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saerotonins · 11 months ago

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actor!yuuji & actor!sukuna headcanons

ft. itadori yuuji and ryomen sukuna

content warnings: fluff, itadori twins au, overall cuteness, implied x reader (separated), jjk manga spoilers, characters are aged up to 20+

wc: 2.3k (jesus christ lol)

note: i miss my little actors so much lol. also, i think this is a bit too long, my bad 😭

jjk actor au masterlist

as twin actors:

believe it or not, jjk is like one of the roles that had them cast together

both of them usually like to play different roles in different shows because they just don't want to be known as each other's twins

love that for them, they're so real for that

but when they were cast, they accepted it since the script and plot were interesting

yuuji is a sweetheart inside out and sukuna is the quieter one between the two, sukuna is soft for his brother though so don't get fooled by his tough persona

yes, he is the older twin LOL and always holds it against yuuji just to be petty

"dude can you get me that can of soda?""why are you ordering your older brother around? have some shame"

yuuji just rolls his eyes but before he gets up and get it himself, sukuna will wordlessly stands up and does it anyway

checks on yuuji whenever he does intense fight scenes

both of them do the stunt themselves since they ate both so physically active

education wise, yuuji graduated as a marketing major and sukuna has a degree in physical therapy

which explains why him and his brother always practice fight scenes together and he helps yuuji with his stance and warm ups!

it's adorable really and he's so tsundere about it too

"no not like that, put your legs this way dumbass" like that typa stuff

sukuna started off as a model but was later on casted because casting agencies thought he has that great villain face

yuuji started off as a side character and really likes acting (he is the theatre kid between the two and sukuna is the quiz bee kid, their mom is BOOKED and busy) and later on recognized because he's just THAT good

yuuji is usually a romance lead or 2nd lead and a slice-of-life guy so when fans found out he will be in an action show, they are excited!

sukuna on the other hand has been casted as a tsundere in romance shows, sometimes a bully and an antagonist in action shows, but a villain that is literally so powerful??? that is so new so his fans are anticipating

both of them usually arrive on the set together (sukuna is the one driving btw and yuuji just sleeps during the trip)

yuuji prepares both of their bento boxes btw

sukuna loves it

he can cook, but that's it LMAO

he won't admit it but yuuji is the better cook

lowkey a picky eater so yeah

ACTOR!SUKUNA HEADCANONS:

sukuna is the intimidating one (obv) so when him and the other casts first met + the first few readings, it was sooo awkward

turns out he's lowkey a goofy guy

has fun with his costars and helps them with fight scenes too, gotta put that physical therapy degree into good use

both him and nanami have this silent bond because whenever they're together they just don't talk and bask in the silence as they sit, they just peace amidst their crazy schedule

also an avid toji fan so when this guy found out he's in the same show with his idol he's almost shitting bricks

let out a really loud cheer when he found out and only yuuji knew about it LOL

has a deep-rooted respect towards him and it's sooo obvious whenever toji is around

he is such a fucking fangirl

he just thinks he's so badass and feels so honored to be casted in the same show as him

feels bad that he has to beat up almost everyone 😭 he is also a sweetheart deep inside

deep inside, he's such a caring and protective brother for yuuji because even though he doesn't have any scenes to be filmed, he still joins him on set whenever time allows him

he may not show it but he's sometimes lowkey terrified about fans tearing him up into shreds whenever he kills their favorite character

imagine sukuna dripping big sweats by the time THAT episode with [redacted] aired oh my GOD he was so fucking nervous considering their fanbase is so big

yuuji has never seen his brother THIS nervous before and he's enjoying it

luckily though, not much hate happened and most of the time it's just memes and playful banter

his ass is barely on social media LOL

in the years of his instagram existing he only has like 90+ posts or even below 😭 usually it's just promotion, being an ambassador, magazine shoots— very lowkey

doesn't have much digital footprint and i love that for him

whenever he posts, his fans are EATING IT UP since it happens every once in a blue moon lmfao

ACTOR!SUKUNA AS YOUR PARTNER:

as tough as he looks, he actually can be quite clingy, just behind closed doors though

lowkey feels bad when he has to beat up children (LMAO) and his co-actors and asks for cuddles from you for comfort

it's actually kind of adorable

sometimes if his schedule doesn't allow him to have time to visit you, you'll get messages like "babe i just beat up megumi :("

since he's not active on social media, he knows some stuff online through you or yuuji

kind of a sad reason why he doesn't go online as much is because as tough as he looks, he's just a guy scared of the hate he's going to have just because he plays a villain or antagonist most of the time

he knows it's not his fault, he just knows that some people just don't know how to separate reality from acting

especially when that scene where he had to off a certain jujutsu sorcerer actor with a huge fanbase

oh boy was he so fucking scared and ran into your arms for comfort :(

he's a softie deep inside ok

when they have to go out of town or even overseas to film, he gets incredibly homesick and misses you so much

expect a lot of "i miss you" messages, including selfies and candid pictures that he took around the set to

practicing his lines with you is close to impossible, this guy gets all blushy and shit because you're in front of him

and since most of his lines are mean as hell, he just doesn't want to be mean to you

he wants to impress you so bad but when you're around he just becomes a little high school boy with a big crush LMAO

he's such a sweetheart deep inside oh my god

when he decides he wants to post a new photo in his ig, you're the first and only person he'll ask for opinions

so this just means that most, if not all of his posts were handpicked by you

wears your matching stuff like accessories on set and gets sad when he has to take it off while filming

when he learned that his character would have face tattoos, the first thing he did was come home to you with his face makeup on (he had to ask his makeup artist to let it stay) and imitate it on your face

i have this headcanon that sukuna knows how to draw (and is very good at it) so it takes almost no effort to draw the tattoos on your face

you two then have a mini photoshoot (aka just taking a lot of selfies) with the both of you with sukuna marks on the face

it looks so cute that he made it his lock screen

he's lowkey such a sap don't let the character he's playing fool you

ACTOR!YUUJI HEADCANONS:

THE MAN THE MYTH THE BABY

he is literally a sunshine in or out of acting

so polite and so kind it's hard to hate him (not that he is even worth hating on)

so naturally, everyone on set loves to work with him!

unlike his brother, before acting, he doesn't really know a lot of fighting stance (he's a marketing major ffs lol) BUT ever since he was casted, he doubled up on his working out routine with the help of sukuna

even invested his time learning boxing which later on paid soooo much

can literally make everyone on set "aww" whenever his script requires him so cry or even witness a gruesome death scene *cough* nanami and nobara *cough*

during breaks, him and nobara do tiktok challenges and even those kpop challenges all the time and the crew enjoys watching them do it and the fans like it too

he does it too with choso and todo

this guy literally has 3 older brothers who are protective of him it's so cute

this man is so talented, he can cook, sing, dance, act, and is pretty smart too during his university days, it's so hard not to be in love with him

the greenest of the green flags (just like nanamin!) the girls the guys the folks LOVE him so much, literally the standard

just like sukuna, he was fangirling so hard when he found out he's going to be in the same drama with THE nanami kento

he's such a big big BIG fan

has a fan account of him on twitter that is pretty popular but you didn't hear that from me

it's so cute when they're together because they're literally THE father and son duo EVER

has the time of his life whenever he visits nanami and his wife's house and just chill there, sometimes brings his first-year trio besties too (both nanami and his wife don't mind at all)

aside from sukuna, he sometimes practices fight scenes with nanami too!

he is so active on social media 😭 interacts with as many fans as he can and posts all the time on ig and twitter

has a lot of cute interactions with fans too

by extension, his account is sukuna's behind the scene account LOL

since his brother doesn't post a lot, sukuna's fans tune in to his posts and stories of sukuna behind the scenes or even just some pictures of him that he doesn't post

some of it are just pics of the brothers chilling or going out

yuuji is literally the sukuna fan's saint because of the amount of sukuna content he's giving them LOL

ok but don't get fooled by yuuji's sunshine personality, because he knows how to bite too

whenever he saw hate tweets his brother is getting for playing a villain, he is quick to respond and defend his brother

lowkey a nightmare for the PR team but they know where he's coming from

and despite sukuna telling him to just ignore it, he appreciates his little brother more than anything

ACTOR!YUUJI AS YOUR PARTNER:

one word: ANGEL

he's literally so lover coded oh my goodness

leaves you some post-it notes on the fridge every single day before he leaves to film

if the trip goes on for days he will leave at least three long love letters for you to read when you miss him and he's busy

creates personal vlogs JUST FOR YOU so if the both of you can't facetime, you'll still know what he is up to

when he was contacted to be the main character of the show, he confided in you whether or not he should accept the offer

don't get him wrong, he is beyond grateful the people think he's capable enough to be the main lead but it makes him nervous

this is his first main character role and the pressure of it all is heavy on his shoulders

he asked for his brother's opinion too but he trusts you enough to talk about his feelings regarding this

of course, when you said that you'll be there with him in every step and support him all the time and do everything to keep the communication between the two of you going despite his soon-to-be hectic schedule, his heart is finally set on accepting the role

you are so proud of him! your baby finally getting the recognition he deserves? hell yeah

his busy schedule was never a barrier between the two of you, yuuji never forgets to update and call you whenever his time permits and he always appreciates every cheer you have given him

type of actor boyfie to show you off his social media platform!

he posts your dates and even hangouts with each other

his fans find it quite adorable and is in love with your whole relationship

likes to do those couple tiktok challenges with you and post them online, you guys even have shippers lol

of course, if you're the lowkey type, yuuji would respect that and will only include you in his online shenanigans when you feel like it or allow him to post it

practicing lines with you is always exciting but never productive LOL

you both just end up giggling and laughing

in the end you just both opt to cuddle instead (or even make our LMFAO)

yuuji just feels so lucky to have his ever-supporting partner along the way

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anonymityisfunwriter · 7 months ago

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The Uptown Girl and The Brooklyn Boy

Pairing: Greaser!Bucky Barnes x Uptown Girl!Reader Summary: Everyone knows that all any Uptown Girl needs is a Greaser from Brooklyn to make her forget all about her uptown world.

A.N. - Here's a long awaited request from one of my dearest readers @oneofstarkskids, it definitely strayed a little from that initial request but i hope you enjoy! "just reread this and it's still so amazing 😭 do you take requests? if so, would you be inclined to writing a grease themed bucky au one shot?"

Bucky Barnes Masterlist | AnonymityIsFun Masterlist

Picture this... he's from the wrong side of the tracks. He's everything every mother in your neighborhood warned you about. His hands perpetually stuffed in his pockets, a cigarette hanging from his lips, scuffed leather jacket snug around his broad shoulders.

You're none of those things, the complete opposite. Pearls strung around your neck. Perfectly done up, lips painted the perfect rouge. You're as educated as a woman could be in your day and age. You're an Uptown girl. Capital O - Old Money.

Your friends are enamored with Bucky Barnes and his friends - though you all know they'll never do anything about. Not as long as their parents had anything to say about it. And none of them are prepared to give up their high class life. It's just fun for them. A way to sow some wild oats before their parents introduce them to their future husbands.

Every chance they get, they pester you to take the long way home. To walk by that mechanic shop where Bucky and his friends hang out.

They never approach those Brooklyn boys. No, they never offer more than a coy smile and a languid, flirty twinkle of their manicured fingers. They just relish in the attention they get from walking past them.

You hate it. You hate their arrogance. You hate the smell of nicotine that hangs around him. You hate everything about them, down to those oddly charming Brooklyn accents.

"Hey," a blonde boy calls as you and your best friend walk past their mechanic shop one day. "Hey!"

"I told you this was a bad idea," you hiss at your friend, locking your arm with hers. "Now, look."

"I think they want to talk to us," she squeals under her breath.

He picks up his stride, doing a half jog until he reaches where your friend holds you hostage on the pavement. "We see you ladies passin' through every once in a while. Thought we could be friends or somethin'."

Your friend is immediately entranced with the blonde boy. Her face flushes as she beams at him, "We would love that!"

"We have enough friends," you simultaneously reply.

"She's kidding," your friend nervously chuckles, elbowing you in your ribs.

The blonde boy laughs, rubbing the back of his neck, "Well, I'm Steve. My friend there is Bucky."

As if on cue, Bucky saunters up beside Steve with an equally arrogant grin. He tips his head at each of you. "Hello, ladies."

Your friend nods at the two of them, an ear to ear grin taking up her entire face. "It's nice to meet you, Steve, Bucky."

The brunette's eyes flash over to you, speaking through that infuriating smirk, "Pleasure's ours."

"Would you ladies like to join us for a Coke?" Steve offers.

"We'd love to!" she immediately replies.

You shoot your friend an intense, incredulous glare. "I'm sorry, could you excuse us for a second?"

"Sure thing." Steve nods, ambling away from you and your friend to give you a moment of privacy.

Bucky doesn't move an inch. He stands before you with that same arrogant smirk, his eyes gleaming with mischief. "Oh, I'm good right here."

"Fine," you scoff, speaking as bluntly as you can. Despite your polite upbringing, you you find don't care about offending him in the slightest. "We are not staying here!"

"Come on," she pleads. "What's the harm?"

"Where's the good in staying?" you shoot back.

"They're just so handsome," she fawns, looking over her shoulder to give a coy wave to the blonde boy. "And there's one for the both of us, it's fate!"

"It's not fate. They're nothing but trouble."

Bucky snorts, rolling his eyes, "You remember that I'm still right here, right?"

You shoot a glare at Bucky. "I know."

He playfully clutches his chest. "You're hurtin' my feelings, Doll."

You can feel the anger raising your blood's temperature. You don't like how quickly he's gotten underneath your skin. "I'm not your Doll."

"Princess?" he suggests with an infuriating wag of his eyebrows.

There's an embarrassingly large part of you that wants to stamp your foot at him and yell at him to stop teasing you. You keep it together just enough to contain that visceral reaction you're having to Bucky Barnes. Mostly. "I'm not your anything!"

He crosses his arms over his chest. "What did I ever do to you, Princess?"

Your eyes narrow in accusation. "I know your type."

"Charming? Irresistibly handsome?"

"Horrendously arrogant," you seethe at him. You turn back to your friend, only to find her missing, "Now, can we please go-"

"Your friend ran off the second you were focused on me."

Your eyes flicker to behind Bucky to your friend, who sure enough is enthralled in a conversation with Steve. "I was not focused on you!"

"Then why didn't you notice your friend runnin' away from you?"

"You're incorrigible."

The corner of Bucky's lips twitch up. "Didn't they teach you in that finishing school that it's not polite to insult people who are tryin' to be your friend?"

"And how would you know that I went to finishing school?"

He quirks an eyebrow at you like the answer is obvious. His eyes rake over you. From the way you hold yourself. To the dresses that oozed quiet luxury. You and Bucky were as different as night and day. "I know an uptown girl when I see one."

"And I know trouble when I see it," you shoot back. "And you Brooklyn boys are nothing but trouble."

It only gets worse from there. After that first interaction, your friend in fully infatuated with Steve Rogers. There is no tearing her away from him.

And that means, as your friend's dutiful alibi, you were dragged down to Brooklyn far more than you ever wanted.

And worst of all, it meant you spent most of your free time in the presence of Bucky Barnes.

"Please, just be nice," your friend begs as you trudge up to their garage. "I'd settle for polite even."

You scoff at her, rolling your eyes, "I'm always polite - just like I'm always nice."

