and zipped up his uniform pants. “Pull up your pants and get out of the car.” the Officer ordered.

David obeyed once again. He got out of the patrol car, and stood at attention in front of the Officer, awaiting his next order. “With the next snap of my fingers, you will forget this experience. You will remember it as just another traffic stop, and a friendly cop who let you off without a ticket. However, from this moment on you are a smoker. You will not remember why you started smoking or how, but you will know internally that Marlboro Reds are a part of you now and you need them to survive. If you feel like something else is missing from your life, you will stop down to our station. That means that you enjoyed the experience today and want to experience it again, and I can certainly make that happen, David.”

With that, the Officer stuck a fresh pack of Marlboro Reds in David’s tee shirt pocket. He snapped his fingers, and David suddenly appeared lost and confused. “Uhh… I’m sorry… what’s going on here?” David asked quietly.

“Nothing out of the ordinary, bro. Just another traffic stop, but all seems well here and you are free to go on your way.” the Officer responded, smirking.

“Oh, great! Thank you, Officer.” David replied.

“No, David. Thank you.” the Officer said with a wink of his eye, as he lit up another cigarette.

David got back into his truck and pulled the door shut. He reached back to pull his seatbelt, when he noticed the pack of Marlboro Reds in this pocket. “This day has been so fucking stressful.” David sighed. He lit up a red, put his truck in drive, and pulled back onto the main road. He waved a friendly goodbye to the Officer, who was still parked.

A moment later, the Officer placed a call over his radio. “This is Officer Fulmer. I’ve got another recruit, Sarge. His name is David. Good looking guy, very open to suggestion. May need to be trained up a little. I expect we will see him at the station within the next day or two.” the Officer explained.

“10-4, Officer Fulmer. Return to the freeway for patrol.” the Sargeant responded.

“Yes, Sir. Must obey, Sir.” Officer Fulmer mumbled.

Officer Fulmer lit up another red, rolled down his cruiser window, and pulled a U-Turn to return to the freeway. He couldn’t wait to find and transition another recruit for his Sargeant.

[holysainz]

hidden truths - mick schumacher

pairing: mick schumacher x messi!reader

warnings: none

summary: you use summer vacation as an escape from the weight of your last name … mick happens to have the same idea

You meet him on the shores of Ibiza. He’s just another sun-soaked stranger as far as you’re concerned. With golden hair tousled by the ocean wind and eyes reflecting the azure blue of the sea, he is magnetic. But you’re just two beach-goers, simply Mick and Y/N, each escaping the intensity of your own lives for a slice of paradise.

You’re both incognito, tucked away behind faux names and tinted aviator sunglasses, your public identities folded away and locked away in your suitcases. He’s Mick, a charismatic car mechanic, and you’re Y/N, a football coach from Rosario. Nearly truth, except for the bits you both conveniently leave out.

Mick’s charm is undeniable. It’s clear that he’s comfortable around people … around you. It’s the easy jokes he cracks about the Spanish heat and the impromptu sandcastle-building competition he starts under the heat of the midday sun that endear him to you. There’s a spark, a connection. But just as a sun sets on Ibiza, the end of summer break looms in the horizon.

You decide to see it through, to ride this wave until the end.

—

One afternoon, as the sun dips low in the sky and bathes the beach in shades of gold, you’re locked in a lively debate about football. Your knowledge, the passion, it’s all too familiar.

“I swear, Y/N, you talk like you’ve been on the field with Messi himself,” he laughs, sipping on his sangria.

There’s a pause, a flicker in your eyes, as you reply. “Well, you talk about cars like you were born in one.”

You share a knowing look. The masks are cracking but not quite broken. Not yet. There’s fun to be had and more summer to enjoy.

—

The last week of your vacations approaches. A parting is imminent but Mick presents an offer, “I’m … going to a race next week. Formula 1, in Zandvoort. As a mechanic, of course,” he adds with a wink. “Would you like to come along?”

Your heart jumps. Attending a Grand Prix? The thought is electric. “I’d love to,” you say, despite the beating in your chest.

So you’re whisked off to the Netherlands, to the world of racing and roaring engines. In the paddock, Mick introduces you as a friend. There’s an energy here, a tangible excitement. It mirrors what you felt watching your father in Camp Nou and Parc des Princes and now DRV PNK stadium. It’s intoxicating. You understand why Mick loves it.

And then it happens.

“Lewis,” he greets a man passing by with a quick nod and beaming smile. You recognize him, even though your previous encounters were during award show red carpets and VIP parties you could barely remember the next morning. Lewis stops dead in his tracks as he spots you. “Y/N?” he questions, reaching for a hug. “What are you doing here? I would’ve gotten you a pass if I knew you wanted to come.”

Your eyes widen as Mick watches the exchange. “You know each other” he asks, the words thick with confusion.

Lewis laughs, “Of course, she’s Leo’s daughter.”

The shock in Mick’s eyes doesn’t fade away.

“You know … Leo Messi,” Lewis is quick to clarify.

The silence hangs heavy. Mick looks at you, betrayal written across his face but there’s understanding too. “And you’re Mick Schumacher, Michael’s son. God, I feel so stupid,” the realization dawns.

For a moment, nothing. Then, Mick smiles. “Guess we’re pretty bad at keeping secrets, huh?”

“Or pretty good,” you retort. “Depending on how you look at it.”

You both laugh, the sound echoing through the Mercedes garage. When you're together, you’re not Mick Schumacher and Y/N Messi but just Mick and Y/N again. You’re more than the gargantuan shadows of your last names.

The end of summer isn’t a goodbye, it’s a beginning. The beginning of something new, something real. Even under the intense scrutiny of the world, you hold onto each other, two hearts beating as one.

And that, in the end, is the true victory.

—

taglist: @musingsbyshreya

[lindssunflower]

𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐋 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆, b. bradshaw

♡ ✈︎ authors note: hii! okay so i wrote this first on wattpad. this is my first time ever writing again since middle school (i just started my senior year in high school a few days ago so i’m rusty.) let me know what y’all think! sorry it’s pretty short.

♡ ✈︎ summary: a handsome stranger notices your struggle to parallel park your car outside of a new local coffee shop before your morning shift. he helps of course.

♡ ✈︎ pairing: bradley bradshaw x f!reader

♡ ✈︎ warnings: none!

────୨ৎ────

i should've definitely been taught this in drivers ed, you thought to yourself as you try to maneuver your car into this crowded parking space.

why is there so many people here?! you shout in your mind.

you feel the tears brim your eyes as you hit your hands against the wheel and ultimately decide in your mind to give up. no coffee is worth this amount of trouble.

"you alright ma'am?"

you jolt your head up at the stranger who's standing outside of your passenger window that was rolled down by the many attempts to park your car. the very handsome man, actually.

he's wearing a blue and light green hawaiian tee shirt over a white tank, blue jeans and black aviator sunglasses. he had brown wavy short hair, tanned skin and a really really pretty smile.

yeah he's hot.

the second you thought and realized this; you quickly wipe your eyes from the tears that were beckoning to fall. sat up straight and smiled.

"yes i'm alright." probably said that way to quickly,

"you need any help?" the man places his hands on his hips. probably unknowingly showing off his toned arms.

"it's fine. i was just leaving." this is so embarrassing.

"cmon, you need any help?" he asked the question again. he placed his arms on the door and smiled kindly at you.

is this dangerous? he doesn't look dangerous.

"okay.. okay." you reluctantly agree; but in your defense, when was the last time you saw this handsome of a psychopath? i mean, unless you count anakin skywalker. eh, he's fictional.

"ya want me to teach you outside of the car or would ya mind steppin' out for me?" he had a sort of country accent to him. he tilts his sunglasses down, then landing on the bridge of his nose.

you step out the old honda and make your way around to him. wow he's tall.

he smiles kindly at you and makes his way over to the drivers side. he adjusts the seat to his liking and fixes his mirrors before looking back at you; eyes squinting from the morning sun coming through the sky.

he sets his hands on the wheel "okay, i want you to pay attention alright?" he smiles and pushes his sunglasses back onto his eyes.

you step back as he puts the car in reverse and starts spinning the wheel towards the left, slowing reversing - occasionally looking in the rear-view window.

he stops the car briefly and looks over at you "alright, you see how i'm turnin'?"

you could honestly, barely focus cause there's a very handsome man driving your car. your car you've had since you were 20. your car that's really messy and he's definitely seeing all the discarded empty coffee cups in the floor you haven't cleaned up yet.

you put your hands on your hips and smile (awkwardly) "yea yea i see." you put your hand over your eyes trying to block the morning sun peeking through the clouds.

he reversed the car a little bit to the right and fits perfectly into the spot you were so unsubtlely trying to park in.

he smiles and parks the car "it's really not that difficult when you get the hang of it." he grabs the keys and hope out of your car and walks his way over to where you were standing.

he hands the keys to you and takes the shades off and clips them on the pocket of his hawaiian shirt.

his eyes were a brown greenish shade, in the best and most mesmerizing way. since he was now closer you can take a better look at him since that pesky sun was now covered by his tall frame.

he had these scars on the side of his neck and you wondered where he got those from. he had a few freckles that were on his nose. he gave off an all american vibe by the way he presented himself.

you smile at him "thanks for parking my car." you chuckle.

he smiles.

you felt your face turn red. and when that happens, it's noticeable. dang it.

the man holds out his hand. his hand was calloused and looked like he had to of had a blue collar job. no ring though.

"i'm bradley." you obliged and shook his hand "y/n."

his hand even felt calloused.

you eventually let go of bradley's hand. he let his arms fall to his side and smiled  "they didn't teach ya how to parallel park in drivers ed?"

"no they didn't." you replied feeling a little bit of embarrassment wash over you "can i buy you some coffee?"

the man winks at you "no need. it wasn't any trouble."

that simple wink made your heart do gymnastic level flips. which could probably be told all over your face now.

"please. i mean, you got me out of a pretty annoying situation to be in at 6 in the morning."

he smiled "i'll pay for it, sweetheart. thank you though."

was he flirting? or am i just delusional? the thought swindled your mind.

you smile and click the button your keys to lock the car.

"thanks."

"no problem. it's just parallel parking."

────୨ৎ────

y’all be honest if this is terrible lol constructive criticism is welcome!

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Comet Donati [Chapter 3: Steal My Girl]

A/N: Hello lovely readers! Thank you so so so much for the love this fic has received. I wanted to give you a heads up that I will be co-leading a field trip to Japan from July 4th-14th and will therefore have much less time to write. HOPEFULLY I won’t have to skip a Sunday update, but I wanted to make you aware just in case. I hope you enjoy Chapter 3!!! 💜

Series Summary: Sex, drugs, boy bands. You are a kinda-therapist recruited (via nepotism) to help Comet Donati through a recent crisis. Things are casual with Aegon, very not-casual with Aemond. Loosely inspired by One Direction.

Chapter Warnings: Language, references to sexual content (18+), drugs, alcohol, smoking, mental health struggles, Aegon-induced chaos, ANGST, Iceland, you cannot escape the Cookie Monster pajama pants.

Selected Chapter Quote: “So what, you don’t like me anymore?”

Word count: 8.3k (wtf I need to chill).

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

Taglist: @doingfondue @catalina-howard @randomdragonfires @myspotofcraziness @arcielee @fan-goddess @talesofoldandnew @marvelescvpe @tinykryptonitewerewolf @mariahossain @chainsawsangel @darkenchantress @not-a-glad-gladiator @gemini-mama @trifoliumviridi @herfantasyworldd @babyblue711 @namelesslosers @thelittleswanao3 @daenysx @moonlightfoxx @libroparaiso @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics @mizfortuna @florent1s @heimtathurs @bhanclegane @poohxlove @narwhal-swimmingintheocean​ @heavenly1927 @mariahossain @echos-muses @padfooteyes​ @minttea07​

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist! 💜  

Athens, Madrid, Porto, Vienna, Stockholm, and now: descending into Reykjavik through clouds like iron. The North Atlantic is an endless sheen of cold overcast blue, a mirror of the sky. The earth is rocky and anemic. There are no jewel tones here, no sapphires or emeralds or aquamarines or fire opals or topazes. It is impossible to look down at Iceland, this dominion of impassionate jaggedness, and not think of how the Vikings had to reap their treasures from every other corner of Europe, silver and gold and glass and slaves piled into ships to be rowed back to the hostile earth they clung to, perhaps just to prove they could.

Across the aisle of the private jet—more like a penthouse than a plane, posh neutral colors and hand-stitched leather—Luke is showing Aemond his latest lyrics, loops of silver on matte black pages. They’re good, from what you’ve heard. They’re really good. And that tells you what kind of person Aemond truly is as he helps Luke polish rocks into gemstones. Anybody can soften the blow of mediocrity. It takes courage to build ladders for people who might one day outclimb you.

Daeron is playing his Nintendo 64, which is hooked up to a 98-inch flat screen tv; Mario is leaping through paintings into worlds of lava, ice, sentient ticking bombs. Criston is answering emails. Cregan is sprawled across a couch with his sunglasses on, presumably sound asleep. Jace is leering at you, dark hair hanging in his face and slurping a Vesper.

You ask him half-mocking: “What tattoo are you going to get for Reykjavik?”

He yanks off his sequined red blazer—nothing underneath, as usual—and twists around to show you the puffin on his left shoulder blade. Comet, at some point in time that preceded you, has already been to Iceland. “Cute, right? Wanna pet it?”

You roll your eyes. “I’m sorry I asked.”

He grins. “No you’re not.”

Aegon kicks the back of Jace’s chair. He’s scribbling some notes of his own, which is unusual. In place of a spiral notebook with onyx pages, Aegon is writing on crinkled Starbucks receipts with a Sharpie. He’s wearing his favorite aviator sunglasses, khaki cargo pants, an excessively bright cyan tank top, and matching Crocs.

Baela stares blankly out the window for a few seconds—like she’s buffering, a lagging connection—and then she looks to you hopefully. “Shopping when we land?”

“Does Iceland have shops…?”

“Probably more than Kansas,” Aemond says, then smiles mischieviously.

“Missouri,” you fling back. He returns his attention to Luke.

“They totally have shops in Iceland,” Baela assures you.

“Then I am amenable. I need more concert outfits.” You mostly wear your boy band t-shirts from home, which has become a joke: One Direction, Backstreet Boys, New Kids On The Block, NSYNC, the Jonas Brothers, Boyz II Men, 98 Degrees, BTS…but never Comet Donati. Anyone but them. Aegon calls you a traitor. Aemond teases, smirks, tries to hide how much he watches you the same way people contemplate art on museum walls, a little confounded, a little entranced.

“Rhaena?” Baela says. “Hello? Hello? Hola? Bonjour? Rhaena?”