"Not to Bucky, you're not."

"I don't know what you're talking about," you grumble, walking into the garage. Your friend takes off, immediately falling into the arms of Steve Rogers. Leaving you with Bucky Barnes to sit with him on the the couch that's become your most constant companion on days like today. As you walk past Bucky, you snipe, "James."

Bucky quirks a brow, smirking at you, "Oh, so now I'm James?"

"That's your name, isn't it?"

He walks away from the bike he spends most of his time working on, snatching a rag from his tool bench and wiping his hands of motor grease. Your eyes involuntarily wander to his hands, the care he puts into wiping each and every one of his fingers.

You stare for a second too long for Bucky not to notice you staring at his hands. "Remind me to thank Steve for tellin' ya that."

You roll your eyes, finally snapping out of it. "It's far better than the alternative."

He flicks the rag over, resting it on his shoulder. "So you like my name?"

You softly snort as you settle onto the couch. "I didn't say that. I said it was better than the alternative."

That smirk only gets even bigger. "What else do ya like about me?"

You roll your eyes. "Not a thing."

He settles into the couch beside you. Far too close for your liking. You can almost feel the rough denim of his jeans through your skirt. "I just love these conversations of ours."

"I don't."

His entire torso turns towards you, mischief and amusement gleaming in those blue eyes, "I mean, why would I want warmth and affection when I could have blind hatred?"

"It's not blind hatred." In spite of easily Bucky gets under your skin, you can't deny just how unfairly handsome he is. Even now, you find yourself lost in the depths of his ocean blue eyes. "It's perfectly reasonable contempt."

He gently runs a finger down your cheek. "I love when you talk smart to me."

You swat his hand away from your face. "Don't patronize me."

"I'm not!" Bucky insists. "I really love it! I know it's just your way of flirting with me!"

You scoff, making no attempt to hide your offense, "I am not flirting with you!"

He tilts his head at you, that arrogant smirk once again tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Come on, just admit it, Doll. You're a little sweet on me."

"I am not your Doll!" You fly up out of your seat with an indignant huff. "And I most certainly am not sweet on you!"

"Don't think I haven't noticed the way you stare at me when I walk around here without a shirt. Or the way you were staring at my hands just now. What exactly were you picturin' my hands doin'?"

"I was not picturing anything." Your cheeks flame as you continue to bicker back and forth with him. Sure, he was possibly the most gorgeous man you'd ever laid eyes on. And yes, he could be incredibly charming. And sometimes, you found yourself staring at him in an not so innocent way. But you hated him. He infuriated you to no end. "And I was not staring!"

The grin is practically splitting his face. "And you've definitely thought about kissin' me."

"I would rather walk from here to Jersey than kiss you."

He slides up off the couch, taking a long step towards you. "You've got a hell of a temper, you know that?"

You refuse to back down. You press an accusing finger into his chest. You can't help but notice just how firm the muscles underneath that white t-shirt are. "I just think you're real good at pushing my buttons."

"Real good?" Bucky teases. "I think Brooklyn is startin' to rub off on you."

"You know what I think?" Your chest starts to heave with the anger and frustration you feel towards Bucky Barnes. "I think that you're the last person I would ever let rub off on me. I think that you're an arrogant smart ass that likes to spend his day running his mouth."

"And I think you're a repressed priss that couldn't take what she wanted 'less it's handed to her on a silver platter."

"You wouldn't know a damn thing about what I want."

"You wanna know what I think..." He leans closer, lowering himself to your eye level. "I think that you're pissed off because you know deep down those punk ass rich boys will never make ya happy, I think you're pissed off 'cause you're bored, and I think you're pissed off 'cause you want me - even if you'll never admit it."

You don't have a response to that. There's not a single word that comes to mind. You don't think you've ever been this mad before.

And because you can't think of a single word to assuage your heaving chest and boiling blood, you do something that a polite, good girl like you would never even dreaming of doing. Before you can think, you find your hand opening and winding back.

Before you can even make contact with his cheek, he catches your hand, gripping your wrist between his warm, calloused hand. He hauls you forward until you stumble into his chest.

For a moment, you can almost hear a pin drop. The tension is so thick the only air in the room Bucky's breath dancing across your lips. "I think I'm gonna kiss you."

A soft breath stutters from your lips. "And I think I'm gonna let you."

You weren't sure what it was, but after that first kiss, you couldn't get enough of your Brooklyn boy. Even after your friend and Steve had mostly fizzled out, you couldn't get enough of him.

You waited for the moment that they all talked about, the moment when you had your fill of the boy from the wrong side of tracks, when your wild oats were sufficiently sowed, but it never came.

Every time you laid eyes on him, the seal on your fate only solidified more and more. The more you saw him, the more you wanted him. And the more sure you were that you would never be able to let him go.

You weren't a stranger to the boredom and monotony of your upper echelon life, but this was different. This wasn't boredom, he wasn't a distraction. From the moment you met Bucky, you lost all interest in the upper echelon of it all.

Suddenly, you don't care what your friends think, what your parents would think. Suddenly, you were throughly repulsed by the thought of marrying one of those repressed, trust fund babies that littered your street.

And even your friends, the same ones that lived off their fleeting attention, didn't understand.

Your friend rolls her eyes again, a sigh of irritation leaving her lips as you ready to go meet Bucky, "Are you really going back up there?"

"You're the reason I met him in the first place!"

"I know. I know," she groans, clearly disappointed that you hadn't lost interest in Bucky like she had with Steve. "And I'm happy for you! I am! I just I want to make sure..."

Her tone finally gets your full attention. You put your bag down on the table, your eyebrow pulled together, "Make sure what?"

"You're just sowing wild oats, right?"

Your entire face puckers with distaste, "What?"

"That sounded bad," she backtracks, a guilty look painting her face. She takes a deep breath, resting a condescending hand on your shoulder. "You just - you know your future isn't with Bucky, right?"

You shake her hand off your shoulder. "What does that mean?"

"He's from a different world than we are. You know that."

"I can't believe what I'm hearing," you scoff. "I thought you, of all people, would understand."

"Come on, he's not exactly the sort of guy you can bring home to your parents."

You snort, turning away from her, "I have to go."

"You know I'm right!" she calls after you.

You didn't know that. In fact, the more time you spent with him, the more you saw why he was exactly the right person to bring home to your parents. He was everything you could ever bring yourself to hope for and more. Sure, he was different than you and your family, but he was a good man. He was perfect for you.

Surely, your parents could see that. Surely, they could see how good he was for you.

So that's exactly what you were going to do.

Bucky sighs against your lips, "I missed ya."

You don't know when that happened, but you've come to find a comfort in the scent of the faded leather of his jacket, in the feeling of his calloused fingertips trailing dangerously high on your upper thigh.

In the backseat of his beloved car, you curl closer into his side, resting your head on his chest, "Me too."

He kisses the top of your head, watching as you stare off into the distance, "What's goin' on in that pretty head of yours?"

You pull back slightly, lifting your head off his chest. With a furrowed brow, you ask him, "How serious are you about me?"

"Dead serious," he replies in an instant.

You lightly swat his chest. "Quit playing."

"'M not playin'," he swears. He does an 'x' over his heart, "Cross my heart."

His answer gives you all the reassurance you need. All there was to do was ask him. Still, there was a hesitancy. You worry that this will just make him realize that you two might just be insurmountably, irreconcilably different. You decide that the best way to ask is just ask. "Then what would you say about meeting my parents?"

"I'd love to," Bucky coolly answers.

You can't help the way your face lights up with hope. "Really?"

"Of course. Anything for my girl."

You really like the way that sounds. His girl. You could get used to being his girl.

The look on your face is worth it all to Bucky. He only hopes you don't see the anxiety in his expression.

He wasn't oblivious to how different your worlds were. He knew there was a good chance that this wouldn't last forever. It didn't really matter what he wanted or how much he was willing to fight for you, he knew the reality of it all.

He couldn't offer you half of what someone in your neighborhood could. Your worlds couldn't be more different.

And he's never been more aware of it than on the eve of meeting your parents.

Steve smirks at Bucky as he fiddles with his tie again. "You're really seein' this through, aren't you?"

Bucky smacks Steve upside his head. "Don't be a jerk."

"I'm just sayin'," Steve shrugs, settled into the couch of Bucky's family home. "I'm happy for ya, Buck. You really like this girl."

"I wouldn't be dressed like this for anyone else. Are you sure this is right?" Bucky tugs at his tie again. Maybe it was that the suit hadn't seen the light of day in a few years and was a little more snug than he remembered. Or maybe it was just that he'd only dressed like this for funerals and weddings, but everything about his getup today made him feel like a fraud. He was sure if your parents saw him like this, they'd see right through him. "I feel like I'm goin' to a school dance."

"Where does she live again?"

Bucky tries his best to hide his wince. He'd never been to your side of town, but he'd heard stories. Sure, most of them were made up, but there had to be some truth buried in the tall tales. "Upper West Side."

Steve pats his shoulder. "Stick with the tie, Buck."

He listens to Steve's advice and sticks with the tie. As he walks through your neighborhood, seeing houses bigger than entire apartment buildings on his block that line your street, he's pretty confident in trusting Steve up until the moment he sees you.

Your smile stutters as you see him waiting outside the gate of your home. It was just his luck that your house was one of the biggest on the block. Your eyes trail up and down Bucky's uncharacteristic attire. "What are you wearing?"

His heart sinks. He looks down, patting his blazer and tie. "Am I - Am I not this thing right? I knew it - I told Steve -"

"No, no," you quickly interject. "You look great! I've just never seen you... like this."

"What's wrong with this?" Bucky hedges.

Your soft smile up at him is the only thing soothing his knotted stomach. "Nothing, I - I just wanted them to meet you, to meet the Bucky that I know and - and I want them to know you. Not whoever this is."

"I - I didn't think they would like that Bucky very much," Bucky confesses.

It doesn't escape you that he's nervous, especially as he fiddles with this tie over and over again. You're well aware of how intimidating this all is. Even as someone who grew up in this social circle, in the thick of the upper echelon, you still found yourself scared of doing and saying the wrong thing.

You knew he was only trying to fit in as best as he could. Still, you missed the smell of his leather jacket, the waft of motor oil that often clung to his skin. "Well, I like you the way you are. Greaser and all."

"Thanks." It's comforting to him. Still, as his eyes rove over your house, he can't help but be glad he listened to both Steve and his mother. He holds out the bouquet of flowers in his hand. "My Ma told me to bring these for your Ma."

An endeared smile tugs at the corner of your mouth. He was really trying to win over your parents. He really was serious about this - about you. "My mother will love this."

"Your mother," Bucky corrects himself, doing his best to tame his Brooklyn twang.

"Just be yourself," you assure him, giving his hand a gentle squeeze as you make your way up the long driveway. "No one else, just you."

"Any other tips?"

"If you run out of things to talk about ask my father about his cars. He collects them."

It takes everything in Bucky not to gape like a fish out of water. "He collects... cars?"

You ignore his question, continuing to fill Bucky in on your parents, "And my mother, well, she's a terrible gossip. If you can get her talking about her friends, you've won her over."

"Okay. Anything else?"

"Just relax. They'll love you."

As he walks into your home, greeted by a man wearing a nicer suit than he is who offered to take his coat from him, Bucky's not quite sure he believes you.

Your heels click against the sleek marble flooring as you guide him through your home. He holds on tight to your hand, half afraid that you'll let go and he'll get lost in the labyrinth of pristine beige hallways.

Your father is the first to greet Bucky in your living room. He extends a hand out to Bucky. "You must be the boy we've heard so much about."

"It's nice to meet you both," Bucky returns the firm handshake before turning to your mother with the warmest smile he can muster through his anxiety. "You have a lovely home, ma'am. I brought these for you."

She takes the bouquet from Bucky's hand. "Oh, that's very kind of you..."

"Oh, it's Bucky," he supplies.

"Bucky?" your mother dubiously repeats. "How unique..."

"It's James, actually," Bucky corrects himself, already feeling himself getting flustered. "James Buchanan Barnes. 's where Bucky comes from."

Your mother nods, offering a tight smile, "How lovely."

As your mother hands off the flowers to one of the wait staff, he can't help but already feel like he's already made that dreaded bad first impression.

As though you can see the despair forming in the pit of his stomach and dampening the glimmer in his blue eyes, you give his hand a squeeze along with a smile.

"Dinner is ready," your mother announces. "Why don't we make our way to the dining room?"

"That sounds wonderful," you beam, leading Bucky into the next room. You stutter to a stop just before the dining table. You look at the table as you take your seat, your eyebrows furrowed at something that Bucky hasn't quite caught on to. "Mother? I thought we agreed on a more simple menu tonight."

As you speak you reach under the table, giving Bucky's hand an apologetic squeeze. Just from your inflection, Bucky can tell what awaits him will not be pleasant.

"Nonsense." She dismissively waves you off. "We have a guest."

"We talked about this," you admonish. "You promised."

"Bucky?" your mother calls. "Do you mind having a more formal dinner? I know it might be a tad unusual for you."

"Mother," you sharply warn.

"Um, no, ma'am," Bucky awkwardly lilts. "That sounds lovely."

A self satisfied smirk settles on your mother's face. "See? It's fine."

"Why are there so many forks?" Bucky whispers under his breath.

"Just work your way in," you reply as quietly as you can.

"Do you change forks every bite or somethin'?" It's half an attempt at a joke, half an honest question.

"In between courses."

"Courses?"

Before you can answer Bucky's question, your mother is already beginning her interrogation. "So, James, tell us about yourself."

"There's not much to tell," Bucky replies. "I was born and raised down in Brooklyn."

Your father snorts, "Really?"

You're not quite sure if Bucky catches the sarcastic lilt to your father's question or if he really does just try to rise above it. It's hard to tell with how he rolls with the punches. "Yes, sir."

"Any siblings?" your mother asks.

"I'm the oldest of four, ma'am."

"Any plans for your life?" your father finally pipes in.

"Dad," you hiss.

Your father shrugs, "It's an honest question."

Once again, it rolls off of Bucky's back. "Well, I'm workin' at a garage right now. Me and my friend, Steve, we're hopin' to buy it out. We've just about saved enough between the two of us to buy it from the ol' man when he's ready to retire."

"A man with a plan. I like that."

"Thank you, sir." You're sure that you hear Bucky's sigh of relief as he finds his footing. You can practically see his signature smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Your daughter tells me that you have an impressive collection yourself."

You weren't entirely sure how he pulled it off, but by the end of the night, Bucky is talking to your parents like they're old friends.

You're not even sure why you're that surprised, you hated him up until the moment you succumbed to his charm.

As the evening comes to a close, he stands in the doorway, shaking your father's hand again, offering your mother that charming grin once more, "Thank you for dinner. Everything was delicious."

"You're welcome back anytime, James."

"Thank you." You're almost shocked at your mother's open invitation. He presses a chaste kiss to your cheek. "I'll see ya later."

The three of you stand in the foyer of your house as Bucky walks down the steps and down the driveway with his hands shoved in his pockets. You look up to your father, face filled with hope. "So?"

"He's a nice boy."

You're not sure your grin can get any bigger. "I really like him."

"You'll grow out of it."

Your heart sinks the moment the words leave your father's mouth. "What?"

"It can't come soon enough," your mother groans. "You're far too good for him."

"You don't know him."

"We know his type, dear," your mother condescendingly sighs. "And good girls like you don't belong with boys like that, but I do think it was sweet of you to invite your little infatuation to dinner."

You feel like all the air has been knocked out of you. For a moment tonight, you really thought they were coming around. You truly thought it would all work out for the best. "Infatuation?"

"That's what this is, right?" your father asks, concern painting his expression when he sees the furiously determined look in your face. "You're just... rebelling?"

You look up at your father, shaking your head. "No, no, I'm not just rebelling."

You fought with them the whole night before you went to find him the very next day. They threatened you with everything they could think of. When that didn't work, they bribed you with everything they could think of. You didn't care for any of it.

The moment you see him, you know he knows. You're not sure if he realized it the moment he walked out of your door or if it took him a quick recollection of the night to realize it, but he knows all the same. It looks like he hasn't slept a wink. A deep frown replaces his usual grin. He looks entirely and totally distraught.

He notices you the moment you walk up to his garage just like you did all those times before.

This time, it's obvious is different. There aren't barbed words or verbal jabs. You don't bound into his arms. Even Steve offers you a sad twitch of his lips.

Bucky watches you for a long moment before you break the silence. He reaches into his pocket, lighting a cigarette in between his fingers. "Hi."

"They hated me, right?" He doesn't waste words. Your lips press together in a tight line. He takes a large drag from his cigarette. You can't remember the last time you saw him smoking. He shakes his head, hissing under his breath, "Damn it..."

"Bucky?"

He takes another large pull from his cigarette. Even from feet away, you can smell the nicotine in the air. "Just do it. I understand."

"What?"

"That's why you're here, right? Just get it over with."

Your eyebrows furrow. "I don't understand."

"I'm not an idiot, alright?" he spits. "I know I didn't pass their little test, so just call it already."

"Is that really what you thought last night was?"

"What else would you call last night? 'Cause I think I was the butt of the joke from beginnin' to end."

"You were not the butt of the joke, Bucky."

"Oh, please, I fell face first into their punchline."

You suck in a shaky breath, both your own hurt and the cloud of smoke around Bucky burning at your throat, "Is that what you think of me? That I was tryin' to set you up?"

"Yes! No- No! I just - I - Don't you see it?"

"See what?" you demand.

"That I'm not good enough for you!" he desperately exclaims, tossing his cigarette on the pavement. "And everyone else already knows it! Last night proved that!"

"My parents are assholes, Bucky. I came here to apologize for them, to tell you that I don't care what they think."

His voice quiets, the anger melts off his words until all that's left is a heartbreaking sincerity, "You should. You deserve so much more than what I can give you."

"They don't know you, but I do." You reach for his hand, lacing your fingers with his. "And I think you've got everything I want. I'm yours, Bucky. All yours."

"Do you mean that?"

"Every word."

"What did I do to deserve you? My perfect girl." He kisses the back of the hand he hods, using it to tug you closer to him. He quirks a brow at you when you pull away from him. "What?"

You wrinkle your nose at him. "I hate the smell of smoke."

"I'll quit," he immediately replies.

"You'll quit smoking? Just like that?"

"That surprise you?"

"It's just - Maybe you Brooklyn boys aren't as tough as you think you are," you tease.

He smirks. "Maybe we're not. Maybe I'm not - but I think it's because I'm in love with an Uptown girl."

Bucky Barnes Masterlist AnonymityIsFun Masterlist

As always, let me know what you think! Reblogs and comments are always appreciated! 💛

Taglist: @marianita195 @meli18gonzalez @ludicbouquetfromearth @matchat3a @famousbreadcherryblossomsstuff @valoraxx @blue786sworld @buckyandgeraltsupremacy @geminigengar @ansaturn @ecolle @lexhalstead3 @ybflkmj @mediocre-daydreams @shanye1112 @thegirlnextdoorssister @toomanyfanficsbruh @moonlightreader649 @breathtaking-cynthia @mirikusashes @beans-and-toast-blog @niyahcoca @katiechikin @elxvrr @antiheroxsblog @infamouslyclumsy @krissydclayton93 @buckysbarne @deadheadwbedhead @qualitygiantshoepsychic @whitexwolfxx310 @getosprettyboy @matchat3a @weallhaveadestiny @mostlymarvelgirl @honeydew3064 @michealharrypotter @mrs-bucky-barnes-73 @withyoutilltheendoftheline @the-photo-hoe @rae-nna @sarachabeans1 @double-shot-of-tequila @spookyparadisesheep @lunaalovesyouu @daisy-loves-bucky @roseproseposts @theoraekenslover @king814318 @maybesomedaytho @carlie-babes99 @sunshinechikin @as-white-as-snow-love @melala1030 @badasswlthafatass

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luvvyouforever · 6 months ago

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headcanons : med student!abby anderson x liberal arts student!reader ᥫ᭡

content: wlw relationship. modern college au. ramblings of fluff, maybe a touch of angst but nothing heavy. enjoy <3

a/n: my authority for writing this you ask? i'm an english major who gets asked regularly what i am going to do with my degree! also this is my first time writing about abby i just had to get this idea out of my head and on to the screen.

-abby decided at a young age to follow in her father's footsteps and become a doctor as well. she committed herself to studying science and math as a kid and occasionally disregarded her other studies like music, art, and english. she did enough to keep a 4.0 GPA but her heart was in science tournaments, young medical professional groups, and ap bio.

-she got into one of the best schools in the states for medicine and was a stellar student in organic chemistry, anatomy, and neurology. she knew she was going to do great on her MCAT, but unfortunately, she wasn't doing so great in some of her gen ed classes and it was impacting her gpa.

-that was how she found herself in a tutoring center in one of the older buildings on campus that was shockingly different from the science buildings she spent all of her time in. she had an appointment with you, but was so nervous to go and admit that she was having trouble in something as simple as art history or literature or communication.

-when she sat down to have her appointment with you, you immediately calmed her nerves and assured her that there was nothing wrong with needing some help in classes she wasn't comfortable in. you helped her ace her quiz and then she just kept coming in to see you. over and over. until she eventually passed the class with an A and no longer needed your assistance.

-and then, as luck would have it, abby got her own job as a tutor for science courses and who happened to walk in but you! the tutor who helped her pass her own difficult course.

-it was history from there.

-despite abby's commitment to her education, she was always able to carve time out of her schedule to be with you. she loves studying with you and filling up a room in the library with your stuff to prepare for exams together. she takes a whiteboard and writes all of her notes on it while you're rereading historical texts or revising your final paper about a painting abby doesn't really quite understand.

-she never makes you feel less than for not studying something "more difficult" as people have before. she loves hearing about your passions for history or writing stories or creating art. she'll come with you to art galleries and try to input her own thoughts from time to time about what she thinks certain pieces mean.

-she understands that graduate school applications are just as important to you as medical school applications are for her. you'll do practice interviews with each other and try on outfits for each other.

-abby will not stand for someone making fun of you for your choice of studies. you two once went to a family gathering on abby's side and when some of her family members began interrogating you on how you're going to get a job and even imply that you'll be living off of abby for your whole life, she gets all up in their face and comforts you later! you will not be sending birthday wishes to those family members anymore and she can guarantee that.

-if you guys get accepted in to schools that are long-distance from each other, you'll absolutely make it work. abby is so methodical that she'll never forget to text you and plans out times that either of you can visit.

-if you ever dedicate a piece that you've created in school to her, she'll positively swoon. like if you wrote a poem about her, she would print it out and pin it up on the fridge. if you painted her, she would hang it up on the wall. and she's the best model for those things too

-i imagine that dinners with your colleagues or friends are very random. abby has but a few friends in her residency and they're each as professional as her. you, however, come with a group of lively people who are discussing philosophical ideas or debating about a piece of art history and how its influenced modern culture. it would be an interesting combination to say the least.

-abby would just be so interested in anything you have to do and would never be critical of your choices. she sees the passion you have for things that lie far outside her field and appreciates it. your future apartment that you build years after meeting when you are each established in your dream careers is a mesh of medical textbooks and flashcards and models but also messy journals and thrifted antiques and poems written on sticky notes for her to find.

#the last of us #tlou #abby tlou #abby anderson x reader #abby anderson #abby the last of us #fluff #the last of us headcanons #abby anderson headcanons #modern tlou

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iwannakisskissyoureyesagain · 28 days ago

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uhhh even more percy jackson headcanons

- there’s always music playing in the apollo cabin. they have communal playlists, but there are times when one person gets to play dj, especially when it’s relatively empty

- everyone has to emotionally prepare for audial whiplash whenever kayla gets to play music because she puts every song she has ever liked in her entire life onto one playlist, so it can go from twenty one pilots to ethel cain to beabadoobee to fifth harmony in just fifteen minutes

- will is usually pretty lenient with who gets to play what and when (he has a few clean playlists for when there are little kids present), but on days when the infirmary is packed and he’s visibly on the verge of collapse, no one dares change it from whatever kasey musgraves song he just put on

- austin exclusively plays obscure 20+ minute-long jazz songs. austin no longer has access to the cabin 7 spotify account

- there are bi-monthly meetings with all the counselors and chiron and dionysus to discuss any problems, questions, quests, deaths, fights, complaints, and other issues

- chiron ended up helping train and appointing a few other apollo kids to take up shifts in the infirmary when will accidentally fell asleep in the middle of one of said meetings. will kept insisting it was fine and that he wasn’t overworked, but eventually gave in when nico kept having to nudge him awake and chiron had to send him back to the apollo cabin early so he could take a nap

- frank cried so hard when he saw barbie that he had to leave the theater for a minute

- drew and will went to the sweat tour together

- drew actually kind of hates that charlie xcx is only really getting properly noticed now because of brat, because she’s a huge charlie fan and has been here since “boom clap”

- ever since blood of olympus, percy is genuinely terrified of getting a nosebleed. the first time it happens is when he’s sick at college and annabeth has to coach him through a panic attack

- nico isn’t actually that invested in star wars, star trek, or any other sci-fi franchise that will obsesses over, but sits through it anyways for his boyfriend’s sake

- piper and shel dressed up as different versions of chappell roan for halloween. piper was lady liberty chappell and shel was “good luck, babe” bird chappell

- every chance they get, piper and leo meet up, get jack in the box, smoke weed, and catch up in whatever car piper stole from her dad, because it helps them both feel normal

- piper and will smoke together whenever she visits camp, usually while having a shit talk session

- sally, paul, and estelle visited percy and annabeth for family and friends weekend while they’re at school, of course, but tyson, ella, hazel, and frank, piper and leo, and nico, will, reyna, and thalia (and, by nature, the rest of the hunters) all made time to stop by at various points during family and friends

- once he realized he could occasionally get away with sneaking out of olympus in the middle of the night, ganymede developed a habit of taking a walk down the beach at camp. he ran into dionysus one night and fully expected to have to fetch some fancy wine for him, or at least go back to get his chalice, unaware of his sobriety punishment, but did a total 180 when dionysus ended up being kind to him. instead, the two of them walked and talked about how much they both hate zeus, and it ended up becoming a therapy session for ganymede (think aimee’s first session in sex education)

- sally got annabeth one of those self defense keychains before she left for school

- apollo brings meg to camp every time he goes to visit his kids. on one visit, he took her, will, kayla, austin, and nico to build-a-bear. it was meg and nico’s first time going. nico was in total awe and meg cried and hugged apollo for a minute straight

- hazel prefers cartoons and animation over live-action movies and shows

- percy is really good at watercolor. rachel tries to teach him to paint and thinks he’s a prodigy until they move onto acrylics and she realizes he was just manipulating the water

- annabeth and sally both love watching the princess bride together. percy tries to watch it three separate times for their sake, like nico does with will’s sci-fi stuff, but ends up drooling on annabeth’s shoulder by the end of the movie each time

- percy desperately wanted a water bed for years when he was younger, but neither chiron nor sally would trust him with one. he eventually begged paul to get him one as a graduation present, and he put it in his cabin at camp. it lasted less than 24 hours before he popped it and woke up in the middle of the night on top of the deflated mattress, he himself completely dry but his floor absolutely soaked. dionysus made an announcement at breakfast the next morning that any mattress filled with anything except air was prohibited, and anyone else who flooded their cabin would get stable duties for a whole week

- will doesn’t like to use his plague powers very much after tsats, but he does like to give anyone who pisses him off mild-but-annoying congestion or a lingering headache

- nico and will like to do this thing to mess with people, where nico cracks will’s back or will cracks his knuckles and he lights up, usually in front of people who don’t actually know how will’s powers work

- austin is the exception to this rule; they do it in front of him because he hates the sound of people cracking their bones

- there was a point where everyone knew that will could glow except percy. he found out the hard way when he, annabeth, nico, and will were hanging out in the jackson-blofis apartment and the power went out, and nico cracked will’s spine and will started glowing. percy was so freaked out that he screamed and woke up the rest of the house

- sometimes frank eats fistfuls of shredded cheese, for the thrill

- very rarely, rachel talks in her sleep and says indiscernible bits of prophecies, both new and old. she has no idea she does it

- apollo hates leonard cohen

pt. 1

pt. 2

pt. 3

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gunsandspaceships · 8 months ago

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Tony’s Childhood. Part 1: Identifying facts

In the MCU, Tony sometimes acts like a kid. There is a reason behind every behavior, so I wondered what it was like for him when he was a real kid.

So, the questions of the day: what do we know about Tony's childhood? Did he have one? And, most importantly, how did it affect him?

Let’s first list what we know from the movies:

At age 4 Tony built his first circuit board (IM1)

At age 6 built his first engine (IM1)

Was sent to a boarding school by Howard (IM2)

Cracked the Pentagon’s firewall in high school on a dare (AoU)

Had a nanny until the age of 14 (IM3)

Went to college at 14 (IM1)

Built Dum-E and U when he was there (IM1)

At 17 graduated summa cum laude from MIT (IM1)

Continued his education until his parents’ death (CW)

Tony’s genius gave him two things: the brain and the pain. And by the pain, I mean that instead of interacting and bonding with his parents, enjoying life, playing, having fun, making friends, taking care of pets, and all the other things children do to gradually prepare for adulthood and grow up "healthy", he got this list of achievements. That doesn’t make a person normal.

Parents

We know his relationship with Howard was complicated. Howard loved him in his own way. He had too many things to do to be a good father: SI, S.H.I.E.L.D., scientific projects, trying to build a better future with clean energy, etc. All good, except when you want your child to love you back. Especially if in the tiny amount of time you spend with him, you don’t show him any signs of affection.

What do we know about Maria? Her name, what she looked like, that she played the piano, and died at Winter Soldier’s hand on Dec 16, 1991. That’s it. She didn’t spend much time with Tony either. Remember, he even had a nanny, instead of a mother. Tony's words about her showed that he loved her, but he didn't talk much about her. Because she wasn’t present in his life enough. Why? Because…

School

Howard sent Tony to a boarding school.

Here’s in the S.H.I.E.L.D.s file we have this information about the school:

“Phillips Academy, Andover, MA 1977-1984”

This means he was there from age 7 to 14. Howard sent him to a boarding school when he was SEVEN.

Phillips Academy Andover serves grades 9-12 only (it is a college preparatory school). Thus, either this is a mistake by the creators of the film/file, or Tony, due to his genius, became an exception. Since the early age he was already at school was also mentioned in IM2 tie-in comics, and in Earth-616 that was also 7, we can mark 1977-1984 as valid.