Rhaena startles, peering up from her novel: Jurassic Park. Once upon a time, as you’ve learned, she had planned to study paleontology. She wants to be alone in the middle of a field someplace digging up bones. Well, no great tragedy there; one is never too old to be a paleontologist. She can take off five years, or ten years, or twenty, or thirty to see Luke through his touring days and then pick back up her own ambitions like keys left on a hook. But Baela gave up a ballet scholarship to follow Jace across the globe, puddle to puddle, land to land, and in your albeit limited understanding, ballerinas age in something like dog years. Their career is a brilliant, lightning-brief flash and then long, anonymous decades running out their mortal clock as choreographers, backup dancers, personal trainers, instructors for blue-blooded five-year-olds. Baela won’t be able to reclaim that dream for much longer. It might be too late already. She is out of practice; but she misses ballet. When Jace is being snide or oblivious, you’ve seen her gazing out windows—Escalades, hotels, jets—wondering if it was all worth it. You gut yourself for someone and they don’t even have the courtesy to put up a gravestone. It’s only natural to develop a propensity to haunt.

“What?” Rhaena asks.

“Shopping. This afternoon. Interested?”

Rhaena’s eyes go wide. She fidgets: closing and then opening her book, touching a hand to her earrings, delicate strings of small silver hearts. “Um…I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Oh, not this again,” Baela groans.

“Just go without me. Bring me back something, you know what I like.”

“What’s the problem?” You are investigative but not accusatory. The tone is essential.

“She’s scared of store employees,” Baela says.

“Well you don’t have to make it sound like that—!”

“What’s so scary about store employees?” you ask Rhaena, calm, cool, collected, nonjudgmental. Aemond glances over, as he often does when you’re working, like he can’t get enough of watching that switch flip, when you slink covertly into therapist mode like a water moccasin weaves through swamps, subtle ripples in the muddied water and vigilant eyes.

“I just hate it when people are watching me,” Rhaena says, twirling an earring. “They’re always waiting right by the door—especially at the posh places like the ones Baela goes to—and they want to know what I’m shopping for, and they want to make suggestions, and they follow me to the fitting room and ask what I like and what I don’t. And I can’t get rid of them! Even if I’m like ‘Just looking, thanks!’ they’ll circle back every five minutes to check on me. I can’t stand it. I get so frazzled I can’t decide how I really feel about a skirt or dress or whatever because I’m too busy trying to make conversation with someone I don’t want to talk to anyway. I end up with a headache and a shopping bag full of regrets. I’d rather click a button on my MacBook Air and save myself the suffering.”

You nod sagely. “What is it about talking to the employees that stresses you out so much?”

“I don’t want to say or do the wrong thing. I don’t want to cause problems.”

“But it’s not like you’re going to do anything they haven’t experienced before. They see hundreds, maybe even thousands of customers a month. And even if you did something ridiculously, dementedly embarrassing, like…um…hey, Aegon, what’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever done while clothes shopping?”

“I fell asleep in a fitting room. I pissed on the floor. I set something on fire. I vandalized One Direction merchandise.”

“No, there was that other time,” Daeron says. Mario is swimming through rings of underwater coins; they chime gleefully as he collects them.

“What other time?” Aegon says.

Daeron grins. “Come on. You know.”

Aegon remembers. “Oh yeah. Once I bit a girl’s feet until I accidentally ripped off part of a toenail and she bled everywhere. But that wasn’t my fault. She was begging for it. It was consensual.”

Criston, not looking away from his emails, says: “And that’s why Aegon is now banned from all Michael Kors locations for life.”

“Right.” You turn back to Rhaena. “So you would never do anything that deranged. But even if somehow you did, what’s the actual worst-case scenario? What, realistically, could happen as a result?”

Rhaena considers this. “The employees will think I’m weird, I guess.”

“So what you’re so concerned about is that the store employees—who are literally paid to be inconvenienced by you—might think you’re weird? Which they’ll remember for, what, maybe an hour before some other customer gives them a more memorable calamity to focus on? You don’t think they’re more annoyed by purse-dog-toting heiresses screeching at them or cokeheads pissing on their floors?”

“Rude,” Aegon says.

Rhaena smiles guiltily. “I mean, when you put it that way, it does sound stupid.”

“Not stupid,” you insist. “Just out of proportion.”

“Okay,” Rhaena says. She takes a deep breath, steeling herself. “Okay. I guess I’ll go shopping.”

“Yes!” Baela cheers, already scrolling through Reykjavik shops on her iPhone.

“Hey, Stargirl,” Aegon says, and then hurls something at you like a frisbee. It’s an Amex Black Card.

“Oh no.”

“Oh yes.”

You raise an eyebrow at him. “What’s my budget?”

“No budget. As long as it’s slutty.”

“I will buy nothing but cardigans and mom jeans.” You crane your neck to peek at his receipts. The black Sharpie squiggles aren’t words; they’re shapes, pictures. “What are you drawing?”

“New merch designs!” Aegon holds up the receipts so you can see.

“Circles…?”

He is somewhat wounded. “Donuts!”

You don’t even know where to begin. “Why donuts, Aegon?”

“Because that’s his code word for doing lines in the bathroom,” Criston says.

“No!” Aegon objects. “Because Donati sounds like donuts! So we could have all these mini donuts, print them on hats or shirts or whatever, and then in the frosting where the sprinkles would be we can put tiny stars, suns, moons, planets, galaxies…and comets, obviously.”

Jace scoffs. “I think you spend a little too much time thinking about donuts.”

Aegon goes quiet. So does everyone else. Gazes flit nervously around the cabin. The only sounds are the roar of the jet and Mario 64, although Daeron has turned his back on the cheerful Italian protagonist and is looking pensively over his shoulder at Jace. Aegon resumes sketching his cosmic Sharpie donuts, his lips pressed tightly together.

“Hey,” you say to Jace, and then once you have his attention, wicked dark eyes: “Shut the fuck up.”

“What?”

“It’s a great idea. It’s a really adorable idea, actually. Let’s see you come up with something better. Go on, whenever you’re ready. I’m waiting. I’m still waiting. But you’re not much of an ideas guy, are you, Jace? Fortunately, you’ve always had other people around to pull that weight.”

Jace opens his mouth to say something, then snaps it shut as Cregan stands up. He towers over you both, as tall as Aemond but more muscly all over, in the chest and the shoulders and the legs. He lowers his sunglasses to show his eyes: greyish, cold, flinty. He glares at Jace, and then at you, and then at Jace again. Jace holds up both hands, showing his palms. You bow your head in capitulation. Cregan lies back down on the couch and repositions his sunglasses just as the pilot turns on the fasten seatbelts signs. As you click yours into place, you exchange a glance with Aemond across the aisle. He is smiling, foxlike and approving, as if he can’t wait to see what else you have left to show him.

“So!” Baela says. “Guess who found a shop in Reykjavik that sells Gucci!”

The jet glides through mist and fog to make a rather bumpy landing at Keflavik International Airport, fighting against gusts of wind coming in off the North Atlantic Ocean, the same water that swallowed the Titanic, the Faucett Peru Boeing 727, the Free Life hot air balloon, whaling vessels and Viking longships, countless cruisers and destroyers and submarines that blasted holes into each other during the world wars. As the band prepares to disembark, Aemond reaches into the front pocket of his shirt—black, with white circling koi fish—and slides out a pair of sunglasses. He doesn’t like wearing them. They limit his vision even more than it already is. But he never walks into an airport without sunglasses on, you’ve discovered. Just in case paparazzi are there snapping photos.

“You don’t have to do that,” you tell Aemond.

He gestures to his scar and his blind eye, a pale cloudy blue. “I’ve thought about just getting it cut out. But then I’d have to worry about shoving in a fake one.”

“I think it’s kind of beautiful,” you say. “It reminds me of Neptune or something.”

And the look he gives you, the look, like he’s never heard anything like this before, like he didn’t know that words could fit together in that order. You hold out your hand to him. He lays the sunglasses in your palm. You put them on, grinning up at him.

“Now I’m the one who looks like a multi-millionaire popstar.”

“Hey, we match!” Aegon says as he follows you and Aemond out of the jet, massaging your shoulders and clopping noisily in his Crocs.

There are paparazzi at the airport, but only two of them, young men in black hoodies who dart around loosing flashes into the stuffy, aggressively heated air. Jace, Baela, Daeron, and Aegon beam and wave, radiant, magnetic, born celebrities. Rhaena smiles politely but hides behind Luke. Cregan saunters and smolders, knowing exactly what his devotees expect from him. Criston and the security guards are loaded up with suitcases like pack mules. The paparazzi don’t pay much attention to Aemond—a former heartthrob, a cracked relic, a fossil or a ruin—but one of them snaps a few pictures of him. Aemond turns his face so they’ll get his good side, his unmarred side…and then he grabs for your hand. You try not to reveal how ecstatic you are, how wildly, uncoolly, over-the-moon thrilled. Your expression might end up commemorated forever in a tabloid, after all.

Shopping in Reykjavik is mostly wool sweaters, hiking boots, and weather-proof jackets, but Baela leads you and Rhaena to a boutique that carries something more her speed: Gucci, Burberry, Balenciaga, Valentino, Saint Laurent. You and Baela try to distract the employees as much as possible; still, they find time to nettle Rhaena with those bothersome, predictable, unnecessary questions. She gets a little flustered, but she fights the instinct to run and hide, to allow herself to sink into a frenetic puddle of self-inquisition. You can almost see the words scrolling behind her dark gentle eyes like a news ticker: They get paid to help me. They aren’t going to remember any of this in a few hours. I’m not on a stage. I’m not being judged.

In the fitting room, you take two selfies to send to Aemond’s WhatsApp account: one in a flowing neon yellow gown, the other in a short, velvet, sparkly black dress embroidered with silver stars.

You ask: Day or night?

He answers before you’ve changed back into your jeans and pink Harry Styles hoodie. Night, obviously. And then he adds: Which constellation are you? Vulpecula the fox? Cygnus the swan?

“God, he’s such a dork,” you murmur to yourself, smiling. You have to think for a while before you reply. You don’t know many constellations; that makes it difficult to rattle off something witty. Then you are inspired. You type: Definitely not Virgo :)

He responds immediately: :)))))

“What does that mean?��� you whisper to yourself in the solitude of the boxlike fitting room. “What the hell does that mean???” He spends nearly all of his time with you, but he rarely touches you. He’s never made a move. He’s never even kissed you. You wouldn’t mind if he did. No, fuck the coyness that women are supposed to cloak themselves in to preserve their worth. You’re waiting for him to kiss you like someone drowning waits for a gasp of air.

Despite Aemond’s vote, you can’t help yourself. You buy both dresses. You don’t look much like an Aegon Targaryen, but the cashier doesn’t seem too troubled by this. Baela and Rhaena are still trying on outfits, so you swing your bag around boredly and wander over to see what Criston is up to. At Aemond’s insistence, he accompanied you on this shopping expedition and left the rest of the security detail back at the Reykjavik EDITION, a luxury hotel overlooking the harbor. Criston is in the jewelry section and holding up a medallion necklace, rotating it to see how the light reflects off the speckling of tiny gemstones, the wise golden face. His own face is distant and melancholy.

“Oh, that’s lovely, Criston!” you say. “All those emeralds. Who’s pictured on it?”

“Saint Jude. Lost causes.”

Interesting. “Are you religious?”

“Not especially. But Alicent is.”

“Who…?”

Criston walks off to the cash register. You watch him go, curious and perplexed.

Back at the hotel, you enter your suite to find a blond Targaryen lounging in your bed…but perhaps not the right one. Aegon still has his Crocs on and is, for some reason, clutching a plushie puffin. He glances over at you, noting your shopping bag.

“Fashion show?” he says. “I hope it’s nothing but miniskirts and bikinis.”

“Don’t you have places to be? Substances to snort?”

“Cregan is currently trying to locate some.”

“That’s really not good for you. Physically or mentally. You might be addicted.”

He barks a laugh, like it’s absurd. “You can’t get addicted to coke, Stargirl.”

“You definitely can.”

He suddenly looks panicked, like he’s never considered this before.

“So.” You hesitate. “Aemond.”

“Yes, I’m familiar with the concept.”

“He’s insecure. Very insecure, though he’s learned how to hide it.”

Aegon throws and catches the puffin, bouncing it off the ceiling. “I wouldn’t disagree.”

“It goes deeper than the accident, I think. The scar, his eye, what happened with the band…that awakened it again. That freed something that he’d had locked away. But where did it start?”

Aegon stares up at the ceiling. He tosses the puffin a few more times, abusing it terribly. “Whoever you are when you’re in high school…that’s sort of who you are forever, you know? If you’re popular and beloved and understood, you carry a certain self-confidence into the rest of your life with you like a suitcase. It’s an assumption that people care about what you have to say. It’s a conviction of your own value. It’s a presupposition the world would have to wrestle away from you. But if you’re a loser in high school, that stays with you too. And it’s one hell of a heavy suitcase to lug around.”

You try to imagine seeing Aemond through eyes that aren’t awed, craving, quietly adoring. It’s simply not possible. “He was alone?” you ask softly, dreading the answer.

“I had friends. He had grudges.” Aegon’s mouth twists as he tries to stop it from trembling. “My father…”

“I know, Aegon.” Your voice is gentle. “You told me in Kansas City, that night at the bar. You don’t have to say it again.”

He is relieved. “Yeah. So people respond to that in different ways, right? I lived in the present. I talked to anybody who would listen to me, and I partied and I got high and I got laid, and I was the antithesis of the kind of son my father would have wanted just to spite him. Aemond escaped into the past. He read books, traced bloodlines, collected old obsolete things. Maybe that gave him hope that a better place was waiting for him out there somewhere, a better time. He got to be cool for three years. That’s it, and that’s all he’ll ever have. He was the one with vision. He said he was going to audition for The X Factor, and I only went with him to meet girls. Then he made it through the first round and I did too. And when they were going to cut us, he found Jace and Luke and Cregan and convinced everyone to start performing together. The show wanted to replace Luke, did you know that? They thought he was too boyish, too innocent. Aemond fought for him. And then Comet finished in second place, and all the sudden we were signed to a label, and we were selling millions of records and we were touring, and we were winning Grammys, and we were buying our parents and siblings houses…and two months after our third album came out, Aemond was maimed at the Budokan and it was time for him to get off the ride.”

You stare at Aegon, tremendously sad, not knowing what to say. Sometimes the right words don’t exist.

Aegon smirks. “He really likes you.”

“Maybe.” And then, with guileless vulnerability: “I hope so.”

“That’s dangerous.”

Your brow knits into fearful grooves. “Why?”

“I know how to enjoy something without owning it. I don’t think Aemond does.”

You don’t want to ask, but you have to. “What was Shelby like?”

Aegon considers this for a long time before he answers. “She was simultaneously too good for him and not good enough.”

Too gorgeous. Too cool. Too Pinterest-board perfect, airy like summer. But not deep. A river, a glimmer, but with no understanding of the abyss. You aren’t sure how you know that this is what Aegon means, but you do. You don’t want to think about Shelby anymore. You pivot. “So Aemond is the past and you’re the present. Who’s the future? Daeron?”

Aegon smiles, lazy and warm. “I think you’re the future.”

“Yeah right. Get your Crocs off my bed.”