Think about it again: Tony was sent to boarding school in another state when he was 7 years old. He spent another 7 years there, alone, among high school-aged teenagers. No parents around, no peers.

For example, even Hogwarts accepts 11-year-old children, and they live with their peers. Now imagine Harry Potter, at the age of 7, is thrown into a dorm with 7th-year students and locked there. Doesn’t make a person normal either, does it?

Nannies and Jarvis

Since Tony was at the boarding school, there are two options for how he could have a nanny (mentioned in IM3) and spend time with Edwin Jarvis:

1) He was at the boarding school with a nanny. There is almost no possibility that the nanny was Edwin Jarvis because Jarvis was Howard’s butler and had other responsibilities.

2) He had a nanny at home in the summer and during short school breaks. In this case, his parents couldn’t even give him this little of their precious time.

In any case, he could only see Jarvis at home, a few months a year at most.

Note: There is a date error in IM3, stating Tony was 14 in 1983. This is clearly an error and we can omit this detail.

Bullying

Remember this dialog between Tony and Harley in IM3?

0:45:15 – Harley asks him how he knew he was being bullied at school. Tony doesn't answer. He gives him a non-lethal flash thing to "discourage bullying."

We see that Tony knew exactly what was going on with Harley at school. Because that’s exactly what happened to him there. Harley reminded him of himself. Brilliant kid with no friends and practically no parents. He was bullied by 9th-12th graders.

If he had a nanny with him at the school, that probably made things even worse. He would be bullied because he has a nanny, and despite he has one to look after him.

In Part 2 we will discuss how all this affected him. Stay tuned.

#tony stark #iron man #marvel #mcu #the avengers #iron man 3 #iron man 2 #avengers age of ultron #captain america civil war #harley keener #phillips academy andover #edwin jarvis #howard stark #maria stark

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star-anise · 1 year ago

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The thing about "parents' rights" and "protect the children [from hearing that other ways of life than ours are possible and okay]" is that it is literally, in the purest sense of the word, patriarchy.

The word literally means "rule by the fathers". We're generally used to hearing it describe how adult women can be dominated by adult men. However, that's not where patriarchy ends; feminists have been less eager to address how within that system, women can exercise power and domination of their own through the traditional gender roles of motherhood. Their maternal rights to power and dominance may have traditionally been lesser than paternal ones, but they were never less than their minor children's. Even single-mother or female-only families can be, in this sense, patriarchal.

Patriarchal families are a complex system that grants parents complete legal and practical control over nearly every aspect of their children's lives. The patriarchal family controls where the child lives, who takes care of them, what rules they have to follow, how they are educated, who they associate with, what healthcare they receive, what religion they practice, and whether they can work or control any money they earn or that is given to or for them.

Normally discussions of patriarchy are a lot more abstract. But right now it's very concrete and real: we are fighting to limit the family's control over children on issues where we can observe that families sometimes tend to make decisions that are bad for the children's welfare or that disrespect their human rights.

Whether a minor child can get an abortion. Whether they can receive gender-affirming care. Whether it's okay to lie or coerce your child to ensure they follow your religion. Whether they deserve to be educated about factual histories or scientific theories that are necessary to understanding the world around them. Whether they deserve to learn accurate, age-appropriate information about consent, setting boundaries, how their bodies and the bodies of other people work, what a normal range of gender and sexual identities look like, what healthy or unhealthy relationships look like, and what sex is, how it works, what its positives and negatives are, and how they might navigate the world, whether or not they ever want to have it.

Hell, on some levels we're still arguing about whether it's okay to hit your kids, or whether children have the right, similar to the rights adults have, not to be assaulted or abused.

Because there are a LOT of people who say: No. Parents should have 100% control over any or all of those issues. If the parent says no, the child is not allowed to do or have any of those things, and nobody else should be allowed to interfere and provide them to the child without their parents' consent.

Pointing this out often results in parents saying, "Oh, so you want just ANYONE to be able to go up and talk sex with kids? You want kids to be able to decide to jump off cliffs with nobody stopping them???" As though parents are the single protective force in the universe, the only thing standing between their child and the ravages of absolute chaos.

On the contrary: most of the time the argument is for children to receive care and guidance from adults who are monitored to ensure they treat children in safe and appropriate ways, who have spent many years studying the best and most rigorously tested of our collective understanding of how to prepare children for happy, healthy lives.

And we are arguing against people who believe that the only important qualification needed to refuse children that kind of care is to be ranked above them in their family hierarchy.

In conclusion...

Fuck the patriarchy. Children have human rights too.

#child abuse tw #child neglect tw #staranise original #patriarchy #children's rights

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trippinsorrows · 7 months ago

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with me + part one

authors note: well, i got some type of writers block working on two other RR wip's so opened a new google doc and ended up with this. prob gonna be 3 parts, maybe 4. there's an almost five year time jump after this one, can you guess why? also, joe's wife is an oc, not galina.

first time posting my roman writings on here and trying not to freak out tbh

warnings: angst, infidelity, language, suggestive content

song inspo: with me by destiny's child

word count: 4,000

You know that assignment everyone at some point in their education where they research what they want to be when they grow up and share it with the whole class for a grade? Yeah, that big mammoth of a question that somehow you’re supposed to have confidently answered before even reaching double digits.

That was always super easy for you.

From as far back as you can remember, you wanted to be a teacher. It took until you were in middle school, almost high school for you to settle on an elementary school teacher, college for a specific grade. But, the teaching profession always called to you.

You chalk it up to your grandmother, undoubtedly one of your favorite people in this entire world. She was also an elementary school teacher who taught until she was expectedly called home when you were 14. Some part of you wonders if you’ve never even allowed yourself to entertain any other professions because of her loss. She was your best friend, and following in her footsteps was wanted but also felt somewhat necessary. Like you had to in order to honor her and her legacy.

A couple years into your career, you still think about that, how you’ve known from such a young age what you wanted to do with your life. Well, one part.

In other areas, maybe the most important areas, you were lost as all of the outdoors. Mostly in one area, if you’re being honest, and truthfully, it’s not even what you want in as much as it is how you get there. The path is relatively simple: find a man, fall in love, get married, have babies, live happily ever after.

It’s such a stereotypical trajectory, but one you’ve also envisioned for yourself since your late teens. You’d gotten partying all out of your system during the early college years, somewhat in high school as well. Now in your mid 20s, soon to be late 20s, all you want to do is prepare to eventually settle down. Sooner rather than later.

And the issue isn’t even having no prospects. You have a prospect, he’s just unavailable.

Because he’s already fucking married.

But can you even call him a prospect when that implies there’s some chance? Because there’s zero chance. You know this. You know this very well, too well. So why you still allow him into your bed and inside of you is beyond you. Yes, the sex is out of this world, but you desire more than that. Maybe not at first, but almost three years deep into this arrangement, most definitely.

You still think back to your first meeting.

Your best friend won a contest that not only granted her two front row tickets to a Smackdown show but backstage passes as well. You met so many wrestlers that night, some you grew up watching on TV as the little tomboy that you were as a kid. But, it was one wrestler in particular: tall, muscular, hair more beautiful and silky than any silk press your beautician mother could ever style, that changed your life. Whether for better or worse remains to be seen.

He was attractive, extremely, possibly one of the most beautiful men you’d ever met. But, the attraction was short-lived when you spotted the wedding band on his left hand. You’d be lying if you tried to say that was when the attraction sizzled out. It diminished, but it was still there. Still, you didn’t think much of it, that was until you received a call from a number on your phone that you didn't recognize.

Why you even accepted the call is still a mystery. You never answered random calls, yet that one was an exception, an exception that resulted in you having an unexpected phone conversation with Roman fucking Reigns. He explained that he got your number from your friend who’d exchanged contact information with a wrestler she met that night as well. They were messing around too, that much you knew. And good for her. He, unlike Roman, was not married and therefore free to fuck around.

The conversation lasted much longer than it needed to, especially given the flirtatious nature it quickly took on. It was wrong, you knew this well, very well. He took vows, but you were also aware of those vows. And heat no point pressured you into anything, you could have cut it off. Flirtatious he was, but forceful he was not.

The conversations increased in frequency and length over a matter of weeks that turned into months, and before you knew it, your day started and ended with either a text or phone call from the wrestler.

A small part of you knew that it would eventually escalate into more, a man like him seemed like he needed more. But, you stupidly tried to tell yourself that when that time came, you would remain strong and draw the line in the sand with just communication. Even if it was just as wrong as anything else.

It was a silly thought.

Your resolve was weak.

You absolutely did not need to accept his invitation to fly you out to one of his shows, and you damn sure didn’t need to allow him to take you back to his hotel where your legs ended up wrapped around his waist as he pounded into you—among other things—until the early hours of the morning.

The days after that were rough. You felt absolutely disgusted with yourself. It was one thing to flirt with a married man, but it was an entirely different thing to fuck a married man. He wasn’t yours. He belonged to someone else. He had a life with some other woman. You had no right to insert yourself into that union, so you decided to sever contact with him, deleting his number from your phone and shoving the experience in the ‘biggest regret of your life’ box with no intention of reopening it.

Unfortunately for you, Roman, Joe, as he asked you to call him, was a persistent bastard.

You ignored his texts, so he called. You ignored his calls, so he texted. You ignored both, and this motherfucker showed up at your goddamn door. There were multiple times you could have and should have ended things, that being another perfect opportunity. If you told him to leave that night, not allowed him into your apartment, he would have listened. He was stubborn and resolute but also respectful. If you told him to leave, really told him, he would have done so.

But, you didn’t. You allowed him into your place and similar to the last time you were in his presence, ended up spread out on your bed with him balls deep inside you until you couldn’t feel your lower half.

Now, fast forward three years later, not much has changed. You two don’t communicate quite as much in the day, and his visits are more spread out given the company’s current efforts at pushing him as the new face of the company. But, that doesn’t stop his visits to come see you and flights he puts you on to come see him, both of which always end with him leaving your legs jelly and throat raw.

All the while his wife sits at home unaware of her husband’s consistent residence between your legs.

The thought alone makes you sick, revolted at yourself, at how you’ve allowed yourself to reach this point in life. Closer to 30 than 20 and going on 3 years of being a mistress to a married man, a man who can never give you the future you want yet refuse to let go.

Not that you’d ever allow yourself to really acknowledge why.

That’s….that’s just too much.

________

Pillow talk was just something that naturally happened between the two of you. It made sense given that your relationship started out with just talking. He seemed interested in knowing more about you, about your likes and dislikes. He shared his as well. You weren’t beyond admitting that Joe was insanely easy to talk to, the flow of conversation always natural, never forced. There never seemed to be a dry spot between you two.

And whether it was an innate ability to pick up on the emotions of others or just his, you could always tell when something was bothering him, could see when he came to you with a burden he didn’t want to discuss.

Not that that stopped you from asking. If he declined to talk about it, you respected it, didn’t push. But, more often than not, he would end up sharing things with you, mostly concerns regarding his career.

It seemed he visioned one thing for himself, while Vince McMahon saw another. He felt frustrated at times, especially when the fanbase started pushing back more. He never admitted as such, but you could see it hurt his feelings. How could it not? Kayfabe or not, Joe was still a real person with real feelings, regardless of the role he played.

And at some point, his visits to see you stopped always involving sex. That happened majority of the time, but there were occasions when he just seemed like he needed someone to be around, a distraction, someone to talk to.

Someone like you.

“Come on.” You jumped up off the couch and offered your hand that he looked at with disinterest. “Don’t make me drag your big ass. It’ll probably break my back.” He lifts his brow, and you roll your eyes. “Joe, come onnnn.”

“Where are we going?” He finally asks, all the while sighing heavily and standing up. Though unnecessary at this point, he still takes your hand. You try not to think too much of the gentle squeeze he gives.

“To my kitchen.”

Glancing over, he gestures with his thumb. “The place that’s like 3 feet away.”

You suck your teeth and shove against him. “Don’t be an ass. We’re gonna bake cookies.”

“Bake?”

“That’s what I said.” Though clearly skeptical, he follows you into the kitchen and watches as you start gathering supplies. “I spent a lot of summers with my grandma, and whenever either of us were having a bad day, she’d take us into the kitchen and we’d bake chocolate chip cookies. She’d always say there’s nothing a good chocolate morsel can’t cure.”

Reflecting on those memories, so fond and cherished, brings a despondent smile to your face.

His eyes fall on you, sensing the sudden sadness. “You miss her.”

“Every day….” Shaking your head, you make a conscious effort to not make this about you and your grief. “Now, we need music.” You settle on some random “cookout” playlist that aids in setting the playful mood. To your surprise, yet not surprise, Joe keeps up without struggle. He's a fast learner, easily following along to your detailed instructions and explanations. Things get messy at times, as one does when baking, but it only causes the two of you to share laughter. Especially when you ‘accidentally’ get flour on each other. For you, it was an accident. His was definitely intentional.

Still, between the laughter, light conversation, and New Edition serving as backdrop, it’s a sweet moment.

“And now we wait,” you announce, plopping down on the sofa. “Wrestler by day, baker by night. Who’d a thunk it?”

He chuckles. “I never knew you could cook.”

At that, you nearly choke on the water bottle you’d grabbed off the coffee table. “Me? Cook? No. Not at all. There’s a reason every thanksgiving, my family only asks me to bring the drinks. My mom is the cook. Grandma was the baker. I can make cookies and a few select items. That’s it.”

You can still hear your grandma’s voice in the back of your head, chiding you for never allowing your mom to teach you how to cook. It just never garnered your interest, even when they swore up and down you’d never find a husband without knowing how.

Maybe they were right.

He joins you in the living room, settling on the other end of the sofa. “Maybe I could teach you then.”

His words—and offer—suprise you. “You can cook?”

“Don’t look so surprised.” He rolls his blue eyes. Some days you love the contacts, others you hate them. Today is a love day. They make his beauty even more exquisite. “Because of the big age difference between me and my siblings, it was just me and my mom a lot of times. They were either out and about or had either moved out. She’d ask me to help her out in the kitchen, and I picked up on a couple things.”

“You’re a fast learner.” That much is very obvious, in several areas of his life. “Was it ever hard? Like, not really having them around?”

He seems to think about her question before answering. “Yes and no. The twins moved to Florida when I was like three, and we became close instantly. It was like suddenly having two new brothers. Obviously, they didn’t live with us, so they weren’t always around, and those times were hard, I guess. But the older we got, the more we did together.”

The Usos. Also wrestlers trying to make names for themselves. He really does hail from a legendary dynasty. “I get that. It was just me and my mom, and she worked a lot to support us, so that’s why I spent so much time with my grandma. And I loved it, but sometimes it got lonely not really having siblings.” You look over at him, studying this massive specimen of a man who seems so unsure of himself right now, unsure of his future. He’d hinted at such during their prep, but you bookmarked the comment to revisit. “It’s all gonna work out, you know.”

His gaze is on you, partially disinterested, mostly in disagreement. Joe knows what you're referring to. He chuckles, darkly, “you sound sure.”

“I am,” you counter calmly. Moving to sit on your knees, you continue, “no matter what it takes, you make them respect you. You can do it, and when you finally find your footing, you’ll be one of the best to ever do it. Mark my words.”

You’ve never been one to build up false hopes in anyone, far too familiar with the sting of disappointment. So every word leaving your mouth drips with sincerity. Joe is so much more than a “pretty face” or someone who got lucky by being born into a wrestling dynasty with a golden spoon in his mouth. He’s worked his ass off, you see how he works his ass off, so the last thing you’d want to witness is him become his own worst enemy by getting too into his head.

“You’ll see. They boo now, but pretty soon they’ll be cheering.” Moving to your knees, you lift your arms in a theatrical display. “Roman, Roman, Roman.” You yelp when his strong arms pull you into his lap, legs spread on either side of his thick thighs. “Would you let me hype you up? Like, damn.”

His smile, so beautiful and genuine, warms your soul. His spirits are lifted, and that’s all that matters. Joe’s hands are on your hips, palms massaging you through your shorts. You move your arms around his neck, resting on his strong shoulders “Thank you.”

It’s at this moment, you foolishly allow yourself to wonder. Wonder what it would be like for this to be the norm, for him to always return to your place when he has time off or in between shows. Wonder what it would be like to consistently be this safe space for him, to be in his corner and not just in the shadows, but in the light. To be supporting him ringside. To be his.

And for a second, you pretend. You pretend that you are his, and he’s yours. That this is your man, and you’re his girl. Just the two of you. Nobody else.

But the comedown from that is devastating, like a boulder sitting on your chest, a butcher knife to your heart. Because he isn’t yours. He never was, and he never will be.

Mood sullen, you lower your arms to separate yourself. “I should…” You clear your throat, climbing off of him. The air is suddenly too stuffy, the room too small. You need space. “I should go check on the cookies.”

Joe’s not stupid, far from it. You know that he has to pick up on your 180 in mood, yet he doesn’t pursue you, doesn’t ask questions, and you’re thankful for that. You need to not be around him right now, not so close, not so connected, not so in love.

You need to let him go. ________

“I can’t do this anymore.”

Joe’s in the midst of sliding his shirt over his head, sitting on the edge of the bed when your voice, low and quiet, stops him mid movement. “What?”

“I said.” You blow out a big breath, unsure why your chest suddenly feels so heavy. “I can’t do this anymore.”

At that, he angles his body so that he can look at you, assess your face. He’s a big eye contact person. “What are you talking about?”

Irritation piques. “You know exactly what I’m talking about, Joe.” Gesturing between the two of you, you kick the blankets off and quickly reach for your t-shirt that got discarded last night. Being naked in front of him suddenly feels uncomfortable. “This. It’s done.”

He pauses for a second and then shakes his head, resuming his dressing. “Okay.”

His tone is dismissive, like he doesn’t believe you. Like he thinks you’re playing around. Of course he would be in one of those moods, where he’s more irritable, less receptive and fucking stubborn. “I’m serious.”

“I’m not doing this shit with you right now.” Joe gets up and continues dressing himself, prompting you to climb out of bed and move in front of him.

He can’t avoid his way out of this. You won’t allow it. It’s time to finally rip the bandaid off.

You’ve sat on this for the last two weeks, since he last left your apartment and you realized you’d stupidly allowed yourself to fall for this man. Fall for a man who walks around with a wedding ring on his left hand, who’s always had that wedding ring from the moment you met him. You’re not upset with him, not as much as you’re upset with yourself.

You grew up the product of an affair, felt the stinging pain of being rejected by a parent whose selfishness resulted in the creation of life, a life he wanted no part of. Seen how your mom literally begged your piece of shit father to be in your life, to play some role. Heard how he cruelly rejected her, rejected you, calling you your mother’s bastard. A mistake.

It devastated you so deeply that you still can’t really talk about it without getting emotional.

And yet, you idiotically found yourself playing the same role you used to judge your mother for: the other woman.

It’s a role you stepped in, and one you must now step out of.

“There’s nothing to do.” You run your hands over your face and shake your head. Choosing to have this conversation at almost 4 o’clock in the morning probably wasn’t the best move, but you also know that if you give yourself more time, you’ll find a reason not to do it. And you need to do this. “You have a wife, Joe. A whole ass woman who loves you and would probably let you fuck her just as much as you like to fuck me. Go be with her, and if not her, find someone else, cause I won’t be that for you. Not anymore.”

You’re not exactly sure what part of what you just said registered with him, but it’s obvious something did by the change of tone he takes. “Where is this coming from?”

“It’s coming from where it should have come a long time ago,” you answer, crossing your arms over your body. “This was never right, and I refuse to partake in it anymore. I won’t be your whore anymore.”

You didn’t expect hurt to flash in his beautiful eyes nor for him to move closer to you, that hurt intensifying when you back away. He can’t touch you. You can’t allow that, because all it takes is only touch, one longing gaze, and you’ll be putty in his hands. This has to end. “Is that really what you think you are to me?”

“I don’t know what I am to you, Joe,” you answer, honestly. It’s something you’ve battled back and forth with for nearly three years. Just what is it about you that keeps him coming back, keeps him in your bedroom, inside of you. At face value, it’s the sexual compatibility between you. Below the surface level though, there’s maybe more. You’ve never allowed yourself to venture there, and you’re certainly not about to right now. You know how you feel about him, but you refuse to really ask yourself how he feels about you. “And truthfully, it doesn’t matter, cause it doesn’t change anything.”

“So, that’s just it?” His voice is wounded, handsome face painted into a mixture of scowl and a frown. “Almost three years, and you want to throw it all away, for what?”

“For what…..Joe, you are married. You have a whole wife at home. Whatever issues you have that cause you to step out, work that shit out. Learn how to be with her. Cause I’m not doing it any more. I—I can’t.” Emotion imbues your voice toward the end, and you hate that shit. You don’t want him to see, to know, how much this has been eating you up as of lately. “I’m gonna be 30 in a few years. I want to be married. I want to have a family. I deserve that, and I’ll never have it as long as I’m messing with you, so I’ve gotta let you go.” You swallow the deep lump in the back of your throat. “And you’ve gotta let me go.”

This time, this time you can see the part that wounds him, that digs into his chest. You’ve gotta let me go.

Joe is fast, fast enough to move directly in front of you, large hands holding your face. He says your name, desperate almost. “Tell me what to do, tell me what you want, and I’ll do it. Just….” He stops, and you close your eyes, refusing to see if it’s his own emotions coming up. You can barely handle your own cascade of feelings right now and refuse to take on his. “I can’t lose you.”

What you want…..

What you want is for him to never leave. What you want is for him to stay with you, to be with you. What you want is for him to have never met Jadah, never married her, never committed his life to her.

What you want is for him to be yours and only yours, but what you want….is also what you can never have.

“I—I want you to leave, Joe.” The words burn your lips, scorch your throat, ache your soul. “And this time….don’t come back.”

You can’t bring yourself to open your eyes, to see the result of your heartbreaking, even if honest request. It’s because you know seeing him hurt will only cause your resolve to crumble, and you can’t have that. You have to be strong, have to be the woman your mother couldn't.

So, you remain there, remain silent as he steps away from you, his touch vanishing. There’s such an emptiness in his wake.

It’s only when you hear the front door of your apartment shut that you finally feel it, the caving of your stomach, the heavy lump move from the back of your throat, the release of the loud sob you didn’t realize you’d been keeping at bay.

It’s when you finally allow yourself to feel all of the emotions of a woman who just told the only man she’s ever loved to leave.

If only you knew his departure was just the beginning of the rest of your life.

#roman reigns x black!oc #roman reigns x black!reader #black writers #wwe #roman reigns x reader #roman reigns fic #arisnotebook

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mistydeyes · 11 months ago

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the boys during medical residency

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summary: we've seen the boys on the field but how would they deal on the other side of battle: in the medical field?

pairing: none!

warnings: swearing, medical descriptions

a/n: just a lil something something as i'm working on a few requests, wips, and preparing for my hospital rotation on monday!

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price

specialty: general surgery

the long hours or sudden calls don’t get to him bc this man never sleeps

"Price, sorry it's late but-" "I'll be right in"

no one knows how he does it but rumor has it he can be ready and over at the hospital in 20 minutes tops

maybe he's just the king of multitasking

a great educator for his fellow medical professionals and patients

he can make a procedure sound like a walk in the park with his soft smile and reassuring words

in fact, the new intern mistook him for a senior doctor when they first met him

that boosted his ego and made the early mornings even more worth it

once he's in the operating room, he is fully focused and locked in

regardless of the surgeon's choice of music for that day, price is ready to go and immediately steps in when its time

speaking of which, his stitches are textbook, perfectly aligned, high tensile strength, and with no tissue reaction

always has everything prepared for handoff to the night resident

this man is READY to leave once he sees his co-resident enter the ward

he gives the most essential run down (he's just tired, not sloppy) and he gets the hell out of there

soap

specialty: pediatrics

most people think pediatrics are straight forward but actually you need to have some creativity

that’s where soap comes in

a child needs to take a respiratory test but is having trouble? think of it like you’re blowing birthday candles

a child doesn’t understand why they need to have their operation? time to pull out dolls and teddy bears to show how the doctors are gonna make them better

he always shows up no matter how early or late with a smile on his face

easily the kids’ favorite resident (he’s the first person most ask to sign their cast)

hates pre-rounds, he wants to get right in and see the patient's and families for the day

despite this, the other senior and junior residents (even the interns) have to remind him that it is essential to have a plan

when he's finally let loose is able to round, he has a field day walking down the hall

you just know all the attendings and nurses have to keep it a secret that he's working the night shift

or else they'll have a full floor of excited kids waiting to chat when he comes in during rounds

gaz

specialty: physical medicine and rehabilitation

the absolute king of finding resources

he'll whip out a full pdf study guide on spinal cord injury treatment and leave you questioning if he made this or found it online

also has one of those pocket guides that sums up everything you learn in med school

he's always there to help out those in the same boat

has such a steady hand when it comes to injections for spascicity

always has a terrible joke when he sees someone is receiving botulinum toxin

"You're basically receiving a less cool botox treatment"

despite his corny jokes, the residents, especially the geriatric ones, love him

has a friendly demeanor when collecting a patient's history, they simply feel like its a conversation and they'll tell him everything

he loves when people report sport accidents but still say they'll go back to it when they're better

he appreciates the dedication fr

also great at communicating with patient's and giving them detailed instructions to follow before their next visit

but his favorite part of the job? the diversity of the patient's he sees

PM&R is such a unique speciality that you'll see patients with a variety of injuries from all walks of life

this man truly thrives on his adaptability to educate and treat whatever patient the hospital throws to him

ghost

speciality: emergency medicine

sign-out in the morning is always the most awkward with him

as the nurse gives him a run-down of his patients, he'll just stare and occasionally nod to show he's following

"That all?" is his go-to way to end the conversation and actually begin the day's work

despite his quiet demeanor, he'll go through the motions beautifully for any emergency

easily the attending's favorite because he requires no further instruction and keeps a level head given the hectic nature of the room

since he's the attending's favorite, he's the intern's nightmare with his constant stares and the overwhelming presence he gives

"Am I doing something wrong, Simon?" the intern asks as she preps a central line and he just shakes his head, "Personally not how I would do it but go ahead."

this motherfucker

despite this, everyone admits no one deserves the title of "chief resident" more than him

he's not necessarily the best in the "educating others" department but he's sure to give a good explanation if needed

just know he's not happy about it

but if you survive the infamous ghost of the emergency department, you're on the path to success

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council-of-beetroot · 6 months ago

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As we see an increase in antisemitism I have reflected on my experiences how many years ago being the token Jew in my eighth grade English class and I have found some aspects about it which lead me to believe are the parts that Holocaust Education in the U.S. goes wrong

Being taught in English Classes

Often such as in my state, the Holocaust is taught as part of English curriculum. English teachers aren't history teachers and they may be lacking in the skills or knowledge required to teach in the necessary depth to discuss the Holocaust.

My mother used to teach English but she had a history degree as well. She would lecture in class about everything leading up to and during WWII. I remember reading handouts she had in her classroom while I was waiting after school about the history of antisemitism. I didn't have any of this in my English class unit, because to put it simply most English teachers aren't my mother who also has the prior knowledge of how to teach history.

Additionally, as it is part of English, there is often more focus on Holocaust literature rather than the topic itself

This is where I think it gets extremely flawed if a person's primary knowledge of a historical period is Anne Frank or the incredibly inaccurate boy in the striped pajamas. A single account or work of complete fiction shouldn't be your main lens to view any topic whether it's the Holocaust, Slavery, Civil Rights movement etc.

You're in short blurring fact and fiction when discussing these things in the context of literature.

Sense of Finality

I feel like in my classes at least there was this idea that was kind of implied that hatred of Jews began and ended with Hitler and the Holocaust. I think this leads to misconceptions about antisemitism.

I feel this is a problem as I remember mistakenly getting that takeaway in school regarding civil rights in America. It was taught that Slavery was a problem, emancipation proclamation, MLK said I have a dream, and the civil rights act was passed and bam no inequality or racism. Later on, I fortunately learned this was flawed for many reasons. But not everyone does.

Not teaching about how the Holocaust happened

If you aren't given the knowledge of how centuries of hatred lead up to the Holocaust, I feel the main takeaway becomes that it was almost a random occurrence.

Many learn the Holocaust is bad without learning the signs of thinking that can lead neighbors to kill neighbors.

So many people don't have the basic facts such as Hitler being elected rather than assuming power.

I think when you learn of an atrocity of such scale without learning the human beliefs that brought about it, you have learned nothing.

I had a girl in my college uni class who was shocked when I said that antisemitism didn't begin and end with Hitler. I can see where she would get this idea if I at ten figured that racism ended with MLK.

Using Simulation

Slavery and the Holocaust should probably not be taught using roleplay. It usually goes poorly and you can find dozens of examples of how this goes wrong.

Sanitizing History

Exactly what it sounds like. But it's a major problem in general with history education in the US. I think we downplay westward expansion, and slavery in the us. When we downplay those it's easy to see how some begin to downplay the Holocaust.

We had a kid faint on the trip to the Holocaust memorial at some of the images. I think it was because they were inadequately prepared to see the horrors in image, my teacher didn't show any pictures in class.

Final notes

I don't blame teachers. Teacher's jobs fucking suck from what I've seen and many don't have the skills or resources or experience. I guess for now I think it's good to recognize those holes in our education and fill them ourselves through self education and life long learning

With the current political atmosphere of education of the unpleasant or difficult to discuss parts of history, i can only see things getting worse if we don't change anything. But like I said in the absence of a solid education which discusses these topics, it's important to educate ourselves and confront our lack of knowledge.

#tw shoah #tw holocaust #jumblr #feel free to add on with your school experiences #especially if you're jewish

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cloudaxolotl07 · 9 months ago

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Here are the official looks for the Bishops in my Beyond au!

They all have the golden skull necklaces but they are just hidden under layers of fabric COUGH I DIDNT JUST FORGET THEM ON ACCIDENT-

Info on each character below!

Shamura

Shamura is the eldest of the 5 siblings and is the Historian and Teacher for the Cult. Shamura is a calm and kind spirit, though if you annoythem enough, they’ll start to disent a little, causing ichor to pour from their wounded head. They can get slight brain fog pretty often during the day but they somehow appear on time to events or remember things when the memory returns after a while. Although Shamura was the ex bishop of War, they are quite the tactical thinker and fighter; quick on their feet and always knows how to take their enemies down when necessary. They assist with educating the younger members of the cult and is quite intelligent in many subjects even if they have brain damage from long ago. They mainly on their free time or when not with any of the kids, they tend to hide in the library, reading in silence.