He complies, groaning, flopping onto the floor gracelessly.

“Where’d you get the puffin?”

“Some Icelandic kid recognized me in the elevator. He wanted to give me a present. In return, I signed an autograph and got him and his dad front row seats to the show tomorrow. So I’d say it was a very favorable exchange for him.”

“You’re a saint,” you say, and then find yourself thinking randomly of Saint Jude again. Lost causes. Lost causes.

Aegon grins at you as he crawls to his feet and makes for the door. “Patron saint of mayhem.”

~~~~~~~~~~

You’re watching old Comet Donati performances on YouTube when the hotel fire alarm goes off. And it’s strange, because the unscarred, clear-eyed boy on the screen is Aemond but also isn’t him; he smiles more easily, he looks at people without suspicion, he is ebullient and confident and carefree like kids blowing bubbles on front porches. When you open your suite door, dressed in your favorite Cookie Monster pajama pants and an oversized New Kids On The Block t-shirt, Aemond is just arriving.

“Oh good,” he says. “You’re still awake.” And then he walks with you to the nearest stairwell.

Outside, the hotel guests are clustered together with their travel companions, shuddering under coats and sweaters and blankets clasped around their shoulders like capes. Even at the start of July, Iceland is cold: fifties during the day as Americans like you measure in Fahrenheit, forties at night, nearly always overcast. It’s 11 p.m., but the sun won’t set until midnight, and even then only for a few short hours; the sky is wearing the colors of dusk, lilac, rose pink, pale blue, fire and gold. You’re shivering, rubbing your bare forearms and feeling the goosebumps that have risen there like braille. Aemond tugs off his black and white Calvin Klein hoodie and offers it to you. As you pull it over your head, you breathe in the pieces of him that have snared in the fabric: smoke and cologne, gin and soap and the brine of the seaside air. Now wearing only his jeans and his koi fish shirt, Aemond lights a cigarette and gazes up at the hotel, postmodern angles and semi-transparent glass.

“No one’s going to give me a hoodie?” Aegon says, quaking in his cyan tank top. Criston reluctantly unzips his bomber jacket and hands it over.

“Did you do this?” Criston asks him, meaning the fire alarm.

“What?! No! No way, man! It wasn’t me!”

Criston turns to Cregan for confirmation. Cregan shrugs, ambiguous. “I knew it!” Criston exclaims. He is distraught.

Several fire engines arrive, red lights strobing, and firefighters enter the hotel to investigate. Baela and Jace are standing near each other but not speaking, arms crossed, faces tense. Luke, Rhaena, and Daeron are watching an episode of The Crown on Luke’s iPhone. Cregan lights a cigarette and manages to take two drags before Criston notices and lunges to bat it out of his hand.

“Stop it!” Criston orders. “You’ll ruin your voice!” Nobody tells Aemond not to smoke. His voice doesn’t matter anymore.

Aegon asks you, his hands buried in the pockets of Criston’s jacket: “Would you run into a burning building to save me?”

“Why would you be in a burning building?”

“That’s really not the point.”

“I’d think about it.”

Luke says, the glow of his iPhone dancing across his face: “Wow, Prince Charles is a bitch.”

“You’d think about it?” Aegon says to you. “You’d think about it?!”

“You have no excuse to be in a burning building. You have now experienced an evacuation, you know exactly how to leave a building successfully, if you’re still in it for some reason then that’s your problem.”

“You hear that, Criston?” Aegon says. “This is a good thing. Now everyone knows what to do if there’s a real fire! And we’re in hotels all the time, so this is super helpful!”

“Please shut up,” Criston begs.

“Hey Cregan, share with the class, what did you learn about fire safety from this fortuitous occasion?”

“I already knew what to do.”

Aegon is grinning. “Yeah? What’s that, Cregan?”

“Get in the shower and wait for the fire department to come rescue me.”

Everyone laughs—even Jace and Baela—and Cregan’s lips quirk up in one corner, the only hint that he is joking. A parade of firefighters exit the hotel. One of them is carrying a toaster. Black smoke pours out of the slits in the top.

She says something in Icelandic that you can’t understand, then repeats in English: “Who was trying to cook hotdogs in a toaster?”

The guests chatter incredulously among themselves: Who would do such a thing?

You, Aemond, Luke, Rhaena, Daeron, Cregan, Jace, Baela, and Criston are mindful to look anywhere except at Aegon. You gaze out at the horizon, the kaleidoscopic midnight sun. Aegon peers down at his Crocs, hair tangled and blue eyes wide.

“Very well,” the firefighter with the toaster says, a little smugly. “We will consult with the hotel staff and see which guest was registered to that room.”

“Goddammit!” Criston hisses, and shoves by the band to go meet the firefighters. You can’t hear what’s being said, but his hands move in exaggerated gestures of humiliation, apology, restitution. Fortunately, the Icelandic people seem to be forgiving.

Daeron turns to Aegon. All he says is: “Why?”

“I couldn’t figure out the buttons on the stove!”

Criston comes trudging back to the band. Guests are being admitted into the hotel to return to their drinks, their television shows and mystery novels, their families, their lovers, their beds. “Alright, it’s taken care of. Go to your rooms. All of you, right now, go.”

No one has the heart to argue with him; he looks half-broken already. Everybody disperses. You and Aemond end up alone together as the elevator zooms to the fifth floor. He takes his small, square metal lighter out of his jeans pocket and toys with it, repeatedly flicking the lid open and then shutting it again.

You point to it. “Vintage lighter. Vintage bike. And yet you write with glittery gel pens instead of quills and ink. Poser.”

“I like old things,” he says, smiling. “I think history is important.”

And you hear Aegon’s words like an echo: That’s dangerous. You start pulling off Aemond’s hoodie to give it back to him.

“No,” he says, sounding pleased. “You keep it.” So you do, finding excuses to bring the sleeves close to your face—touching your hair, your lips, your eyelashes—so you can inhale him.

Aemond leaves you at the door of your suite, but you don’t go inside. You wait for another five minutes until Criston steps out of an elevator and into the hallway, alone and agitated. Still, he has concern to spare for you.

“You okay? Locked yourself out?”

“No. I was just hoping to ask you something.”

“Go ahead.” Criston is tired, but his eyes, dark like fertile earth, are attentive.

“When Aemond was hurt…when the label yanked him out of Comet…no one fought for him?”

“Luke did,” Criston says.

And then he continues down the hall, shoulders low, a man troubled by both the past and the future.

~~~~~~~~~~

The Blue Lagoon is like Aemond’s sightless left eye: a milky blue, opaque, something you could drown in. The band spends several hours splashing and wading in water warmer than the blood in your veins. The white silica mud that forms the floor is soft beneath your bare feet, squishing between your toes; people spread it over their skin like a skin shedding its scales in reverse. Criston orders strawberry-banana smoothies from the in-water bar, trying to distract Aegon and Jace from the beer and the wine. Currently, Comet’s most worrisome performers are locked in combat: Daeron is on Aegon’s shoulders, Luke on Jace’s, entangled in a spirited chicken fight. This is much preferable to their first choice, Marco Polo, which led to Jace ‘accidentally’—and repeatedly—bumping into various early-twenties female tourists, whereupon he would inevitably profusely apologize, introduce himself, and pose for selfies, beads of turbid mineral water dripping from his curls. Cregan has drifted to the other side of the lagoon, floating on his back and basking beneath the overcast midday sun.

“I can’t believe they made everyone shower naked before getting in here,” Rhaena says, drinking her smoothie, submerged in rippling blue up to her collarbones. She had nearly refused to go through with it—I’ll wait in the car! I’ll be fine! I’ll just watch The Crown on my phone for three hours!—until you and Baela offered to hold up your towels to shield her from view and insisted that none of the other guests (all female, as the showers are sorted by gender) were paying attention. Nudity is not a big deal in Iceland. It’s quite a far cry from Missouri.

“You gotta honor the local culture, babe.” Baela flashes Rhaena a teasing grin. “Scandinavians are super progressive. No shame about bodies or relationships. Very sex-positive.”

“Well Jace is certainly blending in.”

Now Baela isn’t grinning anymore. She frowns broodingly out over the lagoon. Rhaena, regretting that she said it but knowing it can’t be taken back, noisily slurps at her smoothie even when it’s gone. You and Aemond exchange an uncomfortable glance. Baela has never broached the topic of her relationship with you, but you know it’s coming. You can sometimes see her working up the nerve like a bucket filling with water, drop by drop.

You change the subject. “See, Rhaena? The naked shower thing wasn’t even that bad. It was over in two minutes, and absolutely nobody was judging you. And if you hadn’t done it, you would have missed out on this amazing experience!”

“You weren’t nervous?” she asks you. “Not at all?”

“I little bit, yeah. Of course. I’m an American.” Everyone chuckles. “But logically, I knew no one would really be watching me. I’m not that interesting. And also…I wasn’t truly naked.”

“Huh…?”

You wiggle your eyebrows and, smiling radiantly, spin around and point to the black-ink tattoo between your shoulder blades, underscored by the straps of your swimsuit that cross just below it: a comet with a streaming tail, lyrics that Aemond dreamed up in a kinder world. Rhaena laughs.

“Oh, right, of course.”

“You are obsessed with that thing!” Baela says, but she sounds relatively happy again.

“It’s true. I am. I admit it.” Sometimes you find yourself staring at it in hotel bathroom mirrors still foggy with steam, wiping away condensation to marvel at the irrevocable ways in which Aemond has marked you, ways you are thankful cannot be erased. When you wear anything that reveals your upper back like a spilled secret, you often catch Aemond gazing at it too. Now he reaches over and skims a fingerprint along the circle that his lyrics form around the comet:

I’ll come back for you if it kills me

Comets clip by again after eons and so can I

There’s a jolt down your spine like lightning, but more eager than jarring. All other thoughts vanish from you. You look over at Aemond, and he looks back, his lips slightly parted, his right eye beckoning to you. And you know it will be good with him, if it happens, when it happens. It will be more than good. It will be laced with an intensity, with a dire breed of necessity that you’ve never tasted before. All at once, you and Aemond realize what you’ve done and drift away from each other again, weakening gravity, elliptical orbits.

“No shame, guys,” Baela quips, raising her smoothie glass in a toast. “Sex-positive, remember?”

After the 45-minute drive back to Reykjavik, and after the concert, the band coalesces in Jace’s suite. There aren’t many hangers-on for this stop of the tour; Reykjavik is isolated and peaceful and not particularly desirable for friends of convenience who are more interested in clubbing and drugs than camaraderie. You wouldn’t trade nights like this for anything in the world.

Aemond is reading off his latest notes, white ink on black paper, stars on the backdrop of the universe. A Benson & Hedges cigarette smolders between two fingers on his left hand. Smoke curls up around his face. “Aegon, you were three steps behind the choreography for basically the entire show.”

“Yeah, that was on purpose.”

“It wasn’t,” Aemond counters, but he can’t help but smile.

“Women love a tragic disaster of a man who is screaming to be fixed.”

“Daeron,” Aemond continues. “I really like that hair flip you’ve started doing…”

Aegon is knocking back dark glass bottles of Gædingur Stout and slurring, very drunk and sinking deeper by the minute. In the absence of coke, he has resorted to other crutches. You are squeezed between Aemond and Baela on one of the couches. And Aemond isn’t really touching you, but he also is: the delicious subtle pressure of his thigh against yours, occasional nudges of his elbow, ostensibly unintentional grazes of knuckles and palms. He’s drinking his usual, a Bramble, and so are you, swirls of slow-moving pink like drops of blood in open water. And you think in a hazy bliss like listening to ground-level conversations from the bottom of a swimming pool: Tonight, tonight, tonight, he’s going to come back to my room with me tonight.

“Oh great,” you mumble as you check your Facebook messages on your iPhone.

“What’s wrong?” Rhaena asks. She’s nestled against Luke on the opposite couch, twirling locks of his hair around her benign, delicate fingers. Jace is sitting beside Luke, drinking a Vesper and trying not to make eye contact with Baela. Daeron is in the fuzzy white sheepskin lounge chair, Cregan perched on a bar stool, Criston standing watchfully with a vivid green bottle of Perrier in one hand. When he briefly steps out onto the balcony to take a call from the label, you can hear only the most dim, indistinct murmurings through the thick tinted glass, sounds but not words. Aegon is sitting—and occasionally crawling around—on the floor. The Backstreet Boys’ I Want It That Way is playing.

“I’m subletting my apartment in Kansas City and there is a strict no pet policy. But my neighbors snitched on the new tenant and apparently she’s got a Flemish Giant rabbit living there with her.”

“Not even a normal rabbit,” Baela muses. “A giant rabbit.”

You sigh. “All the rugs are going to be chewed up by the time I get back.” And Aemond glances over anxiously, like he doesn’t want any reminders that you won’t always be around.

“What’s your apartment like?” he says.

“Old. Vintage. Most of it hasn’t been updated since the 1950s. You’d appreciate it, actually. It would match your aesthetic.”

“Maybe I’ll have to see it sometime.”

You smirk at him, flirtatious, baiting, the silver stars on your dress reflecting golden lamplight. “Maybe. If I invite you.”

He leans in to whisper so only you can hear: “You will.”

“I think I’d be a landlord if I wasn’t famous,” Jace says, nursing his Vesper meditatively like an aspiring philosopher. “I’d just sit back and collect the checks as they rolled in. And you get to raise the rent every year.”

“Yeah, that sounds like you,” Aegon says, grinning up at him saccharinely.

“What would you be, Stargirl?” Jace asks; and you realize you hate the sound of him using Aegon’s name for you.

“I mean, a therapist.” And everyone laughs, even Criston.

Jace flushes, brushing his curls back from his face with one hand. “Oh yeah. Clearly.”

You look to Aemond. “You’d be a historian or an archivist or something.”

“Or a writer,” Luke says.

“Maybe,” Aemond agrees, a tad uncomfortable with the attention. “Or an animal activist, maybe. I’d like to do some sort of good in the world.”

Aegon shouts, far more loudly than necessary: “What would you be, Criston?”

“Thousands of miles away from you.” More laughter, riotous; but Criston is smiling a little.

“What about you, Cregan?” Jace asks. “What would you want to be if Comet didn’t exist?”

Cregan downs a shot of Absolut Vodka. “A plastic surgeon.”

“What? Why?”

Cregan shrugs. “You get to see tits all the time.”

There are scandalized squeals and guffaws. Baela says: “I would not let you anywhere near my tits.”

“And not just tits!” Daeron adds brightly. “Don’t they do, what’s it called, vaginal rejuvenation?”

Cregan points at him with his empty shot glass. “Exactly.”

“Oh God, that sounds painful.” Rhaena hides her face behind a flute of champagne.

“Yeah,” you say. “I don’t think I’m interested.”

Aegon snorts, drips of Gaedingur Stout flying from his nose. “Like you’d ever need it. You’ve got a pornstar pussy, fucking gorgeous.”