Kallamar

Kallamar is the second oldest out of the 5 siblings and is the Chief Medical officer in the Cult. Kallamar likes to act prideful and has a bit of an ego, though truly he is a coward at heart. He has sensitive hearing due to the damage inflicted from Narinder, so loud noises can cause pain to him. Being the ex bishop of pestilence, he has the vast knowledge in medicine and medical practice, with that knowledge were they given the job to look after the health of the followers in the Cult. He loves to collect anything he deems beautiful and is sparkling; always wearing some form of jewelry on him wherever he goes on the cult grounds.

Heket

Heket is the second youngest out of the 5 siblings and is the Cult’s Chief Guard. Heket is quiet and stoic, but caring when it comes to her siblings and the followers of the cult. People, especially children tend to get intimidated when first meeting her, but they easily warm up when eating her delicious food she prepares during breakfast, lunch and dinner. She isn’t able to speak all that well and speaking up never goes well for her as she easily gets ichor filling her mouth to the point of dirtying her lungs, causing coughing fits from time to time. Her siblings however can easily understand what she tries to say when reading her body language, facial expressions or listening for her quiet mumbling; except Leshy for most of the time.

Leshy

Leshy is the youngest of the 5 siblings and is the Chief Farmer for the Cult. Leshy is hot-tempered and chaotic in nature and easily can get embarrassed or offended by small things either when people make fun of him or question his looks and/or intellect. Leshy is completely blind when using his eyes, but he soon made a friend who helps him get around far distances in the Cult. Growing up mainly in the Darkwood, he knows plenty about taking care and nurturing plant life, always knowing what each plant in the cult farms needs to grow to their fullest potential. He relies on his siblings to also help him with either hiding or getting from one place to another when Collie can’t. A small thing he appreciates though is on warm and sunny days, he likes to bathe in the sun, feeling the warmth on his body. A small detail about Leshy is when he expresses heavy emotions or feelings, flowers of different kinds tend to sprout from his body depending on how he’s feeling at the time, mainly they blossom on his head.

#cotl #cotl au #cotl fanart #cult of the lamb #cult of the lamb fanart #cotl leshy #cotl heket #cotl kallamar #cotl shamura #cotl bishops #cult of the lamb au #cotl bts au #cotl beyond the shores #beyond the shores au #~doodles #cotl concept stuff

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brotherskywalker · 1 year ago

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I'm so tired of the narrative that Luke was a whiny, useless twink before his aunt and uncle were killed. I've seen a lot of people saying, "Leia was in the senate, leading top secret Rebellion missions, etc., while Luke was whining about power converters and playing with toys."

This is such a bad, low-level take.

Leia was a literal Princess. She was raised in luxury. She was well-educated. And her parents were already an active, secret part of the Rebellion before she was born. That's why she was given to them. Yes, Leia has a fiery personality and wanted to be involved, but she was encouraged and prepared specifically for that role.

Luke was raised, if not in poverty, at least in a low-class life style on a Hutt-controlled slave world. He was raised, perhaps begrudgingly, by a non-blood related aunt and uncle who, above all else, wanted to protect him and keep him safe. They wanted to make sure he didn't follow the ways of his father. One of the ways they did this was to keep him busy with farm work. To keep his head out of the clouds.

And nevertheless Luke had a best friend who immediately joined the Rebellion once he got off world, and who Luke deeply idolized and wanted to follow.

He isn't "playing with a toy" because he is still childish; he is daydreaming about being in that Skyhopper and fighting the Empire. He wants to be out there doing stuff, but he's been raised to obey his aunt and uncle. He feels obligated to stay and help on the farm. You can see why--they are poor, they are struggling, his aunt and uncle are old. They need Luke to help, or so he believes. Luke is maybe too kind and puts the needs and desires of other people in front of his own, but he's not some useless kid. And it is very clear, from ANH as well as the Obi-Wan Kenobi TV series, that Owen especially wanted to protect and shield Luke from his heritage. (Whether or not that was right or wrong is another debate, but you can't blame Luke for it.)

Luke is desperate to be out there doing it, but he is blocked at every turn until he's forced into it.

#luke skywalker #star wars meta #not a twink #not useless

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strawberrymochin · 7 months ago

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Springtime Fushiguros♪

Context-: exploring the memories of childhood of fushiguros, marking the spring time of you and satoru gojo.

Dropping Megumi at school :- you and gojo drop the fushiguro kids at school.

Megumi comes out of his shared room wearing his new school uniform. You and satoru both decided to admit them to a new elementary to change their surroundings and for better education.

'Megumi-chan, the uniform looks good on you!!' Tsumiki squealed with excitement as you tie her hair into a pony tail.

'Aww Megumi, you look so cute just like your sister.' you couldn't help but melt at this sight. The kids were looking so adorable, just like you imagined.

Gojo ruffles megumi's hair, earning grumbles from him. 'you seem all ready for your new school, make sure you study well. After that when I come home you have practice sessions with me.' Megumi mutters a low 'hm' fixing his hair.

'Come here, Megumi lemme fix your hair.' you say, 'And satoru, go get their scl bags.'

'where is it?'

'Ofcourse in their room. Go get it fast. Don't wanna be late on the first day of class.'

Megumi comes to you as gojo goes to fetch their bags. You fix his hair quickly and tell him to join Tsumiki at the table and have breakfast.

You were in the kitchen where gojo brings their little school bags. You've already prepared their bentos. Decorated with utmost love and affection. You've left the lunch open to let the hot steam evaporate a bit and now it's time to close the lids and stuff them into their school bags.

Gojo takes a bite out of megumi's lunch box, when you protest 'hey! No eating out of kid's lunches.'

'But I'm hungry, just one more please.'

'nope. I've already made pancakes for you. If you're hungry then have them.'

'But you didn't decorate it like these lunches.'

'are you a kid?'

'don't you love me? I want some of that too.' How can you forget the strongest sorcerer can be such a pain in the ass. He sulks as you question your life decisions.

'Gross!' a voice interrupts gojo's sulking. You both peek out of the door to see Megumi giving a disgusted look at his Sensei.

'What do you mean by gross?!' an offended gojo questions the black haired tetchy boy.

'By gross I mean your behaviour.' Megumi declares offending gojo even more. He storms off the kitchen to lecture the 6 year old on how to show respect to his elders, which the kid deliberately ignores.

You sigh realising what you got yourself into. You turn to the counter refilling the empty space of Megumi's lunch box, gojo ate. A smile appears on your lips unconsciously, you know you will see them bickering like this a million times and maybe that's a thing you would treasure.

Tsumiki watches gojo lecturing her brother, who doesn't even spares him a look and continues eating his breakfast as if the man shouting beside him doesn't exist.

'Enough! Finish your breakfast. Otherwise we are gonna be late.' you want, shutting gojo up.

'I'm done.' says Tsumiki, Megumi follows her next after finishing his breakfast. Gojo's the last one to finish, after stuffing the entire pancake into his mouth at once, earning a critical look from you three, to which he responds, 'whmff wff afe geffimg lffe?' (he chokes on his pancake)

Tsumiki couldn't suppress her laugh watching her guardian struggle choking on a pancake, 'what language on earth is he speaking?' asks Megumi, creeped out.

'nothing he's just telling we will get late, now you two get your bags while I deal with him.' you drag gojo to the bathroom, hitting him firmly on the back to help him vomit.

After dealing with gojo and his dumb decisions, you go quickly to fetch your camera.

'whats that for?' gojo asks after gulping water, coughing a bit.

'To take a group picture, now hurry!'

You set the camera on a tripod, setting a timer gathering the kids as gojo joins in. 'Come on kids, smile.' Tsumiki smiles for the picture, Megumi does too. You squat down to their height along with gojo.

Click

~♡~

After gojo's rash driving, you guys reach the school and you wish both of them good luck for their first day in school with a kiss.

Extras-:

You noticed gojo sulking while he drove you back to the apartment.

'hey what happened? Whats with the sullen face huh?'

'YOU DON'T KISS ME WHEN I LEAVE FOR WORK! This is partiality.'

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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 11 months ago

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Napoleonville [Chapter 1: The Fall-Down House]

Series Summary: The year is 1988. The town is Napoleonville, Louisiana. You are a small business owner in need of some stress relief. Aemond is a stranger with a taste for domination. But as his secrets are revealed, this casual arrangement becomes something more volatile than either of you could have ever imagined.

Chapter Warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), dom/sub dynamics, alligators, kids, parenthood, smoking, cupcakes!

Word Count: 7.2k (she's very chonky for a first chapter).

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

Since this is the first chapter of a new series, I'm going to tag a bunch of usual readers, but I won't tag you again unless you want me to. 💜

@persephonerinyes @tinykryptonitewerewolf @daenysx @babyblue711 @arcielee @bhanclegane @jvpit3rs @padfooteyes @marvelescvpe @travelingmypassion @darkenchantress @yeahright0h @poohxlove @trifoliumviridi @bloodyflowerrr @fan-goddess @devynsficrecs @flowerpotmage @thelittleswanao3 @seabasscevans @hiraethrhapsody @libroparaiso @st-eve-barnes @chattylurker @vagharnaur @moonlightfoxx @heliosscribbles @beautifulsweetschaos @namelesslosers @partnerincrime0 @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics @marbles-posts @maidmerrymint @backyardfolklore @dd122004dd @jetblack4real @joliettes @mariahossain @minttea07 @please-buckme @florent1s @tempt-ress @wintersire @w3ird11 @eltherevir @florent1s @maii777

Let me know if you'd like to be tagged! 🥰🧁

“What do you want to do to me?” you whisper through the phone, stretched out across your bed like a cat as George Michael’s Faith plays from the baby pink Panasonic boombox out in the kitchen. It’s late afternoon, and fading daylight falls in tiger stripes through the window blinds. The May air is hot, muggy, golden; cicadas hum in the southern live oaks, an ancient earthen music like rattling bones.

A few seconds pass before he can reply. It was a bold way to begin. You are admittedly a little impressed with yourself; an idea like this has been pacing around in your skull like a beast behind bars for years, but you’ve only now set it loose. “That’s difficult to explain in words,” he says; and in the low, teasing purr of his voice you can hear that your gamble paid off like striking oil. He has a British accent, which you never would have expected. You only recognize it from clips you’ve seen of Prince Charles and Princess Diana on 60 Minutes. “But I’d enjoy showing you.”

It’s laid open beside you on the bed, his personal ad in the Bayou Journal: Educated white male in his mid-20s. Single and not looking to change that. Seeking an open-minded, adventurous, and spirited lady for short-term D/s arrangement. Be prepared to answer the following riddle: I’m small but loom large, I’m Italian but French, I give away much to gain little. Who am I? Best regards, An Indecent Gentleman. “I’m waiting.”

“You understand what is meant by D/s?”

“Of course,” you say, your best feigned flippantness. You only know because Amir told you; he’s been daring you to call for three days.

“Thank God,” the man on the other end of the line sighs. There is an inhale like a drag on a cigarette. You imagine what he might look like: broad or slight, dark-haired or blonde, striking or average or homely, treacherous or safe, forbidden fruit or just plain forbidden. “I’ve had four different women ring me thinking I’m going to be their boyfriend, dinner and flowers and everything. They’re functionally illiterate down here.”

How unfortunate, you think. He’s highfalutin. But alas, no one is perfect. That’s no prohibitive obstacle. He doesn’t need to be faultless; it’s not as if you’re planning to marry the guy. “I like when someone else is in control.”

“Why?” This is a test, you can feel it. You can sense his rapt attention across the wire, through the electricity and the lush treetops and the rust-amber sky.

“I have a lot of…responsibilities in my real life,” you explain. “A lot of pressure. I make the decisions, I look out for other people. Sometimes I want to be the one who’s told what to do.”

“I can make that happen. And the riddle?”

“It’s Napoleon.”

The grin is sharp and triumphant in his voice. “Good girl.”

“He was short but an emperor. He was born in Corsica to an Italian family, but he ended up ruling over France. He sold off a bunch of French colonies to focus on conquering Europe and still couldn’t quite manage it. But the U.S.A. got this charming little corner of the world as part of the bargain.”

“You’re a historian,” the man says, sounding pleased.

“No sir, we all had to learn about him in school whether we wanted to or not.”

“Sir,” he echoes, tasting it, savoring it. You imagine a pink tongue flicking out to skate across his lips. Then he is abruptly cool, impersonal, businesslike. “Listen, I’ve got a scar down the left side of my face. It’s thin, it’s clean, but it’s noticeable. The eye is glass, although you can’t really tell unless you look closely. Is that a problem?”

A scar? Is he a veteran? A lion tamer? A motorcycle enthusiast? You try to remember what kinds of hobbies British people have. Isn’t there some kind of sport where men swing sticks around while riding horses? That sounds like it could put an eye out. Perhaps to your own surprise, you find that you are more intrigued than uneasy. Oh, you realize, dull like dawn through mist. I like him. I want him. Not just THIS, but HIM. “No, I don’t think so.”

“Brilliant. I don’t want to talk about it again.”

“That’s fine.” You hesitate. “There’s actually something I should tell you too.”

“Hm?”

The hum of his voice is arrogant, hungry. You try not to get distracted. Blood rushes hot and ashamed into your cheeks. “Um, well, uh, sometimes it’s difficult for me to…you know. Finish. Not when I’m alone, just when I’m with a guy. Especially if I’m anxious. And I don’t want to feel worried about faking it or making sure it happens or dealing with you getting offended or upset or whatever. Because it’s fine, really. It doesn’t mean I’m not having a good time. I’m just…stuck in my own head.”

There is a sound you can’t quite match to an expression, an exhale, a scoff. “Obviously I wouldn’t be mad at you. But you’ll come. I know you will. I’ll make you.”

And you’re flooded with a relief that you never dared to hope for. A confession spills out in a trembling whisper: “Please.”

“When?” he says, eager, urgent.

“I think if we don’t do it now, I’ll lose my nerve.”