A hush sweeps through the room like a dust storm. Baffled glances dart around wildly. Immediately, Aegon realizes his mistake. He gazes up at you from the floor with large, glazed, drunken blue eyes that glisten with apology. You gape back, half-furious and half-petrified.

“Wait, what?” Aemond says. Ashes build on his cigarette, forgotten.

“Oh, wow.” Jace gestures from you to Aegon. “You guys…you guys have…?”

“It was once, a long time ago,” you say quickly. “Like, a really long time ago. Over a year ago.”

Aegon is trying to help. “Ages ago. Ancient history.”

“Where? In Kansas City?!” Baela gasps, stunned.

Aegon tells her: “You remember that bar we all went to after the show, right? The one on the roof?”

Baela is blinking at you, not comprehending. “You hooked up with him? In a bar?! Aegon?!”

“Um, yeah.”

Jace brays out a laugh, shaking his head. “Damn, Stargirl. I thought you had better taste than that.”

You feel like you’re fighting for your life. You feel like you can’t breathe. “It really wasn’t serious…” Not the sex part, anyway.

“No, no, it totally wasn’t,” Aegon agrees gamely. “It was like, what? How long were we in that bathroom? Maybe ten minutes total?”

Daeron is giggling. “Bruh, stop roasting yourself!”

As the chatter flies, you hide your face in your hands; beneath your palms, your cheeks are hot. You can feel Aemond pulling away from you, spaces opening up between your thighs and shoulders and arms like the ever-expanding void of the universe. When you steal a glimpse of him through the cracks in your fingers, he is staring down at the floor. He is silent, but you can see the thoughts—the images—riddling him like bullets. You can see him filling up with them like a punctured ship fills with seawater. He smokes until his cigarette is gone, and then immediately lights another.

Luke is the one to mercifully intercede. “Hey, Criston, where are we going next?”

“Uh,” Criston says, trying not to gawk at you or Aegon. “Let me think. Uh. Oh, right. Paris.”

Jace cackles. “The city of love! How appropriate!”

Criston ignores him. “You have some press interviews and then you’re doing two shows at the Accor Arena on July 7th and 8th…”

Aemond gulps down the rest of his Bramble and then walks out onto the balcony, closing the sliding glass door behind him.

“Fuck,” Aegon sighs miserably, then guzzles his Gaedingur Stout.

You bolt off the couch and go after Aemond. The heavy sliding glass door growls as you roll it open and then shut it again. Outside, Reykjavik is cold and windswept. The midnight sun is aflame. It’s still too bright to see the Northern Lights; even if they were there, you would have no way of knowing. Aemond is smoking with his back to you. He’s looking out over the boats bobbing in the harbor, sunbeams glinting on the crests of waves. Flapping gulls swoop and scream.

You say cuttingly, like a surgeon slicing away malignancies: “So what, you don’t like me anymore?”

Aemond flicks ashes over the balcony railing. “I just think I understand you better.”

“What does that mean?”

He whirls to you and says pointedly: “Why are you here?”

A disorienting question. Too easy. “I followed you out onto the balcony.”

“No, here with the band, here in Reykjavik, why are you here?”

You know how the truth sounds, but you can’t rewrite it. “Because Aegon asked me to be.”

“Because he asked you to come fix me, right?” Aemond demands. “To crack open my skull and stir things around until I’m okay with the fact that my life ended seven months ago.”

“No!” you shout into the wind. “I mean, yes, he thought I’d be able to help you, to help Comet, but that’s not what this is about for me anymore—”

“Why would I believe you? You’re a liar, you’re a confirmed liar, why would I believe a single goddamn word of what you have to say?!”

“I didn’t lie to you!”

“Friends!” Aemond roars. He doesn’t touch you, but his rage is horrifying, ageless and deep like lava bubbling beneath tectonic plates. “You said you and Aegon were friends!”

“We are friends—”

“No, you’re not. You met him, you fucked him, and then when he invited you to join the tour you dropped everything to do it, why, because you still want him? And I’m the charity case? Or I was just next in line? Maybe you were planning to work your way through the whole band. Who’s next, Jace? I don’t think he’d object.”

“No—!”

“You and Aegon. And you didn’t even have the guts to tell me.”

“Because I didn’t want to have this conversation, the one where you eviscerate me for something that happened before I even met you!”

“You chose him,” Aemond says, venomous. “At the bar in Kansas City, you chose him.”

“What?! Aemond, I don’t even remember seeing you, I don’t think you were there at all—”

“I was there.” He glares at you, thunderstorms, tornadoes, the earth splitting in two. “Last June. Rooftop bar. String lights. View of the river. I remember it, I was there.”

“Well then you didn’t notice me either and you probably spent the whole night with Pilates princess, Malibu Barbie Shelby, so what’s the fucking point?!”

He glowers at the horizon. Iceland DOES have jewel tones, you think erratically. But they only come out at night, like owls or bats. “It’s different.”

“It’s not different! You’re so convinced people don’t like you that you do insane, irrational things that make people not like you! It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy! It’s a fucking circle, you idiot!”

“I’ve had enough psychoanalysis, thanks.”

“No, you could use some more of it, you could use a lot more, you have so many demons it’s like Paranormal Activity in your brain, they’re in there all day tearing things off the walls and kicking over chairs and sabotaging anything you dare to care about and you let them!”

He turns away from you. “Just go the fuck back to Kansas.”

“I’m from Missouri!”

Aemond pitches the end of his cigarette over the balcony. His good eye flicks to the sliding glass door. The curtains rustle as the faces that hovered there just seconds ago disappear back into the suite. Very muffled through the thick glass, you can hear Criston chastising people.

You ask Aemond, embers in your throat: “This is really something you consider unforgiveable?”

He shakes his head, mournful, violently disappointed. “You’re just a groupie. You’re just a slut.”

Slut. It’s not the word, it’s the way he said it, with dismissiveness, with condemnation, the same way men love to use it as a blade to carve off every other piece of you—kindness, coldness, ferocity, loyalty, wit, passion, talent, triumphs, failures, ghosts—until that one little word is all that’s left. You’re dismantled into a clutter of loose bolts and bent nails. You’re a beef cow that was led into the maze of a gnashing, metal-and-blood processing plant and came out the other side a brainless, raw-pink patty just the right size to fit in a Big Mac box, something to be consumed but not remembered. “What did you say to me?”

He’s staring out into the twilight sky, both hands on the balcony railing. “I can’t believe you. I can’t believe I…”

“Are you kidding me?! I can’t believe I got your lyrics tattooed on my fucking back, what am I supposed to do about that now, rip my own skin off?!”

“So get it covered up. I’m sure Aegon would be thrilled to help you choose a new design, or Jace, or Cregan, or Daeron, or whoever.”

“You know what I think?” you say, caustic like acid.

“Don’t say it,” he threatens, low and dark.

“I think you haven’t fucked anyone since the accident, and you’re terrified to. But you shouldn’t be, Aemond. Because there’s nothing wrong with you. There has never been anything wrong with you.”

But he doesn’t hear that part. He only hears the first thing, what you never should have said at all. It’s true, but that doesn’t mean you should have said it. “I hate you,” he says softly, and you can’t think of a reply. The space between you fills up with wind, cold, dying sunlight. Aemond looks at the sliding glass door. “I don’t want to go back in there.”

“Well, we’re five stories off the ground, so you’ll probably have to.”

He studies the series of balconies that run along this side of the hotel, each separated by perhaps three feet of open air. Then he starts climbing over the metal railing.

“Aemond, don’t!”

But it’s too late. Fortunately, he has long limbs. He scrambles onto the next balcony, and then the one after that, and then one more, until he reaches the balcony for his own suite. He tries the sliding glass door—locked—and then sits down to wait for someone to open it. You go back inside Jace’s suite, where everyone pretends to have been talking about something other than you.

“Where’s Aemond?” Criston says, alarmed.

“He’s on the balcony of his suite. You should go let him in.”

“What?!” Criston yells, and then sprints out into the hallway.

You flee too. Both Baela and Aegon try to stop you, try to talk to you. They’re asking what Aemond said. They’re asking if you’re okay. You tell them you’re fine and that you want to be left alone. They argue. You insist. You walk back to your own room and start packing.

Your suitcase fills up with crumpled clothes and souvenirs: a Colosseum pencil sharpener from Rome, a tiny alabaster Apollo from Athens, a Spanish fighting bull refrigerator magnet from Madrid, handmade soap from Porto, a bar of chocolate from Vienna, a moose snow globe from Stockholm, a silica mud mask from the Blue Lagoon, a tiny stuffed comet that Rhaena crocheted for you. You reach back to touch your fingertips to the comet tattooed over your spine, tears biting in your eyes. If I had told him from the start, would that have made a difference? If I had met him first, would we have had a chance? You are gathering up your makeup when you hear a knock on the doorframe.

Cregan lurks there. When he speaks, he sounds startled; he sounds afraid. “You can’t leave.”

“I’ve literally never had a conversation with you, so thanks for the input but I’m still going.”

“No,” he says, persistent. “You can’t leave.”

“Aemond doesn’t want me here.” Your voice is fragile, shattering. “I can’t help him anymore.”

“It’s not just about Aemond. It’s about everyone. They’re all fucked up. They all need you.”

You stare at Cregan, not understanding. “I really don’t think I’m equipped for this.”

He fixes his cool greyish eyes on you. He is harsh but somehow not unkind. “You would never be able to comprehend where I came from. I’m not going back to that. The band has given me everything. I’m not going to let anyone take that away from me. You have to stay. You have to fix Comet. You can’t leave.”

He watches you, and you watch him, and you aren’t sure who has the upper hand here, who is the predator and who is the prey. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe everyone is a patchwork of strengths and deficits, fields of gold strewn with landmines.

At last, you relent. And Cregan doesn’t vanish until you’ve begun taking your souvenirs out of your suitcase and placing each of them—carefully, reverently—back on your nightstand where they were before.

[harringtonswriting]

Omg Bree that list!! I would love to read 25. goodnight kisses with Bradley?🥺

ahhhh thank you so much Nova!! <3 i am SO sorry it took me so long to get this finished, but i hope you enjoy it!! god this was so adorable to write and i really, REALLY appreciate you picking this one bc it was such a cute idea <3

...

This was the best first date you’d had in a long time. Probably the best first date you’ve ever been on, if you’re being honest, but that’s not something you’re going to admit to your date. You didn’t want to give his ego that big of a boost this early, and also didn’t want him to think about your dating history being any sadder than he might already think it is.

Bradley Bradshaw had asked you out the night you met him at the Hard Deck, where he was drinking with his friends and you’d been convinced by yours to come out for some drinks and the promise of some very pretty Naval officers to look at. Which, you were happy to find, there were plenty of. Bradley included.

You’d thought he was just another good-looking flyboy when he’d walked up to you at the bar top, though his endearing smile and his outrageous taste in fashion had you intrigued enough to say yes; you had no idea how he still managed to look attractive wearing bright blue and magenta, but that coupled with his 70s-esque mustache and very pretty, big brown eyes ended up winning you over. You’d put your number in his phone, let him buy you a drink, and your friends teased you for the better part of an hour about giving your number to the first pilot who talked to you. But there was something special about Bradley, something genuine and funny and maybe you were a little tipsy, but you didn’t regret giving him your number.

Bradley messaged you the following afternoon to ask you to dinner this coming Friday night, and after the initial awkwardness (he’d responded to you with just a thumbs up emoji and you’d used maybe a few too many exclamation points), the two of you fell into an easy rhythm of texting back and forth. You find yourself enjoying talking with him, and looking forward to seeing his name pop up on your phone.

All too quickly, though, Friday night arrives and he picks you up in what is obviously a very old, but very well loved, truck. He’s got sunglasses on, big mirrored aviators, but no Hawaiian shirt tonight (he’d later tell you that he’d received advice that he should wear something a little more toned down for the first date, and you couldn’t say that a black t-shirt and jeans didn’t suit him just as well as what he’d been wearing the night you met him). He’d lifted his sunglasses off his face, clipping them on the front of his shirt as he got out of his truck, and a wide grin split across his face as he caught sight of you coming out of your house.

“You look amazing,” he says, and the words come out loud and earnest–it’s a genuine compliment, and his smile is infectious to boot. You smile as you return the sentiment.

“Not so bad yourself. I like this look,” you tell him, and you see him puff his chest out just a bit. As you walk towards him, he reaches into his truck and comes back out with a bouquet of sunflowers tied with a yellow ribbon. He holds them out to you, and you take them from his hands.

“These are for you,” he says, and you look down at the flowers. They’re beautiful, the loveliest shade of yellow from soaking up the warmth and love of the sun. “I didn’t know what you liked, but they reminded me of your smile, so I hope these are okay.” Bradley’s just a little bashful, and you rest one hand on his forearm.

“They’re beautiful,” you tell him, and it’s the truth. They are, and the fact that they reminded him of you? You don’t know how he can say that with a straight face, and if it came from anyone else you might be embarrassed. You still are, a little, but you’re just a little pleased, too, that he’s been thinking about you. You take the flowers inside, quickly putting them in a tall glass of water before heading back out to where Bradley and the Bronco are waiting. You head around to the passenger side door to pull it open… but it won’t budge. You try again, but still no dice. Oh, god, did you break his car? This is a classic, right? That’s what a lot of older cars are. He gets you beautiful flowers and you break his car. Wonderful. You look at Bradley, and he grimaces. Oh no.

“The, uh, the door sticks sometimes. Lemme get it for you,” he says, coming around to fiddle with the handle before the door pops open. You feel some relief, then, knowing that you didn’t just bust his car, and you climb in and he shuts it behind you. Then he’s getting in on his side, and the two of you head out to the restaurant he’d told you about for dinner.

It was a place that Hangman had recommended, Bradley told you, but he only decided to take that recommendation seriously when Phoenix, Payback, and Fanboy had all confirmed it was good. And you’d have to remember to thank Bradley’s friends the next time you see them, because they were right. It was a small place, not too far from the Hard Deck, with the best food you’d had in a while. The atmosphere was friendly and it was busy enough that you and Bradley had plenty of time to talk between your server’s check ups, but not too busy that you felt rushed or couldn’t get a table.

The two of you got through the basic first date talk pretty quickly; he’s a much better listener than the last few guys you’d gone out with, and actually asked you some questions when you were telling him about some work drama you’d been dealing with. You enjoy the way his big, beautiful brown eyes crinkle at the corners with crows feet when he smiles, and how he scrunches his nose when he laughs. He also talks with his hands, you’ve come to realize, and he nearly knocks his glass of water off the table no less than four times as he’s telling you a story about what had happened at work earlier today.

“Anyway, so the radio was totally shot, right? So I’m inverted above Coyote, Phoenix and Bob are freaking out, there’s no way to communicate and we still have half a training exercise to complete. Can you believe that?” Bradley has his hands in an awkward position, trying to give you a visual as to what things had looked like. You can tell by the way he talks that he absolutely loves what he does, and he loves being able to fly. And there are very few things more attractive than seeing a man get so excited to tell you all about how he managed to get his plane upside down and scare the shit out of his friends and co-workers when no one was able to talk to each other in the air.

Dinner is over all too quickly after that, though, but thankfully nothing gets spilled during the rest of Bradley’s animated descriptions of his completely serious job duties. After you’d left the restaurant, since it was still light out, Bradley suggested that the two of you take a walk together along the beach behind the Hard Deck. He swore up and down that watching the sunsets from there were phenomenal, and, not wanting the date to end just yet, you agreed to go with him. He drove you there, and the two of you left your shoes in the back of his truck while you walked along the sand, continuing your conversation from dinner.

Bradley was absolutely right about the sunset, too; it was gorgeous, seeing all the blues and pinks and oranges, and every colour in-between, painting the sky in front of you and the water softly splashing against the shore. The two of you stop walking and talking as the sun hits the horizon, the cool water gently lapping against your feet and washing the sand all around. You swear you feel the back of Bradley’s hand ghost against the back of yours as the two of you stand there, side by side.

There’s a soft breeze blowing, putting a little chill in the air, and you find yourself shuffling a little closer to Bradley. Warmth radiates off of him, and as you look at him out of the corner of your eye and see him bathed in the burnished glow of the setting sun and how it gleams in his eyes, you think all the warmth and light of that sun must have been soaked up into him. And the more time you spend here with him on the beach, the happier you are that you didn’t let the date end after dinner–and that you gave him your number in the first place.

Once the sun has fully dipped below the horizon, the two of you make your way back to Bradley’s truck as the night sky faded from dusky twilight to a deep blue. You do keep a few steps behind him, though, to admire the way he fills out his t-shirt and jeans from the back. He’d once again popped the passenger door open for you, and closed it for you before he made his way back over to the driver’s side. Then, once he’s situated in the driver’s seat, he’s peeling out of the parking lot and heading back to your place.

The windows are rolled down as Bradley’s truck speeds along the road, and the cool breeze from earlier is back and blowing through the cab of the truck. The drive passes by all too quickly, with you needing to give Bradley directions the closer you get, and before you know it he’s pulling into your driveway. He parks the truck and turns the engine off. A beat of silence passes between the two of you before you turn to him and smile.

“Thank you for tonight,” you tell him, and you catch a flash of his teeth as he smiles.

“I should be thanking you. I’m glad you let me take you out.” He’s so earnest, maybe just a bit too earnest, but you have a feeling that he’s not quite as slick as some of his friends had been at the bar when you’d met. Which wasn’t entirely a bad thing; as pretty as the green eyed blond who’d been chatting up your best friend had been, he seemed just a little too full of himself. Bradley was much more your type (though you’d probably wait to admit that, that’s more of a post-third date kind of thing, if you got a third date, that is. You hope you do).

Though you don’t really want to date to end, judging by the time glowing on the dashboard of the truck (which Bradley had insisted was only thirteen minutes behind and it had been since his father owned it, and was lovingly referred to as running on ‘Goose time’, which you hoped he’d explain in the future), it was getting pretty late and you weren’t sure if he had to work in the morning. If he did, then he probably should have been at home a while ago.

“I should probably let you get going.” You unbuckle your seatbelt and grab your bag, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think you almost saw a pout cross Bradley’s face. But he nods, unbuckling his own seatbelt.

“At least let me walk you to your door,” he says, and before you can protest he’s popping open his door and you watch him jog around the front of his truck to your side. He fiddles with the door handle for a minute before he gets it open, and when he does he offers you his other hand to help you out of the Bronco. You take it, and once you’re clear he closes the truck door–and doesn’t let go of your hand as he walks all the way down the driveway, up your front steps, and stops in front of your door.

The two of you stand on the porch, his calloused hand still clasped around your own as the dim, yellow light shining above your door illuminates the space around you. A few moths are bobbing and weaving around said light, a few of them getting a bit too close and dropping down before flying back up again in an endless cycle.

“Is it alright if I kiss you goodnight?” he asks, voice a little huskier than it had been all night as he breaks the silence, and you feel cool relief flood through you when you nod because yes, absolutely, you definitely want this man to kiss you, and it feels good to know he wants to kiss you, too.

You hadn’t been quite sure what to expect, though; would he be eager? Pushy? Sloppy?

Thankfully he’s none of those things–sure, Bradley’s lips are more than a little chapped, but that’s not surprising given what he does for work. But they’re also warm, and the gentle pressure behind the kiss has you closing your eyes and leaning into him. His mustache tickles against your skin, brushing against it as his mouth works against yours.

When you pull back due to the rather unfortunate need that your body has for oxygen, you take a moment to scan his face in the dim porch light. He’s got scars on his cheek, chin, and neck, you realize, and they gleam almost silver as you take them in. There’s a tiny smattering of barely there freckles that dot his nose, and one of his deep brown curls is hanging loose and slightly over his forehead. You wonder what it would be like to reach up and brush it away, but decide that the first date maybe isn’t the right time for that. His eyes are crinkled at the corner, crow’s feet softening his deep brown eyes as he looks down at you.

“That was… wow,” he tells you, which is probably pretty close to what you’d have said, because he’s not wrong. “I mean, better than just wow, but this is probably where I should get going before I make a total fool of myself. Thanks again for tonight.” He squeezes your hand one more time before he’s turning and stepping back off your porch to head towards his truck. You dig your keys out of your bag and unlock your door.

“Get home safe,” you call after him, and he waves back at you over his shoulder with a loud laugh. You step inside after you watch him get into the driver’s side, and close and lock your door as you hear the Bronco speed off into the night.

And about half an hour later, while you’re laying in bed, your phone screen lights up with a notification from Bradley–he’s home safe, he just wanted to let you know so that you don’t worry about him, and he’d love to take you out again, if that’s something you want. You look over at the sunflowers on your dresser, yellow ribbon still tied around them, and you can’t help the smile on your face as you tell him a second date is more than alright with you.

[scoutsbabygirl]

the butcher of badwater; (yandere) sniper x reader [part 2]

part 1: https://www.tumblr.com/scoutsbabygirl/751123357519560704/the-butcher-of-badwater-yandere-sniper-x-reader?source=share

"why the hell did you do that!?"

cautiously, on your hands and feet flat on the ground you backed up, lifting your ass off the ground. you always knew something was wrong with him (honestly, you brushed it off the isolation, loneliness of being adopted to even speculating he had some degree of autism) but this was something you could never imagine him doing. well, he was a killer but you didn't think he would kill his coworkers. rabbits, deer and other creatures around didn't count either as you knew he was an outdoorsy type of man and hunting game was his specialty.

"i don't like the way he looks at you." he stood up without warning and sharply turned his front to you. you only saw his back before. his face and aviators were covered in blood, his entire front look like he bought the clothes a crimson red and not a baby blue colour. "i don't like the way he talks to you" he eyebrows narrowed indicating he was concentration. you could see jeremy's body just behind him but you didn't dare to look. "i don't like how he tries to flirt with you." he scratched the back of his head with his right hand. he was acting like nothing out of the ordinary just occurred and more importantly that a body was laid close enough that he could bend down and touch his lifeless skin. "so i figured he'll learn from his mistakes".

there was an uncomfortable silence that washed over you. you were stunned, speechless.

blindly, he threw the bloody and bent kurki to the side. it hit a rock as the clang rang out into the air. you cringed at the loud noise. he was weaponless, at least. you were grateful for that. he walked a bit to get closer to you then crouching down to meet your eye level despite being a few inches taller than you. it felt weirdly intimate- not in a sexual way but one that may have provided you comfort if given much different circumstances.

"he never caused me any problems though?" you spoke quietly, your voice was breathy and sounded like you had just run a mile long marathon without any breaks nor water. "we were just friends?" your eyes wandered from his face, to his stubble covered chin to the grey rocks behind him realizing you had just used the past tense to describe one of your best friends.

he removed his sunglasses with both of his hands. "see, the question in your voice is what worries me." pausing, he attempted removed the blood and other innards from his glasses with his blue sleeve. "i don't think you would dare to betray me." there was hick in his voice. he looked down at you with a straight face, he was challenging you. he knew this scared you. he knew he scared you. normally, he would hate feeling this way but the anger overtook him. he wasn't that friendly bloke that talked a bit too much about the surrounding floral and fauna and starting campfires with sticks and mirrors but rather a cold blooder butcher. "i think he would try to sway you away from me, whether it be by early morning jogs or stargazing with him outside at night. i've seen it all."

your jaw went slack. in disbelief. you had an inkling that he was romantically interested in you but not to this extent he was acting obsessed. sure, jeremy would try his cheesy pickup lines that resulted in the both of you going quiet then laughing or the mindless hand touches but there wasn't anything direct. you thought of him like the brother you never had growing up as a little kid.

"why does this all matter to you, mick?" your eyebrows furrowed. you had so many questions but you didn't want to tick him off even more and cause harm to yourself.

"are you fucking re-" he pinched the bridge of his nose, sighing, catching his words. "jesus christ" he mumbled under his breath. he looked down at his midwestern styles shoes and your dusty white sneakers his eyes bouncing back and forth. "listen- i'm gonna stand up and walk to my van. i'm then going to grab my white washrag and douse it in chloroform. i'm then going to track you down and knock you out with it then drag you back to my van. i'm tired of worrying about these other fuckers taking you away, so i'm taking you away from them."

"what?" you blurted as your heartbeat speed up after every word in a struggle to comprehend what exactly he was trying to say. you watched as his left hand reached from something in his khaki pants, slowly taking out a swiss pocket knife. he flicked the pocket knife out of the red covering. mick studied the silver knife glimmering off the sunrays. you looked at the knife and looked back at him, unsure what to focus on. they were both weapons to some extent and that thought left you on the edge and anxious.

without speaking his whipped the small knife up to your jugular vein protruding out of your neck. you knew that if you moved it would tear open the skin and you would bleed out right there on the ground.

you repeated "okay" over and over again half trying to ground yourself and half in an attempt to convince him to remove the knife from touching your delicate skin. you knew he had the power to cut through you like a hot knife in butter. he laid the flat part of the knife on your neck which caused a shiver to travel up your spine leaving you to shake lightly for half a second.

"listen to me", his mouth was against your ear. "i want you to listen to everything i have to say", his voice was dark and gravelly which reminded you of how sandpaper sounds when rubbing the material against each other. "i have the knife against your throat and i want you to follow me to my van." the hairs on your neck stood up. "i don't wanna use it on you and i don't wanna waste my chloroform." he sat on his haunches with both of his legs on either side of your torso. this didn't allow you to run away nor escape.

you knew right then you had to follow all of his orders and instructions otherwise you knew you wouldn't make it out alive.

[chiaraanatra]

You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’ | Part 3

Summary: Goose meets you at the O Bar after a couple of drinks and a conversation he wished would never end he believes that he’ll never see you again. Little did he know while this may have been your first meeting, it would not be your last.

Warnings: swearing, flirting, Goose being an anxious, hopeless romantic, use of Y/N and she/her pronouns, dancing, and a kiss(?)

Word Count: 2.1k

Songs: Mandy by Barry Manilow; Brandy (You're a Fine Girl) by Looking Glass; She's Always a Woman by Billy Joel

A/N: Goose is a leg man and a hopeless romantic, I will not be taking any questions on the matter. We are all imagining that Carol is living her best life somewhere far from San Diego. Sorry not sorry to Bradley for wiping your existence from this fictional plane. Also, I know nothing about planes, aviation, engineering, the Navy, or the Air Force.

《 part 1 || part 2 || part 4 || epilogue 》 《 m.list || ao3 》

4:00 pm

Goose sped home, violating several traffic laws and making it in record time. He walked in the door, kicking off his boots and dropping his bags on the floor. He ran into his bedroom and whipped open his closet, only to be greeted by Hawaiian shirts in every color imaginable.

“Shit…” Goose had no real reason to own any nicer civilian clothes. Why buy a dress shirt when the Navy supplied dress whites and blues for any fancy occasion? “She did just say dinner… how fancy of a place could we be going?” Nick decided to keep it simple choosing the least Hawaiian-looking short sleeve button-up he owned. He threw the shirt on his bed along with a pair of jeans and the other outfit essentials before running into his bathroom. Goose looked at himself in the mirror and thought it best to shave the stubble that had formed on his face before jumping into the shower.

4:30 pm

Only a little ways away you were prepping dinner. You already had a plan for dinner tonight, a relatively simple dish that you could easily throw together before tossing it in the oven for an hour. Luckily, you had no concept of a single-person meal, often making enough for a small army even though it was only ever you sat at your patio table every evening watching the sun as it set over the coastline.

You looked at the radio clock perched on your counter. 4:35 PM. You had just enough time to get out of the stockings that had been constricting your legs since 6:30 am this morning and shower the day off of you.

5:15 pm

Goose was pacing around his living room, “what if she wants to go to a fancy restaurant? Should I get her flowers? Girls like flowers! What kind of flowers would she like…? Where the hell do I get flowers?” Goose grabbed the yellow pages, “Florist… florist…” He ran his fingers through the bright yellow pages of the giant phone book. “Perfect!” He grabbed the phone dialing the number of the newly found florist.

An older woman answered the phone, “Thank you for calling White Fox Florist, how can I help you?”

“Hello yes, what flowers would you recommend for a kinda-sorta first date?”

“Kinda-sorta first date?” The woman on the other line had a confused inflection in her voice.

“I really like this girl, she asked me to dinner, I thought flowers would be a nice touch because I really like this girl-“

“Daisies,” the woman interrupted. “White, a small bouquet of about 6 with green filler. I can have it ready in 15 minutes.”

“Ma’am you are a blessing!”

5:50 pm

It was now just before 6. You had showered and changed, replacing your stockings for a pair of jeans and your blazer for a flowing oversized button-up shirt. You put just a touch of blush on your cheeks and styled your hair the way you usually did. Just as you turned off the oven you heard a knock at the front door.

You opened your door to find a nervous-looking Goose rocking back and forth on his heels. “Hello, Goose. Come on in.” You couldn’t help the smile that spread across your lips.

Goose stepped into your house. He perched his sunglasses on top of his head before pulling a small bouquet of white daisies from behind his back. “For you,” he was hoping you couldn’t hear the nervousness in his voice.

“Nick, they’re beautiful!” You grabbed the bouquet and smelled the delicate blooms. You looked up at his auburn eyes before leaning up on your tip toes to kiss the taller man’s cheek. “I should put these in some water.”

Nick stood in your small foyer, watching you make your way through the open layout towards to what he assumed would be your kitchen. I want her to look at me like that for the rest of my natural life… He untied and removed his New Balances and hung up his jacket before making his way to your kitchen.

“You know I can’t remember the last time someone bought me flowers.” You were standing in front of your cabinets on your tiptoes trying to reach a vase on the top shelf. Your breath caught when you felt Nick’s form behind you, effortlessly reaching above you grabbing the vase.

I will buy you flowers every day. “Allow me.” Nick took the vase and the flowers over to your sink. He grabbed a pair of scissors from your knife block and began to cut the stems to fit the vase. He filled the vase up with water before arranging the flowers to sit nicely.