There is a razor-thin pause, and then he asks for your address.

~~~~~~~~~~

You haven’t had a man in your bed in years; you are abruptly and unkindly reminded of this when you paw through the top drawer of your bedroom dresser and find only practical, deadly unsexy cotton Kmart underwear. You dash to the closet, yank open the squeaking door, and—tucked away in a cardboard box of winter clothes like sweaters and jeans, forgotten, needless—unearth a sprinkling of insubstantial silk and lace, all in luxurious gemstone hues: amethyst, ruby, sapphire, onyx, emerald.

“Oh, hallelujah.” You throw off your sunshine yellow shorts and tug on what were once upon a time your favorite panties. They don’t fit nearly as well as they used to; they fit horribly, in fact. They evaporate the thrill and leave nauseous trepidation in its place. “Oh God. Oh no. Oh no, oh no.” You steal a harried glimpse of the clunky black alarm clock on your nightstand. The flashing red numbers inform you that you have approximately ten more minutes until he arrives.

You jog pantsless to the kitchen, pour yourself a glass of sweet tea—ice cold, bright with a squeeze of lemon juice—and pace back and forth across the wooden floor as you sip it. The pine boards slope at just the slightest angle; if you laid an apple by your feet, it would roll. The house is sinking. It was built at the turn of the twentieth century, but it won’t live to see the next. Ailing sunlight casts your shadow against the wall, mint green, spider-leg cracks inching through the paint. Outside cicadas buzz and doves coo in long, mournful whirrs.

You pick up the phone—pink to match the boombox that is now playing Poison’s Nothin’ But A Good Time—next to the refrigerator and dial with one finger, your other hand still clutching the frosty glass of sweet tea. It rings twice before he answers.

“Wassup?” Amir says distractedly. You can hear a commotion from his living room on the other side of town: his grandmother squawking, ambient applause, Wheel Of Fortune.

“Quick, what should I wear?”

“Huh?”

“The guy! The guy from the ad! I called the guy! What should I be wearing when he shows up?”

Amir cackles. “Ho, you must be truly desperate, why the fuck are you asking me?” There is some shrill protestation in the background. “Grandma, don’t you dare try to act like you’ve never heard that word before, we just rented Aliens.”

“You know what men like,” you plead.

“Not the straight ones!” And then, not to you: “Grandma, calm down. Grandma, Grandma! It’s my homegirl. She has an emergency. She’s got a man coming over and she doesn’t know what to wear. What did you wear for Pop Pop? What? What?! You expect me to believe you got seven kids out of that dude with just some old floral nightgown?! Prairie girl fabulous? Looking like you’re on your way to join the Donner Party? Okay, if you say so! Phyllis knows best!” Amir’s attention returns to you. “Grandma suggests a nightgown.”

You are skeptical. “That seems slutty.”

“You’re inviting some stranger over for an all-expenses-paid ride on the Pussy Express and you’re concerned about looking slutty?!”

He has a point. “Okay. Okay. Yeah. You’re right. Okay.”

“You wear that nightgown with confidence and you take that random kinky man directly to bed, do you understand me?” Amir orders.

“Totally,” you say, gulping sweet tea with a shaking hand.

“Good luck. I gotta go, it’s the Bonus Round. Hope you have a few rounds to tell me about tomorrow.” Then he hangs up.

Back in your bedroom closet, you find a black satin slip that runs to your ankles and flows like a ballgown. You put it on some nights when you’re feeling desirable, after a bath of bubbles and steam, candles and Madonna, freshly shaved legs and shimmering with Pond’s, when you want to lounge around daydreaming, when you want to remember the fantasies you once had about what your life might turn out to be. Now you wear it in the fading daylight, nothing underneath and golden sunbeams turning your skin to something that warms and glows.

You appraise yourself in your dusty dresser mirror, and you think: Not too bad, actually. You’ve had your hair up in a haphazard bun. You reach to take it down, then stop yourself. You like the wayward wisps, the I-don’t-care-too-much casualness. Your breathing is slow and calm again. There is a noise outside: tires crunching on gravel. Your glass of sweet tea, now mostly just ice cubes, is sweating on top of your dresser. You grab the glass, swipe the Bayou Journal off your bed, and take both to the kitchen counter, still speckled with flour, powdered sugar, flecks of cinnamon. Then you pad across the sloping wooden floor in your bare feet to open the front door. Amber dusk streams in; you can hear bullfrogs croaking and the hoots of the long-eared owl that lives in the collapsing, overgrown shed behind the house. Spanish moss hangs like cobwebs, like chandeliers. The tree swing rocks idly in the breeze. The first notes of You Shook Me All Night Long play from the kitchen boombox.

His car is red, sporty, with a logo on the grill that you don’t recognize, a series of circles intertwined like rings. He cuts the engine and steps out into the driveway as you watch from behind the screen, leaning against the doorframe with your arms crossed over your chest. He’s tall, trim, blonde, wearing Adidas sneakers and light-wash jeans and a Marlboro jacket that it’s far too hot for. He peers around, taking in the trees and the house through his black aviator sunglasses. He puffs one last time on a cigarette before putting it out on his own windshield and starting towards the porch. And immediately, primally, you crave him like water or air.

He climbs the groaning steps, splitting wood and rusty nails. You open the screen door to meet him in the threshold. And he takes off his sunglasses so he can look at you, stowing them in a pocket of his jacket, his gaze not wavering from yours, his lips not saying a word. Yes, he has a scar, but it doesn’t diminish him in the slightest. Yes, his left eye may be glass, but you wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t already told you. You’re too tangled up in the right. His iris is a brisk greyish blue, not like the ocean, not like the bayou, more like the sky before a hurricane, heavy with the threat of wind and rain. His face is strong, jarring, beautiful in a rare way. His full lips are curling into a grin.

At last, you speak first, an inane observation that feels somehow significant. “You found me.”

“I did.” He nods towards the large lavender sign out by the mouth of the gravel driveway. Hand-painted on it are the words Hummingbird Bakery and a logo that Amir designed, a hummingbird feeding on the frosting swirl of a cupcake as if it’s a flower flush with nectar. “You told me to look for the sign. That helped.”

“What kind of car do you drive? I don’t recognize it.”

“It’s an Audi Quattro.”

“Audi,” you repeat, like a hopelessly distant place, New York City or Los Angeles or Paris or the moon. “Is that British?”

“German, actually.”

“You’re from a very different world.”

“Yeah, I am.” His eye flicks up and down your body, black satin that curves and clings; his grin widens. “But I could learn to like yours, I think.”

You step back so he can follow you inside. The screen door shuts with a bang. Under the shadows, as the sun sets into the west, he unzips his Marlboro jacket and tosses it onto your living room couch. Underneath he wears a white t-shirt. We’re opposites, you think dazedly, wondering what he will taste like when he kisses you. He grazes his fingertips down the front of your throat, continues to your chest, stills when he hits the satin of your slip.

“You can tell me to stop whenever you want to,” he murmurs, and you breathe in his smoke and cologne and dauntless, dizzying self-assurance. “But until you say stop, I’m gonna keep going.”

Your heartbeat is drumming beneath his hand, part exhilaration and the rest nerves. You are afraid of disappointing him; you aren’t sure what to expect. “I don’t even know your name.”

“Aemond.”

Aemond. Foreign, like Audi, like Paris. You give him your own in return. He leans in, presses his hips to yours, denim and satin that you can feel his heat through. And you think he’s going to kiss your neck, or bite it, bruise it, mark it, claim it, claim you; but he only ghosts his parted lips from the edge of your jaw to your bare shoulder, inhaling slow and deep, drawing your atoms into his lungs until they tumble down the narrowest corridors and into his capillary beds, into his bloodstream. You moan softly, helplessly, and turn your face to kiss him.

“No,” Aemond growls, teasing you, catching your chin with one hand to hold you still. His other hand glides down the front of your slip and stops between your legs. Through satin the color of a starless midnight, his fingers stroke you roughly, commandingly. Animalistic yearning bolts low to weaken your knees, high to rip a gasp from your throat. “Nothing underneath,” he notes in approval.

Oh, I like him, you think, in equal parts ecstatic and petrified. I REALLY like him.

But are you going to be able to impress him too? Are you going to ruin this?

You whimper, unintentionally and almost inaudibly. Aemond is studying your face; furrows appear in his scarred brow, so faint and fleeting you might have imagined them. Then his hand retreats as he says: “Show me your toys.”

You gape up at him; this is not what you anticipated. “What?”

“I want to see how you make yourself come. You have toys, don’t you?”

“I do,” you admit, though you’ve never used them with anyone else before.

Aemond smirks mischieviously, then commands: “Show me. Right now.”

You lead him to your bedroom and slide open the middle drawer of your dresser. You glance at his reflection in the silvery glass of the mirror; he’s staring, not at your body but at your face, his gaze locked with yours, his mouth open, entranced, hungry. You move to stand against the wall, smiling sheepishly as Aemond shoves aside folded sheets and pillowcases to reveal your collection. It’s nothing too adventurous: five vibrators in different colors, styles, sizes.

“Quite the assortment,” he praises.

“They were gifts from a friend.”

Now Aemond is dubious. “A friend?”

“Don’t be jealous. He doesn’t like women.”

Aemond laughs, warm and boyish like he’s breaking character; and you are alarmed by the wave of fondness for him that crashes through you. It’s something that could pull you under. It’s something you could drown in. He picks up the largest vibrator: long, thick, pink like soft feminine vulnerability, like love. Then he is darkly, deliciously stern again. “On the bed.”

“No.” Not because you’re genuinely protesting. Because you want him to make you.

Aemond grabs you around your waist and drags you towards the bed as you squeal, giggle, fight him halfheartedly. He throws you down onto the wildflower-patterned duvet and climbs between your thighs, parting them as he pushes the hem of your black satin slip up to your waist. Abruptly, you are bare for him, exposed, fiery dusk air cool against your wetness. Aemond is still fully clothed, white shirt and pale blue jeans. He is holding your legs open with his own. You can see the bulge of his cock beneath the denim: at least as large as the vibrator and hard with insistent longing.

I want him, you think as you hear the vibrator click on. I want him, I want him…

Aemond brings the pink silicone tip to your flesh, and instantly you’re ravenous. It shocks you how much more erotic this is when someone else is holding it, when someone else has you entirely at their mercy. You cry out, loud and shameless, euphoric. Your back arches; your fingers twist into the duvet. As he presses the vibrator down more forcefully, Aemond braces his hips against yours, grinding into you through his jeans, taunting you, conquering you.

You fumble for the button and zipper of his jeans. “Please—”

“No,” Aemond snarls, beaming, snatching your hand and pinning it up by your head. His other hand is still circling your clit with the tip of the vibrator. “You haven’t earned it yet.”

“Aemond, please, I need you—”

“No,” he says, defiant. He makes the rules. He has the power; he’s in control. Suddenly, he pulls the vibrator away. You yelp in dismay. “You know,” Aemond quips cavalierly. “It’s a shame you have such a difficult time finishing when you’re with a man. I bet you’re not even close.”

“I am,” you whine, in agony, in ecstasy.

Aemond pretends to be surprised. “Hm.” He returns the vibrator to your skin, slick, hot, aching in the most wondrous way. You sigh as the pleasure surges through you, as you soar up to the previous plateau and then begin to ascend beyond it. You must have repositioned yourself without noticing; Aemond releases your hand to smack his palm against the inside of your thigh. “Keep your legs apart. I want you wide open for me.”

“I will, I promise.” I’ll do anything you tell me to.

Aemond’s hand ventures lower. Two of his fingers glide inside you and thrust in time with his hips. “Fuck,” he hisses, breaking character again; and something rocks through his shoulders, his spine, a divine temptation that he is battling.

“Aemond, more,” you plead, looking at the massive outline of his cock under his jeans.

“Not yet,” he pants, fucking you with his fingers as the vibrator hums against your clit. “You have to come for me first, baby. You have to earn it.”

And you’re close, you really are, you’re closer than you ever would have imagined you’d be with him tonight, this stranger, this elusive British man, this man from a personal ad in the Bayou Journal that you almost never replied to. Your hair has come undone and is wild around your face; your heart is pounding frantically; your skin is bathed in a sheen of victorious perspiration. When was the last time someone made you feel like this? You can’t recall; the answer might be never. There is a spellbinding, intensifying sensation of warmth, of opening, you’re only seconds from the brink, you’re ready to step off the precipice and into open blue air the same color as his eyes—

Aemond yanks the vibrator away again, grinning toothily down at you.

“No!” You scrabble for him with shaking hands, pulling yourself up as you reach for the vibrator. Aemond pushes you back onto the bed. Despite your protests, you love the feeling of his weight on top of yours; you love the organic symphony he’s built of, muscle and bone and skill and power. His fingers are still pumping in and out of you, keeping you soaked and throbbing, pinning you to the edge of an orgasm without permitting you to succumb to it.

“It’s going to be so good for you like this, baby,” Aemond insists, low and raspy. He’s reading your face, attentive to every detail, drinking up your desperate body and quivering voice. “I swear I’m not torturing you for no reason. Let me show you. Let me take care of you. When it happens, it’s going to blow your fucking mind. Are you ready?”

“Yes, now, please, do it now,” you whimper as you lie beneath him, open, bare, senseless, vanquished.

Aemond drags his tongue over the tip of the vibrator, moaning with lust as he tastes you. Then he at last presses the pink silicone to your clit once more. In your electrified nerves, in your scalding blood, there are sparks and momentum and currents rushing towards the cataclysmic breaking of a rogue wave. “Nice and slow,” Aemond murmurs. “Let it build.”

Instead of the peak, you reach another plateau, so high and so rapturous you can’t stand it, you can’t fathom climbing any farther. It’s becoming so sharp and intense it’s almost painful. Fresh anxiety flashes in your mind like lightning. The momentum begins to dissipate like dewdrops under the late-morning sun. Oh no, I’m going to lose it, I’m going to disappoint him—

Aemond lifts the vibrator off you again; before you have time to collect yourself enough to speak, to apologize, he’s slipped his fingers out of you and carefully guided the vibrator inside, stretching you, filling you, thrusting rhythmically but not too viciously or too deep. He places his thumbprint on the place where the vibrator was just seconds ago and circles quickly, once, twice, again, and then…

You try not to scream, but you can’t help it, can’t stop it; the climax wrenches out of you indescribable pleasure, vanished fears, awe and relief, twisted muscles and gasping breaths, every electrical impulse of every atom, and each time you believe it’s over it rolls a little farther like an endless summer afternoon. When it’s done—truly done—you aren’t sure exactly how it happens but suddenly you’re sitting upright on the bed and the vibrator is lying forgotten on top of the duvet and Aemond is laughing, kissing you—sweat and nicotine, smoke and salt—and caressing your face with his hands, saying: “You were such a good girl. You did amazing. I’m so proud of you.”

“Okay,” you exhale unsteadily, smiling. You nod to the very noticeable bulge in his jeans. “Your turn.”

“No,” Aemond says primly.

“What?”

“No,” he repeats. “Not today.”

“But…but…why?”

The curl of his lips is crooked and playful. “To prove I’m not just here to get myself off.” He kisses you again, far more tenderly than any random dom from a personal ad should. “You don’t trust me. But maybe next time you will.”

“How could I trust you? I don’t even know you.”

“We’ll have to spend more time together.”

“You seriously aren’t going to fuck me right now? Me? A mostly-naked stranger you met up with exclusively for the purposes of fucking?”

“Are you dissatisfied?”

In truth, no; your pulse is slowing, your thoughts are calm, your lust is satiated, you’re reasonably certain that you’ve sprained no less than four muscles. You feel like the sky after rain: emptied, unburdened, untroubled, at peace. “Not at all.”