“And no man has ever done that before…” you said quietly. You could feel your cheeks heating up. You took a deep breath. Get it together, Stinger!

When Goose was finished arranging the flowers he placed the vase in the center of the island. “So what plans did you have for this evening?”

You put on an oven mitt before opening the oven and pulling out a large dish, “well, I hope you’re hungry!”

Goose’s eyes brightened at the sight of a homecooked meal, “starving!”

The two of you sat at the small round table on your enclosed patio. You poured each of you a drink before sitting down for the meal that you had just prepared. You were never really a fan of small talk but you wanted to know more about Nick ‘Goose’ Bradshaw. “So what made you join the Navy?”

Nick couldn’t help but smile at the question. “Well, my dad was an Air Boss on the USS Enterprise for almost 30 years. I remember growing up, he would come home and show me pictures of him, and his buddies lined up in front of the planes. He would take me on base when he was home, and we would watch the planes take off. I was about 10 when I told him and my mom that I wanted to be up there. I swear my mother almost had a heart attack.” He couldn’t help laughing a little remembering the look on his mother’s face the day he told her. “Anyway, after high school, I miraculously got into the Academy. After graduation, I made my way to flight school where I met Mav and became a RIO.”

“What did you study at the academy?”

He looked down at his glass, holding back a smile. “You have to promise not to judge, Ms. Ph.D. in aerospace engineering.”

You held your hands up in defense, “no judgments.”

“History.”

“I never took you for a history buff, Lieutenant.”

God, Nick couldn’t help the thoughts that ran through his mind at the way the word fell from your lips. Nick shook the thought of you saying ‘lieutenant’ wearing nothing but a smile from his mind. “What about you?”

“Well,” you took a drink from your glass. “I was also a military brat. My dad was a pilot in the Airforce. Many of the stories he told me growing up were about how he felt when he was flying. As I got older, I knew I wanted to be involved in that world in some way. As stupid as this is going to sound aerospace engineering just kind of fell into my lap. My engineering professor during my first year in undergrad saw something in me and steered me in that direction.” You looked down at your glass pausing for a moment.

“That doesn’t sound stupid at all.” Nick couldn’t help but place his calloused hand gently on top of yours.

You smiled as your gaze made its way back to him. “I knew I wanted to work within the military in some capacity so after graduating with my bachelor’s I decided to go straight into getting my Ph.D. and that’s a total of 8 years of my life I’ll never get back.” You couldn’t help but chuckle.

Nick was awestruck, “That’s honestly amazing.”

You could tell by the sincerity in his voice that he was honestly impressed with the effort you had put into your career. You looked down at the empty plates in front of you. “Let me put this all in the kitchen and we can continue this conversation.” You stood up from your seat and reached for Nick’s plate.

“Let me help you do the dishes.” He picked up his plate and yours, “That way you won’t have to worry about it later. I’ll wash you dry?”

“That would be great. Thank you.” My God could this man be any more perfect. Flowers? Helping to clean up? If he pulls a ring out of his pocket, I’d say yes without a second thought.

Goose followed you to the kitchen. You set some of the dishes in the sink before turning on the radio. Goose started the hot water as the end of Barry Manilow’s ‘Mandy’ filled the kitchen. The two of you hummed along as you quickly cleaned the few dishes that were left dirty.

You poured each of you another drink leaning against the small kitchen island.

“Thank you once again ladies and gentlemen for tuning into 144.5 the Groove, playing you the easy listening and soft rock hits of the 60s and 70s. This one goes out to you Ron K.”

As the two of you listened to the radio DJ you couldn’t help but look at Nick. “Ron K…? You don’t think…?”

“Ron, I hope you enjoy.”

“Slider! Has to be!” Nick let out a laugh as ‘Brandy’ by Looking Glass played through the radio’s speakers.

“Oh, if it is, Slider’s got good taste, I love this song!” You hummed along to the short introduction. Before you knew it you were brought into the open space between your kitchen and dining room. Nick twirled you towards him before he began singing along to the song.

There's a port on a western bay

And it serves a hundred ships a day

Lonely sailors pass the time away

And talk about their homes

Goose pointed at you as a queue to start singing the next verse.

And there's a girl in this harbor town

And she works layin' whiskey down

They say, Brandy, fetch another round

She serves them whiskey and wine

Goose twirled you close to him and dipped you. As the chorus came Nick continued to sing changing up the lyrics slightly.

The sailors say, "Y/N, you're a fine girl" (you're a fine girl)

Looking at you now, even more so than when he first saw you, Nick thought you were the most beautiful creature to ever walk the earth.

"What a good wife you would be" (such a fine girl)

Nick could see his future in your eyes. Marriage, white picket fence, a kid, the whole nine yards.

"Yeah, your eyes could steal a RIO from the sky"

Nick was being serious in that moment. His first true love was flying but if you asked he would give her up in a heartbeat.

You couldn’t help but burst into laughter. You couldn’t remember the last time you had laughed this hard or had this much fun. The two of you continued to dance around your kitchen. As the music faded, Nick dipped you one last time. His hands held your waist as your arms hung loosely around his neck. The laughter that filled the room subsided and was replaced by the soft, melodic piano of Billy Joel. He raised you back up and the two of you sway back and forth to the beat of the music.

She can kill with a smile, she can wound with her eyes

And she can ruin your faith with her casual lies

And she only reveals what she wants you to see

She hides like a child but she's always a woman to me

You never took your eyes off of each other. At the turn of the second chorus, you could see a small spark in his eyes as he glanced down at your lips.

“Y/N…”This was the second time you heard your name fall from his lips. Your name had never sounded more beautiful than it did at that moment. “I really want to kiss you right now.”

“I wouldn’t stop you…”

And with your consent, he leaned in and placed his lips to yours. They were soft and warm against your own. You couldn’t help but smile against his lips at the feeling of his mustache tickling your face. You couldn’t help but think that this was the perfect first kiss. Goose could die happy with this being his last first kiss.

Part 4

Tags: @luckyladycreator2 @saturnsbabe69 @belleroguewolf @goosegirl98 @desert-fern

As always, feedback, likes, comments, and reblogs are appreciated!𝑊𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑎 𝑏𝑒 𝑡𝑎𝑔𝑔𝑒𝑑? 𝐿𝑒𝑡 𝑚𝑒 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 💜

[50calmadeuce]

Ch. 1: Home

Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction using characters from the Top Gun: Maverick world, trademarked by Paramount Pictures Corporation. I do not claim ownership of the characters and the world that I am borrowing.

The story and situation I am creating are a work of my imagination and I do not ascribe them to official story canon. This work is for entertainment only and is not a part of the storyline.

I am not profiting financially from the creation and publication of this story, but I do hope it gives you happy thoughts.

These stories are my own, so please do not take them and use them for yourself without my permission. If you see them somewhere else, please let me know. :)

It was a scorching summer day in Austin, Texas. You were dressed in a light gray tank top beneath a short-sleeved gray plaid button-up shirt, paired with blue jeans and a set of gray cowboy boots. Your dirty blonde hair was neatly tucked into a French braid, concealed beneath a well-worn gray baseball cap and your silver-blue eyes were hidden behind a pair of mirrored silver aviator sunglasses.

You leisurely walked through the crowd, savoring the creamy mint chocolate chip ice cream on the cone.

As you strolled along, you took in the sights and sounds of the bustling city. Vendors called out their wares, colorful stores and restaurants lined the streets, and the aroma of various foods filled the air. It was a lively scene, and the coolness of the ice cream against the warmth of the day was a delightful contrast.

You had just flown in last night and it wasn't because you wanted to, you had to. Your brother called the previous afternoon and delivered the somber news of your mother's passing. Luckily, you managed to secure an evening flight to Austin in order to be with your family.

You took a deep breath, releasing it in a heavy sigh. It had been a decade since you last set foot in your hometown, and the urban hustle and bustle were certainly not something you missed.

Glancing at your watch, you noted that it was three o'clock in the afternoon. The night had been spent at the hotel, and the morning consumed by the somber task of finalizing your mother's arrangements at the funeral home. However, you remained uncertain whether you were emotionally prepared to return to the place you once called home.

Taking another deep breath, you set out towards the hotel where the rented truck awaited your journey back home.

Jake 'Hangman' Seresin was outside his parent's home in rural Texas, tending to a section of fencing when his mom approached him. He had taken some leave time from his job with the Navy to come home and check on things.

"Jake?"

"Yes, Momma?"

"I need you to drive over to the Atherton Ranch. I just got word that Doris passed away the other day."

Jake looked at her as he continued to work on the fence. "That's terrible."

"I know. Well, you know James has been running the ranch for awhile now and I know you remember him."

He nodded. "Yes, Ma'am." How could he forget? James was his ex-girlfriend's brother. He set down the tools he was using and took off his work gloves. He glanced at his mother with a solemn expression. The news about Doris was certainly sad, but it brought back a flood of memories from his time with his ex-girlfriend. He had actually been to Atherton Ranch to help James out a few times, and also to see if his ex had been around, but he hadn't seen or spoken to her in years, and the prospect of returning to the Atherton Ranch brought a mixture of emotions. What if she was actually home? Nevertheless, he nodded in acknowledgment.

"I'll just finish this up and head over there, Momma," he replied, his voice steady. He knew that despite the complexities of the situation, paying his respects was the right thing to do.

"Thank you. I'd do it myself, but I'm knee-deep in this pie for the fair. And there's a casserole for you to take along, so be sure to swing by the house."

"Yes, Ma'am."

She began to make her way back towards the house, but then paused and turned back to face him. "And Jake?"

He met her gaze.

"Y/N hasn't been seen or heard from since the last time you were home." With that, she pivoted again and headed back towards the house.

You drove along the dusty, winding dirt road, approaching the ranch that held many memories. The two-story house, constructed of wood and stone, gradually came into view, as did the matching large barn with the large black fancy looking 'A' on it. As you drew nearer, the cowboys in the training pen caught sight of your vehicle and paused their work, casting curious glances your way to see who was arriving.

You parked the truck in front of the garage and stepped out, feeling the weight of all eyes on you. Fortunately, you were no stranger to being the center of attention in a room full of men.

"Y/N?" a male voice called from the back porch.

Turning towards the voice, you met a pair of silver-blue eyes, so much like your own.

"Hi, James," you greeted as you closed the truck door and made your way towards the porch.

"I wasn't sure if you'd gotten the message."

"You lucked out. I was in town that day and I heard it come over the radio." You slowly started up the steps.

Standing at an imposing six foot three, James Atherton exuded the quintessential image of a rancher. He was clad in well-worn jeans, sturdy cowboy boots, a blue shirt with a t-shirt underneath, and his gaze pierced through from beneath his tan Stetson that also covered his dirty blond hair.

"I wasn't even sure if you were going to come."

"I'm here, aren't I?" You halted in front of him. "Took care of the funeral arrangements this morning. They'll be out here on Saturday."

"I know. They called."

You shot him a look. "Wait a minute. So you already knew I was home?"

He shot back that mischievous grin he used to wear when getting you both into trouble as kids. You couldn't help but grin back.

"You ass."

He extended his arms, and you willingly stepped into a warm embrace.

"Welcome home," he said, holding you close.

"Thanks," you replied, a genuine smile on your face as you pulled away.

"Griff has your room all set up."

"Griff is still around?"

"He's not planning on leaving anytime soon. Come on, let's get you settled."

James draped his arm around your shoulders, and the two of you entered the house together.

[strange-august]

Tag Yourself as Me and My Friends' Favorite Colors

💜Purple💜

Neon signs in the night, Visiting the barcade, Taxi rides, Cracked sidewalks, Aviator sunglasses, Wild violets, Glitter covered hands, Heavy stage curtains, Spilled soda pop, Astrology, Planetariums, Train tracks, Dyed hair, Zippo lighters, Bathroom tiles, Crystalline bubbles, Lavender honey lattes, Faded street signs, Animal hair on clothing, Heavy eyeshadow, Holding hands, Running 'til you're breathless

🩷Pink🩷

Fresh morning air, Sunshine reflecting off your hair, Raspberry stains on clothes, Winter snow melting away, Sunlight streaming through the window, Busy hands, Antique porcelain teacups, Fields of wildflowers, Old books with yellowed pages, Palace ballrooms, Bubble baths, Sleeping in late on a friday morning, Thick fog, Flushed cheeks, Carousel horses with chipped paint, Gacha machines, Piano music, Soft serve ice cream, Cat paws, Stawberry milk tea

🧡Orange🧡

Bonfires in the woods, Smooth river rocks, Late summer thunderstorms, Street lights, Converse shoes, Stepping in puddles, Goldfish bowls, Childhood TV shows, Sharing a clementine with a stranger, Fireworks on the 4th of July, Flannel jackets, Fresh paint on a house, Old brick buildings, Candy shops, Glass blowing, Quotes highlighted in your favorite books, Splashing in the pool, Podcasts, Cassette tapes, Bagels in the morning for breakfast

💙Blue💙

Steely gray eyes, Raindrops on the windowpane, Jellyfish in the aquarium, Mirror mazes, Acoustic guitar, Cars on the highway, Bowling alleys, Old televisions, Glass bottles, Watercolor paints, Flying over the clouds, Blueberry muffins, Dip dye, Late night cooking, String lights, Movie theaters, Pedestrian bridges, Locker rooms, Cigarette burns on hands, Glow in the dark stars on ceiling, Crying in the bathroom, Skateboard tricks

🩵Cyan🩵

Lake water, Clear skies, Wishing on dandelions, Long hallways, Old cars, Analog clocks, Pillow forts, Record players, Gummy bears, Paper stars, Messy hair, Empty soda cans, Payphones, High rise buildings, Messy bedrooms, Butterfly houses, Airports, Karaoke with friends, The smell of chlorine, Driving with the roof down, Clear slime, Silly string, Wooden floors, Icicles, Concrete steps, Sea shells, Motivational posters, Parking lots

[darlingshane]

Raising Willa Part 3

Shane Walsh x F!Reader

Rating: G // WC: 1,2k // Content: Family Fluff

Summary: You take a little trip in matching outfits with your daughter and husband to the International Cherry Blossom Festival.

– Read below or at AO3

– Links: Part 1 // Part 2

– For @gabymiller​, that wanted more dad!Shane. Hope you like this part 💗

Part 3: Pretty in Pink

It’s springtime, and you’ve decided to drive to Macon to the International Cherry Blossom Festival to witness the blossoming of hundreds of thousands cherry trees blossoming in all their glory, and take part in some festivities. For the occasion, you’ve bought matching shirts for all three of you in pink with a floral pattern. Of course, Shane is slightly objecting to your color choice after putting it on, even when he knows how much love matching outfits with him and Willa. You’ve been doing it since before she was born. You remember that tiny newborn outfit you bought for her of cargo pants and blue shirt that had her matching Shane. They were so adorable together, and you can’t help trying to do the same at least twice a year. It’s cheesy as hell, but you adore your collection of pictures, and it makes you happy to look at them from time to time, so you’re not going to stop anytime soon until the day they really start hating you for it, which you doubt.

You bind the buttons of Shane’s shirt up to his chest, capturing the amusing frown in his brow and the pout of his mouth.

“You know pink is not a color just for girls, right?”

“I know. I just don’t like pink, what can I say?” he shrugs.

“Well, you better get used to it, or you're gonna get sick of it today,” you smooth his shoulders and take a good look at him, “but it really suits you. Take a look at you, handsome.”

As he scoffs, you get out of the way, so he can stare at himself in the full length mirror of your closet. He undoes the top two buttons of his shirt, while you roll the short sleeves of yours, cause they’re a little too long for you.

Then you go finding Willa who is already dressed and ready to take off, killing time watching videos on your phone.

“Willa, c’mere, let’s take a picture.”

“Are we leaving?” She asks, handing you the phone.

“Almost,” and you whisper, “tell daddy he looks really pretty in pink.”

She runs to Shane, and he picks her up in his arms, so you can take a photo of the two of them.

“Daddy, you look really pretty in pink.”

“Yeah? I’m a real Molly Ringwald,” he quips, “did mama tell you to say that?”

“Yep,” she shamelessly sells you out, and adds, “you also look like a flamingo.”

“I did not tell her to say that,” you snort and hold your phone up, “okay, you two flamingos look at me now.”

After taking a photo of them, you set the timer of your camera and prop the phone against a picture frame over the mantle to get a snapshot of the three of you together. Shane keeps holding Willa in one arm, while he links his other around your waist. And lil Will plants a kiss on Shane’s cheek before the flash goes off.

“Can I see?” Willa asks, and you show her the pictures on the screen.

You lock everything in the house and head out to the car, where you also hand them those pairs of sunglasses to go with their outfit that you had in your bag. They’re rose gold, yours and Willa’s are heart shaped, and Shane's are aviators.

“You went all out, huh?” He checks himself in the rearview mirror.

“Yeah, we never go anywhere, so–” you shrug, glancing at Willa strapped in her car seat at the back, “you like yours, baby?”

“Uh-huh.”

She looks really cute in them with her matching blouse, jeans, and pink converse.

During your road trip, while she watches her show on the backseat, you go over your notes and checklist for Willa’s 6th birthday party, which is coming up soon. Recently, she’s been really into cats and all she wants is that– a cat themed birthday party, and Gabby’s Dollhouse from her favorite show, featuring more cats. She has also requested chocolate lavender cupcakes and pizza. You’ve already figured out some of those details, and you and Shane have decided to adopt a kitty as a surprise. You’re having a friend over who works at a shelter on the day who is bringing some cats up for adoption. You still need to get all the decorations, but you almost have everything ready. It's a little stressful cause this year she has invited a lot of friends from her class. Last year it was just the three of you and a handful of family and friends. And now that she's older she's becoming more her own person, you want her to have the best day.

It’s a fun-packed day when you arrive at Macon and you get to capture some beautiful moments in your phone of the three of you having fun throughout the whole day. The first thing you do is watch one of the parades. Shane hoists Willa up on his shoulders while you eat your ice-cream cone, occasionally sharing some with him. Later, you take a walk across the park under the shade of all those beautiful blooming trees and have a picnic on the grass. In the afternoon, you buy three passes for the amusement rides and hop in all the ones that your five-year-old is allowed to ride. She gets a cherry blossom painted on her cheekbone in one of the booths, and temporary tattoos on her arms. There are fireworks at the end of the night, and she’s spent by that time. She almost falls asleep in your arms while you watch the beautiful lights exploding in the sky, but she doesn't completely drift off until you get to the car.

“Hey, baby. What you said earlier about never going anywhere… ” Shane voices tiredly on the drive back.

“I wasn't complaining. It was just an observation.”

“I know, but I was thinking that maybe we could do something fun this summer other than camping.”

“But I love camping, and so do you.”

“I do. We could do both, camping and a little trip.”

“Like what, Disney World? I think she'll enjoy it more in a couple of years.”

“No, somewhere romantic, just the two of us. We haven't gone anywhere since she was born, and now that she's older… she could stay with Rick and Michonne for a couple of days.”

“You really thought it through,” you turn your head to see your daughter soundly asleep, hugging a stuffed pink poodle you bought for her, “yeah, I guess we could.”

“You don't sound too convinced.”

“No, babe, I want to… I just have to get used to the idea of leaving her, even for a short time.”

“Just think about it. We don't have to decide anything right now.”

“Okay,” you reach with your hand to rake softly the hair at his nape.

It's a long drive back and when you get home you open the door while Shane carries her up to her bedroom. He carefully trades her clothes for her pj's and tucks her in.

“Good night, baby,” Shane sweetly kisses her hair twice, one for mommy, and one for daddy.

[ghcstcd]

Dew would have 2 main ways that he’d dress. (Aside from any bedroom kink stuff that could be whatever)

A- Casual Dew : tighter than tight black skinny jeans are part of his daily uniform . There could be a rip in the knee depending on how old they are or how much he’s been crawling around on his knees (cough cough). He wears wears well fitted band T shirts- mostly metal bands but there could be some 80’s or 90’s goth or 80’s hair bands in there too (depends on his mood) to show off his slim body. If the weather is cold, he might layer up with a nice dark flannel or utility shirt. (No bright colors bc he’s a dark rock kid at heart). Once in a while on the really frigid days, he could wear an oversized wool sweater with a turtleneck. Darker colors- of course. He might wear a black metal bullet belt once in a while or a studded leather belt. He will wear black vans. Although he likes his grungey stuff, he also has a penchant for more expensive accessories and will wear black combat type boots from Frye. His leather motorcycle jacket is also expensive (it’s a Schott Perfecto) . He will wear expensive Rayban sunglasses or mirrored aviators. Sometimes, if he’s in a slutty mood he might wear some tortiseshell cat eyed sunglasses and rosey, shiney lip gloss. Dew regularly wears black winged eyeliner.

B- Formal or biz casual Dew: He LOVES a skin tight suit- dark colors- possibly black on black pinstripes, etc to accentuate his lithe form. He will wear a high quality, black sheer button down (unbuttoned of course) or sometimes go shirtless with the jacket to show off his chest jewelry. He likes a pop of color do he’ll wear a dark blue or dark red colored neckerchief that has a slightly metallic sheen. (Think “Mr. Ghost” Tobias AMA style) With this ensemble- he’ll wear short black pointed snakeskin boots with a slight heel. He also likes to accessorize with the before mentioned sunglasses, and lots of chunky silver rings from The Great Frog.

This boy KNOWS he looks good and is not afraid to flaunt it. 🔥

There are so many points that you've given that I'm making notes of. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts. I'm also already in love with the Jewelry from The Great Frog. I'm looking at their collections right now and I love them.

[theartistknownaslymond]

Whumptober 2022 day 25

Lost Voice | Duct Tape | “You better start talking.”

I CAUGHT UP!!

Another suggestion from @stripedroseandsketchpads​ thank you Kay!! ‘3rd one re: getting caught in GoK (arrest at the end maybe?)’

CW: period typical journalistic homophobia and scaremongering about AIDS. References to terrorism, bigotry and racism as well as mob violence (very vaguely alluded to). Good old fashioned fisticuffs :’)

---

Francis Crawford was sitting outside Kings Cafe in the bright grey light of a crisp autumn day in Glasgow. He wore his customary shades and long-mouthed scowl, and his knee jogged impatiently. He ignored the glances of theatre kids and uni students slipping into the cafe for post-lecture brunches. If any of them were brave enough to pause and address him -

"'Scuse me, man, are ye Lymond?"

"When's the new album out, pal?"

"Wouldya sign this serviette fer me? Reckon I could get a few bob fer it down at Barras market..."

- he simply stared back in silence until the sight of their own pimply faces in his reflective lenses disconcerted them and sent them scuttling away. No one complained about this treatment: he was wearing the kind of folded and studded leather jacket that could conceal any number of things in its pockets, and his fist was curled tightly on the unevenly settled aluminium table. The scars on his knuckles shone white beneath the rumour of sunlight and the tabloids were still full of speculation about all the horrors he might have participated in during his time in New York.

Will Scott took all this in with a knowing sneer as he loped along Elmbank Street, a copy of today's paper and a cassette player tucked under his arm.

Lymond thought he was untouchable, the callous bastard. On the anniversary of his little sister's death he was sitting there, waiting for his bandmates to answer his summons, focussed only on how much money he could squeeze out of their next album.

Will had had enough of it.

He stopped by the table and stood deliberately between Francis and the hazy spot of cloud the sun was pushing at. In the mirror of Francis' sunglasses he was a curving beanpole of a man, like some kids' TV character: blue jeans, black leather, shock of red curls.

"Fair fa' ye, boss," Will said with a smirk of anticipation.

Francis' pale brows where hidden behind the rims of his aviators and his expression didn't change. He just nodded and gestured to the other seat.

"Actually," Will grinned, drawing a deep and satisfying breath of cafe air - it smelled of bean sauce, weak tea, and suet. "I told Mat tae meet us over at Blythswood. It's nicer being in the park - I can play ye the new demo without the traffic." Will gestured to the cassette player under his arm.

Francis looked up at him - Will assumed he did by the angle of his chin, anyway - and Will wondered whether he was going to be obstreperous.

Instead, Francis shrugged. "Go and get your tea to take away, then..." he said impatiently.

Will did so, and when he emerged saw that Francis was standing in anticipation of him, pacing a little and kicking at the cigarette butts on the pavement.

He was really craving a smoke, Will saw, and he was pleased to think the treacherous arsehole was suffering. "C'mon! Don't wanna keep Turkey waiting..." Will elbowed him in the arm and strode off at a clip towards Blythswood.

Francis traipsed along after him, moodily silent until they reached the side streets. Then, to Will's discomfort, he began to chat about the album and how he envisaged the material coming together. He sounded genuinely interested in hearing the demo Will claimed to have brought, and Will clenched his jaw and reminded himself what fun it would be instead to see Francis' expression when he realised Will had rooted out the truth of his past.

They wandered around the edge of Blythswood Square gardens, circling the railings until they were at a sheltered spot under a drooping cherry tree. Francis pulled himself up and over the iron barrier easily and then held his hands out to take the tea, the cassette player and the paper Will was holding.

Will passed them to him and lifted his own leg to brace against the stump of a branch pushing through the rails. He hauled himself up and over without impaling himself - it was perhaps the smoothest he'd ever managed the manoeuvre of trespassing into the private gardens, and he straightened with a smirk, imagining that Francis might have some grudgingly impressed witticism to share.

Instead, Francis was frowning at the pages of the paper Will had brought.

Damnit, did he have no self-restraint? Will thought, checking his watch as a new worry occurred to him. He needed to keep Francis here until the fuzz arrived - he didn't want Francis getting his suspicions up early and making a run for it.

"What's up? Worried your hero's sold out?" Will tittered, thinking of the headline about Sinn Féin's recent electoral success and grabbing his tea back,

Francis looked up at him sharply. He'd pushed his sunglasses back so they rested among the ash blond waves of his hair. They stood in the shade of late autumn colour, where the air was still cool from a light morning frost, and a single, deep line scored the pale skin between Francis' brows as he fixed Will with his stare.

"Did you read this?" he asked softly.

Will, who had skimmed the front page - but taken Dandy Hunter's word at face value that the damning report on Francis' collusion with terrorists would be included - shook his head and smiled innocently. "No?"

Francis looked him over slowly and then turned the paper towards him.

Will folded the sheets messily - they flapped and fought him at every step, and he wished Dandy didn't have to be pretentious enough to write for one of the few remaining broadsheets.

He looked for the pseudonymous diary column, but instead his eyes fell on a hateful little piece at the bottom of the page.

Chart Topping Drummer Potential 'Typhoid Mary' in Gay Plague Spread  

Next to the article was a picture of Turkey Mat, sweaty and happy after a gig, his thick arm slung round Francis Crawford's shoulder. Francis was wearing one of his more fey outfits, something lacy and flouncy, and his smile could only be described as Puckish. To his side stood one of the famous drag stars from the Ostrich in full stage make-up. The middle finger she was giving the camera had been censored out with a black box. Another, smaller image, showed Francis sharing a microphone cheek to cheek with a second guitarist; a man. The photo was apparently taken in New York, at a club called Three Cheers.

Will's eyes ran back and forth over the text but he couldn't really take it in. It was full of lies anyway - Mat wasn't gay (at least, Will had never heard him express interest in anyone of any gender), he'd probably been infected when he was using drugs, or working with addicts, and in any case he hadn't known he was a carrier of the virus when he'd left New York, so Francis hadn't been part of any campaign to 'smuggle' AIDS into the country, as the newspaper came perilously close to claiming. It was a sensationalised, racist, and deeply homophobic distraction from the real story Will had approached Dandy with, which was the issue of Francis and the IRA weapons.

"What the fuck is this...?" Will muttered, shaking his head.

Francis was looking at him strangely. He'd gone quite pale - paler than normal - and there were lines of worry around his remarkable eyes that Will hadn't really appreciated before.

"Did you speak to Mat this morning?" his voice was still unsettlingly gentle, filled with concern for the toothless oaf of a drummer he'd picked up in some skeevy punk club.

"What? I, no," Will said defensively.

Francis blinked. "When you told him to meet us here and not the cafe?"

"Oh! Oh, yeah."

"He didn't mention this?"

"Probably hadna seen it. I don't imagine he's a subscriber to the broadsheets," Will chuckled nervously.

Francis looked nauseated. He didn't contradict Will, but he shook his head and gazed out past the topiary shrubs to the main part of the garden. He plucked the paper from Will's fingers and folded it up. The he took the cassette player from under his arm instead. "Shall we have a listen to this demo, then?"

"Here?" Will asked.

"We are, after all, in Blythswood Square."

"Aye, but how will Mat see us here in the hedgerow?" Will scoffed. "There's a bench right there," he nodded.

Francis' eyes narrowed suspiciously and he peered out over the railings they'd climbed. He seemed to listen carefully to the traffic, and Will hoped to god the police squad he’d tipped off would be smart enough to come without sirens.

Whatever he heard or didn't hear, Francis found no excuse not to follow Will to the bench.

"Aye." Will sat down and Francis sat down, the machine between them, poised to play. "A little introduction..." Will took a deep breath and let it out, reminding himself of all the justification he had for this, all the reasons he'd read about in the papers, seen on the news, all the innocents who'd never be coming back to their families because of what Francis Crawford had helped the terrorists achieve.

"The story behind this one - and correct me if ye know it already - begins a few thousand miles that-a-way." Will pointed in the direction closest to west, and Francis watched him in silence.

He'd put his sunglasses away. The cloud cover had thickened and blackened, and the sun no longer illuminated it from behind. Francis sat on his hands and learned forwards, a little hunched, his frown unchanging and his mouth unhappy.

But he listened.