“Then you shouldn’t be complaining.”

You reach out to touch Aemond’s unscarred cheek and he smiles. You try to ghost your fingertips over the left side of his face and he flinches away, leaves the bed, takes the vibrator to the bathroom to scrub it with soap and water. “Can I at least pour you a glass of sweet tea or something?” you call after him. “I feel guilty. I feel like I didn’t uphold my end of the bargain.”

“You exceeded all of my expectations,” Aemond says with a strange sort of somberness. “But sweet tea sounds great.”

You take five minutes to clean up and change into real clothes—ratty denim shorts and a red, white, and blue Pepsi t-shirt, chaotic hair, no bra—and then meet Aemond in the kitchen. He’s surveying the large circular table, which is littered with covered cake plates in a hodgepodge of sizes and colors; you found most of them at yard sales and thrift shops. The sun has set and the stars have risen; the kitchen is illuminated by yellow-hued florescent light. Night air flows in through the screens of the open windows. The boombox is currently playing Tiffany’s I Think We’re Alone Now.

“What’s the deal with that?” Aemond asks about the cluttered kitchen table.

“They’re the baked goods. For my bakery.”

“Right,” he says, remembering, tapping his chin thoughtfully. “The sign out front.”

“Would you like anything? Today we had butterscotch chiffon cake, coconut custard cake, blackberry dark chocolate cupcakes, pecan pie, red velvet brownies, lemon blueberry cookies, lavender black tea cookies, chocolate meringue pie, butter pecan muffins…”

“How about those?” He points.

“Oh! Those are banana bread cupcakes. One of my favorites.”

“Banana bread…cupcakes?”

“Here.” You plop one on a plate for Aemond, then go to the refrigerator to pour two tall glasses of sweet tea. “A lot of people put chocolate chips in their banana bread, but I feel like any chocolate really eclipses the banana flavor. It’s so subtle, you know? So what I do instead is cinnamon, honey, cream cheese frosting, and a tiny bit of sea salt mixed into the batter. If you get the ratio just right, there’s this really great blend of saltiness and sweetness, and the banana is still the star of the show. Of course I’ve fucked up plenty of times too and almost given myself dangerously high blood pressure. If I ruin a batch, I’m the one who has to eat it. We can’t let anything go to waste. Our profit margin is thinner than a crescent moon on the best months.”

“Oh my God,” Aemond says. He’s taken a bite and is now gawking at the banana bread cupcake. “You made this?” He gestures to the table. “You made all of this?”

“My best friend Amir runs the business with me, but most of the recipes are mine. My mom used to bake all the time when I was little. Now she has rheumatoid arthritis and has given it up, more or less, but that’s where I learned a lot of what I know. And I try to come up with new ideas each week to add to the rotation.”

“This is exceptional,” Aemond says. His mouth is full of the rest of the cupcake. He washes it down with a few gulps of sweet tea; ice cubes jangle in the misty glass. “This is, like, insanely good. Can I have another one…?” He’s already lifting the cover off the cake plate.

You chuckle. “Yeah, seriously, have as many as you like.”

“How much do you sell them for?”

“The cupcakes are $1, but you don’t have to pay me. You get the unrequited orgasm discount.”

“Just $1 each.” Aemond is incredulous. You aren’t sure what that’s about. He sets the second cupcake down on the table, tugs a black leather wallet out of his jeans pocket, and gives you a $10 bill.

“Aemond, really, you don’t have to—”

“I know I don’t have to. I want to. Take the money. Stop talking about it.”

You smirk up at him. “Is that an order, sir?”

He grabs your jaw with one forceful hand, kisses you roughly, bites your lower lip almost hard enough to draw blood. He tastes like cinnamon, honey, sugar, sex. “Yes,” he says, grinning wickedly. Then his hands drop to unbutton your shorts. The idea of stopping Aemond doesn’t even cross your mind; your desire for him—him specifically—is back, flaring red and primeval and irresistible. “I want you on top of that counter—”

Outside there are footsteps bounding up the front porch, loud on the creaking boards. You tear away from Aemond and hurry to re-button your shorts. What? Already??

You know exactly who it must be.

Well, now I’m definitely never going to see Aemond again.

He’s terrified, he’s wondering whether he should try to jump out of a window. But really, he’s already been spotted; his Audi Quattro is still waiting for him in the gravel driveway. “Please don’t tell me that’s your homicidal armed boyfriend or something.”

“No,” you say. “It’s my daughter.”

“Wait, your…?!”

The door swings open; you hardly ever lock it. Cadi trots in just as you are flipping over the copy of the Bayou Journal on the kitchen counter so Aemond’s personal ad is no longer visible. Instead, what now faces up—dotted with flour, powdered sugar, cinnamon, grease stains of butter—is a column about the rigs opened in Lake Verret. Just what this town needs, you think distractedly. An environmental disaster.

“Mom, whose radical car is that—?” Then Cadi spies Aemond and blinks at him a few times. She is ten years old but thinks she’s your age, short hair, short temper, denim overalls and a t-shirt underneath patterned with multicolored horses.

“This is Aemond,” you explain. He waves awkwardly and then resumes nibbling on his second banana bread cupcake, avoiding her scrutiny. “He’s a friend.”

“But you don’t have any friends,” Cadi replies.

“Watch it, Child Of The Corn. I have friends.”

“You have like one friend.”

“What happened to your sleepover with Mawmaw? I thought you were excited to trick her into watching Hellraiser.”

“Blockbuster didn’t have it. Then Great Aunt Ethel called and said she broke her hip. Mawmaw dropped me off here on her way to the hospital.”

“And she didn’t even think to check with me first, huh?”

“As if you’d have anything better to do.” Cadi races to the refrigerator—careening around a shellshocked Aemond—and heaves open the door. “What’s for dinner?”

“I think we have some Swanson’s meals left. Oh, and spaghetti.”

She narrows her eyes at you. “Who made it?”

“You’re in luck! Not me. Amir.”

“Yay!” Cadi trills, then drags out the pan and begins spooning mounds of spaghetti onto a plate. Aemond looks to you, intrigued.

You say: “I bake, I don’t cook.”

“She really doesn’t,” Cadi concurs.

“Completely different skillset.”

Cadi places a few paper towels over the heaping plate so sauce doesn’t splatter all over the microwave and then sets it to three minutes. As she waits to eat, she wanders over to where the Bayou Journal is lying on the counter and scans the page: Viserys Targaryen, three state-of-the-art oil rigs, Lake Verret, an additional 50 employees hired, Jade Dragon Energy. “Those bastards are going to get their way, I guess.”

You sigh. “Yup.”

Aemond is alarmed. He polishes off the last of his cupcake, frowning as he licks frosting from his lips. “You don’t approve?”

“They’ll blow up the whole town,” Cadi says matter-of-factly.

You smile wanly at Aemond as you sip your sweet tea. “You work for Jade Dragon, right?”

He stares back at you—stunned, perhaps even fearful, a deer flooded with headlights—but doesn’t speak.

“It’s alright. I figured you must. Some smart British guy way out here in Cajun Country? It’s gotta be for a job. Don’t worry. We won’t shoot and skin you or anything. It’s not your fault. You’re just collecting a paycheck, it’s not like you’re running the company.”

“Right.” Aemond grabs a third cupcake and gnaws at it. After a moment he adds: “I have a degree in petroleum engineering. I just moved to Napoleonville last week.”

“I knew it,” you say.

“Boo!” Cadi heckles jokingly. The microwave beeps, then she disappears into her bedroom with her plate of spaghetti. You hear Cadi turn on her little television and flip through the channels until she finds Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Aemond watches her closed door for a few seconds—still processing, you assume—and then turns back to you.

“Her name’s Katie?”

“Cadi. C-a-d-i. It’s short for Arcadia.”

He is impressed. “Greece?”

You titter nervously. You don’t know what he means. “It’s a town up by Shreveport, it’s where Bonnie and Clyde were arrested or killed or something. I’m not sure. Her father picked it.”

“You didn’t have an opinion?”

“Um, I wasn’t really…uh…conscious for a few days after she was born. By the time I was up and around again, he’d already filled out the birth certificate.”

What is that you see flicker across his face like the transient surge of a lightning bug? Curiosity? Apprehension? “I see. And her father is…” Aemond raises a blonde eyebrow, the one his scar cuts through. “On an aircraft carrier somewhere?”

You laugh. “He’s not deployed. We’re divorced, Willis lives about fifteen minutes down the road. It’s amicable.”

“So I don’t need to worry about him showing up on your front porch to murder me with a 2x4 full of nails.”

“No. Although he is the town sheriff.”

Aemond smirks. Is this a challenge or an inconvenience? “Why’d you two split up?”

You shrug, glancing at Cadi’s bedroom door. She is quite aggressive with her television volume; you’re confident she won’t be able to listen in if you keep your voice low. “It’s not that interesting a story.”

“I’m extremely interested.” And he sincerely appears to be, head tilted to the side, eyes fixed on you (though you know the left one sees nothing), thoughts whirling like storm winds.

“Well…we only ever got married because of…” You gesture towards Cadi’s room. Aemond nods, following along. “And I was too young and I didn’t know anything. I didn’t know what I wanted out of a man, I didn’t even know I had the right to set standards to measure a husband by. Willis wasn’t terrible. He didn’t hit me. He just wasn’t really who I wanted.” You chew at your lower lip, peering down at the kitchen counter, drawing circles in the sparse flour dust. “He never even proposed to me. Not properly, I mean. I told him I was pregnant and he said: Well, guess we oughta get married, huh sugar? and then drove me to the Kmart up in Gonzales to pick out a ring.”

“Classy,” Aemond mutters.

“I had to buy it myself, actually. Willis didn’t have enough cash on him. He paid me back later, but still. It wasn’t about the ring. I don’t need gold and diamonds. But I need someone who really sees me and understands me and chooses me, you know? I’ve never felt chosen. And I decided I didn’t want to settle for that. If I ever get married again, I want the whole goddamn thing. The real thing. I want the candles and the flowers and a boombox blasting Heaven Is A Place On Earth. And if that’s not in the cards, I guess I’m not the marrying type.”

“And you’ll make do with occasional visits from your friendly neighborhood dom.”

You grin up at Aemond. “Yeah, exactly.”

“You really hate Jade Dragon?”

“Companies like that…they just use us. Our land, our labor. And then when they decimate the place they pack up and disappear overnight, no pensions, no retirement, no unemployment, no meaningful cleanup, just Thanks for the millions! Bye! and we’re left to live in their filth.”

“That’s a rather cynical perspective,” Aemond says.

“It’s a realistic perspective,” you counter. “In 1965, there was a pipeline explosion in Natchitoches, in ‘79 there was an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, in ‘80 a Texaco rig accidentally drilled into a salt mine under Lake Peigneur and destroyed the whole ecosystem. Two weeks ago there was a refinery explosion an hour east of here in Norco. 4,500 people had to be evacuated from their homes. So no, the jobs sound nice, but in my humble estimation they’re not worth dying for.”

Aemond considers you, a look that is not patronizing or combative but not convinced either. And there’s something else too: a caginess, a nervousness.

“And these Jade Dragon people, the Targaryens? They have a history,” you continue. “I read about it in the Bayou Journal. Last year they had an oil spill at an offshore rig near Ketchikan, Alaska. They poured hundreds of thousands of barrels of poison into the ocean and killed a bunch of dolphins and whales and everything. Fishermen went bankrupt, people committed suicide.”

“Mistakes happen.” Aemond places his empty sweet tea glass in the sink.

“But they didn’t make it right. Their lawyers blamed a defective piece of equipment and kicked liability back to the manufacturer. They’ll be battling it out in court for the next decade. And meanwhile, the people of Ketchikan get nothing but misery. I don’t want Napoleonville to end up like that.”

Aemond gazes out the kitchen window and into the cicada-rattling night, faraway, pensive.

“But seriously,” you say, more casually now. “I get that it’s not your fault, Aemond. I don’t hate you or anything. You’re working for a living like anyone else. You can only do so much.”

He looks back to you and smiles vaguely. “I just go where they tell me to.”

“And that’s why you like to be in control when you’re with me.”

“Yes,” Aemond says; and on his face—strong, scarred, perfect—you can see that he is reminiscing, that he is planning what he wants to do to you next. But he can’t do any of it. Not here, not now.

“I’m sorry about…you know. The kid thing. I really didn’t think she’d be home tonight. I would never subject her to something like that, walking in to find a strange guy in the house. And I wouldn’t want to make you uncomfortable either.”

“It’s okay. I believe you.”

“I don’t usually do this. I’m sure you think I’m lying, but I’m not. I’ve had two boyfriends since I got divorced seven years ago, and both times it didn’t last long and Cadi never met them. And it wasn’t…like it is with you. The dynamic, I mean. The…control thing. They were just normal dudes.”

“And they couldn’t satisfy you,” Aemond says, taunting, proud, setting your blood on fire.

“No. They couldn’t. Not even close.”

You both stand silently in the kitchen amidst a cascade of inconsequential noise: Eurythmics from the little pink boombox, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from Cadi’s room, cicadas and bullfrogs and the long-eared owl from the world outside that is primordial and feral and green. For the first time in as long as you can remember, you feel not like the piecemeal potential of a desirable woman but whole. Aemond’s right eye traces every curve and edge of you in a way that makes you think: Maybe I will see him again after all.

“Come on,” you say, turning towards the front door. “I’ll walk you out.”

But when he steps onto the creaking porch—pulling on his Marlboro jacket, watching lightning bugs bloom like daisies in the yard—Aemond seems to be stalling. “This is lopsided,” he says, tapping the wooden boards with his Adidas sneakers.

“I know. The whole foundation is, it’s sinking. We’ll have to move eventually. But we’ve been in this place since Cadi was five, it has a lot of memories. She calls it the Fall-Down House.”

“Cute,” Aemond says, but he’s pondering something. “Do you own it?”

“Oh no, God no. We rent.”

“Are you saving for a down payment to put on a new house?”

This is a rude question. “A little,” you reply curtly. Not enough. You need to make money to save money.

“Okay.” Aemond senses your discomfort. He’s good at that; it’s an advantageous skill for a dom to possess, knowing when he’s approaching a limit long before you have to shut him down. He descends the porch steps. “I’ll be back for more of those cupcakes—” There is a shrill, alien hissing from out by the tree line. Aemond shouts and scrambles back onto the porch, throwing an arm in front of you to shield you from his enigmatic nocturnal adversary. “What the fuck was that?!”

“Just a gator,” you reassure him, amused.

“A what?”

“An alligator.” You show him the shadow that lurks beneath a young oak tree draped with Spanish moss. “She’s over there. Just stay on the gravel once you get off the porch.”

Aemond is puzzled. How does anyone live in this hellscape? his face says. “How do you know it’s a female?”

“She’s not too big, and she doesn’t bellow. But she sure loves to hiss.”

“I think alligators should have gone extinct with the rest of the dinosaurs.”

“Well, there’s a secret to dealing with them.”

“Yeah?”

You smile, skating your fingers into the sleeve of Aemond’s Marlboro jacket and up his forearm until you feel goosebumps rise on his skin. “If she gets mean, you just have to bite back.”

Aemond chuckles, turns your face towards his, kisses the apple your cheek…and then, for only a moment, his teeth close around the sensitive flesh there leaving a whirlpool of pulsing, forbidden heat. He whispers through your hair: “See you soon.”

“Will you?”

“Yes,” he says, severely now. It’s a commandment, it’s a need. “I absolutely will.”

Aemond leaves you, strides across the gravel driveway without glancing back, ducks into his car, lights a cigarette; you can see the rust-colored glow through the windshield as he takes a drag. You wait in a flurry of moths under the dim florescent bulb of the front porch until his Audi Quattro veers onto Route 401 and disappears.

I hope he meant it, you think as a lightning bug lands on your knuckles and illuminates there like the gemstone of a ring. I hope I’ll see him again.

Then you shake away the insect and go inside to see if Cadi wants to help you clean up the kitchen and get a brown sugar pie baked for tomorrow. As compensation, you’ll offer her the $10 bill Aemond gave you for the cupcakes.

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