Will spun a story of a young man's ambition, of a hedonistic reliance on drugs and fame, of mob debts and a wannabe gangster who figured the best way to beat his captors was by joining them. He imagined a sadistic joy in cruelty, the transformation of ambition into a power trip. Noble ideals - the freedom of a nation - soured into commercial, base calculations regarding how many of their side needed to die in order for his side to win. People became pawns to him, as he sought influence over the world in whatever way he could get it.

When Will had finished, Francis let out a quiet snort and stood.

"I told you, Will - prog's out of fashion."

"What? Don't you want to listen to the cassette?"

Francis' cornflower blue eyes were totally hidden by heavy lids as he gazed down at the machine.

"I don't think it will fit the album, from your description," his lip curled.

"Don't you want to give your side of it?!" Will exclaimed.

Francis let the ensuing silence stretch out across the square. Only beyond it there wasn't silence - the noise of the city continued, unabated. And within that noise Francis now heard something that made him curse and shake his head.

"It seems you already have it on your wretched cassette, Marigold," he spat. He turned, evidently resolved to leave.

"No - " Will leapt to his feet, his hands balled into fists. "This is you, this is what you do! What ye've done! And ye'd better start talking, acause soon the whole world is goin' tae know about ye anyway!"

Francis cast a glance over his shoulder, condescending and disdainful. "It seems I've already done more than enough talking, does it not? Now, I am going to go and see my sick friend and check how he's responding to the national press comparing him to a plague rat."

Will rolled his eyes. "Och, he'll be fine. That wasna meant tae happen..."

"Fine?" Francis repeated, and let Will's diagnosis hang. "Then I hope you've learned a lesson about dealing with creatures such as Andrew Hunter," he added coldly before turning away again.

There was still no sign of the fuzz, so Will did the only thing left to him and grabbed a leather-clad shoulder and spun Francis back to face him, swinging his fist simultaneously so that it cracked into one of those sharp-boned cheeks.

"Ye bollix!" Will exclaimed at the pain in his knuckles and bent over, shaking his hand.

It had been effective, though - Francis had staggered and reeled and now held his jaw with his own hand, a look of fury kindling in his eyes.

He gave a little nod to Will, a kind of challenge that asked him, Really? Do you really want to do this?

Will, who had been stewing in resentment and anger - fear for his family and friends - rage at how easily the world fell into place for Francis Crawford, who might have already had it all if he wasn't such an uncompromising tyrant - kissed his bruised knuckles, tossed his red curls back from his forehead, and licked his lips: Aye, I do.

He braced as Francis lunged at him.

[mery-cm99]

In the Stars (Cp. 9)

In the Stars Masterlist

Description: Harper doesn't want any pilot near her, at least as far as possible. But that's really difficult when you work around them. She has managed to keep her “no pilots'' rule to date. That's until Bradley Bradshaw enters the Hard Deck like a great wave, destroying everything in his way and smashing all the walls Harper had built all this years ago.

Pairing: Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw x plus size!OC

Warnings: Mention of trauma, blood, crashes and sad stuff in general. There's some spice and mention of sex, but nothing too explicit. English is not my first language, so sorry in advance for any grammar  or spelling errors.

Rating: Teens and up

Chapter: 9/11

Word Count: 2,083 words.

NOTE: There's some spice at the end, iykyk. But nothing too explicit.

Harper looked in the mirror frowning. She had put on a blue summer dress with daisies, sandals and wore her hair in a braid, but now she was considering her decision. She didn’t want to look too dressed up to go have a few beers with a bunch of pilots. What did you wear for that occasion? She sighed and walked back to her closet intending to pull out some short jeans and a blouse, but she heard her bell ring. She cursed under her breath and pulled out her denim jacket to come down to open. On the other side she found a smiling Bradley. He wore a Hawaiian shirt (What a surprise!), although this was a dark green with red flowers, which highlighted his tanned skin. He wore it closed, only with the upper buttons open, which glimpse of his naked chest. In addition, he wore jeans and his aviators. He lowered his glasses with his index finger to look at her.

“You look gorgeous” he assured, and Harper could almost see him drooling. Apparently it had not been such a bad idea to put on the dress.

“Thanks!” she replied, entertained in picking up her keys from the entrance so he didn’t see that he had made her nervous.

The man waited for her to close the door and then accompanied her to the car and opened the passenger door for her, earning a new “thank you” from her. The short trip to the Hard Deck felt even shorter while they listened to music and sang the lyrics, Bradley loudly and Harper low but with a smile on her face. Music had always been important in her life, she liked how you could express a lot of thighs with the righst song, how your mood could change and you could feel everything the artist had felt while making the song. And hearing Bradley’s voice only made it better.

Once at the Hard Deck, Bradley gestured for her to enter first and then guided her with one hand on her lower back to the darts area, where some of his colleagues were already.

“Guys, this is Harper, our doctor. I guess you don’t need me to tell you their names”

“It’s not necessary” she confirmed amused.

“Harper, come. Sit here” Phoenix offered, pointing to the stool beside her. Next to the woman was Bob, who seemed to never part from his pilot. “Rooster told us you will come with us tomorrow” she began.

“Yeah. I’ll be your doctor in case you get a migraine while deciding whether to fly with or without sunglasses” she joked. After Bradley had confessed that pilots were terrified of not coming back and didn’t talked about their fears, Harper had decided not to mention the dangers of the mission that night.

“Or if we have a hangover after tonight” commented someone else. Harper turned to look at the blond man, recognizing him as Hangman, the man who apparently  wanted to drive Bradley mad. At least it had been before, now they were simply ignoring each other. 

“For that too” she nodded with a smile.

“Why Top Gun? Isn’t it a little… boring?” Bob asked this time. “I mean, a doctor at FighterTown doesn’t have much work, you’d have more action in a hospital or on the battlefield”

Harper shrugged her shoulders.

“FighterTown is my home. I’ve always lived here, and I like the atmosphere of the base, so that counteracts the boredom of my work” she explained. The brunette turned when a beer appeared right in front of her face. It was Bradley, who brought many bottles in the other hand, for the rest. Harper thanked him with a smile, accepting the drink, and watched him pass through the rest of his friends repeating the action. Then, he leaned against the pillar next to Harper’s stool and took a sip of his drink.

She was grateful when the conversation drifted away from her and the pilots started joking with each other while playing darts or pool. She was occasionally brought back to the conversation, explaining some anecdote so she could continue the conversation. A while later, Fanboy offered her his cue when he lost to Hangman and she accepted it with a smile as she watched Coyote and the blond man place the balls back on their place to start again.

“Have you ever played?” asked Hangman once they were ready, indicating he let her throw first.

“Sometime” she replied shrugging before hitting the cue ball, which hit the other and sent one straight into the corner net. She changed position and hit another one, getting it in the net too.

“A pilot?” asked Bradley, arms folded, but with a smile. Harper laughed, not noticing the confused looks of the rest.

“Yes. I was taught to play when I was ten. I didn’t even reach the table, I had to use a chair. We played at the base pool when they had some free time. I always thought they let me win so I wouldn’t feel bad” she told them, moving around the table and hitting balls. She got two more before missing.

“You weren’t that bad, apparently” said Phoenix, amused to see Hangman’s frown, who seemed much more focused on the game than before.

“You’re a Navy brat, aren’t you? One of your parents was in the Navy. That’s why you lived on the base” said Halo, the other female pilot. Harper nodded leaning on her cue.

“Yeah, I’m a descendant. Well, I don’t know if I can be considered one because my father was a pilot and I’m a doctor. The funny thing is that when I was a kid I wanted to be like you, like him. I wanted to be a pilot” she told them. Not even Bradley knew that.

“What changed your mind?” asked Bob curiously. Bradley was about to change the subject to save her, assuming it had to do with her father’s death, but she beat him to it.

“I guess I realized I was more into medicine” she replied sincerely. “That and the fact that I’m afraid of heights” she added half-joking, making the rest laugh.

Bradley had to admit that he was surprised by her answer. Her natural way of admitting her fears, her elegant way of deflecting the questions that she didn’t want. He followed her with his eyes as she continued to play pool with Hangman. Watching her shy smile as the rest jumped to celebrate with her that she had beaten the blond pilot. And he couldn’t but smile when her eyes met his in the commotion. He was really smitten by that incredible woman.

At one point in the evening, they saw Maverick arrive, but instead of approaching them, he headed to the bar to talk to Penny. Harper imagined what was happening. She knew those two had history together, as Amelia had explained to her, so Maverick was saying goodbye to her because it was his last day ashore for a while. 

A couple of hours later, Harper began to notice the effect of the three beers she had had. She wasn’t drunk enough to have a hangover the next day or to not know what she was doing, but she did felt lighter, freer. At the time, she was with Phoenix, who was telling her her story at the academy and how she got to be the first of her class. After so long, Harper had to admit she had missed hearing the pilot’s stories, getting out of FighterTown through a story narrated by the protagonist theirself.

“You’re awesome. My father would have liked to have known you and taught you” she assured her, without realizing what she could be revealing with the comment. Phoenix caught it, but didn’t ask her, didn’t want to bother her by asking if her father was dead.

It was really late, and some of the pilots had already gone to rest for the important day they would have the next day. That’s why Bradley approached them after saying goodbye to the rest.

“Come on, Harper. I’m taking you home” he said, offering her a hand to help her get off the high stool. Harper took his hand and after getting down, she turned to look at Phoenix again.

“It was nice to met you, Natasha. See you tomorrow” she said before saing goodbye to Penny and then followed Bradley out of the bar.

The travel back was similar to the one before, with Bradley singing to songs on the radio while hitting his fingers on the steering wheel. Harper, on the other hand, was too focused on controlling herself and not letting her temptations get out of control because his beautiful voice. The alcohol wasn’t exactly helping. Once at her home, they both got off and Bradley walked her to the door.

“Thank you, for tonight. I had a great time” she told him once she had her door open, turning to look at him. He had leaned on the frame like that morning at the base, with his hip and shoulder, arms crossed. But this time Harper was close enough to notice the muscles in his arms tightening the fabric of his Hawaiian shirt and the tanned skin that peeked through the space of his chest.

“It was fine” he confirmed with a small smile, which provoked a new shot in Harper’s nervous system and she squeezed her thighs unconsciously, looking for some friction. 

Like on the beach, he didn’t miss the movement and looked up and down as his smile grew bigger. That was the last straw. Throwing her self-control out the window, Harper dropped her purse and keys on the floor and grabbed the fabric of his shirt with a fist to reach up to kiss him once and for all. Bradley let out a surprised noice, which drowned in Harper’s mouth, but instanty kissed her back, wrapping her in his arms and pushed her so that they could enter the house and close the door with his foot. Then he turned them around and pushed her against the locked door so he could keep kissing her.

They parted because of the lack of oxygen and Bradley looked at her with a smile. 

“I didn’t know you wanted me so bad” he joked.

Harper gave him a sarcastic laugh before putting her hands up to his neck to pull him down and kiss him again. This time, Bradley was expecting it and it didn’t take him long to keep up. As she entangled her fingers in his curls, he slid his hands down, reaching down to her thighs. He was really obsessed with them, always in his head, imagining how it would feel to have them around him. He took one of her legs up to his hip so they could be even closer. Harper groaned in his mouth as she felt him move between her legs, which ended up turning him on even more. 

“Room?” he asked between her lips.

“Room” she confirmed likewise, sliding from his arms to guide him upstairs and to her room. Once inside, Bradley was the one to lured her back to his body to kiss her, and as he did so, he stroked her down her sides to her thighs before climbing again, this time under her dress. “Rooster…” she groaned when she felt it, but he stopped to look at her.

“Don’t. Don’t say that. You can’t call me that” Harper smiled amused. She’d been listening all night to his friends call him Rooster, so it had come out like that. She preferred his real name anyways.

“Okay. Bradley” she whispered close to his ear, getting the man to shiver. She felt powerful, more than ever. Bradley lifted her softly and put her on the bed gently before climbing on her to kiss her again. This time, when he put his hands under her skirt, it was she who stopped him.

“Wait” she murmured nervously.

“What is it?” he asked worried.

“I’ve never done this before” she confessed.

“What? You…” he started confused, and quite surprised.

“Do I have to remind you that I haven't dated any pilot and that’s the only thing I have around?” she pointed out. Bradley smiled and kissed her again, this time more softly.

“Don’t worry, I’ll take care of you. If something bothers you, don’t hesitate to stop me”

Harper nodded and let go of his wrist, letting him continue.

Taglist:

@luckyladycreator2

@chaoticassidy

[cosmiksouls1]

Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: 💙Gold Frame Icy Blue Aviator Sunglass😎.

[armanivision]

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[rxsafetyglasses]

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Protecting your eyes from harmful UV radiation is crucial for long-term eye health. Prolonged exposure to the sun's UV rays can lead to eye damage and increase the risk of developing conditions such as cataracts and macular degeneration. Specialized golf sunglasses offer UV protection, shielding your eyes from the sun's harmful rays while you focus on your game. By wearing UV-protective sunglasses, golfers can enjoy peace of mind knowing that their eyes are safeguarded against potential harm.

Beyond functionality, golf sunglasses are also stylish accessories that can complement your on-course attire. With sleek designs and lightweight frames, they offer both comfort and performance, ensuring you can wear them throughout your round without any discomfort. Whether you prefer a classic aviator style or a modern wraparound design, there are plenty of options to suit your taste and preference.

Oakley Batwolf Sunglasses are meticulously designed for the golf course. Crafted with a lightweight frame and Square O metal icon accents, these sunglasses blend durability with sophistication, available in Matte Black, Black Ink, Polished Black, and Matte Black Camo options. Engineered with Oakley's advanced shield lens technology, including High Definition Optics®, they offer unrivaled clarity and protection against glare and UV rays, ensuring optimal performance on the green. Tested under extreme conditions, they guarantee reliability. Enhance your vision clarity with optional Prizm™ Golf lenses, spotting subtle breaks and textures. 

Elevate your golf game with Revo Horizon Sunglasses, crafted for style and function. Their lightweight titanium frame and vintage navigator style ensure comfort and durability. Featuring polarized photochromic lenses with Blue Water and Evergreen mirror coatings, they offer clear vision and UV protection. With adjustable nose pads and handmade temples, they fit perfectly for long days on the green. Plus, they're available with non-photochromic Graphite lenses for added versatility. Experience clarity and style on every swing with Revo Horizon Sunglasses.

In summary, when selecting golf sunglasses, it's paramount to consider the above factors to optimize your performance and protect your eyes on the course. Prioritize features such as lens tint, frame design, and fit to ensure comfort and functionality throughout your game. Opting for polarized lenses can significantly reduce glare and enhance contrast, offering a clearer view of the terrain and improving your accuracy. Look for lightweight yet durable frames with adjustable nose pads and temple grips for a customized fit that stays secure during swings and movements. Moreover, prioritize sunglasses with a high UV protection rating to shield your eyes from harmful rays, safeguarding your vision in the long term. For a comprehensive range of golf sunglasses, including prescription options, explore the offerings available at RX Safety's website. Their expertise in eyewear ensures you'll find the perfect pair tailored to your specific needs, ultimately enhancing your golfing experience.